She earned her Ph.D. in Rural Sociology with a graduate certificate in Women’s and Gender Studies from the University of Missouri-Columbia. While working on her dissertation, she rediscovered her passion for writing. Breidenbach began taking seminars in creative nonfiction writing and eventually enrolled in an M.F.A. program. She earned her M.F.A. in Creative Writing from the Solstice Low-Residency MFA in Creative Writing Program at Pine Manor College in Boston in 2014. Breidenbach brings an interdisciplinary approach and her identity as a writer to her teaching. She is working on a manuscript titled Girlhood Cache, which is a memoir told through a series of flash non-fiction essays. Her current research project, “Feminist Activism and the Women’s Film Festival: a Site for Social Change,” explores the impact of women’s film festivals as a means of feminist activism.