D ecember 2 010 / Ja n uary 2 011
Marquette Grant helps students stay on path while managing disabilities What is it like crossing Wisconsin Avenue and not being able to see the traffic lights or approaching cars because of a visual impairment? Or, imagine it taking three times as long to read the assignments from English, theology, psychology, history and anthropology because of a reading disability. Try navigating a 90-acre campus in a wheelchair after a snowfall. At least 300 Marquette students with learning, physical, psychological and other disabilities face these and other challenges daily. Through a $1 million grant from the U.S. Department of Education, some of these students will have access to additional support services to mitigate the effects of their disability. Awarded to the Disability Services office, a division of Marquette’s Student Educational Services, the goal of the five-year grant is to improve the graduation rates and academic performance of students with disabilities. The grant comes through TRIO — which funds services for low-income, first-generation and disabled students — the federal program that also supports Marquette’s Educational Opportunity Program. The program, MARQ Your Path, will offer a variety of support services, including specialized freshman orientation, advising, technology aids and a peer mentoring component. It will be supervised by Heidi Vering, coordinator of disability services. “Students managing a disability are facing additional obstacles that the typical education environment can’t always meet,” Vering said. “In addition to balancing classes and studying requirements with interests in extracurricular programs, our students may be managing dyslexia or anxiety. This program will help us meet the unique needs these students face.” According to Vering, 69 percent of Marquette students with a disability graduate within six
Photo by Dan Johnson
By Andy Brodzeller
Heidi Vering (second from left) is principal investigator for “MARQ Your Path,” which will provide students managing disabilities with supplemental advising designed to identify the course combinations and schedules that take into account students’ specific strengths and limitations related to their disabilities. About 300 Marquette students, including (L-R) Owen Kenney, Jordan Koconis-O’Malley and David Check, have registered with Disability Services; some of them may serve as mentors for the program.
years, compared with Marquette’s average of 80 percent. She also noted that students with disabilities struggle with adjusting academically to Marquette, averaging lower GPAs their first year than students without a disability, 2.58 versus 3.08. The discrepancy is even greater for low-income students, who average a 2.19 GPA their freshman year. MARQ Your Path will serve 100 students every year, adding 25 to 35 new students annually to replace students who graduate. Over the five years of the program more than 200 students, one-third from low-income families, will benefit from the program’s services. Vering said the grant will allow Marquette to assist students by purchasing technology
aids, such as voice recognition software, screen reading programs and graphic organizers for their personal computers, currently available only in a lab in the John P. Raynor, S.J., Library. The grant will also pay current Marquette students who have effectively managed a similar disability to serve as one-on-one peer mentors. Students who want to participate in MARQ Your Path (or other services offered by Disability Services) must register with the disability office and provide documentation of their disability. “Students need to verify that they have gone through an assessment with a physician,” Vering said. “Certain thresholds must be met before C o n t i n u e d o n pa g e 4
Campu s H a p p e n i n gs Rev. James Heft to present faculty seminar about Catholic Identity
Simmons funds available to support religious nature of university
Rev. James Heft, president of the Institute for Advanced Catholic Studies at the University of Southern California, will present a faculty seminar Friday, Jan. 14, 2011, in the AMU Ballrooms. The seminar, “Six Challenges Facing Catholic Universities: A Dialogue about Catholic Identity,” will take place from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. and includes lunch. For more information or to register, contact Dr. Susan Mountin, director of Manresa for Faculty, at susan.mountin@ marquette.edu or call 8-3693. Register by Friday, Dec. 17.
The submission deadline for proposals to the Edward D. Simmons Religious Commitment Fund is Feb. 15, 2011, for grants for the 2011-2012 academic year. The fund finances small projects or seed money for programs and events that deepen the religious nature of Marquette. The grants usually range between $500 and $2,500. Proposals that are interdisciplinary and interdepartmental receive special consideration. For more information, visit www.bit.ly/MUSimmons.
Annual Christmas Tree Lighting is Dec. 10
New website provides co-curricular data
Marquette’s annual Miracle on Central Mall will be Friday, Dec. 10, at 5 p.m. in front of St. Joan of Arc Chapel. This year’s theme is “Jingle Bell Rock: WILD about Christmas.” The evening will include the tree lighting and blessing by Marquette President Robert A. Wild, S.J., and Christmas carols and reflections from representatives of the International Learning Center. A social will follow on the Raynor Library bridge with hot cocoa, cider and cookies.
The Division of Student Affairs has launched a new website, www.marquette. edu/dsa/assessment/, to inform the campus community about the co-curricular (out-of-class) experience of Marquette students. The site includes executive summary reports of all the major institutional surveys conducted by student affairs and will be continuously updated as new reports become available.
Marquette Matters
New EOP director envisions research and study abroad opportunities By Tim Olsen
her career at Marquette in 1974 as a financial aid counselor in the EOP and became the director in 1986, serving for 24 years before her retirement last summer. Some of the alumni referred to by Green include Congresswoman Gwen Moore, Milwaukee County Circuit Court Judge Pedro Colón, Deputy Secretary of the Wisconsin Department of Transportation Ruben Anthony, City of Milwaukee Common Council President Willie Hines, Milwaukee Alderman Ashanti Hamilton, and Milwaukee Journal Sentinel editorial writer and columDr. Joseph Green said the Marquette EOP position was an opportunity to work for the best nist James Causey. program in the country. That, and the appeal of Marquette’s Catholic identity, its mission and focus on student service drew him to Marquette. Even with its storied history and national reputation, the EOP has the opportunity to get even stronger, abroad, including taking a foreign language according to Green. Some of the priorities and having a passport by their junior year. he has identified include: • Provide an undergraduate research • Continue to keep the program funded. experience for all EOP students, and • Continue to see EOP students graduate encourage them to go to graduate or at a high rate. professional school. • Work collaboratively with alumni “Dr. Green brings to Marquette a wealth of and other programs and departments experience working with TRIO program students throughout campus. and parents and enhancing individual students’ • Showcase student successes. potential for success in higher education,” said • Begin an initiative in which all EOP Anne Deahl, associate vice provost for academic students have the opportunity to study support programs. Photo by Dan Johnson
As an alumnus of Student Support Services himself, Dr. Joseph Green is acutely aware of the difference focused Student Support Services can make for students. As an administrator of those services (the equivalent of Marquette’s Educational Opportunity Program), he understands the value they have to the university itself. Green benefitted from the tutoring, mentoring and study skills development that he received from Student Support Services as an undergrad at Bowie State. He later served as an administrator of Student Support Services at Bowie as well as at the University of North CarolinaChapel Hill, the University of Central Florida and North Carolina A&T University. At Marquette, Student Support Services is part of the university’s EOP, which also includes Upward Bound, Upward Bound Math & Science, and the Ronald E. McNair Scholars Program. EOP is an academic program that assists low-income and first-generation students whose parents do not have a baccalaureate degree to succeed in higher education. “Marquette is thought of as the premiere EOP program in the country because of the past leadership of Dr. Mitchem and Sande Robinson, and so many notables among its 1,700 alumni,” said Green, director of the EOP as of October. Dr. Arnold Mitchem, Grad ’81, was director of the EOP from 1969 to 1986 and has been a Marquette trustee since 2008. Robinson began
Godsend gadgets
Speech and Hearing Clinic patients benefit from iPads, Kindles Portable high-tech devices like iPads and Kindles are both functional and cool. But can they also be life-changing? Instructors in the College of Health Sciences’ Speech and Hearing Clinic think so, and they’re putting their hypothesis to the test. Katie Brueck and Tina Puglisi-Creegan, clinical instructors of speech pathology and audiology, are using such gadgets as “augmentative and alternative communication systems” with some of their patients. Brueck and Puglisi-Creegan recently purchased a Kindle, an iPad and an iPod Touch to help patients who have decreased or no ability to speak or use language due to certain neurological or behavioral disorders. “We really don’t know how many other clinicians are using iPads or Kindles for this purpose,” Brueck said. “But the use of everyday technology to assist individuals with communication challenges is likely the start of a trend.” According to Puglisi-Creegan, the application of these devices is particularly appealing to many individuals for a variety of reasons. “First, the social stigma attached to using an external communication device is lessened,” she said. “The population as a whole is very used to seeing people using high-tech gadgets, so it doesn’t immediately flag an individual as having a disorder.”
Photo by Dan Johnson
By Christopher Stolarski
Using everyday technologies like iPads as assistive communication devices with patients is cost-effective, according to Katie Brueck, clinical instructor of speech pathology and audiology. They cost approximately $400 to $700, compared with $1,500 to $14,000 for industry standard devices.
Brueck also pointed out that both professionals and non-professionals already have some familiarity with these or similar devices, so training and practical application is generally easier. Puglisi-Creegan is using a Kindle with a male patient in his early 60s who suffered a stroke about 10 years ago — he lost the ability to read and even identify the alphabet. Through therapy with the Speech and Hearing Clinic, he now reads novels. The Kindle allows him to easily download books, and he can quickly use the built-in dictionary and thesaurus to look up words he doesn’t recognize. Brueck’s approach is slightly different. She’s using the iPad with one of her patients, a 31-year-old female who suffered a severe head injury in an automobile accident. While not cognitively impaired, she has significant difficulties with speech and movement. Through a software program available on iTunes, the patient “speaks” through the iPad by pressing preprogrammed or self-created icons on the device’s touch screen. “Our patients find the devices ‘cool’ and easy to use,” Brueck said. “In fact, since we purchased them, we have had at least two inquiries about acquiring more of these devices from individuals who have previously rejected use of other assistive communication tools.”
Comforts of home for homeless kids
Zip car arrives on campus
Photo by Grant Worden
Imagine being a child with no home to call your own and no bed that you know you’ll be tucked into every night. For hundreds of kids in Milwaukee, that is a reality. Project Night Night, a program coordinated by Kathy Hawkins and other Marquette employees, attempts to make those lonely nights at a homeless shelter a little more comfortable. Each night, children staying at three local homeless shelters find a comfort tote waiting for them on their bed, filled with a blanket, a book and a stuffed animal. “The book is for education, the blanket is to keep them warm, and the stuffed animal is the friend they can tell all their troubles to,” said Hawkins, administrative assistant in the
Kathy Hawkins, Kris Weber and Lori Zingsheim assemble comfort totes for homeless children.
Department of Social and Cultural Sciences, who got the idea last year while looking online for a possible service project. “Project Night Night fascinated me, and the closest area that had any shelters participating was Oshkosh. There was nothing in Milwaukee.” So in June Hawkins applied for and received a Simmons grant, a Marquette grant program that finances small projects that deepen the religious nature of Marquette. Then she began to fill room 003 of Marquette Hall with blankets, books and tons of stuffed animals. The funding helps pay for the tote bags, which are purchased through www.projectnightnight.com, as well as supplies to make the blankets, many of which are made by inmates at Taycheedah Correctional Institution. Joy House, Hope House and Cathedral Center all received a supply of the totes in August. A second supply is ready for when the shelters next request them. Hawkins coordinates a small group of volunteers, including Ellen Blonski, administrative assistant at the Faber Center for Ignatian Spirituality; Lori Zingsheim, purchasing assistant; and Kris Weber, administrative assistant in the College of Professional Studies, who help assemble the bags. To contribute to Project Night Night, contact Hawkins at 8-6838. New or gently used children’s books and stuffed animals are accepted, as are new blankets and yarn or fabric to make the blankets. The project also accepts monetary donations.
Photo illustration
By Kate Venne
Marquette’s new partnership with Zipcar, Inc., means you may see these vehicles parked at Zilber Hall or “zipping” around campus. This a lternative transportation option provides cars that can be reserved by the day or hour, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Visit www.zipcar.com/marquette for more information.
Take
On the Side
Fabien Josse – Wine collector By Cortney Krauss
Photo illustration
Dr. Fabien Josse, professor of electrical and computer engineering, may be one of the people on Marquette’s campus to ask for an expert’s perspective about wine. Growing his wine collection for the past 25 years, Josse has pursued some of the world’s best wines throughout the United States and Europe. Sharing his wine-collecting interest with his father, Josse became an avid collector when a close friend, one of the managers of the wine division for a large grocery store in France, invited Josse to join him on a trip to select wines for the store at various chateaux. Twenty-five years later, Josse still travels to France a couple of times a year. Over the years, Josse has also traveled to Spain, Portugal, Italy, Napa Valley and Sonoma, Calif., tasting and collecting wines. “The Bordeaux regions of France are the best in the world for blends made primarily from cabernet sauvignons and merlots; the Rhone region of France produces the best blend of grenache, syrah and mourvedre wines; and the best cabernets in the world are produced in California,” he said. Boasting a wine collection of 700 to 800 bottles, Josse adds to his collection whenever he sees a good bottle or vintage.
Dr. Fabien Josse (above), an avid wine collector, shares his interest in wine with Dr. Stephen Heinrich, professor of civil, construction and environmental engineering, and Dr. Dean Jeutter, professor of biomedical engineering, who are also wine connoisseurs and collectors.
Story idea submitted by Jessica Bulgrin, College of Engineering administrative assistant. “On the Side” offers a glimpse of faculty and staff interests outside of Marquette. E-mail your story suggestions to
[email protected].
5
The five busiest months for phone and e-mail traffic in Marquette Central since it opened in November 2009, according to Marquette Central, were: 1) August: 5,969 calls + 1,307 e-mails = 7,276 2) January: 4,879 calls + 969 e-mails = 5,848 3) July:
3,939 calls + 849 e-mails = 4,788
4) April:
3,946 calls + 825 e-mails = 4,771
5) March: 3,353 calls + 656 e-mails = 4,009 “Take Five” is a brief list concerning an interesting aspect of Marquette life. E-mail your list suggestions to
[email protected]. Marquette Matters is published monthly, except June, July and August and a combined issue for December/January, for Marquette University’s faculty and staff. Submit information to: Marquette Matters – Zilber Hall, 235; Phone: 8-7448; Fax: 8-7197 E-mail:
[email protected] Editor: Tim Olsen Graphic design: Nick Schroeder Copyright © 2010 Marquette University
Marquette Matters
England and China await two Fulbright scholars By Tim Olsen
Dr. Kristen Haglund, associate professor of nursing.
Adolescents and Young Adults.” She will study the behaviors of youths age 14 to 21 to understand their “trajectory” of alcohol use and sexual involvement from early adolescence to young adulthood. Sexual contact while under the influence of alcohol increases the risk of violence, unplanned pregnancy and contracting sexually transmitted infections, according to Haglund. “However, there are few qualitative studies that have examined the contexts within which alcohol use and sexual behaviors occur among adolescents and young adults,” she said. “It may be that contextual reasons for alcohol use and sexual involvement are so compelling that without attention to them, interventions may not be successful.” Haglund, who returns to the United States in July 2011, expects her Fulbright experience to benefit her teaching, research and practice. “I look forward to sharing what I have learned with the Marquette community, and I want to help spread the word that there are Fulbright opportunities for students,” she said. Sorby, too, expects her experience in China to have broad applications when she returns in June 2011. “We have a rich tradition of humanities research at Marquette and at other Jesuit colleges,” she said. “I’m proud to do my part in keeping it alive and sharing its value with others. China is beginning to see the role that the liberal arts can play in promoting innovative and critical thinking.” Sorby, associate professor of English, will teach two English literature courses in the English Department of Xiamen University in Fujian Province, China — “History of American Poetry” and “Fiction(s) of American Culture.” Her premise is that the body of classic American liter-
ature is under constant revision by readers and that the field of literature is moving away from a nationalist approach to one that addresses how readers and cultures connect across borders. She hopes to help her Chinese students feel empowered to interpret literature in a variety of ways, rather than seeking the one ‘correct’ answer. “The American canon is not fixed or dead; rather, it is an ongoing, living narrative that is constantly being revised and reinterpreted by its readers,” said Sorby.
Photo by Dan Johnson
Photo by Dan Johnson
With the 75th and 76th Fulbright U.S. Scholar awards accepted by Marquette faculty members, Drs. Kristin Haglund and Angela Sorby will leave in January for England and China, respectively, for spring semester. Haglund, associate professor of nursing, will travel to The School of Nursing and Midwifery at the University of Sheffield, United Kingdom, to lecture and conduct research for her project, “The Social and Cultural Contexts of Alcohol Use and Subsequent Sexual Involvement among
Dr. Angela Sorby, associate professor of English.
Disability services grant students can qualify for services as a student with a disability.” Not every student with a disability will register with the office. Unlike high school, where services are provided automatically, FERPA and disability laws require college students to self-identify and request assistance. This can be a difficult process for students who are accustomed to others advocating for them. “As minors, parents are a student’s primary advo-
c o n t i n u e d f r o m pa g e o n e
cate, along with school counselors,” said Vering, emphasizing that college students must learn to be their own advocates. Of the approximately 300 students with disabilities registered with Disability Services, about 200 of them use services or programs offered through the office, up from the 117 students who sought services in 2007. The grant provides for three new staff members to support the program — a full-time
counselor, a full-time project assistant and a part-time records manager — and an existing financial aid liaison position. Program staff will collaborate with service providers across campus, including admissions offices, Educational Opportunity Program, Career Services Center, and the offices of Student Educational Services and Student Financial Aid, to meet the needs of program participants.
M A R Q U ET T E H ap p enings Baccalaureate Mass and Mid-Year Commencement are Dec. 18 and 19 Marquette’s Mid-Year Commencement will take place Sunday, Dec. 19, at 9:30 a.m. at the U.S. Cellular Arena. The program will include individual recognition of the candidates and remarks by Marquette President Robert A. Wild, S.J.; Dr. Joseph Daniels, professor of economics; and a student speaker. The Baccalaureate Mass will be Saturday, Dec. 18, at 7:30 p.m. at Church of the Gesu, celebrated by Father Wild. He will be joined by members of the Marquette Jesuit community and diocesan priests.
Business Plan Competition accepting entries The Kohler Center for Entrepreneurship is accepting submissions for its 2011 Business Plan Competition. The application, which requires completing an entry form and answering three questions, is due Monday, Jan. 10, 2011. Applications received by Monday, Dec. 6, 2010, are free. Cost for those applying after Dec. 6 is $50. At least one member of a team must be a Marquette student, faculty or staff member or an alumnus/a. For more information visit www.marquette2010.istart.org/.
Book by Father Kurz has sold 1 million copies The Acts of the Apostles (Liturgical Press, 1983, 1989), by Rev. William Kurz, S.J., professor of theology, has now sold more than 1 million copies. The book, which has been published in Italian, Hungarian and Spanish, is one of six books on the New Testament that Father Kurz has written. This commentary on Acts is part of the Collegeville Bible Commentary Series and has been frequently used for Catholic Bible study groups.
Cancer pain at the end of life is subject of Wake Lecture Dr. Judith Paice will present “The War on Cancer Pain — Making a Difference at the End of Life” for the James J. Wake Memorial Lecture on Tuesday, Dec. 7, at 5:30 p.m. in Clark 111. Paice is director of the Cancer Pain Program in the Division of Hematology/Oncology and a research professor of medicine at Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine. Much of her clinical work has been in the relief of pain associated with cancer and HIV disease. Her research interests include adverse effects associated with pain medications and quality improvement measures to foster pain relief.
