Addressing the 590 graduates of the College of Arts and Sciences at this year’s commencement ceremony on May 11, Dr. Paul Farmer did what he has done his whole life: surprise and inspire people.

The surprise for many hearing the MacArthur Foundation “genius” award winner and internationally renowned public health advocate was that he avoided the traditional platitudes about graduates embarking on a new chapter in their lives. Instead, he told a “tale of two cities”: Boston and Mirebalais, which is in central Haiti.

“If anyone embodies the American University ideal of active citizenship it is Paul Farmer,” said Peter Starr, dean of the College of Arts and Sciences. “He has devoted his entire career to helping people in some of the poorest places in the world get the kind of health care they not only need but deserve.”

Farmer is chair of the Department of Global Health and Social Medicine at Harvard Medical School. He also serves as U.N. Special Adviser to the Secretary-General on Community-based Medicine and Lessons from Haiti.

He is perhaps best known as the cofounder of Partners In Health, an international nonprofit organization whose main goals are “to bring the benefits of modern medical science to those most in need of them and to serve as an antidote to despair.” He received an honorary doctor of science degree at commencement.

Tale of Two Cities

In his tale of two cities, Farmer started with Boston, home to Brigham and Women’s Hospital, social where Farmer is chief of the Division of Global Health Equity. In nearby Cambridge is Harvard Medical School, where he teaches and started his medical studies 30 years ago.

In Boston, after two bombs exploded near the finish line of the city’s marathon, Farmer noted, a safety net of world-class hospitals and highly trained physicians and caregivers sprang into action. Three people died and more than 260 were injured. But not a single patient who reached the hospital alive died, even though many had suffered massive trauma. Doctors began operating on the injured within half an hour of the blast.

The system worked.

Compare that with Mirebalais, one of the poorest places in the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. That’s where Farmer has chosen to live and to help the people who need his help the most.

Farmer first visited Mirebalais in 1983, after he had graduated from Duke and was about to enter Harvard Medical School. In the first few years of conducting health surveys in Haiti, he recounted, he’d lost three close fellow workers in ways that would have been unimaginable in Boston. One died of misdiagnosed cerebral malaria, another from typhoid fever complicated by an ileal perforation, and a third of sepsis caused by infection just days after giving birth to a boy. Her death could have been avoided by the kind of hygiene practiced routinely in hospitals in places like Boston.

Farmer’s conclusion was a fitting charge to the Class of 2013.

“Martin Luther King was right when he told us the year before his death by martyrdom that anyone can be great because everyone can serve. All of us can serve by helping to build or support the safety nets our species needs.” Not everyone can survive devastating disease or disasters, he said. “But how many survive serious illness or injury depends heavily on what sort of safety net we build for all those who share our neighborhoods, cities, states, nations, planet.”

Samantha Amberg, CAS ’13, is one of few American University students to have worked in an operating room as an undergraduate.

Amberg, a biology major in the College of Arts and Sciences, found out about an internship opportunity at DaVinci Plastic Surgery during her junior year and couldn’t pass it up.

Though most of her time at DaVinci was spent tracking supply inventories and maintaining medical records, for Amberg, watching and assisting with surgeries was the most valuable part of her experience.

During operations, she prepared surgical tools and materials, scribed and kept track of the time, and served as a general assistant for physicians—tasks most medical students don’t get to do until their second or third year of medical school.

Amberg quickly learned that a day in the operating room can be quite stressful, typically starting at 6 a.m. and ending at 5 p.m.

"Being in the operating room is like running a very stressful marathon," Amberg said. "The first few times I assisted with surgery, it was a deer-in-headlights situation. But I learned quickly and eventually was able to be of greater help to the team, while also learning how to deal with this crazy schedule."

American University is known for fostering an environment that promotes active internships like Amberg’s. The class of 2012 set a new school record, with 88 percent of students completing at least one internship before graduation. 

Like Amberg, they’re not all interning in fields like politics, international service, and communications—traditional strengths of AU. They’re interning in all corners and sectors of Washington, D.C.

"Internships help [students in smaller programs] achieve professional goals in the same manner as any other student by adding specific skills and accomplishments that supplement in the classroom experience," said Sue Gordon, director of career development in the Career Center.

When Maria Schneider, CAS ’13, tells people she majors in American Studies, the first questions she has to answer are "What’s that?" and "What do you want to do with that?"

Luckily, Schneider has a response for both questions. Throughout her coursework, she has focused on education reform, specializing in programs for disadvantaged youth. To supplement her studies, she currently interns at City Kids Wilderness Project, a nonprofit that focuses on outdoor education and leadership for D.C. middle and high school students.

As part of her internship, Schneider organizes weekend retreats that focus on topics like diversity and social justice with the students.

"Most people don’t even think of something like this as a possibility for an internship," Schneider said. "I think it’s important that students know that there are opportunities in D.C. to satisfy every possible interest."

Schneider’s work with City Kids reminds her every day why she is pursuing a career in the education field. Her internship has also helped her land a job teaching middle school Spanish in New Orleans through Teach for America following graduation in May.

"Through internships, students hone their skills and capabilities to build a strong resume and become a more competitive job applicant," Gordon said.

Swathi Nuli, CAS/SPA ’14, is taking advantage of another D.C. institution—the National Institutes of Health. Like Amberg, she interns in the science field, but their internships and long-term goals couldn’t be more different.

Nuli, a pre-med student majoring in psychology and justice/law, interns at NIH’s Institute of Allergens and Infectious Diseases. At NIH, Nuli helps proofread manuscripts from around the world, creates visuals for scientific publications, and assists with HIV research.

"My job [at NIH] has been one of the most influential opportunities I have had as a pre-medical student at AU," Nuli said. "I think a lot of political science and School of International Service majors at AU come to D.C. to work with the top politicians in the world, and I feel similarly fortunate to be working with the top scientists."

Nuli said that her NIH experience inspired her to bring a chapter of Phi Delta Epsilon, an international medical fraternity, to AU. She points to engaging and helpful mentors as the most important resource for pre-med students. 

Nuli will be extending her HIV work by volunteering in South Africa this summer and said she hopes to stay in this field for the long run.

Amberg, on the other hand, decided to pursue a new field after her time with the plastic surgeons. After interacting with patients and hearing their individual stories, Amberg discovered that her true passion is in psychology. She is grateful for her internship experience and the fact that it gave her a clearer vision of her future goals.

"My time at DaVinci has given me so much more than another bullet on my resume," Amberg said. "I’ve gained plenty of practical skills, but my most valuable takeaways are intangible: how to behave in a professional environment, how to interact with clients, and how much I can accomplish if I push myself."

One day, Stephen Casey was sitting at his kitchen table while his teenaged daughter and her 11 friends sat in a different room, chatting away and using their cellphones.

“I was thinking that there’s no way, with the way that we think about communication, that we’ll keep up with that generation,” the mathematics and statistics professor said. “Because what happens is that they talk in these incredibly rapid bursts of communication. It is also rich, multilayered communication.” 

Casey said this “art” of allowing information to be communicated electronically is called signal processing. 

“I was sitting at the kitchen table, in essence hiding. I was the adult in charge at this time, and I was trying to let them do their thing and just trying to remain invisible,” he added, “while thinking about this signal processing innovation.”  

What resulted from that day was an idea that led to a $145,537 award from the Air Force Office of Scientific Research for a three-year project called “New Techniques in Time Frequency Analysis: Adaptive Band, Ultra Band and Multi-Rate Signal Processing,” which led to an invention that now has a pending patent. 

“My invention is to take blocks of the signal and project that into what is called frequency space,” he said. “The method that I invented is called the projection method.” 

Casey already has two provisional patents for this method and said he is currently under review for a full patent.  

When he applied for the Air Force Office of Scientific Research award, he described all the different ways his method could provide solutions for the different problems the Air Force works on.  

“One is a very interesting phenomenon called ultra wide band communication,” Casey said. “This came about because of high-level radar and sonar signal processing, which obviously the Air Force is interested in.” 

Casey explained ultra wide band communication through a civilian use, referring to the earthquake that shook the Washington, D.C., area in the late summer of 2011. 

“We noticed that the first thing to go down was cellphone networks,” he said. “So the projection method actually solves the post-earthquake communication problem. Because if we communicated with our cellphones via ultra wide ban communication and used the projection method, we could layer the communications in hierarchy so that the low-level communication would get through.”  

Casey said text messages would go through first, followed by voice messages, then followed by video uploads or Facebook statuses about where a person was when the earthquake happened. The projection method is also energy efficient, Casey said, because when there is less complicated communication, it operates more efficiently and at lower energy levels. In the three years that Casey has to work on his idea with the award money, he said he will continue to write papers and think about a few other ideas that branch off of his projection method.

“I am amazed at how useful and how interesting mathematics is,” he said. “Even though I’ve been teaching for 25 years, I still feel like a student. I’m just very excited and enthused by the wonderful collection of things I get to work on, and I am thankful for having the opportunity to teach the great students we have in the AU Mathematics and Statistics Department.”

Presenting a semester's worth of work in front of your professor and classmates is stressful enough, but add in a real client and it's a different ball game entirely. That's exactly what students faced in Assistant Professor Cristel Russell's Advertising and Promotion Campaigns class.

The Concept

Student teams worked with one of two clients—the nonprofit Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) or media start-up SocialRadar—to develop a strategic campaign designed to meet the client's needs.

"I think it was a really great experience for the students to work with real clients on a real campaign. There's so much more to learn than what can just be read in textbooks," said Russell.

For SocialRadar, teams worked to develop a traditional launch campaign of a new smartphone app. But for CSPI, the challenge was to develop a campaign to encourage consumers to demand less marketing of unhealthy foods aimed at children.

Working on the same project throughout the semester gave students the opportunity to tie together principles learned across the marketing curriculum, according to Russell. Despite seeming like apples and oranges on the surface, marketing an idea versus a traditional product required the same steps in the end.

"Some of the students struggled a bit in the beginning…but once they realized the same principles applied, you could really see the lights in their eyes as they started coming up with ideas."

More Than Homework

From the student perspective, they were able to take away even more from Russell's class—now they have tangible evidence of their abilities.

"It was incredible to have a real client and do real work, not just deal in hypotheticals," said Kristianna George, BSBA '13. "It's been really helpful when I've applied to jobs because I have this project to hand over and say 'Here, I did this,' and it's exactly what I gave [my client.]"

Working with real clients also allowed students to overcome difficulties that may not be covered in a textbook.

"We definitely had struggles, but really learned what the [campaign presentation] process can really be like," said Kurtis Gobencion, BSBA '13. "There was more pressure because we had a real client, our materials had to be professional, we couldn't just say 'Good enough.'"

Professional Quality

Students may have been producing the work, but the final campaigns presented were anything but student quality, according to the clients.

"Everything I saw was top-notch," said Michael Chasen, CAS '94, and CEO of SocialRadar. "I couldn't have gotten better results going to an outside contractor."

Chasen, who has worked with several schools in the area, enjoys engaging with his alma mater and hopes to continue to work with Kogod in the future.

"I found the students to be very entrepreneurial. It was obvious they inherently understood the online media world, and they really stood out among schools I've worked with."

Lindsay Vickroy, nutrition policy coordinator for CSPI, echoed Chasen's positive experience.

"It was obvious to me that the students were very committed to the project and worked diligently to provide us with a product that would work," she said. "I know it wasn't easy to develop a campaign to market an idea instead of a product, but they really rose to the challenge."

Not so long ago half of humanity was all but invisible in history books. Bit characters in male narratives of wars and diplomacy, the best women could hope for were cameos, the occasional “woman worthies” who somehow transcended the limitations of the fair sex.

The odd chapter on Joan of Arc or Marie Curie notwithstanding, women have never been content to be written out of the narrative. They’ve been writing women’s histories all along. 

How those histories have grown in sophistication to the field’s more nuanced transnational approach is, in part, the subject of 10 essays collected in AU history professors Pamela S. Nadell and Kate Haulman’s new book, Making Women’s Histories: Beyond National Perspectives. 

In Making Women’s Histories, which Nadell and Haulman coedited, the perspective ranges from the experiences of women in Tsarist Russia and the British empire in Egypt and India to Qing dynasty China and the 1960s-era United States. 

In her essay “Women’s Past and the Currents of U.S. History,” essay contributor Kathy Peiss of the University of Pennsylvania cuts to the chase on what many women historians consider the political role of women’s history. 

“When I began work as a women’s historian,” Peiss writes, “we all promised each other a revolution. If the original goal was to write women into history, we have made amazing progress—from exclusion to inclusion, from private to public, from attention to ‘women worthies’ to an extraordinary exploration of women from many different origins and all walks of life, in the United States and around the world . . . Now, women’s history and gender analysis are shaping the comparative, transnational, and international histories that are beginning to revise anew how we understand the . . . past.” 

Women’s history’s often explicitly politically engaged mission, coeditor Nadell maintains, makes it no different from other kinds of history—African American history, say, or her own field of Jewish history. Nor are all women’s historians writing today “engaged in the same kind of political project,” she says. 

Women’s history now enjoys much more public awareness. But progress hasn’t always been linear. Take the growing popularity of Women’s History Month. 

Nadell’s coeditor, AU history professor Haulman, is at best ambivalent about the annual recognition of women’s accomplishments.

“I’m not a huge fan of Women’s History Month,” Haulman says. “It had utility for its time. But every month is Women’s History Month. Women’s history is everywhere. Segmenting it into its particular month can have a marginalizing effect.” 

And that old heroine, the woman worthy, has hardly faded away. News of the first woman this, or the first woman that, is a TV and newspaper staple. 

“I just got something today, the first female rabbi chaplain in the U.S. Air Force,” Nadell says. 

Even so, she agrees that women worthies can serve a positive purpose. 

“For somebody not trained as a historian, they’re manageable, they’re understandable,” she says. “They’re an individual life within your particular capacity to understand. The kind of more theoretical and sophisticated work we do in terms of women’s history isn’t always so accessible. So I understand the reason for it.” 

An important benefit of women’s history coming to the forefront is its effect on historians in general. It’s no longer acceptable to pretend that half the human race doesn’t exist, says Nadell. 

The book is dedicated to the memory of Robert Griffith, who was responsible for the spring 2008 AU conference on women’s and gender history from which the idea for the book was born. 

Nadell and Haulman write in the book’s acknowledgments, “[T]hat this book is now in your hands is due in part to the efforts and encouragement of our colleague, friend, and then department chair, the late Professor Robert Griffith. When a fund created in the 1890s for the ‘education of young women alone,’ unexpectedly fell into his lap, Bob, with his characteristic grand vision, imagined a series of projects which would advance the field of women’s and gender history . . . American University’s Clendenen Fund for Women’s and Gender History was born.” 

Asked which of the book’s essays they liked best, Nadell and Haulman both smile. 

“We love all of our children equally,” Haulman says. 

Making Women’s Histories: Beyond National Perspectives (NYU: 2013) contains essays written by Arianne Chernock (Boston University), Anna Clark (University of Minnesota), Barbara Engel (University of Colorado–Boulder), Jocelyn Olcott (Duke), Kathy Peiss (University of Pennsylvania), Lisa Pollard (University of North Carolina–Wilmington), Claire Robertson (Ohio State), Mytheli Sreenivas (Ohio State), Ulrike Strasser (University of California–Irvine), Heidi Tinsman (University of California–Irvine), and Cristina Zaccarini (Adelphi). Nadell and Haulman wrote the book’s introduction.

People say they live and breathe art, but three AU master of fine arts alumni and one current student really do—they opened an art exhibit in the living room of their Columbia Heights row house.

Delicious Spectacle is an experimental gallery space where artists can show their work and meet other artists, according to Sam Scharf, MFA ’12 and one of the founding members of the exhibit.  

Scharf said his fellow housemates—who include Victoria Greising MFA ’11, Camden Place MFA ’12, Dan Perkins MFA ’13, and Megan Meuller (a 2008 Virginia Commonwealth University BFA grad)—decided to host a different art show at Delicious Spectacle each month.  

“I thought it might be a nice way to show work that might not be getting shown,” he said. “It’s nice to have a space where artists can feel free to kind of explore, and maybe try something they can’t do in a traditional white-wall space.” 

Since its opening, Delicious Spectacle has hosted more than 20 different artists, some of them AU students or alumni. The founders do not show their own art on principle.  

“You know there’s going to be good work up,” Scharf said. “It’s new, contemporary, and innovative. We try to focus on that to come through.”  

The Washington Post has featured the exhibit space twice, bringing a flood of people into the house for exhibit opening parties. Between 100 and 150 people came to the opening of the first exhibit, but the past couple shows were jammed with 200 to 250 people. There was literally no room to move in the two exhibit rooms.  

“I’m happy that people are there,” Scharf said. “Yeah, some of them are there to get free drinks, but at least they’re surrounded by art.”  

Scharf said house art exhibits are relatively new to the D.C. area.  

“It is a house, and we can still show really good work,” he said. 

The housemates all have their own assignments when it comes to Delicious Spectacle. They divvy up who will curate the different exhibits, as well as who will promote the shows, construct and deconstruct the exhibit space, and buy drinks for the opening and closing parties.  

“There’s a lot of effort and energy being put into it, and we’re not getting paid for it,” Scharf said. “The best thing is that it’s possible.” So what is the spectacle, and why is it delicious? 

“A spectacle is a concept that has to do with the larger system that we live in,” he said. The group originally wanted to do an art critique blog and was talking about spectacles in art late one night.  

“We were talking about how delicious it is, how we just wanted to soak this up,” he said. “It is very tasty in a way.”  

Delicious Spectacle’s next opening is May 24, when the work of artist Matt Rich will be presented.

Kristina Bell was one of three graduate students to receive the 2013 William K. Reilly Scholarship from AU’s Center for Environmental Policy. The new scholarship, named for the pioneering environmentalist and former administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, will help Bell pursue her interests in the environmental and social dimensions of sustainable development.

This honor sparkles atop Bell’s record of scholarship and a variety of learning experiences and challenges.

Bell, SPA/MPA’14, doesn’t see the world through a single window. Nor does she approach her own calling—helping create sustainable opportunities in the developing world—from a narrow path.

On her journey to a master’s in public administration, Bell has worked for an international nonprofit organization, the Egyptian arm of a private multinational company, and a local DC government agency – experiences she all sees as complementing her formal education.

“I’m interested in global policy and international development – for example how global governance structures can help promote international development through economic and social standards,” said Bell. “But there are many different routes to that. If I’ve learned one thing, it’s not to narrow my options or my outlook.”

Since arriving at AU, Bell has taken on three internships that have helped enrich her classroom learning with real-world experience. In 2011, Bell joined PriceWaterhouseCoopers Egypt, working as a corporate engagement manager on an initiative to encourage blood donations through corporate partnerships.

“It was challenging, being an American intern cold calling companies like Coca-Cola Egypt,” said Bell. “I had to work through language and cultural barriers, but it was a tremendous learning experience.”

Bell also interned for the Global Business School Network, a nonprofit that aims to level the playing field for higher education. Bell helped develop and implement a survey of about 300 schools worldwide to gauge the demand for an online PhD program.

To round out her experience, Bell took on an internship this spring at the DC Department of Housing and Community Development.

“I wanted to understand how the public sector operates. It was a totally different experience, working with a government bureaucracy,” said Bell.

Bell, who played Division I basketball as a business major at Fordham, also managed to find time to play on an intramural league to blow off steam in between classes.

“Basketball has taught me a lot of valuable skills. You have to know how to manage your time and energy, maintain your work-life balance, and plan ahead,” said Bell.

“Teamwork is also important, especially learning how to bring out your teammates’ strengths and help them realize their value. Everyone has a piece of the puzzle.”

This summer, she will pack her bags for Malaysia and Indonesia, as part of an SIS class, Globalization, Governance and Human Security in Southeast Asia. She and her classmates will spend three weeks in Kuala Lumpur and Jakarta, taking classes and conducting cultural and professional site visits.

These experiences have all enhanced the multi-faceted education Bell has received at AU.

“The diversity of professors and their eclectic professional backgrounds has been extremely valuable,” said Bell. “So has being in the classroom with students with experience and knowledge about different issues. I learn just as much from my classmates as from my professors.”

Congratulations Class of 2013!

The 2013 College of Arts and Sciences commencement ceremony took place on May 11 at 4:30 p.m. View photos of the ceremony.

Speeches

Renowned medical anthropologist and physician Paul Farmer spoke to graduates of the College of Arts and Sciences and received an honorary doctor of science degree. Known for his work on health, human rights, and the consequences of social inequality, Farmer is chair of the Department of Global Health and Social Medicine at Harvard Medical School, and also serves as U.N. Special Adviser to the Secretary-General on Community-based Medicine and Lessons from Haiti. "Your paths will lead to unexpected engagements," Farmer said. "The connections you made here will last a lifetime." Watch video.

Student Mariam Sameh Aziz also spoke, telling graduates, "Let us not forget our own voices and that they matter. In this age of globalization, do not become lost in the sea of people." A native of Egypt, Mariam completed her baccalaureate degree this past December, with a double major in economics and women’s, gender and sexuality studies. During her time at AU, she spent six months in Ghana working with abandoned children; helped to organize an Egyptian diaspora group in support of the Arab Spring; and participated in an alternative break program in Haiti studying development efforts after the 2010 earthquake. Watch video. 

Awards

• Andrey Verendeev received the University Student Award for Outstanding Scholar at the Doctoral Level.
• Andrew Paul Merluzzi received the University Student Award for Outstanding Scholar at the Undergraduate Level.
  
• Carley Rose DeFranco received the Evelyn Swarthout Hayes Award.
• Mohamed Nazran Baba received the Carlton Savage Award.
  
• Stephen A. Bronskill, who also graduated from the School of Public Affairs, was recognized as the winner of the Stafford H. Cassell Award and the President's Award. The President's Award is the highest honor awarded at commencement. It is given to an undergraduate senior who has displayed a longstanding commitment to building community and promoting AU’s ideals of academic achievement, integrity, selflessness, leadership, and service.

Naomi Baron spent the past year exactly the way you would expect the winner of the Betty T. Bennett award to do.

The Betty T. Bennett award was established by the family of former College dean Betty Bennett in memory of her service to the university from 1985 to 1997 and in particular to recognize a member of the College's faculty who is both a superior scholar and an exemplary leader in an administrative role.

Baron has split her time this year between Washington and California. She spent a month in the fall at Stanford, where she is a visiting scholar at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences, and two months there this spring, all the while continuing her “day job” as executive director of AU’s Center for Teaching, Research, and Learning.

Baron is at Stanford as part of a group of five scholars working on new media language, put together by Georgetown professor Deborah Tannen. Each member of the group is pursuing his or her own research agenda, but they “talk a lot,” according to Baron. They test their theories and bounce ideas off one another and other colleagues at the Center.

Baron is working on a book that already has a title, Words Onscreen: The Fate of Reading in a Digital World, a publisher, Oxford University Press, and a publication date, 2014.

Baron’s central research question is whether reading on digital screens—computers, tablets, e-readers, mobile phones—is changing our notion of what it means to read. Since the invention of writing, the medium on which we record written words has affected how we read. Books are easier to read than scrolls; printing introduced active use of page numbers; and so on. Digital technologies are also affecting how we read, but in new ways. Probably the most important is that reading on screens urges us to keep seeking new bits of information but discourages more serious, contemplative, deep reading. Baron is concerned about the consequences of this shift.

Baron joined the College of Arts and Sciences in 1987 as associate dean for undergraduate affairs and thus began her relationship with Betty T. Bennett. Baron then became associate dean for curriculum and faculty development, spending a total of seven years in the Dean’s office.

Baron says she was fortunate to be able to work so closely with Dean Bennett. “During that time I learned an enormous amount about how to juggle full-time administrative responsibilities with a continuing research agenda.” While she was associate dean, Baron wrote two books and “a slew of articles and book chapters.”

After she left the Dean’s office, Baron’s administrative posts have included four years as chair of the Department of Language and Foreign Studies (now the Department of World Languages and Cultures) and 15 years directing the TESOL program. In July 2011, she assumed the leadership of the Center for Teaching, Research, and Learning. Throughout that time she has been a prolific scholar, having now published seven books, along with scores of articles and book chapters. She is a popular media figure, sought out by major news outlets to discuss new media and her research.

Baron’s interest in how we read—and how new media are affecting the reading process—reflects her longstanding commitment to figuring out how to best structure higher education. A personal goal throughout her professional career has been to inform her thinking about education by research—both the work of other scholars and her own.

Writing is another of Baron’s passions—as it was Betty Bennett’s. Crafting language well is a vital aspect of professional scholarship but it is also the backbone of a liberal arts education. Describing Bennett’s love of language, Baron says, “She took very seriously her word choice in everything she produced, every speech she gave, every report she wrote. It was, I think, part of her own way of demonstrating the integration of scholarship and administration. And of course, teaching was also a vital part of the mix.”

Bennett modeled the integration of scholarship, administration, and teaching. The same can be said of Naomi Baron, this year’s winner of the Betty T. Bennett award.

The American University Museum has quite a treat for D.C. art buffs. On the second floor gallery is a collection of master’s thesis work from MFA students in AU’s Department of Art. The exhibit showcases well-refined talent and diversity in subjects and techniques from 11 artists: David de Bol, Angela Esteve, Emily Francisco, Lisa Marie Jakab, Ryan Carr Johnson, Shahdeh Khodavandi, Dan Perkins, Anna Prezioso, Heather Ravenscroft, Jenny Sawle, and Harini Thyagarajan.

Each artist’s processes, inspirations, and final products described in the gallery talks were fascinating. Here is a conversation with three of the artists, starting with Harini Thyagarajan, an artist from Chennai, India. Her piece was an experiential artwork made of 17,500 pounds of salt on which she invited viewers to play.

Steven Dawson: Why salt?  
Harini Thyagarajan: “I have a personal history with salt. My family had our own salt farm back in Chennai, India, on the southern coast by the sea. My hometown is the saltiest place I’ve ever been. You walk outside and you can feel the salt on your tongue; that’s how salty it gets in the summer. The material just started making its own work for me.”

SD: What kind of salt do you use?
HT: “When I started working with salt, I started experimenting with the different origins. Was it rock salt? Was it sea salt? And then experimenting with their functions. Was it ice melting? Used for cooking? And then slowly the origins and history began to vanish because the salt itself was overtaking those aspects. It didn’t matter where it was from; it didn’t matter what history it had. I think the presence of the material itself would speak for itself. That’s when I realized that we would have a sort of play on words with ‘all purpose salt,’ which is what I used.”

SD: Where do you get 17,500 pounds of salt?
HT: “This is actually restaurant-grade salt, so I get it from large wholesalers and depots. I received quite a few suspicious looks.”

SD: Tell me about the experience of creating it and then showing it.
HT: “The experience was very satisfying because I moved every single salt bag individually. So it was 50 pounds at a time, and opening each bag was like opening Christmas presents, it was so satisfying.”

SD: What is next for you?
HT: “I have to move back to India. But I am currently in the process of exploring these works. Initially, I wasn’t interested in gallery exhibitions or anything because I feel like I should wait and just enjoy the experience of making these experiential works. To me, it is all about the experience with the art.”

Next, I talked with Angela Esteve, who works with shredded paper to form themed collages whose ambiguity allows viewers to project their own meaning onto the work.

Steven Dawson: How did you arrive at using shredded paper as your material, and what do you shred?
Angela Esteve: “I tried a lot of different things, using paper; ripping it, tearing it, and eventually shredding it. Then I tried putting together photos of my children, because they’ve all left home, and I wanted to reconstruct the feeling of having them there. But then I realized that you couldn’t have that, so I started using children’s books that I read to them as children. Then I thought I would use my own work, since that is something else from the past. So it’s a combination of children’s books, my work, and new prints. Anything related to my life is in the work. For example, I like reading the Financial Times, so that’s in there.”

SD: What do you want a person to get out of looking at your piece?
AE: “It’s all very representational. I like to start off with something real and recognizable and then make it into an abstract work. It could mean anything to the person looking at it.”

SD: What are your plans after graduating?
AE: “I already have two degrees, and a post-graduate certificate in education, and now a master’s degree. So I am going to get teacher certification. I’d like to teach while still carrying on making work.”

Finally, I had a conversation with Anna Prezioso, who created clothing from denim material that was intentionally meant to constrict the movement of the person wearing it to explore the limitations that trauma survivors experience.

SD: Why did you use denim as your primary material?
Anna Prezioso: “I’m really interested in the material for a couple of reasons. I love how people have tons of different associations with denim, so I’m interested in what the viewer brings to the piece. For me, I always found that jeans can be so comfortable, but if you don’t have your right size, you can’t force yourself to fit in them. It doesn’t stretch like spandex or cotton. So I enjoy pushing the limitations of the material itself, to see where that breaking point is. So I like playing with that duality of the material.”

SD: You mentioned in your Gallery Talk that this is the first time you have introduced performance into your art. What was that like?
AP: “Performance is a new thing for my work, and it was great getting feedback from the live models that I tailored the outfits for. I feel like having people interact with my work, and having someone actually wear my work opened new doors for my work. I will definitely keep creating work with a performance aspect.”

SD: What are your plans after AU?
AP: “I am going to Berlin for six weeks in AU’s MFA summer program out there. There is a wonderful art community over there, so I am interested to see what that’s like over there versus New York or LA or D.C. After that I plan on returning to teach. I get a lot out of working with students, and working with them feeds my own work.

The MFA Thesis Exhibition, Crossing the Bifrost, will be at the American University Museum through May 26. For more information, visit the MFA thesis gallery website.

As a Northwest D.C. native, Dr. Laurie Cutting brought her voracious love of reading to AU's library even before she was enrolled as a college student. Recalling her high school memories of studying in Bender Library, Laurie returned to AU as a student. While she always knew that she wanted to work with children somehow, she, like many students early in their careers, was unsure of how to get there. Laurie excelled in her literature degree program while also taking some pre-med classes and graduated cum laude in 1993. 

From D.C. to Chicago, Laurie went on to receive her doctorate in communication sciences and disorders from Northwestern University. While there, she completed an internship with top-notch childhood development learning centers, such as Johns Hopkins Kennedy Krieger Institute, Yale University School of Medicine's Center for Learning and Attention, and the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.

Coupling her understanding of literature with her learning in cognitive development, Laurie conducted research for 12 years, first as a postdoctoral fellow and then as a member of the faculty, at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine/Kennedy Krieger Institute. She tested how learning disabilities manifest themselves in early childhood and how the neural structure and function of the brain can begin to inform educational practices.

Currently, Laurie holds multiple faculty positions at Vanderbilt University, including an endowed chair with appointments in both Vanderbilt's Peabody College of Education and Vanderbilt's Medical School. She is also the faculty director of Vanderbilt Kennedy Center Reading Clinic, and part of the Vanderbilt Brain Institute. Her diverse research is part of a new discipline known as educational neuroscience, which integrates previously isolated bodies of knowledge to form new exciting connections. Laurie embodies a new age of scientists whose backgrounds in the arts serve to inform their passion and dedication to social causes.

Laurie excitedly admits that while her educational path was non-traditional, in retrospect, she wouldn't have it any other way. "I would not be where I am today without my time at AU," she said. She remains very close with several of her friends from AU, including her best friend. Their sons were born two weeks apart, and the families regularly hear stories from their time on campus.

Dr. Sara Nieves-Grafals, CAS/BS ’75, CAS/MA ’79, CAS/PhD ’80, practiced clinical psychology for 32 years, has traveled the world, co-authored a travel cookbook called Mystical Places and Marvelous Meals with her husband, and speaks five languages fluently. She is also one of the newest members of the American University Alumni Board.

While growing up in Puerto Rico, Sara says, “I had a life-changing experience that influenced my desire to celebrate life everyday and to keep learning for the rest of my life. When I was 18 years old, I contracted viral encephalitis from a mosquito bite. I was in a coma for a week.

“Physicians told my parents that if I survived, I should forget about ever going to college because I would likely have brain damage. I fully recovered. Yet it was not until I took a battery of neuropsychology tests while training as a doctoral student that I breathed a sigh of relief.”

Despite her doctors’ predictions, Sara began her undergraduate degree at another institution, and eventually transferred to AU for its more challenging academics. She completed her bachelor’s in psychology, then decided to pursue her doctorate in psychology at AU as well.

“The [psychology] professors were excited about the field and helped guide students. … The whole experience was such a privilege. It was a very collaborative environment and conducive to learning,” she says. She especially admires psychology professors Dr. Jim Gray and Dr. Tony Riley – now the department’s chair.

Sara decided to become more involved with AU after receiving two free men’s basketball tickets in the mail. “Why not get in touch with your inner Eagle?” asked her husband, whom she says is “an Eagle by marriage.”

“Now that I am retired, I have more time, and AU was so helpful to me,” she says. Sara has taken advantage of all AU has to offer while volunteering her time and expertise to help the university.

In addition to joining the Alumni Board, Sara is auditing an art history course through the alumni audit program. “I love being able to go back to school to see the technology and how people learn now. I have my first exam on Friday. I’m excited!” she says.

She is helping plan a psychology reunion to honor current department chair Dr. Tony Riley, who has been at AU for 35 years. Since she lives near the university, she enjoys coming to alumni events and interacting with current students. “I was at a multicultural alumni event the other day, and it was like an AU family. Alumni can guide and mentor students now in a way that wasn’t available to us as students,” she says.

When Mayra Rivera, CAS/BS ’13, was a senior at Bell Multicultural High School in the Columbia Heights neighborhood of Washington, D.C., she was No. 2 in her class of 173 students. But as the daughter of El Salvadorian immigrants and with her mother a small business owner, Rivera wasn’t sure if she was going to apply to college.  

“I never heard of American University, even though I live here in Washington, D.C.,” Rivera says. “But during my junior and senior year, we had a representative from AU come over and give us a presentation, and I started thinking about it.”

Rivera applied to AU, and, thanks to a competitive financial package, she accepted. Four years later, with multiple federal work study (FWS) positions under her belt and a passion for working with children, Rivera is taking advantage of an assortment of student employment and volunteer opportunities both on and off the campus. As a first-generation student, Rivera is changing her family’s expectations about a college education and blazing a trail for her younger relatives while still finding ways to give back to her community.

Rivera has plans to use her degree in health promotion to educate children about the power they have over their bodies and choices. The adaptability and individuality of the subject appealed to Rivera.

“You have the power to change your health—to eat healthier, to exercise—and I feel like the reason why a lot of people don’t stick to diets or don’t go and work out is because they don’t know, they lack the education,” Rivera said. “So with health promotion, I’m learning how to implement programs and ways to approach how to make changes today.”

Sharing those lessons with children has been the main thrust of Rivera’s FWS positions with DC Reads and Kid Power. Introduced to the organizations through the Career Center’s Student Employment Coordinator, Tasha Daniels, Rivera worked with DC Reads for a year and then transitioned to Kid Power, where she has been for the last two years.

Students looking for FWS positions or part-time jobs on campus should regularly check the AU Student Jobs website, www.american.edu/studentjobs, keep an eye on list-serv or department emails that may advertise positions, and should be persistent, Daniels says. Look often, both before and during the semester, to see what kind of opportunities are out there, she suggests.

“Finding any job is a process,” Daniels says. “Keep applying until [you] land a position. … Submit professional application materials—resume and tailored cover letter—to increase [the] likelihood of landing a position.”

With both of her FWS opportunities, Rivera has been able to stay local and focused on her educational goals. During her time at DC Reads, Rivera worked with students one-on-one at CentroNía, a bilingual charter school in Columbia Heights—a five-minute walk from her home. At Kid Power, where Rivera both works as a FWS employee and is conducting an internship, Rivera is applying her knowledge about physical health and nutrition while leading whole classes.

“I was able to give back to my community,” Rivera says, and her impact is still felt years later. “The mom of the girl who I tutored at DC Reads works at Target and I also work at Target, and we always talk, and I always ask her questions about her daughter—I just saw them, and she’s grown up. And it’s nice to see they remember me.”

Rivera ensures the students remember her lessons about health, too. Thanks to encouragement from her Kid Power supervisor Shaden Dowiatt, Rivera is involved in the program Veggie Time, teaching students about gardening and nutrition.

“She’s fantastic; the kids really, really love her,” says Dowiatt, SIS/MA ’10, LAMB Site Director for Kid Power. “I think she relates really well to the students; she’s always very positive, smiles a lot, is pretty easygoing. Her passion and her focus is obviously on health education. This year she’s been doing an internship with me—she’s helped develop some of the lessons about nutrition and I’ve encouraged her to share those lessons with the students.”

And Rivera isn’t the only AU student at Kid Power. The organization employed both university alumni and 44 FWS students in fall 2012—about five to six AU volunteers are located at each of Kid Power’s 10 sites, Dowaitt says—and that atmosphere creates an undeniable sense of camaraderie.

“This past summer, we had this close connection,” Rivera says of her AU peers who also worked with Kid Power at their summer camp. “We all hung out at night, we had dinner and stuff together—we created this little AU family.”

And as for Rivera’s own family, they’ve been affected by her college choice, too. Although her mother was initially skeptical of her decision to apply to AU and hoped Rivera would help her with her small business, she’s grown to appreciate that Rivera “wants to do more”—“she’s always encouraging me, and now she brags about me going to college,” Rivera says. And Rivera’s younger sister has followed in her footsteps, and is currently a student at Georgetown University.

With graduation coming up in May, Rivera hopes to volunteer with other health- or children-focused nonprofit organizations and eventually gain employment at one; graduate school isn’t out of the question, either. But for now, she’s staying with Kid Power, hoping to introduce students to healthy recipes and eating habits. Without these FWS opportunities, Rivera says she’s not sure how she would have been able to so effectively prepare for her career.

“I never heard of Kid Power or DC Reads before federal work study, but it’s my interest to work with kids and to help them,” Rivera says. “If it weren’t for [FWS], I don’t know how I would get this experience.”

“My entire career has been devoted to public service, the law, and improving the administration of justice,” said Rainey Ransom Brandt, CAS/BGS ’89, SPA/MS ’90, CAS-SPA/PhD ’93, during her Senate confirmation hearing to become an associate judge of the District of Columbia Superior Court.

When announcing her nomination in March 2012, President Obama said, “Throughout her career, Rainey Ransom Brandt has demonstrated an unwavering commitment to justice. I am proud to nominate her to the Superior Court of the District of Columbia.”

Although she is still awaiting confirmation from the Senate to become an associate judge of the D.C. Superior Court, Brandt was sworn in as a Superior Court magistrate judge on November 7 after spending 14 years as special counsel to the chief judge of the D.C. Superior Court.

As special counsel, Brandt was the in-house expert on criminal law and prisoners’ rights, handling sentencing issues and answering inquiries regarding law changes. In her new role as a magistrate judge, she will preside over preliminary hearings in domestic violence cases, including arraignments and child support.

While attending American University, Brandt had different plans. The popularity of the show “L.A. Law” piqued her interest in pursuing a career as an FBI agent. But research she conducted at the now-closed Lorton Prison while completing her PhD in justice with a specialization in corrections changed her mind. She decided to go to law school at Catholic University, but no longer wanted to join the FBI.

Brandt taught classes while she was a graduate student and has remained committed to AU as an adjunct associate professor for 21 years – including one year as a full-time professor – and teaches one criminal justice class every semester.

“I learn more from my students than they learn from me,” Brandt says. Moderating classroom discussions has shown her the value of integrating many opinions and points of view, and she hopes her experience as a professor in the classroom will translate to being a judge in the courtroom.

“My students have taught me how to deal with issues and controversy. As a professor, I have always tried to be a calming influence over their chaotic lives. … Having to deal with all those different scenarios over the years has taught me how to be calm and rational under pressure,” she adds.

No matter where her career goes next, Brandt’s dedication to AU and education is unwavering. She says, “I will always remain a professor at heart. … I won’t stop that just because I’m becoming a judge.”

For Ron Vogel, CAS/BA ’72, the lessons of running a business came as a student on the campus of American University.

Ron owns Booeymonger, a thriving D.C.-area delicatessen that cooks up specialty sandwiches fresh to order. He stays busy serving as what he describes as a “cheerleader/ motivator/repairman/traffic controller” for each of the deli’s four locations—the original in Georgetown; Friendship Heights; Bethesda; and Ballston, the newest.

Owning a restaurant is not the first job he had in mind. When he came to AU, Ron set out to follow in the footsteps of his father and brother, who were dentists. However, science coursework did not prove to be his cup of tea, and a conversation with then-associate dean Ruth McFeeter changed his outlook.

“She told me, ‘Do what you’re good at, instead of what you think you should be doing,’” Ron recounts. What he was good at was the food business. He found a home at 97 Carry Out, a student-run carry-out service on campus. He began working there his first year of school in 1968, and by 1970 ran the entire operation.

What Ron experienced there laid the foundation for the rest of his career. “It humbled me,” he says, with particular reverence for his fellow workers who served food directly in the dining halls. “They had a certain respect for the job, a certain respect for the students. It gave me a good sense of what hospitality is all about,” he says.

A guiding principle that Ron lives by is treating all of his employees as if he worked for them. He has a clear philosophy on leadership. “There are two ways to motivate people,” he explains, pausing to set up the contrast. “You can give them more money and more input on decisions; or you can work alongside them.” Moments before uttering these words, Ron jumped up to assist a patron with a stroller entering his restaurant.

Booeymonger also has provided Ron with a natural outlet to stay connected to AU, primarily through the athletic department, which he passionately supports. Feeding athletes at countless sporting events sparked a close relationship with the basketball team in particular, with whom he occasionally travels.

A one-time AU basketball player himself, Ron’s genuine admiration for student-athletes is obvious. “Whenever I talk to them, they want to ask me about my experience in business, but I want to know more about them!” he exclaims, his face lighting up. What inspires Ron the most about college athletics is the incredible amount of work the students put in to be successful both on the field and in the classroom. “I have such an appreciation for what they do.”

As his restaurant hours become less intensive, Ron looks forward to spending more time volunteering at AU. He remembers fondly an occasion when he spoke to a class of business students, and he hopes he will get the opportunity again. In addition, he could see himself one day as a guide for Discover DC, a program that introduces new students to sights around the city. In whatever capacity he gives back, Ron will always cherish the personal interactions and most enjoy “dealing with students, helping them get involved.”

Ron will be honored with this year’s Alumni Eagle Award, given to alumni who have rendered outstanding service to the university, the alumni association, or both.

The Republican Party tapped American University alumna Dr. Sharona Ross, CAS/BS ’95, as its designated surgeon for the party’s convention in Tampa this past August. Given her long list of academic and medical accomplishments, it’s no surprise that, in an emergency, Ross was trusted to save the lives of some of our country’s most prominent politicians.

Ross is director of minimally invasive surgery and surgical endoscopy at the Florida Hospital Tampa, Southeastern Center for Digestive Disorders Pancreatic Cancer – a clinic she recently founded with her longtime mentor.

As designated surgeon to the 2012 Republican National Convention, Ross was charged with assembling teams of doctors in Tampa and surrounding cities who would be on call and ready to treat any VIPs attending the convention, including GOP leaders, members of congress, and delegates. If anyone needed surgery, Ross would be their surgeon.

Thankfully, she says, her surgical skills were not needed during the convention.

Ross discovered her love of surgery when she was only five years old, growing up in Israel. She recalls, “I was walking behind my mother coming home from school, and there was roadkill. She stopped to talk with a friend and didn’t notice that I was literally taking all the organs out and lining them up. It was really interesting to me.”

Her mother was understandably disturbed, but Ross knew she found her calling. At age 12, she met a German pathologist who agreed to let her assist in breast cancer research every day after school.

Upon entering the Israeli military, Ross joined the medical corps and became the head of a military medical clinic. In Israel, she met her future husband, Jack Ross, SOC/BA ’87, SIS/MA ’93, WCL/JD ’99, who had just graduated with his bachelor’s degree from AU, and he convinced her to move to the United States.

Ross did not know English, but she enrolled in two courses – math and biology – at AU while her husband began his master’s program. Math was easy, since it was mostly numbers, but biology was a challenge.

“I went to the first class, and I couldn’t understand one word. So I recorded every class, then I sat in the library until it closed every night. With my dictionary and recorder, I transcribed everything the professor said. I had the best notes in the class,” Ross says, adding that she earned an A in the course.

Her perseverance paid off, and Ross graduated Phi Beta Kappa, summa cum laude, with honors. “I had a great experience at AU. I loved every minute of it,” she says.

After graduating from AU, Ross attended George Washington University and earned her MD, again with honors.

While in school, Ross gave birth to three children. Based on her experience, she believes that women can accomplish anything they want. She hopes more women will become surgeons, which is why she founded the Women in Surgery Initiative to educate and encourage more women to join the field.

Ross says, “I tell women who are considering becoming surgeons: Despite all the obstacles that I had with language and a new culture… it’s possible to succeed. When I started medical school, I had a 17-month-old son and a 2-month-old daughter, and my husband was in law school. Everyone said, ‘It can’t be done,’ but if you want it enough, you’ll make it happen. Believe in yourself.”

When alumnus John Bell, CAS/MEd ’83, took a summer job, he didn’t know it would change his life. Upon meeting gunshot victim Alex Gàlvez, Bell began a journey of friendship, education, and service which led to the creation of Transitions Foundation of Guatemala.

Bell’s career began in the DC Public School System and led him to AU for special education training, supported by the Department of Education. A member of a small cohort of graduate students, Bell taught during the day and took classes on nights and weekends. Bell recalls they were “trained as leaders, not teachers.”

While in Guatemala to volunteer and study Spanish, Bell met Galvez, who was dying from a paralyzing gunshot wound because he couldn’t get medical care. Returning to Washington, Bell utilized a network of people to obtain assistance for Galvez and personally assisted others.

By aiding Galvez, Bell thought he had reached his pinnacle. However, when Galvez shared news that others needed assistance, Bell knew a path of service awaited him. He and Galvez just created Transitions Foundation of Guatemala, which assists Guatemalans with disabilities.

Through a holistic approach, clients are supported through health and rehabilitation, education, spiritual development, leadership, social interaction, and employment opportunities. The Wheelchair Workshop and Prosthetic & Orthotics Programs are at the forefront of these initiatives. As the foundation’s mission grew beyond grassroots work, they found partnerships with Rotary International as well as engineering and design groups such as Designers without Borders, MIT, Cal Tech, and San Francisco State University, that support the wheelchair program.

Bell stresses their programs are a collaboration between disabled and non disabled, one member helping another. When you work within a family setting, he says, there’s a “higher accountability and respect” for the work that you’re doing . . . you drive yourself to do your best.”

While Galvez is the face of the organization, Bell is steadfast in his role as co-founder and directs operations and donor relations. Both travel on donor trips – requesting goods and funds – and share news of the violence and challenges faced in Guatemala. In July 2012, Galvez will speak before the UN Session on Arms Trade Treaties; he is recognized as a person who chose to help others as a result of his personal experience.

Looking back, Bell says, “AU gave [me] major tools and formation with higher level academics.” It was an environment that formalized his training. Bell maintains great respect for AU. And recalling his graduate cohort, he remembers “[we] were tight,” and camaraderie is reflected in his work in Guatemala.

Transitions Foundation of Guatemala has set a great example of a holistic approach to aiding the disabled and providing access to care for Guatemalans. Bell says, “In Guatemala, you see struggles, and it helps to keep your perspectives.” And for Bell, just one of those struggles introduced him to a life’s work in service to others.

Every parent has trouble letting go when their children grow up, but Glen Finland, CAS/MFA ’06, had an especially difficult time. In her book, Next Stop: A Memoir of Family, Finland chronicles the story of teaching her adult son David, who has autism, how to navigate the D.C. metro system.

Finland writes, “It’s important to know that a story about autism isn’t a story about a single child. It is a story about an entire family.” Next Stop is a candid, sometimes funny, sometimes painfully honest portrayal of raising a differently-abled child and the toll it takes on Finland’s other two sons and her marriage.

Finland’s story revolves around riding the D.C. metro with 21-year-old David one summer, teaching him all the routes and stops, hoping it would afford David more independence. By August, David announced he was ready to journey on his own; Finland wasn’t. But like so many other mothers, she took a leap of faith. Unlike most other mothers, though, she was genuinely concerned she may never see her son again. David did come home, and he continues to ride the metro on his own.

David has done extremely well since learning to navigate public transit. He is a year-round groundskeeper at a park and, during baseball season, also works as a ticket-taker for the Washington Nationals. Finland says the Nationals organization has been extremely kind to David, who loves baseball. In describing her son, she writes, “David’s is a kind of exuberance that reveals itself by swinging an imaginary baseball bat whenever he’s really happy. Feet squared, wrists piled up high on his right shoulder, and swoosh!”

David loves to run marathons and has participated in the New York City Marathon and twice ran the Marine Corps Marathon. Riding the metro alone and running in marathons, David is carving out his independence and embarking on his own adventure, but his mother and family are always there to cheer him on from the sidelines.

In Next Stop, Finland writes, “Let’s tell our stories – and laugh, and cry, and bang our heads on the table if we must – but let’s tell them true.” This is precisely what makes her story so compelling.

As an adjunct professor at American University, Finland teaches her students a similar lesson, one that one of her own favorite AU professors taught her: “Write your way into discovery. Tell your own story.”

Is a lightning bolt simply a flash of light in the sky? For alumnus Leonard Rosen, CAS/PhD ’81, observation of natural patterns like lightning, crop formations, and veins within a cabbage leaf propelled him into the mathematics of fractals. From his research came his first novel, a literary thriller called All Cry Chaos. 

While flying across the country, Rosen surveyed the landscape below. What he saw begged the question, what do patterns in nature mean, and is there, in fact, a pattern maker? Such ponderings led him to study with mathematicians as well as engage theological questions. The result: All Cry Chaos, published in September 2011.

Rosen credits the novel’s success in part to its accessibility. An explosive attack depicts a situation from today’s global community. Readers follow Interpol inspector Henri Poincare as he investigates, and they are treated to Rosen’s descriptive language and dialogue. 

Following undergraduate studies at Trinity College (Conn.) in English and education, Rosen taught high school before enrolling at American to study composition and expository writing. He credits the books selected by AU professors as “foundational and meaningful.” During his study at AU, Rosen notes that the “nature and quality of conversation changed me.” 

Rosen had the opportunity to co-author a text book on writing, still used in college classrooms today, with an AU instructor, which has led to speaking engagements with composition instructors and graduate students. He also returned to the classroom as an instructor at Bentley and Harvard universities.

He reflects that his experiences at AU contributed to his career path and provided him with “the degree and license” to pursue further literary aspirations. Rosen has written a variety of works, ranging from text books to fiction, and including radio essays for NPR, op-ed pieces, and work on a new novel which will serve as the prequel to All Cry Chaos.

Grateful to earn his living as a writer, Rosen is pleased by the positive critical and popular response for All Cry Chaos. From reviews posted by The Washington Post and The New York Times as well as responses from individual readers who “read the book as he saw it,” Rosen’s excitement is genuine and palpable.

The thriller was nominated for two awards: the Edgar Award for Best First Novel issued by the Mystery Writers of America as well as the first Chautauqua Prize. Rosen humbly views the nominations as recognition of the novel’s literary merit.

 n the late 1960s and 1970s, in the midst of the Cold War and an increasingly dynamic political climate, Andrea Rugh, anthropology PhD ’78, and her husband, a Foreign Service officer, were stationed in several countries of the Middle East, a region of the world that was becoming more important. Rugh, however, wasn’t satisfied as an “embassy-dependent spouse” and began looking to not only learn about the Middle Eastern societies in which she was living, but to understand and analyze them.

At first, Rugh found it difficult to be taken seriously. She applied for positions in Cairo, Egypt, where they were stationed, but nothing was panning out. So when Rugh was asked to accompany a team of Americans and Egyptians to assess the needs of the Egyptian education system so USAID could provide assistance, she jumped at the chance. “My job was to help the experts understand what they were seeing and hearing,” says Rugh. “But when most of the American team abandoned the survey because of the ‘primitive accommodations,’ I was left with two others to write the report of our findings.” Being thrown into this situation gave Rugh the fuel she needed to become an almost overnight education expert, and she hasn’t turned back since.

In late 1972, while she, her husband, and three young children were home on leave from the Foreign Service, Rugh wanted a way to better understand a community she had lived in and observed in Saudi Arabia. “By then, we had lived in five countries, mostly in the Middle East. I was beginning to speak some Arabic and trying to immerse myself in Arabic cultures,” says Rugh. “In Saudi Arabia, I tried to map the kin links of the women I knew and found them so interconnected that I couldn’t begin to draw coherent trees.”

Rugh made an appointment with an AU anthropology professor to see if there was a course that would help her to understand the techniques of studying cultures. At the suggestion of the professor, Rugh enrolled in a continuing education course in ethnography and fell in love with the program, starting an MA and later a PhD in anthropology at AU 15 years after completing an undergraduate degree. “AU not only gave me the ability to make the ‘trees’ I wanted,” says Rugh, “but also gave me a solid theoretical background for the more than 30 years I continued to live in the Middle East.”

Eight books and thirty years later, Rugh still works tirelessly to help students and development professionals understand the realities and needs of education assistance in the Middle East. Her newest book, International Development in Practice: Education Assistance in Egypt, Pakistan, and Afghanistan, published in January 2012, portrays the realities of development work in the field. “Perhaps the hardest part in writing it was reliving the disappointment when government politics undermined some of the real reforms that were taking place,” says Rugh. “But that is one of the realities of assistance work.”

In writing this book, Rugh used her work experiences in Egypt, Pakistan, and Afghanistan to show specific examples of how education problems were addressed on the ground. Education assistance work usually focuses on issues of access to education opportunities, program quality, and capacity building to manage education systems. At the time, a particular emphasis was encouraging more girls to enroll and stay in school.

In Egypt, Rugh studied the impact of USAID support for school construction and practical courses in primary schools. In Pakistan, she worked to design and implement a major education assistance program. “Unfortunately, after the Soviets left Afghanistan, the U.S. lost interest in Pakistan,” says Rugh, “and halted its development work using the excuse of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons. The education project, which was making significant progress, was suddenly stopped after four years, rather than the ten planned.”

Rugh went on to work with UNICEF in Afghanistan to reinvigorate international education programs that had been suspended when the Taliban banned girls and female teachers from schools. “Our efforts there focused on a ‘program in a textbook’ that could be delivered to any group that wanted it,” says Rugh. “The program was ready to use when the U.S. invaded Afghanistan, but just as UNICEF was mounting a huge ‘Back to School’ effort, USAID convinced Afghan authorities to use an old USAID-funded book and our book was abandoned.”

Rugh says that while much development and assistance work is positive, the “donor system” of reporting prevents developers from learning all they could from past experience. “Reports of completed projects stress positive outcomes to ensure future funding and jobs for their consultants,” says Rugh. “As a result, it’s difficult to learn from others’ mistakes, and those entering the field are left to start afresh building their own expertise.”

Rugh believes her book portrays the realties of fieldwork and the challenges faced by development professionals in a way that hasn’t been done before. “In many ways, these countries are entirely different—their history with education, their geographic conditions, their institutional capacities all differ,” she says. “But many of their education problems are the same—difficulties in providing schooling opportunities, an emphasis on rote learning, and the bureaucratic rigidities that make reform almost impossible. In all of these countries, the majority of parents want their children to learn, but those children who remain at home often do so because schooling facilities are not accessible.”

Over her long career, Rugh finds education is important to the very fabric of societies. “Every school system in the world seeks to produce the educated adults the society expects,” says Rugh, “whether that means independent, problem-solving adults or those with refined manners befitting educated persons. That means a program that works in one culture might be resisted in another.” Rugh says that many development experts neglect this integral aspect of development. “Experts sent out to other countries rarely test whether their methods and solutions work in a new context.”

But Rugh says that these challenges are what make the work fascinating. “What makes this work interesting to me,” says Rugh, “are the conflicting ideologies and cultural perspectives that produce challenges every day in the field."