Jim Browne, Roger Hunt, Bruce Bergethon, Kathy Bohn, and Chuck Witte

Members of the College of Arts and Sciences Community Advisory Board toured the College on July 16 as part of a program to familiarize the Board with the excellent work being done by College faculty and staff. Their visit included the Eckelmann-Taylor Speech and Hearing Clinic, the Certified Apple Computer Training Center, teaching and research science laboratories, the planetarium, and WGLT radio station. “What a fabulous tour!” said Dr. Kathy Bohn, who serves as Chair of the Board. Board member retired Judge Chuck Witte added, “From the Speech and Hearing clinic, which is a life-saver for so many children in central Illinois, to the only certified Apple Computer Training Center in Illinois, where we observed cabinet ministers from all over Africa taking a class using their French language, the College is quite impressive.” Click Read More for more photos.

Charlie Schlenker

Charlie Schlenker, WGLT Assistant News Director, is the winner of a 2008 Edward R. Murrow Award from the Radio and Television News Directors Association (RTNDA) in the small market radio division for Writing. The honor was the only one awarded this year in the state of Illinois for radio or television in any size market. This is Schlenker's third Murrow award in four years. His previous national awards were awarded in 2005 and 2006. “Charlie continues to raise the bar for excellence in broadcast journalism. We know the quality reporting he and his colleagues, Willis Kern and Jim Brown, provide central Illinois listeners on a daily basis,” said General Manager Bruce Bergethon. “We're proud that Charlie's outstanding work has received national recognition as well.”  Willis Kern, WGLT News Director, added, “In Charlie, GLT listeners have solid, dependable competence they get to appreciate every day. He has the uncanny ability to capture both the big picture and the subtle nuances of a story and deliver them in a way that takes advantage of radio's capacity to connect with individuals.” 

Joseph Smaldino

Dr. Joseph Smaldino, Chair of the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders, will serve as the new editor of the Volta Review, a major journal in the field that encompasses speech, hearing, and deaf education. Smaldino was appointed to a three-year term after a national search by the Alexander Graham Bell Association for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing, which sponsors the premier research publication. “I congratulate Professor Smaldino on his appointment as editor of this important journal,” said Dean Olson. “He joins a group of distinguished professors across the College who are serving as editors of the most respected journals in their fields.”  For more information about faculty who are currently serving as journal editors, visit http://www.cas.ilstu.edu/faculty/publications/journals.shtml

Education and the Cold War: The Battle for the American School

Andrew Hartman, Assistant Professor of History, recently published Education and the Cold War: The Battle for the American School (Palgrave Macmillan). The book offers a fresh perspective on the postwar transformation in United States political culture by examining the educational history of that era. Hartman notes that shortly after the Russians launched Sputnik in 1957, Hannah Arendt quipped that “only in America could a crisis in education actually become a factor in politics.” The Cold War battle for the American school—dramatized but not initiated by Sputnik—proved Arendt correct. The schools served as a battleground in the ideological conflicts of the 1950s. “In contemporary American culture, the conservative '1950s' have become something of a cliché,” said Jonathan Zimmerman, Professor of Education and History at New York University. “Hartman's smart book gives new historical substance to the term, showing us how—and why—our schools turned Right during the Cold War. Even better, he makes us question whether the schools ever really turned back.”

Maria Henneberry

School of Communication lecturer and alumna Maria Henneberry is the winner of the Association for Women in Communications (AWC) 2008 Headliner Award. The award, which recognizes an AWC member who demonstrates national accomplishments as well as consistent communications excellence, will be presented during the 2008 AWC National Conference on September 26 in Washington, D.C. Henneberry, a member of the Bloomington-Normal chapter, was nominated by Past-President Martha Phares and President Jamie Leffelman. “We wanted to recognize Maria's accomplishments and to show that Central Illinois communicators are world class,” said Phares.

Keith Kattner

Prominent neurosurgeon and College of Arts and Sciences Community Advisory Board member Keith Kattner fulfilled his long-held dream on July 27 when he gave a presentation at the formal opening at BroMenn Hospital of an exhibit of his recent paintings. As an undergraduate at ISU, Kattner was torn between pursuing a degree in biology and a career in his first love: painting. When his art professors were less than enthusiastic about Kattner’s initial attempts at artistic creation, he decided that the prudent course of action was to major in biology. Kattner went on to become one of Bloomington/Normal’s most accomplished neurosurgeons, having performed over 6,000 brain and spine surgeries, but he refused to abandoned his love of art, often traveling around the world to art museums and spending his evenings systematically teaching himself how to paint. His dream came to fruition this summer with the opening of his exhibit, “Art in the Atrium,” a collection of his expressionist oil paintings, many of which are scenes depicting life in BroMenn Hospital. “Although I received very little formal training in art, it has been a constant presence since my early childhood,” said Kattner. “My goal is . . . to express my own experiences through my art.” Click Read More for more photos.