Professional Notes

Professional notes

Fourteen Chemistry Department students presented posters describing their research at the Summer Undergraduate Research Expo sponsored by the University of Minnesota Institute of Technology Aug. 10 at the university’s McNamara Alumni Center. Participating students included: Ashley Kramer and Tim Dickhudt, students of Dr. Tony Borgerding; Jon Athmann and Jonathan Hennek, students of Dr. David Boyd; Matt Turner, student of Dr. Thomas Marsh; Trina Arola (whose poster won third place in the competition’s undergraduate research division), Barjeta Balidemaj, Marika Kuspa and Dana Newman, students of Dr. William Ojala; Katherine Leehy, student of Dr. Kathy Olson; and Brook Jacobson, Jenn Schroeder, Andrew Korte and Rachel Lundeen, students of Dr. Kris Wammer.

Teresa Collett, School of Law, served pro bono as special attorney general for Oklahoma in Nova Health Systems v. Edmondson, a case before the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. In its decision the court upheld the constitutionality of Okalahoma’s law requiring parental involvement prior to performing an abortion on a minor. Nova Health System had challenged the law, arguing that the judicial bypass mechanism failed to comply with Supreme Court requirements.

Dr. Kathryn Combs, Finance Department; Dr. Sharon Gibson, Organization Learning and Development Department; Dr. Julie Hays, Decision Sciences Department, Dr. P. Jane Saley, Accounting Department, and Dr. John Wendt, Ethics and Business Law Department, are co-authors of an article, “Enhancing Curriculum and Delivery: Linking Assessment to Learning Objectives,” which has been accepted for publication in Assessment and Evaluation in Higher Education.

Frank Coglitore and Diane Matson, Accounting Department, are the authors of an article, “The Use of Computer-Assisted Audit Techniques in the Auditing Course: Further Evidence,” accepted for publication in a forthcoming edition of the Journal of Forensic Accounting.

Dr. Daya Dayananda, Mathematics Department, chaired a session, “Social and Economical Statistics,” at SCRA2006-FIMXIII, the 13th international conference of the Forum for Interdisciplinary Mathematics, on interdisciplinary mathematical and statistical techniques Sept. 1-4 in Portugal. At the conference he also gave a presentation, “A Stocastic Model for HIV/AIDS and its Application in Insurance and Health-Care Cost Estimation.”

Dr. Mel Gray, College of Business, delivered the presidential address, “Governance and Management in the Nonprofit Arts: One Economist’s View,” at the biannual meeting of the Association for Cultural Economics International in July in Vienna, Austria. The address marked his final official act as president and his transition to “past president” status, the capacity in which he will serve an additional two years on ACEI’s executive board. The address will be published early next year in the Journal of Cultural Economics.

Dr. Sarah Noonan, School of Education, presented a paper, “Culturally Sensitive Pedagogy: Opening Up Diversity in Teaching and Learning,” at the 2006 annual conference of the National Conference of Professors of Educational Administration Aug. 2-5 in Lexington, Ky.