| Trouble viewing this email? Read it online. |
| June 2, 2023 | Submit a Note |
 Last chance! Catch Into the Woods tonight or this weekend.
I’d like to offer a hardy congratulations to the 20 College faculty who received promotions – to Associate Professor, Full Professor or Senior Lecturer. A big round of applause to: John Birmingham (Physics), Academic promotions represent a long, long journey of tremendously hard work, hope, setbacks and triumphs, each spanning years - often decades. For some, perhaps they glimpsed this journey some time late in their undergraduate careers, for others a little later. Having learned about academic careers and hierarchies, a spark of aspiration and ambition flickered on. And then, each of these faculty jumped through many hoops and made many sacrifices to build the portfolios they currently have. Of course, an academic life is a wonderful life; however, advancement is never a given. I am enormously proud to serve these wonderful faculty, and grateful for their ongoing contributions! As we work to raise the profile of the College, having faculty or staff quoted in the media can really help boost our reputation. If you’re open to sharing your expertise in this way, I encourage you to fill out this form providing your expertise and contact information for our Media Relations team. They regularly get inquiries from the media for expertise on timely issues—we absolutely should be taking advantage of these opportunities and it starts with the team being able to quickly reach our experts. Thank you to all the faculty and staff who have helped or participated in today’s Transfer Admit Day! Every interaction our prospective transfer students have with our amazing faculty and staff makes a difference as they decide if SCU is the right place for them! I wish you well as we head into Week 10 and the end of what has been a productive Spring quarter! Sincerely, Daniel Highlights
The Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry recently partnered with the American Chemical Society to host regional testing for the 2023 National Chemistry Olympiad in our fabulous facilities in the Sobrato Campus for Discovery and Innovation! Under the watchful eye of Linda Brunauer (Chemistry and Biochemistry) and volunteers from local sections of the American Chemical Society, twenty-five incredibly talented Bay Area high school chemistry students were selected to trek to SCU for a day-long series of written exams and laboratory practical testing. Of the nearly 1500 students who competed nationwide, 20 were chosen to attend a Chemistry "study camp" at the University of Maryland in June; from those students, a team of 4 will be chosen to compete later in the year in the International Chemistry Olympiad in Zurich. Bay Area students have a history of frequently being included in the study camp crew and this year was no exception as one of the 25 was selected to move on to the next phase of the competition!
Lindsay Halladay (Psychology, Neuroscience) published a peer-reviewed article in Current Protocols in Neuroscience, "Investigating Neural Correlates of Behavior Through In Vivo Electrophysiology." Lindsay was invited to submit this paper based on her expertise in "single unit" recording, a method using surgically implanted electrodes to record neural activity in individual neurons in the [mouse] brain during behavior. Investigating the neural correlates of behavior can be challenging in freely behaving animals, especially when making inferences related to internal states that are temporally or conceptually ambiguous, such as decision-making or motivation. The article discusses fundamental considerations for the optimal design and interpretation of in vivo electrophysiological recording experiments including careful creation of appropriate and rigorous controls, awareness of the many potential confounds when attributing neural signals to animal behavior, and different optimization strategies required when investigating neural encoding of external stimuli versus internally-driven behaviors. Image: Journal cover image depicts data recorded in the Halladay Lab. Data are raw images of spike waveforms recorded in the mouse brain during free behavior.
Tom Plante (Psychology) co-hosted the conference, Faith Seeking Understanding: Conversations on the Emerging Scientific Foundations of Faith, on Friday, May 19 at SCU and on Saturday, May 20 at Stanford University sponsored by the Ignatian Center at SCU and the Catholic Community at Stanford. SCU speakers included Dennis Smolarski, S.J. (Mathematics and Computer Science), Ahmed Amer (Computer Science and Engineering), Brian Green (Markkula Center), Aleksandar Zecevic (Electrical Engineering), and former Arrupe Center director, Catherine Wolff. The conference highlighted themes in the recently published edited book, Human Interaction with the Divine, the Sacred, and the Deceased: Psychological, Scientific, and Theological Perspectives, by Tom Plante and Gary Schwartz, and from the recent book Beyond: How Humankind Thinks About Heaven by Catherine Wolff. View the video recording.
Three students from the Theatre Design & Technology minor program, Ellen Duncan '24 (Communication), Fernando Salvador Francisco '25 (Communication), Shreyansh Panda '25 (Communication), joined Derek Duarte (Theatre and Dance), Steven Fetter (Theatre and Dance) and Heather Kenyon (Theatre and Dance) at the national USITT technical theatre conference in St. Louis, MO over Spring Break. As well as sessions on stage management, theatre technology, and automation, they met up with Joey Brennan '09 (Theatre Arts) who staged the Super Bowl LVI halftime show in Los Angeles.
Takeshi Moro (Art and Art History) published a limited edition artist book with Sming Sming books. In Benign Neglect: Historic Japanese American Bonsai, Moro documents sixty bonsai grown by seed by the Issei (first-generation Japanese Americans) post-WWII. These bonsai were left in the care of renowned aesthetic pruner Dennis Makishima, who described the collection as being one of "benign neglect" as the Issei became too busy rebuilding their lives after the war, and gave minimal attention to the bonsai. Over time, the bonsai started to form odd visual features, and their aesthetic characteristics are not typical of, or even desired by, traditional or contemporary Japanese bonsai practices. Kenny Murakami, former owner of Moraga Garden Center, writes in the foreword, "The story of these pines is a story of a journey, not a journey of distance, but a journey of time . . . They represent a period of transition for Japanese Americans, from a time of great personal and institutional racism, to a time of greater yet not quite full acceptance by American society." Takeshi Moro's photographs in Benign Neglect are the last time the bonsai are represented together, as Dennis donated his entire collection upon his retirement in 2021. Image: Untitled Bonsai II, Pigmented Inkjet Print, 2023, size variable. Photo Credit: Takeshi Moro
Varya Zlotnik '24 (Psychology) was selected to participate in the American Psychological Association's (APA) Summer Undergraduate Psychology Experience in Research (SUPER). The SUPER fellowship program was created by the APA to promote diversity among psychology undergraduates considering research as a career by expanding access to research and mentorship to students from underrepresented groups in science. Varya is one of only 25 undergraduates selected across North America to participate in the program. The fellowship will support Varya's research in the Halladay Lab, provide funding for her to travel to the upcoming APA research convention to present her research, and allow her to connect with other fellows in the program to develop career-related skills. Varya's research with Lindsay Halladay (Psychology & Neuroscience) incorporates mouse behavioral models with immunohistochemistry and chemogenetics to investigate neural circuitry crucial for aversive memory formation, which has implications for understanding the neural dysfunction associated with fear- and anxiety-related mental health disorders. Image: Varya Zlotnik.
In early May, Lang Chen (Psychology) organized a panel entitled “The Behavioral and Neurobiological Basis of Impaired Memory in ASD: The Heterogeneous Patterns and Interventions” at the Annual Conference of the International Society For Autism Research (INSAR). Lang presented his work on hippocampal circuits and functions associated with atypical memory skills in ASD along with three other talks from Princeton University, LEAD-Université Bourgogne (France), and Université de Genève (Switzerland). In addition, Anna Riggs '23 (Neuroscience), a graduating De Nardo Scholar, presented her research work at the INSAR 2023 as a poster, titled “Aberrant resting-state functional connectivity in individuals with ASD and ADHD comorbidity.” Anna’s work examined intrinsic brain connectivity between various brain regions that showed differences between individuals with comorbid conditions of ASD and ADHD and those with only ASD or those with no neurodevelopmental disorders.
Juan Velasco (English) gave a presentation on the forthcoming critical edition of the unpublished novel by Jose Antonio Villarreal, Our Little Life. The paper was titled “A Pocho Caliban,” and it was presented at the III Muros International Conference, Universidad Miguel Hernández, Spain on May 19, 2023. Juan also gave a poetry reading at the same conference from the anthology of Latinx literature, In Xochitl In Cuicatl. It was a success and he was invited to return in July.
Center for the Arts and Humanities (CAH) student fellows presented their interdisciplinary research projects in the arts and humanities at the CAH Student Fellows Showcase. Digital Humanities Initiative fellow Maddie Moran '24 (English) has indexed SCU's extraordinary collection of zines created by incarcerated women and developed a digital finding aid to use the collection. Alex Perez '23 (Public Health Science, Political Science, Women's and Gender Studies) has been thinking and writing in interdisciplinary ways about indigenous identity, sacred lands, and the University. Bianca Romero '23 (History, French & Francophone Studies) has investigated the colonial structures of urban planning in Vietnam and French Indochina. Emma Rutter '23 (Neuroscience, Theatre Arts) has pushed current thinking about dance and memory in new directions with her study on movement and dance education.
Marilyn Edelstein (English) returned this quarter to teach “Family, Love, and Loss in Contemporary American Short Stories,” which explores how literature can evoke emotions and empathy and how love and grief can shake a family dynamic. An OLLI alum, Marilyn has been teaching for the program regularly since 2007. OLLI@SCU will be featuring notable instructors periodically in the College Notes. The average course ranges from 4 to 10 hours of instruction per quarter. We hope this will inspire you to stay updated on OLLI news and possibly teach a class for our members. OLLI instructors are compensated for their time and knowledge; to learn more about the joy of teaching adult learners, contact olliatscu@gmail.com.
Get connected!     |
Back row L-R: Joey Brennan, Derek Duarte, Steven Fetter, Fernando Salvador Francisco.
Lang Chen (left) and Anna Riggs (right). 
Left to right: Bianca Romero, Alex Perez, Emma Rutter, Maddie Moran.| College of Arts and Sciences |
Questions? Contact Sandy Boyer |