WP Perspectives

wpperspectives Vol. 9 No. 1 May 2011

University Festival Promotes Multiculturalism A three-week festival of the arts and culture of Africa on campus this spring brought not only a celebration of the many different cultures of the continent to the University community, but also served to provide students with a truly global multicultural outreach that ties directly into the University’s mission.

“The festival works in many dimensions,” says Raymond Torres-Santos, dean, College of the Arts and Communication, the founding sponsor of the festival now in its second year. “It fulfills the University’s wish to expose students to a global education through the arts and culture, but also serves to connect the institution to the community.”

Although last year’s festival, which focused on the Middle East, promoted only art and culture, this year’s program expanded to include programming from the College of Humanities and Social Sciences, the Cotsakos College of Business, the College of Science and Health and the Cheng Library.

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Jane Hutchison (right) associate director, instruction and research technology, and Sandie Miller, director, instruction and research technology, demonstrating NJVid

Streaming Digital Video Provides Desktop Resource for Faculty, Students William Paterson University students, faculty, and staff can access hundreds of streaming digital videos at their desktops via NJVid, a statewide digital video portal and repository that members of the University community were instrumental in conceptualizing and developing.

The result of a three-year, $1 million National Leadership Grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services to the University, Rutgers University, and NJEDge.net, NJVid offers centralized access to a variety of tools and services, including locally owned videos (materials owned by individual institutions that can be viewed by all), licensed commercial videos, and video lectures on demand via a Web-based streaming video portal.

“Streaming video, especially interactive video, is one of the most effective teaching and learning technologies available,” says Sandie Miller, director of instruction and research technology at William Paterson and principal investigator of the grant project. “Digital video is so engaging for our students. Now with NJVid we can make that material accessible online through an easy-tonavigate web page.”

The current collection is available at www.njvid.net, or by searching in the Cheng Library’s online catalog. “The library has long endorsed the use of audiovisual materials for teaching,” says Anne Ciliberti, director of the Cheng Library. “The ability to have that video now delivered to your desktop is very exciting from our perspective.”

University users have access to over eight hundred commercial video titles; users must log in with their William Paterson username and password in order to gain access. There are also nearly 130 videos in the “Commons Collection,” videos solicited from entities across the state such as the American Labor Museum and college and university collections that are available for anyone to view.

One important feature is the ability to annotate videos. “For example, a faculty member can select a portion of a video he or she would like their class to see and upload the link for the video clip(s) aggregated in a playlist onto Blackboard,” Miller explains. continued on page 3

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Students Are First Two Researchers to Analyze Historical Documents For seniors Peter Blasevick and Bruce Spadaccini Jr., the opportunity to do original research at the Morristown National Historical Park Museum turned them into working historians with a passion to discover the mystery behind every document.

Their assignment: to research the correspondence of the ninety delegates who were elected to the Continental Congress, an illegal assembly of delegates representing the colony-states, yet who declined to serve for various reasons.

Blasevick and Spadaccini, both history majors, are the first two researchers given an opportunity to analyze the one hundred and seventy seven documents. Their project was part of a history internship assigned by their instructor, Robert Wolk, special collections librarian and archivist for the Cheng Library.

The documents are roughly dated from the 1770s to 1820s. Each manuscript, including personal letters, contracts, notes, and receipts, sheds light about the lives of these prominent historical figures – including the University’s namesake, William Paterson.

Before they began, the students were required to obtain security clearance to have access to the Federal government computer. Most of the records are on microfilm, and are often illegible and challenging to read. The manuscripts also posed reading challenges because of changes in language jargon, writing tools, and handwriting styles. Even deciphering 18th century alphabet letters was a learning process. “If you had two SSs in a row, the first S looked like a giant F,” explains Blasevick.

In addition, many cryptic references needed to be researched and understood in the context of history. “It’s like we were jumping into the middle of their lives, so we had to do a lot of research for each letter or note,” adds Spadaccini.

The result is a treasure trove of information organized into a collection that the museum will have on hand to attract future researchers.

“The papers are fascinating to read,” says Spadaccini, whose share of the names included William Paterson. Paterson was elected to the Continental Congress in 1780 and again in 1787, and both times he declined. “We’re not sure why he didn’t serve, other than the fact that he was probably too occupied with his responsibilities as attorney general for New Jersey from 1776 to 1783,” Spadaccini explains.

Reviewing some historical research are students (from left) Bruce Spadaccini Jr. and Peter Blasevick. With them is Robert Wolk, special collections librarian and archivist for the Cheng Library

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In fact, now more than three quarters through the project, the students have not found any documents in this collection that include reference to the Continental Congress or offer clues as to why the individuals declined to serve.

William Paterson’s documents include a letter from Paterson to Aaron Burr, dated October 26, 1772, Princeton, N.J., wherein Paterson updates Burr on his recent activities, including enjoying the festivities at a Dutch wedding. Spadaccini’s favorite is a letter dated October 18, 1777, from Paterson to Governor William Livingston of New Jersey. Paterson ends the letter by saying, “Glorious News! General Burgoyne has surrendered himself and his whole army of prisoners of war to General Gates. I believe this intelligence may be depended upon, it comes quite direct.” Paterson was referring to the Battle of Saratoga and informing the rebel New Jersey Governor that the war had turned, explains Spadaccini.

“This is hot stuff. It is like reading the news,” he adds.

One of the most interesting people among Blasevick’s share of the names was James Bowdoin, who became governor of Massachusetts during Shays’ Rebellion. Blasevick found a series of about six letters that Bowdoin wrote to Major General Benjamin Lincoln, Commander of the Massachusetts militia, ordering him to take steps to put down the rebellion. On January 30, 1787, Bowdoin writes that he is extremely happy that Lincoln was able to dispense the insurgents without bloodshed, and that “justice tempered with mercy must have the most happy effects upon the minds of all ranks of the community.”

Weeks after their internship has ended, the students have stayed on as volunteers to complete the job of researching the manuscripts. “I want to finish it and see what’s there. Most of it hasn’t been read,” says Spadaccini.

“The work of Bruce and Peter is one of the most successful student internships I’ve seen in all my years of teaching,” says Wolk.

The course itself, he adds, is unique among colleges in New Jersey because it gives students the opportunity to work in area museums or historical agencies where they can conduct research, offer tours, create exhibits, or engage in community activities.

Blasevick plans a future in library science. And as a result of working on this project, he sees the need to transfer old records on microfilm, which has an estimated lifespan of one hundred years, into modern, digitized records that will be more easily searchable for future historians. Spadaccini is set on becoming one of those historians. “This project just happened to suit us perfectly,” says Blasevick. “It’s been a blast.”

Streaming Digital Video

Students Turn Their Tweets Into a William Paterson Freshman Survival Guide

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Looking for ways to help students develop their writing and literacy skills in an increasingly technology-driven world, three professors in the College of Education gave students the task of turning their Twitter messages into a freshman survival guide. The guide is a spiral-bound handbook comprised of bulleted advice.

Freshmen enrolled in First Year Seminar and Basic College Reading during the fall 2010 semester were asked to post messages via Twitter, the popular social networking service. Their messages, called tweets, focused on how to survive freshman year. Students posted hundreds of tweets about studying and homework, goal setting and social life, food and health, living on campus, and campus life in general.

Some typical messages were:

• Choose to do your homework in quiet

places like the Cheng Library.

• Pick a major you are passionate about.

• Wear comfortable shoes because there is a lot of

walking at this school.

Hilary Wilder, associate professor, Educational Leadership and Professional Studies, came up with the idea of using Twitter when she noticed how often students use their cell phones to text and tweet friends as they stand online for lunch in the John Victor Machuga Student Center. “Mostly I wanted to show that as these new technologies become available, they can also be used to facilitate students’ literacy skills. Twitter was deliberately chosen for the study because the technology is well suited to be used as a note-taking device during the prewrite stage of the writing process,” she says.

After trying it out as a pilot project in her First Year Seminar class last year, Wilder realized that linking it with a second class, like Basic Reading, would allow more time for the students to organize and edit their writing. She collaborated with colleagues Carrie E. Hong, assistant professor, and Geraldine Mongillo, chair, in the Department of Educational Leadership, and together they developed the two classes as a cohort.

“Students do much better when they write about something that interests them,” says Mongillo. “And we know they are proficient users of this type of social media – texting and writing tweets. So we’re trying to bridge the gap between out-of-school and in-school literacies to show them how to be better writers. That was our goal.”

After all the tweets were posted, Hong took the students through the editing and rewriting process. “They enjoyed it!” she notes. “They didn’t realize that their tweets could be a formal, written publication. When they saw the final product, they were surprised.”

Copies of the 36-page “Freshman Survival Guide” were given to First Year Experience and other departments that help freshmen adjust to campus life.

Learning on demand video, comprised of class or guest lectures or other non-commercial material intended for a specific audience, is still in its formative stage. Terry Finnegan, professor of history, is the first faculty member on campus who has created such content for students in his online classes. Finnegan has combined text, visual images, musical selections, and his own audio narration into a streaming video that his students can access.

“This ability is crucial to continuing to provide a richer experience for online classes, and for supplementing in-class instruction,” says Finnegan. “The students can watch the video presentation at their own pace, or review it at any time they choose. It provides flexibility,” he adds. “They don’t see me, but they hear my voice, so I feel that maybe they get to know me a little better.”

In addition to William Paterson and Rutgers, other institutions participating in development of the project include Atlantic Cape Community College, Middlesex County College, Montclair State University, New Jersey City University, Passaic Valley Regional High School, and the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey. Other contributors include the American Labor Museum, Fairleigh Dickinson University, and New Jersey Network.

The project has already won several awards. The Digital Rights Management and Cultural Institutions Project has cited NJVid as an “exemplary project.” In addition, Miller and Jane Hutchison, associate director of instruction and research technology, will receive the 2011 Technology Innovation Award from the New Jersey Library Association College and University Section for the NJVid Video Collection.

An example of a video available via NJVID.

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wpperspectives

University Festival continued from page 1 Events included panel discussions about Africa’s impact on the American experience, a geographic snapshot of the continent, doing business in Africa, a professional development day for student teachers, and a poetry/jazz contest.

“Each year, the festival builds on influences and commonalities from the year before,” Torres-Santos says. “Some aspects of the culture of the Middle East migrated to Africa, and in turn some features of African cultures was brought to the Caribbean and Latin America, the focus of next year’s festival.”

Top Left: As part of a panel discussion, “The New City: Urbanization of the Arts,” Newark Mayor Cory Booker (left) was presented an award designed by Michael Rees, William Paterson associate professor of art and his former student, Alexander Vicenzi. Booker received the award for his leadership in education and the arts.

City Without Walls (cWOW), a not-for-profit gallery in Newark, together with the University’s program in Computer Art and Animation, initiated the award.

Raymond Torres-Santos (far right), dean, College of the Arts and Communication, the festival’s organizer, with Booker, Edward Weil, provost and senior vice president for academic affairs, and Imafidon Olaye, associate dean, College of the Arts and Communication. Above: Michael Rees (left), showing the award he designed for Mayor Booker to University President Kathleen Waldron. Middle Left: Guests at the Booker award ceremony and panel discussion, which was part of the Cross Cultural Festival. Bottom Left: A guest viewing the exhibit, “Objects of Power: Selections from the Joan and Gordon Tobias Collection of African Art.” The exhibit featured African art and artifacts which are a partial selection from the nearly 700 objects donated to the University

by Joan and Gordon Tobias, private collectors.

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Imani Winds, a Grammy-nominated wind quintet, performed as part of the festival. Below, several members of the quintet presented a master class for students.

The Roy Haynes Fountain of Youth Band presented a concert that featured the legendary 85-year-old drummer, Roy Haynes, as part of the University’s Jazz Room Series. He recently received a 2011 Grammy Award for Lifetime Achievement.

Below: Guitarist and vocalist Abdoulaye Diabate brought his group Super Manden, a collective of musicians and music educators from Mali and Guinea, to Shea Center.

The New York-based ensemble is dedicated to the performance and teaching of the Malinke oral tradition of Central West Africa known as Jaliya.

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wpperspectives

University Awarded Federal Grant to Educate Students Against Domestic And Dating Violence The University has been awarded nearly $300,000 by the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office on Violence Against Women for a three-year project that will include training and preventative education about domestic and dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking in university environments.

Under the grant, William Paterson will design, develop, and implement programs to prevent and reduce violence against women and other potential at-risk members of the campus community.

“Our goal is to focus on prevention, education, and continually improving services,” says Sheetal Ranjan, assistant professor of sociology and director of the grant project. “There is a national trend toward making students aware of these issues as early as possible. Once students are aware of these issues, they are less likely to be victimized or allow a friend to become a victim. We are already doing a great job on campus with these issues and want to make sure students know about the services we have.”

Plans include educational programs for students, especially freshmen, about stalking, dating violence, and sexual assault with the goal of raising awareness and preventing sexual violence. The grant also provides funding for enhanced training for campus police and judicial and disciplinary boards; designated members of the administration and staff who deal with situations involving stalking, dating, domestic, or sexual violence; training for the University’s Peer Health Advocates to provide students with information and support; and training for other students such as resident assistants, student patrol, and student leaders.

The University is also partnering with several agencies in and around Passaic County in terms of the grant, including the Passaic County Women’s Center, the Passaic County Sheriff’s Department, the police departments of Wayne, Haledon, and North Haledon, the Passaic County Prosecutor’s Office, the New Jersey Coalition against Sexual Abuse, and St. Joseph’s Hospital. Representatives of these organizations are joining with members of the campus community to form a Coordinated Community Response Board for Violence Against Women to create crisis response, referral, and resource sharing within and across internal and external partners.

Ranjan’s partner in the grant project is Librada Sanchez, director of the University’s Women’s Center, who has organized numerous campus events to help prevent violence against women.

Nursing Professor’s New Book Provides Practical Guidance for Future Nurse-Practitioners When Nadine Aktan, an assistant professor of nursing, was studying for her master’s and doctoral degrees on her path to becoming a nurse-practitioner, she found she had numerous questions about a range of practical issues, but no readily available source of information.

Now, nurses with similar questions can read Aktan’s new book, Fast Facts for the New Nurse-Practitioner: What You Really Need to Know in a Nutshell, a guide for potential, current, and newly practicing nurse-practitioners that features personal stories by Aktan and other nurses presented in a quick, easyto-read style.

Nurse-practitioners are advanced-practice nurses who can serve as a patient’s primary health care provider, and see patients of all ages depending on their designated scope of practice. “As a nurse-practitioner, you are managing the care of the patient,” she says. “You are writing the orders for medication and treatment, not following them.”

Aktan’s book explores reasons to become a nurse-practitioner, discusses contractual relationships with institutions, doctors, and other related health providers, outlines legal and malpractice issues, and offers suggestions for surviving the first year of practice.

Questions and concerns posed by her students played an important part in the topics Aktan chose to include in the book.

The end product offers basic skills, practical aspects, and a plethora of information. “The feedback from my students has been the most meaningful,” she says.

In addition to teaching, Aktan serves as a family nursepractitioner at an urgent care/family practice in Clifton, Bloomfield, and Totowa. She also receives release time from the University to practice one day a week in the primary care clinic located in Eva’s Village, a progressive homeless shelter in Paterson, where she is conducting research.

“It’s important to practice what I am teaching about, and to keep my knowledge and skills current,” she explains. She also seeks to mentor her students. “I have had some wonderful mentors, and now the next generation needs mentors to learn from. It’s an opportunity to pay it forward.”

wpperspectives

Vol. 9 No. 1 May 2011

William Paterson University 300 Pompton Road • Wayne New Jersey 07470 Published by the Office of Marketing and Public Relations College Hall • 973.720.2971 • fax 973.720.2418 stollb2@wpunj.edu

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Professor’s Experience in United Arab Emirates is Focus of New Novel The changing role of women in a small desert country in the Middle East is the basis of a new book by Tina Lesher, professor of communication.

The Abaya Chronicles is based on her experiences in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) where she spent one year as a Fulbright Scholar teaching at Zayed University, a school for women in 2006-2007, and an earlier stint in 2001 spent teaching at the University located in the capital, Abu Dhabi.

During her time in the country, she observed the culture and interviewed numerous women about their lives in a society that has seen rapid change over the past few decades after oil was discovered. Returning to the U.S., she gave presentations about her experiences, and found there was great interest about Emerati women in this country.

“I had two goals,” Lesher explains. “I wanted to educate people about Abu Dhabi and the UAE, and to do so through a story about women with fictional characters based on a composite of the wonderful people I interviewed or met.”

The book focuses on a sixty-year-old woman whom oil has made successful. Dissatisfied with her life, she begins a journey from her protected, traditional home life to one that includes more contact with the outside world.

An abaya is the outer black robe worn by Emerati women.

Lesher says it symbolizes the way women’s lives have changed in the UAE recently. “In 2001 when I first taught there, most women wore black ones. Now, many wear abayas with trim or other decorations.”

History Professor Explores 1970s California Punk Rock Movement Growing up in Los Angeles as a middle class, suburban teenager in the 1970s, Dewar MacLeod witnessed the development of suburban punk music first-hand. In fact, at age fifteen, he and a friend saw the archetypal punk band The Ramones up close at an L.A. rock club.

“We stepped into the Whiskey and found ourselves standing right in front, leaning on the stage,” he recalls. “Then the Ramones hit the stage. 1-2-3-4, and the sound just exploded against my face as Johnny Ramone thwacked his guitar not five feet from my head.”

MacLeod, an associate professor of history, examines L.A.’s punk scene in Kids of the Black Hole: Punk Rock in Postsuburban California. The book explores how punk rock took hold in a region generally known for surf and folk music, as well as the wider issues surrounding youth culture of the time.

As a historian who teaches courses in popular culture, rock and roll, childhood and youth, suburbia, and U.S. foreign policy, MacLeod became interested in Southern California punk as a social movement, and as an indicator of some key historical changes that were affecting the nation as a whole at the time.

“By the mid-1970s, young people saw themselves only as individuals, with little attachment to any larger group or society,” he explains. At the same time, suburbia was changing, as areas outside major cities such as Los Angeles evolved from bedroom communities to full-scale, self-contained regions. For bored teenagers, punk music was a way to rebel.

“What is interesting is that in California, punk bands stayed in their suburban communities, forming scenes around them,” which eventually led to a wider interconnected movement, explains MacLeod. During his research, he interviewed numerous key participants and examined countless fanzines (local newsletters and tabloids about the punk scene), which were sold at record stores and concerts. “The zines were very gossipy and conveyed a sense of excitement and rebelliousness, that you were part of something new that others wouldn’t understand,” he adds.

“Punk was an identity,” he says. “They were part of something larger than themselves, yet still separate from the mass.”

Professor’s New Book Offers Tips on Dealing with Stress Managing stress with a few simple strategies based on an individual’s preferences and values is part of an overall stress reduction strategy outlined by Richard Blonna, professor of public health, in a new book.

In Stress Less, Live More: How Acceptance and Commitment Therapy Can Help You Live a Busy Yet Balanced Life, Blonna, an author, life coach, and stress management expert, introduces acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT), a values-based approach to managing stress and other psychological problems.

“One of ACT’s main objectives is to help people set goals and live lives that are consistent with what they value,” Blonna says. ”Values give direction to our lives and are central to defining who we are as people. Our values are so important to us, stress commonly occurs when they collide with each other.”

Blonna recommends a four-part process that helps participants clarify their values. He suggests beginning by exploring values, then moving on to choosing and ranking values, publicly affirming them, and the acting on the values chosen.

“Living out your values is the key not only to managing your stress but also to being the person you most deeply want to be,” Blonna says. “ACT can be a valuable tool in this process because it reminds you that you are more than the content of your life.”

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wpperspectives

Students Flock To New Campus Fitness Center

The chance to use new, up-to-date fitness equipment in a spacious room where light streams in through large windows on even the darkest days is the big draw for both resident and commuter students who do their daily workout in the newly opened Overlook Fitness Center.

“Our whole purpose on campus is centered on promoting a healthy lifestyle,” says John Martone, vice president for student development. “Our vision is to create learning villages in the residence halls where students can use smart classrooms, attend programs, or meditate, among other things, and fitness is a big part of that. The Overlook Fitness Center was created because students requested it and so far they have reacted positively.”

Treadmills, elliptical machines, and other cardio-vascular equipment are only part of the twenty-four various workout machines now available to the students who previously used equipment in the Rec Center.

“With the Rec Center bursting at the seams we needed additional space for student fitness programming and activity space,” says Kathy Unger, director of recreational services.

“The Overlook Fitness Center has helped us address those needs. This is a student-only facility, which is in very close proximity to most of the residence halls. The additional programming space will allow us to add additional activities for the students.”

The Center is located on the ground floor between Overlook North and Overlook South. It includes a multipurpose room where yoga and other fitness classes are held, a lounge area, and features large screen TVs. The area is popular with students.

A student works out on a lateral pull machine.

Students use the new state-of-the-art workout machines in the Overlook Fitness Center.

In addition to the new workout machines, students can take a variety of fitness classes including yoga.

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