Christine Vossler
Up To The Challenge
When Christine Vossler joined Haslam 19 years ago, she had no idea where the journey would take her. As one of the college’s first professional staff hires, she brought energy and fresh ideas to the table. “I’d find interesting things other colleges were doing and ask my department head if we could try it, too,” Vossler says. Most of the time, the answer was yes. Over the years, she has launched new initiatives, taken on leadership roles, and tried to relieve faculty of administrative tasks so they could focus more on teaching and research.
Vossler has served the college’s MBA, Accounting and Information Management (AIM), and Business Analytics and Statistics (BAS) programs. Today, she supports all BAS graduate programs and coordinates PhD programs across the college, fostering community among students through orientation, professional development, and social events. “It’s important for them to connect with other students outside their departments,” she says. “It’s good to have fun along the way, too, so we also plan social events such as trivia nights.”
Vossler knows firsthand the pressures of graduate school. While working full-time at Haslam, she pursued both a master’s degree and a PhD from UT. During her own PhD program, the demands became overwhelming, and she put her dissertation on hold, until she woke up one day with a new-found resolve to complete her degree. “I was more determined than I’ve ever been about anything,” she says.
Over the next several months, Vossler spent countless hours reading journal articles and refining her research on sexual harassment and the ways people—and institutions—talk about it. Her dissertation explores how victims, the accused, and bystanders each describe the experience differently, and how those conversations shape the impact of the incident. “It’s a harm carried out verbally,” she says, “so everything about it is conversational.”
Since finishing her PhD, Vossler has enjoyed teaching one class each semester as an adjunct in the university’s sociology department. She’s taught courses on topics like gender and crime, criminal justice, and criminology. “My hobby is prepping for classes,” Vossler laughs. “I never stop learning, and I love it.”
