Rate My Professor Catherine Bonner

Catherine Bonner serves as a Lecturer in the Department of English and Foreign Languages at Grambling State University, where she has been employed for over twelve years. She holds a B.A. from the University of Southwestern Louisiana (ULL), an M.A. from Louisiana Tech University, and has satisfied most of the requirements for a Ph.D. Ms. Bonner is an accomplished teacher specializing in African American literature and history. She has been awarded National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) fellowships to Harvard University, the University of South Carolina, and the University of Virginia, and has been specially selected to teach experimental classes. Her research interests include African American literature, 20th-century history, oral history, and public history.

In addition to her teaching, Bonner has made significant contributions to pedagogical innovation and humanities initiatives at Grambling State University. In December 2015, she collaborated with Connie Walton, a professor in the Department of Chemistry, to facilitate a group discussion at the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges (SACSCOC) annual meeting in Houston. Their presentation, titled “Utilization of a ‘Speak Student’ Approach for Teaching English Composition to Underprepared Freshman Students,” highlighted a developmental English pilot program implemented in fall 2013 and spring 2014, sponsored by the Louisiana Board of Regents. The program utilized contextualized and strategic instruction, with modifications such as gender-grouped classes that fostered student ownership. Bonner also developed the service-learning project “Documenting our Stories – Documenting our Lives,” presented at the 7th Annual University of Louisiana System Academic Summit at the University of New Orleans. She organized a Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities-funded program on local civil rights history in 2018 and served as faculty contact for initiatives promoting reading skills among Pre-K through 12th-grade students. As a core faculty member for Grambling State University's 2020 NEH Humanities Initiatives at HBCUs grant of $92,919, Bonner participated in designing and implementing an interdisciplinary Digital Humanities minor, including organizing workshops, proposing new courses, administering and promoting the program, and conducting annual assessments.