Katherine Miller-Purrenhage graduated from Kalamazoo College in 2021, where she earned her BA in German Studies and Music, with a minor in Philosophy. During her undergraduate years, Katherine played flute in the college band and orchestra, sang in the choir, tutored at a local elementary school, participated in philosophy club (of which she co-founded a sector for non-men identifying people), and acted as both the Departmental Student Advisor for the German Department and as a German Teaching Assistant. In the summers of 2019 and 2020, Katherine worked at the Latinx-run nonprofit El Concilio as the Assistant Program Coordinator. She also spent a semester abroad in Erlangen, Germany, where she attended the Friedrich-Alexander Universität as a full time student and interned at the Eichendorffschule Erlangen as both an English and DaZ (German as a second language) teaching assistant. During her undergraduate studies, Katherine received four excellence awards in Music, two excellence awards in German Studies, as well as German Departmental Honors. She was also inducted into the Alpha Delta Phi German Honor Society. After graduating, Katherine earned a Fulbright Teaching Assistantship in Germany, working for a year at two Gymnasien in Bamberg and Höchstadt while taking classes part-time at Otto-Friedrich Universtität Bamberg.
Katherine’s research interests (some of which she had the privilege to write about) include inclusive pedagogy, decolonization of German Studies, second and foreign language acquisition, and existentialist and ethical philosophy. She is hoping to intersect these topics in her research at Georgetown, focusing on the interdisciplinary approach to teaching a foreign language with an inclusive and decolonized approach.