Category: Professional Notes

The Division of Information Technologies is pleased to announce the hiring of Raymond Usler as Director of IT Security and ISO.  As Information Security Officer, Ray will administer UMW’s information security program.  He is responsible for planning and directing efforts to safeguard the university’s data from unauthorized access, modification, or dissemination to ensure its confidentiality, integrity, and availability.

Ray comes to UMW from Macomb Community College in Michigan where he served as Manager of Information System Security.  He holds a BS in Business Administration from Central Michigan University, and CISSP and CISM certifications, and is a member of several information security associations.

Ray joined UMW on February 10.  He reports directly to the Vice President for Information Technology and CIO and works in Tyler House on the Fredericksburg Campus.

These College of Arts and Sciences faculty members submitted Faculty Development Grant proposals in November, and following review by the Committee on Faculty Development and Grants, the CAS Dean made these awards for the 2011-12 fiscal year:

• Jason Davidson, Department of Political Science and International Affairs, ” ‘We Gotta Get out of this Place’: US. Allies’ Decisions to Withdraw from Iraq and Afghanistan.”
• Mindy Erchull, Department of Psychology, “Objectification, Sexualization, and Sexual Agency.”
• Jacqueline Gallagher, Department of Geography, Textbook on Field Methods in Mobile GIS and GPS.
• Debra Hydorn, Department of Mathematics, “Correcting for Error in GPS Postion to Improve the Linear Association Between Satellite and Field-Collected Measurements of Elevation.”
• Rosemary Jesionowski, Department of Art and Art History, “Proof of Experience.”
• Janusz Konieczny, Department of Mathematics, “Conjugacy in Semigroups.”
• Ben LaBreche, Department of English, Linguistics, and Communication, “Samson Agonistes and the Critique of Liberalism.”
• Elizabeth Lewis, Department of Modern Foreign Languages, “Women and Charity in Spain, 1786-1939.”
• Leslie Martin, Department of Sociology and Anthropology, “Making Sense of Need: Organizational Constructions of Homelessness and Solutions.”
• Maya Mathur, Department of English, Linguistics, and Communication, ” ‘Big Fish and Little Fish’: Comic Economics on the Jacobean Stage.”
• Keith Mellinger, Department of Mathematics, “Cap partitions of affine spaces.”
• Laura Mentore, Department of Sociology and Anthropology, “The Social Significance of Competitive ‘birdsport’ among Guyanese Men.”
• Marjorie Och, Department of Art and Art History, “Community and Friendship in the Letters and Portraits of Vittoria Colonna.”
• Jennifer Polack-Wahl, Department of Computer Science, “iPod for Education: Teaching Resource for the Future.”
• Sheshalatha Reddy, Department of English, Linguistics, and Communication, “Two Chapters on Indian-English Periodical Literature.”
• Debra Steckler, Department of Psychology, “An Investigation of the Foundation of Arnett’s New Life Stage: Emerging Adulthood.”
• Abbie Tomba, Department of Biological Sciences, “Identification of Larval stages of trematodes (Family Opecoelidae) parasitizing freshwater snails (Family Pleuroceridae).”

Nabil Al-Tikriti, associate professor of history, gave a keynote address, “The State of Middle East Studies in the American Academy,” at the 5th Joint International Workshop held in Tokyo, Japan February 12-13.  Al-Tikrit also served as a discussant for the graduate student workshop “Science, Institutions, and Identity in the Muslim Societies” organized jointly by Kyoto University and the Tokyo University of Foreign Studies.

Listen to “A Night of Jazz,” in The Underground. The program features a discussion led by Doug Gately, director of the UMW Jazz Ensemble, on jazz music in the African-American community and a performance by the UMW Faculty Jazz Sextet. 8 p.m. Free. 540/654-1044.

The Free Lance-Star interviewed Associate Professor of History Nabil Al-Tikriti about the ongoing protests in Egypt.  In the February 3, 2011 article by reporter Heather Brady, Dr. Al-Tikriti briefly explained the calculations of the Mubarak regime, and the situation on the ground faced by certain friends and colleagues.