In the Spotlight: Jan. 6, 2017

Kudos to these faculty, staff and students

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  • Evil ChildrenSenior English Lecturer Karen Renner published a book, Evil Children in the Popular Imagination (pictured left). Focusing on narratives with supernatural components, Renner argues the recent proliferation of stories about evil children demonstrates not a declining faith in the innocence of childhood but a desire to preserve its purity. “From novels to music videos, photography to video games, the evil child haunts a range of texts and comes in a variety of forms, including changelings, ferals, and monstrous newborns,” Renner said. In this book, she illustrates how each subtype offers a different explanation for the problem of the “evil” child.
  • Northern Arizona University was selected as a recipient of the second annual SANsational Award given by WICHE Cooperative for Educational Technologies (WCET) State Authorization Network (SAN). This award recognizes outstanding efforts by SAN member institutions and organizations in developing a high-quality, comprehensive solution to a challenging state authorization issue.
  • The therapeutic value of do-it-yourself activities produced last year by Ann Collier, assistant professor of psychological sciences, was recently featured in The Academic Minute’s “Best-Of for 2016.” In the story, Collier writes about the benefits of art as therapy in relation to emotional memories. Her research showed crafting, do-it-yourself activities, home arts (such as baking and gardening) and hunting activities are not only stimulating, arousing and engaging, but they are the best types of activities to fix a bad mood and deflect the potential health impact of that mood.
  • NAU’s Campus Health Services Laboratory passed its recent inspection and was honored with the COLA Laboratory Excellence Award as a result of its commitment to performing quality patient testing and overall laboratory practices. The Laboratory Excellence Award is achieved by complying with all COLA essential and required criteria and demonstrating successful proficiency testing over the course of the last three inspections.
  • Nicholas Clement, Ernest W. McFarland Citizen’s Chair for the NAU College of Education, was recently featured in Where Are They Now?—a story published by his hometown school district in Gobles, Michigan. “Gobles Public Schools made me who I am and I owe them a lot,” Clement said. “In fact, they led me to NAU.”
  • Professor of Journalism Martin D. Sommerness edited the second edition of Survey of Communication, published by McGraw-Hill. Sommerness focuses his research and teachings on issues in mass media and society as well as mass communication law and ethics.
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