Holly Sweeney

New Grant, FirstUP Planning

July 22, 2013

The University of Portland has received a grant from the Corporation for National and Community Service and Oregon Campus Compact to host an AmeriCorps VISTA member who will help the University develop resources and build capacity to better serve first-generation college students, according to Michele Leasor, honors program. Holly Sweeney, pictured, will be joining the UP community for this one-year AmeriCorps VISTA appointment beginning August 31.

In fall 2012, the University of Portland hosted FirstUP, a welcome event for first-generation college students. FirstUP was a cooperative effort between the academic and student affairs divisions. One aspect that made FirstUP 2012 a great success was the support of faculty and staff who were themselves first-generation college students. All first-generation college students who would be willing to have the planning group contact them with opportunities to be involved with this year’s efforts are asked to contact Leasor at 8264 or leasor@up.edu.

The FirstUP Planning Committee would like to thank the Division of Student Affairs, Office of the Provost, and Office of the Executive Vice President, who collaborated to provide the matching funds required for the AmeriCorps VISTA grant.

James Peña, residence life, was honored with the 2020 New Professional Award from the Northwest Association of College and University Housing Officers. The award celebrates James’ contributions to Residence Life, the campus community, and the student affairs/residence life profession outside of UP.

Jakob Kotas, mathematics, had his article, “Atmospheric CO2,” Systemic Initiative for Modeling Investigations and Opportunities with Differential Equations” published by SIMIODE, an education community where modeling comes first in teaching differential equations, in January 2020.

Martin Cenek, Shiley School of Engineering, had his article, “‘One Size Does Not Fit All’: A Roadmap of Purpose-Driven Mixed-Method Pathways for Sensitivity Analysis of Agent-Based Models” (with coauthors Arika Ligmann-Zielinska, Peer-Olaf Siebers, Nick Maglioccia, Dawn Parker, Volker Grimm, Eric Jing Du, Nazia Arbab, Uta Berger, Rajiv Paudel, Derek Robinson, Piotr Jankowski, Li An, Xinyue Ye, and student coauthor Viktoriia Radchuk) published in Journal of Artificial Societies and Social Simulation, 23 (1) 6. January 2020.

Bob Butler, environmental studies emeritus, Jenda Johnson, Earth Sciences Animated, and Wendy Bohon, IRIS education specialist, published “Haiti 2010 – 10 Years Later,” an animation feature which explores plate tectonics, earthquake damage, and rebuilding efforts after the devastating magnitude 7.0 earthquake in Haiti on January 12, 2010. Animation can be found on the IRIS website at this link or on YouTube at this link.

Christina Ivler, Shiley School of Engineering, had her presentation, “Development and Simulation of Damage Tolerant Control Laws for a Compound Helicopter,” (with Joe Horn, Eric Johnson) published in Proceedings of the AIAA SciTech Conference, Orlando, FL, January 2020. She presented “Development and Flight Validation of Unmanned Aerial System Handling Qualities Requirements for Multicopters” (with Declan Kerwin, Kevin Truong, Joel Otomize) at the same conference.

Simon Aihiokhai, theology, presented “Solitude, Identity, and Vocation” at the University of Portland’s spring semester retreat for resident assistants on January 9, 2020. He presented “Christian Identity as an Invitation to Become the Medium of God’s Life in the World: In Memory of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.,” a reflection given at the 2020 MLK Celebration Mass at Saint Andrew Parish, Northeast Portland, OR, on January 12, 2020.

Matthew Kuhn, Shiley School of Engineering, had his article, “Linear-frictional contact model for 3D discrete element simulations of granular systems” (with coauthors Ali Daouadji, Kiichi Suzuki) published in International Journal for Numerical Methods in Engineering, 2020, volume 121, No. 3, pp. 560-569. DOI 10.1002/nme.6216 (February 2020).

Aziz Inan, Shiley School of Engineering, had his piece, “My View: Franklin’s life a nice piece of Pi,” published in the January 17, 2020 edition of the Portland Tribune. See the article using this link.

Nicole Hanig, performing and fine arts, performed a recital (“Social Justice in Art Song”) with pianist Susan McDaniel as part of the Twilight Concerts at the Cathedral series in Limerick, Ireland on January 17, 2020. She also offered a Master Class in voice practice on January 18.

Jane Scott and Susan Stillwell, nursing, had their article, “Sensitive Versus Specific Search Strategy to Answer Clinical Questions,” published in Journal of Nursing Education, 59(1), 22-25.