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Jupiter String Quartet will perform April 20 in Hugh Hodgson Concert Hall
April 13, 2015
Vol. 42, No. 33
www.columns.uga.edu
UGA GUIDE
5
UGA’s Samantha Joye receives SEC Faculty Achievement Award By Sam Fahmy
sfahmy@uga.edu
Photo courtesy of the Hargrett Rare Book and Manuscript Library
A journalism newsroom circa 1940. The Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication is celebrating its 100th anniversary this year.
100 years in the making Grady College celebrates centennial of teaching democracy’s next generation
By E. Culpepper “Cully” Clark and Charles N. Davis cully@uga.edu and cndavis@uga.edu
Editor’s note: E. Culpepper “Cully” Clark and Charles N. Davis are dean emeritus and dean, respectively, of the Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication. Before he godfathered the Southeastern Conference, before he built a stadium that would bear his name, and before he became the principal architect of the University System of Georgia, Steadman Vincent Sanford inaugurated journalism education at UGA. Sanford taught the university’s first course in journalism and by 1915 he won trustee approval to make it a school. One hundred years later Grady College celebrates its lustrous history and promising future.
In 1921, the school was named for Henry W. Grady, the New South’s chief journalist and publicist, whose death in 1889 was the occasion for national mourning. That year also saw the school’s first graduate, Lamar Jefferson Trotti, who went on to write and direct more than 20 major motion pictures. Trotti’s career affirmed Sanford’s belief that journalism was a literary genre that would attract more students to literature and critical thinking. Grady’s second graduate in 1922 would become its legendary dean, John Eldridge Drewry. As director and dean from 1932 to 1969, he developed Grady’s national reputation. He launched institutes for newspapers, broadcasters, advertisers and public relations professionals, and Grady
soon became home to all their Halls of Fame. The ’30s also inaugurated student honor societies, a scholastic press association and one for intercollegiate editors. In 1939, Drewry took a nowfamous call from Lambdin Kay, general manager of WSB-Radio. Having been spurned by Columbia’s Pulitzer Board, Kay asked whether Grady might sponsor awards for the National Broadcasters Association. By 1940 the regents approved the George Foster Peabody Awards, named for the Georgia native and UGA’s principal benefactor. Its first presentations were made in New York in 1941, and it remains the oldest and most prestigious award in electronic media. The Peabody Archives in the Richard B. Russell Building See CENTENNIAL on page 8
Samantha Joye, Athletic Association Professor in Arts and Sciences and professor of marine sciences, has been named UGA’s 2015 recipient of the Southeastern Conference Faculty Achievement Award. The award, which is administered by SEC provosts, comes with a $5,000 honorarium and recognizes professors with outstanding records in teaching and scholarship who serve as role models for other faculty and students. “Dr. Joye’s trailblazing research, commitment to students and extraordinary record of outreach make her one of the University of Georgia’s most respected faculty members,” said Pamela Whitten, senior vice president for academic affairs
Samantha Joye
and provost. “These attributes also make her one of the nation’s most influential marine scientists and a worthy recipient of the SEC Faculty Achievement
Award.” Joye’s research bridges the fields of chemistry, microbiology and geology to better understand marine and coastal ecosystems. She has been studying natural seepage of oil and gas in the Gulf of Mexico for more than 15 years. Her research related to the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill zone has examined the distribution of deepwater plumes of oil and gas.
See AWARD on page 8
ACADEMIC AFFAIRS
Finalists for deanship of Warnell School to make presentations By Sam Fahmy
sfahmy@uga.edu
Four finalists for the position of dean of UGA’s Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources will visit campus this month to meet with members of the university community. A committee chaired by J. Scott Angle, dean of the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, conducted a national search to identify the finalists. The committee was assisted by the UGA Search Group in Human Resources. Each finalist will make a public presentation from 9:3010:30 a.m. in Room 120 of the R.C. Wilson Pharmacy Building. The finalists and the dates of their presentations are:
• Rose-Marie Muzika, a professor and associate director of the School of Natural Resources at the University of Missouri, Columbia, April 14. • Keith Belli, a professor and head of the department of forestry, wildlife and fisheries at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, April 16. • W. Dale Greene, a professor and interim dean of the Warnell School, April 22. • Mark Ryan, the Rucker Professor of Wildlife Conservation and director of the School of Natural Resources at the University of Missouri, Columbia, April 27. The CVs of the finalists, along with their full campus visit itineraries and candidate feedback forms, are available online at http://t.uga. edu/1pK.
HONORS PROGRAM
ACADEMIC AFFAIRS
By Sam Fahmy
Graduate Research Fellowships
UGA Honors students receive Goldwater Scholarships 16 students, alumni offered NSF every year for the past 20 years, and the 2015 recipients bring the uniThree UGA Honors versity’s total of Goldwastudents—Lauren Denter Scholars to 49. “UGA students connison, Erin Hollander and Karishma Sriram—have tinue to excel—year after received 2015 Barry M. year—in competitions Goldwater Scholarships, for prized national acathe premier undergraduate Lauren Dennison Erin Hollander Karishma Sriram demic scholarships,” said scholarship in the fields of UGA President Jere W. mathematics, the natural sciences and juniors. The scholarships will Morehead. “This continuing succover the cost of tuition, fees, books cess is a testament not only to the and engineering. The UGA students are among and room and board up to a maxi- outstanding academic quality of our a group of 260 recipients of the mum of $7,500 per year. students but also to the exceptional one- and two-year scholarships that UGA students have received strength of our faculty who teach recognize exceptional sophomores the Goldwater Scholarship nearly See GOLDWATER on page 8 sfahmy@uga.edu
By Sam Fahmy
sfahmy@uga.edu
A record number of UGA students and alumni have been offered National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowships this year. The highly competitive awards recognize and support outstanding graduate students in science, technology, engineering and mathematics disciplines. The 16 UGA students and alumni were among the 2,000 fellows selected from more than
16,000 applicants nationwide for the 2015 competition. “The University of Georgia’s academic programs in the STEM disciplines are among the best in the nation,” said UGA President Jere W. Morehead. “We expect our outstanding students and alumni who represent these programs to compete successfully for the most prestigious academic awards, and they do so consistently. I extend my congratulations to the award recipients for this significant accomplishment.”
See FELLOWSHIPS on page 8
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HUMAN RESOURCES
April 13, 2015 columns.uga.edu
Around academe
Northern New Mexico College in battle with legislators over its name
Students at Northern New Mexico College in Espanola may be confused over what to call their school. The college’s board of regents voted to change the name to Northern New Mexico University in January. Now state legislators are arguing the board did not have the authority to change the name without approval from the General Assembly first, according to the Sante Fe New Mexican. The regents, who say the new name better reflected the schools offerings, did request a bill from the legislature, but only after they approved the name change first. However, that bill died when its sponsor did not present the bill.
Rhodes scholarship organization plans to include Chinese students
The Rhodes scholarship organization, the prestigious grant program that sends students to the University of Oxford in England, has announced plans to begin naming scholars from China, according to The New York Times. This move into China is one of the program’s biggest expansions, and it is meant to introduce a more diverse group of students to the program. This fall, Rhodes plans to select its first group of three to six scholars from China.
News to Use
Search for level, sunny spot when selecting vegetable garden site
Choosing a garden site is one of, if not the most, important decisions a gardener will make. Follow these tips from UGA Extension to develop a usable garden site. • Choose a site that receives at least six hours of direct sunlight each day. A gradual sloping hillside with a southern exposure is preferable. • Plant vegetables away from buildings, trees and other things that could shade the garden. If part of the garden must be in the shade, grow lettuce or crops such as cabbage, broccoli and kale there. • Examine the site to see how well the soil drains. Avoid placing the garden in a low spot where water drains poorly. • Select a spot away from trees and shrubs. Their roots will rob vegetables of nutrients and water. Tree roots often extend far beyond the tree’s drip line. • Look for a site that supports lush vegetative growth, even if it’s in the form of dark green, sturdy weeds. If weeds won’t grow in an area, vegetables probably won’t grow there either. • Consider the distance to the nearest water source. A nearby, easy-to-use water supply is important. Planning is an important step to planting and growing vegetables. The more thought put into a garden ahead of time, the more successful the harvest will be. For more information on planting a backyard vegetable garden, contact a local UGA Extension office at 1-800-ASK-UGA1.
Best of the best UGA was named in the top 20 in an annual ranking of the top four-year public colleges. Institution
1. U. of Michigan 2. U. of North Carolina 3. U. of Virginia 4. William and Mary 5. U. of California-Berkeley 7. U. of Florida 12. U. of Texas 13. Georgia Tech 16. UGA 20. Texas A&M University
Source: The Business Journals
By Matt Chambers mattdc@uga.edu
Droves of retirees and soon-to-be retirees flocked to the Georgia Center April 3 for informational sessions on upcoming changes to retiree health insurance from the University System of Georgia. So many people showed up to the first session that even with four overflow rooms, an additional session was added to meet the demand for information about the changes that go into effect Jan. 1. At each session, USG representatives and a representative from Aon Hewitt gave a presentation on the plan that will provide supplemental health care coverage for Medicare-eligible retirees through a private retiree health care exchange instead of through the USG health care plan. Karin Elliott, associate vice chancellor of total rewards for USG, told the crowd that the change is being made to address concerns about rising costs and liability. USG has 17,000 Medicareeligible retirees. “Since I’ve been working in the benefits field, that is a constant—health
care costs are rising,” Elliott said. The new private retiree health care exchange, which will be managed by Aon Hewitt, is not part of the federal Affordable Care Act or public health exchanges, Elliott said. The private exchange will offer a variety of coverage options, plans and providers. Elliott said USG will continue to provide a contribution to retirees to put toward health care costs. “USG is committed to providing a significant contribution toward your health care coverage,” Elliott said. Elliot also said the specific amount provided has not been determined since USG is still in the budgeting process; that amount will be presented to the Board of Regents of the University System of Georgia in the fall. “We will continue to keep it around the same (amount provided for health care coverage) unless our budget doesn’t allow it, and we don’t anticipate that,” said Marion Fedrick, vice chancellor for human resources for USG, during a question-and-answer session. USG retirees who are not Medicareeligible will stay on the USG plan, according to Elliott. Dependent children
Janet Beckley
and spouses covered by a USG retiree also will be on the USG plan. Dental, vision and life insurance all will continue as they are now. Aon Hewitt will be providing licensed benefit advisers to work with USG retirees during the enrollment process. These advisers, who are located in the U.S., are experienced in Medicare-related insurance and do not have any incentive to steer retirees to specific health care carriers or plans. “Our commitment to you throughout this process is that you get excellent customer service and all your needs met,” Elliot said. According to Elliott, a website about the upcoming change will be launched in May, and a transition guide will be mailed to retirees.This summer, retiree advisers will be trained, and informational videos will be posted online. In August, a flier or postcard will be sent out informing retirees of informational meetings that will take place in September. In midSeptember, retirees will receive an open enrollment letter with information about an enrollment appointment with a benefit adviser. Enrollment opens Oct. 1 and closes Dec. 31.
EARLY LECTURE Speaker urges students to fight against inequality By Molly Berg
mberg14@uga.edu
Best and brightest
Wingate Downs
Meredith Gurley Johnson, executive director of alumni relations, left, stands with students who were winners of the Center for Undergraduate Research Opportunities Symposium Best Paper Awards March 30-31. Winners, from left, were Anish Narayanan, Brett Bennett, Joseph Coppiano, Sarah Lane, Timothy Montgomery and Emily Wall. Winners of the UGA Libraries’ Undergraduate Research Awards were Allison Koch, Stefania Barzeva, Brett Bennett and I.B. Hopkins. Winners of the CURO Research Mentoring Awards were Erik Hofmeister, an associate professor of anesthesiology and chief of small animal surgery and anesthesia in the College of Veterinary Medicine, and Jeb Byers, a professor in the Odum School of Ecology.
STAFF COUNCIL
Source: UGA Extension
Rank
Informational sessions held on retiree health insurance changes
VP for development, alumni relations speaks to Staff Council; officers elected By Matt Chambers mattdc@uga.edu
UGA is making progress on increasing alumni and outside engagement, but still has room to grow. That was the message Kelly Kerner, vice president for development and alumni relations, gave to UGA Staff Council April 1. Kerner, who was addressing the group for the first time since he started last July, said UGA needs to grow its endowment as well as its participation rate for giving. “The good news is that there’s a lot of people who love this place,” Kerner said. Everyone in Development and Alumni Relations has been working to create “a culture of giving.” That culture is something relatively new to UGA within the last 20 years, Kerner said. “I like to think about UGA as a
family, and all of you would probably do just about anything for your family,” he said. “I think our job in fundraising and alumni engagement is taking care of our family.” Kerner said his division is trying to find ways to connect people outside the university to the institution in meaningful ways. “We always have to be looking to deliver value back to them,” he said. While Kerner said UGA is lagging behind peer institutions in some aspects of giving and engagement, he is optimistic. “We’re so fortunate to be a part of a place like this,” he said. Also during the meeting, Staff Council officers were elected. Marie Mize and Mary Moore were re-elected vice chair and coordinator, respectively. Andy Davis was elected recording secretary.
During the April 1 Mary Frances Early Lecture, Michael Thurmond, superintendent of the DeKalb County School District, challenged students to be courageous and speak out against all inequality. Currently on leave from the law firm of Butler Wooten Cheeley & Peak, Thurmond is a former state legislator and also a former state labor commissioner. He was appointed superintendent in 2013 to address accreditation issues. Under his leadership, the school district’s accreditation was upgraded in 2014. Thurmond, a native Athenian, paid homage to Early—the first African-American to earn a degree from UGA—for her accomplishments. “Thank you for your unwavering faith, perseverance and quiet dignity,” he told Early, who attended the lecture. “Thank you for ensuring that the stain of legalized racial segregation has been forever removed from the black and red fabric of this university.” Thurmond said the purpose of the lecture isn’t just to celebrate Early, but to continue the work she began. He then addressed the students in the Tate Student Center audience, asking them to fight inequality whenever and wherever they encounter it. “Greatness is within your grasp,” said Thurmond, who encouraged students to follow in Early’s footsteps and challenge inequality, even when it may create enemies. “This lady decided that she was going in and not running away. One young man or one young woman with courage can make a majority. “The people who cursed her, the people who slandered her, the people who despised her, are not being honored with a lecture series at the University of Georgia,” he also said. The lecture was sponsored by UGA’s Graduate School, the Office of Institutional Diversity and Graduate and Professional Scholars.
RESEARCH NEWS
columns.uga.edu April 13, 2015
3
Digest SPIA professor to appear in PBS documentary ‘American Masters’
Changying “Charlie” Li, an associate professor in the College of Engineering, left, and Jesse Kuzy, a first-year graduate student majoring in artificial intelligence, developed a sensor that detects the gas given off by rotting onions.
Paul Efland
The sniff test
Researchers develop electronic nose to find rotten onions By Molly Berg
mrberg14@uga.edu
Onions, one of the biggest vegetable crops in Georgia, risk disease when they are harvested and stored. To solve this issue, UGA researchers have developed new technologies, including a gas sensor and imaging methods, to detect diseases in onions. Their study was published recently in the journal Sensors.As part of a three-year grant, Changying “Charlie” Li, an associate professor in the College of Engineering, sought to find latent diseases, ones not easily detected by the human eye, in onions. These diseases can spread to other onions in close vicinity, sometimes damaging half of the supply in storage. “Most onions are harvested at the end of spring in Georgia,” Li said. “Some onions go to fresh markets, while others are stored for a few months. While in storage, some onions already could be infected with a postharvest disease. If it’s not caught, the disease can spread to the other onions in storage.” Onions, which had a farm gate value of $93.1 million in Georgia in 2013, are susceptible to two major postharvest diseases, known as neck rot and sour skin, which cause crop damage and lost revenue each year. The diseases are difficult to
detect naturally, so Li and his collaborators developed technologies that would monitor quality in onion storage facilities. With Glen Rains, an entomology professor in the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences and an adjunct professor in the College of Engineering, Li’s lab designed an electronic nose, commonly known as the e-nose, a device meant to detect smells in the air. “Electronic noses can be a low-cost instrument for detecting smells,” Rains said. “There is precedent in using electronic noses to identify different chemicals in odors.” Postharvest diseases cause onion degradation, rotting and a unique odor. The e-nose is able to monitor onion storage for the odor. “We developed the sensor to detect the smells of diseased onions,” Rains said. “Using a microprocessor, the e-nose collects data and sends it to a computer. The computer then determines the results.” Li and Rains tested the e-nose on Vidalia onions, Georgia’s official state vegetable. Collaborating with Vidalia onion farmers, Li and Rains successfully tried the e-nose on onion samples. “We worked with the farmers to get onion samples,” Li said. “We monitored the onions for internal quality, firmness and sweetness.”
In addition to the gas sensor, the three-year project also yielded other technologies to combat the spread of postharvest diseases. Li’s group developed an imaging system for quick detection of sourskin-infected onions on packing lines to potentially reduce the reliance on human inspectors.The imaging system prevents infected and low-quality onions from being packaged and sold to consumers. Another imaging system screens onions with high dry matter content, which has practical value to the onion powder industry and annually makes more than $100 million in revenue. “Our goal is to cut economic losses and reduce labor costs for onion growers and packers, and to provide quality products to consumers,” Li said. Now at the conclusion of their project, Li and Rains hope to continue finding ways to help the onion industry. “The life of this project was three years, and we largely accomplished our goals,” Li said. “There’s still more work to do. We want to make the gas sensor more robust and available to growers.We want our technology to benefit growers and consumers.” The study’s co-author is Tharun Kondaru, a former graduate student in the College of Engineering.
COLLEGE OF EDUCATION
Study shows promise for treating pica in children
By Kristen Morales kmorales@uga.edu
A College of Education graduate student recently had a major role in a study that finds behavioral therapy to be a successful treatment for children with pica. Pica is the ingestion of a nonedible item, which can lead to life-threatening complications. Items consumed may be household items such as paper clips or batteries, or items found outdoors such as dirt or wood. Christina Simmons, a doctoral candidate in the school psychology program in the communication sciences and special education department, worked with lead author Nathan Call, director of severe behavior programs at Marcus Autism Center at Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta and an assistant professor of pediatrics at Emory University School of Medicine, along with Joanna Mevers, an assistant professor of pediatrics at Emory,
and Jessica Alvarez, a postdoctoral fellow at Emory. The study was published in the January issue of the Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders. Until now, research on pica mainly has focused on case studies with only a few children at a time, according to Simmons. “Typically, up to 25 percent of children with developmental disorders engage in pica, but there are no large studies,” she said. “We wanted to look at clinical records of all children treated for pica at an intensive day-treatment program. We wanted to eliminate the potential for publication bias with previously published studies.” This study analyzed the records of 11 children brought to the center over 12 years. All but one child was diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder, and all but one was referred to the outpatient program for pica; one was treated for pica after treatment for aggression. While specific behavioral interventions vary depending on the child and severity of the issue,
treatment components included redirecting, blocking and rewards to turn a negative behavior into a positive one. “With behavioral intervention, each treatment is based on the reason why an individual engages in the behavior,” Simmons said. “You determine which treatment approach works, so it is individualized among the participants.” Overall, the behavior modification treatment was successful in nearly all cases, with an average reduction of 96 percent. To determine the effectiveness, the team trained parents or caregivers to continue the behavior modification treatment at home, then made follow-up assessments. Over the course of a child’s treatment period, children were brought into rooms with items that would be tempting for them to consume. The success of the behavior modification methods speaks well for programs such as the Applied Behavior Analysis program and clinic at the College of Education.
John Anthony Maltese, a Meigs Professor and the Albert Saye Professor of Political Science, will appear in an upcoming episode of the PBS series American Masters. Maltese also is the head of the political science department in the School of Public and International Affairs. His academic expertise centers on U.S. executive and judicial branches, but he also has an interest in classical music. He will be featured prominently in American Masters–Jascha Heifetz: God’s Fiddler. The documentary about the influential violinist will air April 16-17 on PBS; it will be rebroadcast on WUGA-TV April 24-25 and 28. God’s Fiddler had an advance screening at UGA’s Hugh Hodgson Concert Hall in 2011 before its New York premiere. Maltese and his father, a retired violinist and music professor also named John Maltese, are co-authoring a biography about Heifetz, who emigrated from Russia to the U.S. in 1917. He would go on to be called “perhaps the greatest violinist of all time” by The New York Times. They plan to complete the biography by 2017, the 100th anniversary of Heifetz’s U.S. debut. The younger Maltese said that the collaboration with his father has been one of the highlights of his life. He also is completing the ninth edition of his textbook, The Politics of the Presidency, which will be published next year.
Metaphysical Society of America to hold 66th annual meeting at UGA April 17-19
The 66th annual meeting of the Metaphysical Society of America will be held April 17-19 in Room 115 of Peabody Hall. The meeting, “Selfdetermination and Metaphysics,” is sponsored by the philosophy department in the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences. Pamela Whitten, senior vice president for academic affairs and provost, will officially welcome meeting attendees to UGA April 17 at 3:30 p.m. Richard Dien Winfield, Distinguished Research Professor of Philosophy at UGA and current MSA president, will give the presidential address, “Self-determination in Logic and Reality,” April 18 at 5 p.m. Edward Halper, Distinguished Research Professor and Meigs Professor of Philosophy, will discuss “Self-determination as a First Principle” April 18 at 10:25 a.m.
Center for Drug Discovery to hold seminar with Emory bioethicist
The UGA Center for Drug Discovery is sponsoring a special interdisciplinary seminar April 20 from 3:30-5 p.m. in Room 201 of the Pharmacy South building. Open to the university community, the seminar will be preceded by a reception from 2:30-3:15 p.m. in the second floor lobby of Pharmacy South. The speaker for the seminar is Paul R. Wolpe, the Asa Griggs Candler Professor of Bioethics at Emory University. He will give a presentation titled “Prediction and Prodrome: Ethics of Medicine as a Risk Management System.” A professor in the departments of medicine, pediatrics, psychiatry and sociology, Wolpe also is director of Emory’s Center for Ethics. In addition, he serves as the first senior bioethicist for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, where he is responsible for formulating policy on bioethical issues and safeguarding research subjects. A futurist interested in social dynamics, Wolpe’s work focuses on the social, religious, ethical and ideological impact of technology on the human condition. Considered one of the founders of the field of neuroethics, which examines the ethical implications of neuroscience, Wolpe also writes about other emerging technologies, such as genetic engineering, nanotechnology, prosthetics and new reproductive technologies.
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4 April 13, 2015 columns.uga.edu
RESEARCH NEWS
Digest Presentation on protecting cultural heritage to be held in Dean Rusk Hall
The UGA Master of Historic Preservation Program will host the presentation “From Savannah to Syria: Protecting Cultural Heritage Through Law” April 16 at 4:30 p.m. in the Larry Walker Room of Dean Rusk Hall. The presentation will be delivered by Will Cook, the associate general counsel for the National Trust for Historic Preservation. It is open free to the public. Cook’s work includes litigation advocacy on behalf of the National Trust for Historic Preservation in courts across the U.S. His recent projects include defending the use of historic tax credits, challenging federal agency approval of the world’s largest wind farm in the middle of Nantucket Sound, securing boundaries for a traditional cultural landscape in New Mexico and supporting historic property owners against the harmful effects of massive cruise ships in the Port of Charleston. The presentation is co-sponsored by the School of Law and the College of Environment and Design.
UGA Symphony Orchestra to perform April 18 for Saturday Morning Club
The Performing Arts Center will present the UGA Symphony Orchestra in the next Saturday Morning Club concert April 18 at 10 a.m. in Hugh Hodgson Concert Hall. The Saturday Morning Club is designed for children ages 4 through 12 and their parents and grandparents. Tickets for the concert are $10, $6 for children and can be purchased at the Performing Arts Center box office, online at pac.uga.edu or by calling 706-542-4400. The Saturday Morning Club is presented in partnership with Athens Regional Health System.
2 UGA faculty members receive Hall of Fame Award at Regents’ scholarship gala
William Finlay, a professor of sociology, and Paula Lemons, an associate professor of biochemistry, were honored as the 2014 recipients of the Felton Jenkins Jr. Hall of Fame Faculty Award at the Regents’ Scholarship Gala in late March. Their awards were announced last September (see http://t.uga.edu/1py). University System of Georgia Foundation Chair Regent James M. Hull announced that the USG Foundation raised more than $1 million in corporate contributions to the event. The funds provide need-based scholarships for deserving students at the USG’s 30 colleges and universities.
Company to purchase WUGA-TV
Marquee Broadcasting Inc. of Brookeville, Maryland, has entered into an agreement to acquire WUGA-TV from UGA for $2.5 million. Marquee Broadcasting is owned by Brian and Patricia Lane. The company also owns WMDT-TV, the ABC/CW/Me-TV affiliate in Salisbury, Maryland. WUGA-TV has a history of service to communities in Northeast Georgia from a broadcast tower located in Toccoa and is available on satellite and cable systems across much of North Georgia. The station, originally known as WNEG-TV, was acquired by the University of Georgia Research Foundation in 2008 from Media General Inc. After three years of operation as a commercial station, the license was transferred to the university and management was transferred to the UGA Division of Public Affairs in 2011. The call letters were changed to WUGA-TV, providing noncommercial programming under an affiliation with Georgia Public Broadcasting. In the summer of 2014, UGA retained Patrick Communications to explore a potential sale of WUGA-TV and advise the university throughout the process. After exploring all of the currently available options, the university determined Marquee Broadcasting was the best fit in terms of price and engaged ownership from a buyer with interest in actively serving the local community. Plans for the station involve multiple subchannels with a variety of programming options as well as a focus on community feedback and involvement. Transfer of the license for the television station is subject to approval by the Federal Communications Commission, which is anticipated this summer.
Ajaya Biswal, an assistant research scientist, left, and Debra Mohnen, a professor of biochemistry and molecular biology in the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences, examine young cottonwood trees grown in a greenhouse.
Paul Efland
Out of the woods
Franklin College scientists create fast-growing trees that are easier to turn into fuel By James E. Hataway jhataway@uga.edu
UGA researchers have discovered that manipulation of a specific gene in a hardwood tree species not only makes it easier to break down the wood into fuel, but also significantly increases tree growth. In a paper published recently in Biotechnology for Biofuels, the researchers describe how decreasing the expression of a gene called GAUT12.1 leads to a reduction in xylan and pectin, two major components of plant cell walls that make them resistant to the enzymes and chemicals used to extract the fermentable sugars used to create biofuels. “This research gives us important clues about the genes that control plant structures and how we can manipulate them to our advantage,” said study coauthor Debra Mohnen, a professor of biochemistry and molecular biology in the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences. “The difficulty of breaking down the complicated plant cell wall is a major obstacle to the cost-effective production of biofuels, and this discovery may pave the way for new techniques that make
that process more economically viable.” The researchers tested their hypothesis on a species of tree called Populus deltoides, more commonly known as the eastern cottonwood. Working together with colleagues in the BioEnergy Science Center, they created 11 transgenic trees in which GAUT12.1 was reduced by approximately 50 percent. This tree species is particularly attractive to the biofuel industry because it grows relatively quickly and produces large quantities of biomass in a short period of time. “Our experiments show that the trees we created were less recalcitrant, meaning that it would be easier to extract sugars from the plant cell walls,” said the study’s lead author Ajaya Biswal, an assistant research scientist in Mohnen’s lab. “But we were particularly happy to see how quickly these trees grew compared to what one would observe in the wild type.” The plants they tested displayed between 12 and 52 percent increased plant height and between 12 and 44 percent larger stem diameter when compared to controls. Faster growing plants would yield more biomass over a shorter period of
time, making them more attractive to both growers and the biofuel industry, Mohnen said. While the researchers emphasize that these are preliminary results, they and their colleagues in the BioEnergy Science Center already are preparing new experiments that will test their transgenic trees in different environments. “We’ve already learned a lot from this process, but we are confident that we can expand and improve on our research to achieve even better biomass and understanding of how it is produced,” said Mohnen, who is also a part of UGA’s Complex Carbohydrate Research Center. Their research project was conducted in partnership with the BioEnergy Science Center, one of three U.S. Department of Energy-funded research centers seeking new methods to overcome biomass recalcitrance. The research team also partnered with ArborGen, a leading producer of tree seedling products and one of the largest providers of conventional and technology-enhanced seedlings for the forestry industry.
WILLSON CENTER FOR HUMANITIES AND ARTS
University initiatives in digital humanities to be launched By Dave Marr
davemarr@uga.edu
The Jane and Harry Willson Center for Humanities and Arts, in partnership with the UGA Libraries and the University of Georgia Press, will launch its new Digital Humanities Lab on the third floor of the main library as part of “DIGI@UGA” Day April 17 at 2 p.m. The day’s events will include the announcement of a new interdisciplinary undergraduate certificate program in digital humanities; a Digital Humanities Symposium; the opening of the UGA Digital Arts Library’s Textual Machines exhibit; and a public reception at the new home of the Willson Center at 1260 S. Lumpkin St. at 5 p.m. The reception is open free to the public, and refreshments will be served. The field of digital humanities emphasizes the building of tools and resources such as digital archives, Web
applications and mobile applications and their use in the service of advancing humanistic knowledge and making it available to the public. The Willson Center Digital Humanities Lab, known informally as the DigiLab, will be a state-of-the-art instruction space as well as an incubator and publicity hub for nationally recognized digital humanities projects. It will be outfitted with advanced technological resources and flexible workspaces for individual or collaborative projects. The DigiLab will open this summer. The Digital Humanities Research and Innovation certificate program will bring together courses taught across a range of humanities disciplines— including English, history, classics, geography, Romance languages, theatre and film studies, historic preservation, art and music—under the course prefix DIGI. The program will begin in the fall.
The DigiLab and the DIGI certificate program both grew out of the Digital Humanities Initiative, a Willson Center Faculty Research Cluster chaired by Stephen Berry, holder of the Gregory Chair of the Civil War Era in the history department; William Kretzschmar, the Harry and Jane Willson Professor in Humanities in the English department; and Claudio Saunt, the Richard B. Russell Professor in American History and chair of the history department. The launch event and symposium will take place opposite the DigiLab space in the Reading Room on the third floor of the main library. After opening remarks by organizers of the DigiLab and DIGI certificate programs, the symposium will feature talks by visiting scholars and innovators in digital humanities. More information on the speakers is online at http://t.uga.edu/1pJ.
UGAGUIDE
columns.uga.edu April 13, 2015
For a complete listing of events, check the Master Calendar on the Web (calendar.uga.edu/). The following events are open to the public, unless otherwise specified. Dates, times and locations may change without advance notice.
EXHIBITIONS
UGA Symphony Orchestra to perform April 16
Keith Wilson: Desire Path. Through April 17. College of Environment and Design exhibit hall.
The Art of Diplomacy: Winston Churchill and the Pursuit of Painting. Through April 17. Hargrett Gallery, special collections libraries.
By Joshua Cutchin jcutchin@uga.edu
Small Truths: Pierre Daura’s Life and Vision. Through April 19. Georgia Museum of Art. Pierre Daura (1896-1976): Picturing Attachments. Through April 19. Georgia Museum of Art. A Feast of Color: Recent Works by Tom Ventulett. Through April 26. State Botanical Garden. Southern Highlands Reserve: A Garden Rooted in the Place of its Making. Through April 30. Circle Gallery. Master of Fine Arts Degree Candidates Exhibition. Through May 3. Georgia Museum of Art. Chaos and Metamorphosis: The Art of Piero Lerda. Though May 10. Georgia Museum of Art. “OC” Carlisle Solo Art. Through May 11. Candler Hall. Food, Power and Politics: The Story of School Lunch. Through May 15. Russell Library Gallery, special collections libraries.
The Jupiter String Quartet will perform April 20 at noon and 8 p.m.
String quartet to give concerts By Bobby Tyler btyler@uga.edu
The UGA Performing Arts Center will present the Jupiter String Quartet with special guests clarinetist Jon Manasse and pianist Jon Nakamatsu April 20 at 8 p.m. in Hugh Hodgson Concert Hall. The Jupiter Quartet also will perform a free concert earlier in the day at the Chapel. The lunchtime Chapel concert begins at noon and is open free to the public. Tickets for the concert are $35 and are discounted for UGA students. Tickets can be purchased at the Performing Arts Center box office, online at pac.uga.edu or by calling 706-542-4400. The Jupiter String Quartet is a uniquely intimate group, consisting of violinists Nelson Lee and Megan Freivogel, violist Liz Freivogel, who is the older sister of Megan Freivogel, and cellist Daniel McDonough, who is the husband of Megan Freivogel and brother-in-law of Liz Freivogel. The quartet regularly performs across the U.S., Canada, Europe, Asia and South America.
Terra Verte. Through May 31. Jane and Harry Willson Sculpture Garden, Georgia Museum of Art.
6 p.m. Ramsey Concert Hall, Performing Arts Center. 706-542-4752, musicpr@uga.edu.
Jay Robinson: Quarks, Leptons and Peanuts. Through June 21. Georgia Museum of Art.
LEWIS LECTURE “Physical Activity, Health Risk and Academic Success in Children,” Darla Castelli. 6:30 p.m. M. Smith Griffith Auditorium, Georgia Museum of Art. 706-542-4230, emily122@uga.edu.
AiryLight: Visualizing the Invisible. Through June 28. Georgia Museum of Art. Circles. Through June 28. Georgia Museum of Art. The Pennington Radio Collection. Through December. Brown Media Archives and Peabody Awards Collection, special collections libraries.
MONDAY, APRIL 13 HONORS WEEK Through April 17. 706-542-0383, mamstutz@uga.edu. PSO MEETING AND AWARDS LUNCHEON 10:30 a.m. Part of Honors Week. Georgia Center. 706-542-6045, dempsey@uga.edu. GUEST LECTURE “Racism-Related Stress and Mental Health: A Study of African-American College Students During the Transition to Young Adulthood,” Enrique Neblett Jr. 3 p.m. 248 Miller Learning Center. 706-542-2983, jshaikun@uga.edu. CONCERT The UGA Tuba Euphonium Ensemble.
FACULTY RECOGNITION BANQUET Part of Honors Week. This event is invitation only. 6:30 p.m. Mahler Hall, Georgia Center. ddodson@uga.edu. CONCERT The UGA Symphonic Band. 8 p.m. Hugh Hodgson Concert Hall. 706-542-4752, musicpr@uga.edu.
TUESDAY, APRIL 14 WARNELL DEANSHIP PRESENTATION Rose-Marie Muzika, University of Missouri, Columbia. 9:30 a.m. 120 R.C. Wilson Pharmacy Building. (See story, page 1). GUEST LECTURE “President’s Malaria Initiative: The U.S. Government’s Commitment to the Global Malaria Fight,” U.S. Navy Rear Adm. Timothy Ziemer. 4 p.m. Masters Hall, Georgia Center. 706-542-3924. ECOLOGY SEMINAR “Mind Control: How Parasitic Manipulators Alter Host Behavior,” Shelley Adamo. 4 p.m. Ecology building auditorium. 706-542-7247, bethgav@uga.edu.
Calendar items are taken from Columns files and from the university’s Master Calendar, maintained by Public Affairs. Notices are published here as space permits, with priority given to items of multidisciplinary interest. The Master Calendar is available on the Web at calendar.uga.edu/.
GUEST LECTURE “Art Works—sometimes,” John Hatfield. 5:30 p.m. S151 Lamar Dodd School of Art. 706-542-0116, michelleegas@uga.edu.
WEDNESDAY, APRIL 15 TERRY COLLEGE HONORS DAY 9 a.m. Part of Honors Week. Chapel. elizwill@uga.edu. FILM VIEWING AND DISCUSSION The Hunting Ground. Members of the campus community will view this film and then participate in a conversation about sexual assault and how the university community stands united against acts of sexual violence. Noon and 6 p.m. Tate Student Center Theatre. 706-542-3028, smchutch@uga.edu. SOFTBALL vs. USC Upstate. 6 p.m. Jack Turner Stadium. 706-542-1621. CONCERT The UGA Collegium Musicum. 6 p.m. Ramsey Concert Hall, Performing Arts Center. 706-542-4752, musicpr@uga.edu. HONORS RECOGNITION BANQUET 6:30 p.m. Part of Honors Week. Classic Center, 300 N. Thomas St.
The UGA Symphony Orchestra will present a concert of all-Russian composers April 16 at 8 p.m. in Hodgson Concert Hall. The performance, led by Hugh Hodgson School of Music professor Mark Cedel, will feature Igor Stravinsky’s The Firebird and Dmitri Shostakovich’s Festival Overture. Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5 in E minor, Op. 64 will be directed by graduate student Josh Manuel. Tickets are $10, $5 with UGACard and can be purchased at pac. uga.edu or by calling 706-542-4400. Festival Overture was written by Shostakovich in 1954 for a special celebration commemorating the October Revolution’s 37th anniversary. The Firebird, which originally debuted in Paris as a ballet, tells of the struggle between the evil warrior Kashchei and Prince Ivan, who is assisted by the eponymous creature. Tchaikovsky’s 1888 Symphony No. 5 in E minor, Op. 64 is a cyclical work featuring a recurring theme that appears in each of its movements.
JOHN SUTHERLAND MEMORIAL CONCERT 6 p.m. Ramsey Concert Hall, Performing Arts Center. 706-542-4752, jcutchin@uga.edu. SOFTBALL vs. Florida. First of a three-game series. 6 p.m. Jack Turner Stadium. 706-542-1621. UGA RELAY FOR LIFE 7 p.m. Intramural Fields. BASEBALL vs. LSU. First of three-game series. $5-$8. 7 p.m. Foley Field. 706-542-1231. PERFORMANCE The UGA University Chorus. 8 p.m. Hugh Hodgson Concert Hall. 706-542-4752, musicpr@uga.edu.
SATURDAY, APRIL 18 SATURDAY MORNING CLUB CONCERT UGA Symphony Orchestra. $10; $6 for children. 10 a.m. Hugh Hodgson Concert Hall, Performing Arts Center. 706-542-3301, btyler@uga.edu. (See Digest, page 4).
FILM VIEWING AND DISCUSSION The Hunting Ground. 3 p.m. Tate Student Center Theatre. 706-542-3028, smchutch@uga.edu.
SOFTBALL vs. Florida. Second of a three-game series. 4 p.m. Jack Turner Stadium. 706-542-1621.
GUEST LECTURE “From Savannah to Syria: Protecting Cultural Heritage Through Law,” Will Cook. 4:30 p.m. Larry Walker Room, Dean Rusk Hall. (See Digest, page 4). RESEARCH AWARDS BANQUET 6:30 p.m. Mahler Hall, Georgia Center. READING Poet C.G. Hanzlicek. 7 p.m. The Globe, 199 N. Lumpkin St. 706-542-3481. CONCERT UGA Symphony Orchestra. $10; $5 with a UGACard. 8 p.m. Hugh Hodgson Concert Hall. 706-542-4752, musicpr@uga.edu.
FRIDAY, APRIL 17
SUNDAY, APRIL 19 BASEBALL vs. LSU. Third of three-game series. $5-$8. 1 p.m. Foley Field. 706-542-1231. SOFTBALL vs. Florida. Third of a three-game series. 1 p.m. Jack Turner Stadium. 706-542-1621.
MONDAY, APRIL 20 CULTURAL AWARENESS CELEBRATION Free African cuisine prepared by students and faculty, skits, music and dance. 11 a.m. Grand Hall, Tate Student Center. BIOETHICS SEMINAR “Prediction and Prodrome: The Ethics of Medicine as a Risk Management System,” Paul R. Wolpe. 3:30 p.m. 201 Pharmacy South. 706-542-9755, ransley2@uga.edu. (See Digest, page 3).
2015 ALUMNI AWARDS LUNCHEON Noon. Part of Honors Week. Grand Hall, Tate Student Center. wdarden@uga.edu. (See story, page 7).
TO SUBMIT A LISTING FOR THE MASTER CALENDAR AND COLUMNS Post event information first to the Master Calendar website (calendar.uga.edu/). Listings for Columns are taken from the Master Calendar 12 days before the publication date. Events not posted by then may not be printed in Columns.
MEETING: METAPHYSICAL SOCIETY OF AMERICA Through April 19. 115 Peabody Hall. 3:30 p.m. (See Digest, page 3).
BASEBALL vs. LSU. Second of three-game series. $5-$8. 2 p.m. Foley Field. 706-542-1231.
THURSDAY, APRIL 16 AG DAY AT TATE 9 a.m. Tate Student Center Plaza. 706-207-8943, carof@uga.edu.
DIGI@UGA DAY 2 p.m. Reading Room, main library. (See story, page 4).
WARNELL DEANSHIP PRESENTATION Keith Belli, University of Tennessee, Knoxville. 9:30 a.m. 120 R.C. Wilson Pharmacy Building. (See story, page 1).
OWENS IBR LECTURE “The Misperception of College Drinking: Pluralistic Ignorance and Campus Life,” William Sonnenstuhl. 3:30 p.m. 137 Tate Student Center. 706-542-2983, jshaikun@uga.edu.
Any additional information about the event may be sent directly to Columns. Email is preferred (columns@uga.edu), but materials can be mailed to Columns, News Service, 286 Oconee Street, Suite 200 North, Campus Mail 1999.
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NEXT COLUMNS DEADLINES April 15 (for April 27 issue) May 6 (for May 18 issue) June 3 (for June 15 issue)
6 April 13, 2015 columns.uga.edu
Two Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources professors received awards from the Southeastern Society of American Foresters in recognition of their service to forestry education and research. David Dickens was awarded the public education/technology transfer award, and Michael Kane received the research and development award. Dickens, a professor of forest productivity, focuses on outreach services by educating forest landowners, practicing foresters, land managers and state and federal land management employees about forest management decisions. Kane is a professor of quantitative silviculture and the director of the Plantation Management Research Cooperative, which is a university-private sector research cooperative dedicated to researching pine plantations in the southern U.S. As director of the cooperative, Kane works with researchers at UGA and other institutions on issues such as climate change, biomass production and sustainable forest management. In the last eight years, he has led research projects with grants totaling $4.2 million. The Southeastern Society of American Foresters is one of 33 state and multi-state societies that make up the national body known as the Society of American Foresters. SESAF is composed of professional foresters and forest technicians from the three-state region of Alabama, Florida and Georgia. Darris R. Means, an assistant professor in the College of Education’s counseling and human development services department, received an award from the Multicultural/Multiethnic Education Special Interest Group of the American Educational Research Association for his research advancing diversity, equity and Darris Means inclusion in all levels of education. The Dr. Carlos J. Vallejo Memorial Award for Emerging Scholarship is given each year to an emerging scholar or early-career faculty member whose research advances multicultural or multiethnic education within all educational, cultural, societal and social settings. Means teaches in the areas of counseling and student personnel services, and college student affairs administration. His research focuses on the areas of college access for students of color, low-income students and first-generation college students; and the intersection of race, gender and sexual orientation in higher education. A book co-authored by two researchers from the UGA College of Education won an award from the University Professional and Continuing Education Association. Adult Learning: Linking Theory and Practice, by Sharan B. Merriam and Laura L. Bierema, is the recipient of the 2014 Phillip E. Frandson Award for Literature, which recognizes an outstanding work of continuing higher education literature. The book, which explores the theory and practice behind adult learning, blends research with practical applications to give master’s-level students and professionals an understanding of the forces that influence adult learners. The book also received the 2014 R. Wayne Pace Human Resource Development Book of the Year Award from the Academy of Human Resource Development. Bierema, associate dean for academic programs and professor in the lifelong education, administration and policy department, has received many awards for her work in career development, organizational development and workplace learning. Merriam is a professor emerita of adult education and qualitative research who focuses her work on the foundations of adult education. Kudos recognizes special contributions of staff, faculty and administrators in teaching, research and service. News items are limited to election into office of state, regional, national and international societies; major awards and prizes; and similarly notable accomplishments.
FACULTY PROFILE
Craig Piercy
Photo by Paul Efland / Photo illustration by Janet Beckley
Business education goes online with help of MIT program director By Matt Weeks
mweeks@uga.edu
As the director of the Master of Internet Technology program and the first certified online instructor in the Terry College of Business, Craig Piercy is no stranger to teaching students he’s never met. In fact, conveying a personal touch through a computer screen is a specialty of his. “One of the things you can’t get naturally online is the teacher-student connection,” Piercy said. “You lose that presence when you don’t see people face to face.” Piercy finds ways to remind students that there is a human being behind the instructional videos they watch. He tries to allow students to get to know him. “I always include a little bit of myself, maybe telling some corny jokes and introducing the concept,” he said. Teaching that transcends time and location is important for Piercy because the MIT program, which prepares working adults for careers at the intersection of business and technology, transitioned to a completely online program in fall 2014. “There are two kinds of students that we typically see in this program,” Piercy said. “They are people who either want to enhance their careers with a master’s degree or switch their careers and move to a new field.” Piercy gave the example of a high school math teacher who wanted to switch careers, and now she’s a tech consultant for Web development. While the MIT program is open to students across the state and the nation for the same price, it can be funded
partially for UGA employees through the Tuition Assistance Program. The MIT program’s move to an online-only format, Piercy said, is not only a chance to better serve graduate students, but the teaching lessons learned by the program instructors also can impact the more traditional classes on the UGA campus. This is particularly true for classes that are delivered using the “flipped classroom” model of education. “The whole idea for the flipped classroom is that instead of going into class and lecturing, being a ‘sage on the stage,’ we move a lot of our curriculum to a learning platform, like e-Learning Commons, and when students come to class we give them practical activities to work on,” Piercy said. “So the teacher becomes more of a ‘guide on the side.’ The learning modules that we create for our online classes can easily be used with our on-campus flipped classes when appropriate.” MIT students spend five semesters taking online courses at their own pace, culminating in a capstone group project. Courses are divided into modules that students can complete in a week, with quizzes and assignments built in. Most weeks, Piercy’s classes don’t include any “live” classroom time. On other weeks, Piercy holds live sessions where he interacts with students through the Internet. Those classes aren’t required. They’re posted online later for students who cannot attend. But attendance is encouraged. Piercy came to his position almost by accident. He started as an electrical engineer with Milliken. And, after a few years on the job, he started to think about MBA programs. He took the GMAT and applied to a few places,
FACTS
Craig Piercy Director, Master of Internet Technology Program and Senior Lecturer Management Information Systems Department Terry College of Business Ph.D., Management Sciences, UGA, 2001 MBA, Business Administration, UGA, 1990 B.S., Electrical Engineering, Tennessee Tech, 1985 At UGA: 14 years, 4 months
but had planned to put off graduate school. That is until a phone call from a Terry College administrator, Don Perry, changed his mind—and eventually his life. He accepted a scholarship to Terry College and found not only did he excel at learning the material, but he also enjoyed explaining it to others. “Back in my MBA days was when I really discovered I liked teaching,” he said. Piercy was a teaching assistant. But in his own classes, especially the more quantitative ones, Piercy became a popular “study buddy” with classmates. “When you’re a study buddy, you’re really just teaching your friends,” he said. “So I realized that I had a knack for taking these difficult quantitative concepts and breaking them down into an understandable level. “The other thing I realized is that once you teach something, then you really know it,” he said. “First you read about something and try to understand it, but if you really want to know if you know something well, try to teach it someone. That’s how you really learn.”
ACADEMIC AFFAIRS
Members of promotion, tenure review committee announced In accordance with UGA Guidelines for Appointment, Promotion and Tenure, the membership of the University Review Committees are being announced. University Review Committee members for 2014-2015 are: • Fine and Applied Arts—Sandy Martin, Ron Miller (chair), John Morrow, Richard Neupert, Mark Reinberger, Stephen Scheer and David Zerkel. • Health and Clinical Sciences— Cathy Brown, Phaedra Corso, Buffy Howerth, David Hurley (chair), Holly Kaplan (clinical), Michele Lease, Toni Miles and Matthew Perri. • Humanities—Francis B. Assaf, Frank
R. Harrison, Elissa R. Henken, Chuck Platter (chair), Bob A. Pratt, Tim B. Raser and Hyangsoon Yi. • Life Sciences—Michael Adang, Mark Harrison, Allen Moore (chair), Jim Porter, B.C. Wang, Barney Whitman and Jeanna Wilson. • Physical Sciences—Hamid Arabnia, Lynne Billard, Douglas E. Crowe, Tim Grey, Ramana Pidaparti, Phillip Stancil (chair) and John Stickney. • Social and Behavioral Sciences— Barbara Biesecker, Jamie Carson, Brenda Cude, William Finlay, Erv Garrison, Marguerite Madden (chair) and Joshua Miller.
• Professional and Applied Studies [A]—Sundar G. Bharadwaj (chair), Paige Carmichael, Julian Cook, Robert Cooper, John Dayton, Romdhane Rekaya and Betsy Vonk. • Professional and Applied Studies [B]—John Blackstone (chair), Michael Bamber, Georgia Calhoun, Karen Cornell, Steve Oliver, Lynne Sallot and K.A.S. Wickrama. • Professional and Applied Studies [C]—Steven Castleberry, Linda Harklau (chair), Barry Hollander, Mary Ann Johnson, William Lastrapes, Susan Sanchez, Beth Phillips (clinical promotions) and Art Snow.
UGA ALUMNI ASSOCIATION
columns.uga.edu April 13, 2015
C.L. Morehead Jr.
James Blanchard
Willis Potts Jr.
Rebecca Hanner White
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Deep Shah
‘Extraordinary contributions’ Alumni Association to present 6 awards at annual luncheon
By Elizabeth Elmore eelmore@uga.edu
The UGA Alumni Association will present six awards to alumni, friends and faculty during its 78th annual Alumni Awards Luncheon April 17. The luncheon, which will take place during the university’s Honors Week, recognizes individuals who have demonstrated a deep commitment to bettering the university. “The UGA Alumni Association is pleased to once again celebrate the extraordinary contributions of the University of Georgia’s most generous alumni and friends,” said Meredith Gurley Johnson, executive director of alumni relations. “It is also a time to recognize the importance of private support to the success of the university and to reflect on the transformative nature this engagement has on the lives of thousands of students each year.” On-site registration and check-in for the Alumni Awards Luncheon will open at 11:30 a.m., and the program will begin at noon in the Grand Hall of the Tate Student Center. The Faculty Service Award first was presented in 1969 to recognize current or retired UGA faculty and staff who have distinguished themselves in service to the university. This year’s recipient is Rebecca Hanner White. White, who specializes in the areas of labor law, employment discrimination, employment law and law arbitration, served as the first female dean of the UGA School of Law. On Dec. 31, 2014, she stepped down as dean, yet remains on the School of Law faculty where she holds a J. Alton Hosch Professorship. The John F. and Marilyn McMullan Family will be recognized as the 2015 Family of the Year. John and Marilyn McMullan, who met while attending UGA, value higher education. Over the past 45 years, they have made the
Marilyn and John McMullan
university the beneficiary of their philanthropy. John McMullan graduated from UGA in 1959 and 1960 with undergraduate and master’s degrees in business, respectively, and is now the CEO of Camden Real Estate, an Atlantabased company he founded in 1990. The couple has established a number of scholarships at UGA, including a study-abroad scholarship, the McMullan Academic Support Fund, the Mr. and Mrs. John F. McMullan Football Scholarship and the McMullan Family Women’s Tennis Scholarship. The Dean’s Suite in the new Terry Business Campus will bear the McMullan family name. The Alumni Merit Award, the UGA Alumni Association’s oldest honor, will be presented to C.L. Morehead Jr. and James H. Blanchard. Morehead graduated from UGA in 1950 and 65 years later, is one of Athens’ most treasured businessmen and one of the university’s most generous benefactors. Through his business, Flowers Inc., Morehead became close friends with the late Lamar Dodd, for whom UGA’s School of Art
WEEKLY READER
Book showcases iconic Civil War photos
Lens of War: Exploring Iconic Photographs of the Civil War Edited By J. Matthew Gallman and Gary W. Gallagher University of Georgia Press Cloth and ebook: $32.95
Lens of War grew out of an invitation to leading historians of the Civil War to select and reflect upon a single photograph. Each could choose any image and interpret it in personal and scholarly terms. The result is a remarkable set of essays by 27 scholars, including one by Stephen Berry, UGA’s Gregory Professor of the Civil War Era. The scholars in this book have contributed numerous volumes on the Civil War exploring military, cultural, political, African-American, women’s and environmental history. The essays describe an array of photographs and present an eclectic approach to the assignment. Readers will rediscover familiar photographs and figures examined in unfamiliar ways. They also will discover little-known photographs that afford intriguing perspectives.
is named. Dodd inspired Morehead to become an avid art collector and today, the alumnus has assembled the largest collection of Lamar Dodd works and other significant collections of rugs and Chinese, tribal and pre-Colombian art and artifacts. “At the university and its Georgia Museum of Art, these items will be invaluable as a cultural resource; one that will be fundamental in teaching generations of students and the community,” Johnson said. James H. Blanchard holds a Bachelor of Business Administration and a Bachelor of Laws from UGA. He spent 34 years as CEO of Columbus, Georgia-based Synovus Financial Corp., guiding it during its greatest era of growth and prosperity. His servant leadership approach led Georgia Trend to name him its Most Respected CEO in 1997 and Georgian of the Year in 2003. In 1999, Fortune magazine named Synovus the best place to work in America, a direct result of Blanchard fostering a work-life balance as part of Synovus’ corporate culture.
The Friend of UGA Award is given to a non-UGA graduate whose professional or public service has greatly assisted the university, and this year, Willis J. Potts Jr., will be honored with the 2015 Friend of UGA Award. Potts graduated from the Georgia Institute of Technology with a bachelor’s degree in industrial technology. In 2004, Potts retired as vice president and general manager of TempleInland Corp. Today he is the chairman of the board of CatchMark Timber Trust in Atlanta. In 2006, Potts was appointed to the Board of Regents of the University System of Georgia and became chairman in 2010. It was during his time on the board of regents that Potts made his greatest contribution to UGA by championing the creation of the UGA College of Engineering, which now has enrolled more than 1,300 students since it was founded in 2012. The inaugural Young Alumni Award will be presented to Deep J. Shah. Shah arrived at UGA with a Foundation Fellowship, the university’s premier undergraduate scholarship for academically outstanding students. While attending UGA, he co-founded the UGA Roosevelt Institute Chapter, a student-led think tank. He was named a 2007 Truman Scholar and a 2007 Rhodes Scholar. After graduating summa cum laude in 2008 with degrees in international affairs and biology, Shah earned a master’s degree from Oxford University and then enrolled in Harvard Medical School on a Paul & Daisy Soros Fellowship for New Americans. Today, Shah is an internal medicine and primary care physician resident in the J. Willis Hurst Internal Medicine Residency Program at the Emory University School of Medicine. He plans to serve as a primary care doctor and physician policymaker. He continues to support the UGA Honors Program by engaging with prospective students, current students and alumni.
ABOUT COLUMNS
CYBERSIGHTS
Columns is available to the campus community by subscription for an annual fee of $20 (second-class delivery) or $40 (first-class delivery). Faculty and staff members with a disability may call 706-542-8017 for assistance in obtaining this publication in an alternate format. Columns staff can be reached at 706-542-8017 or columns@uga.edu
Editor Juliett Dinkins Art Director Janet Beckley Photo Editor Paul Efland
Plant Center site features photos, info
Senior Reporter Aaron Hale
http://plantcenter.uga.edu/
With its beautiful array of plant photography, the new website for The Plant Center highlights the breadth of research conducted in plant molecular breeding, biochemistry, genetics and genomics. The new website describes areas of research conducted by Plant Center members, ranging from discoveries in plant growth
and evolution to their application to agriculture and associated industries. It provides information on faculty, postdocs, graduate and undergraduate students, visiting scholars and staff. The website also features recent discoveries and upcoming symposia, retreats and other events.
Reporter Matt Chambers Copy Editor David Bill The University of Georgia is committed to principles of equal opportunity and affirmative action. The University of Georgia is a unit of the University System of Georgia. I
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8 April 13, 2015 columns.uga.edu GOLDWATER from page 1
and mentor them. I am delighted for Lauren, Erin and Karishma, and I look forward to watching their very bright futures unfold.” The students, all of whom are enrolled in UGA’s Franklin College of Arts and Sciences, plan to earn doctoral degrees related to biomedical research. In addition, all three students are members of UGA’s Honors Program and are recipients of UGA’s foremost undergraduate scholarship, the Foundation Fellowship. Dennison, a junior from Raleigh, North Carolina, is pursuing a double major in biochemistry and molecular biology, and genetics. She aims to earn a doctorate in cancer biology to explore the pathology of leukemia and the mechanisms that lead to drug resistance. She conducts research through UGA’s Center for Undergraduate Research Opportunities in the lab of professor Stephen Hajduk and spent last summer interning at New York University’s Langone Medical Center. Her research has resulted in a paper that she has submitted for publication in a peer-reviewed journal, and she has presented her findings at a national conference. Dennison is a member of UGA’s Palladia Honor Society, a UGA Honors Ambassador and is a member of UGA HEROs, a student organization dedicated to supporting children with HIV/AIDS in Georgia. Hollander, a sophomore from Athens, is pursuing a double major in biochemistry and molecular biology, and genetics. She is a current Ramsey Honors Scholar and recently was named a 2015 Mid-Term Foundation Fellow. She plans to earn a doctorate in biomedical engineering with the goal of conducting research into treatments for neurological disorders using gene therapy techniques. She has conducted research through CURO in the lab of Distinguished Research Professor Michael Terns. Through UGA’s Young Scholars Program, she has conducted research in the lab of Steven Stice, Georgia Research Alliance Eminent Scholar and director of UGA’s Regenerative Bioscience Center, as well as with professor Wayne Parrott. She also conducted research as an intern at the Institute of Molecular Medicine at the University of Lubeck in Germany through
the DAAD RISE scholarship program. She presented her research findings at the 2015 CURO Symposium and also is a member of the Roosevelt Institute at UGA, a studentrun policy think tank. Sriram, a junior from Athens, is pursuing a degree in biochemistry and molecular biology and plans to enroll in a combined M.D./ Ph.D. degree program and pursue research into the use of stem cells in healing bone injuries and other tissue damage. She has conducted research through CURO in Stice’s lab. She also has worked in the lab of GRA Eminent Scholar of Molecular Cell Biology Stephen Dalton through UGA’s Young Dawgs program. Under the mentorship of professor Bryan McCullick, she conducted policy research through the Roosevelt Institute Scholars Class on effective ways to address the lack of physical education in high schools. She tutors local schoolchildren through UGA MATHCOUNTS, is an Arch Society member and has studied abroad in Morocco, Bolivia, Bali and at Oxford University in the United Kingdom. In addition to UGA’s three Goldwater recipients, Kip Lacy, who is pursing a double major in ecology in the Odum School of Ecology and biology in the Franklin College, received an honorable mention. Lacy intends to earn a doctorate in evolution and ecology with the ultimate goal of conducting research and teaching at a university. “I am very thrilled for all of these students,” said David S. Williams, associate provost and director of the Honors Program. “They are dedicated researchers and wonderful people. It is a pleasure to work with them, and I know that this investment in their futures is well advised and well deserved.” The Goldwater Scholars were selected on the basis of academic merit from a field of 1,206 mathematics, science and engineering students who were nominated by the faculties of colleges and universities nationwide. The scholarship program honoring U.S. Sen. Barry Goldwater was designed to foster and encourage outstanding students to pursue careers in the fields of mathematics, the natural sciences and engineering.
FELLOWSHIPS from page 1 UGA’s 2015 NSF Fellows and their fields of study are: Catherine Lynn Debban, evolutionary biology; Courtney Kathleen Ellison, microbial biology; Eilidh Geddes, economics; Devon Paul Humphreys, evolutionary biology; Ayan Hussein, neuroscience; Jake Philip Moskowitz, psychology; Liza Diep Ngo, biochemistry; Hilde Oliver, biological
oceanography; Tomas Pickering, ecology; Todd Pierson, evolutionary biology; Malavika Rajeev, ecology; Daniel John Read, cultural anthropology; Francisco Jesus Sarabia, sustainable chemistry; Olivia Ann Thompson, microbial biology; Amy Katherine Webster, genetics; and Castle Adam Williams, communications.
Bulletin Board UGA Night at Six Flags
The 12th annual UGA Night at Six Flags Over Georgia will be April 17. UGA students, faculty, staff, alumni and their families will have exclusive access to the theme park from 6 p.m. until midnight. Tickets purchased by April 17 are $30.50 or $25.50 for students. Tickets sold online or at the gate are $35.50. All ticket purchasers will receive a voucher for a free return visit June 7, 14 or 21. Parking will be free, and children ages 2 and younger will be admitted without charge. Tickets may be purchased weekdays at the Tate Student Center’s cashier window from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., by calling 706-542-8074 or online at http://tate.uga.edu. Student ticket prices are honored at the cashier window only. Tickets ordered online or by phone are subject to the nonstudent rate. A limited number of bus passes are available at a cost of $14 for students and $24 for nonstudents. Bus passes are available for purchase at the cashier window only. For more information, call
706-542-8074 or see http://tate.uga.edu.
Spring pottery sale
The UGA Ceramic Student Organization will hold a spring pottery sale April 21-23 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. in the first floor lobby of the Lamar Dodd School of Art, 270 River Road. Work on sale will include handbuilt sculptures for home and garden as well as functional pottery: teapots, mugs, plates, vases and bowls. All work was made by ceramic students or faculty. Prices will start at $10. Proceeds from the pottery sale will support a student educational field trip to museums and galleries in New York as well as help bring resident artists to campus. Hourly parking is available at the Performing Arts parking deck, which is located next to the Performing Arts Center on River Road. For more information, contact Ted Saupe, tsaupe@uga.edu. Bulletin Board is limited to information that may pertain to a majority of faculty and staff members.
Paul Efland
Campus scenes Above: Habitat for Humanity International framed a house on the lawn of the Richard B. Russell Building Special Collections Libraries April 1. The framing was the highlight of a program to announce the opening of the Habitat for Humanity International records at UGA’s Hargrett Rare Book and Manuscript Library.
Andrew Davis Tucker
Left: Children watch newly hatched quail chicks during the College of Veterinary Medicine’s annual open house April 3. The event also included exotic animal displays, horseback-riding demonstrations, a parade of dog breeds and limited tours of the new UGA Veterinary Teaching Hospital.
CENTENNIAL from page 1
AWARD from page 1
Special Collections Libraries is the third largest media collection in the world. World War II caused a dramatic decline in enrollments with women assuming leadership roles. Margaret Childs became the first female editor of the Red & Black. Grady always attracted female students with 20 of its 61 graduates in the 1920s being women. Grady faculty and students were front and center in the American awakening that followed World War II. In 1953 four Red & Black editors resigned rather than knuckle under to demands of an arch-segregationist regent, and in 1961 Charlayne Hunter-Gault broke the segregation barrier and chose journalism as her major. She was befriended by Tom Johnson, also a Gradyite and Red & Black editor. Both went on to spectacular, award-winning careers and both have maintained close ties to the college. When Drewry retired in 1969, the college had just opened its current academic home following years in the Commerce and Journalism Building. By the ’80s a new norm had settled in. The faculty had matured into its research emphasis, a Ph.D. program was added in 1983, and with a full complement of degree programs the school became the Henry W. Grady “College” of Journalism and Mass Communication in 1988. Today, Grady College has 15 named and endowed professorships and chairs.With centers and institutes for everything from international research and outreach to management studies to health and risk communication, the college’s reputation is impressive with an open horizon of opportunities that await the college and its students in the next century. Like the partners with whom the college collaborates, Grady must transition to a digital-first footing while never losing sight of the principles of fairness, accuracy and truth telling, clear and concise written expression and the ethical moorings of these professions. To this end, Grady has completed a massive restructuring, merging the newsgathering faculty in a single journalism department and replacing the telecommunications department with the newly created entertainment and media studies department. As the venerable college prepares to launch its new journalism curriculum, students look toward a digital-first, multiplatform program that offers a rich mix of the skill sets needed to work in the newsrooms of tomorrow. Grady’s entertainment and media studies program combines the latest digital storytelling techniques, interactivity and gaming to capitalize on the momentum surrounding transmedia and the fast-growing film industry in Georgia. The department of advertising and public relations maintains its leadership status, preparing students for exciting careers in the era of digital social media.
A team that she leads recently was awarded a three-year, $18.8 million grant from the Gulf of Mexico Research Initiative to continue to measure the activities of the microorganisms that break down oil and gas and to assess the impacts of the spill. She has published more than 130 peerreviewed journal articles and book chapters, with nearly 20 more in review or under revision. In the past four years alone, she has received 11 external grants and published 29 peerreviewed journal articles. During that period, her research productivity has placed her in the top 1 percent of all 1,063 active faculty housed in marine sciences departments nationally, as measured by Academic Analytics. Joye has been recognized repeatedly for her research and instruction. She is the recipient of the Distinguished Service Award for Education and Outreach from the U.S. Department of the Interior and in 2014 was elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. In 2012 she was named one of the “100 Most Influential Georgians” by Georgia Trend magazine. She received UGA’s Creative Research Medal in 2007 and was named Athletic Association Professor in 2011. She has mentored more than 40 undergraduate students, 20 doctoral students and 12 postdoctoral fellows and also serves on departmental, Franklin College of Arts and Sciences and university committees, including as an elected member of the UGA President’s Faculty Advisory Committee. Joye regularly is called upon by the news media and national and international scientific agencies and policy groups for expert commentary. In 2010 she was interviewed, quoted or featured in more than 4,000 news stories and testified before the U.S. Congress about the Deepwater Horizon oil rig blowout. She has been an invited plenary speaker at eight Gordon Research Conferences over the last 10 years and is a current member of the Scientific Advisory Board for the Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology in Bremen, Germany, among many other academic engagements. Her extensive outreach includes more than 50 events in 2014 alone, including a speech to the Council on Foreign Relations about the impacts of climate change on the oceans and serving as an invited film judge, science speaker and youth mentor at the Blue Ocean Film Festival and Ocean Conservation Summit, an event organized by marine biologist Sylvia Earle’s Mission Blue Foundation. In 2014 Joye created the “Science at the Stadium” program, in which she and her research team educate alumni and fans, including hundreds of school-aged children, about science and oceanography before home football games.
THE UNIVERSITY OF GEORGIA
HONORS&AWARDS Richard B. Russell Awards 15
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Three UGA faculty members will receive Richard B. Russell Awards for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching April 13 at the 2015 Faculty Recognition Banquet at the Georgia Center. Russell Awards recognize outstanding teaching by faculty early in their academic careers. Award recipients receive $5,000. The Richard B. Russell Foundation in Atlanta supports the program.
Andrew Davis Tucker
Peter Jutras
Associate Professor of Music Piano Pedagogy and Class Piano Specialist Hugh Hodgson School of Music Franklin College of Arts and Sciences What makes a great music teacher is rooted in what happens beyond the classroom, said Peter Jutras, an associate professor of music and coordinator of undergraduate class piano and piano pedagogy instruction at the Hugh Hodgson School of Music. “I am driven to help students teach themselves by thinking creatively, experimenting, exploring, questioning, debating and evaluating a range of ideas,” he said. “This challenges them to truly make the learning process transformative, and it is my hope that they will extend these transformations to their own students, long after they have left my classroom.” Jutras arrived at UGA in 2006 as an assistant professor of music. Since then, he has worked to overhaul curriculum with a focus on broad skills—entrepreneurship, pedagogy and technology. In his nine years at the music school, Jutras has garnered over $100,000 in grants for new state-of-the-art instructional technology. Some of that technology includes software that allows students to practice at their own individual pace and advanced presentation technology for teaching assistants. Implementation of other teaching tools, such as video tutorials and submitting assignments via video, has further helped students learn in new ways. Students praise his passion for teaching, which is exemplified by his participation in so many ways to help educate students. He serves as an adviser to undergraduate piano teachers in the Community Music School, is co-adviser of the UGA student chapter of the Music Teachers National Association, TONIC, and has worked as a service-learning fellow this past year to create a distance learning program that will give students an opportunity to teach music to an all-girls school in Kenya. “Seeing the passion for his love of teaching not only makes me want to become more proficient at the instrument, but it encourages me every single class period that I am in the right degree program,” said David Kennedy Miller, a senior music education major. “If I can ever teach my students in the ways that he teaches us, then I know that success is in my future. He is an inspiration.” “Through his high standards and achievement in the classroom, his dedication to innovation, his creative reinterpretation and imagining of the learning process, and his high profile as editor-in-chief of the only critical journal of piano pedagogy in the United States today, he casts a broad and influential shadow,” said Dale E. Monson, Hodgson professor and music school director. “Dr. Jutras’ love for practical application of theory into translated and useful technique has inspired his students, helped guide his fellow faculty members to reach for new goals and transformed the musical experience of the undergraduate students in the Hodgson School.”
—Jessica Luton
Robert Newcomb
Andrew Owsiak
Paul Efland
Jennifer L. Palmer
Assistant Professor of International Affairs School of Public and International Affairs
Assistant Professor of History Franklin College of Arts and Sciences
As Andrew Owsiak circles the classroom in his trademark red shoes, there is a powerful sense of engagement with his students. “As an instructor, my goal is to teach students how to think critically about the world around them so that they, as citizens, can positively contribute to our democratic society,” Owsiak said. “I am very proud to provide students with an experience that they find supportive, challenging, interesting and educational.” Owsiak arrived at UGA in 2011 after receiving his doctorate in political science from the University of Illinois, UrbanaChampaign. In his three and half years at the School of Public and International Affairs, Owsiak has developed a teaching philosophy that emphasizes five core strengths: an innovative teaching style, mentorship, pedagogical research, performance development and passionate classroom instruction. For Owsiak, the most memorable and educational moments occur outside the classroom, and he tries to create those moments for his students through what generally is considered mentorship. “ ‘Mentoring’ is not even the right term,” said Markus Crepaz, head of the international affairs department. “He is socializing undergraduates into what it means to do research. He breathes a desire to learn into his students by exposing them to role-playing exercises, simulations and closely supervised research projects.” As the adviser to the Model United Nations, Owsiak plays a passive, yet important, role. His approach allows the students to make their own decisions and experience the effects of those decisions, while also remaining present and available for consultation. Additionally, Owsiak spends most of his mentoring time working through the Center for Undergraduate Research Opportunities. He often works with students for multiple semesters to introduce them to the academic research process, help them discover their own research interests and guide them through a process where they can research, write and present an independent project about a question that interests them. For his mentoring efforts, he was awarded the 2014 CURO Research Mentoring Award. Inside the classroom, Owsiak takes a similar approach by engaging his students in active-learning exercises. Whether he asks the students to lead discussions or participate in policy debates, his goal is to teach them to analyze the questions, identify the critical components of an answer and obtain consensus among the group. “The thing that makes Dr. Owsiak stand out as a mentor, professor and adviser is his ability to provide quiet leadership built upon a foundation of stability,” said former student Ashton Moss. “Professor Owsiak is an outstanding person and an exemplary professor who has made an enormous impact on my life.”
Eighteenth-century French salons created an intellectual community in which a diverse group of people with different backgrounds and interests debated critical questions with the goal of improving society. Using the salons as a model, Jennifer Palmer teaches Enlightenment concepts and texts in a forum that encourages her students to collaborate with and challenge each other. From upper-division seminars on “Women in Early Modern Europe” to introductory courses on Western society since 1500, Palmer uses the salon as a framework for her classroom even as she reimagines it for the digital age. According to history department head Claudio Saunt, Palmer falls into that elite group of professors truly engaged in reinventing the classroom. “For her ‘Age of Enlightenment’ class … Dr. Palmer has her students conduct primary and secondary research in groups on a topic of their choice and then create videos, which they post on YouTube (the “France Enlightenment” channel),” Saunt said. “The videos are amusing, creative and informative—just the kind of work we strive to inspire in our undergraduates.” Her colleague, Benjamin Ehlers, an associate professor of history, agrees. “Dr. Palmer’s innovative techniques are redefining the possibilities of undergraduate instruction in European and Atlantic history,” he said. Palmer arrived at UGA in 2011 after a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Chicago. A recipient of numerous grants and fellowships including a Chateaubriand Fellowship from the French government, Palmer’s first book, which grew out of her doctoral dissertation, “Intimate Bonds: Family and Slavery in the French Atlantic,” is forthcoming from the University of Pennsylvania Press. “The roots of our own society are in early modern Europe. To understand categories that affect us every day, such as race, gender and citizenship, we need to understand how they took shape,” Palmer said. “When students use social media to explore and share connections between past and present, they use classroom knowledge to engage with the world in a truly inspiring way.” Palmer’s enthusiasm and ingenuity percolate through her teaching to students at every level. She demonstrates an infectious desire for learning that guides, empowers and inspires. “In addition to contributing to the revitalization of my love for learning, Dr. Palmer is a kind and relatable person,” said freshman Jamie Radicioni. “She answers every question we have to the best of her ability but never pretends to know more than she does, and that down-to-earth quality allows us to be completely comfortable and speak freely in her class. She is the kind of professor everyone hopes for, and finding her so quickly is a gift I will not take for granted.”
—Caroline Paczkowski
—Alan Flurry
2015 HONORS & AWARDS
Josiah Meigs Teaching Professors
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Four faculty members will be honored as Josiah Meigs Teaching Professors April 13 at the 2015 Faculty Recognition Banquet at the Georgia Center. The professorship is the university’s highest recognition for instruction at the undergraduate and graduate levels. Meigs Professors receive a permanent salary increase of $6,000 and a one-year fund of $1,000 for academic support.
Robert Newcomb
Malcolm R. Adams
Dorothy Kozlowski
Peter Frey
Andrew Davis Tucker
Professor and Department Head Mathematics Franklin College of Arts and Sciences
Mark Harrison
Professor of Food Science and Technology College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences
Erica J. Hashimoto Allen Post Professor School of Law
Professor of Small Animal Internal Medicine College of Veterinary Medicine
A leader in graduate and undergraduate programs at UGA, Malcolm Adams is a tireless advocate for students and for academic rigor in American higher education. “There are so many pressing problems facing today’s world: climate change, poverty, epidemics and hunger,” Adams said. “Mathematics offers a collection of powerful tools to help us understand these problems and to model solutions. “Even more, it offers a precise language of science that helps us transcend opinions and politics so that we can address real issues,” he added. “I am forever grateful that I have the opportunity to teach these tools to my students while at the same time trying to convey the intrinsic joy of exploring their intricacies.” His instructional activities inside the classroom and beyond include restructuring calculus labs, mentoring, developing a 3000-level “transitional course,” developing applied mathematics and research experiences for the undergraduate curriculum, and working with middle and secondary school teachers to implement state and national mathematics education policies. Adams redesigned Math 2700, the differential equations class taken by all engineering majors, into a miniature introduction to applied mathematics that now is required of all math majors as well. Adams, who co-authored the textbook Measure Theory and Probability while still a graduate student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, has never lost interest in the innovative blending of course material. His Linear Algebra text is used widely across universities in the U.S., and Adams has designed “bridge courses” at UGA to help students pass from the computational paradigm of lower division courses to the theoretical realm in mathematics. In addition to these published texts, Adams chose not to professionally publish his notes on sequences and series—used extensively in these bridge courses at UGA—so as to make the notes freely available to students. “These courses are crucial in the development of the mathematics and mathematics education majors, and it is a daunting task indeed to teach them as they require a complete and thorough revamping of the students’ understanding not only of the material at hand but of mathematics itself,” wrote Theodore Shifrin, Meigs Professor of Mathematics in Adams’ nomination dossier.
After 31 years in the UGA food science and technology department, Mark Harrison still enjoys teaching and conducting research. “I like the fact that I can do both, but the student interaction is important and, after all, that’s really why we have universities,” he said. Harrison teaches courses in food microbiology, food toxicology and the governmental regulations of food safety and quality. In addition to teaching 20 percent of the advanced microbiology classes and four of the online master’s of food technology classes, Harrison advises students. He sometimes uses case studies to present the subject matter because they require the students to formulate and think critically to find solutions. This includes, for example, bringing guests from the industry into his “food law” class to provide a real-world approach to learning. “To do a fair job, I can’t just talk about the legal aspect. I’m not a lawyer. I say, ‘Here’s the law, and now let’s look at how it’s developed and why one side of the issue likes it and the other side doesn’t,’” he said. “We also look at the impact the laws and regulations have on our food.” Harrison tries to connect to students, but admits he’s had to make some changes over the years. “I try to relate to them, but I’m not 22 anymore,” he said. “It was easy to fall into that pseudo-student mode when I was young and first beginning to teach. But later, your interests and their interests become much different. I’m not here to be their buddy. I’m here to teach and advise them.” Harrison has changed his teaching style as a result of the generational gap that now separates him from most of his students. “I’m sure we have all heard speakers say ‘Remember when this or that happened’ when using an example without realizing their audience has no memory of the event since it may have occurred before they were born or when they were in middle school,” he said. “To make the information meaningful, I think you have to tell the story and then relate the story to the course materials.” Harrison must be hitting the mark as his student evaluations are always peppered with praise: “Patient, kind and understanding,” “Awesome, good attitude, not boring,” “His office doors are always open and he always responds to emails” “professional, personable, intelligent—expert on the subject matter,” and “Dr. Harrison is one of the best instructors I have had at any university.”
Erica J. Hashimoto, who holds the Allen Post Professorship at the School of Law, is a “hands down” favorite among law students. One former student said she “stands alone” as his “most influential” teacher. “She not only teaches her students the rule of law, she inspires them to shape and develop it in a truly meaningful way,” he said. What makes this description especially remarkable is that Hashimoto has just 10 years of teaching experience, and her classroom portfolio includes a first-year class as well as heavily subscribed upper-level courses and an experiential learning course. “Being an admired and effective teacher for all three types of courses takes a tremendous amount of dedication, skill and flexibility,” said former law school Dean Rebecca Hanner White, who nominated Hashimoto for the honor. “Each of these courses demands a very different type of instructional delivery.” Additionally, few law professors nationwide have diversified their teaching portfolios to straddle the long-established clinician/ nonclinician line. The creation of the Appellate Litigation Clinic is arguably one of Hashimoto’s greatest contributions. Through this experiential offering, three federal circuit courts of appeals appoint the clinic to represent clients. Thirdyear law students enter appearances on behalf of the clients, draft written briefs and orally argue the cases before these courts serving the 4th, 11th and D.C. circuits. When establishing the clinic, Hashimoto had to convince the 11th Circuit Court to adopt a rule allowing students to practice before that court. According to U.S. Court of Appeals Judge Beverly Martin, Hashimoto felt strongly that the experience of arguing on behalf of real clients in the U.S. Courts of Appeals would be invaluable for her students, and she put her own reputation on the line to make this happen. “The year I spent in the Appellate Litigation Clinic with professor Hashimoto was, to put it plainly, a life-changing experience,” said Thomas Clarkson,a former clinic student.“As I am sure you can imagine, with the clinic having only six students, every class session involved extremely close interactions between professor Hashimoto and the clinic team members. … This small classroom dynamic put pressure on both the students and the professor.” Hashimoto has said her former experience as a federal public defender in Washington, D.C., allowed her to “find her voice” as an advocate for others.
Cynthia Ward has been praised for being prepared, caring, compassionate, respectful and always aware that her students and clients learn in different ways. These hallmarks of Ward’s role as a teacher and clinician have made her the kind of veterinary doctor her students wish to become. The chief medical officer for the Small Animal Veterinary Teaching Hospital, Ward teaches both First-Year Odyssey courses to UGA’s undergraduates and veterinary students in both the classroom and hospital setting. She also trains interns and residents in small animal internal medicine. Board certified as a specialist and highly regarded as one of the world’s foremost experts in veterinary endocrinology—her niche area of internal medicine—Ward is a sought-after instructor on the continuing education circuit, and she is invited to present lectures at five to six national meetings each year. “Dr. Ward is able to let residents have enough freedom to manage their cases, but also gives sufficient oversight to feel guidance and backup, allowing them to gain confidence in their skills and develop as doctors,” said one of her graduate students. Ward begins nurturing their confidence in the classroom. And her impact is everlasting. “How she would affect my life in one day in the hospital was even more significant than what she taught me in class,” said Dr. Carolyn Karrh, a 2008 graduate who recalled her first hospital encounter with Ward. The professor and her students had entered an exam room to explain to a couple that their elderly dog—their “child”—had terminal cancer. “As it was clear the information was sinking in with the couple, Dr. Ward paused, knelt down in front of them, and with the most compassion I have ever seen from any veterinarian in nearly 15 years, proceeded to truly connect with those people, to look them directly in the eyes, talk about their dog, how special he was, how sick he was and how euthanasia was a kind decision if they were to consider it,” Karrh said. “I knew at that moment Dr. Ward was, without question or hesitation, the kind of veterinarian I wanted to be for the rest of my life.” Ward began her career as an educator at the University of Pennsylvania School of Veterinary Medicine, where she also earned both her medical degree and doctorate in veterinary medicine.
—Alan Flurry
—Sharon Dowdy
—Heidi Murphy
Cynthia Ward
—Kat Yancey Gilmore
2015 HONORS & AWARDS
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CREATIVE RESEARCH AWARDS Creative Research Awards are given in the sciences, the arts and humanities and the social and behavioral sciences to recognize outstanding bodies of work that have gained broad recognition. Stories by James E. Hataway
Andrew Davis Tucker
INVENTOR’S AWARD
for a unique and innovative discovery that has made an impact on the community Jerry Johnson, a professor of crop and soil sciences in the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, has developed or co-developed a total of 44 new small grain crop varieties, including several wheat and barley cultivars. His research particularly focuses on the development of plant seeds or tissues that resist common diseases and pests, such as leaf rust, powdery mildew and Hessian fly. Johnson continues to release approximately two new wheat varieties each year. The total gross license revenue received by the UGA Research Foundation from the commercialization of his varieties totals nearly $3 million. With other land-grant universities, he was also instrumental in establishing the Sungrains Cooperative Breeding Group, a small grain breeding and marketing effort that gives private industry a valuable source for elite new plant varieties. The discoveries made in Johnson’s lab continue to benefit farmers throughout the Southeast, who are constantly searching for new crop varieties that promise to increase yields.
Andrew Davis Tucker
ACADEMIC ENTREPRENEUR OF THE YEAR AWARD
for a faculty member who has started a company within the past four years based on research originated at UGA Steven Stice, D.W. Brooks Distinguished Professor, Georgia Research Alliance Eminent Scholar and director of the Regenerative Bioscience Center, has led industry and academic research teams in the area of pluripotent stem cells for over 20 years. Prior to joining the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences at UGA, Stice worked for a Fortune 500 company and was co-founder, CSO and CEO of Advanced Cell Technology, the only U.S. company currently in human clinical trials using human pluripotent stem cells. Stice’s entrepreneurial spirit continues at UGA, where he co-founded four startup companies: Prolinia, Cytogenesis, which later merged with what is now ViaCyte, ArunA Biomedical and SciStem. ArunA was the first company to commercialize a product derived from human pluripotent stem cells, and the company has developed stem cells that were used to facilitate approval of Pfizer’s current cognitive enhancing pharmaceuticals.
Peter Frey
ALBERT CHRIST-JANER AWARD
File / Dot Paul
LAMAR DODD AWARD
File / Dot Paul
WILLIAM A. OWENS AWARD
for distinguished achievements in the arts and humanities
for distinguished achievements in the sciences
for distinguished achievements in the social and behavioral sciences
Sunkoo Yuh, a professor of art in Franklin College’s Lamar Dodd School of Art, is a renowned artist and sculptor whose works have been featured in galleries throughout the world. Calling on the rich cultural and artistic heritage of his native Korea, Yuh draws images intuitively and spontaneously with ink and brush. After studying his drawings carefully, he transforms those he cherishes most into three-dimensional ceramic sculptures that express his relationships, life experiences and memories. Featuring tight groupings of various forms, including plants, animals, fish and human figures, his work is driven by implied narratives that often suggest sociopolitical critiques. In the last decade, Yuh has been invited to participate in 72 group exhibitions, and he is represented by four galleries in Florida, Massachusetts, New York and Philadelphia. Yuh’s work also is included in 20 permanent museum collections, including the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C., the Philadelphia Museum of Art and the Museum of Fine Art in Houston.
Geert-Jan Boons, Distinguished Professor in Biochemical Sciences, is a world leader in glycoscience and synthetic chemistry. His discoveries have provided new insights into a variety of infectious and immunological processes, and many of the compounds developed in his laboratory are entering clinical evaluation. A faculty member in the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences, Boons is best known for co-developing a vaccine that trains the immune system to recognize and attack tumors. In a mouse model that mimics human breast and pancreatic cancer, this vaccine shrunk tumor size by an average of 80 percent. He also is recognized widely for developing one of the first methods to synthesize asymmetrical N-glycans, which are complex structures that are essential for normal cell function. This discovery will allow the scientific community to develop a better understanding of how complex carbohydrates function and how to fight against the diseases some of them cause.
W. Keith Campbell, department head and a professor of psychology in Franklin College, is a nationally recognized expert on narcissism, society and generational change. Narcissism—an inflated and grandiose sense of self—is associated with a range of social problems. Campbell’s research focuses on the role of narcissism in close relationships, organizations, cultural trends and broader sociological and economic issues. He has demonstrated that narcissists devalue and destabilize their close relationships with friends and loved ones, and his work also shows that narcissistic leaders can be both charismatic and cause significant problems in organizations. Campbell has examined narcissistic behavior on social media like Facebook, and he currently is examining the phenomena of geek culture and selfies. In addition to his numerous research articles, Campbell is author of the books When You Love a Man Who Loves Himself and The Narcissism Epidemic: Living in the Age of Entitlement and co-editor of The Handbook of Narcissism and Narcissistic Personality Disorder.
Creative Research Medals
2015 HONORS & AWARDS
2015 HONORS & AWARDS
Distinguished Research Professor
D April 13, 2015
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Stories by James E. Hataway
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Stories by James E. Hataway
These medals are awarded for outstanding research or creative activity within the past five years that focuses on a single theme identified with the University of Georgia.
The title of Distinguished Research Professor is awarded to faculty who are recognized internationally for their original contributions to knowledge and whose work promises to foster continued creativity in their discipline.
Paul Efland
Dorothy Kozlowski
Dorothy Kozlowski
Robert Newcomb
Paul Efland
Andrew Davis Tucker
Peter Brosius, a professor of anthropology in the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences, has been at the forefront of efforts to transform the field of environmental anthropology. He is recognized widely as an authority on the Penan hunter-gather peoples in Malaysian Borneo, and he is also a leading scholar on the political ecology of conservation. Brosius has used his scholarly expertise to analyze the impact of environmental degradation on local and indigenous communities and to demonstrate the multiple linkages that connect those communities to global institutions and processes. He is also the founding director of UGA’s Center for Integrative and Conservation Research, which promotes interdisciplinary research collaborations that foster the evolution of the integrative approaches that make space for multiple perspectives and ways of thinking about complex trade-offs in conservation and development. Brosius and his colleagues have used this approach to examine a variety of conservation topics, including the social acceptability of bioenergy in the American South. He also continues an active research trajectory focused on the interactions between local communities, conservation and development in Malaysia and Indonesia.
Noel Fallows is associate dean of international and multidisciplinary programs and the senior professor of Spanish in the Romance languages department of Franklin College. He is also a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London. Literary critic, historian, translator and editor, Fallows is one of the foremost authorities in the world in the field of Medieval and Renaissance chivalric culture. His work focuses on Western Europe, with particular emphasis on the Iberian Peninsula. He has published a large number of influential books and articles on topics as varied as jousts, tournaments, military medicine, early equine medicine, knightly cults of wounds, propaganda campaigns, psychological warfare, mounted combat and riding techniques and arms and armor. The clear and accessible style of his books and articles offers readers the opportunity to consider social and political questions from the past that remain powerfully resonant today, including questions of war and peace as well as the complexities of relations between Christians and Muslims. His research publications have garnered numerous international awards and have been widely acclaimed for their innovative interdisciplinary research, meticulous textual analysis and thorough cultural contextualization.
Nancy Manley, a professor of genetics in Franklin College and director of UGA’s Developmental Biology Alliance, is recognized internationally as an expert on the development, function and aging of the thymus and parathyroid organs. These areas are highly relevant to the function of the immune and endocrine systems. Manley has carved a unique niche at the intersection of development, immunology and aging. By using molecular genetic approaches to investigate the biology of the thymus across the entire life span, she has been able to uncover fundamental principles of organ development and aging, including mechanisms regulating stability of cell fate and degeneration of the immune system with aging. These principles have particular relevance to developing therapeutic interventions aimed at improving the immune system in the elderly by rejuvenating or replacing an aged thymus. She was recently part of a research team that was the first to grow a fully functional thymus in a living animal from transplanted cells. This discovery one day could aid in the development of laboratory-grown replacement organs, and it may form the basis of a thymus transplant for people with weakened immune systems.
Scott Ardoin, a professor of educational psychology in the College of Education, has been a pioneer in the application of new methods for improving upon a popular reading intervention commonly referred to as repeated readings. Although the procedure is recommended as a best practice by the National Reading Panel, the majority of research supporting repeated readings demonstrates its effectiveness in helping students to read materials that they practice, rather than new, unpracticed material. Concerned with these limited generalization effects, Ardoin created innovative procedures to increase the probability that the intervention schools were providing to struggling readers would result in greater classroom gains. Whereas other repeated readings procedures require one-on-one instruction, the modified procedures produced significant gains in students’ reading fluency with a 1-to-3 teacher student ratio, allowing the intervention to be provided to more students without the need for additional resources. More recently, Ardoin has employed previously unused technology, such as eye-tracking devices, to better understand how and why students’ reading improves.
Shiyou Chen, an associate professor of physiology and pharmacology in the College of Veterinary Medicine, has made many important contributions to the understanding of smooth muscle development, which is important for both cardiovascular development and the onset of several major cardiovascular diseases. Chen developed two powerful cell model systems that have been very useful to study the molecular mechanisms controlling smooth muscle development. These two models allow scientists to identify the fundamental regulatory mechanisms governing the different functional properties of vascular smooth muscle cells and how diversity in these cells may contribute to the onset of cardiovascular diseases. His other works have identified several molecular targets useful for the development of new drug-eluting stents, which are coated with medicine that prevents scar tissue from growing into the artery. Chen’s discoveries will allow the development of new drugs to regulate the proliferation of smooth muscle and endothelial cells and could lead to new coatings on stents that reduce blood clot risk.
Robert Cooper, a professor of wildlife ecology and biometrics in the Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources, is recognized for his innovative research using advanced quantitative methods to improve decision-making about the conservation of bird populations. His work has influenced how this important natural resource is managed in the Southeast and has had a lasting impact on how wildlife conservation is taught. A particular theme in Cooper’s work is the study of how insectivorous bird populations interact with and control populations of their prey, which has advanced the understanding of how the insect food base drives bird survival and population dynamics. More recently, Cooper has broadened his research to understand the effects of climate change and other human impacts on a variety of bird habitats and species. He currently is co-leading a team of scientists, land managers and policymakers to develop a biodiversitymonitoring program for coastal habitats along the Gulf of Mexico in the wake of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill.
Graduate student award recipients
Andrew Davis Tucker
Robert Newcomb
Susan Mattern, a professor of history in the Franklin College, has established an outstanding national and international reputation as an expert on the history of Rome. Her first book, Rome and the Enemy, is regarded widely as one of the most important contributions to the topic of Roman imperialism and was among the first to emphasize the informal nature of Roman rule that relied more on negotiation and patronage than scholars previously had realized. Mattern’s second book, Galen and the Rhetoric of Healing, represents a major shift in her research focus. In it, she argues that medicine was inflected by Greek ways of thinking about social values such as citizenship and masculinity. Therapy, she illustrates, was both an intimate dialogue between doctor and patient and a negotiation over power in the patient’s household. Mattern continued to break new ground in her third book, The Prince of Medicine, which is the first to systematically set the prominent Greek physician Galen in his social and environmental context—the ancient Mediterranean world of infectious disease. Previously portrayed as a dogmatic pedant, Mattern argues that Galen carried on an exhausting clinical practice that included several years of battle with the Mediterranean world’s first smallpox epidemic.
Boris Striepen, Georgia Research Alliance Distinguished Investigator and a professor of cellular biology in Franklin College, has made tremendous contributions toward understanding the cell and molecular biology of human parasites. His work has focused particularly on Toxoplasma, an opportunistic pathogen that causes severe disease in patients with weakened immune systems, such as AIDS patients or organ transplant recipients. Striepen studied a novel cell component, which is required for parasite survival and an attractive target for drug development. More recently, his laboratory has investigated the parasite Cryptosporidium. This organism is a leading cause of diarrheal disease and death in infants and toddlers around the world. Striepen and his colleagues have developed technology to genetically manipulate this organism, which up to now has been notoriously difficult to study. They are using this technology to work toward urgently needed drugs and vaccines. His genetic analyses of various parasites also have generated a clearer picture of the evolutionary origin and fundamental composition of dangerous pathogens. Striepen views teaching and the training of young scientists as an important and most enjoyable part of his work.
• Robert C. Anderson Memorial Award This award is given to recent doctoral students for outstanding research at UGA or immediately after graduating. It is named for the late Robert C. Anderson, who served as UGA’s vice president for research and president of the University of Georgia Research Foundation Inc. This year’s recipients are Danielle Atkins, a recent doctoral graduate in public administration and policy. Her research focuses on federal and state-level policy changes that make emergency contraception available without prescription and how these shifts have affected contraceptive behaviors of women; and Julie Rushmore, a recent doctoral graduate in ecology, who uses behavioral observations from a community of wild chimpanzees in Kibale National Park, Uganda, to examine how disease-causing pathogens are transmitted among the chimps and to evaluate the effectiveness of various disease intervention strategies. • James L. Carmon Award Presented to UGA graduate students who have used computers in innovative ways, the award is named for the late UGA faculty member who for 36 years helped make the university a leader in computer research and development. The award was established by the Control Data Corp. This years’s recipients are Dilina Perera, a doctoral candidate in physics and astronomy, who developed a state-of-theart computer simulation technique that unites two methods used to solve problems
in condensed matter physics: molecular dynamics and spin dynamics; and Ryan Toole, a master’s candidate in engineering, who is developing an optical processing scheme that mimics neuron interactions within biological neural networks.
• Postdoctoral Research Awards Created in 2011, these awards recognize the remarkable contributions of postdoctoral research scholars to the UGA research enterprise. The UGA Research Foundation funds up to two awards a year to current scholars. This year’s recipient is Olivia Perwitasari, a postdoctoral researcher in the infectious diseases department of the College of Veterinary Medicine, who has made remarkable contributions to the field of antiviral therapeutics and the host-virus interactions to govern infection outcome. Her work at UGA has focused on the repurposing of available drugs as new influenza treatments. • Graduate Student Excellence-inResearch Awards Initiated in 1999 to recognize the quality and significance of graduate student scholarship, these awards may be given in five areas: fine arts, humanities and letters, life sciences, mathematical and physical sciences, and applied studies. This years’s recipients are Allison Howard, a recent doctoral graduate in psychology, who studies animal travel patterns in natural environments and the decision-
making processes that animals use to decide where to go. She is currently a postdoctoral researcher in the University of Maryland’s department of biology; Yuanyuan Ma, a recent doctoral g raduate in food science and technology, who took on a research project that focuses on fortifying peanut butter with antioxidant-rich peanut skins, which generally are regarded as an industrial byproduct. Ma’s research makes possible the development of new peanut butter product lines and niche markets of peanut skin-fortified products with improved antioxidant and fiber levels; Colette Miller, a recent doctoral graduate in foods and nutrition, who studies obesity and how excessive weight may contribute to the development of liver diseases like fatty liver, fibrosis, cirrhosis and liver cancers. Currently a postdoctoral research associate at UGA, Miller recently accepted a postdoctoral research position at the Environmental Protection Agency at Research Triangle Park; Anriban Mukhopadhyay, a recent doctoral graduate in computer science, who researches the use of 3-D shape analysis, computer vision and machine learning in biomedical image analysis. He is currently a postdoctoral fellow at the IMT Institute for Advanced Studies in Lucca, Italy; and Pauline Reid, a recent doctoral graduate in English, who conducts highly original research that integrates and extends scholarship on early modern vision, book history and early modern rhetoric. She currently is a lecturer at the University of Denver Writing Program.
File / Dot Paul
Peggy Ozias-Akins, a professor of horticulture in the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, is recognized widely as a world expert on apomixis, the asexual production of seeds in plants. While this phenomenon is rare, seeds produced by apomictic plants germinate into plants that are exact genetic copies of the parent. For agriculture, the incorporation of apomixis means the possibility of using hybrid seeds without having to cross two different parents each time. Ozias-Akins was among the first to localize apomixis to a chromosomal region, and later she found the first plant gene associated with apomixis. Her research lays the foundation to start research into systematic application of apomixis in plant breeding. Harnessing this form of asexual seed formation could lead to major improvements in yield and economize the delivery of new plant varieties, which could have enormous impact on agriculture in both advanced and developing nations.
Jan Westpheling, a professor of genetics in Franklin College, has made extensive contributions to the emerging field of bioenergy. Working as part of the BioEnergy Science Center, one of three Bioenergy Research Centers funded by the U.S. Department of Energy for biofuels research, Westpheling developed genetic methods for the previously uncharacterized bacterium Caldicellulosiruptor bescii and used those tools to engineer a pathway for ethanol production. This unusual organism grows best in the heated waters around hydrothermal vents, thriving in temperatures around 170 degrees Fahrenheit. Her laboratory engineered a version of this bacterium that is capable of converting switchgrass—a nonfood, renewable feedstock—directly into ethanol without conventional pretreatment of the biomass. Removing the necessity of pretreatment not only saves time, it also significantly reduces costs, one of the major obstacles to sustainable biofuel production. Westpheling’s discovery could pave the way for the rapid introduction of new biofuels to the market using sustainable biomass feedstocks, which would reduce dependence on nonrenewable fuel sources such as petroleum and limit the production of greenhouse gases.
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Early-Career Scholars 2015 HONORS & AWARDS
April 13, 2015 columns.uga.edu
Stories by James E. Hataway
Named in honor of UGA’s 18th president (Fred C. Davison), 20th president (Charles B. Knapp) and 21st president (Michael F. Adams), these awards recognize outstanding accomplishment and evidence of potential future success in scholarship, creative work or research by early-career faculty members.
Robert Newcomb
Andrew Davis Tucker
Peter Frey
FRED C. DAVISON EARLY-CAREER SCHOLAR AWARD
CHARLES B. KNAPP EARLY-CAREER SCHOLAR AWARD
MICHAEL F. ADAMS EARLY-CAREER SCHOLAR AWARD
Named in honor of UGA’s 18th president, this award recognizes outstanding accomplishment and evidence of potential future success in scholarship, creative work or research by an early-career faculty member in the sciences.
Named in honor of UGA’s 20th president, this award recognizes outstanding accomplishment and evidence of potential future success in scholarship, creative work or research by an early-career faculty member in the social and behavioral sciences.
Named in honor of UGA’s 21st president, this award recognizes outstanding accomplishment and evidence of potential future success in scholarship, creative work or research by an early-career faculty member in the arts and humanities.
Nicholas Berente, an assistant professor of management information systems, is a rising star in his field, leading a number of interdisciplinary efforts to fundamentally affect the way large-scale science happens. His research focuses on the way digital innovations reshape some of society’s most entrenched institutions. “Digital innovation” is a term Berente uses to describe everything from smartphones, computers and software to large-scale IT-enabled infrastructures. His work in the social sciences focuses on the development of computational approaches based on gene-sequencing tools from computational biology to better understand organizations. He looks at sequences of organizational activities, or routines, along with the individuals and technologies used in these routines as a sort of “organizational DNA.” Berente’s approach bridges the divide between computer science and information systems, which could be highly beneficial to helping manage the nation’s scientific efforts.
Chloe Wigston Smith, an assistant professor of English, is an outstanding scholar and author of the recently published book Women, Work and Clothes in the EighteenthCentury Novel. This groundbreaking work shows, for the first time, how women’s work with textiles and garments contributed to the creation of the British novel. It revises current approaches to the role of labor in fiction and the history of sexuality to reveal how the novel reshaped women’s roles and the value of their work. Using an innovative interdisciplinary methodology, this book juxtaposes novels with a wide-ranging collection of clothes, engravings, criminal trials and trade debates to examine the genre from a new perspective. Wigston Smith currently is working on a new book project that examines gender, the novel and domestic crafts in an imperial setting. This work also will draw on her joint expertise in literary studies and art history, and bring together a diverse range of texts and material artifacts.
Roberto Perdisci, an assistant professor of computer science, has made great strides in his research on Internet security by inventing new, more effective defense solutions against malicious software, more commonly known as malware. Malware infections affect hundreds of millions of users worldwide and enable most of today’s cybercrimes, including identity theft and online robberies. His research bridges computer and network security with machine learning and big data mining, and his work already has made significant impacts on real-world network defense systems. Perdisci and his students have developed a malware detection system called AMICO, which is used by the UGA Information Security Office to defend UGA’s campus network against infections. The success of this project is further demonstrated by the fact that Perdisci has received new funding from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to transition the AMICO system to market. He also has received a Faculty Early-Career Development grant from the National Science Foundation.
Service-Learning Teaching Excellence Award Sponsored by the Office of Service-Learning, a public service and outreach unit, this award recognizes faculty who have developed innovative academic service-learning courses that integrate relevant community service with academic coursework to enhance student learning, develop civic responsibility and address community needs. Stories by Shannon Wilder Kris Irwin, a senior public service associate in the Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources, developed the first designated service-learning course in the forestry school. In “Foundations of Environmental Education,” students partner with community and government organizations such as Athens-Clarke County Stormwater Education and Sandy Creek Park to create environmental education plans. Irwin also regularly teaches a course in “Natural Resource Management for Teachers” and has taught international Kris Irwin service-learning courses in Costa Rica, including a new spring break course about tropical reforestation. Irwin previously served as a senior scholar for the Office of Service-Learning in 2008-09 and helped develop a faculty toolkit for creating service-learning protocol courses at UGA Costa Rica.
Michael Marshall, a professor and area chair of photography in the Lamar Dodd School of Art, has engaged undergraduate and graduate photography students in service-learning courses since 2010 by partnering with communities across Georgia through UGA’s Archway Partnership as well as locally to implement documentary photography and digital storytelling skills with the community. Marshall’s service-learning courses are designed to promote artistic, academic and civic learning through community photography. Michael Marshall A former student wrote that Marshall’s service-learning course “took me out of my comfort zone, requiring creative problem solving and improvisation ... (and) has inspired a desire to become a better citizen and pursue the ideals of my work on a local level as well as in my photography.” Marshall previously was recognized as a Service-Learning Fellow in 2011-2012.
2015 HONORS & AWARDS
columns.uga.edu April 13, 2015
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PUBLIC SERVICE & OUTREACH
The Office of the Vice President for Public Service and Outreach will recognize five faculty members and one staff member for outstanding service to the state and UGA at the 24th annual Public Service and Outreach Meeting and Awards Luncheon April 13. Stories by Maegan Snyder
Alfredo Martinez
Raye Rawls
Paula Sanford
Clint Waltz
WALTER BARNARD HILL FELLOW When Eric Prostko was growing up in the Northeast, he initially was exposed to agriculture during frequent visits to the small farm of a childhood friend. During college, Prostko had the opportunity to work on a small row-crop/vegetable farm where he was introduced to basic agriculture and farming principles. It was during that time that Prostko was inspired to set out on a path that would lead him right to the heart of the agricultural industry. After receiving his master’s degree in agronomy/weed science, he took his first job as a county extension agent where he worked for five years before going back to school to earn his doctorate and become an extension specialist. Today, Prostko is a professor and Extension weed specialist in the crop and soil sciences department where he is responsible for the statewide weed science programs in field corn, peanut, soybean, sunflower, grain sorghum and canola. In short, he is the primary person in the state of Georgia responsible for making sure growers know how to manage the weeds in these crops. In recognition of his work, Prostko has been named the 2015 recipient of the Walter Barnard Hill Fellow Award presented each year by the Office of the Vice President for Public Service and Outreach. The Hill Fellow Award is UGA’s highest award in public service and outreach, recognizing sustained, distinguished achievement and contributions to improving the quality of life in Georgia or elsewhere. “Eric is recognized as one of the leading experts, both regionally and nationally, in his field,” said Don Shilling, head of the crop and soil sciences department in the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences. “Collectively, his research and extension programs have an Eric Prostko annual estimated impact of more than $64 million in Georgia.” As a former county extension agent, Prostko is deeply committed to the county delivery system. In his role, he takes university research and delivers that information to the general public—in his case, through Georgia county extension agents. Whether it is through inservice training programs, educational programs or county production meetings, his goal is to make sure he’s extending the information to the people who need it and can benefit from it most. “I feel as though my primary responsibility is serving as a resource person for our county extension agents,” Prostko said. “My main role is to respond to their questions and look to the future to see what potential problems might be on the horizon and have those answers before they develop.” Right now, Prostko said the biggest issue he sees in his field nationally is herbicide resistance weeds— specifically in Georgia, Palmer amaranth, which is a type of pigweed. “Weeds are a huge problem for crops, and most growers spend a large portion of their money on weed control,” Prostko said. “We’ve been working on the resistant weed issue for the past 10 years and are slightly ahead of the game compared to other states. So we frequently get requests to visit other locations and share our knowledge about how we’re managing herbicide resistant weeds and what growers in other areas might be able to do if they’re not doing it now.” Prostko said at the end of the day, what they are really trying to do is solve problems and develop information that keeps Georgia growers profitable. And to do that, county agents must have the most up-to-date information available. “I am in a unique position because instead of reading the information from somebody else, I’m living it,” Prostko said. “I’m the person who actually collected the data, sprayed the plot, was driving the tractor or whatever it might be.” Prostko currently is preparing for the spring and summer months where he primarily will conduct research trials in the field. He’s also focused on making sure the state’s newest and youngest agents are properly trained and ready to address any issue that might come their way.
WALTER BARNARD HILL AWARD Four faculty members and service professionals will receive the Walter Barnard Hill Award for Distinguished Achievement in Public Service and Outreach in recognition of their outstanding contributions to the improvement of the quality of life in Georgia and beyond. This year’s Hill Award recipients are Alfredo Martinez, Raye Rawls, Paula Sanford and Clint Waltz. Martinez, a professor of plant pathology in the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, focuses on disease management and production practices for turfgrass, small grains and grass forages in Georgia. Rawls, a public service associate at the J.W. Fanning Institute for Leadership Development, works in community leadership development with a specialty in conflict resolution, mediation and arbitration. Sanford, a public finance and organization specialist at the Carl Vinson Institute of Government, has helped public agencies throughout Georgia address critical governance issues on retirement benefit reforms through applied research and technical assistance. Waltz, a professor and turfgrass extension specialist in the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, has statewide responsibilities in all turfgrass management areas, including turfgrass water management.
STAFF AWARD FOR EXCELLENCE The Public Service and Outreach Staff Award for Excellence honors outstanding effort and workplace creativity and innovation, and celebrates the achievements of public service and outreach staff. T h e 2 0 1 5 r e c i p i e n t i s S a n dy Christopher, a program coordinator and assistant to the director at the J.W. Fanning Institute for Leadership Development. Sandy Christopher
H April 13, 2015
2015 HONORS & AWARDS
columns.uga.edu
TEACHING AWARDS
FIRST-YEAR ODYSSEY TEACHING AWARDS
CREATIVE TEACHING AWARDS
Six UGA faculty were honored with 2015 First-Year Odyssey Teaching Awards at a reception April 1. Award recipients and their seminar titles are:
Presented by the Office of the Vice President for Instruction, the Creative Teaching Awards recognize UGA faculty for excellence in developing and implementing creative teaching strategies to improve student learning. Up to three awards are presented annually to encourage instructional excellence.
• Robert Beckstead, an associate professor of poultry science and undergraduate coordinator, College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, “Chickenology: Everything You Need to Know About Chickens”; • Janet Frick, an associate professor of psychology, Franklin College of Arts and Sciences, “Humans and Animals in Society;” • Lisa Fusillo, a professor of dance, Franklin College, “Creating Magic: Inside the Creative Process”; • Stephanie Jones, a professor of educational theory and practice, College of Education, “Working-Class Matters”; • L. Stephen Miller, a professor of
psychology, Franklin College, “Psychology of Aging”; and • Brock Tessman, an associate professor of international affairs, School of Public and International Affairs, “Games Nations Play: Strategy in International Relations.” This was the second annual First-Year Odyssey awards reception to recognize outstanding instructors who have demonstrated innovation in teaching, connection of seminar content to the instructor’s research and how program goals are incorporated into the seminar.
—Tracy Coley
Robert Beckstead
Janet Frick
Lisa Fusillo
Stephanie Jones
Stephen Miller
Brock Tessman
—Courtney Smith
OUTSTANDING ADVISOR AWARDS
Robert Beckstead
Robert Beckstead, an associate professor of poultry science in the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, voluntarily has increased his advising load in his eight years as an advisor to ensure students meet with a faculty member in their first semester. He also has assisted in designing an advising protocol that has been implemented within the department. He is known for inviting advisees interested in graduate school to conduct research in his laboratory.
Michelle McFalls
Richard Menke, an associate professor in English in the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences, has developed an innovative approach to analyzing a novel in collaboration with another faculty member and class from North Carolina State University. Students from both classes worked on research teams together, using Skype and digital research tools to analyze data derived from Charles Dickens’ David Copperfield. The project, named “Data Copperfield,” was transformative for the students as they collaborated with peers from different universities and analyzed text in a data-derived format. Montgomery Wolf, a senior lecturer of history in Franklin College, uses a variety of teaching methods, including service-learning, game-based learning and activelearning strategies such as “flipping the classroom.” In her classes, Wolf’s students examine primary sources and produce historical content to allow them to think and act like actual historians. She also encourages her students to use a range of learning technologies, like TopHat, WordPress and podcasting, to increase engagement opportunities. Brock Woodson, an assistant professor, and Siddharth Savadatti, a lecturer, strive to impact learning and retention rates by incorporating active engagement strategies in their “Statics and Fluid Mechanics” courses in the College of Engineering. They also employ flipped classroom practices by introducing students to topics via brief Web videos viewed outside of class, with homework assignments that include foundational problems based on concepts covered in the videos. In class, students collaborate with instructors, teaching assistants and undergraduate students to work through more complex problems and concepts in both one-on-one and small group formats. Their teaching approach has moved introductory knowledge delivery outside of the classroom while employing hands-on problem-solving strategies in class.
Richard Menke
Montgomery Wolf
Brock Woodson
Siddharth Savadatti
The Outstanding Advisor Award is presented by the Office of the Vice President for Instruction each spring to recognize three outstanding UGA academic advisors. Michelle McFalls, an advisor in the Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication, was chosen as the staff recipient of the award for her impact on students and her willingness to go above and beyond her regular duties as an advisor. She has spent eight of her past 12 years as an advisor in the advertising and public relations department after previously serving in the College of Education and the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences.
Diana Beckett
Congratulations Great faculty and staff make a great university—and there are many here at UGA. They are committed to our students. They are committed to their research and scholarship, and they are committed to serving the state of Georgia and beyond.
President Jere W. Morehead
Diana Beckett in the Terry College of Business already has made a meaningful impact on students’ academic careers in her two years as an advisor in the economics department. She serves as a dedicated advisor to 450 students in two undergraduate degree programs as well as a combined bachelor’s and master’s degree program. Although she manages many students and responsibilities, she is always attentive to the needs of her advisees.
—Tracy Coley