Office and People Directory

Adrienne Phillips Luhr

Biography

Adrienne is a Licensed Clinical Mental Health Counselor (LCMHC) and has worked in the Champlain College Counseling Center since 2017. Her professional interests include identity exploration and concerns, family of origin issues, interpersonal relationship issues, emotional awareness and education, trauma, anxiety and depression. Her professional training and approach is trauma-informed, drawing on attachment, emotion-focused/somatic based therapies and mindfulness strategies. She enjoys helping people examine their personal values, affirming their resilience and inner strengths. She works collaboratively with her students to explore how systems of oppression, power differentials and social location impact mental health and wellbeing. She strives to establish safe and supportive therapeutic relationships based in humility, curiosity and compassion.

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Richard Pickering

Biography

Dr. Richard Pickering is an Assistant Professor and the Program Director for Technology here at Champlain College Online. Richard has a PhD in Teaching and Learning coupled with an MBA and numerous technology-related certifications.

Prior to Champlain, Dr. Pickering enjoyed a distinguished career blending pedagogical expertise with strategic leadership in program management and product development within the educational business sector.

Dr. Pickering also has held positions as Chief Executive Officer at Virtual High School Global Consortium, Chief Operating Officer at Victory Productions, various Program/Product Manager posts as well as Adjunct Professor appointments.

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Stephen Piela

Biography

Steve is a proud Champlain College graduate of the Class of 2011. His love for rugby began during his tenure as a founding member of the Champlain College Rugby from 2006-2011. Following his playing days, he transitioned into coaching, serving as an Assistant Rugby Coach from 2011 to 2015. Since then, he has proudly taken on the mantle of Champlain College Women’s Rugby Coach, guiding and mentoring a new generation of athletes with dedication and enthusiasm. As someone who became an athlete in college, his favorite part of coaching is witnessing a player find empowerment through being part of a team and discovering their abilities and fortitude, which are hallmarks of rugby culture. Beyond the rugby pitch, he works as a Treasury Management Sales Consultant at M&T Bank. He lives in Essex Junction with his wife Maggie and their 3 cats.

What are your hobbies?

Travel, dining, computer science

Favorite local eateries and things to do in Vermont:

El Gato, the Middlebury Tasting Trail, watching local rugby

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Mark Pierce

Biography

Mark earned his BA in Philosophy with Saint Michael’s College in 2008 and his MS in Education with Wheelock College (now Boston University) in 2014. Mark solidified his passion for education through a service year with an AmeriCorps non-profit in Chicago, IL where he acted as a tutor and mentor to students in a public high school. From there he found himself in various roles supporting young learners in achieving both core educational benchmarks and socioemotional well-being throughout Chicago, Boston, and Chittenden County, Vermont. Mark joined the higher education realm with Champlain College Online as an Academic Advisor and found tremendous value in supporting students’ personal development while they pursued their own educational and career goals. Mark now acts as the Academic Operations Manger for CCO. Mark is a nerd at heart who enjoys movies, reading, and sharing laughs with friends over video game and tabletop game sessions during his free time.

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Nicholas Pierce

Biography

Nick is the current Access Services Manager for the Champlain College Library at the Miller Information Commons, and has held a career in academic libraries for over 15 years. He’s worked at several institutions- Skidmore, Babson, UVM, and most recently, Yale. Nick loves leading and managing teams focused in access services and collections management, but he also has experience in interlibrary loan, preservation, and reference work. He lives in South Hero with his wife, Julia, who works as a wedding photographer, and their 3-year-old rescue pup Pickles. Nick is absolutely thrilled to be joining, contributing to and serving the Champlain community.

Hobbies

Hiking with my wife Julia & Pickles the pup, homebrewing, reading!

Favorite Local Eateries & Things to do in Vermont

Two Heroes Brewery, Winooski River Walk, Colchester Pond, Museum of Everyday Life!

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Michael Pierorazio

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John Pile Jr

Biography

John Pile Jr is a Technical Director and Principal Engineering Manager at Schell Games. Previously a full-time professor for Champlain College, John now teaches as an adjunct faculty for the Game Studio.

John has a deep background in digital entertainment, video games, and interactive story-telling experiences for PCs, Mobile, Game Consoles, and specializes in MR / VR / XR. He is the author of “2D Graphics Programming for Games” and has presented at the Game Developer Conference on topics in computer graphics education.

Publications & Abstracts

2D Graphics Programming for Games

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Darrin Pillsbury

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Andersen Pinckney

Biography

Andersen is a Game Design graduate from Champlain College’s class of 2020. He has worked as an aerospace software engineer for Saber Astronautics, a project manager for the DoD, and in production for Rockstar Games. He has been an adjunct professor for Champlain College since Fall 2021.

Favorite Quote

“Shake and bake, baby!”

–Ricky Bobby

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Hallie Pixley

Biography

Hallie Pixley is the Sustainable Transportation Coordinator with Campus Operations, where she passionately advocates for biking and active transportation. A 2024 graduate of Champlain College, Hallie holds a Bachelor of Science in Environmental Studies and Policy. Her dedication to promoting sustainable transportation solutions is driven by her commitment to environmental stewardship and community well-being.

What are your hobbies?

Hallie loves biking, skiing, playing guitar, going to see live music, and painting/drawing (as well as most things involving the great outdoors).

Favorite local eateries and things to do in Vermont:

Nothing beats The Grey Jay’s shakshuka followed by a bike ride down the Colchester Causeway!

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Michelle Platt

Biography

Michelle earned a BA in Political Science at Southern Illinois University in 2008 and a Master of Public Administration (MPA) at Southern Illinois University in 2014. Michelle began working in Higher Education in 2014 after a 15 year career in retail management. Michelle was previously the Director of Outreach and Recruitment at a College in Washington State. Michelle is passionate about access to education, removing barriers and promoting educational equity. Michelle looks forward to working with students throughout their educational journey through to completion. In her spare time, Michelle is a geek and a dog mom who enjoys; attending Comic-con, tabletop gaming, pop-culture, movies and tv, reading, traveling, and collecting fandom art and collectables.

What are your hobbies?

Reading, Gaming, Listening to music, Travel, Film/Television, Comic-con and collecting fandom memorabilia.

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Kimberly Polite

Biography

For the last 29 years, Dr. Kimberly Polite has built her career in business and Higher Education Administration as a leader in training and development, management, project management, sales, marketing, and team engagement. She is also a veteran.

Kimberly holds a doctorate in Business Administration from Walden University, a Master of Education in Management as well as a Bachelor of English, both from the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville. She currently teaches and trains in business and educational organizations on strategic change management and employee engagement.

Her concentration areas include research on employee engagement and what factors contribute to increased engagement and productivity.

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Isabella Poloes

Biography

Isabella is a Licensed Clinical Mental Health Counselor and has worked at Champlain College since 2020. Isabella strives to create a nonjudgmental and welcoming environment for students, where they can collaboratively work on the issues that are most important to them. In her work, she recognizes the impact systems of oppression have on our mental health and welcomes exploration of these themes. She appreciates humor and honesty within the therapeutic relationship and practices from an eclectic, trauma-informed lens- bringing in elements of narrative, feminist, and cognitive behavioral theories as appropriate.

Outside of the office, she enjoys cooking, hanging out with her dog, Oliver, and reading in hammocks.

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Alexis Pomerleau

Biography

Alexis Pomerleau serves as a Leadership Giving Officer, where she cultivates meaningful relationships that advance the College’s philanthropic mission. With expertise in donor relations, leadership giving, and strategic partnership development, Alexis works closely with diverse constituencies, including parents of current students, alumni, board members, and major gift prospects.

Alexis brings a unique professional background that spans higher education advancement, retail operations, startup ventures, and wellness services. Her career has been defined by a passion for connecting people with opportunities that create lasting impact. She excels at managing multiple high-profile projects simultaneously while maintaining the personal touch and attention to detail essential to effective relationship building.

In her role at Champlain, Alexis orchestrates donor cultivation activities, develops strategic communication campaigns, and coordinates volunteer advisory councils. She is particularly skilled in event stewardship, long-term relationship management, and creating value through authentic engagement. Her approach combines strategic thinking with genuine relationship-building, ensuring that every interaction advances both immediate goals and sustainable institutional growth.

Alexis holds a bachelor’s degree in Business and Marketing from Saint Michael’s College.

Hobbies

Horseback riding, cooking, hiking, and exploring new places.

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Raymond Presky

Biography

Ray is originally from London, England, and moved to the USA in 1979. Married since 1982, his wife is from Japan, they have 3 children, all of them have left home years ago, so he is an empty nester with extra time. He enjoys teaching at Champlain and like getting to know the students.

He was a self-employed store owner for 15 years, it was a lot of work, enjoyable but stressful. He considers himself fortunate to have fallen into networking and security engineering around 2000.

He is currently working for a large ISP and has been working in Networking, Security and Communications since 2000. He has worked with Telco, Fiber-Optic and Cable Companies and covered all aspects of networking and security from the user to the internet and lots in between.

Favorite Quote

“Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.”

—1 Corinthians 17:7

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