Elise Verzosa Hurley is a new assistant professor of English at Illinois State.

She joins the Department of English from the University of Arizona, where she recently earned her Ph.D. in rhetoric, composition, and the teaching of English. She also holds an M.A. and B.A. in English from Texas A&M University-Commerce.

Her research and teaching specializations include professional and technical communication, visual and spatial rhetorics, multimodal composition, and service-learning/civic engagement pedagogies. She served as the assistant editor of Rhetoric Review, and her work has appeared in Kairos: A Journal of Rhetoric, Technology, and Pedagogy, with forthcoming publications in Technical Communication Quarterly and other edited collections.

When not wearing her academic hat, Elise enjoys cooking, reading, hiking, and spending time with her family, friends, and two dogs.