Noteworthy

Graduate and Continuing Studies Associate Dean Janelle Williams, Ed.D. co-authored a report, entitled "Presidents and and their Strategies to Build Partnerships at HBCUs." 

This report was developed by Zachary C. Brown of Purdue University, Williams, and Levon T. Esters of Purdue University, and was co-sponsored by brightspot strategy and the second of a three-part "Year of Leadership" Series in The Samuel DeWitt Proctor Institute for Leadership, Equity, and Justice.

The report emphasizes the importance of successful partnerships between Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) and other institutions, industries, and community partners.

According to the report, HBCUs have been historically disadvantaged when compared to their Predominantly White Institution (PWI) counterparts. State and federal governments disproportionately support and provide funding to PWIs as compared to HBCUs. 

Report findings conclude that while some partnerships and leadership practices are distinct to particular institutions, commonalities are present as well. These include prioritizing student and community needs. Each university president discussed diverse criteria when choosing partners, but they all kept institutional and student success in mind as they engage partners. 

The report can be accessed here: https://proctor.gse.rutgers.edu/sites/default/files/MSIreportFeb21_R4.pdf

Share link: https://www.widener.edu/news/noteworthy/graduate-continuing-studies-associate-dean-janelle-williams-co-authors-report-partnerships-hbcus

Institute for Physical Therapy Education faculty Ellen Erdman, clinical associate professor and director of clinical education, and Jill Black, associate dean of College of Health & Human Services and the director of the Institute, co-authored a report in the journal Physical Therapy Education.

The purpose of the article was to compare and contrast the physical therapy international clinical education experience in both the developed and developing country and compare the experiences to professional standards and guidelines.

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Amy Franzini, associate professor of communication studies and digital media informatics, recently had an article, entitled "U.S. coviewing during COVID" published in a special issue of The Journal of Children and Media. The special issue was entitled "Children, Media, and the Clarity of Crises in 2020."

The article focused on how the COVID-19 lockdown in 2020 provided a unique opportunity for Franzini to interweave her personal family life, as a parent, and professional life, as a researcher of teachable moments in children's media.

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Jill Black, associate dean of the College of Health & Human Services and director of the Institute for Physical Therapy, is a co-author on the research report "Defining Global Health Competencies for Entry-Level Physical Therapist Education." The report, which was published in the journal Physical Therapy Education, investigated a framework to integrate a global health perspective into physical therapy curricula. 

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Michael Rosko, professor emeritus of health care management, published a book chapter, “Profitability of Rural Hospitals: An Analysis of Government Payment Policies,” in Advances in Healthcare Management, Volume 19, A Focus on Consumerism and Profitability. The book was edited by Jennifer Hefner and Mona Al-Amin and published by Emerald Publishing 2020 Bingley, UK.

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Delaware Law School Veterans Law Clinic Director Jennifer Morrell has joined the Scholarship Committee of the National Law School Veterans Clinic Consortium and has taken the lead in managing and restarting the organization’s blog. Her post about NLSVCC’s virtual bootcamp for veterans clinic interns and faculty was noted on the web site for the U.S. Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims.

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Kim Noble, associate professor of nursing, published research in the March 2021 issue of the journal JBI Evidence Implementation. Her findings demonstrated a reduction in both postoperative pain and patient length of stay within a postoperative day surgery podiatric patient population through the use of podiatric enhanced recovery after surgery protocol, also known as PEP.

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Widener School of Business Administration students Lambert Thomas, Angelica Calel, and Kyle Jones represented Widener University at the Drexel University FIC3 Fraud and Internal Control Case Competition. Thomas' team placed third, and Calel and Jones' team placed fourth during the competition.

On Feb. 12, seven student teams virtually competed in analyzing a real-life inspired fraud and internal controls case and then presented their comprehensive detection, prevention and deterrence plans to a panel of judges. Each team had three and a half hours to review the case and critical information provided, formulate their response to the case questions and develop a PowerPoint-based presentation.

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Associate Professor Jeff Lolli has been named to the founding editorial board of the International Journal of Gaming, Hospitality, and Tourism, a peer-reviewed, open-access journal for members of the gaming, hospitality, tourism, and events management community.

In addition, Lolli had two papers published in January: ‘Online hotel reviews: Factors influencing how customers perceive their credibility and the likelihood of customer adoption,’ which was published in the Journal of Applied Marketing Analytics, and ‘The Influence of Background Sounds, Physical Sounds, and Managers’ Proactive Customer Service Regarding Situational Sounds on Customer Satisfaction in the Restaurant Industry,’ which was co-authored by Department Head of Management Brian Larson and published in the Journal of Small Business Strategy.

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Nursing faculty DeLisa Cofer, assistant dean, Jawanza Bundy, assistant professor, and nursing alumna Erika Nicholls '19 published an article in American Nurse, the official journal of the American Nurses Association. Titled "Black Americans in Nursing Education," the article discusses the racial disparities among nursing students and faculty and ways to promote diversity within the field including efforts to recruit and support Black, Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC) in faculty and student roles. 

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Catherine Kim-Safran, assistant professor of biology, and undergraduate nursing students Makayla Chatman and Alexandria Reid co-authored an article that ran in the January 2021 issue of Imprint, the official membership magazine of the National Student Nurses’ Association. Reflecting on their experiences leading and serving as peer-learning assistants for anatomy and physiology labs that transferred fully online during the COVID-19 pandemic, the authors reported on the impact of peer mentoring on student success and best online teaching practices.

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Dr. Paul Baker, an assistant professor of physics, co-authored an article in The Astrophysical Journal Letters based on data gathered and analyzed over 13 years by the North American Nanohertz Observatory for Gravitational Waves (NANOGrav). The published findings, “The NANOGrav 12.5-year Data Set: Search For An Isotropic Stochastic Gravitational-Wave Background,” shows an intriguing low-frequency signal that may be attributable to gravitational waves from merging supermassive black holes in other galaxies.

NANOGrav researchers studying the signals from distant pulsars – small, dense stars that rapidly rotate, emitting beamed radio waves, much like a lighthouse – have used radio telescopes to collect data that may indicate the effects of gravitational waves.

Gravitational waves are ripples in space-time caused by the movements of incredibly massive objects, such as black holes orbiting each other or neutron stars colliding. Astronomers cannot observe these waves with a telescope like they do stars and galaxies. Instead, they measure the effects passing gravitational waves have, namely tiny changes to the precise position of objects - including the position of the Earth.

But gravitational waves can interrupt this observed regularity, as the ripples cause space-time to undergo tiny amounts of stretching and shrinking. Those ripples result in extremely small deviations in the expected times for pulsar signals arriving on Earth. Such deviations indicate that the position of the Earth has shifted slightly.

By studying the timing of the regular signals from many pulsars scattered over the sky at the same time, known as a “pulsar timing array,” NANOGrav works to detect minute changes in the Earth’s position due to gravitational waves stretching and shrinking space-time. 

These newest findings set up direct detection of gravitational waves as the possible next major step for NANOGrav and other members of the International Pulsar Timing Array (IPTA), a collaboration of researchers using the world’s largest radio telescope. Baker has been a member of NANOGrav since 2016.

Learn more: http://nanograv.org/press/2021/01/11/12-Year-GW-Background.html

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Barbara Patterson, professor and director of the nursing doctoral program, published "Veteran-centered Care in Education and Practice," a resource for nurse educators on how to incorporate caring for the military and veteran population into the curriculum and student clinical experiences. Patterson co-authored the book with nursing alumna and former military nurse Brenda Elliott as well as Katie A. Chargualaf, assistant professor of nursing at University of South Carolina Aiken.

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Deb Morley, director of the Wolfgram Memorial Library, was named to the board of directors of the Pennsylvania Academic Library Consortium, Inc. (PALCI). The PALCI membership consists of 70 academic and research libraries, private and public, in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, West Virginia, and New York. Member institutions range from small liberal arts colleges to publicly funded universities to Association of Research Library institutions to the State Library of Pennsylvania. 

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Associate Professor of Management Kerri Crowne Brannen recently published the article “Does National Culture Influence Peer Evaluations on Global Virtual Teams?” in the Journal of Teaching in International Business. Research for her timely article indicated that cultural variables had a weak effect on peer assessment of performance, and the most influential variable on performance was English language ability. Brennan teaches in the School of Business Administration. 

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Professor Ilene D. Lieberman received the Faculty Institutional Leadership Award at the 2020 Faculty Awards event. The honor recognizes her record of leading initiatives that further the university’s vision, mission and strategic objectives. Lieberman has played a vital role in the development and revitalization of many academic programs over 30 years of service to Widener. As director of the Honors Program in General Education, Lieberman has instituted multiple high-impact practices such as early adoption of high-impact practices in honors courses, establishment of an honors Living Learning Community, and development of a mentor program. Her work has improved Widener’s recruitment of academically talented students, and those students benefit from her mentorship. Lieberman was also a co-founder of the Women’s Studies Program (now known as Gender, Women, and Sexuality Studies), which has brought fresh ideas to the university and helped attract high-caliber faculty to provide students with leadership and civic engagement opportunities. A commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion has been a recurring priority in her leadership.

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Associate Professor Kerri Crowne Brannen received the Outstanding Researcher Award at the 2020 Faculty Awards event. The honor recognizes a faculty member who has exhibited distinction in scholarly work and has made a significant contribution through research to advancing the profession or discipline and the university’s mission. Brannen is a prolific researcher who has published 10 articles in a variety of highly-ranked journals over the last five years. She is an internationally recognized scholar and some of her work addresses the role of cultural and emotional intelligences on transformational leadership, which in turn drives change in the workplace. She has also explored her field through award-winning research linked to her use of high-impact teaching practices, which has enriched the education of Widener’s business majors. Much of her research has been carried out collaboratively with colleagues at Widener and elsewhere. She is also Co-Editor-in-Chief of Organizational Management Journal.

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Robert Wellmon was named a Distinguished University Professor at the 2020 Faculty Awards event. The designation recognizes faculty of distinction and demonstrates to the broader community that Widener is committed to recognizing excellence in teaching, scholarship and service throughout a faculty member’s career. Wellmon has distinguished himself on campus with excellent teaching, dedicated service to the university and a well-regarded, clinically relevant research program. He has implemented transformative curricular initiatives to promote student learning and success through several interdisciplinary and inter-professional endeavors. His scholarship is nationally and internationally recognized, with numerous publications and recognition by the National Academies of Practice as a Distinguished Scholar and Fellow. He has served as the chair of the Southeast District of the Pennsylvania Physical Therapy Association and on the Board of Directors of the National Interprofessional Education Consortium of the American Council of Academic Physical Therapy. 

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Loyd Bastin was named a  Distinguished University Professor at the 2020 Faculty Awards event. The designation recognizes faculty of distinction and demonstrates to the broader community that Widener is committed to recognizing excellence in teaching, scholarship and service throughout a faculty member’s career. Bastin’s passion for promoting sustainable practices has led to an active and productive research program in green chemistry, sustainability and education. His recent co-edited book “Integrating Green and Sustainable Chemistry Principles into Education” and numerous invited presentations reflect his reputation as an important scholar. Bastin’s contributions to university leadership include shepherding the chemistry department to environmentally sustainable lab practices, and raising sustainability awareness across campus. As a member of the Vision 2021 GO Team and as chair of the Academic Affairs Committee, Bastin has worked toward implementing rigorous academic practices, clarifying academic policies and developing new programs for student success. 

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Professor Richard S. Hopkins received the Lindback Distinguished Teaching Award at the 2020 Faculty Awards event. The honor is given to a faculty member who has demonstrated a history of teaching at the highest level. It is endowed by the Christian R. and Mary F. Lindback Foundation, a Philadelphia-based foundation that provides grants to institutions of higher education for the promotion of excellence in teaching. Hopkins’ highly distinguished teaching spans a diverse array of history courses including Madness, Crime, and Punishment; Sex and Gender in European History; French Revolution and Napoleon; and more. Students give him superior evaluations for active-learning teaching methods that include mock trials, debates, and engagement with primary sources. He has co-led multiple interdisciplinary excursions in French Philadelphia and at European Union simulation competitions around the nation and in Europe. He has also co-directed grant-funded public history and education projects in Chester including a Community Archival Workshop and the Chester Made Humanities Summer Camp. His productive scholarship on modern French history, urbanism, and women’s and gender studies has resulted in two books and multiple articles. 

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