Penn State Lehigh Valley faculty engage in scholarly activities off-campus

CENTER VALLEY, Pa. — Penn State’s mission includes improving the well-being and health of individuals and communities through teaching, research and service. Penn State Lehigh Valley faculty regularly present, serve on panels and share their research with people and institutions outside of Penn State.

Over the last few months, Lehigh Valley faculty’s off-campus engagement included:

Barbara Cantalupo, professor of English, served as plenary speaker at the First International Conference of the Edgar Allan Poe Spanish Society: “Poe in the Age of Popularism” on Feb. 1 at the University of Valladolid in Valladolid, Spain. Cantalupo’s talk was titled “Poe’s Visual Legacy.” She discussed a number of visual artists who either illustrated Poe's works or were inspired by his work.

Margaret Christian, associate professor of English, delivered a talk titled “What the World Needs Then and Now: 16th Century Sermons and 21st Century Echoes” on Nov. 13 for the English Colloquium series at La Sierra University in Riverside, California. Christian, who graduated from La Sierra University in 1980, returned to share her research into Tudor court sermons with an audience of English majors, faculty and community members. Her presentation noted parallels between societal conditions in 16th century England and in the United States today.

Nichola D. Gutgold, professor of communication arts and sciences:

• served as plenary speaker at the Communication Across Cultures Conference on Sept. 29 in Chania, Greece. Gutgold spoke about her research on women world leaders.

Nichola D. Gutgold, professor of communication arts and sciences, provided political commentary during the live WLVT-PBS39 election night coverage on Nov. 6 in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. 

Credit: Nichola D. Gutgold

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• gave a talk titled “When Will America Elect a Woman President?” on Oct. 18 at the Single Sisters House in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. Attendees included students from Cedar Crest College and Moravian College. Gutgold explained the obstacles women face and the many ways women are overcoming them to run successful campaigns.

• served as a panelist for the panel discussion based on the book “Women in the Academy: Learning From Our Diverse Career Pathways,” edited by Gutgold and Angela Linse, held on Oct. 29 at the University of Kansas in Lawrence, Kansas.

• provided political commentary during the live WLVT-PBS39 election night coverage on Nov. 6 in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.

Tai-Yin Huang, professor of physics:

• co-presented a talk titled “Intensity Variations and Wave Activity Over the Andes Lidar Observatory (ALO)” on June 26 at the 2018 Cedar Workshop in Santa Fe, Texas.

• gave an invited talk titled “Empirical Values of Branching Ratios in the Three-body Recombination Reaction for O(1s) and O2(0,0)” on June 7 at the Asia Oceania Geosciences Society (AOGS) 15th Annual Meeting in Honolulu, Hawaii. Huang also presented the talk titled, “Nighttime Airglow Ripples as an Example to Study the Coupling Processes Between the Lower and the Middle Atmosphere” at the Annual Meeting, and served as co-convener and chair of a session titled “Experimental and Theoretical Investigations On The Electrodynamic Coupling Between Troposphere And Near-earth Environment.” Huang also served as the Atmospheric Sciences Section Coordinator of Meet the Experts Program for AOGS from May 1 to June 8, matching experts and students, and coordinating their meetings.

• co-presented a talk titled “Airglow Variations by the Influences of CO₂ Increase, Solar Cycle Variation, and Geomagnetic Activity” on May 15 at the 10^th Workshop on Long- term Changes and Trends in the Atmosphere, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, China.

• served as an expert during the Meet the Experts Program on June 4-7 at the 15^th Annual Asia Oceanic Geosciences Society in Singapore.

Kasey Hudak, assistant professor of corporate communication:

• presented a talk titled “Amplifying Social Entrepreneurship via Civic Media” on Oct. 25 at the 2018 West Palm Beach - International Leadership Association in West Palm Beach, Florida. Hudak’s presentation highlighted her work in an introductory communication course, where students are encouraged to work closely with local communities to recognize their needs and concerns, as it pertains to media use, and then create or adapt a form of media that allows communities to share, understand and act on civic information.

• delivered a presentation titled “Risking the City: City Branding amongst Crisis in Flint, Michigan” on Apr. 26 at the Eastern Communication Association 109th Annual Convention in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Hudak’s presentation extended city branding research to the realm of risk communication in hopes of unearthing constructive crisis communication strategies for city planners.

David Livert, associate professor of psychology, delivered the closing remarks at the Psychology of Sustainable Consumption Conference on May 20 at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.  

Credit: David Livert

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David Livert, associate professor of psychology, delivered the closing remarks at the Psychology of Sustainable Consumption Conference on May 20 at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. His remarks covered the history of the Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues (SPSSI) in the U.S. and the Society for Australasian Social Psychology (SASP) Small Group Series.

Beth E. Michalec, lecturer in corporate communication, and Kasey Hudak, assistant professor of corporate communication, presented on Oct. 25 at the 2018 West Palm Beach - International Leadership Association in West Palm Beach, Florida.

Credit: Beth E. Michalec

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Beth E. Michalec, lecturer in corporate communication:

• co-presented a talk titled “Social Entrepreneurship & Philanthrocapitalism: The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Impact" on Oct. 25 at the 2018 West Palm Beach - International Leadership Association in West Palm Beach, Florida. Michalec’s presentation drew on ancient wisdom from Aristotle who used philanthropy to describe a virtuous friendship among humanity rooted in care and goodwill toward others. Grounded in a textured understanding of philanthrocapitalism, the presentation explored the strategic leadership of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and questions the potential for and pitfalls of the Foundation's global impact.
• delivered a presentation titled “An Irony of Risk: Failures of Industrialization and Corporate Social Responsibility Driving Volkswagen’s Emissions Crisis” on Apr. 26 at the Eastern Communication Association 109th Annual Convention in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Michalec’s presentation examines the 2015 VW emissions crisis through the lens of corporate social responsibility and “greenwashing” in the hope of adding to the ongoing conversation of what constitutes ethical and legitimate business practices for the benefit of the triple bottom line.

Maung K. Min, assistant teaching professor and director of business programs:

• presented a paper titled “Does Integrated Reporting Live Up to Its Hype? A Comparative Analysis of Integrated and Stand-alone Sustainability Report” on Apr. 21 at the 2018 Business Research Consortium (BRC) Conference at SUNY Oswego in Oswego, New York.

• gave a lecture via ZOOM on sustainability and business on May 28 for the Executive MBA Program of Grenoble Ecole de Management in Grenoble, France.

Jacqueline S. McLaughlin and her research colleague, David Esparza from the University of Texas, El Paso, presented the learning outcomes of a CHANCE embedded program in Cuba  on Oct. 11 at the 47th NAAEE Conference in Spokane, Washington.

Credit: Jacqueline S. McLaughlin

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Jacqueline S. McLaughlin, associate professor of biology and director of Penn State CHANCE:

• was the invited plenary speaker at the 2018 International Aridlands Conference on Aug. 14 at Texas Tech University in Lubbock, Texas. McLaughlin also led and moderated a workshop that focused on how to better collaborate in education focused on aridlands and water loss.

• held a seminar titled “Exposing Students to Environmental Realities: The Merit of International Course-based Undergraduate Research Experiences (I-CUREs)” on Oct. 5 as part of the Alabama Water Institute Seminar Series at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. McLaughlin’s presentation provided a conceptual-practical model detailing the central features of CUREs and offered vignettes of international CUREs focused on global water issues that have been successfully implemented through short-term study abroad experiences at Penn State.

• presented the poster titled "Learning Outcomes of an International Program that Offers Undergraduates Authentic Research in Environmental Policy" on Oct. 11 at the 2018 North American Association of Environmental Education (NAAEE) Conference in Spokane, Washington. McLaughlin and her research colleague, David Esparza from the University of Texas, El Paso, presented the learning outcomes of a CHANCE embedded program in Cuba that allowed students to engage in authentic environmental policy research. Results indicate significant improvement in students’ global learning, intercultural awareness, and oral presentation and critical thinking skills.

Jeffrey A. Stone, assistant professor of information sciences and technology, delivered a presentation about his paper titled “Student Perceptions of Computing and Computing Majors" on Oct. 20 at the Consortium for Computing Sciences in Colleges (CCSC) Eastern Conference in Arlington, Virginia. The presentation discussed a study Stone performed, which explored perceptions of computing, computing majors and computing careers among incoming first-year students.