IN BRIEF

FACULTY AND STAFF

Rachel H. Adler, associate professor and chair of the department of sociology and anthropology, was an invited guest at Randolph-Macon College in Virginia. Adler had lunch with freshmen seminar students who are studying immigration this semester, and then delivered a public lecture on April 6, discussing the impact of recent immigration policy and enforcement on Latino communities in the United States. Her data was based on her work in the Chambersburg area of Trenton, NJ-- research that has been generously supported by both the New Jersey Historical Commission and TCNJ.

Susan Albertine, dean of the school of culture & society, has been selected to be the president of The Council of Colleges of Arts and Sciences (CCAS).  Albertine will begin her three-year term next academic year starting as president-elect, president the following year and then past president. The president-elect designs the national program for the next year when they serve as president. Albertine’s meeting will be in Portland, Oregon in November of 2008. For the past year, Albertine has been working on a national project co-sponsored by several higher education organizations to bring the study of public health into undergraduate education throughout the arts and sciences, as well as in professional schools. She hopes to incorporate elements of these projects in her role as president.

James A. Graham, associate professor of developmental psychology in the Department Psychology co-authored a textbook with Yvette R. Harris of Miami University titled, The African American Child: Development and Challenges published by Springer Publishers.  This is the first textbook which offers a comprehensive portrait of African American child development. This nine-chapter text includes topics which range from research issues, physical, cognitive/emotional, and social perspectives of African American children.

Sharon Sherman, professor of elementary and early childhood education, and Cathy Liebars, assistant professor of mathematics and statistics, received national recognition from the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) for the development of a mathematics and science professional development model that increases teacher quality and student achievement. This CCSSO study is designed to provide feedback to state education leaders about the degree to which this set of nominated professional development programs meet the criteria of research-based, high quality professional development.

STUDENTS

Hasan Danish, senior biology major, has been awarded a four-year, full scholarship to attend Robert Wood Johnson Medical School beginning in the Fall of 2007 as part of the Dean’s Scholars Program.  Full scholarships with the Dean’s Scholars Program are very rare at Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, which is ranked in the top 60 medical schools nationwide according to this year’s US News and World Report. The school’s past recipients of the program have been undergraduate students from Yale, Harvard, William and Mary and University of Pennsylvania.

Mackenzie Esch, junior biology major, was accompanied by Professor of Biology Howard Reinert on April 8 as the College’s first student representative to the annual Lehigh Valley Evolution and Ecology Symposium, where she was awarded the honor of Best Poster.  Her poster, titled “Geographic Variation in the Diet of Timber Rattlesnakes, Crotalus horridus” was selected from a field of 19 poster entries, many by graduate students.  The conference was attended by nearly 100 faculty, undergraduate, and graduate students from 20 colleges and universities in the PA and NJ area.

Several students competed at this year’s New Jersey Women's and Gender Studies Consortium annual student essay contest. Syd Herman submitted "Women, Gender and Islam: A Cultural Battle" and Brittany Hammer, Brigette McNamara, Kristin Auci, and Jillian Nash submitted their paper "Nationwide Newspaper Coverage of Abortion: A Community Structure Approach.”  Allison Kuti, an ’06 alum, was one of three grand prize winners for her paper "Feminist Advertisements--Fact or Fiction?: A Critical Analysis of the Dove and Nike Campaigns.” For the contest, each competing institution submitted three papers that represent the best in feminist scholarship. 

Jenna Lerro, senior English education major, has been selected as a recipient of the 2007 New Jersey Commissioner's Distinguished Student Teacher Award. Since 1985, the Presidents of New Jersey’s teacher training institutions have been invited to submit the dossiers of their five most outstanding prospective teachers into competition for this award. An independent panel of esteemed New Jersey educators evaluates these dossiers to select the award recipients. The top 15-16 student teacher candidates are then given an award at the Commissioner’s Distinguished Teacher recognition ceremony that is held annually in May. Lerro was one of three students nominated from TCNJ.

The College of New Jersey sent its first team ever to the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) and American Institute of Steel Construction (AISC) Regional Steel Bridge competition at New York City College of Technology on April 13 and 14. The team consisted of senior engineering majors Thomas Lombardi, Shannon Murray, Danielle Novak, and John Savage, all of whom designed the project. Junior engineering majors Brian Spieker and Kevin Campbell helped the team construct the bridge, which placed first in aesthetics and fourth in stiffness.

Teo Paoletti, senior mathematics major, was selected by the Mathematical Association of America for publication in their online magazine Convergence. Paoletti’s paper, a paper written for Judit Kardos’ history of mathematics course, discusses Leonard’s Euler’s solution to the Konigsberg Bridge challenge. Graph theory, a branch of mathematics, emerged from this solution. Paoletti’s paper not only discusses the mathematical proof but also incorporates intriguing historical events and human aspects.  The article can be found at: http://mathdl.maa.org/convergence/1/?pa=content&sa=viewDocument&nodeId=1310

Junior communication studies major Andrew Pearson’s short film, Photograph,
has been selected for screening at a number of area film festivals, including the Trenton Film Festival. The short fiction film about an autistic man piecing together elements of his memory to solve a murder case while solving his own “puzzle” at the same time was produced as an independent study project supervised by department chair Susan Ryan.
Photograph was selected for Trenton Film Festival and was screened as part of the Trenton area filmmaker showcase on May 4-5. Other films screened at the festival included the Oscar nominated Live Action and Animated Shorts. In addition to the Trenton Film Festival, the short film also received invitations to screen in April at the George Stickel Festival of Moving Images at Bergen County Community College and the Victorydance Film Festival in Voorhees. Photograph can be seen at the following http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pvVoM6ey6Nw.

Jennifer Sengin, senior music education major and member of TCNJ Chorale, worked with Professor Michael Mendoza in an independent study course for the past three semesters. On April 29, Jennifer conducted the Chorale concert in Mendoza’s place after he was rushed to the hospital two days prior. Following the Chorale’s standing ovation and encore performance, members of the singing group went to visit Mendoza in his rehab facility.  

Sara Tomczuk, junior sociology and history double major, has been awarded a research grant from Tulane University’s Newcomb College Center for Research on Women to investigate the experiences of Russian and Eastern European women who work during the summer on Long Beach Island, NJ. Tomczuk will work with Eileen Tomczuk, a student at Tulane University, to conduct ethnographic fieldwork and videotape key informant interviews to document the experience of these unskilled female workers this upcoming summer. More information on the Newcomb College Center for Research on Women can be found at:  http://www.tulane.edu/~wc/

Eleven electrical engineering students have lent a hand in designing some of the software that will fly aboard SuitSat-2, a test bed satellite being launched by the International Space Station. The students conducted the work for their course “Software Defined Radio”, taught by adjunct professors and members of the Amateur Radio on the International Space Station Bob Mcgwier and Frank Brickle.