Presentations and Panels
 
presented on a panel with the Student Press Law Center entitled "Developing Strategies to Achieve Consensus on Issues Critical to the Student Press" at the Association for Education in Journalism & Mass Communication (AEJMC) conference in Chicago. She also moderated a research session on "Issues Facing Campus Media" as the Research Chair of the College Media Association.

Maynard Schaus presented a paper titled "Impact of Urbanization and Shoreline Development on Salt Marsh Bird Community Composition" at the Society of Wetland Scientists annual meeting in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Three former students were co-authors on this presentation.

In Print

Alain Gabon  published in French and English "How the European Union Conceals Far-Right Terrorism Against Migrants and Minorities" for the Middle East Eye  and a series of seven analyses of the May-June French presidential and legislative elections for Saphirnews.

Mort Gamble continues to write a bi-monthly column for The White Tops, the official magazine of the Circus Fans Association of America. Gamble serves as the volunteer media and public relations director for the national organization. His column has appeared regularly in the magazine since 2008.

Stephen Hock's  article "'That's Your Uncle? He's White!' 'Yeah, a Long Time': Negotiating Whiteness in the Rocky/Creed Series" was published in Italian Americana.
October 2017
 
Taryn Myers   had a paper accepted for publication in Body Image with co-authors at Old Dominion University, citation below: Howard, L.*, Heron, K., MacIntyre, R., Myers, T., & Everhart, R. (In press). Does use of social networking sites influence women's body dissatisfaction and disordered eating? A look at racial differences. Body Image.  

Taryn Myers created five activities for the Your Scientific World Online Supplement to Licht, Hull, and Ballantyne's Scientific American Psychology. Each required a manuscript-length script and supervision of the implementation of original content, interactive activities, and assessment questions relevant to the pertinent chapter.

Other

Sue Erickson  will be serving as a mentor for a new college library director through the College Library Director Mentoring Program of the Association of College & Research Lib
raries.  The formal mentoring program takes place over the course of a year.

Jason Squinobal performed three of his  original arrangements of African American 
Spirituals at "Crowns: Portraits of Black Women in Church Hats" at Great Bridge Presbyterian Church, for a joint concert for the Church's Candlelight Concert Series and VWU's Center for Sacred Music. Squinobal was joined by fellow faculty member, George Stone and VWU Students Joy Vernon and Patrice Glover.

Wayne Pollock  was elected to the board of directors of SMILE, an organization whose mission is to enhance the lives of children impacted by a life threatening disease through education, encouragement, and empowerment.
Community Engagement

PORTfolio Program students, under the direction of Robin Takacs  and Larry Hultgren, shopped and filled flood buckets that Chaplain Greg West delivered to the drop-off spot. This was truly a group effort and the students also wrote notes of support for the victims of flooding in Texas and Florida that were placed in the buckets.

Takeyra Collins, Kathy Stolley and students (Cecelia Billings, Taylor Cain, Hailey Goff, and Jaelyn Washington) facilitated various games and activities at the Western Bayside Community Day. Virginia Wesleyan participated as part of the Western Bayside Campus-Community Partnership, as we have for the past several Western-Bayside Community Days. This event offers opportunities to engage with community neighbors and network with community leaders.
Technology Corner

Infographics: A New Way to 
Present Information and Research
 
You've heard the 
phrase "a picture is worth a thousand words." Some faculty at Virginia Wesleyan University have taken that message to heart and have begun asking their students to create infographics as an alternative to the traditional report or re search paper. 

According to Mark Smiciklas in his book, The Power of Infographics: Using Pictures to Communicate and Connect with Your Audience, "An infographic (short for information graphic) is a type of picture that blends data with design, helping individuals and organizations concisely communicate messages to their audience." 

With free programs like  Piktochart and  Easel.ly containing templates and design tools and tutorials available through the institution's subscription to  Atomic Learning, students and  faculty alike can experiment with a different way to present information and research.

I n her "Writing for Mass Media" course, Lisa Lyon Payne asks students to find the most current Virginia Wesleyan  fact sheet , carve out an angle, and present the information visually in an infographic. She says the students have fun thinking about how to create visual appeal from the figures as they are presented on the fact sheet.

Kathy Stolley, in her course "Issues in Sociology: Epidemics and Society," asks students to choose an epidemic (or potentially epidemic) disease to research. Students can write a traditional paper or create an infographic to present what they have found. 

Stolley says that she wanted to give students the option to create an infographic because she believes this assignment could enhance students' media/literacy skills, encourage organizing information and distilling down to the most crucial points, let them experiment with representing their topic in a different sort of narrative, and encourage them (hopefully) to think creatively and in new ways about their topics.
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