News & Events

Mary McHugh,adjunct lecturer inpolitical science and director of the Stevens Service Learning Center, was quoted in an Oct. 20, 2017, Daily News of Newburyport, Massachusetts, story about the war chest Gov. Charlie Baker has amassed for a possiblereelection bid in 2018. “It’s hard to beat an incumbent,” she said. “Especially a popular one like Charlie Baker.”

Dr. George Heffernan, professor and chair of philosophy, recently published a chapter titled “Stein’s Critique of Heidegger on Temporality, Eternity, and Transcendence—with Special Attention to Conrad-Martius’s Contribution”. This volume is dedicated to the lives and legacies of Edith Stein (1891–1942) and Hedwig Conrad-Martius (1888–1966), two key figures in the early phenomenological movement.

Melissa Zimdars, assistant professor of communication, was quoted in a May 16, 2017, post by technology blogger Richard Hartley about new measures taken by Facebook to root out “fake news.” Zimdars, who has gained national attention for creating a list of untrustworthy news sites, said it seemed Facebook was largely responding to bad press. “My initial read on it is it’s ultimately kind of a PR move. It’s cheap to do. It’s easy. It doesn’t actually require them to do anything,” she said.

He Li, professor of political science, waspart of a panel on “Sino-Latin American Relations in the Era of Trump” on April 19, 2017, atCornell University. Sponsored by the university’s Latin American Studies Program and the SC Johnson College of Business’ Emerging Markets Institute, the panel explored the growing uncertaintyof multilateral relations amongthe United States, China, and Latin America since the election of President Donald Trump. Li is an expert on Chinese political thought and Sino-Latin American relations.

Ana Silva, associate professor of finance and chair of the accounting and finance department, was quoted in a WalletHub.com “Ask the Experts” column about secured credit cards. Asked how the issuer of a secured credit card with no annual fee makes money, Silva responded, “Issuers charge high APRs on the unpaid balances each month. Late fees are also charged when a customer misses a payment. Some issuers charge a fee for setting-up an account. Issuers also charge the interchange fee on every credit card transaction. In addition, some banks cross-sell other products such as insurances.”

Director of Campus Music Activities Hugh Hinton is the winner of the 2021 Choir Master Prize in choral conducting. This award is given each year to the person who earns the top score in the National Choir Master certification examination.

Sociology assistant professorDaniel Herda,with coauthors John Hagan (Northwestern) and Bill McCarthy (UCDavis),have published a study in the journalThe DuBois Review.The research looked into the connections between legal cynicism, the electoral regime of Mayor Richard M. Daley and citizen calls for police assistance and police reports of drug crime.

Laura Pruett, associate professor and chair of visual and performing arts, presented a research poster, “I Did It My Way: An Alternative Concept for Teaching American Music,” March 25, 2017, at the annual conference of the Society for American Musicin Montréal.

Sociology assistant professorDaniel Herda’s latest article, with Dr. Bill McCarthy of UC-Davis, is “No Experience Required: Violent Crime and Anticipated, Vicarious, and Experienced Racial Discrimination.” The article is in press atSocial Science Research.

Raymond Shaw, associate professor of psychology, wrote an essay, “Assessing the Intangible in Our Students,” for the July 27 issue of The Chronicle of Higher Education. “Ten years ago, Richard Shavelson wrote that accreditation pressures could lead us to focus on easily formulated, standardized and measured student outcomes and to neglect ‘personal and social responsibility skills’ — ‘personal, civic, moral, social and intercultural knowledge and actions,’” Shaw wrote. “He warned that if we do not measure those, ‘they will drop from sight.’ If we neglect the ineffable outcomes in our efforts to understand what college is for, and what we accomplish in higher education, they could disappear from our attention, our aspirations and eventually from our teaching.”