Biography

Linda Coutant, Ed.D. is an award-winning communications professional, educator and certified mindfulness instructor with a doctorate in educational leadership. Her passions are guiding others in discovering their best selves and helping organizations achieve their goals through strategic communications.

Her diverse career in higher education and with non-profit organizations has led to innovation and cultural and organization change at the local and national level.

Communications

As a professional writer and editor, Linda got her start in print journalism and spent much of her career in higher-education public relations/marketing where she led external communications and special projects that positioned Appalachian State University as an educational leader.

She engaged prospective and current students, faculty and staff, alumni, donors, news media, and other stakeholders through internal communications, web content, press releases, fundraising materials, newsletters, media pitches, social media content, audio/visual projects and other promotional collateral. Linda served on the university's Emergency Management Task Force for crisis communications for nearly a decade. For 13 years, she served as editor of the university magazine and producer of a statewide cable television program hosted by the university’s top executive.

As communications director for the national non-profit One World Everybody Eats and local F.A.R.M. Cafe (Feed all Regardless of Means), she advanced and brought national attention to the pay-what-you-community cafe concept — which allows all people to eat quality, nutritious food with dignity regardless of their ability to pay. F.A.R.M. Cafe in Boone, North Carolina, was lauded as a must-stop restaurant by the Wall Street Journal and featured in The Washington Post, while One World Everybody Eats received the 2017 James Beard Humanitarian of the Year Award.

Since August 2022, she has worked as staff writer for the National Parks Conservation Association.

Education and Mindfulness

Linda has maintained a daily meditation practice for more than 20 years and has more than 100 hours of retreat experience. She was a leader in creating App State’s faculty/staff contemplative organization called Still Point, which presented workshops and weekly meditations on campus to support others in developing and maintaining a mindfulness practice and to help them incorporate contemplative practices into their work with students.

Inspired by the growing use of "contemplative education," Linda earned her Doctor of Education degree in educational leadership from App State, with an emphasis on the use of mindfulness/contemplative practices in higher education. Her dissertation explored organizational structures and cultures created by campus leaders as they sought to bring greater mindfulness and contemplative practice to their university’s academics and student life.

Since 2016, she has been a certified teacher of the four-week Koru Mindfulness Curriculum. She also incorporates mindfulness and other contemplative practices in her teaching as an adjunct professor in Appalachian State University’s Department of Communication, where she has taught since 2008. She is a published academic researcher and peer reviewer as well.

In addition to her doctorate, Linda holds a Master of Arts degree in educational media from Appalachian State University and a Bachelor of Arts degree in mass communication from Emory & Henry College.

Public Speaking

Linda has conducted numerous workshops and presentations on communication strategies and mindfulness in education and the workplace. She has led, organized and served as a panelist and keynote speaker for professional workshops and conferences in her areas of expertise.

Notable appearances include the 2022 Conference on Meaningful Living and Learning in a Digital World, the 2018 Contemplative Practices for 21^st Century Higher Education Conference, and the 2018 Women in Educational Leadership Symposium (WIELS).

Diversity, Equity and Inclusion

As a member of the LGBTQ+ community, Linda has long held a commitment to improving diversity, equity and inclusion through both job-specific and volunteer roles.

At Appalachian State University, Linda contributed to the improved DEI climate by:

• creating and sustaining the university’s Diversity and Inclusion website, including conceptualizing and writing the Resilience Toolkit

• completing training to be an employment mediator through the North Carolina Office of State Human Resources and a Title IX hearing officer and decision-maker through the Association of Title IX Administrators

• volunteering as a Sustained Dialogue Campus Network moderator, INTERSECT Social Justice Retreat leader, and featured participant in a local production for The Trevor Project “It Gets Better” Video series.