Alumni Spotlight

Natalie Grewe, BS ’17 Anthropoogy

I’d love to start out by saying that choosing the Anthropology program at Illinois State was one of the best decisions that I could have made. The friendships, knowledge and experience that I gained through this program will stay with me forever. I am fortunate enough to say that the late Professor James Skibo was my thesis mentor and made my time at ISU so fun and interesting. 

After graduating from ISU in 2017, I went on to complete my MBA at St. Francis University. Currently, I work at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in the College of Education. I am a Program Coordinator for the “Training Qualified Interpreters for IEP meetings” program. Training Qualified IEP Interpreters (TQII, pronounced "tiki") is a project funded by the Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) and housed at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. The aim of the project is to develop a training program for interpreters to serve in Illinois public schools during individualized Education Program (IEP) meetings with families who do not feel comfortable conversing in English. Experts at the University of Illinois have developed language proficiency tests and training modules in Special Education and in Interpreting to meet this need for the state.

Read past  Alumni Spotlights.