Faculty/Staff News of Note
September 2003
Brian Streeter, director of athletics, welcomes Angela Meserole, assistant athletic trainer/lecturer in ESACT/champs coordinator, and Joe Tristan, men's and women's water polo coach/assistant swim coach/lecturer. Jen Slack is the new head men's and women's swim coach/aquatics director/lecturer.
Dr. Charisse Nixon, assistant professor of psychology, has co-authored a book with Dr. Cheryl Dellasega, a nurse-practitioner on the faculty of Penn State's College of Medicine, titled "Girl Wars: 12 Strategies that Will End Female Bullying." "Society is becoming increasingly aware of the ways adolescent girls use relationships to harm one another," said Nixon. "This cruel behavior can be so subtle it is missed by adults until it accelerates into major problems. Relational aggression - fighting with words and emotions rather than fists - exists on a continuum from mild to extreme, and unchecked, it will spiral out of control."
Congratulations to Diane Nowacinski, administrative specialist, for twenty five years of service to Penn State. Diane will receive her Penn State rocking chair at a gathering of the School of Humanities and Social Sciences faculty and staff on September 5.
Dr. Licheng Sun, assistant professor of finance, has published a paper titled "Nonlinear Drift and Stochastic Volatility: An Empirical Investigation of Short-Term Interest Rate Models," in the Journal of Financial Research, Volume 26, Issue 3, pages 389-404, September 2003.
Dr. Holly Welker, assistant professor of creative writing, has published an article titled "Self-Portrait as Critic with Body" in the Fall 2003 Iowa Review.
Dr. Darren Williams, assistant professor of physics and astronomy, in collaboration with Dr. David Pollard, research associate in geoscience at Penn State, have conducted research on the subject of "Planetary Tilt Not a Spoiler for Habitation." This research is sponsored by the National Science Foundation and will be published in the International Journal of Astrobiology.
George Looney, assistant professor of English and creative writing, has been awarded the Larry Levis Editors' Prize in Poetry for the year 2002. The prize, first given in 1991, honors the memory of Missouri Review co-founder and distinguished poet, Larry Levis. Looney also received second prize in the St. Louis Poetry Center's 43rd Annual Contest for Best Poem. The contest was judged by James Tate, an award-winning American poet and a chancellor of the American Academy of Poets.
Congratulations to Laura Palmer, staff assistant in Housing and Food Services, for twenty five years of service to the college. Cake and punch will be served on Friday, September 12, from 1:00 to 4:00 p.m. and an invitation has been extended to all employees to stop by and congratulate Laura.
Please welcome Nick Silka, computer support specialist, at the Computer Center. Nick is a contract employee and will be filling in while a staff member is on extended leave. Nick will support academic users in the Computer Center labs, kiosks and technology classrooms. He will also be the evening staff support person and will work closely with MISC staff in maintaining the college's technology classrooms. He is a recent graduate of Behrend, majoring in MIS.
Welcome to MikeYurkewicz, a '93 graduate of the plastics engineering technology program, who has been hired as a project engineer with the Plastics Technical Center. Mike was formerly a production manager with Alcoa-Reynolds Food Packaging in Grove City, Pennsylvania.
Welcome to Karolina Niedobecka, a '01 marketing graduate of Behrend, who has been hired as program coordinator in the Center for Corporate and Continuing Education. She will work closely with the CCCE director and area representative in coordinating non-credit programs and contract training.
Dr. Meng Su, assistant professor of computer science, received word that his paper titled "Spatial Data Distribution and the Cost Models for Metric," which he presented at the Computer, Communication, and Control Technologies International Conference, won best paper in the Image, Speech, and Signal Computing session. The conference was held in Orlando, Florida July 31-August 2.
Su also chaired one of the sessions and was thanked by the general chair, Professor Jose Ferrer, who said, "I am personally grateful to you for participating in the high quality of scholars and researchers who effectively supported our effort in organizing and conducting the CCCT conference. Thanks to excellent scholars like you, we can keep growing in quantity and quality. It will be an honor to us to count on your support in the next conference."
Farewell and best wishes to Mary Negri, director of development, whose last day is Friday, September 26. Negri will assume the position of Director of Development at Arizona State University West.
Dr. Dawn Blasko, associate professor of psychology, presented a paper titled "Metaphor and Similarity: A Developmental Perspective" at the Fifth International Conference for Researching and Applying Metaphor, held in Paris, France, September 2-6. Her co-authors on the project were Dr. Victoria Kamzerski, associate professor of psychology, and Dr. Debra Titone, from McGill University, Montreal Canada.
Captain Darrell Burger, assistant professor of military science and officer in charge of ROTC, was promoted to Major on July 17 by the United States Army. Enthusiastic about his program, Maj. Burger believes that Army ROTC gives students the edge for success. ROTC courses teach students how to succeed in a competitive world--in college and business as well as the battlefield. Before moving to Erie, Major Burger worked with the FBI in Kansas City, Missouri, and with the DEA, IRS, US Customs, and other agencies as an intelligence officer. There are more than forty students enrolled in Penn State Behrend's ROTC program, which is a member of the Pride of Pennsylvania Regiment housed at Gannon University.
Dr. Ido Millet, associate professor of MIS; Dr. Diane H. Parente, assistant professor of management; Dr. John L. Fizel, director of Penn State's online MBA; and Dr. Ray R. Venkataraman, associate professor of management, had their paper "Metrics for Managing Online Procurement Auctions" accepted for publication in Interfaces.
Shannon Sweeney, assistant professor of engineering, had his article titled "Statistical Tolerancing for Combinations for Coaxial Features and Clearance Fits" published in Quality Engineering, a journal of The American Society for Quality. The article appears in Volume 16, Issue 1, pages 13-20 (3Q03).
Carla Torgerson, director, Center for Teaching and Educational Technologies, attended the ED-MEDIA conference in June 2003, where she presented the paper "Using Interactive Multimedia to Learn and Apply Observational Research Methods." This paper by Torgerson; Dr. Dawn Blasko, associate professor of psychology; Dr. Victoria Kazmerski, associate professor of psychology; and Jacob Cornwell was recognized as "one of six representative ED-MEDIA 2003 best works," and the authors were invited to publish a related paper, which will appear in the October issue of the Interactive Multimedia Electronic Journal of Computer-Enhanced Learning.
Dr. Chester Wolford, professor of English and business, had a story titled "Staring at the Bear" published in Words of Wisdom and presented a program titled "Arenas" at the ALDEEU conference (Spanish Professionals in the U.S.) in Jaen, Spain, in July 2003.
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