Jeff Birdsell, Ph.D.

Jeff Birdsell is an organizational communication scholar whose work explores the relationships between how we "do" work and how we communicate about work. His recent work in this area has examined the way undergraduate students understand their university life through metaphors, how graduate students navigate identity challenges when they do paid work in non-academic environments, and his own development of routines and identity while performing as a minor league baseball mascot. He has co-authored work on the way information communication technologies have affected the storytelling of job-seekers and employers as well as the efficacy of communication curriculum developed to meet the needs of students placed in “high-risk” programs in grades 9-12.

Birdsell is an award-winning instructor and has received recognition from a variety of student organizations and university divisions. At PLNU, you will most often see him in a research methods course, introducing students to ways knowledge is created in the discipline and reminding them, and himself, that, “The way you collect data changes what you can say about the results.” Students in his courses are regularly challenged to apply their knowledge to the “real world” by partnering with nonprofit organizations in the community and innovating solutions for their communication practices.

A PLNU alum himself, Birdsell previously served in the Office of Admissions, which began his nearly 15 years of service as a staff or faculty member in Christian liberal-arts universities in California, Texas, and Oregon.