Brain Awareness Week (BAW), March 12-18, is the global campaign to increase public awareness of the progress and benefits of brain research. Belmont’s College of Sciences and Mathematics celebrated BAW with many events on campus. Professor of Biology Dr. Lori McGrew said, “Brain Awareness Week is a great opportunity to showcase the talented neuro-scientists we have at Belmont along with fascinating speakers from our community.”

Neuroscience is a growing field, including a wide range of sub-disciplines such as cognition, behavior, cellular neuroscience and computational neuroscience. Belmont’s neuroscience major combines foundational courses in biology, chemistry, psychology and physics with upper level coursework in biology and psychology and culminates in a student-driven research project in neuroscience. The program prepares students for careers as research assistants and animal behaviorists among others or for entry into medical school or graduate school. A chapter of Nu Rho Psi, the National Honor Society in Neuroscience, was started at Belmont in 2017.The Psychological Science and Neuroscience programs at Belmont hosted numerous events to celebrate Brain Awareness Week this week including:

• “Cognitive Study Strategies” talk with Dr. Yandell: Dr. Yandell discussed with students how to study in accordance with cognitive research in order to improve testing ability and scores.
• Brain Dissection Demonstration with Dr. Lori McGrew
• Good Will Hunting Movie Night with Dr. Giordano: Dr. Giordano discussed how psychology and brain biochemistry affect each other, and how these concepts are related to the movie Good Will Hunting
• “Alzheimer’s Research” talk with Dr. Kate Gifford, Vanderbilt University
• “Sex/Gender and Sexual Identity in Relation to Biopsychosocial Stress” with Dr. Robert-Paul Juster, Columbia University
• Relax Your Brain Social Event: Students were invited to socialize while playing with board games, play-doh and much more!
• Brain Blast Science Fair at Martin Professional Development Center: Belmont students traveled off-campus to meet with kids and to teach them about science of the brain!

In the United States, immigrant entrepreneurs start almost one third of all new businesses. However, many immigrant entrepreneurs lack the knowledge or expertise to evolve their businesses beyond the ethnic enclave where their businesses are located. Jose Gonzalez, assistant professor of management and entrepreneurship, was recently interviewed on Panorama, a show from the Latin American Chamber of Commerce, to share findings of recent research regarding these realities.

This researched analyzed how Latino immigrant business owners (all located in Nashville, TN) successfully expanded their business beyond their ethnic enclave. Data were collected from interviews, company documents and observations of the operation of businesses and owners. Miles, Huberman and Saldana’s data analysis method was used to identify six themes that yielded three possible strategies to help Latino immigrant business owners expand outside of their enclave:

1. Adopt a multicultural hybridism model changing the internal make-up of the employee base to include more inter-ethnic labor and managerial resources
2. Achieve language and cultural proficiency of the host community
3. Seek and nurture professional development and mentoring relationships to obtain access to advice, opportunities and financial resources.

Also noted was the importance of individual readiness to seize opportunities and tenacity in business efforts. The study findings may contribute to positive social change, because strategies that help immigrant entrepreneurs succeed have benefits that extend beyond their immediate family to the broader communities in which they operate by increasing job creation, wealth accumulation and the development of society.

Each spring, Belmont sends its junior social work majors to compete in the annual Day on the Hill event, which allows a chosen representative from the group to present a summary of a bill that is on the Tennessee Legislative Assembly Agenda. This year, under the guidance of Dr. Jenny Crowell, instructor in the department of social work, the team won the event.

The competition consists of social work students from across the state. The Belmont group, with Lauren Barnhart as their speaker, discussed the importance of the bill the allow the creation of recovery high schools. The bill was recently signed by the governor.

Over Spring Break this semester, a group of 15 Belmont students and faculty spent seven days exploring Iceland. The program was the culminating experience of an 8-week interdisciplinary course examining the impact of isolation on the genetics, political systems and culture of the island nation.

Throughout the trip, the group participated in a tour of the Icelandic parliament, a presentation at DeCode, one of the foremost genetic research organizations in the world, a visit to a farm which both raises the iconic Icelandic horse and uses geothermal energy to grow hot-house tomatoes even in the dark of winter and a walk through the volcanic rift valley where the North American and European continental plates are pulling apart. They were also treated to the natural wonders of Iceland, including its waterfalls, geysers, hot springs, glaciers and the northern lights.

The 66th annual Middle Tennessee Science and Engineering Fair (MTSEF) took place in Belmont University’s Janet Ayers Academic Center’s 4th floor conference center on Friday, March 16 and Saturday, March 17. MTSEF is the premiere STEM competition for middle and high school students in Nashville-Davidson County and its surrounding counties. Dr. Steve Murphree, Belmont biology professor, is the Director of MTSEF.

There were 91 students that participated with 81 projects (some were team projects) from public, private and home schools in middle and west Tennessee. About half of the projects were presented by students in grades 6-8. Students were judged in various scientific categories on Friday evening, and the public was invited to view the projects from 10 a.m. until 2 p.m. on Saturday.

Two high school grand prize winners were selected by a panel of 9 judges on Saturday morning.  These students will represent MTSEF at the International Science and Engineering Fair, May 13-18 in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania and will receive an all-expense-paid trip. The grand prize winners were:

• Maya Misra, Harpeth Hall School: “Fusing the LRP6 and Frizzled Extracellular Domains as an Inhibitor of the Wnt Pathway”
• Aylor Huneycutt, AP-4 Home School: “MARS-Q: A Vertical Thrust Vehicle Capable of Planetary Reconnaissance in a Martian Atmosphere”

Also, eight middle school projects were selected to compete in the international Broadcom MASTERS competition. The Middle School Broadcom MASTERS nominees were:

• Braden Huneycutt, AP-4 Home School: “Just a Small Fry: A Study of the Effects of Temperature on Growth Rates of Koi Fry (Cyprinus carpio)”
• Leo Huneycutt, AP-4 Home School: “The Effect of Climate Change on Tornadoes”
• Bella Putt, Faith Home School Tutorial: “How Does Caffeine Affect Plant Growth?”
• Nevaeh Hyde, Lead Cameron School: “What Type of Toilet Paper Brand Supports the Most Weight?”
• Michael Morgan, Morgan Academy Home School: “Your Pencil, Your Light Switch”
• Caleb West, Mitchell Loh and Sharanda Ghantasala, Sunset Middle School: “What’s Up With the Air?”
• Maya Reilly, AP-4 Home School: “Effect of a Solar Eclipse on Hen Behavior”
• Benjamin Bradley, Classical Conversation-Nolensville: “ The Impact of Nutritional Supplementation on Motile Organisms”

Belmont Audio Engineering Technology students Parker Anderson and Jason Saitta traveled alongside Lecturer of Audio Engineering Technology Scott Munsell to attend the Association of Loudspeaker Manufacturing and Acoustics International Symposium and Expo in Las Vegas, Nevada earlier this semester. The event included two days of presentations on topics ranging from new active noise cancellation technologies to current trends in loudspeaker development and design. This was the first year that representatives from Belmont attended the annual conference. Anderson and Saitta both entered into an essay-based contest for free hotel accommodations with Anderson’s submission chosen as one of three winners.

“I found the conference to be not only very interesting, but also worthwhile,” said Saitta. “It was eye-opening to see how many facets of the audio industry there are outside of the traditional studio or live emphases.”

“My favorite presentation was about the challenges associated with domed compression drivers and the advantages of annular diaphragms,” Anderson said. “These new technologies can be used with modern composite materials to reduce breakup patterns and resonances within a driver, reducing overall harmonic and intermodulation distortion while eliminating subharmonic distortion.”

“It was a great opportunity for students to learn more about speaker design from some of the best in the business,” said Munsell. “The chance to learn about and experience new emerging technologies as well as network and make professional connections is what this trip was all about!”

The Ambassador of Italy to the United States, Armando Varricchio, recently visited Nashville for an official visit with Governor Bill Haslam. Dr. Francesca Muccini, associate professor of Italian and representative of the Consulate of Italy in Middle Tennessee, accompanied him during his stay.

The Ambassador later had the opportunity to meet with Provost Dr. Thomas Burns and Dean of the College of Visual and Performing Arts Dr. Stephen Eaves for a tour of Belmont University and the Mansion.

Students from the Belmont University College of Health Sciences and Nursing, with Dr. Natalie Michaels, participated in a Health Science Career Fair at Hillwood High School on Friday, March 23. High school students had a chance to interact with Belmont students to learn more about the fields of nursing, occupational therapy and physical therapy.

College of Entertainment and Music Business Admission Coordinator Ileia Hook has been working as a background vocalist for three-time Grammy award winning contemporary Christian artist Michael W. Smith. With a desire to capture the heart of unity in diversity, Smith called upon friends and vocalists from an array of diverse experiences for his newest worship project, “Surrounded,” including Hook.

She participated in the live recording, studio sessions and a handful of live worship events upon the album’s release. Although light touches of her vocal stylings can be heard through the album, she is most noticeably woven into track number four on the record titled “Reckless Love.”

“Surrounded” can be found via major music outlets.

Last weekend, four Belmont graduate nursing students participated in a hospital design challenge with teams of architecture, engineering and construction management students from across the nation as part of the PDC Design Summit in Nashville. The PDC Summit brings together senior leaders working in all disciplines of health care planning, design and construction to learn, network and discover ways to create value for the health care built environment.

Each year, as part of that conference, students participate on interprofessional teams to design a health care structure (within 48 hours) and compete as part of a juried experience. As the first year that nursing students were included in the experience, Belmont’s students were supported by the Nursing Institute of Health Care Design. They designed a micro-hospital to be built in the Gulch and were introduced to the project at their host architect firm’s office, Earl Swensson Associates and visited the construction site prior to the design process.

The Belmont students helped their teams understand a realistic model of care, patient and clinician work flow, necessary adjacencies of departments, infection control, HIPAA, patient and employee security concerns, noise considerations and many other factors. The students determined nurse staffing models, set nurse to patient ratios and calculated staffing budgets.

Dr. Yolanda Keys, professor of nursing at Texas A&M Corpus Christi and past President of NIHD noted, “Including nurses early in the planning stages of a facility can prevent mistakes that may result in non-value added work for nurses when they occupy the space. The opportunity to equip students with an appreciation of stakeholder involvement increases the likelihood that future health care buildings will not only be efficient, but also support positive staff and patient outcomes. We were pleased to sponsor nursing students to participate in this event.”

For more information on this event, click here.

Belmont University has recently announced that Dr. Jane Duncan has been named as the University’s College of Visual and Performing Arts Associate Dean, a new position that was recently created. Duncan will begin her new role July 1.

Coming to Belmont from Nova Southeastern University in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, Duncan has worked as a theatre educator for many years and with many populations including students ranging in age from 4- to 90-years-old. While at NSU, she served the institution as the Director of Accreditation, on a Department of Education Title V Grant and most recently, as Executive Director of Assessment and Accreditation. She was also recognized with the Adjunct Faculty Excellence in Teaching Award in 2011.

In addition to her 12 years at NSU, Duncan has held appointments at the University of Central Arkansas and Barry University. She has experience working within academic affairs, program review, assessment of student learning outcomes, curriculum and faculty development and oversight of compliance with regional, specialized and accrediting standards. Duncan holds a PhD in Theatre Studies from Florida State University, an MFA in Acting from Virginia Commonwealth University and a BA in Theatre from the University of Dayton.

Duncan said, “I am thrilled to join the Belmont community and combine my academic credentials (theatre) and recent professional experiences (assessment and accreditation) to serve the students in the College of Visual and Performing Arts. I felt so comfortable and welcomed when I visited campus in January and look forward to building on the practices and traditions that have already been established. I eagerly anticipate working with students, faculty and staff in upholding the mission, vision and values at Belmont.”

In her new role on Belmont’s campus as Associate Dean, Duncan will focus on accreditation, curriculum and assessment. She will serve as a collaborative leader among various departments, working to develop and implement academic curricula, procedures and processes pertaining to curriculum development, accreditation reporting and planning, assessment and assurance-of-learning activities, student advising and faculty development.

Associate Professor of Management Information Systems Dr. Lakisha Simmons has been awarded the Susan Short Jones Emerging Leaders Award by the National Coalition of 100 Black Women, Inc. Metropolitan Nashville Chapter. Jones was the founding president of the chapter and a lifelong community activist. The award was presented at the Women of Color Luncheon at Belmont, part of the Sister for Sister Conference hosted last weekend. Simmons participated on the Digital Divide panel at the event. She is the Speaker and EdTech Founder of Homework Suite Student Planner, an assignment tracker app for students.

First-year honors political science major Tyler Redmon won first place in Extemporeous Speaking at the Tennessee Intercollegiate Forensics Association’s (TIFA) annual state tournament held at Tennessee State University last weekend. He was named State Champion in the Extemporaneous Speaking Category for 2018.

Redmon said in an interview, “I believe the Forensics team has been one of the most amazing parts of my time here [at Belmont]. We’ve put in tons of work practicing for a whole year now, and it’s incredible to see that work pay off by winning a state championship. Extemporaneous speech can be intimidating at first; having to write and memorize a seven minute speech in thirty minutes while finding a source for every point you make isn’t exactly easy to pick up, but through the great support of my team and lots of practice, I was able to succeed. Winning at TIFA as a novice wasn’t something I was expecting, but with the help of a great group of people around me, I was able to accomplish that goal.”

English Professor Dr. Beverly Schneller has eight recent publications to boast, ranging from four books to a conference presentation. Her publications include:

• “John Hill and Mary Cooper: A Case Study in Eighteenth Century Publishing” in the book Fame and Fortune – Sire John Hill and London Life in the 1750s
•  “Administrative Redesign: Human-Centered Design Applications for Sustaining Change,” a co-authored essay proposing the adoption of a new model of academic administrative design, including Schneller’s chapter, “Workbook Discussion Guide”
• “Educating the New Majority Learner – an Interview with Eric Malm and Marguerite Weber” published in Academic Transformations – A Design Approach for New Majority Learners, which explores the prevalence of New Majority learners in higher education.
• Four entries to the Cambridge Companion to the Eighteenth Century Novel for the novels The History of a Woman of Quality, The Adventures of a Man of Pleasure, Margaret; or, the Penitent of Godstow, and St. Margaret’s Cave.
• “Teaching Entertaining lives – a Humanities Elective on the Music Business and Entertainment Industry,” a presentation at the Music and Entertainment Industry Educator’s Association conference this month. The presentation discussed Schneller’s curriculum designs, assessment methods, applied pedagogues and motivation for the course, which will be offered in Fall 2018.

Chemistry professors Drs. Alison Parker, Rachel Rigsby and Justin Stace, along with Belmont Chemistry majors Avery Daniels, Tyra Avery, Hannah Peterson, Amber Ansari, Christopher Hanson and Mary Barber attended the 255^th American Chemical Society (ACS) 2018 National Meeting in New Orleans, Louisiana March 18-22, 2018. ACS organizes two national meetings and expositions each year, and each one attracts an estimated 11,000 to 13,000 chemists, chemical engineers, academicians, graduate and undergraduate students and other related professionals. Students and faculty enjoyed a graduate school fair, undergraduate research poster sessions and graduate and professional research presentations at the meeting.

Four Belmont students presented their undergraduate research posters:

Avery Daniels (and Dr. Justin Stace) presented “Synthesis, characterization and spectroscopy of a terbium-centered complex: Remarkable emission from a colloidal mixture”

Tyra Avery (and Dr. Danielle Garrett) presented “Greener options in the chemistry classroom:  a titrimetric analysis of coffee”

Hannah Peterson presented Elucidation of amino acids regulating the species-selective activation of TRPM8 by coal fly ash particle

Amber Ansari (and Dr. Rachel Rigsby) presented “Lipid extraction of wet algal biomass via osmotic shock”

Dr. Pete Giordano, psychological science, has published a book chapter titled “Personality is Culturally Constructed and Maintained: Helping Students Think Globally about Themselves and Others” in the book Culture Across the Curriculum: A Psychology Teacher’s Handbook (Cambridge University Press, 2018), edited by Kenneth Keith.  You can learn more about the book here.

On Friday, March 16, Belmont University hosted Mike Tabor, DDS, as a speaker for an on-going linked cohort course (LCC). For the past three years, Dr. Danielle Garrett, assistant professor of chemistry education and Dr. Linda Holt, associate dean of CLASS and associate professor of English, have participated in a LCC, linking a major chemistry course and a literature course during the spring semester. The common theme for the two courses is forensic science. Each year, through a QEP grant, they have been able to involve their students in an interesting and engaging experience, including visiting the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, bringing an interactive mystery theater production to class and inviting an author as a guest speaker.

This year, they sought out Tabor, a native Tennessean, who currently runs a local private dental practice and is involved in forensic dentistry where he uses dentistry in forensic identification. Tabor has served as the Chief Forensic Odontologist for the State Medical Examiner’s office in Nashville since 1983. In addition to his private clinical practice, he has served as President of the Tennessee Board of Dental Examiners, President of the American Board of Forensic Odontology and the Section Chair for the Odontology Section of the American Academy of Forensic Science. He also serves as a senior consultant for the Criminal Investigations Division of TBI under its Medicaid Fraud Unit. He is a nationally known speaker in his field of forensic odontology and has lectured internationally to dentists, law enforcement and death investigation officers in Australia, New Zealand and Haiti.  He has coauthored two scientific texts in addition to his creative writing.

From 2014-2017, Tabor was on faculty of the University of Tennessee College of Graduate Medicine at UT hospital as assistant professor of dentistry in Knoxville. He has authored Walk of Death, a forensic novel. His second manuscript, Out of the Darkness, has been completed and submitted for edit and publication for anticipated release. He is currently working on his third forensic novel, Grave Mistake, all three of which are based on his true case file experiences.

Tabor was invited to campus as part of a two-part event. First, he held a Q&A discussion with students in the LCC. During this discussion, Tabor addressed his thoughts about the future of forensic science, how modern forensic fiction writers have more to write about with the maturation of DNA and how the introduction of DNA has impacted our legal system and the way human bite mark cases are handled. Tabor then spoke at a convocation event for Belmont students – Taking a Bite Out of Crime: How Forensic Dentistry Helps to Solve Mysteries – where he talked about what forensic science is, the need for forensic science and several interesting cases he worked on that were solved based on forensic dentistry.

“Beyond Dr. Tabor’s amazing professional career and wealth of knowledge, I was so impressed with his enthusiasm and zeal for wanting to engage with our students,” Garrett said.  “After the event, I asked Dr. Tabor what compelled him to want to speak with college students, after all of his other speaking experiences.”  Dr. Tabor replied, “Over the years, I have had the privilege of instructing other forensic scientists, law-enforcement agents, medical examiner teams, and other dentists about the science of forensic odontology.  In those cases, I was teaching the details of the specialty I have practiced since 1983.   At this point in my career, I feel now is the time to instruct a younger group of our population that will carry the torch forward into the fascinating field of forensic science. As I looked into the young eyes of the audience at Belmont University, I really felt a strong connection with these students. I am honored to share some responsibility in helping shape their career choices.”

More than 100 students attended the convocation. Attendees were engaged, asking questions throughout the talk. Tabor even stayed after to continue discussions with several students. “We had a good number of questions from the students, more than I had been expecting. The detailed nature of the questions made it obvious that these students have a strong interest in forensic sciences,” Tabor said.

Garrett and Holt felt that Tabor provided a unique perspective not only for their students, but for the Belmont community as a whole, helping them to develop insight into the challenges of accurately and effectively analyzing and communicating scientific information in writing, to gain awareness of the realities of the use of forensic techniques in criminal investigations, and to see the possibility of unique multi-disciplinary career opportunities.

To those students interested in pursuing forensic medicine, Tabor gives the following advice. “An exciting part of forensic science is the vast diversity of specialty within the forensic team. The parent organization, the American Academy of Forensic Science continues to actively recruit young students from high school through graduate school in the many components to our field. There are also many mentors in forensic fields that are willing to share their knowledge and experience with the young scientists of today.”

Belmont is preparing to celebrate National Public Health Week this year. During the first full week of April each year, the American Public Health Association (APHA) brings together communities across the United States to observe National Public Health Week (NPHW) as a time to recognize the contributions of public health and highlight issues that are important to improving our nation. Each day of NPHW 2018 will focus on a different public health topic that’s critical to creating and sustaining a healthy nation.

Daily Themes

Monday, April 2: Behavioral Health

Tuesday, April 3: Communicable Diseases

Wednesday, April 4: Environmental Health

Thursday, April 5: Injury and Violence Prevention

Friday, April 6: Ensuring the Right to Health

Belmont University’s Public Health Program will be hosting several events to celebrate NPHW this year:

• Monday, April 2, 7 p.m.: Screening of Warning: This Drug May Kill You in the Johnson small theater.
• Tuesday, April 3, 10 a.m.-12 p.m.: Metro Public Health Department will host a booth in McWhorter lobby. They will be providing information on clinical services provided at the health department, various job roles within the health department and potential employment/ internship information for students.
• Wednesday, April 4, 10 a.m.: “Applying Global Health Concepts to Local Practice” – Carol Etherington, associate director of community health initiatives at the Vanderbilt Institute for Global Health, will discuss the universal nature of global health principles and practices, and ways to apply them locally to improve the health of designated populations. There will be an opportunity  for a lunch-and-learn directly following the event. Lunch will be provided to the first 30 attendees.

Alumnus Mark Fry (’85) has recently published a new book, DETERMINED: Encouragement for Living Your Best Life with a Chronic Illness, which offers a refreshing outlook for those living with a chronic illness. Diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis over 20 years ago, Fry shares his own personal story of living with an illness while offering advice and encouragement for others who share that experience.

Specifically, the book offers biblical encouragement to those who don’t know what to do post-diagnosis but want to live a more positive and encouraging life.

The Doctorate of Physical Therapy Class of 2019 received an esteemed visitor to their Health Care Systems Class taught by Associate Professor Dr. Natalie Michaels this week.

Congressman Jim Cooper came to talk about the current state of health care in the United States. He talked candidly about the current situation in both the federal and state governments regarding health care, focusing his talk on physical therapy and answered questions for the students.