Volume 14, Number 9
Featured Stories
- UWM alumna is named U.S. ambassador to KuwaitFifteen months after first being nominated to be the U.S. ambassador to Kuwait, Karen Sasahara was confirmed by the U.S. Senate in October 2023. The journey to confirmation was long …
- UWM junior wins major international scholarshipA suggestion from her Japanese sensei – her teacher, that is – has given Lauren Sroka an amazing opportunity to study for a year in Japan. Sroka, a junior majoring …
- Jewish Studies welcomes its first postdoc, and it’s music to their earsUW-Milwaukee’s Center for Jewish Studies is breaking new ground this year: The program is welcoming its first-ever postdoctoral research fellow to campus. Samantha Cooper, who holds a PhD in Historical …
- UWM Students Prep for a Spooky Space Extravaganza this Fall at the PlanetariumUWM students are busy preparing for Creepy Cosmos, this fall’s Halloween-themed program at the UWM Planetarium. The show highlights some of the spookiest space phenomena, including the solar system’s most …
- Service-learning helps communications student land a job before graduationAfter volunteering for a children’s organization in her home country of Nigeria, Christiana Ibiwoye knew she wanted to pursue a career working with children. Her experience in service-learning helped her …
- When plants are predators: UWM biologist helps identify how sundews collaborate to digest their preyThe UW-Milwaukee Field Station is hardly the Little Shop of Horrors, but it’s still the home of some fascinating carnivorous plants. Now, thanks in part to a UWM biologist, scientists …
- Meet the new faculty members in Letters & ScienceAs another school year begins at UW-Milwaukee, the College of Letters & Science welcomes two new faculty members to our ranks! We're excited to introduce Derrick Harriell and Srishti Sardana, …
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Alumni Accomplishments
Annika Van Rossum (‘21, BA Journalism, Advertising, & Media Studies and Digital Arts & Culture) joined McCarty Law LLP in its business and corporate law practice. She will assist local companies with various transactions and will also focus on working with health care clients to address business and regulatory needs.
Ching-In Chen (‘15, PhD English) won a $50,000 fellowship from the Academy of American Poets. The award is part of a program that, in the words of the Academy, honors “laureates’ literary excellence while enabling them to undertake meaningful and innovative projects that enrich the lives of community members, including youth, through responsive and interactive poetry activities.” Dr. Chen is the 2024 poet laureate of Redmond, Washington, and teaches at the University of Washington-Bothell. Supported by the fellowship, Dr. Chen plans to “work with organizations that are part of the local food ecosystem to sponsor a community youth poetry gathering, with a focus on transgender, nonbinary, intersex, and gender-expansive poets. Dr. Chen will also solicit work from global poets through other UNESCO Cities of Literature and Gastronomy to share at these gatherings, and will print and distribute poetry postcards featuring these poems alongside the poems by local poets.”
Lael Keiser (‘96, PhD Political Science) was chosen to receive the 2024 John Gaus Award. The award, presented each year by the American Political Science Association, recognizes scholars with a “lifetime of exemplary scholarship” in both political science and public administration. Keiser is a professor and director of the Harry S Truman School of Government and Public Affairs at the University of Missouri. Her research focuses on the role of gender and race in representative bureaucracy. Keiser will deliver the Gaus Lecture in September a the annual meeting of the American Political Science Association.
Lisa Kotter (‘92, BA Political Science; ‘94 Master of Public Administration) was named the new city administrator of Red Oak, Iowa. She brings 30 years of administrative experience to the job, having served in cities around Wisconsin, Illinois, and Iowa. She was most recently the city administrator in Cascade, Iowa. Kotter begins her job on Sept. 18.
Anibal (Alejandro) Boscoboinik (‘20, PhD Chemistry and Biochemistry) has been named the “Inventor of the Year” by Battelle Memorial Institute, part of the group Brookhaven Science Associates, which manages or co-manages nine different national laboratories for the U.S. Department of Energy. Boscoboinik is a materials scientist at the U.S. DOE’s Brookhaven National Laboratory. The award honors a scientist’s contributions to science or engineering that hold promise to make a positive impact on society. Boscoboinik was recognized for his role in developing materials that can trap and separate noble gases like radon, xenon, kyrpton, and argon, which are notoriously inert or unreactive.
Sonia Spitz (‘24, BA Journalism, Advertising, & Media Studies) joined the staff of BizTimes Milwaukee as a general assignment reporter. As a student, she was a finalist for several journalism awards and recently worked with CNN at the Republican and Democratic national conventions.
In the Media and Around the Community
Quotes from Professor Kennan Ferguson’s (Political Science) book Cookbook Politics were included in a Slate lifestyle article about how the stresses of parenting and household chores can impact the joy of cooking.
The Wisconsin Jewish Chronicle talked to Rachel Baum about her podcast, “Making Midlife Magic.” Rachel is the deputy director of UWM’s Sam & Helen Stahl Center for Jewish Studies.
Does a background in politics help or hinder a candidate? Kathy Dolan (Political Science) weighed in on Spectrum 1 News, and helped the station analyze the impact of Democratic outreach across party lines. She was also quoted in an article in The Week that explored the gender gap in general political orientation, and in Roll Call about how reproductive policies can also impact men. Wisconsin Public Radio consulted Dolan to analyze the impact of Vice President Kamala Harris’ candidacy on the presidential race, and Milwaukee Magazine sought her explanation for whether ballot drop boxes increase election turnout.
Racial profiling and class are often intertwined and often play a role in who is charged in criminal traffic cases, Joseph Rodriguez (History) said in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
In advance of the annual Negro League tribute game hosted at Milwaukee’s American Family Field, doctoral student Ken Bartelt (History) spoke with Wisconsin Public Radio. Black baseball in Milwaukee’s history is the topic of Bartelt’s master’s thesis.
Natalie Batlle (‘08 BA Global Studies) was featured in Forbes en Espanol where she talked about her Barcelona-based business, Juno House. The interview covered her journey as a female entrepreneur, motherhood, and wellness.
Undergraduate Graham Thomas (Journalism, Advertising, & Media Studies) joined WUWM Radio as a student digital producer. He introduced himself to his audience with a Q&A.
The Shepherd Express profiled Tasneem Jassar (‘23, BA English), a Palestinian poet and activist and an Emerging Poet Fellow at Woodland Pattern Book Center.
Graduate student Dulmini Jayawardana was featured in a Milwaukee Journal Sentinel article about her geography research work in the Lindsay Heights neighborhood. We also wrote about her project in the May issue of InFocus.
In an article covering Milwaukee’s Greentree neighborhood, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel highlighted Gay Donahue (‘81, MA Art History) for her dedication to supporting adult learners develop reading skills, computer skills, and GED study skills.
Mauricio Kilwein Guevara (emeritus English) led a pre-show seminar before the Peninsula Player’s Theatre production of Mary’s Wedding in Fish Creek, Wisconsin, in August.
UWM is helping the environment with solar green roofs on its buildings. UWM Sustainability Manager Lindsay Frost (‘10, BS Conservation & Environmental Science; ‘16, MS Nonprofit Management) explained the particulars to WISN 12 News.
The Nigerian publication Punch highlighted efforts by PhD student Tochi Nkwocha (Chemistry & Biochemistry) to establish chemistry-focused innovation hubs in Nigeria.
A Milwaukee Journal Sentinel article exploring the “Bridge Wars” of the city’s past drew on research and writing from Lex Renda (History).
Michael J. Mikoś (Ancient and Modern Languages, Literatures & Cultures) was elected a member of Polska Akademia Umiejętności (The Polish Academy of the Arts and Sciences) in Cracow, Poland.
People in Print
Elana Levine (English). 2024. Silly Women’s Stories? The Foundational Role of the Daytime Radio Serial. In The Oxford Handbook of Radio and Podcasting, (eds. Michele Hilmes and Andrew Bottomley): Oxford University Press: 118-135.
William Penn (Philosophy). 2024. Pure Process Realism: The Unification of Realism and Empiricism. Manuscrito, 47(1): 2023-2051.
Miriam Boehm (Philosophy). 2024. Conceivability as the Standard of Metaphysical Possibility. In Hume and Contemporary Epistemology, Routledge Studies in Eighteenth-Century Philosophy (S. Stapleford and V. Wagner, eds.). Routledge.
Derek Handley (English). 2024. Struggle for the City: Rhetorics of Citizenship and Resistance during the Black Freedom Movement. University Park, PA: Penn State University Press.
D.R. Johnson and Timothy O’Brien (Sociology). 2024. Morality policy at the frontier of science: Legislators’ views on germline engineering. Science and Public Policy, scae048.
Jocelyn Szczepaniak-Gillece (English). 2024. Movies Under the Influence. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
Passings
Former Letters & Science Dean Richard Meadows passed away on Aug. 18. Richard started his career at UW-Milwaukee in 1971 as a faculty member in the Department of Economics where he served as department chair from 1982-86. His administrative career continued as Associate Dean in the social sciences and culminated as Dean of the College of Letters & Science from 2001-10. Upon his retirement in 2010, Richard continued teaching economics courses for a few years. His areas of research and teaching interests included money and banking; public finance, urban economics; and economic theory.
His close colleague, Bob Beck, notes, “Richard was a true gentleman — distinguished, thoughtful, civil, and professional. With humility and wry wit, he contributed his time, talent, and spirit most generously to the university community. A visionary, Richard saw the promise of data and technology — undertaking enrollment and budgetary modeling while enrollments were still strong, enthusiastically promoting online education in its early stages, and prioritizing IT as transformational infrastructure for the college.”
Richard was an Army veteran (1962-63) and held a bachelor’s degree in business from Texas A&M, and master’s and doctoral degrees in economics from Washington University. He was a great advocate for L&S, and was a key contributor to the growth and development of the College as we know it today. His obituary can be viewed online.