Alumni, Faculty, Students, and Staff Briefs

After a year-long search, the UCI Claire Trevor School of the Arts has named CUNY SPS MA in Applied Theatre (MAAT) alum ARIYAN JOHNSON to its Department of Dance faculty. Johnson specializes in storytelling and creating strong female perspectives using hip hop styles, jazz, and Afro-fusion modern dance. Her hiring demonstrates UCI’s commitment to expand its current offerings in dances rooted in the African diaspora.

Women’s Project Theater has selected B.J EVANS as a producer in its 2020-22 Theater Lab. An ‘18 graduate of the CUNY SPS MA in Applied Theatre (MAAT) program, Evans joins WPT artist-scholars as they create bold new works for the stage as well as contribute to the development of plays to be presented at the biennial Pipeline Festival.

The highly competitive two-year residency has launched the careers of over 350 theatre artists since its founding in 1983.

“Inclusion in the Workplace: Are We Doing Enough?”, an article written by EBONYE GUSSINE WILKINS (MA in Business Management & Leadership ’11), was featured as one of the 5 Top Intriguing Cutter Business Technology Journal Articles for 2020.

Alexis Jemal (’21), Brennan O’Rourke (’21), Jenny Hipscher (’21), and Tabatha Lopez (’21) published essays in ArtsPraxis, NYU’s educational theatre journal. The pieces “Pandemic Lessons” (Jemal and O’Rourke) and “Theatre for Liberating Social Work Education” (Hipscher

and Lopez) drew on work that was undertaken during their MAAT course studies.

The journal Pedagogy and Theatre of the Oppressed published the essays “Joker’s Log 2020: An Odyssey,” by Julian Pimiento (‘19), and “Don’t Poke the Bear - A Project Report” by Grace Cannon (‘19) and Nicole Kontolefa (‘19). These essays were the result of an MAAT independent study that took place in collaboration with Ashleigh Bragg (‘19) and Elise Goldin (‘20).

Adeola Adegbola, assistant director of the MAAT program, congratulated the alumni. “We are all so proud of our graduates’ contributions to the larger field of Applied Theatre. They continue to use Applied Theatre tools to incite positive change in their respective communities.”

PIPER ANDERSON, CUNY SPS MA in Applied Theatre alum (’11) and current faculty member, was invited by the arts organization The Laundromat Project to be their inaugural Radical Imagination Fellow, a year-long post supported by The David Rockefeller Fund. In this role, Anderson will engage LP leadership and community members as they deepen their understanding of abolition, healing justice, public memory, and the Black radical imagination. “I’m thrilled to be exploring strategies for increased critical thinking, liberation, and healing justice with The Laundromat Project,” said Anderson.

AMY S. GREEN, associate professor in the MA in Applied Theatre (MAAT) and Interdisciplinary Studies program at John Jay College, published an essay in the journal Critical Stages/Scènes Critiques entitled “What Is This Thing, Drama? Plays for Dialogue in a Rwandan College Setting.” In it, Green documents the work of American faculty and graduate students at the University of Rwanda College as they participated in the training of the country’s first group of secondary-school drama teachers during a series of summer residencies that took place between 2010-2017.

CHLOË BASS, artist and faculty member in the CUNY SPS MA in Museum Studies program, was named a member of the 2020-22 Andrew W. Mellon Seminar on Public Engagement and Collaborative Research cohort. As a seminar participant, she will work with other artist-scholars to develop public humanities projects driven by social justice goals. Bass’s work is also featured this year in shows at the Queens Museum, Pulitzer Arts Foundation, and the Brooklyn Public Library.

CLIFFORD D. CONNER, a historian of science who teaches at CUNY SPS and the Graduate Center, discussed his latest book The Tragedy of American Science: From Truman to Trump in an interview in September 2020 with journalist Sonali Kolhatkar. This interview was broadcast on Rising Up with Sonali, a women-run radio and television show that brings progressive news coverage rooted in gender and racial justice to a wider audience.

DEBRA SCHALLER- DEMERS, a lecturer in the MS in Research Administration and Compliance program, is the 2021 recipient of the CUNY SPS Adjunct Faculty Teaching Excellence Award. The award, a student-driven initiative begun in 2019 to recognize outstanding faculty, includes a $1000 prize.

DR JAMES W. BROWN, a science educator and adjunct faculty member in the School’s health information management programs, has been granted a joint legislative resolution from the New

Jersey Senate and General Assembly honoring him for his work helping many colleges and universities place their courses online during the COVID-19 pandemic. The resolution showcases Dr. Brown’s long career in public health and science education and recognizes him as a pioneer in online learning.

ELLEN KARL, academic director of the CUNY SPS Health Information Management and Health Services Administration programs, published the article “Education: Where Does It Get Us?” in the Journal of AHIMA (American Health Information Management Association). In it, she emphasizes the role of graduate education in the furthering of careers within the health care information arena.

DR. ELIZABETH ALSOP academic director of the Communication and Media program at CUNY SPS, published three pieces throughout the 2020-21 academic year, each focusing on cultural and social representations and trends in television.

Dr. Alsop’s January 2020 video essay “The Television Will Not Be Summarized,” which was published in the Journal of Videographic Film & Moving Image Studies and later reviewed by in[Transition], “explores this recent (re)turn to ‘televisual excess’ in post-network television shows” including Twin Peaks: The Return, The Leftovers, The Knick, Hannibal, and Enlightened.

In August 2020, Dr. Alsop published the essay “All Together Now” in Film Quarterly. This piece explores the representations of community and solidarity in recent television programming, especially in the COVID era.

Dr. Alsop also contributed to the 2021 anthology After Happily Ever After: Romantic Comedy in a Post-Romantic Age, which examines the reinvention of the romantic comedy in the 21st century. Her chapter, “The Radical Middle: Jane the Virgin, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, and the Subversive Potential of the TV Post-Romcom,” focuses specifically on the way TV shows like Jane the Virgin and Crazy Ex-Girlfriend use their serial format to reshape the genre. As Dr. Alsop explains, the chapter explores how “… television’s serial structure allows it to transform the genre in new and surprising ways—for instance, by continually deferring the expected ‘happy ending.’”

JENNIFER SPARROW, associate dean of academic affairs at CUNY SPS, has been appointed to the Board of Directors of the Workforce Professionals Training Institute (WPTI), the leading provider of support to New York City’s workforce development organizations and practitioners whose collective goal is to generate pathways out of poverty through employment. She joins CUNY SPS Foundation Board Chair Blake Foote and Jill Hyland, former executive director of PEWL, who also serve on the WPTI board.

LINDA PARADISO, an assistant professor at CUNY SPS who teaches in the nursing programs, co-published an article in My American Nurse examining the initial response by media, government officials, and hospital administrators to COVID-19. The piece “What Do We Learn When the Unknown Suddenly Appears?” comments on medical staffing shortages, limitations of resources, containment plans, and other relevant issues of the pandemic, from a public health nursing perspective.

MIA NAGAWIECKI, faculty member in the CUNY SPS Museum Studies program and VP for education at the New-York Historical Society, has been named to Crain’s 2021 40 Under Forty list. The annual list recognizes New York’s most accomplished young business professionals.

Georgetta Dennis Jill Francisco and Jill Francisco, graduate students in the MS in Research Administration and Compliance program during the 2020-21 academic year, joined RAC faculty member James Casey in coauthoring the article “What Impact Will the Pandemic Have on Research Administration?” in the August 2020 issue of NCURA Magazine.

The article was born out of a discussion board thread Professor Casey used as a forum for his Introduction to Financial Research Administration (RAC 600) course, which addressed in real time the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on the field and practice of research administration.

“With the discussion thread, I wanted students to share their work experiences during the pandemic— and how the practice of research administration has changed in their perspectives,” said Professor Casey.

“…Their responses highlighted the fact that research administration is as much about professional relationships as it is about knowledge and technology. That’s not a new idea, but it is new while many people are working at home.”

Both Dennis and Francisco are veteran RAC professionals working at academic research institutions— Dennis is at Auburn University, while Francisco is at the University of South Carolina—who enrolled in the RAC program to boost their skills and expertise. Taking Professor Casey’s class against the backdrop of COVID-19 proved to be extremely timely, as they were able to process the ramifications of the pandemic in their own workplaces and exchange insights and ideas with other graduate students.

“The wide range of involvement of the students enrolled in RAC 600 that semester and the sheer unknown of how COVID is impacting not only our positions but research in general led to some very lively

realizations of how adaptable we are in our daily work settings,” observed Dennis. “The entire class contributed to the discussion board and thankfully I was able to pick up some great tips.”

Because of the relevance of the discussion in the class, Professor Casey proposed to develop it as an article for the National Council of University Research Administrators (NCURA) magazine. The concept was readily accepted, and Dennis and Francisco jumped at the chance to help write it when Casey put out the call for coauthors.

The resulting article emphasizes the importance of collaboration and staying connected that is the hallmark of a CUNY SPS education. Francisco reflected, “As an NCURA member and active research administrator, I took this as a great opportunity to contribute to my field….Many of the impacts our article highlighted seem to be coming to fruition.”

CHRISTIAN THIEME, a student in the CUNY SPS Data Science program, published “Understanding Linear Regression Output in R” on the website towardsdatascience.com, which provides a forum for sharing concepts and ideas in the field of data science.

MARCI LITTLEFIELD, a CUNY SPS MA in Museum Studies student and faculty member at the Borough of Manhattan Community College, has been named one of the 2021 Andrew W. Mellon Foundation/The American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS) Community College Faculty Fellows. Professor Littlefield was awarded this honor for her book project Reconstructed Legacies: Black People, Freedom, and the United Kingdom, which challenges the national narrative of servitude in the UK. Fellows receive up to $40,000 in recognition of their vital contributions to scholarship and teaching within their communities.

NIA WILLIAMS, a rehabilitation professional and student in the CUNY SPS MS in Disability Studies program, was awarded the 2020 Marge A. Tierney Memorial Scholarship by the New York State Board of Regents. “We are so proud to learn that Nia received this accolade in recognition of her years of clinical rehabilitation work,” said Dr. Mariette Bates, academic director of the CUNY SPS disability studies programs.

In an effort to assist students experiencing food insecurity, the School launched a virtual Food Access Initiative (FAI) in Spring 2021. The program was spearheaded by Jennifer Grace Lee, associate dean for enrollment management and student services at CUNY SPS, and funded with the generosity of the Carroll and Milton Petrie Foundation and the CUNY SPS Student Association.

The FAI seeks to lessen the burden students may be experiencing by providing eligible enrolled students with $50 micro-grants that they can use to purchase groceries. Initial grants to students are being distributed as an e-grocery card.

“With the pandemic, we know that many students are struggling even more with food insecurity, and CUNY SPS eagerly wants to help,” said Lee. “We encourage all students who may be in need to reach out and apply for these micro-grants.”

Helping our students succeed is the number one priority for the faculty, staff, and administrators at the CUNY SPS, though many of them often do this work behind the scenes.

As part of a growing School-wide effort to use data and systems to help drive student success, Enrollment Systems Specialist Cindy Lin quietly champions CUNY SPS students through her innovative use of data. In her enrollment management role at the Office of Admissions, Lin compiles data from systems like Blackboard, DegreeWorks, EAB Navigate, and CUNYfirst, and then works with the School’s advisement, academic departments, and other enrollment management units to generate reports that help identify—and then meet—student needs.

One of the reports Lin has pioneered is focused on electives not allowed. For this, Lin generates a list that identifies students who are registered for courses that do not meet their degree requirements. She then passes this on to the School’s advisors, who reach out to the students to instruct them to drop or swap out the course for one applicable to their degree. “This is quite simple, but the impact is pretty powerful because you can actually tie the dollar amount that student saves by not paying for a class they don’t need to that report,” explained Lin.

Lin also develops reports that help students cross the finish line to their degree. In one example, Lin routinely pulls data to determine which students may have only 1-3 classes remaining before graduation, and works closely with advisement to encourage them to register for either the winter or summer session so that they may complete their credit requirements sooner.

Other reports Lin compiles assist with needs related to course planning or financial assistance. Each semester, Lin generates a list of all students who will be eligible to register for a capstone project class to help various academic programs plan how many of these courses to offer. Lin also provides lists of

students who may be eligible for scholarship opportunities to the Office of Scholarships, which then reaches out to those students directly to encourage them to apply.

For Lin, her work is part of a larger culture of support at CUNY SPS. “It’s a collaboration between the data we have and the offices who have the relationships with our students and can act on it,” said Lin. “I use the tools available to provide these teams with whatever they need that may be helpful. In this way, I see my role here as fulfilling wishes.”