Sara Sewell published “Antifascism in the Neighborhood: Daily Life, Political Cultural, and Gender Politics in the German Communist Antifascist Movement, 1930-1933, Fascism: in the Journal of Comparative Fascist Studies,” vol. 9, no. 1-2 (December 2020), pages 167-194.

Lisa Lyon Payne and three coauthors published "Keeping the Lights on and the Wolves Outside: College Student Media Advisers in Communities of Practice" in Journalism and Mass Communication Educator. The quantitative study advances communities of practice theory within student newsrooms and develops and verifies scales for four COP pillars in student newsrooms: practice, community, identity, and meaning.

Terry Lindvall's playful chapter, "Recasting Snow White: Parodic Animated Homages to the Disney Feature", appears in editors Chris Pallant and Christopher Holliday's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs: New Perspectives on Production, Reception, Legacy (Bloomsbury Academic, 2021), a celebrated analysis of the cultural and aesthetic landmark Disney feature.

Stephen Hock's essay "'Just Junk in a Safeway Cart I'm Pushing Down to the Recycling Center': The Aesthetics of Ecology in Michael Robbins's Poetry" was published in Modern Ecopoetry: Reading the Palimpsest of the More-Than-Human World.

Michelle Albert Vachris has published two articles co-authored with Cecil E. Bohanon in the winter edition of The Independent Review: "Human Nature and Civil Society in Jane Austen" and "Philanthropic Exchange in Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man."

As a member of the Education and Research Committee at Chesapeake Bay Academy, Mindy Gumpert co-authored an article for the school's website titled "Technological Innovation in Education: COVID-19 and Beyond." The article documents technology use at CBA from 1989 to the present, as well as, highlights the school's reliance on data to inform decision-making. 

Travis Malone served as Editorial Board Chair for the book "Cultivating Leadership" from the Association for Theatre in Higher Education. In addition to collaborating with the editors and authors, Travis assisted in the editorial/author selection process, development, production, and final design for the book, serving as the association's signatory for the project.

Clair Berube has a new article published in the Journal Healthcare entitled “Autism and Hidden Imagination: Raising and Educating Children Who Cannot Express Their Minds.” The article posits that the nonspeaking population of the autism community do indeed have different ways of understanding the world, theories of mind and awareness.

Gabi Martorell just published her second edition of "Life: The Essentials of Human Development" with McGraw-Hill Higher Education. "Life" covers human development from conception to death with a focus on culture, diversity, current events, and practical applications.

Nadia Nafar contributed the book chapter "Business in Emerging Markets: The Case of Morocco" in a book titled "Off-Campus Study, Study Abroad, and Study Away in Economics - Leaving the Blackboard Behind" by Springer (2021).

President Scott D. Miller serves as Executive Editor (along with Dr. Marylouise Fennell) on the presidential thought-leadership series President to President, launching the 16th year of this publication with the 2020-2021 series titled "Fostering a Culture of Innovation." In the 2020-2021 series' fifth chapter, "Innovation in a Time of Transition," Hollins University President Mary Dana Hinton, Ph.D., describes how innovative thinking in higher education can advance efforts to achieve racial equality and social justice. His daily blog, Dialogue, can be found at prezscottmiller.blogspot.com.

Ben Haller presented a paper titled "Orpheus and Orfeu: Marcel Camus Eastertide Pagan Temporale" in the Classical Representations in Popular Culture Area of 2021's virtual meeting of the Southwestern Popular/American Culture conference. Ben also serves as area chair for Classical Representations, and assists the conference organizers in assembling the paper panels.

Scott Ramsey presented his paper titled "2020 Vision: How a Global Pandemic and the Black Lives Matter Movement Focused our Teaching" to the American Association of Geographers Annual Convention in Seattle, WA. The article will be published in the January edition of the European Journal of Educational Sciences.

Sara Sewell's paper, "Train Sounds: Sonic Experiences in Deportation Trains," was accepted to be presented at the conference "Beyond Camps and Forced Labour: Current International Research on Survivors of Nazi Persecution," at the University of London and The Wiener Holocaust Library in London, UK. Unfortunately, the conference was canceled due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Dan Margolies presented his most recent paper "#QuédateEnCasa y Huapango! Diasporic community and musical wellbeing in streamed live performances of musica huasteca" at the "Sounds of the Pandemic" International online conference, Università di Firenze in December.Mindy Gumpert was a guest speaker in Bill McConnell's EDUC 621 "Collaboration with Families, Communities, and School Personnel class." Mindy and Bill discussed how the use of reflective journaling in their elementary inclusion classroom improved not only their pedagogy, but also the academic and behavioral performance of their general education and special education students.

Annette Clayton presented an eposter titled "Examining the Relationships between Perceived Microinteractions and Adolescents' Self-Reported Grades and Feelings of Self-Esteem: Gender and Racial Differences and Similarities" at the Society for Social Work and Research 25th Annual Conference - Social Work Science for Social Work Change.

George Jackson, a J. Robert Beyster Fellow at the Institute for the Study of Employee Ownership and Profit Sharing at the Rutgers University School of Management and Labor Relations, presented a paper, "Differential Tax Treatment of Debt vs. Equity: How Do You Draw a Line That Doesn't Exist?" at the Institute's annual Mid-Year Fellows Workshop.

Eleven VWU faculty members' proposals were accepted to be presented at the Conference on Higher Education Pedagogy through Virginia Tech's Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning. This year's conference was held virtually. Presentation titles and presenters included: "Transformation Through Team Teaching" by Sue Larkin, Travis Malone and Bryson Mortensen; "When Will Robot or AI Systems Replace Online Teachers?" by Oliver Hedgepeth; "Faculty/Librarian Collaboration to Improve Transferable Skills Across the Curriculum" by Sherry Matis, Joyce Howell, Kellie Holzer, Rebecca Hooker; and "Love Liberally: Loving, Learning, and Creating Campus Engagement" by Denise Wilkinson, Kathy Stolley, Amber Gruszecska.

Jason Squinobal performed a 45-minute virtual concert of original music. For this concert, Squinobal composed eight compositions that explored the synthesis of electronic and acoustic music. He performed with his group the Trio Atomic, recorded and edited all of the video and audio, and produced the video. He was joined by adjunct faculty members Will McPeters and Mike Laubach.

Joyce Easter has been appointed to a three-year term on the Small College Committee of the National Collegiate Honors Council to begin in January 2021.

Stephen Leist has been appointed to the editorial board of Virginia Libraries, the publication of the Virginia Library Association, for a two-year term.

Doug Kennedy was one of nine people appointed by the US Department of Justice to serve on the Tort Claimants Committee (TCC) in the Boy Scouts Bankruptcy proceedings. The TCC is responsible for representing over 75,000 victims of childhood sexual abuse and negotiating a settlement. Elected one of its leaders, he co-hosted a "Town Hall" that has now been viewed over 10,000 times (TCCBSA.COM) and had his story covered in part by the New York Post.

Jessica Harrington was part of a panel interviewed by Zippia, a career search platform, on current job market trends. 

COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT

The adventure of learning continues at Westminster-Canterbury on Chesapeake Bay (WC), a Virginia Beach life-care community for active retirees. This spring, members can once again engage in Virginia Wesleyan University course offerings in religion, communication, political science, and more through the Westminster/Wesleyan Lifelong Learning Institute. Programming for the initiative—a component of Virginia Wesleyan University Global Campus—is coordinated by Ben Fraser, in collaboration with Virginia Wesleyan’s Robert Nusbaum Center.

In January, Craig Wansink presented the first session of his course, "Extreme Religion: The Body and Rituals from World Religions." Benson Fraser's course, "Mass Communication and its Influence," was also offered beginning in January. The full schedule for spring 2021 is available here.

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