CAMPUS

Jan Barker Alexander was named executive associate vice president for diversity and inclusion following a twenty-seven year career at Stanford University where she “curated experiences for students that pushed them intellectually and created programs that serve as a national model for intellectual engagement, cultural awareness, leadership development, and social justice." Alexander earned a bachelor’s degree in journalism from LSU and a master’s in education from Southern University.

Jacqueline Bach, interim vice provost for academic programs and support services, was appointed to the position permanently.

Units reporting to the vice provost include the Center for Community Engagement, Learning, and Leadership (CCELL); Communication Across the Curriculum (CxC); Academic Center for Student Athletes; Gordon Cain Center for STEM Literacy; LSU Discover; and Residential Colleges.

Ernie Ballard, longtime director of LSU media relations and most recently interim vice president for communication and university relations, assumed the position of senior director of communications and marketing at Pennington Biomedical Research Center in December. Ballard earned a bachelor’s degree in public relations in 2001 and an MBA in 2003, both from LSU, and worked at LSU for eighteen years.

Andrea Beauchamp Carroll, the Donna W. Lee Professor of Family Law at the Paul M. Hebert Law Center, was named Distinguished Professor and Calogero Justice Award Recipient by the Louisiana Bar Foundation at the organization’s Fellows Gala in April.

Theda Daniels-Race was named a Provost's Fellow in the O ce of Academic A airs, heading up the Open Educational Resources project, Integrative Learning Core, and the Learning & Teaching Collaborative. Daniels-Race, the Michel B. Voorhies Distinguished Professor in the Division of Electrical & Computer Engineering, was formerly the director of the School of Collaborative Academic Programs.

Nicollette Davis, LSU’s kinesiology, social work, and health sciences librarian, was named a 2023 Emerging Leader by the American Library Association. Davis’ cohort includes forty-six early-career leaders from across the U.S. and Canada who will gain an inside look into ALA structure, network with other emerging leaders, and participate in project planning work groups to enhance their careers. Davis earned a master’s in library and information sciences from LSU in 2018.

Tammy Dugas, professor of comparative biomedical sciences, and Michael Khonsari, professor of mechanical engineering, were elected as Fellows to the National Academy of Inventors (NAI). They will be inducted at the NAI annual meeting in June 2023.

Todd Manuel was named vice president of Civil Rights & Title IX, overseeing LSU’s Title IX compliance programs and obligations. Manuel is a seasoned executive and diversity thought leader with expertise in leveraging diversity, equity, and inclusion as a business enabler at both enterprise and industry levels. He holds a bachelor’s degree in accounting from LSU, a JD from Southern University Law Center, and an executive certificate in diversity, equity, and inclusion from Georgetown University.

Adam McCloskey was named director of the Louisiana Small Business Development Center (SBDC) at LSU, leading an o ce that provides no-cost consulting to small businesses and aspiring entrepreneurs in the nine-parish capital region.

James Olson was appointed chief executive o cer of the Stephenson Technologies Corporation (STC), LSU’s a liate to conduct high-level defense and national security applied research and development. Olson is also executive director of the LSU Stephenson National Center for Security Research and Training.

Eugene Kennedy, professor in the School of Education, was named associate dean for academic programs and institutional e ectiveness, facilitating and documenting assessment and reporting processes, supporting a culture of assessment at the department and college levels, working in the development of student learning outcomes, and evaluating curriculum e ectiveness.

Michelle Schulte, senior curator and director of public programs at the LSU Museum of Art, received the Southeastern Museums Conference 2022 Museum Leadership Award, and the museum received awards in the exhibition and publication competitions.

Jennifer Scott, assistant professor of social work, received a $999,992 grant from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine to adapt, deliver, and assess the e cacy of a brief group mental health intervention in East Baton Rouge Parish organizations. The team includes Scott; Tara Powell, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign; and Khalid Hudson, Together Baton Rouge.

Julie Schneider, assistant professor in the Department of Communication Sciences & Disorders (COMD), and her co-investigator, Janna Oetting, professor in COMD and associate vice president of humanities, social sciences, and allied fields in the LSU O ce of Research & Economic Development, were awarded a $365,766 grant from the National Science Foundation to study how researchers measure and characterize the type of language input children throughout the Deep South hear in their day-to-day lives. The grant will examine whether the language children hear and speak aligns with the way their vocabulary is tested, as most research on this topic has been conducted in urban cities in the Northeast and Midwest United States.

Jenny Sones, associate professor of theriogenology in the School of Veterinary Medicine, received a Catalyst Award from the National Academy of Medicine. Sponsored by the National Institute of Aging, the award includes a $50,000 cash prize and travel costs to attend an annual Global Innovator Summit. She is one of only twenty-five U.S.-based innovators to receive the award each year during 2020-2022.

Greg Upton, associate professor, was named interim executive director of the LSU Center for Energy Studies, replacing David E. Dismukes, who retired in January. Upton holds doctoral, master’s, and bachelor’s degrees from LSU. He is a member of several professional associations and currently serves as chair of the 2023 U.S. Association for Energy Economics conference, to be held in Chicago in November.

Richard Vlosky, Crosby Land & Resources Professor of Forest Sector Business Development and director of the Louisiana Forest Products Development Center, School of Renewable Natural Resources, was re-elected chair of the LSU Agricultural Faculty Council for 2023.

Ursula White, assistant professor at Pennington Biomedical Research Center, was selected by the Obesity Society for the Society of Behavioral Medicine Leadership Institute, which helps advance the careers of participants by fostering self-awareness and the development of leadership skills.

Critical and cultural media scholar Asha Winfield, the Doris Darden II Professor in the Manship School of Mass Communication, was awarded the Ralph E. Powe Junior Faculty Enhancement Award and the National Communication Association's Outstanding Dissertation Award, among other honors this year, for her research on black health and black representation in media.

William T. “Bill” Treas (1995 BACH BUS, 1997 MAST HS&E), founding partner in Nielsen & Treas, Metairie, La., was named to Louisiana Super Lawyers for 2023 in the area of insurance coverage.

LSU cybersecurity researchers are developing a new tool, HookTracer, to speed up cybercrime investigations using artificial intelligence (AI) to reveal cybercriminals and cybercrime. Investigators such as Louisiana State Police’s Cybercrime Unit can use HooKTracer stop or at least understand and mitigate cyberattacks. Louisiana ranks high on the list of U.S. states most at-risk of cybercrime, in fact, the highest among all Southern states, besides Florida.

The Reilly Center for Media & Public A airs at the Manship School of Mass Communication is partnering with Tulane University’s H. Sophie Newcomb Memorial College Institute to document women’s experience as political leaders through oral histories. This partnership will expand the geographical footprint and constituencies for the Louisiana Women in Politics Oral History Project, an e ort to provide a record of female political figures who played important roles in some of Louisiana’s most notable historical moments.

The LSU Police Department is the first in the SEC to implement a “soft interview room” for victims of trauma or sexual violence. The new room features comfortable lighting, furniture, weighted blankets, and items intended to help survivors talk to police about what happened. The room was installed with the help of Project Beloved, a nonprofit charitable organization that partners with law enforcement agencies to implement soft interview rooms across the nation.

The U.S. Department of Education awarded LSU Upward Bound and the McNair Scholars Program grants totaling $6,019,530 over the next five years. The funding for the proposals, written by wifeand-husband team Stephanie and Joseph

Givens, will help improve outcomes in higher education enrollment, retention, and graduation of first-generation college students with financial needs. Stephanie Givens serves as the Upward Bound director and associate director of the Gordon A. Cain Center. Joseph Givens is director of the Ronald E. McNair Research Scholars Program.

The LSU Center for Analytics and Research in Transportation Safety (CARTS) received a Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration grant to build an artificial intelligence (AI) engine to study driver behavior that leads to crashes in order to help prevent them. The grant will help provide information about driver behavior on roads, especially around commercial vehicles. Lead principal investigator is Helmut Schneider, CARTS executive director and the Ourso Family Distinguished Professor of Information Systems in the E.J. Ourso College of Business.

The Stephenson National Center for Security Research and Training is changing its name to the LSU Stephenson Security Programs Institute (SPI) to support LSU’s agenda to create a thematic zone for defense capabilities by building and strengthening collaborations with local, state, and federal partners in national security and cybersecurity.

LSU Executive Education’s new Certified Public Manager Program is a nationally accredited, comprehensive leadership development program that prepares individuals for careers in federal, state, and local government, as well as public or notfor-profit organizations. Those completing the 300-hour program will receive a Public Manager Certificate from LSU.

LSU was approved by the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) to receive a Challenge America Award of $10,000 to support the Collaborative Piano Institute at the LSU School of Music. This year’s edition will focus specifically on issues of race, underrepresentation, and bias in classical music. Eight Black, Indigenous People of Color, or BIPOC faculty, and guest artists deliver lectures, discussions, master classes and live performances from June 4-24, which are free and open to the public.