A Message from the Dean - February 2021
Winter has come to Edwardsville. In mid-February, freezing temperatures, snow and subzero wind chills shut down the SIUE campus for two days. A week later, however, temperatures climbed into the 60s. The sun is rising earlier and setting later. Spring is on the horizon.
The COVID-19 pandemic continues to influence instruction, research and other activities on the campus. All students, staff and faculty who returned to campus before January 22 were required to undergo COVID testing, and nearly 7,400 tests were completed. Only 38 people (0.5 percent) tested positive, which indicates that students, staff and faculty are taking precautions to prevent the spread of the virus. An ongoing surveillance testing program has revealed that very limited virus transmission is occurring in the SIUE community.
February is Black Heritage Month at SIUE, and CAS joined other units in recognizing and honoring the contributions of African Americans to U.S. history:
- The Women’s Studies program sponsored talks on Black women and yoga, the socioeconomic and cultural norms associated with barriers to physical activity among African American women, and community service and activism with Chicago area leader and activist Ms. Drema Lee Woldman.
- The Black Studies program sponsored a Black History Scavenger Hunt.
- The Political Science Black Sociopolitical Lecture Series sponsored a panel discussion, “Visibly Invisible: The Sociopolitical Reality of Black Women,” featuring Ella Jones, the mayor of Ferguson, Missouri, Sharon Johnson, PhD, professor and dean of the School of Social Work at the University of Missouri–St. Louis, and Tarsha Moore, assistant director of the SIUE Center for Student Diversity and Inclusion.
- And as part of the Sankofa Lecture Series, sponsored by SIUE’s Truth, Racial Healing and Transformation (TRHT) Campus Center, Victoria Harrison, instructor in the Department of History, presented her research on Conway Barbour, who was born into slavery but achieved success as an entrepreneur and politician in the middle decades of the nineteenth century.
CAS joins the larger SIUE community in mourning the death of Johnetta Randolph Haley. Professor Haley, a faculty member in the Department of Music from 1972 until her retirement in 1993, also served for many years as director of the SIUE East St. Louis Center. A celebration of Professor Haley’s life is planned for late April 2021, and a memorial concert is planned for 2022.
Jessica Harris, PhD, associate professor in the Department of History, has been named SIUE’s first Vice Chancellor for Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion. Dr. Harris joined the history faculty in 2011, and she served for three years as interim assistant provost and then assistant provost for academic equity and inclusive excellence.
Even as their activities are restricted by the ongoing pandemic, CAS students, staff and faculty continue to engage in notable research and creative activities. Kylea Perkins, senior studio art major, created a large, four-chain necklace for an Undergraduate Research and Creative Activities (URCA) project. Perkins’s necklace reflects her interest in and research into U.S. race relations.
Adriana E. Martinez, PhD, associate professor with a joint appointment in the Department of Geography and Geographic Information Sciences and the Department of Environmental Sciences, received the Hoppe Research Professor Award for 2021-23. The Hoppe Award, which is given by the SIUE Graduate School, recognizes and supports SIUE faculty members whose research or creative activities have the promise of making significant contributions to their field of study.
Other CAS faculty have recently been recognized for their achievements. Venessa A. Brown, PhD, tenured professor in the Department of Social Work, was recognized as one of 25 women who have made a difference in higher education by Diverse: Issues in Higher Education. Dr. Kim Archer, professor of composition in the Department of Music, was selected by the President’s Own United States Marine Band to compose a new fanfare for President Joe Biden’s inauguration in January.
Under the leadership of Carolyn Butts-Wilmsmeyer, PhD, associate professor in the Department of Biological Sciences, SIUE’s Center for Predictive Analytics (C-PAN) is leading a statewide, multi-institutional fellowship program. Funded by the USDA’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture, the program is designed to meet the growing need for statisticians and data analysts.
Alumni of CAS departments and programs give back to SIUE in many ways. Rodney Coates, PhD, who earned his bachelor’s degree at SIUE, will speak on “The Matrix of Race—Fostering Social Change and Justice” at 7 p.m. on Thursday, February 25. Dr. Coates, who went on from SIUE to earn graduate degrees from the University of Illinois Springfield and the University of Chicago, is professor of critical race and ethnic studies in the Department of Global and Intercultural Studies at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, where he has worked since 1990. A native of East St. Louis, Dr. Coates has conducted bias training for school districts and municipalities, police and universities. He works with local communities, corporations and Miami University to establish pathways to progress for under-represented students in such fields as STEM, business, and law.
Please read more about these people and their accomplishments in This Month in CAS.
Kevin Leonard, PhD
Dean, College of Arts and Sciences
