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ULM
has been awarded a $1.2 Million (3-years) NSF Grant for the Delta
Agriculture Middle School Applied Life Sciences (DAMSALS2)
Project. The
DAMSALS2 project will serve 7th through 12th grade teachers and students in
twelve parishes in rural
Northeast Louisiana
. The goal of the project is to provide opportunities
for teachers and students to learn about, experience, and use
information technologies within the context of instruction addressing
agriculture related science concepts.
The principal
investigator on the project, Patty Watts, is the designer and director
of the DAMSALS LaSIP Project. She has 13 years experience directing
successful professional development projects through the Louisiana
Systemic Initiatives Program and Delta Rural Systemic Initiative.
She is currently serving as Director of the Delta Regional
Educators’ Academy at
ULM
.
Watts
said, “The project’s objectives are to enhance the information
technology skills of science teachers and students, increase awareness
of the use of information technology in agriculture related sciences,
and increase the science content knowledge of teachers and
students.”
Watts
also noted that
Louisiana
has made great strides in bringing technology into classrooms in
recent years by reducing its ratio of students per computer from 88:1
in 1996 to 5.6:1 in 2001.
She said, “Even though the communities served by
the project are poor and traditionally underserved, the region has a
student per computer ratio almost equal to the state. However,
technology is still not being used even with all the availability. The
National
Center
for Educational Statistics reports that the availability of technology
does not ensure its use and that it is used more often in schools with
small minority populations and low levels of poverty.”
The
program is set to run for three years.
Each year there will be a summer institute for teachers, summer
camps for students, and academic year follow-up activities.
Participants will be from the twelve rural school systems in
Northeast Louisiana
. The first year
will be for grades 7 and 8, year two will be for 8th and 9th
grades, and year three for 9th through 12th
grades.
One
co-principal investigator on the grant is Dr. Charlotte Owens, an
assistant professor of computer science at
ULM
. Owens has extensive experience with projects for improving
technology use in grades K-12. Another co-principal investigator on
the grant is Dr. Eric Pani, Associate Dean of Arts and Sciences at
ULM
. Pani is a
meteorologist and has extensive experience in professional development
of science teachers through LaSIP and Delta RSI sponsored projects.
The other co-principal Investigator Dr. Mike Camille, an associate
professor of Geosciences, is an expert at GIS.
Additional
ULM
faculty
participating in the project will be Dr. Sean Chenoweth and Dr. Paul
Croft from Geosciences and Dr. Willy Hoefler from Agriculture.
For
more information about the grant contact Patty Watts at 342-1884.
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On October 14, the
University
of
Louisiana
at Monroe School of Visual and Performing Arts presented a concert
featuring the two Fazioli 9 foot-Grand Pianos owned by the University.
The concert featured Deborah McClung-Guillory,
Richard Seiler and Coralie White, of the ULM Piano Department, and
Donald Cornell, retired
ULM
professor of piano. Proceeds from the event benefited the ULM School
of Visual and Performing Arts.
The Fazioli Company has designed and produced grand
and concert-grand pianos in its factory in
Sacile
,
Italy
since 1979, the year the company was founded by pianist and engineer
Paolo Fazioli. The Fazioli Company makes only 100 pianos a year
because of the scarcity of wood used in the production. “The most
important part is the soundboard – the heart of the piano – we use
spruce to make it, “Fazioli said during his lecture earlier that
day. “We use many types of wood and each one is specific to each
component of the piano. It is not easy (to find the wood) because it
comes from one part of the Italian Alps and they only cut the old
trees to get it. Not all they cut is appropriate for the sound board
– it has special characteristics and that is why we cannot produce
many pianos a year.”
“These
pianos are the best made in the world today,” Dr. Keith White, head
of the
School
of
Visual
and Performing Arts, said. “
ULM
is the only University in the country to have two 9-foot Grand Fazioli
Pianos and we are very proud of that. Our concert not only featured
the exquisite pianos, but also our outstanding keyboard faculty here
at
ULM
.”
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The
University
of
Louisiana
at
Monroe
’s Speech and Debate Forum finished the fall 2003 semester by
earning 31 awards against some of the nations top speech and debate
teams.
The team began the 2003-2004 intercollegiate speech
competition season with a third place finish at the
University
of
St. Thomas
and
Rice
University
tournaments, held in
Houston
,
Texas
, on September 27-28. This competition featured the 2002 national
championship team from the
University
of
Texas
, in-state rivals
McNeese
State
University
, as well as eleven other universities from throughout the region. The
team was led by junior Isaac Henderson who finished third in Dramatic
Interpretation during the
St. Thomas
tournament.
Henderson
then built on this success with fourth place finishes in both Dramatic
Interpretation and Poetry Interpretation during the
Rice
University
portion of the competition.
On
October 4th, 2003
, the team traveled to
Manhattan
,
Kansas
, where the ULM Speech and Debate Forum completed its first-ever
appearance at the Kansas State University Invitational Speech
Tournament with a 6th place overall finish. The competition
featured the Big 12 powerhouses
Nebraska
,
Oklahoma
,
Texas
and
Kansas
State
, as well as twelve other universities from throughout the region. The
team was led by team captains Isaac Henderson, who finished second in
Dramatic Interpretation, and Nick Hirsch, who finished sixth in Prose
Interpretation.
The
University
of
Louisiana
at
Monroe
’s Speech and Debate Forum continued its successful season with a 3rd
place overall finish at the Central Missouri State University Speech
Tournament. The competition featured eleven of the top speech programs
from
Arkansas
,
Kansas
,
Louisiana
,
Missouri
and
Oklahoma
. The tournament, hosted by
Central
Missouri
State
University
, was held in
Warrensburg
,
Miss.
, on October 31st - November 1st. The team was led by team
captain Isaac Henderson, who won the championships in both Dramatic
Interpretation and Program of Oral Interpretation.
Henderson
also finished as a finalist in Poetry Interpretation and Communication
Analysis, en route to a 5th place Pentathlon finish. Other
ULM team members earning honors as finalists were Lashonda Williams in
Extemporaneous Speaking and Impromptu Speaking, Tara Bouchie in
Informative Speaking, Kymberleigh Bell in Persuasive Speaking, and Amy
Wilson in Impromptu Speaking.
The ULM Speech and Debate Team finished the fall
semester with a team victory over
Louisiana
State
University
,
University
of
Alabama
,
University
of
Mississippi
,
University
of
Texas
, the
University
of
Oklahoma
, and others at the 2003 Red River Classic, hosted by LSU-Shreveport
on
November 14-16th, 2003
. The three day tournament featured more than 1,000 entries in
individual speech competitions and 154 debaters, representing 32
colleges and universities from throughout the south. While the
ULM
team enjoyed success in speech competitions throughout the semester,
this competition also marked a successful debut for
ULM
in debate competition for the 2003-2004 season. Lashonda Williams
earned honors as the top speaker in debate, out of 154 competitors and
earned a 9th place finish overall, and Amy Wilson debated
her way to a 5th place finish. In individual events
competition, senior Nick Hirsch finished 2nd out of 61
competitors in Prose competition.
The fall semester was one of the most successful in
the history of
ULM
’s program, and saw the team earn 31 awards, including 5
championships. Team members Kymberleigh Bell, Tara Bouchie, Isaac
Henderson, Nick Hirsch, Lashonda Williams and Amy Wilson all qualified
for the National Forensics Association National Championship
Tournament, to be held next spring in
Providence
,
Rhode Island
. The team will now begin preparations for the spring semester which
features the state and national championship tournaments.
The
ULM Speech and Debate Forum is open to any undergraduate student, and
no prior experience is required. If you are interested in finding out
more about the team, please contact Bob Alexander at 342-1462.
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When asked about the accomplishments of the
Toxicology Department, Dr. H.M. Mehendale smiles, laughs, and talks
excitedly about
ULM
’s award-winning students and top-notch faculty. A cursory glance at
the thick file of published papers and awards shows why he is so
proud. In 2003 alone,
ULM
toxicology students won top prizes from the National Kidney
Foundation, Colgate-Palmolive, the Society of Toxicology, the
American
College
of Toxicology, and Quintiles, Inc.
For the uninitiated, toxicology is the study of the
adverse effects of chemicals and physical agents on the human body.
Toxicologists study drugs as well as environmental hazards. They are
often involved in risk assessment for agencies like the Louisiana
Department of Environmental Quality and the Environmental Protection
Agency where they help determine the exposure levels at which
chemicals become dangerous.
One student who is at the forefront of health
research is graduate student Vishal S. Vaidya, who received a National
Kidney Foundation post-doctoral fellowship of $80,000 to work at
Harvard
University
. Vaidya received his Ph.D. from
ULM
’s Toxicology program and is now working with renowned scientist Dr.
Joseph Bonventre at Harvard to find an early detection method for
kidney failure. Kidney failure is an enormous problem for the elderly,
and often results in death or painful dialysis. Vaidya and Bonventre
are developing a test to spot kidney failure in its earliest phases so
that suitable clinical interventions may be developed to stop its
progression.
For the second year in a row, a
ULM
student submitted the top paper at the annual Society of Toxicology
meeting. Pallavi B. Limaye was awarded top honors for her paper in the
mechanisms specialty. Dr. Mehendale is particularly proud that
ULM
students win so many awards for papers. He says that often in science,
in addition to conducting thorough and high-level research, good
writing and communications skills are not encouraged enough.
“Doing research is important, but we must also
teach the students to communicate. If you cannot communicate the
results of your experiments to other people, you might as well not
have done it,” he said.
Another milestone for this department is that, for
the third year in a row, a
ULM
student won the Novartis Graduate Fellowship award. Only one of these
$16,000 awards is given throughout the
United States
and
Canada
.
ULM
students were also the only ones to receive the Colgate-Palmolive
awards for student research training.
With
four full-time faculty members, the Toxicology Department teaches
approximately fifteen graduate students and twenty-five
undergraduates. They also bring in over $2 million dollars in outside
funding. Theirs is a small department with a huge national impact.
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This semester, the
ULM
department of Kinesiology received a gift worth $150,000 from Glenwood
Regional Medical center to revisit Dr. Lisa Colvin’s 1993 pediatric
body composition study.
In 1993, Dr. Lisa Colvin was a doctoral student at
the
University
of
Southern Mississippi
collecting data for her dissertation investigating pediatric body
composition measures and use of standards for the determination of
overweightness and obesity. For her project, Dr. Colvin was awarded a
$25,000 grant from
Glenwood
Regional
Medical
Center
to use their Magnetic Resonance Imaging facility.
The project consisted of 24 pre-pubescent boys and
girls ages 6 through 12 from the
North Louisiana
and
South Arkansas
region. The participant’s body composition was measured using
skinfolds thickness, hydrostatic weighing, bioelectrical impedance,
near infrared imaging, and body mass index --data which was collected
in the Department of Kinesiology with the assistance of Dr. Luke
Thomas-- as well as magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to compare
skinfold measure to a “true” subcutaneous fat measure -- data
which was collected in Glenwood’s MRI facility.
After the data was collected, comparisons were made
between measures, using MRI as the gold standard for body composition.
The results indicated that skinfold and MRI are the best predictor of
percent fat in this population, and new skinfold equations were
written for this age group as a result.
Ten years later, in October 2003, Dr. Colvin, now a
ULM Kinesiology professor, asked
Glenwood
Regional
Medical
Center
if they would be interested in repeating this study with the same
children they measured 10 years ago. They agreed to repeat the study
and have given Dr. Colvin the MRI department equipment, film, analysis
and technician time which is worth approximately $75,000 in funding.
Dr. Colvin is currently locating and scheduling all subjects for their
repeat study.
In addition, Glenwood has agreed to begin a new study
with 30 additional children, an additional $75,000 gift, using the
same protocol that was used before. One new form of measurement is
Dual Energy X-Ray Absorptiometry (DEXA).
DEXA has been traditionally used to detect and diagnose
osteoporosis but has been used extensively in the past 5 years as a
highly valid and reliable means of measuring percent fat.
Due to the high cost of MRI investigations, DEXA has become the
tool of imaging choice and an additional “gold standard” measure
for the assessment of overweightness and obesity.
Dr. Lisa Colvin received her B.S. in Health and
Physical Education and M.Ed. in Physical Education at The University
of Louisiana at
Monroe
. She completed the Ph.D. in Exercise Physiology at The University of
Southern Mississippi. Over the past 10 years, she has been active in
the field of childhood obesity and overweightness research and looks
forward to continuing her work in the
North Louisiana
area. Dr. Colvin and the ULM Department of Kinesiology are in the
process of forming the
North
Louisiana
Center
for Childhood Obesity Intervention, which will be open to the
community and will use physical activity, nutrition and behavior
modification strategies to help children and their parents address
their condition. Area pediatricians, health care providers and
hospitals will be involved in the project, as well as other
ULM
faculty members on campus.
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- Finding a business opportunity and turning it into
a successful enterprise is not just about making money. “I look
forward to coming to the University everyday, and I can’t imagine
spending my life doing something I don’t enjoy,” Dr. Paul Dunn,
Director of the
ULM
Small
Business
Development
Center
, told the 20 people attending his Finding
Business Opportunities Workshop on
November 18, 2003
. “Before you decide on your business, make sure that it is
something you want to do for the rest of your life!”
-
- Finding
Business Opportunities is only one of the
free workshops offered on a regular basis by the ULM Small Business
Development Center (SBDC). For more than 20 years, the SBDC, a
member of the Louisiana Small Business Development Center Network,
has been providing management and technical assistance to
entrepreneurs and small business owners in twelve parishes in
northeast
Louisiana
.
-
- Without proper guidance and counseling, the rate of
failure for a small start-up business is usually 80% within the
first 5 years Dr. Dunn explained. “Counselors at the
ULM
Center
use an interactive approach to counseling that produces consistently
high quality results,” Dr. Dunn said. “Clients are encouraged to
be directly involved in the process so that they achieve better
understanding and become better, more independent managers for the
future.”
-
- During the fiscal year 2002-2003, the Center
provided counseling to 312 individual clients with a total of 2,308
counseling hours. The Center provided 60 workshops in 12 parishes
for 1,248 participants and 4,595 training hours. Partially funded by
the U.S. Small Business Administration, the U.S. Department of
Agriculture, the Louisiana Department of Economic Development, and
the
University
of
Louisiana
at
Monroe
, the activities of the ULM SBDC resulted in 55 completed business
plans. These plans resulted in 153 new jobs, $643,000 in facilities
improvements, and $895,925 in new equipment. There was a reported
sales increase among clients of $1,886,000, and total new funding
from loans, lines of credit, and equity amounted to $4,455,873.
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- As an example, the ULM SBDC has helped Don and Sam
Weems, co-owners of the Waterfront Grill, established in February
1997, with three successful loan packages, marketing research,
financial analysis, and business plan development.
“Dr. Dunn and the ULM SBDC have been invaluable to Sam and
me as we worked to build our business,” Don Weems said. “As we
go forward growing our business, we will continue to rely on this
incredible business community resource.” The Waterfront Grill now
employs 8 full-time and 42 part-time employees, and Don Weems was
named Louisiana Restaurateur of the Year in 2002.
-
- The Center also provided assistance to Sarah
Calhoun, owner and president of Medical Temps, Inc. in
West Monroe
. Medical Temps, Inc. won the 2001 Rivertown Award of Excellence and
currently employs more than 350 professional medical temps. In 2001,
sales increased 5 fold.
-
- The SBDC has had a very valuable impact on the
local and regional economy. “We need to develop the economy so
that our residents have decent economic opportunities,” Dr. Dunn
said. “Economic development and diversification depends on
creating new ventures, expanding existing businesses, and attracting
targeted outside firms.”
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- For
more information on the
Small
Business
Development
Center
contact Dr. Paul Dunn at 342-1224.
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