Welcome to our monthly compilation of good news, gathered from the college's faculty and staff! Would you like to include your own news or a colleague's? Send us your details on the CHSS Brag Points form.
A shout out to Cynthia Kierner, professor of history, for being named a finalist for the George Washington Book Prize for her novel, The Tory’s Wife: A Woman and Her Family in Revolutionary America. The literary award recognizes the past year’s finest works focused on the nation’s founding era, especially works that help advance a broader public understanding of early American History. Congratulations, Cynthia!
Blake Silver, associate professor of sociology and director of graduate studies in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology, has released his new book: Degrees of Risk: Navigating Insecurity and Inequality in Public Higher Education. In the book, he explores how insecurity permeates every aspect of college life, despite the idea that higher education institutions are a place of privilege. Congratulations, Blake!
Congratulations to Thalia Goldstein, associate professor and director of applied developmental psychology, on the release of her new book, Why Theatre Education Matters: Understanding its Cognitive, Social, and Emotional Benefits. She reports on the first large scale systematic qualitative analyses of acting classes for adolescents, and introduces the eight Acting Habits of Mind—thinking strategies to solve problems and creatively complete tasks.
A shout out to Seth Kaplan, professor of psychology, who co-authored a new book: Crisis-Ready Terms: Data-Driven Lessons From Aviation, Nuclear Power, Emergency Medicine, and Mine Rescue. The book analyzes valuable data that builds a framework for studying crises and teams in organizations.
Congratulations to Matthew Kelley, assistant professor of linguistics and director of the Phonetics and Phonology Lab, who co-published an article about and released a new piece of software for automatically aligning words and sounds in recordings of speech using machine learning techniques. The new software showed better performance than the system currently most popular in the field for performing this task. Read it here!
A shout out to Sabine Doebel, assistant professor of applied developmental psychology, who received an award from the Association for Psychological Science to conduct a half-day pre-conference on teaching developmental science inclusively. The preconference includes finding interesting ways to illustrate development in diverse contexts, showcasing universality and diversity in developmental skills and outcomes.
Two global affairs students, Ayman Habib and Adam Sherinian, served as George Mason University delegates to the Duke-UNC China Leadership Summit. The opportunity presented a unique way for Ayman to learn more about the politics in the region, especially on reshaping US-China narratives. While Adam learned more about China’s place in the world, he also gained a deeper understanding on the people, culture, and history. Congratulations, Ayman and Adam!
September 13, 2024