GGP Faculty

Christine Fabiszewski has been with the GGP since its inaugural spring 2019 semester.  She has a M.A. in linguistics from the University of North Texas at Arlington and a B.A. in Greek from Calvin College. She has worked as a linguist in Africa and has taught ESL at the Center of English Language (Dallas), Baylor (Waco), and the University of North Texas (Denton). A lover of languages, Christine has studied many and has lived abroad in Ecuador, Nigeria, Mexico, France, and Chad. She enjoys working with international students and helping them improve their English skills. For the past four years, Christine has been active in the Waco Christian Writers Workshop (CWW), attending workshops, presenting, leading critique groups, and serving on the CWW board. She has worked as a free-lance editor and is writing a novel. In her free time, she reads, creates piano arrangements, cooks international dishes, gardens, and plays with her cat. Both she and her husband are active in their church.

Matthew Piech is a full-time lecturer in the Global Gateway Program at Baylor University. He comes to Waco from the Texas Panhandle where he was the Adult Education and Literacy (AEL) English as a Second Language (ESL) Program Coordinator at Amarillo College. He has worked in Florida, Texas, New Mexico and Arizona – all in the field of ESL. He has an MA in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL ) from Emporia State University, an MA in Adult Education and Distance Learning from the University of Phoenix, and a BA in English from Arizona State University. He also has two AAS Degrees from Pima Community College: one in Business Administration and the other in International Business Communication Studies. Mr. Piech studied intermediate-level Spanish abroad at El Centro Linguisticos y Multiculturales in Cuernavaca, Morelos, Mexico.

Tanya Vernon majored in vocal performance and English at Mississippi College and studied abroad for a year at Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz, Germany.  After working at a law school for two years, she went to work for a humanitarian aid organization in Hong Kong and soon realized that teaching English to international students was not just an interest but a passion.  She returned to the U.S. for graduate studies and earned her master’s degree in applied linguistics from the University of Texas at Arlington with an emphasis in TESOL.  Tanya has taught in intensive English programs at Texas A&M University, the University of Texas at Arlington, and Dallas Baptist University. She has also been a foreign expert at universities in Kunming and Xi’an, China, as well as for a petroleum company in Tianjin. Studying both German and Chinese in their respective countries has given her a unique understanding of living and studying abroad.

Debra Wainscott has been with the GGP since January, 2019 and has been teaching and working with international students since 2001. She has lived and taught English as a Second Language in several schools and cities in China, including Guangzhou and Qingdao.  In between living in China, she worked at East Texas Baptist University as the Assistant Director in the International Education office. Upon returning from China, she taught English to adults and worked at a private school in Knoxville, Tennessee. She has a Master’s degree from The University of Texas at Arlington in TESOL. She loves to cook, travel, and send mail to her friends. She’s beyond thrilled to be back in Texas and a part of the Global Gateway Program at Baylor.