Speaking

I have had the pleasure to speak and teach at a number of conferences, meetups, and classrooms. I love speaking to both present and future developers about a variety of front-end development topics. A list of both my upcoming and previous speaking dates and presentations are below.

Questions? Comments? Want to chat? Let me know!

Presto Chango: The magic of block transforms

WordPress block transforms provide content editors with an easy way to migrate content from one block to another. The core editor already includes many transforms from one core block to another. Turn a paragraph block into a heading. Turn an image block into a cover.

But, did you know that you can up your post editor game by writing your own transforms? Turn a core block into your own custom block! Give your content editors the ability to easily switch between two blocks and create custom shortcuts that will automatically populate a custom block.

HighEdWeb 2022
October 4, 2022
Online
Session Details

Gutenberg Developer Hours

This new meetup series from the WordPress Social Learning Meetup invites attendees to ask a panel of WordPress developers about the block, plugins, theme development, or any other WordPress editor topic. I am very excited to have been asked to be a part of the panels for 2 of the 4 inaugural sessions.

March 22, 2022
Meetup
February 22, 2022
Meetup
Watch Recording

Dynamic Blocks FTW!: Customize Gutenberg Without Living in Fear of Validation Errors

Picture this: You write a brand new custom Gutenberg block. Sometime later, you realize that you need to change your block’s markup to either fix a bug or add a new feature. Suddenly, the editor crashes your block. Validation error! You can fix this with a deprecation object. Or… could there be a better way?

Enter the dynamic block. In this workshop, you will learn about the difference between dynamic and static blocks, how block validation works, and how to write a dynamic block. You will never have to write a deprecation again!

HighEdWeb 2021
October 4-5, 2021
Online
Dynamic Blocks FTW
Session Details
WPCampus Online 2021
September 21-22, 2021
Online
Dynamic Blocks FTW
Watch Video

See What I Mean?: Data Visualization in WordPress

Data visualizations are graphical representations of large and small datasets. Usually, they are charts or graphs that make patterns in these datasets easier to understand. This developer-focused talk demonstrates how to use Google Sheets and SVGs to create a custom Gutenberg block that will display data in a responsive and accessible way.

WPCampus Online 2020
July 29-30, 2020
Online
Data Visualization in WP
Watch Video
Javascript for WordPress Conference 2020
July 8-10, 2020
Online
Data Visualization in WP

Customizing Gutenberg: Lessons Learned at Georgetown

The new Gutenberg editor comes with so many great content blocks. However, what if your editors have special use cases for their content that cannot be easily created with Gutenberg’s out-of-the-box blocks? At Georgetown, we have created a series of custom Gutenberg blocks in an effort to address our editors’ unique content needs.

WPCampus Online 2019
January 31, 2019
Online
Customizing Gutenberg
Watch Video

Accessible Web Development

We develop websites for everyone to use, so why not make sure that everyone is able to use our sites? We as developers need to plan for accessibility before we write our first line of code.

edUi
September 25-27, 2017
Charlottesville, VA
Accessible Development
ConvergeSE
June 14-16, 2017
Columbia, SC
Accessible Development
NoVA CodeCamp
April 1, 2017
Washington, DC
Accessible Development

Accessible Development Class

In addition to my Accessible Development conference talk, I have also lead a class for fellow Georgetown staff members about how to develop web sites in an accessible manner.

Georgetown University
Online (internal course)
Slide Deck

Front-End Development Courses

I have also taught front-end web development courses, primarily to students with no programming experience. These are 100% beginner courses.

Introduction to JavaScript workshop
September 2016
General Assembly DC
Introduction to SVG
November 2015
Northern Virginia CC
See Notes
Design Tools Mini-Course
May 2016
General Assembly DC
Slide Deck
Front-End Web Development 10-week classes
2015-2016
General Assembly DC