Monthly Archives: November 2017

Cincinnati Biomedical Sciences Day

Some of your undergraduates may be very interested in this event hosted by UC to provide information, facilities tours, etc. This wil be especially useful to those that may be considering their summer research program, SURF, which has applications due February 1. From the hosts:

We’re writing to invite you to attend our annual Biomedical Research Day (BMRD), which will be held on Friday, January 5th, 2018. Online registration is now available.

We hope you will be able to come! The BMRD includes tours of labs and core facilities, plus a grad fair and a stimulating lecture, fortified by a complimentary lunch! The featured speaker this year will be Dr. Steve Davidson, a very accomplished young scientist (and an excellent speaker!), whose lab is identifying the neural substrates in the brain that regulate pain tolerance and using these insights to suggest new therapies.

You can read more details about the event by checking out our BMRD flyer.

fNIRS training in spring

Those that are interested in learning more about fNIRS (functional neuroimaging) have the chance to benefit from a course Vrinda is offering in the spring semester, which is open to all. There will be both an undergraduate and graduate component, so any of your graduate students or RAs could attend. The course will cover basics of cortical organization, hemodynamic response, and fNIRS (experimental design, data collection, and basics of data analysis). The meeting times are:

Undergraduate (PSY 375): WF 11:40 – 1:00; M 2:55 – 3:45 (Lab)

Graduate (PSY 620): M 1:15 – 2:55; M 2:55 – 3:45 (Lab)

Please direct any questions directly to Vrinda.

Working groups for Big Ideas

The dean is organizing working groups for inter-departmental conversations regarding the Big Ideas. Unfortunately, these are scheduled during other obligations that Vaishali and I have, and regardless many of you may be better suited to join these conversations. For example, Paul attended the working group recently focused on Human Health. The two remaining meetings for the semester are as follows; please let me know if you are able to attend to represent the department:

  • Big data and Analytics: Wednesday, 11/29, Benton 114
  • Social justice and Intercultural competence: Wednesday, 12/6, Shriver (Bystrom-Reid)

Do you partner with foundations or corporations?

If you have any collaborations with foundations or corporations, it would be very beneficial to represent the department in response to a request from the provost for such partnerships. This information will be included in discussions during the next meeting of the Board of Trustees. If you have any current or recent partnerships, please complete the information using this form by December 1. The form will ask for the entity and start/end dates. You will need to complete the form separately for each partnership.

Faculty 180 training

As a reminder, all faculty will be using Faculty 180 to complete their annual activities reports. You can add activities to Faculty 180 at any time (rather than having to wait and complete everything after December 31). Those who would like training, including “open labs” where staff will be available to assist you, should note the upcoming sessions:

  • Tuesday November 28, 2:30-4:00, Upham 316
  • Wednesday January 10 10:00-12:00, FSB 2050
  • Monday Jan 29, 10:00-11:30, 325A Hughes Hall

Self-nominations for 2018-19 CAS committees

The call for nominations to CAS committees has been released, and I would encourage you all to consider these, as relevant. It can be valuable for our department to be well represented, and college-level committees are an important service contribution to be recognized in annual reviews and promotion consideration. From Renee Baernstein, via Nancy Burnside:

I write to invite you to volunteer for service on for the various standing committees of the College of Arts and Science. The committees listed below have expected vacancies for 2018-19. Before the Committee on Committees makes recommendations to fill the vacancies, you are invited to indicate your interest. You must have continuing faculty status to be eligible. Please email Nancy Burnside by Monday, November 27 if you are interested in serving on any of the committees listed below, and specify which committee(s) you are interested in.

Committee of Advisors: 4 year term. Reviews petitions from undergraduate students regarding exceptions to academic requirements of the CAS and University. Meets every other week, until the 9th week of the term when it becomes weekly; occasional (but not required) meetings during the summer and winter terms. Advising experience such as being CDA is helpful but not required. Eligibility: all continuing faculty.

Curriculum Committee: 3 year term. Reviews all new or changed courses and programs (majors, minors etc) in the CAS. Meets every two weeks during the fall and spring semester. Eligibility: all continuing faculty.

Governance Committee: 2 year term. Meets as needed to discuss revisions to the CAS Manual of Operations and other governance docs. Has not met in recent years. Eligibility: all continuing faculty.

Personnel Committee: 2 year term. Advises the Dean on recommendations for tenure and promotion of tenure-line faculty. Meets several times in the fall semester, including one long meeting. Eligibility: full professors.

Pre-health Advisory Committee AND Ecology Research Center Policy Committee. These two committees generally comprise faculty whose professional interests lie in these areas. Coordinate and set goals and policy for these programs. Eligibility: all continuing faculty.

From time to time there are also vacancies in the advisory committees for interdisciplinary programs. If you have a professional interest in any of these areas and would be interested in serving on the committee should a vacancy occur, please check below where appropriate. We will inform the appropriate chair(s) of your interest.

East Asian Studies Program Committee
European Area Studies Program
Medieval Studies Program Committee
Middle East and Islamic Studies

 

 

Are you doing work related to diversity/inclusion?

From the Diversity and Inclusion committee:

The Diversity and Inclusion committee is hoping to better highlight all the fantastic diversity and inclusion related work in which our faculty and graduate students are involved. In order to do this, we would like faculty and graduate students to provide a 400-600 word summary of any research/outreach/service they are engaged in related to diversity or inclusion. These summaries could describe an individual project, a set of studies, or a program of research/outreach/service. We welcome individual submissions and also lab-based submissions (i.e., Dr. X submits an entry summarizing all the relevant work in his/her lab across multiple investigators). Also, a given person can submit more than one entry (to describe separate projects) if desired. Feel free to tailor your submission(s) in whatever way you wish.

We envision displaying these summaries on a rotating basis on the Psychology webpage, Facebook, and Twitter. We hope that highlighting the work we do related to diversity and inclusion will encourage more diverse faculty, graduate students, and undergraduate students to work in our department.

Please send your summary to April Smith (smitha53@miamioh.edu) by December 15, 2017.

Plug-In + Reboot presenters sought

From eLearning Miami:

Plug-In + Reboot is an annual event at Miami that allows faculty and teaching staff to enjoy a day of learning and renewal. There will be interactive, hands-on workshops on teaching with technology as well as sessions to reinvigorate your body and spirit.

We are looking for faculty and staff who are interested in sharing their expertise by presenting at the Plug-In + Reboot event. This year the event will be held on Wednesday, January 24th 2018.

We are looking for presentations that will ignite passion for teaching, inspire innovation, and invigorate faculty. Sessions will include “best practice” examples of creativity in use of technology in teaching, research summaries, a showcase session of example courses, and a “technology test kitchen” to try out new approaches and tools. Please complete this form below by November 20, 2017. Your proposal will be reviewed and you will be notified of a decision by November 30, 2017.

OARS workshops in December

OARS is offering the following professional development opportunities this semester. To register for any session, click on its title.
Crowdfunding on HawksNest workshop – Thursday, December 7, 10:00-11:30am, AIS (134 King Library)
HawksNest is a crowdfunding site that allows alumni, family, and friends of the university to directly support the research and scholarship of Miami University. It’s a great opportunity for Miami students, faculty, and staff to get up to $6000 to fund their research, art, or service projects.
To be successful, crowdfunding through HawksNest requires active engagement. This hands-on workshop offers practical advice for maximizing crowdfunding success by outlining what to do before, during, and after a HawksNest campaign. We will also share worksheets and other materials to help you execute a successful crowdfunding campaign.
After attending this workshop, participants will be able to: List the three keys to a successful crowdfunding campaign; Describe features of clear and compelling crowdfunding stories; Explain the importance of images and video to a crowdfunding campaign; Identify specific strategies for targeting crowdfunding donors.
This workshop is open to faculty, staff, graduate, and undergraduate students interested in using HawksNest to fund a project.
*****
Proposal development for early career programs workshop – Friday, December 15, 9:00-10:30am, AIS (134 King Library)
A number of Federal agencies and private foundations offer early career awards. These programs differ depending upon the sponsor, but they feature a number of common elements that are useful to master for these and other grant applications. The workshop presenter, Professor Carl A. Batt, has over 30 years of experience in grant proposals from the perspective of a successful PI, reviewer, and panel manager. He has successfully obtained more than $70M in external funding from federal agencies — including NSF, NIH, DOJ, DOD, USDA, and NASA — and private foundations and industry sponsors. The workshop will cover the array of sponsors and the basic elements of grant writing, taking reviewers, panels and program managers into consideration. The focus will be on the NSF CAREER program as a prototypical opportunity that stresses the applicant’s plan for advancing as a teacher-scholar. Grant components, including specific aims, research plans, and the NSF-specific sections on education and broader impact, will be addressed. 
*****
Grantwriting 101 workshop – Friday, December 15, 1:00-2:30pm, AIS (134 King Library)
Getting funded by any entity, either public or private, is no longer a matter of having a great idea. Proposals that get funded today tell a story with a compelling outcome that addresses a gap in the current body of knowledge.   The workshop presenter, Professor Carl A. Batt, has over 30 years of experience in grant proposals from the perspective of a successful PI, reviewer, and panel manager. He has successfully obtained more than $70M in external funding from federal agencies — including NSF, NIH, DOJ, DOD, USDA and NASA — and private foundations and industry sponsors. The workshop will cover the array of sponsors and the basic elements of grant writing, taking reviewers, panels, and program managers into consideration. Basic elements of a compelling grant narrative — from gap analysis, to the “art” of specific aims to research plans and measurable outcomes — will be covered. The workshop is intended for both novice and experienced PIs and is offered from the perspective of the presenter’s experiences and observations.

Quick tips for advising

Some random but useful notes from Jay, addressing common advising points:

  • If advising first year students – if they haven’t taken ENG111 – they should do so in the spring (do not wait for fall).
  • STA 261 covers both Miami Plan and CAS formal reasoning requirements.
  • Language requirement is through the 202 level of the given language – so for a person starting from scratch that is usually four semesters. This can be shortened by either AP scores or scores on the placement test (for those languages that have them). For example if a person took the Spanish placement test and placed into SPN201 – then they would take 201 and 202 and be done with the requirement.
  • PSY/Neuro (co-major/minor)/ Pre-med is a feasible (and popular) combination – particularly if the student is a first year.
  • PSY400 and PSY394 can count towards upper level requirements
  • The language is changed a little but the upper level requirement is still 2-300 and 2-400 (with one being the capstone) – we tried to build some flexibility into this (e.g., 3-300 level or multiple 400 level) – but deviations from the 2/2 will still need to be cleared by the CDA
  • For Miami Plan stuff follow this link; it has requirements for both of the current Miami Plans (2014 and before/ 2015 and beyond).
  • For CAS stuff follow this link; not as straightforward but can give you a general rundown of the key stuff.