Harlynn Ramsey

Biography

Harly Ramsey is Associate Professor of Technical Communication Practice and Associate Director of the Engineering in Society Program at the USC Viterbi School of Engineering. With a Ph.D. in English, her training in narrative theory, cultural studies, and rhetoric informs her work in engineering education. Her teaching and scholarship explore how engineering students develop professional identity, sociotechnical awareness, and reflective judgment within global learning environments.

Across nearly 30 years of teaching, Ramsey has developed courses that encourage engineering students to think about how technical work intersects with communication, ethics, public life, and global context. Her teaching has been recognized with USC’s General Education Award in Writing and, most recently, the Dean’s Award for Innovation in Teaching and Education. Her work includes embedded study abroad courses in Berlin, Sydney, Tokyo, and soon Goa; research on students’ future professional selves; multimodal assignments, such as podcasts and ePortfolios; and five-minute self-regulation practices that support focus, belonging, and classroom community. Her work has received support from the National Science Foundation, the USC Viterbi Dean’s Office, the LearningWell Coalition, and the American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE).

Ramsey’s scholarship and teaching examine how students come to see themselves as engineers and how they learn to interpret engineering as a deeply human and global practice. She regularly presents this work at national conferences and has been invited to share it with international engineering education leaders and STEM faculty learning communities.