The top A&S websites in terms of relative percent of pageviews in the period August through December, 2011 were: A&S Home page and Chemistry at 8%; Economics and Psychology at 7%; Mathematics/Statistics at 6%; English and Physics at 4 %; History and the Writing Center at 3%. The remaining other academic departments combined were at 3%. (Theatre site views could not be measured by UMKC.)
Students from the Department of Architecture, Urban Planning & Design made a presentation on November 17, 2011 on what makes a resilient Joplin. The public presentation was sponsored by the Kansas City Chapter of the American Planning Association (APA) and the Kansas City Chapter of the American Institute of Architects (AIA) and took place at the AIA office in Kansas City, MO. For more see:
. cas.umkc.edu/pdfs/11-17-11%20AIA%20Event%20Flyer.pdf.
The Planning and Design Student Organization of AUP+D hosted a Regional Transit Forum on December 6 where city and county officials discussed the future of regional transportation for the KC area. For more see:
. info.umkc.edu/aupd/2011/11/29/regional-transit-forum/
Theatre Department lighting and scenic design graduate students are the focus of an exhibit titled “Form Follows Function”
. www.theboxgallery.org/?p=154.
The exhibit runs through February 24 at the Box Gallery which is in the Commerce Bank building at 1000 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO. The exhibit is open from 8 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Monday through Friday. Admission is free and open to the public. “Form Follows Function” is curated by Sarah Oliver, assistant professor of Costume Technology and Lindsay Davis, associate professor of Costume Design.
Mona Lyne (Political Science Chair) learned that her book The Voter’s Dilemma and Democratic Accountability: Latin America and Beyond received the Choice Award for an Outstanding Academic Title. For more see:
. www.cro2.org/default.aspx?page=reviewdisplay&pid=3465899.
Richard Gentile (Geosciences Emeritus) was honored for his contribution to the profession of Geology by the Association of Environmental and Engineering Geologists: Kansas City/Omaha Section at a reception in September, 2011. He started his career at the Missouri Department of Natural Resources in 1958 and came to UMKC in 1966. For more see:
. www.aegweb.org/files/public/KCO-SEC_August_2011_
Newsletter.pdf.
Delwyn Catley (Psychology) was awarded a University of Kansas Cancer Center Pilot Project Award, for $27,703, for a project entitled: The Role of Implicit Attitudes in a Motivational Smoking Cessation Intervention. The purpose of this study is to assess whether Motivational Interviewing changes implicit attitudes (relative to a cognitively oriented health education control intervention), and whether any changes in implicit attitudes lead to more quit attempts.
New Letters has again done well in its field. One of the most highly regarded national prize anthologies for literary presses and magazines has reprinted two more works from UMKC’s New Letters. The Pushcart Prize XXXVI: Best of the Small Presses 2012, released in November 2011, includes an essay, “Logophilia,” by B. H. Fairchild, and a short story, “Rockaway,” by Lydia Conklin, both from New Letters vol. 76 no. 4 (summer 2010). “It is rare that a magazine or press receives multiple Pushcart Prizes in a single year,” says New Letters editor Robert Stewart. “Even one is an honor.”
They go on to say that these two new awards combine with a Pushcart Prize “triple crown” in 2010 to place New Letters among the top 10 Pushcart Prize winning magazines in the country over the latest three years, from 2010 to 2012. Other magazines that equaled five or more awards during that time period include Ploughshares, Tin House, Threepenny Review, and The Kenyon Review.
Theodore Seligson, (AUP+D Visiting Professor) recently received two achievement awards. The American Institute of Architects – Kansas City Chapter presented a Presidential Award and The Historic Kansas City Foundation presented a Lifetime Achievement Award in early December. In addition, to honor Seligson’s contributions to architecture and design, the faculty and advisory board of AUP+D and Seligson’s friends recently established the Seligson Fund for AUP+D. The fund will provide financial backing for lectures, special events and other projects that support and advance the AUP+D program.
The A&S College spent more than $6,700,000 on student scholarships and fee remissions in FY 2011. $5,035,417 was debited from the College’s tuition income by the campus to contribute to the automatic scholarship pool for the campus. The College paid $1,297,296 from its own accounts to cover student fee remissions. And more than $369,000 was paid out from A&S-based scholarship fund accounts.
Three of the five graduating students who were selected as the Fall 2011 Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs and Enrollment Management Honor Recipients were from A&S. According to the notice in UMatters, the selection was based on the students’ high academic achievements, leadership roles and service to the university community. We add our congratulations to these students.
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| Emma L. Frank Nominated by Dr. Kathleen Kilway |
Ramanda Hicks Nominated by the late Dr. Carol Koehler |
Anthony McDaniel Nominated by Dr. Eric Grospitch |
Chris Fowler (Psychology doctoral student) earned a student research award from the Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies Schizophrenia Special Interest Group for his poster presentation: “How skill knowledge and capacity influence real-world skill performance in persons with serious mental illness.” Co-authors on this project were Psychology graduate students Amy Barnes and Meghan Murphy, and their faculty mentor, Melisa Rempfer. For more see
Between August and December 2011, the Websites in the College experienced an average of 94,000 pageviews per month. In every month during that period the College had more views than any other academic unit at UMKC. The average pages visited per visit was 3.12.
| Jennifer Phegley (English) had her new book Courtship and Marriage in Victorian England recently published by Praeger/ABC-Clio. According to the publisher’s site, it “draws on little-known conduct books, letter-writing manuals, domestic guidebooks, periodical articles, letters, and novels to reveal what the period equivalents of “dating” and “tying the knot” were like in the Victorian era. By addressing topics such as the etiquette of introductions and home visits, the roles of parents and chaperones, the events of the London season, model love letters, and the specific challenges facing domestic servants seeking spouses author Jennifer Phegley provides a fascinating examination of British courtship and marriage rituals among the working, middle, and upper classes from the 1830s to the 1910s.” For more, see: |  |
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Richard Gentile (Geosciences-Emeritus) has his new book out. It is titled Rocks and Fossils of the Central United States with special emphasis on the Greater Kansas City Area and was published by the Paleontology Institute of the University of Kansas in 2011. For more see: |
| Jie Chen, (Mathematics and Statistics Chair) has co-authored a research monograph entitled Parametric Statistical Change Point Analysis: With Applications to Genetics, Medicine, and Finance published by Birkhäuser, Boston, 2012. This book is an expanded second edition of the first edition which was published in 2000. For more see:
. www.springer.com/birkhauser/applied+probability+ |
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More than 100 UMKC A&S faculty and staff attended the 2011 A&S Awards Reception at The Residence on Thursday, September 8th. Interim Dean Wayne Vaught presided and introduced the new faculty present, recognized recipients of system and national awards as well as presented this year’s outstanding teaching and outstanding staff awards in the College.
TEACHING AWARDS
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The 2011 Dean’s Outstanding Teaching Award for Regular Faculty was awarded to Beth Miller (pictured left), Department of Political Science. |
| The 2011 Dean’s Outstanding Teaching Award for Non-Regular Faculty was awarded to Julie Urbanik (pictured right), Department of Geosciences. |  |
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The 2011 Dean’s Outstanding Teaching Award for Part-Time Faculty was awarded to Mark Raab (pictured left), Department of Geosciences. |
| The A&S Alumni Association, represented by Pat Madden (pictured right), immediate Past President of the A&S Alumni Board, presented the 2011 Alumni Good Teaching Award to Jennifer Phegley (pictured right), Department of English. |  |
STAFF AWARDS
The staff awards (after a College-wide nomination process and then an evaluation by peers from outside the nominees’ units) recognize those whose work excels in meeting the “Six R’s” of outstanding staff service. These are respectful, responsible, resourceful, receptive, responsive, and reasonable.
The 2011 College of Arts and Sciences Staff Member of the Year is Susan Hankins, who was the Administrative Assistant in the Department of Sociology until July, 2011 when she became Executive Staff Assistant to the Dean.
There were three runners-up from among the 12 nominees as well: Cathy Slack, Accountant in the Dean’s Office, Alicen Lundberg, Administrative Assistant, Department of Art and Art History and Mandy Seley, Administrative Associate, Department of Psychology.
OTHER RECOGNITIONS
Interim Dean Vaught also recalled for those present that two of the three newest UM Curators’ Professors were from the College: Kathy Goggin (Psychology) and Kathleen Kilway (Chemistry). He also noted that the College had two of its faculty awarded Guggenheim Fellowships this year: Clancy Martin (Philosophy) and Christie Hodgen (English).
In AY2010-2011, the College produced 161,628 SCH. 91 percent were undergraduate hours and 9 percent were graduate hours.
On Friday August 25, 2011 more than 500 students from UMKC and several area high schools took part in the Department of Physics’ Physics Phest held in labs and classrooms of Flarsheim Hall and on the Quad. Organized by members of the department’s faculty and staff, this event allowed the attendees to have opportunities to ask professional and student scientists about their research, tour research labs, watch physics demonstrations and try 
hands-on physics-based activities. They were able to meet faculty from the Physics Department as well as from Mathematics & Statistics, Chemistry, Geosciences and the School of Computing and Engineering. Others present included science teachers from area high schools and members of the Astronomical Society of Kansas City. As the accompanying photos attest, the event kept everyone busy and was given a “thumbs up” encouraging the Department to plan for an even better Physics Phest for next year. (Parts of this article were previously used by U-Matters in one of their stories.)
Fifteen A&S Faculty were among those promoted to Associate Professor with Tenure or promoted to Professor in 2011. They were among the 34 recipients recognized at the campus celebration on September 1, 2011 in Pierson Auditorium. We appreciate their contributions to the College and their departments. And, we join in congratulating them.
Those promoted to Associate Professors with Tenure are:
Anthony Caruso, Physics; Christie Hodgen, English Language and Literature; Caitlin Horseman, Communications Studies; Jennifer Lundgren, Psychology; Erik Olsen, Economics; Melisa Rempfer, Psychology; Liana Sega, Mathematics and Statistics; and Jacob Wagner, Architecture, Urban Planning +Design.
Promoted to Professor are:
Andrew Bergerson, History; Cathleen Burnett, Criminal Justice and Criminology; Stephen Dilks, English Language and Literature; Jennifer Phegley, English Language and Literature; Noah Rhee, Mathematics and Statistics; Victor Tan, Theatre; F. Wayne Vaught, Philosophy.
With the recent naming of Kathy Goggin (Psychology) as a Curators’ Professor and Kathleen Kilway (Chemistry) as a Curators’ Teaching Professor, the College now has a grand total of 14 faculty members who hold this honor. They are:
Curators’ Professors
Felicia H. Londré, Department of Theater (1987)
Wai-Yim Ching, Department of Physics (1988)
Max Skidmore, Department of Political Science (1999)
Yanching (Jerry) Jean, Department of Chemistry (2002)
James Durig, Department of Chemistry (2003)
Jerry R. Dias, Department of Chemistry (2010)
Michael B. Kruger, Department of Physics (2010)
Kathy Goggin, Department of Psychology (2011)
Curators’ Teaching Professors
Bruce Bubacz, Department of Philosophy (1998)
David Atkinson, Department of Political Science (1999)
Charles Wurrey, Department of Chemistry (2002)
Joan Dean, Department of English (2003)
Carla Klausner, Department of History (2004)
Kathleen Kilway, Department of Chemistry (2011)
To learn more about the titles and their history, go to:
We welcome to the College Phil Watson who joined the College of Arts & Sciences as Director of Development and Gift Planning on August 1, 2011 after serving as UMKC’s Director of Gift Planning for the past six (6) years. Before joining UMKC in 2005, Phil served as Vice President for Advancement at Avila University, as Director of the Olathe Medical Center Charitable Foundation, and as Associate Director of Planned Giving at the Kansas University Endowment Association. Phil also enjoyed fifteen years in trust & investment management sales and administration, holding senior-level positions with local and regional banks. Phil grew up in Lawrence and holds Bachelor of Arts and Master of Public Administration degrees from the University of Kansas. He is a former Certified Financial Planner. He has served on numerous local advisory boards and fundraising committees and is a past President of the Mid-America Planned Giving Council.
In his position with the College, Phil will be responsible for securing major and/or planned gifts to support various departments, programs and centers in the College of Arts & Sciences. Phil has specialized expertise in estate planning and gift planning, including counseling major gift donors on how to minimize the costs of a gift while maximizing the financial and tax benefits of a gift. He will utilize creative gift planning techniques to help our donors create meaningful gifts that will have an impact on the College and its students.
