NUMBER 1
Fall 2006
|
|
KSC Ranks!
Keene State College has been ranked #83 in the U.S. News and World Report listing of 2006-07 Best Master's Universities in the North. KSC is also one of 222 outstanding colleges and universities in the Northeast that the Princeton Review recommends to college applicants in the new 2007 edition of its book, The Best Northeastern Colleges. A two-page profile states: "There's a fine and challenging education to be had at Keene State, and all you have to do is go looking for it." The evaluation is based on student surveys. Student comments in the profile noted KSC's small classes and excellent library.
 |
 |
 |
Hayes, Mullens, and Rooney Lauded at Honors Convocation
The College honored academic excellence and outstanding service at the Fall Honors Convocation on Sun., Oct. 15. Don Hayes, KSC coordinator of community service from 1992 until his retirement last June, received the Community Service Award, and Dr. JoBeth Mullens, professor and chair of the Geography Department, accepted the 2006 Distinguished Teacher Award. Robert M. Rooney Sr. was awarded the Granite State Award, conferred by the Board of Trustees of the University System of New Hampshire for outstanding service to the community.
Cambodian Artists in Residence at KSC
Members of the artists collective Sovanna Phum from Phnom Penh, Cambodia, were on campus in September for a 17-day residency with Sandglass Theater of Putney, Vermont. Sovanna Phum and Sandglass conducted lecture demonstrations and workshops in Cambodian music, dance, and shadow puppetry. They concluded their residency with a performance of The Story of the Dog, a cautionary tale that blames war for the criminal conduct of good people.
"Most Cambodian stories blame individuals and judge them," says Kosal Mann, Sovanna Phum's artistic director. "This story recognizes their plight and blames the effects of war for the disintegration of society."
The Story of the Dog combined rod puppetry, spectacular shadow puppetry, and Cambodian dance set to an original musical score played on authentic Cambodian musical instruments. Students from Project KEEP, Keene's after-school program for K-5 students, attended a rehearsal and participated in a question-and-answer session with the artists.
Early Sprouts Garden Granted $5,000
The KSC Child Development Center (CDC) is the beneficiary of a $5,000 grant from Hannaford grocers to support a new curriculum project combining organic gardening with healthy eating for preschool children and their families. Early Sprouts was launched last spring when CDC students and teachers helped prepare and plant raised beds (built with a generous grant from MacMillan Company) in the playground behind Elliot Hall. Over the summer, dedicated parents, children, and staff weeded, fertilized, and watered the gardens. This fall, CDC students are learning how to harvest and prepare vegetables and fruits. The Hannaford grant is being used to create home-based weekly recipe preparation kits for families to supplement classroom instruction.
Karrie Kalich, a Health Science assistant professor who is developing the curriculum and made the alliance with Hannford, says that key food habits form between the ages of 2 and 5, so the potential impact on the CDC's preschoolers is significant.
Media Arts Center Opens at Heart of Campus
The Film Studies, Graphic Design, Communication, and Journalism Departments are now housed in a building renovated specifically to nourish creative interaction between these disciplines.
The $3.3 million project rehabbed the 27,500 square feet of open space created when the old dining hall was gutted. The Burt Hill, Inc., design team emphasized open community spaces and a techy look that includes open ceilings, brightly colored panels alternating with black support beams, lots of glass, and an entry with plasma TVs and data projection displays of student work.
"Burt Hill caught the excitement, the edginess of the project," says Nona Fienberg, dean of arts and humanities. "It's risky architecture that reflects creative synergy – faculty offices are all in one area to facilitate the exchange of ideas. There are lots of gathering spaces for students. Even the curving front panels will have a graffiti look that captures the 'swoosh of excitement' of new media."
Film editing labs, a fully equipped television production studio, temperature-controlled film archives, and state-of-the-art writing and graphic design facilities are shared by all three programs. Students have been involved in all stages – providing input on furniture, designing the departmental logos that hang as banners on the building, and creating the art displayed on panels and projected by gobo lights in the entryway.
Fienberg predicts that the center will have a dramatic impact on the level of interest students have in these programs and also on the campus community. "The exciting new synergy that is happening in media arts will vibrate right at the heart of the College community," she says.
Additional resource: Media Arts Center – this presentation contains audio and starts automatically. Please adjust your volume.
Move-In Day: 'Welcoming, Low-Stress, and Efficient'
"Thank you so much for your contribution to making move-in day so welcoming, low-stress, and efficient …"
The opening lines of a parent's e-mail to Corinne Kowpak, vice president for Student Affairs, says it all. Keene State College staff and faculty welcomed new students to the College in August.
Faculty Tenure, Promotions Are Announced
The University System of New Hampshire Board of Trustees, on recommendation from its Academic Affairs Committee, promoted 14 Keene State College faculty members, granting emeritus status to two retiring professors and awarding tenure to eight professors.
 |
||
| Emeritus Status (retiring professors) |
Douglas Nelson (music) Delmar Ogg (technology, design, and safety) |
|
|
||
| Professor | Larry Welkowitz (psychology) | |
|
||
| Associate Professor |
Ann Atkinson (communication) Anna Kaladiouk (English) Mark Timney (journalism) |
|
|
||
| Associate Professor with Tenure |
Leonard Fleischer (education) | |
| Tenure |
Joseph Darby (music) Maria Duggan (economics) Gordon Leversee (science) Kirsti Sandy (English) Peter Stevenson (sociology) William Stroup (English) Melinda Treadwell (technology, design, and safety) |
|
One Butler Court Welcomes Residents
One Butler Court opened in August. The newest residence hall is energy-efficient and makes use of recycled materials. At the ribbon-cutting ceremony Keene Mayor Michael E. J. Blastos praised the College for responding to the needs of the Keene community and for its efforts to house 60 percent of all full-time undergraduate students on campus, a goal that will be reached when the new Pondside III residence hall opens in January.
KSC Buys Former Alpha House
Mike Ward, Student Center, just had time to grab his camera when he heard about the demolition of the former Alpha Pi Tau fraternity house on 6 Madison Street. The building, which the College acquired in June, was damaged beyond repair by fire last spring and had to be razed. The College's master plan identifies this area for additional parking.
The Year Ahead: A College with Character
President Giles-Gee described Keene State as a "college with character" in her opening address on August 21. After welcoming new Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs Mel Netzhammer and presenting an overview of the academic year 2005-06, she noted that one of the key issues of the past year was to develop a strategic plan and vision for the College, and she outlined the progress made on five top goals of KSC's Strategic Plan.
Among the recent achievements she noted were the ECAC Jostens Institution of the Year award, the Davis Grant for Integrative Studies, awards in excellence for the construction of the Science Center and the admissions website, a suicide-prevention grant for the counseling center, successful service-learning fund-raising, and the winning records of coaches Ron Butcher and Ken Howe.
The next step, she said, is to strive for a new level of academic excellence. "It is our responsibility, together as a community, to lift Keene State to prominence as a seat of learning, an outstanding center of liberal arts and sciences, and an institution that prepares its students for lives and work rich with meaning."
New Thinking and Writing Program Launched
The Evolution of the Little Red Schoolhouse, Technology and Civilization, Ethical Implications of the Holocaust. This fall, 260 first-year students are taking these classes and 10 others instead of the traditional English 101 essay-writing course as part of a pilot program to launch the College's new Integrative Studies program.
The courses are part of the Thinking and Writing component of the new curriculum, which helps students write well at the college level in any academic field.
Quantitative Literacy, the second course in the first-year "foundation" of the new general education curriculum, will be offered in the 2007-08 school year. Students will choose topics from any discipline and focus on developing quantitative reasoning and analytical skills.
The development of the four-credit Integrative Studies courses dovetails with another major curriculum change on campus: by the fall of 2007, the College will switch to a comprehensive four-credit model. Students will take fewer (usually four) classes per semester, creating an opportunity for greater depth and breadth in course work.
These curriculum changes add momentum to a campus-wide discussion on academic excellence initiated by President Giles-Gee. "We envision a College that embraces academic excellence within a context of civic responsibility," she says. "We are in pursuit of excellence. There is no other path for us."
Alumni Awards Honor MacDougall, Hayes, Crooks, and O'Brien
Four distinguished individuals were honored during Reunion Weekend.
Don Hayes, coordinator of community service at KSC for 14 years, was presented with the 2006 Outstanding Service Award. Don came to Keene State in 1992 to promote community service as a key part of a liberal arts education. He began the active Habitat for Humanity chapter on campus, instituted the Alternative Spring Break program, and started the international Global Village program at KSC.
Jason Crooks '96 received the Alumni Inspiration Award. After graduating from KSC, Jason joined the Peace Corps. During his stay in a village in Kenya, Jason befriended a young man named David Kiara, who had lost a leg. Jason raised money to bring David to Keene State; David graduated in 2004. Jason is active with the Habitat for Humanity chapter in Burlington, Vermont. In February he traveled to Guatemala to work on a Global Village housing project.
Ruth Doan MacDougall '61 received this year's Alumni Achievement Award. Her work as a writer has appeared in many forms, from short stories in Redbook magazine to book reviews in The New York Times, Newsday, and the Christian Science Monitor. She has written 11 novels, including The Cheerleader, a national best-seller.
Jody J. O'Brien '82 received the Sprague W. Drenan Award for support of alumni programs. O'Brien served for six years on the Alumni Association board of directors, including one year as president. She helped form the Keene-area alumni chapter and continues to be a valued volunteer and active at alumni events.
KSC Employees Honored by Governor
Governor John H. Lynch and the N.H. Executive Council gathered on campus in August as part of a series of meetings held throughout the state.
During breakfast at the Cohen Center for Holocaust Studies, Paul Vincent and Tom White gave brief presentations about the center's educational efforts.
Mary Jensen, KSC sustainability and recycling coordinator, was honored for her work on the campus's recycling program; Mary Mayshark-Stavely was honored for her work in early childhood and multicultural education; professors William Sullivan, Lawrence Benaquist, and Thomas Durnford were honored for creating a documentary about Martha Sharp and her efforts to rescue refugees during the Holocaust; and Jan Cohen, a member of the Cohen Center advisory board, received a commendation for her work to implement Holocaust studies as part of the New Hampshire school curriculum.
New Program, New (Old) Name
After three years of significant discussion, the Education Department (formerly ESEC) has developed a new teacher education program proposal and submitted it for approval by the Senate. The move to a four-credit program will allow more time for students at the beginning of the program to engage in critical reflection, for students in the middle of the program to spend in the field teaching and observing, and for students at the end of the program to develop robust curriculum and pedagogy.
The new program also brings an opportunity to reclaim a departmental name set aside 12 years ago when the Education, Special Education, and Early Childhood Education Departments merged, forming the mysterious-to-most acronym ESEC. Returning to the Education Department name makes life a bit simpler for prospective students and others.
2006-07 Sidore Series Focuses on Political Economy
Two distinguished speakers challenged conventional wisdom on campus this fall as part of the Sidore Series, which brings original and sometimes controversial thinkers to campus. This year, speakers are addressing issues of political economy in our global society.
Anwar M. Shaikh, professor of economics at the New School for Social Research in New York, examined "Globalization and the Myths of Free Trade."
"International trade theory stops being mysterious as soon as one recognizes that real international competition works in the same way as national competition: it favors the competitively strong over the competitively weak," Shaikh said.
The second Sidore lecture, planned for Nov. 14, features KSC alumnus John Uniack Davis '84, who has spent most of his adult life wrestling with issues concerning social justice and poverty in Africa. Since 2002 he has worked for CARE International, one of the world's premier humanitarian and development organizations.
Davis will present "W(h)ither Africa? Development Challenges in the 21st Century," a talk that explains how the numerous major wars and conflicts on African soil, unequal terms of trade, and crushing levels of debt exacerbate the myriad social and economic challenges on the continent.
At Keene State, Davis was active in student politics and served as the student representative on the USNH Board of Trustees. He earned graduate degrees from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst and Michigan State University.