Earth Day is this week! What a great week for CNAS – Undergraduate Research Day, the all-college picnic and MSU Graduate College IDF!  I hope to see you at all events.

• Thursday, Apr 21 – Undergraduate Research Day begins at 2:00 PM in the PSU Ballroom.  Please encourage students from all of your classes to view the posters from 2-4 PM. Awards Ceremony starts at 4:00 PM.
• Friday, April 22 – Ecopalooza
• Friday, Apr 22 – All-CNAS Picnic is from 5p-8p!  (set up at 4p) – See attached flyer!!!  The weather is going to be great!  Let’s enjoy!
• Friday, Apr 22 – Earth Day documentary screening of Racing Extinction at the Betty and Bobby Allison Recreation Fields, 8:00 PM, free to the public and free popcorn!
• Saturday, Apr 23 – Graduate College IDF

• May 4       All Faculty Recognition Reception at 3:00 PM in PSU Ballroom
• May 13      Commencement – CNAS at 10:00 AM

FACULTY HIGHLIGHTS

Give yourself a pat on the back.  Proposal submissions are up significantly and CNAS faculty have been a big part of that!  Even funding levels are up for the year!  Thank you, thank you, thank you!  I know that you can only get external funding if you submit grant proposals.  You are doing great! (See attachment “Research Report” for details)

• Jason Ray and Diane May – Congratulations on your contract with APA Missouri for administration!
• Jennifer Pursley, Kimberly Van Ornum, Patti Blanton, and Jokima Hiller – Congratulations on receiving a Certified Distance Educator Award for 2015!
• Ron Malega (Geography) partners with Criminology on research: Using arrest data to strengthen public safety

Inorganic Chemistry Meeting

Nick Gerasimchuk organized the Midwest Inorganic Chemistry group meeting in March.  There were representatives from 5 states, 7 speakers total, and 3 posters. Schools – both Ph.D. and non-Ph.D.

Thank you, Nick for hosting this meeting at Missouri State University.  Tammy

Retirement Party

Come celebrate the career of Bill Agee, Electronic Support Specialist, on Friday, April 29 from 2:00-3:30 PM in Temple Hall 156.

CNAS HIRING UPDATE – 2016

• GGP – Matt McKay, PhD West Virginia University (2015) will be joining us in August 2016.
• CSC – Tony Clark, PhD Michigan State University (2016) will be joining us in August 2016.
• BIO – Debra Finn, PhD Colorado State University (2006) will be joining us in January 2017.
• ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING– Tayo Deborah Obafemi-Ajayi, PhD Illinois Institute of Technology (2010) will be joining us in July of 2016
• BIO – LaToya Kisoon-Charles, PhD North Dakota State University (2012) will be joining us in August of 2016.
• PAMS – Evan Frodermann, PhD The Ohio State University (2008) will be joining us in August of 2016.

INCLUSIVE EXCELLENCE

The CNAS Diversity Page is up and running! We can still use your input and feedback, so please send me thoughts, ideas, information, etc. and CC David Szepatowski also.

STUDENT HIGHLIGHTS

The GGP Planning students attended the National Planning Conference in Phoenix, from April 2 – April 5. Eleven of our planning students went to this conference. Three of us spoke – myself (Simon Nogin), Carrie (Garza) Wallen, and Kyle Shoemake – about driverless cars. Planning for Autonomy: Driverless Cars and the Cities of Today was presented during the “Fast, Funny, or Passionate” time-slot. This time-slot is for quick presentations on a topic, and they particularly draw a large crowd. We estimate 120 people were in attendance during our presentation.

The National Planning Conference is an annual conference that attracts planners from all over North America (Canada included) to learn about what’s new in the field of city planning. Planning is a very broad and diverse field, so naturally our conferences reflect that. We attended planning sessions covering transportation, social justice, sustainability, emerging energy, ecological conservation, historic preservation, rural, water, and more.  A large part of attending conferences is the opportunity for us students to network with municipalities we are interested in working for, and networking with nationally accredited graduate planning programs.

Personally, since attending Phoenix and the networking I was able to do there, I have been approached for three very competitive internship opportunities! Had we not gotten the chance to attend the American Planning Association’s (APA) National Planning Conference (NPC), I would not have met these professional planners and made the connections I needed to be considered for these internships.

– Simon Nogin, Community & Regional Planning Major

L to R: Jake Justus, Curtis Vaughn, AICP President-Elect Glenn Larson, Keegan Stanton, Corey Coffman, Mark Scott, Simon Nogin.

L to R:  Kyle Shoemake, Simon Nogin and Carrie Wallen

MEDIA           

• Tune in every Thursday morning at 9:45 AM for 5-minute STEM SPOTS on KSMU hosted by Dr. David Cornelison.
• Check out CNAS blog and CNAS NewsWatch for more information.

 

Dr. Tammy Jahnke

Dean, College of Natural and Applied Sciences