Emilienne Akpan has served as the Interim Director of the American University of Nigeria Writing Center since 2015, while also working as a full-time faculty member. Before joining the University in 2012 as adjunct instructor of Modern Languages, she had worked with the AUN Academy as a K-12 teacher in English and French from 2012 to 2014 after serving for six years as the Head, SANVEE International School, one of the best private schools in Uyo, Akwa Ibom State.
An expert in Modern Languages, Academic Writing, Mass Communication, and a certified Social and Behavioral Investigator, Mrs. Akpan has for many years applied her varied skills and experiences in different responsibilities to promote the culture of academic integrity and reposition the operations of the AUN Writing Center to meet international best practice standards. She has also been actively involved in the Global Liberal Arts Alliance (GLAA) Course Connection programs since 2016 and the American International Consortium of Academic Libraries (AMICAL) conferences since 2019. Through AMICAL collaborations, in Spring 2020, she co-created the Virtual International Universities Debates (VIDS) with Dr. Ekaterina Galimova of the American University of Central Asia to connect students in her classes, each semester, with their peers in Kyrgyzstan through virtual discussions on topical issues.
For professional excellence, she received the AUN Outstanding Staff Award in 2013. In the same year, she was offered a scholarship by the French Embassy for a French Teachers training at Université d’Été, Nantes, in France. In 2019, Mrs. Akpan received a GLAA Oral History Project Award for a digital history course connection project titled “Participative Narration: Words and Foods that Heal” which connected students from the American University of Nigeria, FLAME University, India, and the Universidad San Francisco de Quito, Ecuador. In 2021, the AUN Judicial Affairs office gave her the Meritorious Service Award.
Mrs. Akpan is a member of Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) International Association, International Writing Centers Association (IWCA) and Gender-Based Violence Area of Responsibility (GBV AoR) Community of Practice. She has received training in several capacity building programs and also served as an Alumni Facilitator of the Online Professional English Network (OPEN) establishing Academic Writing Centers MOOC delivered by the Iowa State University. She reviews texts in English or French; and coordinates the publication of the AUN School of Arts & Sciences (SAS) Bulletin, and REFLECTIONS (the AUN students’ digital literary magazine).
As Emilienne Motaze, she is the author of Her African Face (Y-Fenni, Gwent: The Collective 1993), a slim volume of poetry now out of print, and other creative writing contributions. Akpan is a co-author of some articles and forthcoming work include (i) Akpan, E. & Searle-White, J. (2021) Book Chapter. Seeing the World Through the Eyes of Others: Learning Perspective-Telling Through Storytelling in Johnston, D. & López, I. (Eds.). (in press). The Wiley Handbook of Collaborative Online Learning and Global Engagement. John Wiley & Sons, Inc, and (ii) Isine, I. & Akpan, E. I. (undated) Book Chapter. COVID-19 Pandemic, Advertising Revenue Shortfall and Nigeria’s Asphyxiating Media Ecosystem in Rishante, J.S, Esuh, P. & M'bayo, R. (Eds.). Advertising and Public Relations in the Digital Age: Festschrift in honor of Professor Idorenyin Akpan.
She is passionate about semiotics; emotional intelligence; social emotional learning; creative writing; academic integrity, teaching English to speakers of other languages, and multiliteracies in higher education.
As the founder of the Idorenyin Akpan Foundation, Akpan also works with vulnerable people impacted by migration and the effects of gender-based stereotypes. She is a United Nations Populations Fund (UNFPA) trained gender-based violence specialist and holds a Postgraduate Diploma and a Master of Arts in Mass Communication from the University of Uyo, NIGERIA, and a Bachelor of Arts in Bilingual Letters with specialization in English & French from the University of Yaoundé, CAMEROON.
