CUNY BA considered “Best College” for the DIY Learner!

The DIY (Do It Yourself) learner is best served by individualized, self-designed academic programs and CUNY Baccalaureate has been considered among the best of these by “thebestcolleges.org.”

In fact, CUNY Baccalaureate stands at the top of the list among NYU, Hamilton and Swarthmore Colleges, the University of Minnesota, and Lesley and Indiana Universities!

Read more at: http://www.thebestcolleges.org/the-best-colleges-for-the-diy-learner/

Congratulations to Professor Kawashima!

Kim J. Hartswick and Sue Kawashima at the Consulate General of Japan

Sue Atsuko Kawashima was honored last night (April 15, 2013) by Ambassador Shigeyuki Hiroki, Consul General of Japan in New York, with the Consul General’s Commendation for 2013.
I had the honor of attending the ceremony and reception and to meeting for the first time Professor Kawashima, who has been a CUNY Baccalaureate faculty mentor for a number of students pursuing degrees in Japanese Culture and Language.
Professor Kawashima has been teaching Japanese at Hunter College since 1988 and is the founder of the Japanese Program. Returning to college at the age of 47, Sue earned her BA and MA and is a PhD candidate in Western and Japanese Art History at Columbia University.
Her publications include A Dictionary of Japanese Particles published by Kodan-sha International and Oxford University Press (1999), which enjoys the reputation as one of the “Best Five” Japanese language textbooks in Japan; A Doctor in Your Pocket: Basic Medical Terms in English and Japanese co-authored by John J. Olichney, MD published by 3A Corporation (2000); Medical Communication in English and Japanese published by Nitto Sho-in (2002); and A Girl’s Record, Around That Time-1935-8/15/1945 and 9/11/2001 published by Kodan-sha (2006), which is a World War II memoir based on her real-life experiences. She has given lectures on world peace at Lehman College in NY, Hiroshima, Tokyo, and various other cities throughout Japan.

Invitation to Visit Solar Boat and Plane!

The SolarDeepWater Project is the world’s largest solar-powered vessel. Currently on its second world tour, it is expected to arrive in New York City in the first week of June (dates to be determined) and educational visits with crew members are planned.

The SolarImpulse is the first plane in history to fly both night and day exclusively on solar power. It will be at New York’s JFK airport in mid-July (dates to be confirmed) and educational visits are also planned.

If you are interested in seeing either the boat or the plane, please contact:

Alison Kling
NYC Solar Coordinator | Sustainable CUNY
255 Greenwich Street, 5th floor | NYC | 10007
212-346-8581 | alison.kling@mail.cuny.edu

www.nycsolarmap.com

Congratulations to Mentor, Sandra Clarkson!

Sandra Clarkson, Professor of Mathematics and Statistic, Hunter College, is a CUNY Baccalaureate faculty mentor, who has received, with her colleague, William H. (Bill) Williams, the 2012 Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Mathematics Education for their long-term collaborative effort, innovation, and emphasis on evidence-based instruction at Hunter College.

The award was given to Clarkson and Williams in recognition of their exemplary work in overhauling Hunter College’s Elementary Probability and Statistics course (STAT 113). The course is taken not only by Hunter’s mathematics majors, but also by majors in other programs—among them nursing, psychology, adolescent education, and geographic information systems—and in Spring 2012 drew over 650 students, a typical enrollment total for the course.

Previously taught using traditional methods (e.g. classroom lectures, chalkboards), Clarkson and Williams’ redesigned STAT 113 course makes use of ActivStats, an innovative, multimedia DVD-ROM and software platform for teaching introductory statistics. STAT 113 students at Hunter now find their course material and sample data online; they learn by working interactively with the instructor and the software. The course curriculum is also now standardized across the many sections of the course (in Spring 2012 there were 29 sections of STAT 113). Clarkson and Williams have implemented a training program for all STAT 113 instructors, and have also undertaken rigorous assessment of the course.

CUNY Baccalaureate salutes Professor Clarkson and Williams for their pedagogical innovations and for this recognition by the Chancellor!

Faculty Mentor, Don Waisanen

Congratulations to faculty mentor Don Waisanen, Assistant Professor, Communication, Baruch College, School of Public Affairs, who was invited to be the keynote speaker at the 26th Annual David C. Bicker Communication Ethics Conference on February 7, 2013 in Azusa, California. The speech was called, “Time to Move Beyond ‘Civility’?: What the President, the Media, and the Rest of Us Should Do with a Second Term.”

He also has two journal articles coming out this year:

(Trans)national Advocacy in the Ousting of Milošević: The Otpor Movement’s Glocal Recursions. Communication Studies.

Hermeneutic Range in Church-State Deliberation: Cross Meanings in the Los Angeles County Seal Controversy. Western Journal of Communication.

And one book chapter that will be published soon:

An Alternative Sense of Humor: The Problems with Crossing Comedy and Politics in Public Discourse. In C. Rountree (Ed.), Venomous Speech and other Problems in American Political Discourse. New York, NY: Praegar.

Fashion Symposium!

FASHION, HACKED: LIBERATION THROUGH PARTICIPATION

MA Program in Liberal Studies
Co-sponsored by the Center for the Humanities, Women’s Studies Certificate Program, and the Italian Trade Commission’s Fashion of the Vine Project

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 28TH, 2013 ⋅ 5:30 PM ⋅ ROOMS 9206-07
How is our clothing a purveyor of our political ideologies and related social values? Fashion is embedded in global and local markets and implicated in cultural change, sexual codes, and social progress. As the fashion industry takes account of these issues, in what ways might it respond? How, for instance, might new technologies in the fashion industry improve the industry’s environmental impact? Join panelists from a variety of disciplines as they discuss the ways that fashion influences the global economy and expresses political, religious and ethical choices.
Reception to Follow. Please RSVP:
fashionhacked.eventbrite.com
Speakers:
Susan Buck-Morss (The Graduate Center, CUNY)
Hazel Clark (Parsons The New School for Design)
Jessamyn Hatcher (New York University)
Kyoo Lee (John Jay, CUNY)
Sarah Scaturro (Metropolitan Museum of Art)
Elizabeth Wissinger (BMCC, CUNY)
Moderator:
Eugenia Paulicelli (The Graduate Center, CUNY)

Digital Marketing Communications Internship!

INTERNSHIP/JOB INFORMATION

Employer Information
Company/Organization Name*: T. Schreiber Studio and Theatre
Company Description: Established Acting School and Theatre (43rd year)
Address*:151 West 26th Street, 7th Floor
Website*:www.tschreiber.org
Company Contact Name*:Sally Dunn
Title: Managing Director
Email*:sally@tschreiber.org
Phone:212-741-0209

Position Information
Position Title: Digital Marketing Communications Intern

Position Description*: T Schreiber Studio is hiring an intern to help manage the execution of TSS’s full online marketing strategy. This is an opportunity to help the full digital marketing effort for one of the most recognized acting conservatories in New York City. A great opportunity for someone with a working knowledge of how to manage Facebook Pages, Google+ Pages, Twitter and Blogging.

Duties include posting pre-approved content, moderating for inappropriate comments, responding to questions/comments/replies across our social properties and helping us learn from the feedback we receive so we can improve our digital marketing efforts. Candidate should have a working knowledge of posting content (text, photos, video) to Facebook, Google+ and Twitter.

Perfect for students or anyone looking to further develop their media skills. An awareness of Google Analytics/Google Adwords/Facebook Ads/Wordpress/Hootsuite is helpful, but not required.
Duties:Post pre-approved content and monitor TSS’s presence on all social media and digital properties including Facebook, Google+, Twitter and our blog(s);
• Monitor, research and report on advancements in social media/digital and how they might contribute to TSS’s presence;
• Provide regular reports on our digital properties (Facebook, Google+, Twitter, Google Analytics) to help our team determine what’s working and what’s not;
• Generate ideas for TSS to further its work in the field of digital media;
• Provide general administrative support
Qualifications for Applicant:
Knowledge:
Required: Familiarity with social media outlets (Facebook, Twitter, Google+, etc), through previous internship or maintenance of personal profiles. Knowledge of how a blog works, great writing skills, an imagination, an eagerness to learn, dependable work ethic. Must possess a basic understanding of Microsoft Office, especially Word & Excel.

Approximate hours per week: 15-20
Salary Level: none

Semester offered or duration of internship (Fall, Spring, or Summer)*: Fall/Spring and Summer
Desired Class Level (Freshman, Sophomore, Junior, Senior, or Grad Student): no preference
Is this internship for credit? (Y/N or Optional)*: Optional
Travel Stipend Offered? (Y/N): Y

Christa Salamandra, Faculty Mentor!

Christa Salamandra (right). Anny Bakalian (left), Associate Director of the Middle East and Middle Eastern American Center (MEMEAC) and the Master’s program in Middle Eastern Studies at the Graduate Center, City University of New York (CUNY).

Christa Salamandra, a faculty mentor for Devon Clark’s concentration in “Social Problems and Solutions,” is a Syrian media specialist and Associate Professor of Anthropology at Lehman College and the Graduate Center, City University of New York. She received a Ph.D. from the Institute of Social and Cultural Anthropology, University of Oxford, where she also served as Postdoctoral Research Associate. She has been a Visiting Lecturer in the Department of Anthropology, The School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, a Fulbright Scholar and Visiting Professor at Lebanese American University in Beirut, and a Visiting Fellow at the New Islamic Public Sphere Programme, University of Copenhagen.

Among her most recent academic accomplishments are:

“Syrian Television Drama: A National Industry in a in a Pan-Arab Mediascape.” In Tourya Guaaybess, ed., National Broadcasting Policy in Arab Countries. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013.

“The New Old City: Nostalgia, Representation and Gentrification in Historic Damascus.” In Vinayak Bharne, ed., The Emerging Asian City: Concomitant Urbanities & Urbanisms. London: Routledge, 2013.

College Completion Must Be Our Priority

Following a mandate from President Obama for the U.S. to have the highest proportion of college credentials by 2020, the National Commission on Higher Education Attainment, an 18-member panel from the nation’s six leading higher-education associations, released today an open letter to colleges and universities subtitled “College Completion Must Be Our Priority.”

Anyone in higher education understands that we are in a different academic world where the “traditonal” 18- to 21-year old residential student is no longer the majority. The present, typical student is older, has tranferred with credits from at least one college (the majority of all undergraduates have attended at least two or more colleges), and likely is part-time. The academic needs of these students must be recognized as distinctively different from “traditional” 18-year-old freshmen entering college directly from high schools. Many have jobs, family commitments, and personal economic challenges that impact their college choices, enrollment in courses offered during working hours, financial aid eligibility and time to graduation. As a result it is no longer sensible to rely on 4-year completion rates to measure success when the majority of students are part-time and therefore cannot earn a degree within a 4-year period. The important statistic is not how long it takes a student to earn a degree but that a degree has been earned – even if it takes 6 or 8 years.

The commission report urges colleges and universities to offer credit through: examination, such as the College Board’s College-Level Examinaion Program (CLEP); portfolio assessment (Prior-Learning or Life-Experience); and other college equivalency evaluations. It also suggests flexibility in course offerings (on-line; independent studies; internships) and easier transfer of credits.

CUNY Baccalaureate for Unique and Interdisiplinary Studies has been fuflfilling the commission’s recommendations for decades. It offers flexibility in credit transfer, non-classroom credits (CLEP; Life Experience Portfolios; Military Credits); internships, independent study, academic fellowships for both full and part-time students and personal advising by a professional staff and faculty mentoring of individualized majors resulting in consistent graduation rates of 75%, with the majority graduating with academic honors and continuing to graduate programs.

Although our graduation rate far exceeds the norm it is still only a “C” grade. We should not be satisfied with simply an average grade but must continue to do everything we can to retain even more students to earn their degrees. We at CUNY BA will not be satisfied until we are approaching a 100-percent graduation rate, whether it takes 2 or 20 semesters.

Graduate Course for CUNY BA Students!

An exciting graduate course is being offered in Spring 2013 on Monday evenings that is open to qualified CUNY BA students! It is a great opportunity to work with other students, learn more about the whole of CUNY and get valuable research experience
The course is being offered by Prof. Juan Battle <jbattle@gc.cuny.edu>  and Prof. Bill Kornblum <wkornblum@gc.cuny.edu>  (both in Sociology). if you want more information, feel free to reach out to them directly.

CUNY as a Laboratory – SOC 81200 GC2 – CRN: 20350

Course Description – All students will work on a semester-long group project conducting quantitative (survey) and qualitative (one-on-one interviews, focus groups, and ethnography) research on a CUNY-wide study of undergraduates. Students will receive experience in all phases of empirical research, from conceptualization to analysis and all points in between. This course is appropriate for students in the traditional social sciences (e.g. sociology, anthropology, psychology, urban education, and history) as well as more contemporary ones (e.g., gender studies, race studies, American studies, cultural studies, lesbian and gay studies).