Academic Advisory Committee for History
Committee Members
Kelly Saenz (Chair)
AP European History Teacher, Westwood High School, Austin, TexasKelly Saenz has taught AP and IB European History at Westwood High School in the Round Rock School District in Austin, Texas for sixteen years. Saenz is a recipient of the Texas Exes Teacher Excellence Award and the Lillian Rhodes Teacher Excellence Award. She holds Bachelor of Arts and Master of Arts degrees from the University of Texas at Austin. Past service to the College Board includes Co-Chair of the College Board's AP European History Redesign Commission and service on the AP European History Test Development Committee and as a question and table leader for the AP European History exam.
Back to TopOmar H. Ali
Associate Professor, University of North Carolina, GreensboroOmar H. Ali is a historian of the African Diaspora. An honors graduate of the London School of Economics and Political Science, he received his Ph.D. in History from Columbia University. He has been a Fulbright professor at Universidad Nacional, Bogotá, a Library Scholar at the David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies at Harvard University, and a visiting professor in the Program in African American and Diaspora Studies at Vanderbilt University. The author of two books, In the Balance of Power (2008) and In the Lion's Mouth: Black Populism in the New South (2010), his next book-length project is entitled Bilal's Song: A History of Muslim Africans in the Indian Ocean and Atlantic Worlds.
Back to TopMaggie Favretti (Past Chair)
History Teacher, Scarsdale High School, Scarsdale, New YorkMaggie Favretti has been teaching high school history for 22 years in Scarsdale, New York, and Middlebury, Vermont. She has a B.A. in art history from Yale University and an M.A. from Middlebury College. Favretti has published short works about the commodification of the American landscape and women's poetry during the Enlightenment. She works to develop interdisciplinary teaching and world history programs. Favretti has served on the Executive Council of the World History Association (WHA) and two of its committees, as well as on committees of the American Historical Association and the Organization of American Historians, where she links secondary and postsecondary educators to content and practice. Currently, in addition to U.S. and world history, Favretti is teaching a new course of her own design in food policy and culture. She serves as this Committee's representative to the College Board Academic Council.
Back to TopMichele Forman
Social Studies Teacher, Middlebury Union High SchoolMichele Forman holds a bachelor's degree in history from Brandeis University and a master's degree in teaching from the University of Vermont. In the late 1960s, she served as a Peace Corps volunteer, teaching health in Nepal. Her professional activities include serving on the Vermont Department of Education Task Force on High School Reform. She helped develop history teaching standards for several organizations and is certified by the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards. In 2001, Forman was the first Vermont educator to be named National Teacher of the Year.
Back to TopMaghan Keita
Associate Professor of History, Director of the Center for Arab and Islamic Studies, Villanova UniversityMaghan Keita's areas of specialization include African, African American, and world history and historiography; as well as issues in class, race, and gender. Keita's most recent book, Race and the Writing of History: Riddling the Sphinx, is the recipient of the 13th Annual Cheikh Anta Diop Award for Best Scholarly Book. His work on Huck Finn in Context: A Teaching Guide, developed with the Cherry Hill Public Schools and WGBH of Boston, received the 2000 Distinguished Achievement Award for Excellence in Educational Publishing from the Association of Educational Publishers.
Back to TopBonnie G. Smith
Professor of History, Rutgers UniversityBonnie G. Smith is the Board of Governors Professor of History at Rutgers University. She has written and edited books in European, world, and women's history, including Ladies of the Leisure Class (1981), Confessions of a Concierge (1985), Changing Lives: Women in European History since 1700 (1989), The Gender of History: Men, Women, and Historical Practice (1998), Imperialism (2000) and Europe in the Contemporary World, 1900 to the Present (2007). She is co-author of The Making of the West: Peoples and Cultures (2nd ed. 2004) and general editor of the six-volume Oxford Encyclopedia of Women in World History. She teaches both undergraduate and graduate courses in European, women's and world history.
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