Faculty and staff

William Thorn, director
Dr.
Thorn chairs the department of Journalism. A former newspaper reporter
and editor, he teaches History of American News Media, Religious
Journalism and Newspaper Design.
Thorn has taught regularly at Pontifical universities in Rome and has been a consultant to the Vatican since 1982.
His research interests include electronic database networks for church documents,Catholics as a media audience, Catholic use of media at diocesan level, the effects of media on the religious imagination of children, and the church and Generation X. His most recent book is Dorothy Day and the Catholic Worker Movement.

Judy Dobler
Dr. Dobler has been on the Communication Department faculty at Loyola College (Md.) since its inception. Immediately after earning her doctorate ar the University of Iowa, she came to Loyola to play a significant role in the college’s ground-breaking Writing-Across-the-Curriculum, which was funded by a major national grant.
In addition to teaching essay writing, she heads the Empirical Rhetoric program, which gives qualified entering freshmen opportunities to do more advanced writing.
Dr. Dobler also chairs the college’s Gender Studies Program. Her academic research agenda focuses on the development and use of metaphor in early scientific writing, an interest that is expressed in one of her courses, “Translating the Secrets of Science”. Dr. Dobler was instrumental in the shaping of the Cagli program during her stint on the faculty during its inaugural year.

Carole Burns
Director of the Wakerly Technology Training Center. Carole provided the startup support of the technology for the Cagli program. Setting up of the network, video equipment and software. She enjoyed working with the students and getting to know the Cagli residents and looks forward to returning for future years.

Steve Byers
After more than 30 years working for daily newspapers in Indiana and Wisconsin and a brief stint on the famed Chicago City News Bureau, Steve Byers has been researching connections between newspapers and their communities. He has a doctorate in Urban Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, where he has taught classes in Journalism, History, and Urban Studies (a multi-disciplinary program studying city building).
His research has centered on the ways in which Americans have used newspapers in building a sense of community, especially among isolated groups like minorities, ethnics, and suburban and small town residents. He currently is teaching Journalism, especially digital storytelling, and advising print and online student media at Marquette University in Milwaukee.

John Caputo
Dr. Caputo has been teaching communication courses for more than 30 years.
His areas of expertise include media and social values, communication theory, intercultural and interpersonal communication. He is the author of four books: Dimensions of Communication; Interpersonal Communication; Communicating Effectively: Linking Thought and Expression; and McDonaldization Revisited: Critical Essays on Consumer Culture.
Dr. Caputo has been honored as a Visiting Scholar In-Residence at the University of Kent at Canterbury, England and the Masters Program in Media and Communication at the Universita de Firenze, Italy. He is veteran faculty member from past Cagli programs.

Gael Garbarino
Senior Producer/Writer/Director for Plum Moving Media and a part time journalism instructor at Marquette University. Gael began her career in radio news in Milwaukee and then worked as a television news journalist for 9 years.
She has produced public television documentaries and currently oversees multi-media communication projects for a variety of business clients.

Dan Garrity
Professor Garrity is enjoying his 4th Cagli Project, having joined the teaching team the same year Italy won the World Cup. He's been teaching at Gonzaga University since 2001, coming from 15 years in the professional television world.
Dan and his lovely wife Jennifer celebrated their 27th wedding anniversary this summer. They have 3 beautiful daughters to show for it, but he has no hair because of it. In his spare time, Dan likes eating (Italian, of course), running, and trying to stay upright on his Italian rental road bike.

Giordana Kaftan
Head of the Italian Program at Marquette University. Kaftan teaches all levels of Italian language and classes of Italian culture and literature in translation.
She earned her degree in Translation and Interpretation at Scuola Superiore per Interpreti e Traduttori in Rome, Italy in 1985 and a Master's Degree In Foreign Languages and Literatures from the University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee in 1997.

Michael Williams
Chair of the News-Information track and associate professor of interactive media at the William Allen White School of Journalism and Mass Communications at the University of Kansas.
Williams has been a professor at several U.S. univeristies and has also been a visiting professor at Ural State University in Yekaterinburg, Russia.
Prior to teaching, Williams had nearly 10 years in professional journalism as a photographer, editor and director of Internet development. He has also done extensive visual communication work throughout the U.S., Europe and Russia.

























