We would like to congratulate Michelle Gremp for winning the Mentorship of the Month for April. Her work with her students in the Deaf and Hard of Hearing Education program has been inspiring. We want to take a moment to recognize her for the hard work she has done with her students.
A brief synopsis of the work that has been produced by Josh’s lab:
The Fire Science program is fortunate to be one of the very few in the country that provides higher education and research in the fire protection field. This provides me a multitude of opportunities to collaborate with other faculty, students, and outside partners. One of our outside partners is the National Fire Sprinkler Association (NFSA). We are currently wrapping up a project with NFSA that included a series of full scale fire tests using our burn building at the Ashland Building. Within these burns, old standard response sprinklers and new quick response sprinklers were used inside the compartments with non-standardized fires. Thermocouples are used to record the temperature of the environment pre-sprinkler activation to help determine tenability for occupants that may be in the space at the time of a fire.
For this project, Jacob Lusthaus has been included to help analyze the data and produce the report that will be submitted to committees that produce the codes and standards regulating sprinkler systems. As a freshman, Jacob has begun to see statistical analysis and the true meaning behind the story the numbers are telling. It has been a pleasure to work with Jacob as he is always eager to learn and take on more work to help facilitate his growth.
Halena Shirran and Andrew Mohr are also two of my students that have a very high ceiling. Both are in the Fire Protection and Safety Engineering Technology program in which I am the coordinator and will be the President and Vice President of our student chapter of the Society of Fire Protection Engineers (SFPE) in which I am the advisor. As the leader of SFPE we will continue to pursue creative endeavors to help advance our organization, program, and field.
Dr. Skubik-Peplaski is a professor in the Occupational Therapy department where she mentors students in a variety of contexts from undergraduate students to graduate students. A recent project that she performed with her students in the community is titled: Sew, is it for everyone? A mixed methods study investigating the effects and experience of sewing on quality of life and occupational performance
This study investigated the effects of sewing as an occupation-based intervention on the participants’ executive functioning, motor coordination skills, and satisfaction in occupational performance areas. The study explored participants’ experiences and perceptions of sewing related to their occupational performance. Six sessions, each lasting 90 minutes were performed, where participants completed various sewing project options such as potato bag, bowl cozy all while working with an occupational therapy student. Participants completed a variety of outcome measurements. The final session featured a “Show Me’ event, allowing time for socializing and interactive role modeling. Student investigators administered post outcome measures and are currently working towards dissemination of the study information at the Department of Occupational Science and Occupational Therapy’s research day on April 12, 2024.
Fellow faculty have written that: Dr. Skubik-Peplaski excels at designing clinical research that allows the students hands-on clinical experiences while conducting a study with a neurological population; for instance, her last group of students compared two treatments for individuals post-stroke, with students designing and implementing the interventions as well as collecting outcome data. Her current group is studying the effectiveness of adaptive sewing as an occupation-based intervention for clients with neurological conditions. This team of students won the 2023 Kentucky Extension (Team) Diversity Award.
A former student in OTS 896 noted: “During the time spent outside the clinic, she was always very adamant and thorough about completing tasks in a timely and effective manner and ensuring the best quality of our research product. She has gone above and beyond to ensure that this process included hands–on experience, opportunities for meaningful reflection, and quality input for an amazing research experience. Honestly, I have never seen a professor so dedicated to the research and the lived experience of the student; I can truly say she is passionate about her work.”
Dr. Fox works hard as a faculty member in the English department mentoring to a variety of students groups. She mentors through co-organizing her department’s peer mentorship program for first-year students; supervising Honors (and MA-EWP) theses, along with other undergraduate (and graduate) research projects; developing profession opportunities through ENG 201; and mentoring pre-service (and alumni) English teachers.
Dr. Easterling is an Assistant Professor-Global Supply Chain Management in the College of Business.
Dr. James Kirby Easterling particularly enjoys mentoring students—during college and after graduation—across three primary areas: community engagement, scholarly research, and career planning. Dr. Easterling helps EKU students give back to the community through activities such as providing hands-on flood relief in eastern Kentucky, collecting canned food in supporting families in need across the region, helping renovate historic properties, and assisting the elderly. Dr. Easterling also enjoys collaborating with current and former student in scholarly research, with published proceedings, journal articles, and conference presentations with multiple students, including a recent 2023 article in the journal “Inside Management,” 34(6), 38-43: A Novel Approach to Hospital Supply Chains—just published with a 2017 EKU graduate (Tanner Hayes) in the #1 industry journal for global supply chain professionals. Through his extensive professional network, Dr. Easterling greatly enjoys helping students with career planning in transitioning into the workforce with résumé workshops, mock interviews, coordinating internships, providing introductions to industry executives, assisting with salary negotiations, etc. Dr. Easterling mentors students well after degree completion, including many rising executives at premier companies such as Valvoline, Walmart, Toyota, Lockheed-Martin, and many others.
Research in the Chambers lab focuses on plant distributions and conservation and there are currently three students actively working on various research projects. Sasha Carrasco is an undergraduate student working on a few projects, one focusing on DNA metabarcoding to identify cryptic plants, while in the spring she will start a project studying secondary chemical compounds in the fern genus Lygodium. Ricelle Gibson is an undergraduate student who is continuing research she started over the summer as funded by an NSF REU position, where she is studying how microclimate impacts Vandenboschia boschiana sporophyte and gametophyte distributions and demographics in Kentucky. Zach Maggard, a Masters student, is studying the population genetic structure of an endangered cactus species (Harrisia aboriginum), which will provide important information to conservation managers.
“Our research focuses on understanding the fundamental way particles behave. We study how a neutron, the neutral particle inside all atoms, decays into a proton, electron, and anti-neutrino. By studying this decay, we can better understand how quarks, the tiniest particles inside our protons and neutrons, behave. Our work is conducted at Oak Ridge National Lab and Dr. Fry and Brandon Stone recently visited ORNL to perform tests through a grant from Oak Ridge Associated Universities. Our goal is to help characterize sensitive detectors to measure observables of this decay to 1 nano second, one billionth of a second! We do this by characterizing fast detectors here at EKU and then use them to calibrate sensitive detectors at ORNL.
It’s been a pleasure to have Brandon Stone work and learn in our detector lab. He and two other students, JT Mills and Axel Quintanar-Pena, have worked over the summer to help build and characterize these detectors. The group has been able to work and learn from each other and have gained valuable experience in the lab, outside of the classroom. I started working with Brandon after our Advanced Lab class last spring, started working with JT after having him in the introductory major class, and started worked with Axel when he arrived at EKU this summer.
Brandon, JT, and Axel plan to continue on a physics path post-graduation. Brandon will be going to graduate school for physics after graduating from EKU with the goal of working at a research institution such as a national lab. JT plans on going to graduate school in physics and Axel is interested in Astronomy in his graduate work post-graduation. All three students plan to give poster presentations at American Physical Society meetings in late fall.”
-Dr. Jason Fry
We’re featuring anthropology majors and minors Alisha Rhymer and Breanna Bowling for their food insecurity research with Dr. Amanda Green in our Mentorship of the Month series. The team is conducting interviews with EKU students who identify as food insecure, defined as students who do not have enough access to food or quality food to lead a healthy and productive life.