Faculty Grant Awards Received
J.A. Valentine Visiting Professorship at the University of Otago in New Zealand Living and travel expenses/lecture preparation costs. (Marcus Key, Geology) This appointment is to become an honorary member of the Division of Sciences while at the University of Otago (Spring 2007). Activities to include collection of fossil bryozoans from limestones near Oamaru, carry out morphological and mineralogical analysis, and evaluate changes over the Eocene-Oligocene boundary, which will allow evaluation of the theory that changes in global sea-water chemistry at that time influenced bryozoan growth and composition. In addition, two jointly-authored manuscripts (with Dr. Abigail M. Smith, Senior Lecturer of Marine Science, University of Otago) which are in process will be completed and seminars in both Marine Science and Geology will be presented, as well as participation in advising postgraduate students in Marine Science.
The National Science Foundation – $157,187. (Tom Arnold, Biology) "Competing sinks as constraints on plant defense responses." Plant fitness in the face of insect attack depends upon the induced production of chemical defenses, both at wound-sites and systemically. All plant tissues are not equally protected, however. Complex patterns of chemical defenses occur because wounded tissues vary in their responsiveness and because systmemic responses spread unevenly along vascular connections. While numerous theories predict patters of constitutive defenses in plants (those present before attack), factors which determine the presence or strength of induced responses in wounded plant tissues are generally unknown. This project intends to 1) generate a useful, testable model predicting patterns of induced defenses in plants. This model has a mechanistic basis and will help to explain the success and failures of model plant resource allocation and defense. 2) Provide a mechanistic explnation of how plant reproduction and architecture, soil fertility, competition, pathogen attack and how other factors influence resource allocation in plants may affect plant insect interactions.
Council for the International Exchange of Scholars, Teaching/Lecturing Fulbright. (Cotten Seiler, American Studies). One semester award for teaching in the American Studies Department at the University of Hong Kong. The award will support travel, stipend, and in-country living costs.
Pennsylvania Performing Arts on Tour (PennPAT). $5,725. (Emily Lawrence, Theatre & Dance). This project proposes to bring the Attack Theatre to the Dickinson campus in November 2006 for a two-day residency, including master classes for both Dickinson and Carlisle High School students, an open rehearsal, a performance, and a post-performance dialogue. This project is partially supported by a grant from Pennsylvania Performing Arts on Tour, a program developed and funded by the Heinz Endowments; the William Penn Foundation; the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, a state agency; and The Pew Charitable Trusts; and administered by Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation.
Capital Region Economic Development Corporation/Keystone Innovation Zone Seed/Assistance Grant. $6,223. (David Crouch, Chemistry). Size-controlled Synthesis of Silver and Gold Nanoparticles Using Biomatter. The optical properties of nanoparticles make them useful as sensors for a variety of biological and chemical substances. This project will develop methods that utilize plant extracts to prepare gold, silver and gold-silver alloy nanoparticles of predictable sizes. Methods developed in this project will also be extend3ed to attaching these nanoparticles to glass surfaces. When attached to a surface, nanoparticles in a narrow range of sizes allow significant amplification of scattered light and can be used in surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy-based detectors which have been used in the detection and identification of both bacteria and chemicals. It is the hope that the methods developed in this project can be extended beyond the laboratory to commercial applications. Project supports student-faculty research for summer 2006, including student stipend, room and board, and materials.
Capital Region Economic Development Corporation/Keystone Innovation Zone Seed/Assistance Grant. $10,000. (Hans Pfister, Physics & Astonomy). Sun-tracking Solar Heat Exchanger.
Maison des Sciences de l'Homme (French Social Sciences and Humanities Research Institute), $7,750. (Marion Picker, German). "Poetic Justice. On the ethical and political dimensions of literature, considering the last German-Jewish generation of intellectuals before the Shoah." This grant will support a 4-month residency at the Maison Suger in Paris.
Howard Foundation. $25,000. (Neil Diamant/East Asian Studies & Political Science). The Politics and Sociology of Everyday Patriotism in China - This book project explores the interaction between veterans, family members of revolutionary martyrs and dependents of soldiers in the People's Liberation Army and the state and their communities in urban and rural China between 1949-1980. It focuses on the discrepancy between their high official status and generous preferential policies (to pensions, affirmative action in employment, free or discounted medical care, housing) and the poor treatment they often received by state officials and their fellow citizens, and what this discrepancy means in terms of our understanding of politics and society during these years. This study—based almost entirely on recently opened archives in the PRC—is novel not only in its subject matter (there are no studies of these populations in the China field, even though they numbered roughly 30 million and were crucial to the regime's legitimacy), but also in terms of its methodology.
Flemish Literature Fund - Translation Grant. 5000 Euro. (Jorge Sagastume, SIRENA). Support for translation and publication of poems by Benno Barnard, Luuk Gruwez, Stefan Hertmans, Roland Jooris, Leonard Nolens, Miriam Van hee and Stefaan Van den Bremt.
Mid-Atlantic Arts Foundation/Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, Individual Fellowship, $5,000. (Caroline Savage, Art & Art History) Media project.
Pennsylvania DCNR Bureau of Topographic and Geologic Survey. $9,453. (Peter Sak, Geology). “Constraints on Regional-scale Deformation across the Pennsylvania Salient as Deduced from Geologic Cross-Sections.” Sak will conduct field-based investigation across the valley and ridge physiographic province along the Susquehanna river valley. Here, the south-flowing river is oriented essentially perpendicular to the east-west tending Appalachian mountains. Folded and faulted Paleozoic rocks are exposed in the riverbed, roadcuts along both the east and west banks of the river, in quarries, and throughout agricultural and forested lands of the valley. By constructing a detailed geologic swath map along the shores of the river, working with a Dickinson undergraduate geology major, Sak hopes to constrain the amount of tectonic shortening between Harrisburg and Williamsport. The results of this mapping effort will be used to construct a balanced geological cross section.
Mid-Atlantic Arts Foundation/Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, Individual Fellowship. $5,000. (Ward Davenny, Art & Art History) “Works-on-Paper” project.
National Science Foundation (NSF) RUI/Petrology and Geochemistry. $155,745. (Ben Edwards, Geology, in collaboration with Ian Skilling, University of Pittsburgh). “Using the Products of Volcano Ice Interaction to Constrain Paleo-Ice Conditions.” This is a collaborative proposal to conduct research near Dease Lake, NW British Columbia.
National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) We the People Initiative / Landmarks of American History and Culture: Workshops for School Teachers program. $147,659. (Matthew Pinsker, History). "Landmarks of the Underground Railroad: From Christiana to Harpers Ferry." Two week-long workshops will challenge the way 100 K-12 teachers have been presenting this elusive subject. Site visits integrated with documentary evidence will push participants to broaden their understanding of what did - and did not - constitute an Underground Railroad escape. Participants will discover that fugitives and the northerners who protected them were often as likely to fight as flee when confronted by slave catchers in the 1850s. Study of two nearby historic sites: Christiana PA, and Harpers Ferry WV will provide new insights into the aggressive operations of the Railroad and help frame the story of the coming of the Civil War. By the end of the workshop teachers will draft lesson plans that incorporate both episodes and offer a fresh approach to the study of the Underground Railroad.
US Army War College – Strategic Studies Institute. $50,000. (Doug Stuart, Jeffrey McCausland). “The Other Special Relationship: The U.S. and Australia at the Start of the 21st Century” Dickinson College seeks the support of the Strategic Studies Institute of the U.S. Army War College (USAWC) for a program designed to bring together a core team of experts to study critical aspects of the U.S.-Australian bilateral relationship. Our goal is to audit the multifaceted nature of this unique relationship, to offer predictions about its future direction and then to make policy recommendations designed to help both governments to prepare for potential problems and cultivate positive trends. Dickinson will co-host (with SSI, Griffith University's Asia Institute (GAI), Australian National University (ANU and the National Defense University (NDU)) two high-visibility programs: the first in Australia and the second in the United States. The first conference will take place during the period March 13-15, 2006 in the United States.
The Voice Foundation and the National Association of Teachers of Singing (NATS) Foundation. $2,000. (Lynn Helding Music). This award supports a year-long research project devoted to the research of two common yet misunderstood voice disorders, Muscle Tension Dysphonia and Vocal Fold paresis (also known as "partial paralysis"). The anticipated outcome will be the compilation of a post-critical care and post-therapy vocal exercise regimen for the maintenance of these disorders. Helding has actively pursued professional development in the emerging field of Voice Science over the past decade, most notably through two summers spent studying with renowned Voice Scientist Dr. Ingo Titze, at the National Center for Voice and Speech in Denver, Colorado.
Vernier Software and Technology. $3,000. (Ken Laws, Physics). This grant provides funding for a student research assistant to support Ken Laws' research in the physics of dance.
National Institutes of Health (NIH)/Academic Research Enhancement Award (AREA). $174,888. (Tony S. Rauhut, Department of Psychology). "Bupropion and Secondary Motivational Effects of Nicotine." This will be a three-year research project which aims to determine the effect of the efficacious antidepressant and smoking-cessation agent, bupropion, on the secondary rewarding properties of nicotine during periods of acquisition and expression, reinstatement and reacquisition, and the secondary aversive properties of nicotine during periods of withdrawal, using the conditioned place preference/aversion paradigm. Because the secondary motivational properties of nicotine are thought to contribute to the acquisition, maintenance, withdrawal, reinstatement, and reacquisition of smoking behavior in humans, the ability of bupropion to alter the secondary motivational properties of nicotine during different stages of nicotine addiction may provide valuable clues as to the therapeutic mechanism of action and potentially contribute to the development of novel, more efficacious smoking cessation agents. This proposal requests equipment and supplies necessary for Professor Rauhut to conduct research over a three-year period, as well as funding to support student-faculty research throughout the grant period and sabbatical salary for Professor Rauhut in the final year.
Press Release
East Asia Institute (Korea) Fellowship. $14,900. (Neil Diamant, East Asian Studies) "New Methods for Understanding Power and Legitimacy in the PRC: The Cases of Patriotism, Law, and Gender." Diamant will write an article for the EAI journal and present it, give a seminar (on law), and lecture (on gender in East Asia) in Korea, Japan and Taiwan. Diamant will be there for three weeks in May 2006, a week in each place. East Asia Institute (EAI) is an independent and nonprofit organization that strives to transform East Asia into a society of nations based on liberal democracy, market economy, open society, and peace. This award is one of only five fellowships awarded among a pool of international applicants.
National Science Foundation (NSF) CCLI A&I Track I. $79,797. (Grant Braught, Louis Ziantz, Tim Wahls; Mathematics & Computer Science) The objective of this project is the design, implementation and assessment of a new introductory computer science course at Dickinson entitled, "Integration and Assessment of Pair Programming, Test Driven Development and Lab PRactica in an Introductory Computer Science Course." The project has three distinct goals: 1) adapt and integrate pair programming, TDD and the use of lab practica in the creation of a new introductory computer science course, 2) assess the a) success and retention rate of students, particularly women and minorities in the introductory and subsequent courses, b) the development anof student's individual programming skills, c) students' use and mastery of the TDD methodology and d) the effects of pair programming on a, b and c (above), and 3) refine and disseminate the materials developed for our course in order to facilitate further adaptation and implementation of these exemplary practices.
Institutional Awards
The John and Patty Colburn Family Fund of the Philadelphia Foundation. $3,000. Through the generosity of John and Patty Colburn, Dickinson Class of 1952, The Philadelphia Foundation recently gave Dickinson College an unrestricted grant to be used in support of general operating costs.
U.S. Department of State Middle East Partnership Initiative Study of the United State Institute for Undergraduate Student Leaders. $418,000. Harry Pohlman (Political Science) David Commins (Clarke Center), and Brian Bartosik-Velez (OGE). “The United States through the Prism of Leadership.” A cooperative agreement will support a 7 week summer 2006 session for 22 student leaders from the Middle East and North Africa. The underlying premise of this Institute is that leadership is an insightful prism through which the student leaders can understand the United States (US). The Institute has two objectives: a) to elevate the leadership and collective problem-solving skills of the student leaders by fostering communication skills, “teambuilding” capacities, and management skills through a number of individual and group projects, and b) to provide the student leaders with a challenging academic program that gives them a solid understanding of the US. The goal is to give the student leaders a working knowledge of American history, society, culture, economy, and politics through lectures, discussions, site-visits, debates, workshops, peer interactions, study tours, and community-service/civic-engagement opportunities.
Pennsylvania Association of Broadcasters. $3,100. (Davis Tracy, WDCV). Funding to support a professional training program for on-air DJs at WDCV.
Marjorie M. and Irwin Nat Pincus Fund. $13,500. (Ted Merwin, Hillel). Funding will support a series of Hillel-sponsored events at Dickinson including lectures by Stuart Eizenstat and Rev. William Sanchez, a Performance or Passover Seder with "The Afro-Semitic Experience", a Kosher Chinese Shabbat, “Schtick! A Queer Play on Jewish Vaudeville" and a trip to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.
U.S. Department of State U.S. Studies Institute for South Asian Undergraduate Student Leaders. $252,000. (Bob Winston, English; Laura Mossler, Global Education). The broad objective of this Institute is to provide student leaders from India, Pakistan and Bangladesh with a broad understanding of State, Society and Culture in The United States and opportunities to enhance leadership skills. Through a combination of academic coursework and discussion, visits to appropriate sites of interest, guest speakers, leadership and teambuilding exercises, students will a) examine the values, institutions, and conflicts that have distinguished American life from multiple cultural, political, and geographical perspectives, and b) engage in participatory projects focusing on developing communications and collective problem-solving skills. Complementing the scholarly elements of the program will be the students' experience of cultural immersion in the everyday life of Carlisle, Pennsylvania, and the surrounding region—from New York to Washington, DC. The institute will encourage students' responses to the classroom material and their field experiences, through discussions with faculty and consultants, guest speakers, U.S. student peers, and American citizens from various walks of life, and through community volunteer service projects. The Institute is slated for June 23 – August 5 2006.
Council for International Exchange of Scholars Fulbright Scholar-In-Residence Program. (David Commins, Clarke Center). The program will provide a scholar to the College for spring semester 2007 to bolster efforts toward establishing an interdisciplinary program in Middle East studies. The scholar's home country would be Iraq, Jordan or Morocco, and have a background in Islamic studies, Islamic law, women's studies or anthropology. The Scholar-in-Residence would teach two courses in their field during the semester and meet with faculty to develop the new program. The S-I-R's program would include student clubs, local schools, a community college, and community organizations.
U.S. Department of State/Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs: Study of the U.S. Institute (SUSI) on U.S. Political Economy and the Global Economic System. $299,193. (Russ Bova and Andy Rudalevige/Political Science; Brian Whalen/OGE). The objective of this project is to conduct a third SUSI from June 16, 2006 through July 29, 2006 for 18 foreign university faculty and scholar-practitioners whose professional work requires an in-depth understanding of U.S. political economy. Through academic coursework, visits to appropriate sites of interest, guest speakers, participatory projects, and interactions with U.S. peers and American citizens, Institute participants will examine the U.S. market economy. The Institute will focus on the complexity of the U.S. experience and the debates generated in the quest to find the proper balance of government and market in the economy. Since many participants will be coming from emerging market economies struggling with this issue, it will be useful to them to examine this theme through the lens of the U.S. experience. The Institute will be centered in rural Central Pennsylvania, with study tours to Washington DC and Atlanta, Georgia, as well as shorter trips to New York City and Philadelphia.
Pennsylvania Campus Compact (PACC). (No dollar amount) (Shalom Staub/Campus Academic Life) Dickinson College has been awarded an AmeriCorps*VISTA position for the 2006-2007 academic year (with the opportunity to renew for two additional years) to coordinate a project of “Educational, Health and Environmental Impacts on Child and Family Welfare in Carlisle, PA.” The PACC-VISTA member, who will report directly to Shalom Staub in the Office of Campus Academic Life, will play a vital role at Dickinson in both developing and coordinating a range of campus service efforts to assist local nonprofit agencies serving low-income families and children in the Carlisle community by involving Greek organizations, the Office of Religious Life and Community Service, Career Services/Internships, our Service-Learning program, and student research. This project's focus on education, health, and environmental impacts on child and family welfare reflects community priorities and builds upon existing campus-community linkages.
Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection. $20,000. (Lauren Imgrund, Candie Wilderman/Environmental Studies & ALLARM) “Consortium for Scientific Assistance to Watersheds” (C-SAW). This grant provides continuing support for a project begun in 2001 which involves a consortium consisting of ALLARM, the U.S. Geological Survey, Delaware Riverkeeper, Stroud Water Research Center, and the Resource Conservation and Development Councils. The grant will enable this consortium to provide technical assistance to community-based watershed organizations so they can more effectively address local water quality concerns. The need for C-SAW's technical support is increasing as new watershed groups form and established groups move on to the next phases of their monitoring and restoration programs. This grant will strengthen and extend the C-SAW partnership through 2006. ALLARM will provide technical assistance, mentoring, and laboratory analyses for organizations in the Susquehanna and Potomac watersheds and work with other C-SAW partners to provide multi-group educational workshops on specific topics. (The official grantee will be the Pocono Northeast Resource Conservation and Development Council, and Dickinson College/ALLARM will be a sub-awardee.)
American Library Association $1,500. (Ted Merwin, Judaic Studies; Eleanor Mitchell, LIS). The "Let's talk about it! Jewish Literature: Identity and Imagination" program will expand an appreciation of Jewish American literature among both the Dickinson College community (student, faculty and staff) and the local Jewish community in both Harrisburg and Carlisle. The program scholar will be Dr. Ted Merwin, who will be teaching a course in Jewish American literature at the college at the same time as this program will take place. There will be numerous opportunities for the college students and community members to study together, watch films (e.g. Joan Micklin Silver's Hester Street), do journal writing (including e-journaling), and participate in other activities relevant to both the course and the program. The program will be co-sponsored with the Milton B. Asbell Center for Jewish Life, which will help with publicity and host a reception at the end of the program.
Read the American Library Association press release about this grant.
The Corella and Bertram F. Bonner Foundation – Bonner Leaders Program/Enrichment Grant. $5,000. (John Miyahara and Michael Cameron/Office of Religious Life and Community Services). This grant will support the College's Bonner Leaders Program by providing funding for an orientation program, a service trip, a senior Bonner intern, and costs associated with travel to the service trip.
Foundation for Independent Higher Education - UPS National Venture Fund. $33,000. John Shaddock, Shared Services Consortium (SSC). The Consortium's Group Health Plan Project (GHPP) will create efficiencies in the management of higher education. Providing college & university employees with health insurance continues to be a major driver in the overall cost of tuition. By creating a self-insured group health plan, the SSC schools will be able to exercise greater control over plan design and the various cost components of a health plan. The SSC will develop the program among its core six schools, and will then invite other schools to join the program. SSC is a collaborative partnership consisting of Bryn Mawr College, Bucknell University, Dickinson College, Franklin & Marshall College, Gettysburg College and Haverford College. The purpose of the SSC is seek out and implement new business models in which the can reduce costs by working together. Once programs are developed, the SSC schools invite other schools to join with them to benefit from these cost-reducing programs.
A. W. Mellon Foundation. $35,000. John Shaddock Shared Services Consortium (SSC). SSC Consortium Group Health Plan Project (GHPP)
The Lawrence L. and Julia Z. Hoverter Charitable Foundation. $60,000. This grant will provide funding ($20,000 per year over three years) to upgrade Dickinson's tennis facilities by installing new lighting which will enhance the intercollegiate, intramural, and recreational tennis experience for current and future students and others in the campus and Carlisle communities who use the courts.
Association of American Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) - Shared Futures: General Education for Global Learning. (David Strand/East Asian Studies; Susan Rose/Sociology; Sylvie Davidson/French & Italian; Neil Weissman). Dickinson has been chosen by AAC&U as one of 16 colleges and universities that will form a national network working together to "use global issues as an organizing framework for creating coherent, integrated general education programs that prepare students for citizenship in a world of global change and interdependence." This initiative will allow our project team, comprised of faculty from all three divisions and senior administrators from academic affairs and global education, to engage in a series of dialogues over a two-year period to explore opportunities for enhancing: 1) the relationships among our "cross-cultural studies" general education requirements (comparative civilizations, US diversity, foreign language), 2) the relationships between those requirements and other global dimensions of our curriculum including study abroad, 3) lessons from current study abroad assessment projects in which we are participating for global education generally, and 4) models and practices discovered through discussions with other institutions. We will bring to this dialogue the important perspective of an undergraduate liberal arts institution, proven leadership in global education, experience in multiple national assessment efforts, and strong connections for dissemination.
Pennsylvania Dept. of Community and Economic Development (PA-DCED). $50,000. (Ann Dykstra , President's Office). "Theatre and Dance Department Design Laboratory". A design laboratory will be created in Montgomery House by transforming an existing classroom into a "smart studio." The new studio will provide computer access for 16 students who will be able to work simultaneously on actual productions in a range of design related subfields, and also include a project, DVD and sound system. Structuring and equipping the design laboratory in this way will improve the productions designs of the performances offered to the campus community and the public, and also tighten the connection between the staging and execution of productions with the departmental curriculum. The lab will also be available to other organizations in the Carlisle community, such as the Carlisle Arts Learning Center and the Carlisle Theatre.
Jumpstreet/PA Council on the Arts - PA Partners in the Arts Program. $2,744. (Davis Tracy/WDCV). "Bluegrass on the Grass 2006." This grant provides continuing funding to support the 2006 " Bluegrass on the Grass" concert. This event provides free access to high-quality bluegrass music for a wide variety of individuals and develops an appreciation for this distinctive regional musical form in the community. The grant will underwrite a portion of the expenses to bring three to four top bluegrass music performers to Dickinson on July 8, 2006 for an afternoon of traditional music on the academic quad. The tentative list of performers for next year's series includes the Dismembered Tennesseans, the Lonesome River Band, and the Kenny & Amanda Smith Band, depending on availability.
U.S. Department of State U.S. Studies Institute for South Asian Undergraduate Student Leaders, $250,000. (Bob Winston, and Office of Global Education). The broad objective of this Institute is to provide student leaders from India, Pakistan and Bangladesh with a broad understanding of State, Society and Culture in The United States and opportunities to enhance leadership skills. Through a combination of academic coursework and discussion, visits to appropriate sites of interest, guest speakers, leadership and teambuilding exercises, students will: a) examine the values, institutions, and conflicts that have distinguished American life from multiple cultural, political, and geographical perspectives, and b) engage in participatory projects focusing on developing communications and collective problem-solving skills. Complementing the scholarly elements of the program will be the students' experience of cultural immersion in the everyday life of Carlisle, Pennsylvania, and the surrounding region-from New York to Washington, DC. The institute will encourage students' responses to the classroom material and their field experiences, through discussions with faculty and consultants, guest speakers, U.S. student peers, and American citizens from various walks of life, and through community volunteer service projects. This institute is held through a cooperative agreement between the College and the U.S. Department of State/Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs under the authority of the Fulbright-Hays Act.