Ann Marie Gardinier Halstead , M.F.A.-Assistant Professor & Coordinator of Humans of RVA & VCU
804-828-1803
amghalstead@vcu.edu
Ann Marie Gardinier Halstead joined the Honors College faculty in 2016. She has developed several honors courses, including the curriculum for our city as text (Richmond) course, Humans of RVA & VCU. In addition, Prof. Halstead teaches an international city as text course in which students learn about London, England and then travel there during spring break to explore the cosmopolitan city in person (Ann Marie and Dean Breuninger are developing a global education program to take place at Cambridge University in the summer of 2026). Ann Marie also offers topics courses such as Art and Society and Storytelling.
Ann Marie holds an M.F.A in Theatre Pedagogy from VCU and a B.A. in English/Secondary Education from LeMoyne College. Prior to her time at the Honors College, she served as Associate Professor and Co-Chair of the Performance and Communication Arts Department at St. Lawrence University. During her eleven year tenure at St. Lawrence, she developed and taught courses in theatre, public speaking and community engagement, and directed plays such as "The Laramie Project," "The Vagina Monologue," "Dead Man’s Cell Phone" and "The Importance of Being Earnest." Ann Marie has also directed for several theatre companies, including Pendragon Theatre and Star Productions in New York as well as Firehouse Theatre Project and Barksdale Theatre (now part of Virginia Repertory Theatre) in Virginia. She has done guest artist residencies at Davis & Elkins College, Redhouse Arts Center, Gifford Family Theatre and Not So Common Players in the U.S. and at St. Mary Mackillop School in Australia.
Since launching the city as text program for VCU’s Honors College in 2018, Ann Marie has presented on the curriculum at national conferences such as the Honors Education at Research Universities (HERU) conference and the National Collegiate Honors Council (NCHC) conference. Her current research interests include: engaged pedagogies; Richmond history; the role of art and artists in society; and the intersections of high impact practices such as experiential learning, community engagement and city-as-text curricula.
In addition to writing for an academic audience, Ann Marie has been published in HuffPost, Medium, Spillwords, edutopia, and 30Seconds. She is also a playwright and children’s book author; her play, "Have You Filled a Bucket Today?" has performed across the U.S. and had its international premiere in Queensland, Australia. Ann Marie is currently working on a new play.
