Master of Arts News

Karin Cadwell, Ph.D.

Tue, 11 Dec 2012 15:40:31 GMT

Doctors Nashwa Samra, Amal El Taweel and our own Professor Karin Cadwell recently published their research findings, “The Effect of Kangaroo Mother Care on the Duration of Phototherapy of Infants Re-admitted for Neonatal Jaundice,” in The Journal of Maternal-Fetal and Neonatal Medicine. Out of the 50 jaundiced infants studied at an oasis hospital in Egypt, those that received intermittent kangaroo mother care (KMC: held by their mother in skin-to-skin contact which allows on-demand breastfeeding, among other benefits) required significantly shorter periods of phototherapy to recover from jaundice. Although further research is recommended to confirm these results, the study indicates that KMC is a safe, effective treatment to reduce the duration of necessary phototherapy and frees up ICU resources for sicker infants.

Rudolph Ryser, Ph.D.

Tue, 11 Dec 2012 15:39:27 GMT

Professor Rudolph Ryser reported the content of an intervention to the Adhoc Working Group on the Kyoto Protocols (AWG-KP) summit in Durban, South Africa, in support of the International Indigenous Peoples Forum on Climate Change (IIPFCC). His report stressed the urgency of strengthening the Kyoto Protocol and cutting greenhouse gas emissions to protect Indigenous Peoples, especially in Africa, who are already suffering from the impacts of climate change..

His report warned that pressures to weaken the Kyoto Protocols could result in at least 5 degrees warming, and could lead to the destruction of cultures and the ecocide of territories. The intervention called for the AWG-KP to incorporate safeguards for adaptation and mitigation measures that are negatively impacting Indigenous Peoples. The formation of such an Indigenous Peoples’ Expert Group under the Kyoto Protocol must include Indigenous Peoples to be certain their rights are protected: rights to lands, territories and resources, full and effective participation, as well as the right to free, prior and informed consent, in line with applicable universal human rights instruments, including the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

Professor Ryser is currently lecturing in Mexico under a Fulbright Scholarship Grant regarding the application of traditional knowledge to food security adaptation strategies in response to the adverse effects of climate change.

Judith McDaniel, Ph.D.

Tue, 11 Dec 2012 15:38:14 GMT

UI&U Professor Judith McDaniel will be presenting “The Challenges of Using Authentic Assessments in Online and Community-based Learning Contexts” at the 17th Annual Sloan Consortium International Conference on Online Learning. Teaming up with Jan Kempster, the dean of the Adult Degree Program at Prescott College, they will each present different possibilities for authentic assessment of programs that emphasize interactive, experiential learning. McDaniel explains, “Both UI&U and Prescott College are founded on a belief that education is about the ability to think creatively and to interact with new knowledge as a way of incorporating knowledge into performance, so finding an authentic means of assessment has challenged the faculty.

Within their Applications course at UI&U, some students have chosen to design a course that demonstrates an ability to bring the theoretical learning into a practical application. Dr. McDaniel will demonstrate the design of the website where students create their courses and discuss the effectiveness of self and peer assessment in this context.

Loree Miltich, Ph.D.

Tue, 11 Dec 2012 15:35:59 GMT

The March 2011 Exhibit at the MacRostie Art Center in Grand Rapids, MN, featured Migration, a collaborative project by poets Loree Miltich and Susan Hawkinson, photographer Jackie Solem, and calligrapher Meridith Schifsky. Jackie Solem exhibited photographs from her travels that she explains changed her as she experienced diverse cultures of the world. Loree and Susan wrote in response to the photographs using a form that Loree calls “double-voiced” poetry. With Susan’s voice in the left column and Loree’s in the right column, the poem is also intended to be read line by line across the page to offer greater possibility. Follow this link to experience the poem.

Asghar Zomorrodian, Ph.D.

Tue, 11 Dec 2012 15:34:37 GMT

Due to his expertise in areas of public administration and management, Asghar Zomorrodian was appointed by The Council for International Exchange of Scholars (CIES), to the 2010-11 Peer Review Committee for the Fulbright Specialist Program. With his selection, he joins the ranks of distinguished scholars and professionals worldwide who are leaders in the educational, political, and social lives of their countries. Dr. Zomorrodian has also been appointed as a member of the International Scientific Committee of Academic Public Administrative Studies Archive (APAS). APAS is designated to collect, archive, and disseminate scientific papers focused on public administration.

In 2010, Dr. Zomorrodian acted as track chair for Emerging Trends in Management: Creativity and Innovation for the 17th Annual Conference of American Society of Business & Behavioral Sciences (ASBBS). Dr. Zomorrodian’s paper, Program Evaluation: Its Significance and Priority for Shaping and Modification of Public Policies: A Comparative Analysis, co-authored with Lucia Matei of Romania, was selected as the best paper by a track chair of the ASBBS .

Woden Teachout, Ph.D.

Tue, 11 Dec 2012 15:32:01 GMT

Among Pulitzer Prize-winning historians and other eminent speakers chosen for the First Wednesdays Humanity Lecture Series in Vermont, Woden Teachout presented Imagining America to a packed house. Using famous drawings, photographs and literature, Teachout led the audience through unfolding conceptualizations of America across four centuries. The country has been represented as a dangerous wilderness; through Norman Rockwell’s famous paintings of freedom of speech, of worship, from want, from fear; and, in a recent Egyptian cartoon, as an oversize Uncle Sam lolling on a recliner. Teachout emphasized the fact that America looks very different depending upon who does the imagining. Her speech drew on Benedict Anderson’s famous idea of the nation as an “imagined community” to question the very idea of America. She challenges us to actively choose how we imagine America and shape that vision into being.

The most recent publication of Dr. Teachout, Capture the Flag: A Political History of American Patriotism, has been reviewed by many national publications, including The Wall Street Journal.

Dorothy Firman, Ed.D.

Tue, 11 Dec 2012 15:24:52 GMT

Due to her expertise in transpersonal psychology, Professor Dorothy Firman was invited to blog for Psychology Today. Among other timely topics, she has written about “saying yes to the call of Self” to become “part of the solution to whatever problems we are faced with individually and globally.”

As tragic events unfold domestically and internationally, we are reminded to say “yes” to responsibility, to learning life’s lessons and to change. We learn to say “yes” to hope that give us the possibility of being a better nation and united people. For more sage advice, readLiving a Life of Purpose: Spirituality in Real Time.

Patricia Monaghan, Ph.D.

Tue, 11 Dec 2012 15:23:38 GMT

Patricia Monaghan's book of poems, "The Grace of Ancient Land," has been published by the Voices from the American Land project, established to "revive and amplify a dominant tradition in American letters — the poetry of place, whether urban, rural, or wild." Monaghan's book portrays the little-known Driftless Area of Wisconsin, named for its lack of glacial soil or "drift" and the only area of the Midwest that has been untouched by glaciation for the last half-million years. Of the book, editor Renny Golden said, "Her work falls in the tradition of Aldo Leopold’s “land ethic.” Yet it is a subversive moral vision in the tradition of Eavan Boland’s ethic of “powerful ordinariness.” Monaghan thus genders her land ethic. Monaghan does not mythologize the land but embodies its beauty and bounty in the luminous ordinary of planting, canning, the fleeting presence of deer and hawk. She implicitly links seasonal change to the cycle of birth and death. When she sees the hawk circling for field mice, she reminds us of the mortal path we trod and bids us to pay attention to what grace offers: the quickening unbidden moment." More information atwww.voicesfromtheamericanland.org.

Anna Blair, Ph.D.

Tue, 11 Dec 2012 15:22:40 GMT

Dr. Blair spoke on a cruise to Grand Cayman on May 17-21, presenting “Research Updates in Breastfeeding and Human Lactation.” At the end of August, she is lecturing on a cruise to Alaska on “Continuity of Care in Breastfeeding: Finding the Path to Best Practice.”

In addition to her responsibilities as M.A. faculty and advisor and chair of the UI&U's B.S. in Maternal Child Health, Dr. Blair performs clinical work at Healthy Children’s center on the cape. She also routinelyvolunteers for dolphin rescue at Cape Cod.

Leslie Korn, Ph.D.

Tue, 11 Dec 2012 15:20:04 GMT

Dr. Korn served as a post-doctoral Fulbright scholar in Mexico for 2009-2010. She was awarded a joint grant from the U.S. State Department and COMEXUS to continue her research with indigenous women on traditional medicine in rural west Mexico. Dr. Korn has published two books this year, the bi-lingualMedicinal Plants of the Jungle/Plantas Medicinales de la Selva, and Preventing and Treating Diabetes, Naturally, the Native Way, with co-author Dr. Rudolph Ryser. Medicinal Plants of the Jungleeducates the reader about both indigenous and biomedical science of 11 of the most important healing plants chosen by the women of Yelapa, Mexico. This book is a product of the women’s community medicine project.

Karin Cadwell, Ph.D.

Tue, 11 Dec 2012 12:30:46 GMT

M.A. online faculty, Dr Karin Cadwell, had the opportunity to spend time with the Surgeon General on January 20, 2011 during the announcement of The Surgeon General's Call to Action to Support Breastfeeding.

Surgeon General Regina Benjamin announced 20 key actions to improve support for breastfeeding nationally.

L to R: HC faculty Barbara O'Connor, UI&U & HC faculty Dr. Lois
Arnold, The Surgeon General Dr. Regina Benjamin,
UI&U & HC faculty Cindy Turner-Maffei,
Baby-Friendly USA Trish McEnroe, and UI&U and
HC faculty Dr. Karin Cadwell

Dr. Karin Cadwell works nationally and international to improve maternity practices and increase breastfeeding rate through education, research, collaboration and competency based lactation education through the Healthy Children Project. As faculty for the MA online in Health and Wellness and the BS in MCH Lactation Consulting at Union Institute and University, Dr. Cadwell works with students during their academic journey through their undergraduate and graduate programs. Dr. Cadwell is a fellow of the American Academy of Nursing (FAAN).