Faculty and Staff Career News

To read complete versions of these abbreviated news items where you see a live link, click to reach the faculty member’s personal page. Then visit that page’s “Recent News” tab, where this current item in fuller detail will be at the top. For staffers without a faculty page, the full text of each news item is included here.

George Ashline, professor of mathematics, during the week of July 20-24, 2015, co-taught the course Number Theory for Teachers as part of the Vermont Mathematics Initiative (VMI).  George also was again this year a faculty consultant at the 2015 Advanced Placement (AP) Calculus Readings, held May 30-June 8 in Kansas City.  And on May 18, he presented “Correlation Properties and Applications” to one Algebra II class and “Bias and Margin of Error” to an AP Calculus class at Brattleboro High School.

Valerie Bang-Jensen and Mark Lubkowitz, professors of education and biology, respectively, presented a workshop in July titled “Reading a Garden: Discovering Plant Biology in Great Children’s Literature” at the National Children and Youth Garden Symposium sponsored by the American Horticultural Society in Austin, TX.

Rick Battistoni, associate director of facilities, was recognized with the 2015 Pacesetter Award by APPA (Association of Physical Plant Administrators) at the group’s annual conference in Chicago August 4-6. The award recognizes contributions of upcoming educational facilities professionals who have demonstrated leadership capabilities for the group. Only seven others nationally earned this recognition for 2015.

Michael Bosia, associate professor of political science, presented research on state homophobia in Uganda at the European Conference on African Studies, and participated in a roundtable on debates over marriage at the meeting of the Council for European Studies, both in Paris in July.  He is also the program chair for the New Political Science Section of the American Political Science Association for the 2015 annual meeting in San Francisco in September, and is author of a new chapter in a book on modernity, homophobia and LGBT rights.

Robert Brenneman, associate professor of sociology, presented a paper titled “Doing the Numbers: Homicide, Imprisonment, and Gang Membership Rates in Northern Central America,” in May at the Latin American Studies Association’s annual meeting in San Juan, Puerto Rico, and gave a talk in July at the Universidad Rafael Landívar, the Jesuit university of Guatemala. In August, he presented a talk for the Sociology of Religion’s annual meeting in Chicago, IL.

Mauro Caraccioli, instructor of international relations, recently was selected as winner of the Cesar Chavez Action Committee Award from the Florida Education Association for his work on behalf of the University of Florida’s Graduate Assistants Union from 2011-2015. Mauro also acted as discussant during the September 2015 annual meeting of the American Political Science Association in San Francisco and is the co-author (with Bryan Wright, Cincinnati State) of a recently published article, “Narratives of Resistance: Space, Place, and Identity in Latino Migrant Activism,” in ACME: An International E-Journal for Critical Geographies, Vol. 14, No. 2, pp. 150-157, Special Issue on “Migration and Activism.”

Nick Clary, professor of English, recently had an abstract, keywords and tweets written on his behalf and approved for online publication, for his article entitled “Maclise and Macready: collaborating Illustrators of Hamlet,” published in 25.1 of Shakespeare Bulletin. Nick’s essay focuses on the relationship between theatrical performance and the visual arts through a specific exploration of the relationship between the nineteenth-century actor William Charles Macready and the painter Daniel Maclise.

Brian Collier, associate professor of art, will be part of a panel discussion, “The Working Land,” at Shelburne Museum, Pizzigalli Center for Art & Education, on Oct. 10. The discussion will be an exploration of our historical, artistic, literary and personal relationships to place — in conjunction with the special exhibition Eyes on the Land, developed in collaboration with the Vermont Land Trust. Noted scholars and other artists will be panelists with Brian.

Greg Delanty, professor of English and Poet in Residence, was a featured presenter at the second annual Seamus Heaney Memorial Reading in the First Church Congregationalist near Harvard Square in Cambridge, MA, the evening of August 26, 2015. His many other readings, publications in anthologies and periodicals, in Irish educational publications, along with his appearances on TV and other activities over the last year are numerous and notable, and inventoried more fully on his faculty profile page.

Mike Donoghue, longtime adjunct professor of journalism and veteran reporter for the Burlington Free Press, in July was presented with the Vermont Press Association’s Matthew Lyon Award for his lifetime commitment to the First Amendment and the public’s right to know the truth in Vermont.

Jo Ellis-Monaghan, professor of mathematics, and Greta Pangborn, associate professor of computer science, on July 21, 2015, hosted the conference “Summer Combo in Vermont” on the Saint Michael’s College campus. The annual conference brings together regional combinatorics scholars for a day of collaboration including talks, speakers and poster presentations.

William Ellis, assistant professor of fine arts/music, was interviewed and performed for a PBS series, Craft in America, which airs November 20. The episode is on instruments and instrument makers. In the episode, Bill performs with his dad, banjo composer Tony Ellis, and was interviewed as a traditional music scholar on the history of the banjo.

Katherine Hackett, assistant director of admission, helped rally a Saint Michael’s crew to compete as “The Saint Michael’s College Dragon Slayers” to participate this summer in the Lake Champlain Dragonboat Festival. Her report: “Twenty paddling Knights and our fearless princess drummer, along with Mike the Knight, were down at Waterfront Park on Sunday, August 2 to raise money and awareness for cancer survivors. Dragonheart began as a breast cancer support organization.  The funds from the Festival are utilized to support Survivorship NOW—a cancer support organization that provides FREE programs to all cancer survivors through Survivorship NOW. Our team raised over $1000 and our participation was sponsored by the President’s Office. We won 2nd place for our costumes this year and beat UVM to the finish line in our first round! The team of current students, alumni, faculty, staff and friends included Katherine and (faculty/staff in bold):  Jerome Allen (Information Technology), Mike Brown, Allison Cleary (MJD), Lindsay Damici, (Marketing & Communications), Lucy Qiang Dong (Modern Languages), Justin Fillion, Nate Goyette, Greg Hamilton, Erik Lightbody (Information Technology), Kara Lowe (Athletics), Rachel Lucy, McKenzie McNamara, Taylor Schneider, Kendra Smith (Human Resources), Sarah Springer, Garret Sullivan (Facilities), Chris Swanson (Information Technology), Allison Tilton (Marketing & Communications), Jeff Vincent (Student Life), Adam Wager (philosophy adjunct).

Rowena He, assistant professor of history, has been an invited speaker recently at several prestigious venues: She spoke at Brandeis University for the International and Global Studies Program and Department of Sociology on September 18; and was to speak October 8 for the Yale University Council on East Asian Studies, and on Friday, October 9, for the U.S.-Asia Law Institute at the New York University Law School.

David S. Heroux, associate professor of chemistry, was invited to participate in the VIPEr: Heterogeneous Catalysis at the Frontiers of Inorganic Chemistry workshop held June 28 – July 3, 2015 at the University of Washington in Seattle, WA.  The National Science Foundation supported workshop was organized by the Interactive Online Network of Inorganic Chemists.  Participants worked collaboratively to develop new teaching materials that provide modern catalytic examples to teach inorganic chemistry concepts. Also, David was appointed to the 2017 General Chemistry Paired Question Examination Committee of the American Chemical Society Division of Chemical Education’s Examinations Institute.

Ron Jacobs, circulation senior specialist – daytime/reserves, Durick Library, published Daydream Sunset:’60s Counterculture in the ‘70s (Counterpunch Books).

Dave Landers, instructor of psychology, did a workshop on “Mind, Body and Sport” for the Assumption College Athletic Department, and then followed that up with a workshop on Concussed Student-Athletes for the Athletic Department and the Academic Administration. This summer Dave also presented a workshop on Masculinity/Femininity and Leadership for the Eleanor Roosevelt Community College Emerging Leaders program in Hyde Park, NY.

Crystal L’Hote, associate professor in the Department of Philosophy, was in short-term residence at the Mind and Life Institute at Amherst College, where, in May, she was invited to present a paper on her sabbatical work. Inspired by a poem by Emily Dickinson, who lived in Amherst, the title was “Blue to Blue: Aligning Mind and Brain.”

Mark Lubkowitz, professor of biology, gave a talk at City University of New York (CUNY) in June titled “Discovering peptide transport systems,” and presented another talk in July titled  “Leaves of Green: a project-driven workshop for question-based exploration of plant biology in the high school curriculum” at the American Society for Plant Biologists’ annual conference in Minneapolis, MN.

Heather Lynch, sustainability coordinator/associate director of facilities, completed her Master of Science degree in Sustainable Food Systems from Green Mountain College in July; her capstone was titled “Curriculum Development for Saint Michael’s College – Sustainable Food Procurement.”

Declan McCabe, professor of biology/department chair, this summer authored and had published several newspaper articles – engaging pieces about science in nature written to be easily understand by the general reading public —  including his most recent in early August titled “Keeping it Clean Downstream,” for Northern Woodlands magazine and reprinted in The Burlington Free Press.

Tara Natarajan, associate professor of economics, in 2015 published “Formal Methods for Integrated Socioeconomic Analysis: An Introduction to the Special Issue” in A Special Issue on Formal Methods for Integrated Socioeconomic Analysis, (Ed. by Natarajan, Tara) for the Forum for Social Economics, Taylor and Francis, currently published online; also in 2015 she was the author of “Agriculture” and “Agricultural Technology” entries in the Encyclopedia of World Poverty.

John O’Meara, associate professor of physics, in July gave an invited presentation at the conference “The metal enrichment of diffuse gas in the universe” at the Sexten Center for astrophysics in Sesto, Italy. John also received confirmation that his paper ‘The First Data Release of the KODIAQ survey” was accepted in the Astronomical Journal. In August, John learned he was elected to the Vermont Academy of Science and Engineering — only the second Saint Michael’s professor ever to have been so elected.

Robin Rhodes Astor, senior associate director of admission, graduated in the 2015 class from the Vermont Leadership Institute through the Snelling Center.  The Snelling Center for Government created the Vermont Leadership Institute (“VLI”) in 1995, with the goal of stimulating citizen enthusiasm for and participation in public service. The Institute gives participants the information, tools and inspiration to make greater contributions to their organizations, to their communities and to Vermont.

Doug Slaybaugh, professor of history, recently served as the historical consultant for a children’s book on Vermont. Just published in August 2015 by Red Line Editorial, Our Great States: What’s Great about Vermont by Denise Bailer is part of a series of books intended to introduce third graders to the history and cultural and recreational opportunities in each state.

Kevin Spensley, director of international enrollment and senior international officer, revcently was voted as president of Education Vermont USA. Kevin’s term will be from 2015-2017. http://www.vermont.org/education/about

Patrick Standen, instructor of philosophy, has been asked to be a speaker at the University of Vermont’s Disability Awareness Month Celebration, where he will be delivering the talk “Between Two Jakes: Images of Masculinity and Disability in Modernity” at the Davis Student Center on October 16. Over the summer as part of the Vermont Humanities Council’s innovative “Ideas on Tap” series, Patrick delivered a lecture at Arts Riot called “Epidemics and Ethics” on April 28; and, on May 12 he co-presented a talk about philosophy and Zombies.

John Trono, professor of computer science, gave an invited talk on March 18, 2015, at Middlebury College, presenting his “A Reasonably Secure Cryptosystem Based on Addition.” He also presented his paper “Transactions: They’re Not Just For Banking Any More” at the Central Plains regional conference of the Consortium for Computing Sciences in Colleges (CCSC-CP) which was held on April 10-11 in Branson, MO. John also presented the culmination of a recent collaborative effort, with colleague Philip Yates (Saint Michael’s associate professor of mathematics), at the 27th European Conference on Operational Research, which was hosted by the University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, Scotland, during July of 2015. The presentation and a recent publication concerned predicting the NCAA men’s basketball tournament.

Lindsay Wieland, Director of Vermont EPSCoR Center for Workforce Development and Diversity (CWDD), gave a presentation titled “STEM Collaborations: Integrating Students and Teachers into EPSCoR Research” at the 2015 National Science Teacher Association’s STEM Forum & Expo in Minneapolis, MN on May 21, 2015. The presentation explored how to inspire students to pursue STEM education by connecting K–12 schools with institutions of higher education, integrating students and teachers into active research, and supporting underrepresented groups in STEM.  Lindsay also attended the August 2015 AGMUS Research Symposium for Minority Students in San Juan, Puerto Rico, where several Vermont EPSCoR undergraduate interns presented their research from their summer internships. Lindsay sat on the invited panel to discuss summer internship opportunities and the value of undergraduate research.

William Wilson, emeritus professor of political science and retired vice president for Academic Affairs, in August received a five year teaching certificate from Community College of Vermont (CCV), teaching a first-year seminar and the capstone seminar. Bill was a panelist on Academic Integrity at the annual CCV retreat and currently serves as a faculty member of that college’s retention committee.

Joan Wry, associate professor of English, presented “’Adamant Convictions’: Emily Dickinson’s Varied Roofs of Stone,” at the Dickinson Institute in Amherst, MA in August 2015. Joan also has an article, “It’s Not About You:  Loon Games on Walden Pond,” published in the current issue of The Concord Saunterer, a Journal of Thoreau Studies, Vol 23 (2015) 110-124.