I grew up in New York City and am a proud alumna of Hunter College High School. I was a political science major at Wellesley College and did my Ph.D. at the University of California, Berkeley (go bears!). Between college and graduate school, I taught middle school in rural North Carolina and was the Wellesley-Yenching Fellow at Chung Chi College, Chinese University of Hong Kong. Before coming to Smith, I taught in the Harvard College Writing Program and the Villanova University political science department. I was also a postdoctoral fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School’s Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation. In my (limited) free time, I play tennis, wrangle small children, and cook. I tweet (mostly about China and Taiwan)  at @NewlandSara.