I/O
program ranked among nation's best
The news is out: UNO's I/O Psychology program is one of
the best in the nation. That according to the Industrial-Organizational
Psychologist, which in its July 2004 issue ranked the university's master's
degree in I/O psychology sixth best among more than 100 similar programs
across the country. UNO's doctorate in I/O psychology ranked 19th out of 55
similar programs in the United States.
"We're
excited about the survey results, because the success of our graduate
students is very important to our faculty," said Roni Reiter-Palmon, director
of UNO's I/O psychology graduate program.
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• Graduate student
receives EPA award
• UNO Arts &
Science Around the World
- Antarctica: Geography/Geology
- Cuba:
Political Science
- Ireland: Philosophy/International Studies
- Israel: Religious Studies
•
International Conference takes center stage at UNO
• Getting through that
First Year
• A Project of
Democracy
• Faculty Books: Love
letters, baseball and the American Grassland
• Blizek takes on
development role
• Notes from Arts &
Sciences alumni
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The field, which traces
its origins to the early 1900s, is the application of the psychology of human
behavior to the workplace. I/O psychologists, in essence,
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 Roni
Reiter-Palmon, director of UNO I/O psychology graduate program.
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help enhance the
effectiveness of organizations. "We try to increase the job performance of
individual employees and groups, as well as the efficiency of the
organization as a whole," Reiter-Palmon said. "We're concerned with the
welfare of the worker, as well as the organization."
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I/O
psychologists design systems that run the gamut from eliminating bias and
discrimination in the hiring process to identifying and rewarding the most
meritorious employees through performance appraisal. The field is driven by the
collection and analysis of data. "Our conclusions are based on facts, so when
we make recommendations to managers and executives, they know there is a whole
body of science behind those recommendations," Reiter-Palmon said.
The UNO
I/O psychology graduate program provides students with a variety of research
and field experiences, in addition to relevant course work. Students are
encouraged to become involved in local and national professional societies
appropriate to their career goals. About half the students in the I/O
psychology graduate program at UNO come from Nebraska. Another quarter hail
from throughout the Midwest, and the remainder come from either coast and as
far away as India, Japan and Korea.
UNO I/O
psychology grads have secured a variety of positions in industry, consulting
firms and academia. That includes Andy Noon, a personnel assessment and
measurement consultant at Mutual of Omaha. Noon received his MA in I/O
psychology from UNO in 2001 and currently is pursuing his Ph.D. As a psychology
undergrad at UNO, Noon worked full time as a grocery store manager. "The first
I/O class I took really resonated with me," he said. "I was learning about
things that I could apply to situations occurring in my store."
Today,
Noon's duties at Mutual involve special projects relating to succession
planning, leadership and retention issues. As the company's first I/O
psychologist, he's helping Mutual of Omaha pioneer a new corporate approach to
human resources issues. "I don't think I could have been more prepared for my
career," Noon said. "The faculty at UNO prepare you to be successful."
Graduate student receives EPA award
For the
first time in the university's history a UNO student has received a prestigious
fellowship issued by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
Marlo
Sellin, a graduate biology student, received a 2004 Greater Research
Opportunities (GRO) Fellowship for Graduate Environmental Study. The EPA
awarded just 20 of the $27,260 awards in 2004, issuing them to master's and
doctoral students in academic disciplines related to environmental research,
including engineering and the physical, natural, life and social sciences.
Sellin, a
native Omahan who received her bachelor's degree in biology from UNO in 2002,
is a graduate student in Associate Biology Professor Alan Kolok's lab.
Kolok is
investigating the role that exposure to toxins plays in potential health risks.
His research is funded by a two-year, $102,843 grant from the National
Institute of Environmental Health Sciences in conjunction with its Academic
Research Enhancement Award program. Sellin's research is focused on the
maternal transfer of copper and cadmium in the fathead minnow—a common stream
fish—and its long-term effects on reproduction and behavior.
"Marlo's
successful competition for this award is impressive, as she was competing with
the best and brightest environmental biology students in the nation," Kolok
said. "Her work is at the core of my laboratory's research program, and the
results of her research are destined to shape the research interests of my
laboratory for years to come. This is a truly major accomplishment."
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UNO Arts & Sciences around the world
The College
of Arts and Sciences provides the core of the liberal arts education at the
University of Nebraska at Omaha. The meaning of a "liberal" education has
changed substantially since first coined in medieval times, when it meant an
education appropriate to "free" men—men whose financial and social standing
freed them from the onus of a vocation.
Today, a
more common interpretation of "liberal" education is one that sets people free
through enlightenment: freeing them from assumptions or prejudices that result
from the limited geography and social interaction of their daily lives; and
freeing them to think, to evaluate, to reason from a broad base of knowledge
about their world.
Keeping
current on knowledge of the world and discovering or creating new knowledge are
challenges our faculty embrace. They often travel the globe in pursuit of
better understanding, and they bring that understanding back to our students
and our community.
From the
physical mysteries of the Antarctic to the political complexities of Ireland,
Israel, and Cuba, members of our faculty are on the frontlines of learning.
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Michael Peterson, professor of
geography/geology, spent six months at Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada,
as international collaborator on the Cybercartographic Atlas of Antarctica
Project. The $2 million project, funded by the Canadian government, is
developing an online atlas portraying, exploring and communicating the
complexities of the Antarctic for education, research and policy purposes. The
atlas will highlight the global importance of Antarctica as the continent of
science and peace. Peterson worked on the design and research stage. The team
also is developing an online atlas of Canada's trade with the world. Both
online atlases will be complete by the end of 2006.
Peterson
also served as cartographic consultant to Weldon Owen, Inc., of Sydney,
Australia, for a publication entitled "The Illustrated World Atlas," and was
the regional specialist for the United States. The atlas, published in
September, was developed under the guidance of a team of international
cartographic and specialist thematic map consultants and contains more than 400
maps. Included for each continent are satellite views and physical, political
and human impact maps. A separate European edition of the atlas was published
simultaneously.
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With two books and numerous
articles published on the subject, Jonathan Benjamin-Alvarado is recognized as
one of our country's leading specialists in the Cuban nuclear energy program.
An
associate professor of political science and assistant director for research
and outreach in the Office of Latino and Latin American Studies,
Benjamin-Alvarado also has been instrumental in facilitating contacts between
Cuban energy officials and representatives of Omaha's HDR, Inc., an
architecture and engineering firm, regarding future sustainable development in
Cuba. That includes participation in international conferences on sustainable
energy policy and technology transfer in 2003 and 2004.
Last May
he took a group of UNO students, faculty and staff to Cuba as part of "Cuba at
the Crossroads," a three credit-hour political science course that offered an
in-depth look at the political, economic and social reality of post-Cold War
Cuba.
In
addition to daily lectures, the travel study included meetings with Cuban
journalists, economists, elected officials, artists and students. Visits also were
made to the Cuban Institute of Ballet, the University of Habana and various
museums and cultural centers. The trip was one of many Benjamin-Alvarado has
made to Cuba for his research.
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Rory
Conces, religion and philosophy, in late July conducted a seminar at Queen's
University in Belfast, Northern Ireland. The seminar was entitled "The Myth of
Sisyphus Redux: The Pathology of Ethnic Nationalism and the Pedagogy of Forging
Humane Democracies in the Balkans." The Institute of Governance, Public Policy
and Social Research at Queen's, and two private organizations (The deBorda
Institute and Democratic Dialogue) sponsored the seminar.
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Guy
Matalon, religious studies, will lead a delegation of UNO faculty to Israel in
December 2004. The delegation will include Paul Williams, religious studies,
and William Blizek, philosophy and religion. The three will serve as visiting
lecturers at Western Galilee College in the city of Acco. While there the UNO
delegation will discuss ways of creating an exchange program for faculty and
students of WGC and UNO. Gary Day, College of Fine Arts, Carol Lloyd,
Education, and Cassia Spohn, criminal justice, also will join the delegation.
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International
concerns took center stage at UNO during two longstanding annual conferences
held in mid October.
The 27th
annual Global Strategic Studies Conference (GSSC) was held Oct. 14-16 under the
theme of "Perpetuating the Democratic Experience in a Hostile and Fragmented
World." The 29th annual European Studies Conference (ESC) was held concurrently
as an interdisciplinary gathering of more than 100 scholars from colleges and
universities across the United States and from abroad.
The GSSC
is an interdisciplinary and intercultural forum dedicated to the widest
possible combination of scholars, practitioners and participants in its
dialogue. Topics at the conference included: the rise and demise of democracy;
peacekeeping and violence; economic and social development in urban and rural
areas; third world literature and fine arts; gender issues in the developing world;
religion and conflict; the spread of AIDS and other medical challenges;
problems and solutions in education; and Orientalism vs. Occidentalism.
Among the
speakers:
• Ghaleb
Darabya, counselor for political and congressional affairs for the Palestinian
Mission to the United States. Darabya recently was appointed as assistant to
Palestinian Foreign Minister Nabil Shaath.
• Robert
Schwartz, director of political and media affairs for the Consulate General of
Israel to the Midwest.
•
Charlotte Ponticelli, senior coordinator for international women's issues at
the U.S. State Department and with previous posts in the White House, the U.S.
Agency for International Development and the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights.
"Having
both a Palestinian and Israeli represented at the conference is important for
us," said Tom Gouttierre, dean of UNO's International Studies and Programs.
"It's a matter of being fair to both sides of a longstanding and serious Middle
East issue, and it provides our attendees here in Omaha with a direct
connection to the conflict."
The
European Studies Conference featured 34 panels from a variety of disciplines
including art, history, literature, current issues and future prospects in
cultural, political, social and economic fields, education, business, religion,
foreign languages, philosophy, music, theater and film. Keynote speaker at the
ESC luncheon was Bruce Garver, the Martin Professor of History at UNO. Tatyana
Novikov, foreign languages, was conference chair this year.
GSSC
program Chair Dr. Rory Conces said that the GSSC's mission initially was to
disseminate information about world affairs. It was, and is, an avenue for
scholars to present at the conference and then publish in the International
Third World Studies Journal and Review (available online at
http://avalon.unomaha.edu/itwsjr/).
Conces
said the two conferences were linked together for the first time last year.
Participants at both conferences benefit by attending sessions in either
conference.
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Remember
that first year at UNO? Navigating the maze of oddly named buildings, wondering
where to turn for help and struggling not to begin your grades transcript with
"incompletes," or worse?
Too bad
you didn't have the First Year Experience Program at your employ as today's UNO
freshmen do.
A
collaborative effort involving faculty and administrators across campus, The
First Year Experience Program aims to improve retention of UNO's first-year
students through courses designed to acclimate new students to college life.
Though
retention of first-time, full-time, degree-seeking freshmen has risen steadily
during the past 10 years (reaching 73 percent in 2002), those involved in the
First Year Experience Program believe many students in the remaining 27 percent
could be successfully transitioned to the UNO community through the First Year
Experience.
First
Year Experience courses generally are four credit hours in a variety of
subjects that commonly make up a freshman's schedule, explains FYE Coordinator
Jody Neathery-Castro, political science. "The new model takes the best of
college success strategies formerly taught only in courses for 'at-risk'
students and incorporates those strategies into the content of first-year
courses available to all UNO students," said Neathery-Castro.
Regardless
of subject matter—English, history, chemistry, etc.—First Year Experience
students are taught techniques for organizing their work and their time and a
variety of study strategies. They then are required to apply those techniques
and strategies immediately to the content of that course. Each of the courses
is team-taught by a full-time faculty member from the content area and an
instructor from UNO's Counseling Services. Students also are required to attend
several campus events and to investigate the resources available to them.
In
addition to getting the students familiar with the campus and providing them
with practice in good study habits, instructors in these team-taught courses
create a classroom atmosphere that helps each student to realize his or her
individual importance. Instruction is interactive and student-centered.
Discussion and dialogue are encouraged during class and instructors hold
individual interviews with each student.
"Students
develop closer relationships not only with instructors, but also with fellow
students," said Neathery-Castro. "All of these advantages keep students
interested in and happy with college. All of these advantages are, of course,
only possible in classes limited in size to relatively few students."
Neathery-Castro emphasizes her gratitude to the faculty of
the program and to administrators like Michael Skau, English department chair,
and Deborah Smith-Howell, former director of the School of Communication and
presently assistant vice chancellor for academic affairs, who found the
precious resources to dedicate to the program.
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"The
world," said Winston Churchill, "was made to be wooed and won by youth."
Are
today's youth, though, ready to woo and win the world? A look at voting trends
among 18- to 24-year-olds prompts doubts (though some figures from the 2004
election indicate a possible increase in youth voting). Nationally, cites the
Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE),
youth voting has declined by 13 percent from 1972 to 2000. In Nebraska, the
drop is 16 percent.
Guided by
a liberal arts goal to cultivate an educated and engaged citizenry, UNO is
exploring this issue through a national initiative launched by The New York
Times and The American Association of State Colleges and Universities (AASCU).
The multi-campus initiative, the American Democracy Project (ADP), seeks to
create an intellectual and experiential understanding of civic engagement in
the United States in the 21st century, said Jody Neathery-Castro, an associate
professor of political science and ADP faculty liaison.
The
project's goals are twofold:
• To increase
the number of undergraduate students who understand and are committed to
engaging in meaningful civic actions by reviewing and restructuring academic
and extracurricular activities, as well as the institutional culture on
participating campuses; and
• To
focus the attention of policy makers and opinion leaders on the civic value of
the college experience.
The ADP
is taking root at UNO in a number of ways.
Academic
and Student Affairs has awarded 12 mini-grants for individual ADP projects. The
School of Communication together with the Religious Studies program, for
instance, used two of these mini-grants to organize a series of Debate Watches.
Students, faculty, staff and members of the general public gathered in the
student union to watch the presidential debates and to discuss the issues. The
Political Science and History Departments arranged for electoral college expert
Gary L. Gregg to lecture Oct. 12 at UNO.
Neathery-Castro
also plans to work with other UNO groups, such as student organizations and
leadership programs, the Service-Learning Academy and the American Humanics
Program, to collaborate on civic engagement opportunities.
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Arts and
Sciences faculty publish in a variety of media-scholarly and creative-as
writers or editors. Among the variety of interests and talents of our faculty
are three books published in 2004:
"Not Just Any Land, a Personal and
Literary Journey into the American Grasslands" by John Price, English, focuses
on Price's journey toward a new personal commitment to his home region—the
Midwest—and its natural environment. That process also leads him through the
region's literature and into conversations with contemporary nature writers—Linda
Hasselstrom, Dan O'Brien, William Least Heat-Moon and Mary Swander—who have
devoted themselves to living in, writing about and restoring the grasslands.
"Idleness
Working, the Discourse of Love's Labor from Ovid through Chaucer and Gowerby"
by Gregory Sadlek, English, is an original scholarly exploration of the
presentation of love as labor in classical and medieval literature. Sadlek
offers that the juxtaposition of the "work" of love and the more commonly
accepted "passion" of love is more than an intriguing foil and allows us
insight into not only the philosophies of those times but also into our own
traditions.
"Playing
for Their Nation, Baseball and the American Military during World War II" by
Steven Bullock, history, examines the unique role that military baseball played
in the lives of WWII soldiers, as well as the affects of WWII on major league
baseball. Bullock employs military documents and newspaper articles as well as
personal accounts from players like Joe Dimaggio to draw a poignant picture of
a nation at war.
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Professor
William L. Blizek has taken on the challenge of coordinating development
efforts for the College of Arts and Sciences.
"Bill has been a big supporter of
the college ever since coming here in 1970," said Dean Shelton Hendricks. "He
knows the college, its faculty and the community and will do an excellent job
of assisting all college supporters in finding the proper home for their
donations."
Blizek
will assist in making prospective donors aware of the many opportunities for
giving donations to the College of Arts and Sciences. He also is charged with
making certain that the proper recognition is given donors and that the college
receives the recognition it merits through the media and university
publications.
"I am
delighted to be able to provide this service for the college," Blizek said.
"The College of Arts and Sciences has numerous funds through which alumni,
friends of the college, faculty, students and staff can show their support of
the college. Scholarships, faculty development, faculty chairs, purchase of
books and travel are among the types of funds that are already established to
benefit the faculty, staff and students of the college.
"In
addition to funds that are already established, anyone interested in showing
their support by establishing a new fund is always welcome. I can help
prospective donors explore areas in which new funding is needed or existing
areas in which their donations will make a difference."
Blizek
has been a professor of philosophy and religion since his arrival at UNO. He
has served as chair of the department on several occasions and currently is
chair of the religious studies program. His areas of interest include ethics
and religion and film. In 1997, he founded, with Dr. Ron Burke, The Journal of
Religion and Film (JR&F), now in its eighth year of online publication. The
journal examines the description, critique and embodiment of religion in film.
He has
served as a juror for the HotShops Film Festival and as a consultant for the
Jewish Omaha Film Festival. He also covers the Sundance Film Festival for the
JR&F and in his spare time is an avid golfer.
Anyone
interested in discussing funding opportunities with Blizek may contact him: via
email at wblizek@mail.unomaha.edu;
by phone at (402) 554-3347; or by mail at the University of Nebraska at Omaha,
ASH 205, 6001 Dodge Street, Omaha, NE 68182-0265.
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Bob Mazur
Bob Mazur graduated in 1970 with a
major in mathematics and economics. He pursued a career in banking, working for
such companies as Citibank and Bank of America and for the Federal Reserve
Bank. He retired early and now is living in New Orleans. Bob says, "There are a number of schools
with much better name recognition than UNO. These schools are much more
difficult to get into and are also are much more expensive. UNO provides a very
high caliber of faculty and is large enough to provide the selection of courses
that allows a student to take their education to whatever level they choose to
take it. I feel my education at UNO was second to none and never felt like I had
to take a back seat to any of my working peers from big-name schools. There are
two additional benefits of attending UNO. The first is the fact that when a
person graduates they don't face a lifetime of repayment of student loans. The
second benefit is that a person is being educated in the Midwest, which brings
with it a certain amount of grounding and good basic values. I couldn't be
happier with the results of my education at UNO."
Bob
Nelson
Bob
Nelson (BA, 1967, political science) is vice president of life and estate
planning at Grace/Mayer Insurance Agency, a past national president of the
70,000-member Association of Insurance and Financial Advisors (NAIFA) and a
retired U.S. Navy captain. "My degree in political science led to an
interesting military intelligence career, both on active duty and in the Naval
Reserves," Nelson says. "The influence of Professor Harry Reynolds has lasted a
lifetime and served me well in both the military and business."
Susan
Silver
Susan
Silver, who has an MA in English from
UNO, is a writer living in Omaha. "The English faculty enriched me immeasurably
and broadened my thinking on many levels," she said. "I would not trade a
minute of my experience at UNO." Silver currently is working on a series of
books that take a metaphysical/philosophical approach to evaluating and solving
many of today's problems. She is working on her 12th book in the series.
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