The VWS began in the spring of 2014 with a reading by poet Roger Reeves. Each year, the Department of English continues to bring nationally renowned authors to UK.
"This series is a source of inspiration and excitement for our students, faculty and staff and continues to add to the overall vibrant literary culture of Lexington,” said Crystal Wilkinson, associate professor of English.
You can find a full schedule of 2021 VWS events listed below.
Kevin Willmott (presented by Film and Media Studies): 7 p.m. Oct. 13, William T. Young Auditorium, Register Here
Willmott is an Oscar and Academy Award-winning American film director and screenwriter, as well as a professor of film at the University of Kansas. He is known for co-writing and directing "The 24th" — a historical drama on the true story of the Houston riot of 1917. Willmott grew up in Junction City, Kansas, and received his bachelor’s degree in drama from Marymount College. After graduation, he returned home and worked as a civil rights activist, fighting for the rights of the poor, creating two Catholic worker shelters for the homeless and forcing the integration of several long-standing segregated institutions.
Carter Sickels (presented by the Appalachian Center): 7 p.m. Oct. 21, online via Zoom, Register Here
Sickels is the author of the novel "The Prettiest Star," (Hub City Press) which is a recipient of the 2021 Southern Book Prize and the Weatherford Award. The novel was also selected as a Kirkus Best Book of 2020 and named a Best LGBT Book of 2020 by O Magazine. His debut novel, "The Evening Hour" (Bloomsbury 2012), was adapted into a feature film, which premiered at the 2020 Sundance Film Festival. Additionally, Sickels' works have appeared in a variety of publications, including The Atlantic, Oxford American, Poets & Writers, BuzzFeed, Joyland, Guernica, Catapult and Electric Literature. Sickels, who is an assistant professor of English at Eastern Kentucky University, is the recipient of the 2013 Lambda Literary Emerging Writer Award and has earned fellowships from the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, the Sewanee Writers’ Conference, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts and MacDowell.
Nicole Chung: 7 p.m. Nov. 18, online via Zoom, Register Here
Chung is an American writer and editor. She is the former managing editor of The Toast, the editor-in-chief of Catapult magazine and the author of the national bestseller, “All You Can Ever Know.” The memoir was named Best Book of the Year by The Washington Post, NPR and the Library Journal. Additionally, it was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, a semifinalist for the PEN Open Book Award, an Indies Choice Honor Book and an official Junior Library Guild Selection. Chung's writing has appeared in The New York Times, The New York Times Magazine, GQ, Time, The Guardian and Vulture, among others. She was also named to the "Good Morning America" AAPI Inspiration List honoring those “making Asian American history right now."
All Visiting Writers Series events are free and open to the public.
More than 11,800 students have gained free online access to essential course materials and saved more than $1.48 million in textbook spending from 2017 through 2021, thanks to the University of Kentucky Libraries’ Alternative Textbook Grant Program. The program supports UK faculty to switch from commercial textbooks to openly licensed textbooks, library-licensed information resources or free course content created by grant recipients.
“It is exhilarating to hear that the Alternative Textbook Grant Program has enabled equitable access to learning materials for so many students,” said Deirdre Scaggs, UK Libraries associate dean of services. “UK Libraries is thankful to instructors who have adopted this innovative approach to teaching, and looks forward to partnering with more instructors to elevate students’ academic success.”
Launched in 2016, the annual Alternative Textbook Grant Program has awarded 59 grants to instructors from 13 colleges as of June 30, 2021. While some grantees have replaced commercial textbooks with library resources or openly licensed textbooks, other grantees have created their own course materials and shared them online for other instructors to adopt. Educational resources made freely available by alternative textbook grantees include:
Andrew Byrd and Brenna Byrd, Department of Linguistics and Department of Modern and Classical Languages, Literatures and Cultures, College of Arts and Sciences.
Lauren Cagle, Department of Writing, Rhetoric, and Digital Studies, College of Arts and Science.
The grantees teach a wide variety of subjects, ranging from Russian and arts administration to engineering and political science. With the support of the funds, some grantees aim to create multimedia content to enrich instruction and facilitate student learning.
“Through experience, I have found that an alternative textbook model is optimal for 100% online courses,” said Sara Police, director of the online graduate certificate in applied nutrition and culinary medicine from the Department of Pharmacology and Nutritional Sciences. “Curating, reviewing, editing and then organizing resources for asynchronous learning is essential for this distinct mode of course delivery and independent learning.”
UK Libraries will host two information sessions this semester to introduce faculty and graduate students to the universe of open educational resources. Details about them are available online. Additionally, faculty interested in finding alternative textbooks for their courses are welcome to contact the academic liaisons for their departments or Adrian Ho, UK Libraries director of digital scholarship, for more information. An online guide is also available for consultation anytime.
Starting in the Fall 2021 semester, the University of Kentucky’s College of Arts & Sciences will implement a one-course Race and Ethnicity requirement for all majors, starting with incoming freshmen.
The College’s Race & Ethnicity Ad Hoc Committee developed the plan, which the UK Provost’s Office approved. Students will be able to select from a list of classes that address issues of race and ethnicity in more than 50% of its materials, lecture time and assignments. Students also will be able to use the Race and Ethnicity class to satisfy UK Core and other requirements at the same time.
The committee acted under the leadership of Christina Alcalde, former dean of Inclusion and Internationalization, who is now vice president for institutional diversity and inclusion at Miami University of Ohio.
“This is part of a national trend in higher education for many years as universities are looking at ways to diversify their curriculum,” said Christian M.M. Brady, interim dean of the College of Arts & Sciences. “We have hired so many amazing faculty members in the past few years who lend a tremendous amount of expertise to the teaching of these topics.”
The College has a review process through which faculty submit their courses to the A&S Diversity and Inclusivity Committee. After reviewing the courses, the committee sends them to the College Educational Policy Committee. Once approved, the courses can be included in the program. The College has a wide array of classes from which students can choose. “Overall, the requirement will help students broaden their liberal arts education, no matter which major they choose,” Brady said. “We are eager to offer these classes to our student body across the University.”
Doctoral Student Gabriela Montero Mejia's Work Is Supported by the Robert M. Odear, '28, '30 Faculty Research Fund in Latin AmericaCollege of Arts and Sciences
What drew you to the University of Kentucky graduate program?
I have a Licenciatura degree in archaeology from the Universidad Veracruzana in Mexico, my country of origin, obtained in May 2016. I moved to the United States in 2017, when I was accepted to the Ph.D. program in Anthropology with a Research Excellence stipend at the University of Kentucky.
I have been part of several archaeological projects in Mexico since 2013 as an undergraduate and graduate student. At the Eastern Lower Papaloapan Basin, where I focus on for my dissertation research, I was part of all the field and laboratory seasons of the Recorrido Regional Arqueológico Tres Zapotes project (Tres Zapotes Regional Archaeological Survey, RRATZ), directed by University of Kentucky professor Christopher Pool and staff archaeologist Michael Loughlin. My interest in populations under Aztec and Spanish imperial control emerged while I was working for this project, and I chose to pursue this research in a Ph.D. program at UK with Pool as my adviser.
Describe the research you are conducting and the professor who is your primary mentor.
My adviser is Christopher Pool, a prominent researcher in the archaeology of the Mexican Gulf Coast. Pool is a full professor in the Department of Anthropology, and he has conducted several archaeological projects over more than 30 years in Mexico. His research encompasses a broad range of themes, including long-term change in economic and political organization, historical ecology, culture contact and the evolution of social complexity. The research I am conducting under his supervision focuses on an archaeological assessment of changes in quality of life of indigenous populations to measure economic impacts of the contact period in Mexico, exploring how alterations in access to agricultural land affected native communities after European conquest.
The goal of this dissertation project is to contribute to a more nuanced understanding of how colonialism and its economic enterprises affected indigenous people and their everyday provisioning. This research problem is addressed comparing local adaptations to the Mexican and Spanish political and economic systems through data to be obtained in excavations at two sites of the ELPB: Mazapa and La Sierra. The project will contribute to anthropological understandings of culture contact, developing an approach through household quality of life that affords the possibility of identifying local and socioeconomic variation in the impact of colonialism.
So far, I have had two seasons of predissertation work. In the first season (2018), I conducted archival research in Mexico City and Xalapa, where I analyzed 16th-century maps and located the archaeological communities found by the RRATZ project, confirming their correspondence with colonial occupations. In the second season (2019) I performed laboratory work at the Tres Zapotes Museum in the Eastern Lower Papaloapan Basin, which stores the regional archaeological materials. There, I refined the regional ceramic catalogue for the Postclassic to colonial period. The next step in my dissertation project is to conduct excavations at the sites proposed.
Have you benefitted from any internships, presentations at conferences, research travel or study abroad opportunities?
My predissertation research has been supported by several awards and research grants, including the UK Anthropology Research Excellence stipend; two UK Odear awards; The Susan-Abbott Jamieson Research grant; two Latin American, Caribbean and Latino Studies research grants; and the Halperin Award, which is a world-wide competitive grant by the Society of Economic Anthropology (SEA). I have presented my Ph.D. research in national and international conferences, including several Society for American Archaeology (SAA) annual meetings, the International Congress of Americanists, the American Anthropological Association and other regional symposia such as the Latin American, Caribbean and Latino Studies symposium and the Midwest Mesoamerican Conference. Last spring, I was part of the University of Kentucky team for the SAA international archaeological ethics debate competition, winning first place. I have published a co-authored book chapter on the prehispanic occupations of the Eastern Lower Papaloapan Basin (Pool et. Al. 2017),and public-oriented chapters about the osteological and codex collections of the Anthropology Museum of Xalapa (MAX, Cuevas and Montero 2019).
Please explain how receiving this scholarship or fellowship has impacted your graduate study today and how you see it potentially affecting your future.
I am immensely grateful to the donor(s) of the Odear award as well as to the NSF, which are allowing me to conduct fieldwork in Mexico. One of the difficulties for timely progress when conducting archaeological research internationally is that heritage is legally protected by its country of origin. In my case, Mexican law does not permit the archaeological collections that are recovered in excavations to travel outside of the country, and the analysis of such collections takes several months. This fall semester, I am conducting archaeological research at three sites spanning the Aztec to colonial transition, and I will analyze the archaeological artifacts recovered in my excavations.
The money will allow me to recover data for my doctoral dissertation, but it will mainly benefit my career through allowing me to develop the necessary skills to direct an archaeological research project, with guidance of Pool. My career goals are oriented towards impactful research, emphasizing the relationship between science and public outreach. My dissertation project therefore has a strong focus on knowledge dissemination and communication. The Odear award will allow me to start writing my dissertation in the spring of 2022, finishing my degree in a total of five years. Thank you: I never could have done it without this support.
A recent study by the Kentucky Council on Postsecondary Education lauded the International Studies B.A. program in the University of Kentucky’s College of Arts & Sciences as a top program in preparing under-represented minority students for early career success.
The report is titled “Analysis on Workforce Preparedness and Early Career Outcomes for Under-represented Minority and Low-Income Status Students in Kentucky.” The study’s authors identified the International Studies Program as “exemplary in preparing underrepresented minority students for early career success,” said Matthew K. Vetter, a senior research analyst with the council.
“Our analysis indicates that under-represented minority (URM) graduates from the program are earning competitive wages in their first year after graduation,” he said.
According to the report, earnings for under-represented minority alumni between 2008 and 2018 in the first full year after graduation “actually exceeded the median earnings of their non-URM peers over the past 10 years. In a state-wide comparison, this program is in the top 5% of all academic programs in preparing URM students for early career success.”
Researchers used employment and earnings data about statewide graduates from 2008 to 2020. They identified high-achieving academic programs at the Bachelor’s, Associate’s and Certificate-Diploma levels. The researchers went further using qualitative methods to find out from faculty and alumni why these programs did as well as they did in aiding under-represented minorities toward favorable outcomes.
"This recognition means so much to the International Studies program, especially in light of our recent efforts, which have been supported by the U.S. Department of Education, to increase experiential education opportunities, particularly for URM and low-income students,” said Emily Beauliu Bacchus, director of International Studies for the College.
The International Studies major requires each student to understand a global theme and a non-North American world region from multiple perspectives, to gain competence in a related foreign language, and to carry out in-depth research and writing. International Studies majors graduate with knowledge and skills that enable them to live and work as global citizens throughout the world. The critical analytical skills and the multi-disciplinary perspectives gained as International Studies majors prepare students to be adaptable and successful in their careers.
Established as part of the education reforms set forth in the Postsecondary Education Improvement Act of 1997, the Council on Postsecondary Education is Kentucky's statewide postsecondary and adult education coordinating agency. The governor appoints 13 citizens, one faculty member and one student member to the council; the commissioner of education is an ex-officio member. A supporting state agency is attached to the Governor’s Office and run by the president, who is appointed by council membership.
In the article, Farr states: "In today’s news, Critical Race Theory has become a hot political topic. It seems as if CRT burst on the scene overnight. However, Critical Race has been around for several decades. In this introduction to Critical Race Theory, I will briefly explain what Critical Race Theory (CRT) is and how it originated. I will also distinguish it from theories that it has been confused with. Finally, I will attempt to rescue CRT from several misunderstandings or false interpretations by its critics."
With help from the University of Kentucky, teens from Warren and Logan counties transformed the Logan County Extension office into a dinner theater to relay the message to local farm families that is ok to not be ok.
The teens were the first performers of a pilot Farmers’ Dinner Theater specifically focused on farm stress and mental health. It is a program a year in the making, and one that UK hopes to share with other rural communities across the Southeast.
The UK colleges of Nursing and Agriculture, Food and Environment have partnered to develop resources and programs addressing rural mental health like the theater with funding from the Kentucky Nurses Action Coalition through a nursing innovation grant made possible through support from the Center to Champion Nursing in America, a joint effort of the AARP Foundation, AARP and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and additional support from the Kentucky Cattlemen’s Association. The theater builds on the “Farmers’ Dinner Theater” model developed by Deborah Reed, UK nursing professor emeritus, which educated farm families about unaddressed health and safety risks at convenient times in a casual setting close to their homes.
Mental health services are often lacking in rural communities, which can make it difficult for someone who is struggling to get qualified local help. This is especially true in Kentucky where 112 out of 120 counties are considered medically underserved.
“Part of our goal with this project is to normalize the conversation about mental health,” said Jennifer Hunter, assistant director of UK family and consumer sciences extension. “We want to make it easier for someone to get help. Hopefully, we make it easier for someone to recognize if an individual needs help. We hope to provide access points, so people know where to go if someone does need help.”
Farmers face a unique set of stressors related to their profession. Warren County grain farmers Jennifer and Tom Tucker, who attended the theater, said they sometimes refer to themselves as “professional gamblers” because of all the uncertainties in agriculture.
“We gamble when we plant it. We gamble with harvest. We gamble with prices. Everything we do is out of our control,” said Jennifer Tucker. “When you feel that control slipping, that’s your whole life, so it is pretty important.”
“There is stress every day with the weather, the grain market, employees and with family,” said Tom Tucker. “We deal with it every day. Some days it is better than others, but it is definitely a stressful job.”
Agents with the UK Cooperative Extension Service in Warren and Logan counties helped recruit students to participate and helped facilitate the weeklong program. They also encouraged local farmers to attend the show.
Jenna Coles, a Logan County High School junior, knows firsthand the stress that comes from running a family farm as she lives and breathes it every day. That is why she presented the idea to her local FFA chapter, many of whom decided to participate.
“I wanted to get more people my age involved with it, so we all knew about mental health and how to cope with different situations,” she said. “The most stressful thing is when you get a call at two in the morning saying, ‘The cows are out, and we have to go get them.’ That is really stressful on the farmers and their families.”
Teens learned how to write scripts, design sets and act, and they received QPR training from Julie Marfell, UK nursing associate professor, and Lee Anne Walmsley, UK nursing assistant professor and chair of the college’s work-life and student wellness. QPR stands for question, persuade and refer and is aimed at helping the youth recognize when someone is going through a difficult time and ways to help them get them the mental health services they need.
“I’ve spent my career trying to make sure people in rural and underserved areas have access to care,” said Marfell, who is also co-investigator on the grant and president-elect of the Kentucky Nurses Action Coalition. “To be able to come down here and do this and see these youth just come to life this week, has been very uplifting for me. I think I got as much out of it as they did.”
The theater is just one tool UK is using to address rural mental health concerns. Through various grants UK family and consumer sciences extension has added three new extension specialists, Paul Norrod, Joseph Schroeder and Laura Weddle, who are focused on farm stress and rural mental health.
“These specialists will allow us to reach new audiences and serve our farmers in new and different ways and hopefully provide that support across the state that is needed,” Hunter said.
The specialists will conduct research on farm stress and mental health, develop educational resources including a farmer’s suicide hotline, and educate health care professionals about the unique stressors farm families face.
“It’s personal to me because it is my people,” said Norrod, who grew up on a beef cattle and tobacco farm in Crossville, Tennessee.
Norrod, who is also a registered nurse, became passionate about rural mental health after his community experienced a string of suicides when he was a teenager.
“I hope to take what I learn in my research and bring it to the community,” he said. “The more we are able to talk to people and get them to realize it’s ok to talk about it, the healthier our communities will be.”
The second pilot Farmer’s Dinner Theater performance will occur Sept. 22 in Daviess and Henderson counties.
University of Kentucky College of Medicine students Thailandria Daniels and Megan Stewart were recently awarded inaugural Department of Behavioral Science White Coats for Black Lives Fellowships.
The fellowships, initiated by Anita Fernander, Ph.D., former associate professor in the Department of Behavioral Science and supported by the department’s Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Council, were developed to enhance medical students’ understanding of health disparities, political and social inequalities, and health care inequities experienced by Black Americans.
The fellowship was developed because the Department of Behavioral Science recognized political and social inequalities that have not only created significant health disparities among Black Americans but have led to health care inequalities experienced by Black people due to historical explicit bias and contemporary implicit bias across the health care system. The fellowship experience will enhance medical school training, increase the fellows’ understanding of how behavioral science research can help to address health disparities and enable students to be better prepared to care for underserved Black patient populations.
Over the course of 18 months, each fellow will work with a behavioral science faculty mentor on a research or community-engaged project that addresses the health of Black Americans. Fellows receive a stipend and will present their projects to the campus community in the fall of 2022.
Daniels (Laurie McLouth, Ph.D., faculty mentor) intends to focus on disparities in occupational stress between Black and white physicians in academic medicine and implications for advancing in leadership positions. Stewart (Jennifer Cole, Ph.D., faculty mentor) plans to focus on maternal health inequities among pregnant Black women, including health care inequities and decision-making around obstetric care providers.
The gift will be used to establish and support the Toyota Engineering Technology Diversity Scholarship Fund, which will provide annual scholarships for undergraduate students.
“Building a stronger Kentucky will require deliberate and sustainable efforts to provide equal access to quality education. This program will give more people a chance to build great careers in fields like engineering,” Susan Elkington, president of Toyota Motor Manufacturing Kentucky (TMMK), said. “Toyota is committed to providing resources, time and knowledge to help build stronger communities in which we operate. We’re thankful for great education partners that have the same mission.”
Preference will be given to students whose ethnic, racial, gender or background would enhance the diversity of their institution, as long as these preferences are narrowly tailored to the university’s achievement of its interest in obtaining the educational benefits of a diverse student body. However, every student who is enrolled in the program, is a Kentucky resident and has unmet financial need will have an opportunity to compete for the scholarship.
Beginning Fall 2021, 35 students over a five-year period will be selected to receive full-tuition scholarships. In addition to the preferences, participation in the program and Kentucky residency status, recipients will be determined after a review of the applicants’ qualifications, such as academic merit, extracurricular and volunteer activities, and professional goals.
L. Sebastian Bryson, Hardin-Drnevich-Huang Professor in the Department of Civil Engineering, has been promoted to Full Professor. The promotion makes Bryson the first Black full professor in the University of Kentucky College of Engineering’s history.
“Achieving the rank of full professor means that I have equal standing with my senior peers. Being promoted to full professor also opens opportunities for advancement to senior leadership positions,” said Bryson. “Becoming the first Black full professor in the College of Engineering signals to junior faculty of color that tenure and promotion are achievable goals. Having the first Black full professor in the 156-year history of the College just now occurring in 2021 also signals that the work needed to achieve greater representation and inclusion of all people groups in the Commonwealth is far from being over.”
“We in the College of Engineering celebrate Dr. Bryson’s promotion to full professor. His accomplishments in the areas of teaching, research and service demonstrate he is a model faculty member who is able to connect with and inspire students as well as junior faculty,” said Rudy Buchheit, Dr. Rebecca Burchett Liebert Dean. “At the same time, that we are in 2021 and only now welcoming our first Black full professor in the college shows we have a lot of work to do to ensure a diverse, equitable and inclusive environment.”
Bryson joined the UK College of Engineering faculty in 2006 after teaching at Ohio University for five years. He worked as a geotechnical engineer for CH2M Hill for six years before earning his Ph.D. from Northwestern University in 2002. Bryson holds a joint appointment in the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences and serves as the Department of Civil Engineering’s director of graduate studies.
Earlier this year, Bryson was granted Diplomate, Geotechnical Engineering (D.GE) certification by the Academy of Geo-Professionals. Professional certification offered through the Academy ensures that geotechnical engineers have specialized knowledge and skills in their field of practice.
“What geotechnical engineers do is critical to all aspects of science and engineering,” said Bryson. “I’m honored to have this recognition from my peers.”
