A book of poems by English professor Charles Bachman, If Ariel Danced on the Moon, has received the following praise from noted Cherokee writer Marilou Awiakta, author of Selu: Seeking the Corn-Mother’s Wisdom: “Charles Bachman...delves deep below the surface...to the realm of light where mysteriously, everything communes. He does the same with Native American beings—and is faithful to their natures as Native peoples perceive them.... His voice rings true. We need to hear it again and again.” Bachman’s book was also praised in Artvoice: “He...empathizes deeply and collaborates with the natural world. The combination of serious poems on Native American themes and humorous poems...makes for a delightfully varied read.”

John Thompson, associate professor, Computer Information Systems, presented a session, “Shift Happens: Web 2.0 Applications for Reading,” at the Florida Reading Association’s 46th annual conference in Orlando, Florida, on September 5.

Steve Street, lecturer, College Writing Program, read and graded Advanced Placement essays for the College Board (Educational Testing Service) in Daytona Beach, Florida, in June. In August, he presented at a panel called “Impact of Contingent Academic Labor Conditions on Educational Quality,” at the Eighth International Conference of the Coalition of Contingent Academic Labor; nine other UUP members from across the state, including President Phil Smith, also attended.

Francis S. Lestingi, professor emeritus, Physics and Interdisciplinary Sciences, retired 10 years ago this fall. In the last nine years, his company, Signs of Gold Inc., has been awarded eight national first-place awards, three third place, one fourth place, and 13 honorable mentions for hand-carved, gold-leaf sign artistry. He has written 16 articles on sign art for four national journals and has conducted eight workshops in five cities on gilding and moldmaking and casting. He has also designed a calligraphic font, Pierre.

Shannon Gormley Budin, assistant professor, Exceptional Education, published an article with coauthor William J. Therrien, assistant professor of special education at the University of Iowa, titled “Effects of the Reread-Adapt and Answer-Comprehend (RAAC) Intervention on the Reading Achievement of Students with Reading and Behavioral Difficulties” in Learning Disabilities: A Multidisciplinary Journal 15 (1).

Susan Baldwin, assistant professor, Health and Wellness, presented at the Society for Public Health Education’s 2008 Midyear Scientific Conference in Chicago, Illinois, May 21–24. Baldwin’s presentation was conducted over four hours in a preconference workshop on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s School Health Index: A Coordinated Approach to Improving Health and Academic Achievement.

Tao Tang, associate professor, Geography and Planning, published the following three research papers either as first author or correspondent author:

“Terrestrial Laser Scan (Lidar) Survey and 3D TIN Model Construction of Urban Buildings in a Geospatial Database,” in Geocarto International 23 (4): 259–272. Tang, T., Zhao, W., Gong, H., Zhang, A., Pan, J. G., and Liu, Z. Q. (2008).

“Spatial Analysis of Household Water Supply and Demand in a Distributed Geographic Network in the Towns of Amherst and Clarence, New York,” in Middle States Geographer 40: 133–141. Tang, T. and Keyser, G. (2007).

“Dynamic Data Retrieval and Distance Decay of Triangulated Irregular Network (TIN) in Three Dimensional Visualizations,” in Geographic Information Sciences 12 (1): 21–26. Zhao, W., Tang, T., Gong, H., Duan, F. S., and Mo, Y. (2006).

Deborah Silverman, assistant professor, Communication, served as chair of the Public Relations Society of America’s Northeast District Conference, held September 11 at the Adam’s Mark Hotel in Buffalo. The conference attracted a record-setting 250 public relations practitioners, faculty, and students from upstate New York, southern Ontario, and New England. Silverman also was moderator for the conference’s “Transition to Teaching” panel. Other conference committee members from Buffalo State included College Relations writersTony Astran and Jerod Dahlgren, and communication students Phil Weiss and Eric Schlau.

Gerald Mead, lecturer, Design, served as one of three jurors for ImageArt, an exhibition on view at the Rochester Contemporary Art Center October 3–26.Feasting Eyes: Artists Take on Food, the group exhibition he curated for the Kenan Center in Lockport, New York, is on view through October 5. Solo exhibitions of Mead ’s work will be presented at the Springville Center for the Arts, in Springville, New York, September 27–October 18, and Studio Hart, in Buffalo September 2–October 11.

Richard Herdlein, associate professor, Student Personnel Administration, published two articles in peer-reviewed journals in October:

“Faculty Performance Appraisal in Estonian and American Higher Education,” in the Journal of Higher Education Management and Policy 30 (2). Herdlein, R., Kukemelk, H., & Turk, K. (2008).

“Deans of Women at Historic Black Colleges: A Story Left Untold,” in the Journal of Negro Education. Herdlein, R., Frezza, C., & Dina, J. (2008).

Herdlein also presented “Faculty Survey of Master’s-Level Programs in Higher Education and Student Affairs,” with V. Haddad, at the annual conference of the College Student Personnel Association of New York State (CSPA-NYS), held in Rochester, New York, October 5–7.