JMU Research, Scholarship & Creative
Endeavors
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Thank you for tuning in to our first newsletter of 2020! Before we jump into research and scholarly updates, please join us in wishing the JMU Dukes football team good luck as they travel to Texas to take on North Dakota State in the FCS Championship this weekend. Go Dukes!!
Campus Milestones
:
The Furious Flower Poetry Center
celebrated 25 years in operation
with a gala at the Grand Hyatt Washington last fall. Launched in 1994 by Joanne Gabbin, English faculty member and then-director of the JMU Honors Program,
Furious Flower
is an academic center “committed to ensuring the visibility, inclusion and critical consideration of Black poets in American letters.”
Additionally, the Forbes Center for the Performing Arts is currently in the midst of its
10th anniversary season
. “Since opening with a concert by singer-songwriter Phil Vassar (‘85) in 2010, the Forbes Center has welcomed over 400,000 patrons to 2,900 performances by guest artists, faculty members and students in the schools of Theatre and Dance and Music in its five state-of-the-art venues.”
A big shout-out to the JMU chapter of Sigma Kappa for raising more than $64,000 in support of the Harrisonburg Walk to End Alzheimer’s, held at University Park in November. This fundraising total places the sorority as the 13
th
highest performer out of all teams nationwide. Research & Scholarship has served on the planning committee for this annual event since 2010. Supporting Alzheimer’s care, support, and research, the 2019 Harrisonburg Walk raised more than $163,000 and included 746 members of the community.
After serving as Director of the Center for International Stabilization and Recovery (CISR) for 10 years, Dr. Ken Rutherford has accepted a full-time teaching position as a tenured professor in the Department of Political Science at JMU. We are pleased to announce that CISR Associate Director Dr. Suzanne Fiederlein has stepped in to serve as Interim Director. Suzanne brings 20 years of experience in mine action management and training programs to the director role. Please join us in congratulating Suzanne on this leadership appointment, and our sincere thanks to Dr. Rutherford for his tireless efforts leading CISR, advocating for survivors and their rights, and supporting humanitarian efforts around the world. Best wishes to Ken as he transitions to the classroom.
Office of Research & Scholarship
James Madison University
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Interim Vice Provost for Research & Scholarship Keith Holland poses with
Governor Northam during a reception in Richmond.
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Dannette Bronaugh, Sharon Blatz, and Laura Desportes (Educational Foundations and Exceptionalities) received $43,392 from the Virginia Department of Education to provide courses needed by provisionally licensed special education teachers to become fully licensed within their three-year provisional period.
Steve Cresawn (Biology) received $250,000 from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute to support the Science Education Alliance-Phage Hunters Advancing Genomics and Evolutionary Science (SEA-PHAGES) program.
Timothy Estep (Institute for Innovation in Health and Human Services) was awarded $286,593 from the Virginia Department of Health to bring together local and state home visiting program staff and leadership to understand training and professional development needs from the field, identify unmet needs, prioritize the unmet needs, and identify the most appropriate means and strategies to meet those needs.
Philip Herrington (History) received $8,000 from the Virginia Humanities to research and investigate Virginia as a source of models for the plantation house ideal and as a setting for plantation-inspired architecture.
Hossain Heydari (Computer Science) received $115,000 from the U.S. Department of Defense in support of Cyber Scholarship students and capacity building via Girl Scouts Day of Cyber.
Brian Leventhal (Graduate Psychology) was awarded $5,998 from the National Council on Measurement Education to increase awareness of the field of educational measurement, develop standardized guides for recruitment, and conduct an updated survey of the educational measurement field.
Ilarion Melnikov (Physics & Astronomy) received $43,413 from the National Science Foundation to explore foundational questions in the interplay between conformal field theory and geometry in two-dimensional quantum field theory relevant to string compactification.
Remy Pangle (School of Integrated Sciences) received $25,000 from the Dominion Foundation to support hands-on design competitions for 4
th
to 12
th
graders related to wind and solar energy.
M. Rockwell Parker (Biology) received $75,158 to manipulate radiotagged Judas-snakes with feminizing hormone implants that will make them attractive to free-ranging males within large enclosures in Everglades National Park.
Nick Swayne (College of Education) received support in the amount of $158,925 from FIRST LEGO League to provide support for schools to participate in the Lego League teams and support efforts to grow computer science within each school.
Kim Yeonsoo (School of Communication Studies) was awarded $2,000 from Middle Tennessee State University for the First Amendment PR Campaign. The funding will support development, implementation, and evaluation of a campaign to raise awareness of the First Amendment freedoms and engage university students on the topic.
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Geoscience Research Opportunities in the Caves of Virginia
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As part of a year-long effort to highlight research, scholarship, and creative activities at JMU, the Office of Research & Scholarship recently toured research and lab facilities housed in the College of Science and Mathematics. One of the presentations organized by the Department of Geology and Environmental Science was led by Visiting Assistant Professor Ángel Garcia, who maintains active projects in the following areas:
- Ethnogeology – geological knowledge that is culturally informed;
- Karst Geology – paleoclimate reconstruction of the Shenandoah Valley using stalagmites as proxy; and
- Geoscience Education – using place attachment and place feeling (sense of place) to teach geoscience that is place-based.
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New IIHHS Director looks to Engage with Students
and Community Partners
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Last summer, Linda Plitt Donaldson joined the JMU community as the
new Associate Dean of the College of Health and Behavioral Studies
and Director of the Institute for Innovation in Health and Human Services (IIHHS). Discussing the task ahead at IIHHS, Plitt Donaldson commented, “I want the university and community to know about our programs and to look to us as the resource we are in community engagement strategies. IIHHS as an organization models all pillars of the University’s vision for an engaged university. It is built on a community engagement model grounded in mutual and reciprocal partnerships, and it helps all partners access civic engagement strategies when needed to address community needs. Last year, hundreds of students and nearly 100 faculty contributed to our community-based programs. And we want to continue growing and expanding our work." Prior to arriving at JMU, Plitt Donaldson was a faculty member and chair of Catholic University of America’s Master of Social Work program.
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Noftsinger Celebration and Recognition Reception
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More than 100 faculty and staff joined Research & Scholarship for the annual Noftsinger Celebration of Madison Scholarship & Recognition Reception in November. The Office of Sponsored Programs Pre-Award presented the Outstanding Faculty & Recognition Awards, while Professor of Communication Studies Sharon Mazzarella delivered the keynote address –
Troublesome Bodies: Girls, Moral Panic, and News Media.
Additionally, one of JMU’s newest academic centers, the
Center for Inclusive Music Engagement
, had the audience rocking with an inclusive music activity.
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College of Education Students Present in New Orleans
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K-12 Special Education Master of Arts in Teaching (M.A.T.) students Meredith Browder and Colette Holland delivered a talk at the Council on Exceptional Children’s Annual Conference in New Orleans last November. Laura Desportes, Professor of Educational Foundations and Exceptionalities, joined the students to present “Preparing Preservice Teachers to be Successful in High-Poverty/High-Minority Schools: A University-School Partnership.”
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College of Business Scholarship Highlights
Amy Connolly, faculty in Computer Information Systems and Business Analytics, published “User response to mandatory IT use: a coping theory perspective” in the
European Journal of Information Systems
. The paper earned the Operational Research Society’s Stafford Beer Medal during an awards ceremony in London on November 27
th
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Accounting Professor Charles Bailey published “The joint effects of narcissism and psychopathy on accounting students’ attitudes towards unethical professional practices” in
The Journal of Accounting Education
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David Fordham, Professor of Accounting, and Carol Hamilton, Management Lecturer, co-authored “Accounting information technology in small businesses: An inquiry” in the
Journal of Information Systems
.
Marketing Professor Andy Wood was named a faculty fellow for RNMKRS (rainmakers), an organization whose mission is to improve sales training by using artificial intelligence and technological innovation along with advanced communications.
Assistant Professor of Finance Weiwei Zhang obtained her Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) professional designation this past October. On average, the process takes four years to complete and upwards of 300 hours of study time.
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Computer Science Students Excel at
Programming Competition
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Pictured with the students are Computer Science Department Head Sharon Simmons (far left)
and Assistant Professor Michael Lam (far right).
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JMU Computer Science students Charlie Hines, Jeremy Kesterson, and Eric Wolf
received high marks and praise
during the Mid-Atlantic Regional ACM Programming Contest. During the November event, “The trio successfully completed five out of the eight programming problems, taking third place. Overall, they placed 20
th
out of 154 teams across the region, putting them in the top 15% of all competitive programming teams in the Mid-Atlantic."
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JMU DC Center Hosts U.S. Representative and Ethics Expert
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Walter Shaub (left) with Bill Hawk, Chair of The Madison Collaborative: Ethical Reasoning in Action
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The JMU Washington Center Public Affairs Roundtable hosted two speakers during the Fall 2019 Semester. U.S. Representative Ben Cline provided insight on contemporary public affairs during a roundtable discussion at the JMU Washington Center. Representing the 6
th
District of Virginia, Congressman Cline serves on the Judiciary Committee and the Education and Labor Committee. Walter Shaub (‘93 History), a senior advisor with Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, led a discussion on the
challenges and opportunities for improving ethics in government
. Shaub previously served as the Director of the Office of Government Ethics.
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Faculty Expert: John Almarode
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Today’s rapidly changing world requires that students have deeper knowledge, skills and competencies in order to be successful. John Almarode, faculty in the JMU Department of Early, Elementary & Reading Education, studies what science says about how the brain absorbs information and
translates his findings into teaching strategies
.
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