Faculty

Background: Prior to joining WTU, President Lan served in various leadership positions, including serving as a faculty/department chair at West Virginia University – Institute of Technology, an academic dean and a campus chief academic officer at DeVry University Chicago area campuses, and most recently, the chief institutional research officer at Seattle Pacific University.

After coming to the United States, Stan earned two masters’ degrees: an Master of Science in Electrical Engineering from Northern Illinois University, and a Master of Science degree in Education, also from Northern Illinois University.

Stan completed his Ph.D. at Colorado State University in Educational Leadership with concentration coursework in Advanced Data Analytics.

President Lan and his wife have two adult sons. The elder son, Joe, is working as a senior manager in business development at Amazon, and the younger one, Michael, is currently a medical student.

Background: Dr. Goldsmith graduated from Arizona State University with a doctorate in plant biology and brings more than 28 years of experience in teaching, accreditation, and administrative roles at high school, community college, college and university institutions. In addition to his work, he served as a board member for Catalyst Powering Engineering Program (CPEP), a Connecticut not-for-profit organization that has as its goal to increase under-represented students’ knowledge, attitude, and behaviors relating to the pursuit of STEM and Health careers.

Background: Dr. Kong received a B.S degree in Information Engineering from South China University of Technology, Guangzhou, China, M.S degree in Communication Engineering from National Central University, Taiwan, and Ph.D degree in Computer Engineering from North Carolina State University in January 2018. Before working at Washington Technology University, she was a research assistant and teaching assistant in the areas of networking, stochastic modeling and control in communication networks since 2011. She assisted in multiple undergraduate and graduate courses, which included Computer Networks, Introduction to Computer Systems, Introduction to Wireless Networking, Principles of Electrical Engineering, and Queuing Theory. Her missions are not only to convey knowledge efficiently to students, but also to inspire and motivate students inside and outside the classroom.

Background: Dr. Larson runs her own project consulting company and previously served as a Director with AT&T Wireless. Dr. Larson holds two doctorates, one in management (DM) in IT Leadership from University of Phoenix as well as PhD in International Management from the International School of Management in Paris. Dr. Larson’s dissertations are centered on the value of data in establishing a corporate data strategy and on success factors for data science-centric products and services. She also holds a Master’s in Business Analytics from NYU Stern School of Business.

Background: Dr. Lin has worked as a software engineer for companies such as Google, Bloomberg L.P., Microsoft and C2 Education. Andrew is an accomplished pianist, enjoys astronomy and playing/programming games. Dr. Lin holds a Bachelor degree in Mathematics from Carnegie Mellon University and a Master and PhD in Computer Science from Rochester Institute of Technology.

Background: Dr. Liu is currently working as a Data Scientist in Analysis and Experimentation (A&E) at Microsoft. Dr. Liu received her M.S. and PhD degrees in Electrical Engineering from Columbia University and Northwestern University in 2012 and 2016, respectively. She has won two best paper awards and has worked at Bell Labs, Cisco, and Alliance Data Systems before joining Microsoft.

Background: Dr. Vickers is currently a software project consultant but previously served as President, Vice President, Director of various software companies including his own. Dr. Vickers holds a Bachelor degree in MIS from California State University, Fullerton, MBA from Chapman University, and PhD in Information Systems from Nova Southeastern University. Dr. Vicker's dissertation’s focus was the creation of a domain aware genetic algorithm for the p-Median Problem.

Background: In his current role as Architect at Washington Technology Solutions, Mr. Watler is designing and developing solutions for mission critical business problems. He consults with upper management on high risk and high profile initiatives that impact the State of Washington's enterprise services and solutions.

Background: Born and raised in India, Anjana graduated from Anna University with a Bachelors in Information Technology. She went on to work for Cognizant Technology Solutions as a Technical Product Specialist. She realized her passion for teaching and went on to do her Master's in Computer science and Engineering at Anna University. After moving to Seattle, Anjana worked as a STEM educator ranging from teaching Mathematics, Computer Science and Test Prep courses across Bellevue College, University of Washington, Central Washington University, Edmonds Community College, Shoreline Community College and presently Seattle University. She is very excited to be at WTU to help students learn as they pursue this exciting and challenging path. While not at work, Anjana enjoys spending time with family, surfing the web, swimming, listening to music, and dancing.

Background: Dr. Zhang is currently a Senior Scientist for Microsoft working on deep learning. Prior to joining Microsoft, Jingfen spent nearly six years with Amazon as a Lead Research Scientist and before that a research Professor at the University of Missouri. Dr. Zhang holds a PhD in Computer Science from the Institute of Computing Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China.