Former president Muriel A. Howard is one of six new members who will be inducted into the Buffalo State College Athletics Hall of Fame on Saturday, September 26, following the Bengals’ Homecoming football game against Western Connecticut State. The ceremony will take place at 5:30 p.m. in the Hall of Fame lobby in the Sports Arena. Hors d’oeuvres and cash bar begin at 4:30 p.m. Tickets are $20 and must be purchased in advance through Tom Koller, associate director, Intercollegiate Athletics: 878-6514.

Josh Becker, ’04, led the Bengals basketball team to a SUNYAC championship and an NCAA playoff appearance as a junior when he was named second-team All-Region, first-team All-SUNYAC, and MVP of the SUNYAC tournament. Becker ranks 10th on the school’s all-time scoring list. He was recognized as the school’s male athlete of the year in 2003 and won the Hube Coyer Award for career accomplishments the following year.

Mike Grabowski, ’76, was a four-time All-American as a swimmer at Buffalo State. He swam a leg in the 400-meter medley relay that captured a SUNYAC championship in 1975 and set a school record with a time of 3:39.50, a mark that still stands. Grabowski also helped the Bengals capture a SUNYAC team championship in 1975.

Muriel A. Howard, Buffalo State College’s seventh president, will be inducted into the Hall of Fame as an honorary member, in recognition of her support for Intercollegiate Athletics.

Cheryl Isbrandt, ’95, played shortstop for the Bengals softball team from 1992 to 1995, accumulating a .400 career batting average, the third best in the program’s history. A third-team All-American as a senior, she helped the Bengals to three NCAA regional berths and two New York State women’s championships. The school’s all-time leader in stolen bases (84), Isbrandt was recognized as the school’s female athlete of the year as a senior.

Valerie Krell-Capriotti, ’88, becomes the first women’s soccer player to gain induction into the Hall of Fame. A four-year standout from 1983 to 1986, she was recognized as All-SUNYAC in 1984. Krell-Capriotti led the team in scoring three times and still ranks second on the school’s all-time scoring list. Buffalo State won 40 games in her four seasons, the best four-year run in the history of the program.

Dan Lauta, ’99, anchored the Bengals’ offensive line in the late 1990s and helped lead the football team to four appearances in the NCAA playoffs. Following graduation, Lauta became the only Bengal to sign with an NFL team, securing a free-agent contract with the New York Giants. He went on to play in the Arena Football League with the Buffalo Destroyers.

The ability to read and write, communicate effectively, think critically, and solve problems bolsters students’ potential for success beyond their time at Buffalo State. That is what the Philosophy Department believes and what it aims to provide for students with the new philosophy minor.

The 18-credit minor was approved in June and became available to students this semester. Students may take any six philosophy courses, but no more than 6 credit hours at the 100 or 200 level. Associate professor and department chair Kim Blessing said the lack of specific course requirements allows students flexibility to develop their philosophical skills alongside the requirements of their majors and is in keeping with the American Philosophical Association’s guidelines for philosophy programs.

“We’re always pushing the same kinds of skills and values in every class,” she said. “Students learn how to recognize and evaluate arguments, think critically, and communicate their position effectively.”

Blessing said that while students asked for the minor and some are beginning to sign up, others will soon be learning that they already qualify or are close to qualifying for the minor.

“According to Banner, 75 students had taken 12 or more philosophy credit hours as of spring, and 15 of those students already had 18 credit hours,” she said. “We’ll be notifying all of these students shortly.”

Blessing said many students tend to discover philosophy in later academic years, so the department is looking at ways to expose students earlier to philosophy, such as offering freshman-only classes. While Blessing welcomes more students to pursue the philosophy major, she believes the minor provides a “less intimidating and more accommodating option.”

“The philosophy minor complements any major on campus and deepens students’ understanding of other disciplines,” she said. “It provides a framework for general education and can help students see connections to other courses they’re taking.”

To broaden accessibility for the minor, the department recently added three new courses: PHI 107: Introduction to Mathematical Logic; PHI 347: Western Thought: Homer to Alexander; and PHI 351: Ethics Bowl. All satisfy Intellectual Foundations requirements. The department will offer a cross-department class, Biology and Values, in the spring.

Blessing is confident that student interest in philosophy will catch on with the addition of the minor. “We have a solid program and offer rigorous courses that help students think more clearly about issues and engage in fundamental questions about the human experience,” she said. “Philosophy offers students the chance to think deeply about things they’ve probably wondered about prior to coming to their first philosophy class.”

Dance and spirituality, creating your own study-abroad experience, jazz, paper-cutting as a cultural expression, glaciers, and air pollution and economic development were all subjects explored by undergraduate researchers with the guidance of a faculty mentor during summer 2009.

Thirty-one proposals were submitted to the Undergraduate Research Office seeking funding through the Undergraduate Summer Research Fellowship (USRF) Program, which awarded 20 fellowships. Each fellowship provides a student stipend of $2,500, a faculty stipend of $1,000, and up to $500 for travel, supplies, and/or equipment to support the project.

“We were not able to fund all the highly rated proposals that the reviewers considered worthy of funding,” said Jill Singer, director of the Undergraduate Research Office, professor of earth sciences, and geologist. She is also past president of the Council on Undergraduate Research (CUR), a national organization that works to strengthen undergraduate research at colleges and universities across the country.

The quality of the proposals has increased since the program began in 1999, according to Singer. Each proposal is reviewed and ranked by three to four faculty members who are experienced research mentors and who teach in the school from which the proposal originates.

“About two-thirds of the awards go to returning mentors,” said Singer, “and the remainder go to new faculty members that are just starting out as mentors to undergraduates conducting research. This proportion tells us that the USRF program appeals to experienced faculty mentors, but also succeeds in attracting faculty new to the campus.”

The names of the reviewers are not released. However, if a proposal is declined, the faculty mentor has an opportunity to discuss his or her proposal with Singer, who has served as a program director at the National Science Foundation.

The Undergraduate Research Office presents an orientation for faculty mentors and students, and both faculty and students submit a progress report and a report at the end of the eight-week program.

“The information provided in the reports is valuable both for ensuring that the project is on track as well as to support efforts to document the impact of the USRF program,” said Singer. “There is a lot of interest in evaluating student learning gains resulting from undergraduate research, and Buffalo State has contributed to this, particularly because our program is open to students in all academic areas.” Buffalo State’s efforts to develop instruments and a protocol for assessing the USRF were recently published in the CUR Quarterly.

Under the mentorship of Tao Tang, associate professor of geography and planning, economics major Lei Cai traveled to Beijing to study air pollution and its sources with graduate students from Capital Normal University in Beijing. Cai, who has a minor in planning, also designed a survey to find out if people who lived close to the pollution sources had greater opportunities for jobs or business development. In addition, the survey explored peoples’ concerns about the environment and economic development. Back at Buffalo State, Cai used GIS software to analyze the data and map the spatial patterns of pollution and the survey results.

Tara Nahabetian, assistant professor of design and coordinator of the metals/jewelry program, worked with undergraduate Vincent Pontillo. Nahabetian, who has served as a USRF mentor twice before, said she really enjoys the program. “It’s a closer mentoring relationship than you have in a classroom,” she said.

Pontillo researched paper-cutting traditions and styles from several cultures, Nahabetian said. “He is using industrial processes like laser-cutting on metal and rubber to create work inspired by paper-cutting.” Nahabetian believes that giving students in the visual arts an opportunity to take part in the USRF program is a “gem” offered by Buffalo State. “Students in the arts learn how to write a proposal and complete their commitment,” she said.

Cai and Pontillo, along with 18 other students, will present their work at the 12th annual Student Research and Creativity Celebration on April 30 and May 1, 2010. “The celebration is one way Buffalo State demonstrates its commitment to research and the valuable role provided by faculty mentors,” said Singer.

The Admissions Office will host its first of two Fall Open Houses for prospective students and their families on Saturday, September 26, from 8:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. beginning in the Campbell Student Union, where refreshments will be served. Guests will tour the campus, meet with faculty and student support services, discuss financial aid options, and explore career opportunities. For more information or to volunteer, please contactCarolyn Murphy, 878-6339. A second Fall Open House will be held on November 7 in the Sports Arena.

See the newest faculty members to join the Buffalo State community on the View Gallery Web site. Please contactCollege Relations to update your information.

The Philosophy and Humanities Department has announced its fall 2009 colloquium series. All sessions will be held in Bishop Hall 245 and are free and open to the public. Contact Kimberly Blessing, associate professor and department chair, with questions.

“Mathematical Platonism”
Julian Cole, Assistant Professor of Philosophy
Thursday, October 1
3:30–5:00 p.m.

“Intelligence as an Impediment to Critical Thinking”
Gerald Nosich, Professor of Philosophy
Wednesday, October 14
2:30–4:00 p.m.

“Epistemic Possibility: Accounts of Modal Illusions”
Leigh Duffy, Lecturer of Philosophy
Wednesday, October 28
2:30–4:00 p.m.

“Adoption and Respect”
Jason Grinnell, Assistant Professor of Philosophy
Wednesday, November 4
2:30–4:00 p.m.

“Introduction to Political Confucianism”
Wang Reichang, Visiting Associate Professor of Philosophy, Capital University of Economics and Business, Beijing, China
Wednesday, November 18
2:30–4:00 p.m.

The annual Design Faculty Exhibition opens today with a reception from 5:00 to 7:00 p.m. in Upton Gallery. The show features works by Buffalo State faculty members in ceramics, fibers, metals/jewelry, wood/furniture, communication design, and design foundations. Meet the design faculty, view their artwork, and enjoy refreshments. Visit the Design Department Web site or call 878-6032 for more information. The exhibition is on view through October 9.

The conference Dear America! The Italian Immigrant Experience in Buffalo and the Thomas Sgovio Storyopens Friday, September 25, with a reception at 5:00 p.m. in E. H. Butler Library. Saturday’s conference—which takes place from 9:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. in Classroom Building C122—will address immigration, labor activities among Buffalo’s working classes, and Sgovio’s life story, which personifies the complexity of the immigrant experience as well as one man’s journey through the Soviet Gulag and back to the United States.

The conference accompanies the Dear America! exhibition, on view in E. H. Butler Library through September. The exhibition opened in June at an annual conference in Bari, Italy, attracting librarians, archivists, and historians from almost a dozen countries, including Russia. Both events are free and open to the public.

For some faculty members, a sabbatical offers a slower pace to focus on specific projects. For Mark Warford, associate professor of modern and classical languages, his sabbatical quickened his pace.

Warford carefully planned his first-ever sabbatical to work on three book-length manuscripts about language teacher development. During his break from teaching, he not only completed the manuscripts but also prepared more than 100 abstracts about new directions in language-teaching theory and practice.

“Looking back, working solely on any one of the three manuscripts would have been sufficient,” Warford said. “But I’m happy I accomplished all three and more. I felt intrinsically motivated to stay busy. The sabbatical helped me lose myself in my discipline.”

Warford regularly teaches undergraduate and graduate courses to help aspiring language teachers become skilled at teaching a foreign language. One of his manuscripts, L2 from Day 1: Teaching in the Target Language, focuses on his classroom teaching experience and quantitative research in the field. He recently had excerpts from his work published in several refereed journals.

Warford also develops qualitative studies about the progress of foreign-language teachers. The manuscript,High Hopes, High Needs, is a case study of one Buffalo State graduate’s first years of teaching Spanish in Buffalo Public Schools. He hopes the work will provide a rich portrait of how teachers develop in high-need urban settings—a process, he said, that has received very little attention in educational research. Warford developedHigh Hopes, High Needs into a proposal stage draft and plans to submit it to publishers this semester.

Warford said his third manuscript, Language Teaching: Foundations, Standards, and Innovations, is similar to the other two in that it addresses a timely need. He said the most widely adopted textbooks on the subject, though periodically re-edited, are decades old.

While he awaits word from the publishers about his submissions, Warford said, he is already recognizing the benefits of his sabbatical.

“My students seemed to catch the spark I felt from the time off; they told me they appreciated the fresh ideas I brought to the classroom,” he said. “The discoveries gave me greater clarity and helped me find my ‘center’ as a teacher.”

Warford is happy he is on the path to being published and has many ideas for future works. Although his pace of writing was rapid, he came to realize that the process of publishing takes longer than he expected. Nevertheless, he is grateful to have had the time to write more than he imagined was possible.

“I feel humbled to have been granted the experience,” he said. “A sabbatical is a service that answers to the public trust. In an ideal world, I think everyone in every line of work should have the opportunity to take one.”

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Buffalo State has been awarded a four-year, $194,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Education to manage a four-college consortium and student exchange for the study of transatlantic public administration. The program, called the European Union–United States Atlantis Program, is funded by the Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education (FIPSE).

Buffalo State received $51,500 for the first year to oversee the U.S. side of the program with SUNY Cortland. EU partners are Manchester Metropolitan University in the United Kingdom and Babeş-Bolyai University in Romania. They are funded separately by the European Commission for an equivalent amount.

The funding allows three Buffalo State and three SUNY Cortland students to study overseas during upcoming semesters. In the spring, three British students will study at Buffalo State and three Romanian students will study at SUNY Cortland. Three Romanian students will study here in fall 2010. The funding also allows faculty from the four colleges to travel and lecture abroad.

“The Atlantis Program brings Europeans and Americans together at the ground level for a transatlantic network to learn about what is involved in public policy,” said Laurie Buonanno, professor and chair of political science, who applied for the grant.

Buffalo State’s Political Science Department, which houses the program, is currently seeking three students to study in Manchester in the spring. The deadline toapply is Sunday, September 20. Interested students must be juniors or seniors with a minimum GPA of 2.5 who are majoring or minoring in political science, public administration, international relations, or legal studies. Each will receive $5,000 to defray travel and living expenses.

Students will take courses in politics, ethnic studies, public policy, and foreign language. They will also participate in a public policy internship at a local or regional level, or at an international level with organizations such as the European Commission or the United Nations.

“The students will establish a transatlantic network of lifelong friends and colleagues that will help them become more effective public administrators,” Buonanno said. “The networking that students will experience is so valuable; you never know when you might need to work through transatlantic issues with your counterparts in other countries, especially issues involving regulatory policy and good governance. In the future, they might work together on competition policies, international trade negotiations, or food safety regulations. We need public administrators who are conversant with European and American institutions and policies, and speak the same regulatory language. Globalization no longer permits insulated regulatory regimes among the world’s two largest trading partners.”

Buonanno said transatlantic public administration is an emerging field. She will work with the consortium to produce at least one edited scholarly volume on the subject and create a shared minor by the end of the four years.

Buonanno hopes the exchanges continue long after the grant’s end.

“This program helps us globalize our curriculum,” she said. “It will also strengthen teaching and research for faculty.”