Faculty and Staff Notes

Visiting Associate Professor of Economics Udara Peiris was recently interviewed on NewslineSL, the prime political and economics discussion and analysis TV program, in Sri Lanka on the debt and economic crisis the country is facing.

Assistant Professor of Dance Al Evangelista participated and presented in two panels at the Dance Studies Association annual conference. The two panels titled, “Dancing in the Aftermath of Anti-Asian Hate” and “Acts of Tribute, Practices of Citation: Recognition as Resistance to Cultures of Individualism” took place October 13-16 in Vancouver, BC. On the panels, he discussed upcoming publications including one on dance and bystander intervention training. 

Visiting Assistant Professor of Drawing Charisse Harris has been awarded a printmaking residency at Zygote Press in Cleveland, Ohio as part of their fall cohort of BIPOC fellows.

Associate Professor of Computer Science Cynthia Taylor published a paper with Visiting Assistant Professor of Math Steve Balady (now at CSU San Bernardino) in the journal Computer Science Education. The paper looks at how student attitudes in introductory Computer Science and Math courses align with those of experts.

An excerpt from David Forrest's book A Voice but No Power was published in the latest issue of Social Policy, a magazine for community and labor organizers.

Assistant Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry Shuming Chen recently published an article, "Photochemical Dearomative Cycloadditions of Quinolines and Alkenes: Scope and Mechanism Studies," in the Journal of the American Chemical Society. Coauthors include Sam Le ’22 as well as collaborators from UCLA, the University of Indiana, and the University of Munster, Germany.

Ana Cristina Perry, assistant professor of art history, had an interview published in The Brooklyn Rail with Raphael Montañez Ortiz, an internationally renowned Brooklyn-born Puerto Rican artist and educator who grew up in New York City and founder of El Museo del Barrio.

Drew Wilburn continued his work with the third grade classes at Oberlin Elementary School, sharing information about archaeology. For the past 5 years, with a small pandemic break, Professor Wilburn has worked with the third grade team as they explore the IB curriculum, "Who we are in Space and Time." Students participated in the analysis of a "Mystery Cemetery," which helps the third graders analyze a series of "graves" from a fictional culture, based in part on teaching tools from the Archaeological Institute of America.

Visiting Assistant Professor Kasia Ozga's solo exhibition OEKOUMENE in L’Angle, Espace d’art contemporain du Pays Rochois in La Roche Sur Foron, France, opens on September 30 and will be on view through November 19.

Associate Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry Lisa Ryno was recently awarded a grant from the National Science Foundation, "Sugar-mediated remodeling of the E. coli transcriptome and its impact on biofilm growth and composition." This $534,002 grant will support student-faculty research on how monosaccharides influence both biofilm growth and composition. Because biofilms play a role in antibiotic resistance, better understanding of the biochemical pathways through which they form could have eventual applications in development of antibiotics or antibiofilm coatings.