Considering some of her most recent job titles—instructional designer, STEM evangelist, and senior technical learning experience designer—you might not guess that Brooke Haag has a PhD in nuclear physics and spent several years as a physics professor. But a closer look reveals the thread weaving it all together: a desire to help people access more opportunities through education.

As a new community college student, a career in physics wasn’t on Haag’s radar. But when she needed a physical science class, she registered for physics. Her professor was so inspiring that she decided to pursue a PhD in the field. “Being in physics opened up so many things for me, personally and professionally,” she says. Even as a graduate student, she knew she wanted to help open those doors for others.

After earning a PhD, Haag took her love of physics and education back to the community college where she started. She spent five years teaching physics there and two more at another two-year school, developing curricula, doing research, engaging students in extracurricular physics activities, and bringing physics education research–based practices into the classroom.

After seven years, Haag was ready for a change. She went back to school, this time earning a master’s degree from Harvard’s Technology, Innovation, and Education Program. There was a lot of excitement, promise, and room for innovation in online education, she says. “I wanted to be involved.”

She soon became an instructional designer, working with professors to adapt their classes into edX courses for MIT. This meant grappling with how to translate what’s needed for success in the classroom into an online format. “Being a learner with a background in physics and teaching suited me well for coming into the situation and having a growth mindset,” she says. She started with the attitude, “I don’t know what I’m doing, but I’m going to tinker around and figure it out.” And she did.

Next came a job on Microsoft’s education team. “That was a whole different career pivot,” Haag says. She became a STEM evangelist working with Microsoft’s education sales team. Many people in the education community considered STEM education as a good way to equip students with practical skills—like coding or handling data—that could help them get well-paying jobs in the future, she says. Part of her role while working in that space was thinking through Microsoft’s STEM initiatives and connecting them to the education community.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Haag stepped down from Microsoft but ramped up her involvement in the North America Scholastic Esports Federation. A huge volume of students play online games, she says. Esports works to harness this for educational purposes by, for example, helping students develop social and emotional learning skills through gaming or teaching them science through Minecraft building projects.

For the past three years, Haag has worked as a technical learning experience designer at Pathstream, a company that provides digital skills–based classes and certificate programs to help people advance their careers. She’s helped design classes on a variety of topics and loves that she’s always learning something new. She’s currently the lead on a Salesforce certificate program. “Being a learner, this is a great job for me,” she says. “I’m constantly having to try out new tools or figure out a new subject, or I’m spending a lot of deep, focused time doing something interesting.”

As she reflects on her career, Haag says that she’s enjoyed its different stages and that each made sense for the time. It’s a path all her own, focused on innovation and education. “Education is really important, and so is giving people access to education and helping them use it to be successful,” she says. “I was successful because of the education I received, even though I didn’t have a ton of resources in my life, and I’ve wanted to extend the same to others.”

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Attending a Two-Year College? Apply for an SPS Scholarship! 

The Peggy Dixon Two-Year Scholarship supports students transitioning from a two-year college into a physics or astronomy bachelor's degree program. The $2,500 scholarship is named in memory of Peggy A. Dixon, a physics professor at Montgomery College who served as SPS and Sigma Pi Sigma historian from 1992 to 2003. To learn more and apply, visit spsnational.org/scholarships/dixon.

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