Partner Chair
Christa Bruce has been an educator in Alaska for 40 years, spanning elementary school to graduate university teaching as well as the Alaska Statewide Mentor Program. Her technology career began in earnest in 1978, continued with the ARCTIC Program with six months of immersion in Ohio, and today as a co-founder of Global Education Connections, www.GlobalEdConnect.net, a firm which links school districts and parents with quality online academic education.
She received an Administrative Fulbright Fellowship to the Czech Republic and a sabbatical to teach English in Japan. She was invited by the U.S. Department of State to facilitate online conversations on social justice in Azerbaijan which paralleled Breadloaf School of English collaborative work with rural districts in New Mexico, Colorado, Arizona, and Mississippi. In 1972, she was an emissary to the Republic of China, as a pianist, for the first cultural exchange with the US. She is an Annenberg scholar and holds Master's Degrees in Literature from Middlebury College, Vermont, and Lincoln College, Oxford, England; Master's in Educational Technology from UAS; Master's in Music (Piano Performance) from Peabody Conservatory, John's Hopkins University; Master's in Educational Leadership from UAA; and a Doctor of Humane Letters, an honorary degree conferred by the University of Alaska for her contribution to education.
Christa currently works for the Foundation of Ketchikan General Hospital where she is responsible for annual giving.
She is married to Ron Kotrc, Rector Emeritus of St. John's Episcopal Church in Ketchikan, is the mother of four wonderful adult sons, and is President of First City Rotary. Ron and Christa like the rainforest, make great smoked salmon, sail a 30' sloop, and welcome visitors to their seaside cottage in the Banana Belt of Alaska.
