In the Spotlight: March 15, 2019

Kudos to these faculty, staff and programs

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  • Two professors in rhetoric, writing and digital media studies/English published articles in an edited collection on Defining Literacy Standards: Essays on Assessment, Inclusion, Pedagogy, and Civic Engagement.
    • Laura Gray-Rosendale contributed “Deconstructing ‘Dumb Reading Groups’: Rural New England Culture, Basic Writers/Readers, and the Question of Standards.” She also is the guest editor for two special issues of the Journal of Basic Writing and has an essay in the volume “Re-examining Constructions of Basic Writers’ Identities: Graduate Teaching, New Developments in the Contextual Model, and the Future of the Discipline.”
    • Sibylle Gruber contributed “Learning in Different Worlds: Native American Students’ Approaches to Academic Literacy.” The article discusses a collaborative project to help instructors become more literate about educational and cultural issues related to Native American students.   
  • Associate professor of chemistry and biochemistry Laura Wasylenki co-authored a paper, “Methanogenesis sustained by sulfide weathering during the Great Oxidation Event,” recently published in Nature Geoscience. The paper documents a shift in the weathering reactions controlling the ocean-bound flux of nickel—an essential micronutrient for the organisms that produced methane in Precambrian oceans.
  • Anka Malatynska, faculty member in the School of Communication, was named one of the Top Ten Rising Stars of Cinematography by the American Society of Cinematographers. She also received recognition from Vogue, making their list of all female cinematographers who worked on some of the biggest movies of the year 2018.  
  • Northern Arizona University’s Physician Assistant Program ranked No. 12 out of all public National Universities on the U.S. News and World Reports’ list of Best Physician Assistant Programs 2019. The program also ranked No. 16 out of all public institutions including medical schools and No. 37 out of 250 national programs.
  • Senior lecturer in the School of Communication Angelé Anderfuren is coordinating The Arizona Name Stories Project as part of Flagstaff Public Library’s March Memoir Mondays, organized by English instructor Stacy Murison. As part of the project, Anderfuren will show Arizona residents how to research their names, write their name stories and submit them for publication on @AZNameStories. The purpose of the project is to create a living history that tells the stories of Arizonans past and present.
  • NAU Professional Education Programs partnered with NAU Career Development to host the 5th annual Career Fair & Interview Fest earlier this month. Designed to connect Arizona schools with NAU students graduating from a Teacher Preparation Program, the event had 80 participating school districts interview more than 125 students. 
  • Betty Coplan, faculty member at the Phoenix Biomedical Campus, recently received the 2019 Publishing Award from the American Academy of Physician Assistants (AAPA) for her article, “Burnout, job satisfaction, and stress levels of PAs.” This award is given to a physician assistant who has published a new clinical or research article expressing original or scientifically rigorous ideas. 
  • Paul Lenze, senior lecturer in politics and international affairs, published his second book, “Syrian Forced Migration and Public Health in the European Union,” with Christine Crudo Blackburn of Texas A&M. The book examines the impact of the refugee crisis on public health in neighboring states in the Middle East and Europe. The authors provide a framework to better understand risk factors and provide recommendations on how to respond to public health crises moving forward.
  • NAU’s Classroom Support Team, responsible for managing the technology on the main campus, recently partnered with Crestron Electronics on a case study that evaluated the classroom AV technology deployed throughout academic buildings on campus. Team lead Kegan Remington led an initiative to create a standardized, simplified AV solution for all classrooms on the main campus and satellite community campuses state-wide, also improving the quality and expediency of support provided to faculty. More than 175 classrooms were fully outfitted with Crestron Electronics.