Every year, the Michigan Historical Review awards a prize to the best graduate student paper in Michigan. The winner receives $1000 and has their article published in the MHR. This year, History MA student Kyle Whitman won the prize with his essay "'Indians just fish because it is their right to fish': Michigan Native Americans and the Battle for Fishing Rights." Whitman's paper focuses on the American Indian Movement in Michigan and how the state's tribes used fishing rights as a way to further their sovereignty.

History MA student Carly Scarbrough came in second with her paper "'We Don't Go Anywhere': The Lives of Washtenaw Women during the Reign of the Ypsilanti Ripper." Scarbrough's paper examines the role that gender and the sexual revolution played in the murders committed by John Norman Collins between 1967 and 1969. She is working to revise and resubmit her paper for publication. 

Both papers were originally written for HIST 601: Researching U.S. History, taught by Professor Mary-Elizabeth Murphy.

Six pieces of art created by three Art and Design students were among those selected for display at Michigan's annual Art in the Legislature display on October 10. The students whose works were selected are:

• Katherine Bullock is a sophomore majoring in printmaking. She is a resident of Detroit. 

• Jessica Dietz is in the final year of the Master of Fine Arts in Studio Art, specializing in Photography. She is from Clawson, Mich. 

• Hannah Thuemmel graduated earlier this year with a double major in Math and Art. Her hometowns are Ypsilanti and Port Austin.

See all six works at EMU Today.

Kyle Martin, a Environmental Science and Society (ENVI) major, has been awarded the Mid-East Honors Association's (MEHA) James Ruebel Scholarship. This award is given annually to a student member of the MEHA who demonstrates commitment to academic endeavors, community engagement, leadership, and service to their campus community. For the second time in five years, an EMU student has received this honor. 

Martin told EMU Today, "It's been a struggle to fund college while participating on a Division-1 athletics team. I'm the only one out of six kids in my family to obtain a college degree, and I still plan to pursue a master's degree and possibly a PhD. This scholarship will help pay for my final academic year and let me concentrate on finding funding for graduate school."

Martin is also the 2023-24 recipient of the College of Arts and Sciences' Father Bernard J. O'Connor Endowed Scholarship in Civic Engagement. This scholarship is awarded to a student with a record of excellence in their contribution to citizenship issues within their program of study as well as in co-curricular and/or extra-curricular activities. 

Professor Cara Shillington's students continue to generate press coverage of their research into invertebrates.

Biology graduate student Dallas Haselhuhn was featured in a National Public Radio piece about a tarantula mating season festival in southeastern Colorado. Haselhuhn worked as a naturalist educator at the festival. 

Interlochen Public Radio broadcast a feature about Dr. Shillington's field research class exploring freshwater jellyfish in the Great Lakes Region. The story highlighted students Alaina McCallup and Grace Halcrow and graduate student instructor Rachel Koski as they searched for jellyfish at Pickerel Lake. 

Dr. Shillington's students have caught her enthusiasm for invertebrates. Shillington told Interlochen Public Radio, "How can you not love them? The diversity is just amazing. The varieties of lifestyles, of what they do, of how they look, of the structure…is just absolutely phenomenal. How can you ignore 99% of the animal world and focus on just 1%? So, how can you not want to know more?"

A recent exhibit at the Ann Arbor Art Center, Talismanic: The Collected Collages of Amy Sacksteder, presented collages by Professor of Art Amy Sacksteder. The exhibit featured four different series that she completed over eight years: Generations (2015), Grounded/Ungrounded (2019), Time Ghosts (2019-2020), and Echo Keepers (2021).

Marley Boone wrote in Pulp that, "While the collages tend toward abstraction, the images are inspired by scenes and items in Sacksteder's life, whether it's the natural beauty surrounding her house or the various common objects that reside within it. The cumulative effect of the Talismanic collection gives viewers the impression they are seeing snapshots from a personal photo album."

"I was itching to get back into the studio" after the birth of a son, Sacksteder told Boone, and she turned to collage. "I recalled a process that I had demoed to my 2D Methods and Materials class that involved printing photographs on fine art papers and working back into the prints manually. I had an archive of images I had shot with the intention of using the images as source material for paintings, so I printed a number of them and began what felt like a very intuitive and generative process of cutting, layering, and applying acrylic paint with a ruling pen. Rather than crafting source images for paintings, those experiments became a series in their own right: Generations."

Read the Pulp article.

Dr. Kimberly Barrett, Associate Professor of Criminology, was recently invited to give a keynote address as part of a symposium on Environmental Crime and Methods at the University of Florence in Italy in September. Dr. Barrett spoke as an expert on quantitative methods in green criminology, and her talk was entitled "An analysis of crime in the U.S. oil and gas industry: A quantitative longitudinal approach." The symposium was held as a precursor to the annual meeting of the European Society of Criminology.

Dr. Barrett's keynote presentation involved preliminary findings from an analysis of corporate crimes, political campaign contributions, and revenue among a sample of oil and gas corporations in the United States. This presentation provided an valuable keynote for the symposium because of its methodological approach--quantitative research methods have historically been underutilized in green criminology, which tends to make more frequent use of qualitative, case-study approaches. 

Two works by Professor of Photography and New Media Jason DeMarte have been added to the permanent collection of the University of Michigan Museum of Art (UMMA). The photographs are currently on display as part of A Gathering, an exhibit of recently acquired works. 

Curator Félix Zamora-Gómez told the Michigan Daily that DeMarte's piece, "Vanilla Sky" depicts the effects of climate change and pushes the viewer to reflect on ongoing environmental damage. "("Vanilla Sky") is very interesting in that it thinks about nature and the environment in a very decadent way," Zamora-Gómez said.

Another exhibit of DeMarte's photos, Tangential: Works by Jason DeMarte, can be seen this fall at the Rule Gallery in Marfa, Texas.

"I am interested in comparing idealistic utopian representations of the landscape to the hyper-perfect representation of products and modern consumer life in media," DeMarte explains. "I aim to critique the idea of disillusionment through misleading representation. To achieve this, I create photographs that merge augmented forms of life and colorful processed foodstuffs with idyllic pop material goods, in an effort to create a dialogue around consumption, duplicity, and homogenized ecstasy. I work digitally, combining images of enhanced flora and fauna with commercially produced and processed products. Through these seemingly unrelated and absurd groupings or composites, I aim to address attitudes and understandings of the contemporary experience."

Dr. Gregg Barak, Emeritus Professor of Criminology and Criminal Justice, continues to actively write and publish with a special focus on topics that speak to contemporary news and political discussions. In 2022, Dr. Barak published Criminology on Trump as part of Routledge's series on "Crimes of the Powerful." The book has earned praise from experts including Professor Henry N. Pontell, who writes, "Using a broad criminological perspective that draws on issues central to white-collar and elite offending, this important book provides a deep and novel analysis of Donald Trump's behaviors before, during, and after his presidency. Barak effectively exposes the fundamental shortcomings of media-driven, and relatively narrow legal interpretations of such acts, and in doing so, issues a major rationale for crucial scholarly attention toward elite criminality while setting a copious conceptual table for future research."

Barak has also published a number of pieces on similar topics in Salon and other venues of public interest, including a recent piece entitled "Outlaw Lawyers and Outlaw Presidents: a Brief History of Legal Perfidy," in which he argues that Donald Trump's "lawyers, if and when convicted, should face ethics proceedings, legal sanctions, permanent disbarment and more than token punishments."

In 2020, Dr. Barak published Chronicles of a Radical Criminologist: Working the Margins of Law, Power, and Justice (Critical Issues in Crime and Society) with Rutgers University Press. The book is written from Dr. Barak's first-person perspective and chronicles his career in the field as a way of thinking about the intellectual history of the discipline of criminology. This reflection illuminates the motivation and the relevance of Dr. Barak's ongoing work in the field.

Governor Whitmer has appointed Col. James Grady (BS, Criminal Justice & Criminology, 1995) to be the new director of the Michigan State Police.

"Captain Grady is the right pick to lead the brave men and women of the Michigan State Police," Whitmer said in a statement. "After 25 years, he has earned the respect of troopers across the department and community leaders throughout the state, including in southeast Michigan, where he spent the majority of his service. He has a knack for bringing everyone together to solve problems, and our state is a better place for it. He will do a great job leading our state's top law enforcement agency."  

Grady joined MSP as a trooper in 1998. He served the Adrian and Detroit posts and later became a detective and then supervisor. He was promoted to first lieutenant and section commander of the Fraud Investigation team in 2015 and then the assistant division commander in 2018 with the Emergency Management and Homeland Security Division. He most recently served as commander of MSP's training division, a role he had held since 2020.

"It is an incredible honor to continue serving in the Michigan State Police alongside the finest troopers in the nation," Grady told CBS News Detroit. "I want to thank my partners in leadership at the department. We will continue to make sure that the men and women of MSP have what they need to do their job of protecting Michiganders in communities across the state. It's a tough but rewarding career. I will work every day to earn the trust and respect of my colleagues and the good people of Michigan." 

CAS alum and social media star Jon Kung (BS, Theatre and Creative Writing, '07) will release his long-awaited first cookbook this month. Kung Food: Chinese American Recipes from a Third-Culture Kitchen (Clarkson Potter, 2023), a collection of 100 recipes that re-examines Chinese American food, has earned rave advance reviews:

• "From the Dan Dan Lasagna to the Mapo Paneer, the recipes in Kung Food are so vibrant and bursting with flavor that you'll want to scrape your plates clean—but it's Jon's wonderful writing that gives new meaning to what it means to be Chinese American."—Andy Baraghani, author of The Cook You Want to Be

• "Kung Food is one of those cookbooks that makes you want to sprint to the kitchen, book tucked tightly under your arm. Much like in his videos, Jon mixes heart, culture, an encyclopedic knowledge of spices, and good freaking food in a way that'll make you excited to try everything. Also, thanks to this book my wok is properly seasoned for the first time ever. Can't recommend enough!"—Alexis Nikole Nelson, James Beard Award–winning content creator and food writer

• "Jon has captured the delicious complexities of being a third-culture kid and made me feel proud to consider myself one. His recipes feel at once nostalgic and novel, and at the same time they will teach us how to be a better and more adventurous home cook."—Kristina Cho, James Beard Award–winning author of Mooncakes and Milk Bread

Three EMU historians were honored at the 62nd Annual Eastern Michigan University Alumni Awards celebration on Friday, October 6, 2023. 

Brian James Egen (B.S., History, 1992) received the Alumni Achievement Award, which is presented to alumni who have achieved distinction in their chosen field, clearly demonstrated the value of their college education, and maintained a continuing interest in Eastern Michigan University. Egen is the executive producer of "Innovation Nation" and head of studio production at The Henry Ford Museum. He was recently reappointed to the Michigan Historical Commission by Governor Gretchen Whitmer. 

The Honorable Daniel S. Opperman (B.S., History and Political Science, 1979) received the Distinguished Alumni Award, which is given to alumni who have achieved extraordinary distinction in their chosen field, demonstrated unusual service to others, and maintained a continuing interest in Eastern Michigan University. In 2006, Opperman was sworn in as judge for the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of Michigan. He currently serves as Chief Judge for the Court. Opperman has provided extensive support for student travel and research in History and Political Science. 

Dr. Linda Pritchard received the John W. Porter Distinguished Service Award, which is presented to individuals who have made an outstanding contribution to Eastern Michigan University or the Alumni Association of EMU. Professor Emerita of History, Pritchard retired from EMU in 2016. She also served as the Dean of the College of Arts & Sciences and was the first Department Head of Women's and Gender Studies. Pritchard is active in Women in Philanthropy at EMU. 

This winter the College will offer two five-week, one-credit, elective courses designed to help students prepare to seek employment after graduation. 

• In CASI 177: From College to Career, students will gain an understanding of the workplace value of a liberal arts education and learn to articulate the skills and experience gained through their program as evidence of qualification for internships and employment. Students will take part in career exploration, assessments, informational interviews, and internship searching, and they will have the opportunity to formalize their resume and application materials during the course. 

• In CASI 277: Developing Your Professional Identity, students will articulate workplace skills gained through enrollment in a CAS major through creation of a professional resume, LinkedIn profile, elevator pitch, and phrasing to use in networking engagements and interviews for full-time employment. Students will gain an understanding of workplace etiquette and professionalism, identity at work, their own leadership capabilities, how to employ skills gained through a liberal arts education for workplace success, and personal career management. Students will take part in informational interviews, professional networking, mock interviews for professional opportunities, and career fair participation, and will have the opportunity to formalize their resume and application materials and create a professional identity statement during the course.

Both courses will be taught by April Calkovsky, a Career Coach at the University Advising and Career Development Center (UACDC) who works with CAS students. Students may take either class or both classes, and the classes will carry LBC credit (area 4). While enrollment is open to all EMU students, From College to Career is intended especially for sophomores who are CAS-declared majors or exploratory students, and Developing Your Professional Identity is aimed at sophomore and junior CAS-declared majors.

These special topic courses are being piloted as part of the Dean's College Readiness initiative. The goal of the College Readiness initiative is for every CAS senior to be ready to obtain employment in their chosen career field. Associate Dean Jim Egge remarks, "A liberal arts education provides an excellent preparation for a wide range of careers, but students must be able to identify to prospective employers the career-relevant skills they have learned in their studies." Egge adds, "Students should begin thinking about their career goals and researching possible career paths by the end of their sophomore year, so that they can acquire the credentials and experiences they will need to land the job they want. The UACDC Career Coaches excel in preparing students to seek employment, but most CAS students don't visit the Career Center until their final semester, if ever. To reach every CAS student, we need to build Career Readiness into each of our CAS majors."

Calkovsky points out, "One of the best ways to retain students is to support them in finding their 'why,' or the reason they are pursuing a college degree. The Career Readiness initiative and these pilot courses are two ways to support students in discovering themselves and the value of their EMU degree as it connects to and prepares them for career fulfillment and success." She invites CAS schools and departments to meet with her or another UACDC Career Coach to discuss how the department integrates career preparation into their majors. 

Members of the EMU Percussion studio added a new Marimba One brand 5-octave professional marimba to the School of Music & Dance inventory recently. Marimbas can be costly instruments, so the School is very thankful of the financial support from the CAS Dean's Office that made this acquisition possible. Students across the College of Arts and Sciences utilize professional equipment in a variety of disciplines and those educational opportunities are critical in Music study as well. You can hear this beautiful new instrument on stage in a number of upcoming performances presented by the School of Music & Dance. 

Students in the ESSC 466W Global Tectonics class spent Sept. 28-Oct. 1 exploring the rocks of the Appalachians in West Virginia, Maryland, and Virginia. ESSC 466W serves as the writing intensive, capstone course for EMU Geology majors. Students record notes and structural measurements in field books while learning about the tectonic evolution and variations in style of deformation in different regions of a mountain belt. Geology faculty Dr. Christine Clark and Dr. Hannah Blatchford led the trip.

The School of Music & Dance recently welcomed Hunter Eberly, Principal Trumpet of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, to campus to work with brass students. Mr. Eberly presented a master class to EMU brass students, particularly our trumpeter players, several of whom performed and received instruction. The master class was organized by Dr. Anderson Romero, Assistant Professor of Trumpet in the School of Music & Dance.