Biography

Megan Echevarría, Professor of Spanish and Film/Media, earned her PhD at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.  She specializes in Hispanic literary, cultural, and film studies, with keen interest in intersecting disciplinary boundaries.  Her writing in the humanities centers primarily on interconnections between contemporary literary and film studies and history, human rights, social justice, and interculturality.  She has experience in curricular innovations that integrate humanistic and intercultural content and competencies across the full spectrum of the Spanish curriculum, as well as into STEM and social science education.  Her latest book, Rehumanizing the Language Curriculum (also available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble), brings together new work by renowned scholars in the field of instructed second language education to assert the critical and central role of literature at all levels of innovative, effective, and stimulating language curricula.  Contributors include Claire Kramsch, Guy Cook, Geoff Hall, and Elizabeth Bernhardt, among others.

Outside of her teaching and research, Dr. Echevarría enjoys contributing to the Rhody community and beyond, working for the common good.  As NCAA Faculty Athletics Representative, she had the honor of serving as an advocate for student-athlete well-being and as a bridge between the Athletics Department and the academic units of the university.  In this role she helped strengthen the multifaceted support system for URI’s extraordinary student-athletes: she defended their rights, assisted with self-advocacy, and supported their access to opportunities and resources related to their development and success. 

As Faculty Senator, former member of the Faculty Senate Executive Committee, and former Senate President she has had the privilege of contributing to shared governance processes and to making our community stronger through respectful dialogue, fruitful consensus-building, and meaningful collaboration.

Selected roles in stewardship and leadership

• Director, University of Rhode Island Research Foundation Board of Directors (2023-present)
• MLA Delegate Assembly, Academic Labor and the Profession seat (2022-2025)
• NCAA Faculty Athletics Representative and Chair of Athletics Advisory Board (2021-2024)
• Faculty Senate Executive Committee (2019-2021; 2022-2024)
• Chair of Faculty Senate Constitution, By-Laws and University Manual Committee (2022-2023)
• President, Faculty Senate (2020-2021)
• Section Head, Spanish Program (2018-2021)
• Chair, Departmental Proficiency Implementation Committee (2017-2018)
• Chair, Departmental Strategic Planning Committee (2016-2017)
• Director, Spanish International Engineering Program (2008-2014)
• Chair, Academic Affairs Global Education Task Force (2010)
• Coordinator, Beginning and Intermediate Spanish Program (2004-2008)

Selected grants, awards and honors

• Co-Principal Investigator: “A New Model for Integrated Humanities and Engineering Education” (Principal Investigator: Sigrid Berka) National Endowment for the Humanities grant in the Humanities Connections program (2023-2025)
• Innovation and Entrepreneurship Faculty Fellow, RISE-UP (Resilient, Innovative, Sustainable Economies via University Partnerships), United States Office of Naval Research (2024)
• Project Completion Grant, URI Division of Research and Economic Development (2023)
• Global Mobility Award, URI Global (2023)
• President David M. Dooley and Reverend Lynn Baker Dooley Senate Faculty Award (2021)
• Career Enhancement Grant, URI Division of Research and Economic Development (2021)
• Consultant on interdisciplinary competitive grant “URI Preschool Development Grant” (Co-Principal Investigators: Sue Adams and Jessica MacLeod), State of Rhode Island Department of Health and Human Services (2019)
• Principal Investigator: “Launching the Spanish International Engineering Program in Chile,” 100K Strong in the Americas Innovation Fund Grant inaugurating President Obama’s 100,000 Strong in the Americas Initiative (2014)
• Students’ Undergraduate Teaching Award, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill (2004)
• Other award nominations: URI Foundation University Teaching Award (2010, 2018), Faculty Excellence Diversity Award (2008, 2010, 2015), and College of Arts & Sciences Mentoring Award (2008)