The end of summer marks many beginnings at Cerro Coso, from the first day of classes to the start of another Coyote Athletic season. This year, these beginnings also includes the addition of a new professor for the English Department at the Bishop and Mammoth Lakes campuses. The college welcomes Yvonne Mills to its faculty.
Mills grew up in Southern California and attended Southern California universities for both her undergraduate and graduate education. Besides spending a year as a high school drama teacher, she spent the last eight years teaching at Moreno Valley College.
An award-winning actor and director, Mills has worked on stages throughout Southern California. Her focus is Shakespeare adaptation, which was the emphasis of her graduate research. She thinks Hamlet is the most beautiful and agonizing piece of literature and was fortunate enough to portray Hamlet in a reverse-gender adaption of the play she directed.
Mills considers uprooting her life, husband Ryan a percussionist and music educator, and two dogs and a cat, from their home in Beaumont, California, to Bishop one of the craziest things she has ever done. “I never dreamt that I would be able to carry on my passion for education in a place as beautiful, wild, and pristine as the Eastern Sierra. I hope to have many happy years here.” She looks forward to exploring her new home, improving upon her climbing and mountaineering skills, and hopes to discover a knack for winter sports.
A theatre nerd with a love for both performing and directing, Mills also enjoys musical theatre, contemporary theatre, and absurdist theatre. She is SCUBA certified and enjoys diving when she travels. Mills holds a BA in Biology and English Literature from the University of Redlands, an MA in Literature and Film and PhD in English from the Claremont Graduate University. Her doctoral research concentrated on non-Anglophone political adaptations of Hamlet. “All life is an experiment,” said Mills, “so I try not to let the fear of failure or choosing incorrectly hold me back from fully living.”
