eInside Briefs

Kent State’s Child Development Center Offers STEAM Summer Camp for Children

Children at Kent State University's Child Development
Center play in the center's Outdoor Learning Lab. The
Child Development Center will offer STEAM Summer Camp
for children, ages 3-5, from June 9 - Aug. 15.

The Kent State University Child Development Center will offer STEAM Summer Camp for children, ages 3-5, from June 9 - Aug. 15. Choose from many engaging explorations focused on science, technology, engineering, arts and math (STEAM).

• June 9-13 – Energy: Let’s Move
• June 16-20 – Water Matters
• June 23-27 – SMART play: Playing with Technology
• June 30 – July 3 – Light & Color: Mix it Up!
• July 7-11 – 1, 2, 3 Come Play with Me
• July 14-18 – Nature Detectives
• July 21-25 – Explorers Camp
• July 28 – Aug. 1 – Move, Sing and Play to Music
• Aug. 4-8 – It’s My Body
• Aug. 11-15 – Dig into Fossils!

Campus experts will lead preschool children in experiences related to STEAM from 9 a.m. to noon. Children also will have the chance to learn in the Child Development Center’s new Outdoor Learning Laboratory.

Cost is $130/week if Kent-State affiliated, and $150/week if not affiliated with Kent State. Before- and after-camp care is available for an additional fee. The child must be 3 years old and toilet trained prior to enrollment.

“The Child Development Center curriculum affords children multiple avenues for expression,” says Pamela Hutchins, lecturer in Kent State’s School of Teaching, Learning and Curriculum Studies. “This is a form of symbolic representation that supports children in the exploration of their ideas and makes their thinking visible. Therefore, integrating the arts into a traditional STEM approach supports young children’s desire to know and understand the world around them.”

For more information, and to register for STEAM Summer Camp, go to www.kent.edu/ehhs/cdc.

As Earth Day Approaches, Kent State Celebrates Successful Participation in RecycleMania Competition

Kent State University students are “caught green-handed,”
using reusable water bottles, by the sustainability office
and students from the Environmental Conservation Group
during RecycleMania. 

Kent State University faculty, staff and students collected 263,354 pounds of recyclables during the 2014 RecycleMania challenge, recycling an average of 33,000 pounds weekly. Between Feb. 2 and March 29, 460 colleges and universities across the United States and Canada participated in the eight-week competition that ranks schools based on how much recycling, trash, and food waste is collected.

Kent State’s per capita classic, or the amount of recycling collected per person, was 9.6 pounds based on the population at the Kent Campus. That was enough to retain the Braggin’ Wheel for a third consecutive year in an informal competition with the University of Akron. Akron’s per capita classic was 4.7 pounds per person.

E-cycleMania was held for the second year as part of the RecycleMania competition, where schools collected and tracked the amount of unwanted electronics, such as computers, printers, consumer electronics and other e-waste materials. Kent State ranked 44 out of 68 schools in this area, collecting 10,550 pounds of e-waste. A drop-off drive was held for four days during the month of March, where members of the Kent community could bring in their unwanted electronics to a central drop-off location.

RecycleMania at Kent State is coordinated by the sustainability office, which promotes recycling and waste reduction year-round. Melanie Knowles, sustainability manager at Kent State, says this is the fifth year Kent State has participated in RecycleMania.

“RecycleMania has been a great driver for improvement in recycling rates on campus,” says Knowles. “Each year during the two-month competition, we have more participation and see more enthusiasm among employees and students. I’m already excited to see what we can do next year.”

Other results from Kent State RecycleMania include:

• Kent State placed 2nd in the state for recycling the most amount of material out of 18 Ohio schools.
• The amount of recyclables collected prevented the release of 318 tons of carbon dioxide (MTCO2E) into the atmosphere; that number equates to keeping 67 cars off the road for one year.
• In the residence hall competition, Engleman Hall was the winner for the fourth year in a row. New this year is the most improved Residence Hall, with Centennial A and B taking the lead by increasing 2.66 pounds recycled per person from week one to week seven.
• This was the second year for a friendly competition among some University Facilities Management employees. Five custodial areas competed, with the Front Campus team declared the winners.
• Students, faculty and staff were “Caught Green Handed” doing conservation-minded behaviors during RecycleMania by the Office of Sustainability and the student Environmental Conservation Group.
  

Overall, schools participating in RecycleMania collectively recovered 89.1 million pounds of recyclables and organic material.

While the eight-week contest is a good time for students, faculty and staff to be mindful to reduce, reuse and recycle, Knowles says the key is to continue the recycling habit throughout the year.

She reminds everyone that recycling on the Kent Campus is easy because it is single stream, which means plastic containers, (now accepting #1 through #7), glass, aluminum, paper, paperboard and corrugated cardboard, can all go in the same recycling container, indoors or outdoors.

To honor the winners of the Hall vs. Hall Competition and the Most Improved in the Residence Hall RecycleMania Challenge, a tree planting will take place Thursday, April 24, at 3 p.m. outside Centennial A and B.

For more information about Kent State’s recycling program, visit www.kent.edu/sustainability/index.cfm.

Complete results for all 11 RecycleMania categories can be found on http://recyclemania.org, including a breakout that shows how schools performed by athletic conference, institution size, state and other groupings. 

New Class of Leaders Honored at 36th Annual Student Leadership and Honors Awards

Student leaders, organizations and advisors were
recognized for their contributions to the Kent State
community at the 36th annual Student Leadership and
Honors Awards, hosted by Kent State University’s Center
for Student Involvement. 

Kent State University’s Center for Student Involvement hosted the 36th annual Student Leadership and Honors Awards on April 9 in the Kent Student Center Ballroom. The event celebrates and recognizes student leaders, organizations and advisors for their contributions to the Kent State community during the current academic year. Any student, faculty or staff member at the university is able to submit an awards nomination for any of the categories. A selection committee reviews the nominations and determines the winners.

In addition to the awards, the 2014-15 elected directors and senators of the Undergraduate Student Government took the oath of office, and Executive Director Marvin Logan delivered his inaugural address.

“This ceremony is a great opportunity to recognize our student leaders for their dedication to Kent State and their student organizations, as well as congratulate and thank our graduating seniors,” says Catherine Spisak, graduate assistant for leadership development in the Center for Student Involvement. “It also is a time to inaugurate the new directors and senators of the Undergraduate Student Government for the 2014-15 academic year and reflect on the great work of the outgoing board.”

For a complete list of 2013-14 award winners and newly elected members of the Undergraduate Student Government, click here. 

Kent State’s Owen Lovejoy and Two Graduates to Be Featured in New PBS Series

C. Owen Lovejoy, Ph.D., stands next
to the reconstructed skeleton of “Lucy,”
a near-complete fossil of a human
ancestor that walked upright 3.2 million
years ago.

A new PBS series called Your Inner Fish includes interviews with anthropology experts from Kent State University. C. Owen Lovejoy, Distinguished Professor of Human Evolutionary Studies at Kent State, as well as two Ph.D. graduates from Kent State’s School of Biomedical Sciences in the Biological Anthropology Program, Bruce Latimer and William Kimbel, are featured in the third installment of the series airing April 23.

The PBS special, which is based on the best-selling book by paleobiologist Neil Shubin, has three chapters: Your Inner Fish that debuted April 9, Your Inner Reptile that premiered April 16, and Your Inner Monkey, which will air April 23 at 10 p.m. locally on WVIZ/PBS ideastream and WNEO/Western Reserve Public Media. Viewers outside the Northeast Ohio region can check their local listings.

“Our interviews were filmed last year,” Lovejoy says. “The series is on transformative fossils. We’re a part of the ‘Your Inner Monkey’ program, and I talk about Ardipithecus ramidus.”

Ardipithecus ramidus, or “Ardi,” is the hominid species that lived 4.4 million years ago. It was unveiled by an international science team on Oct. 1, 2009, that included Lovejoy and Latimer. “Ardi” was named Breakthrough of the Year for 2009 by Science and its publisher, AAAS, the world’s largest science organization. Research findings on “Ardi,” which change the way we think about human evolution, were presented in 11 papers that appeared in the organization’s journal, Science. Lovejoy was first author on five papers and contributed to an additional three.

A resident of Kent, Ohio, Lovejoy has taught at Kent State for more than 40 years. He is an internationally recognized biological anthropologist who specializes in the study of human origins and recently was elected Chair of Anthropology for the National Academy of Sciences (NAS). He was elected to the NAS, one of the highest honors given to a scientist in the United States, in 2007 and serves as an editorial board member for its prestigious Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).
Lovejoy is a widely published author, with nearly 150 articles about human evolution, forensics, demography, biomechanics and evolutionary theory. He holds the honor of being one of the Institute for Scientific Information’s (ISI) “Most Highly Cited” authors in the general social sciences.

Latimer is the founding director of Case Western Reserve University’s Center for Human Origins and a professor of orthodontics at Case’s School of Dental Medicine. He also holds adjunct appointments in anthropology, anatomy and cognitive science and is a founding fellow of Case’s Institute for the Science of Origins. He was previously executive director of the Cleveland Museum of Natural History. His research involves the comparative anatomy and biomechanics of primates, particularly the origin of humans’ ability to walk upright, and has been published in Nature, Science and other influential journals. Latimer earned his Ph.D. in biomedical sciences at Kent State.

Kimbel is the director of Arizona State University’s Institute of Human Origins and the Virginia M. Ullman Professor of Natural History and the Environment in the ASU School of Human Evolution and Social Change. He conducts field, laboratory and theoretical research in paleoanthropology, with a primary focus on hominid evolution in Africa during the Pliocene and Pleistocene epochs. Kimbel earned his Ph.D. at Kent State and was an editor of the Journal of Human Evolution from 2003 to 2008. He is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

For more information about PBS’s Your Inner Fish, visit www.pbs.org/your-inner-fish.

For more information about Kent State’s Biological Anthropology program, visit www.kent.edu/biomedical/bioanthro.

designers.in.service: Bridging Local Communities With Upward Bound

Students from Kent State University's public health and
math/science Upward Bound programs celebrate National
TRIO Day, a national day of service. The students paired
up with designers.in.service members to design and
assemble 11 pieces of art that were individually inspired by
the lives of 11 residents of the New Seasons Retirement
Community in Akron.

Kent State University’s College of Architecture and Environmental Design’s designers.in.service organization recently hosted 40 students from the Upward Bound programs at Stark State College. During the visit, the youth from Canton-area high schools enjoyed a light snack followed by an informative conversation with Bill Willoughby, associate dean of the College of Architecture and Environmental Design.

The visit concluded with four miniworkshops, led by designers.in.service members, highlighting techniques and skills applicable within the academic concentrations of architecture, architectural studies and interior design. The workshop topics were Orthographic Projections, Sketching + Drafting, Scaling + Measurements and Presentation + Portfolio. The high school students benefited from learning about this profession from Kent State students’ perspectives.

With a slightly different focus, Kent State’s public health and math/science Upward Bound programs joined designers.in.service at the Summa Center at New Seasons in celebration of National TRIO Day, a national day of service. As the students from area high schools arrived, they were paired up with a designers.in.service member. The teams worked together to design and assemble 11 pieces of art, each one individually inspired by the lives of 11 residents from the New Seasons Retirement Community in Akron. designers.in.service students had interviewed the residents two weeks prior to the event. The teams of students also worked on one group piece, a compilation of the “words of wisdom” shared by the residents to today’s youth.

While designers.in.service led the project, the students from Upward Bound were integral in performing this service for the interviewees. Following the design session, the senior residents were invited to a luncheon for fellowship and presentation of artwork.

Not only did Upward Bound students learn, refine and apply design thinking, and craft and presentation skills during this project, it was a multigenerational, cultural learning experience for everyone involved. The elders' life experiences provided inspiration, humility and valuable life lessons. Just like the artwork, this experience was unique; three generations of unique individuals gathered in one room united in the name of service, despite their differences, became a community of valued acceptance.

designers.in.service plans to host another community day event this spring.

For more information about designers.in.service, including its community initiatives, visit www.designersinservice.info.

Local Author Pens Book on Media Coverage of 2012 Republican Primary Season

Danielle Sarver Coombs, Ph.D., an
assistant professor in Kent State
University's School of Journalism and
Mass Communication, will sign copies of
her book Last Man Standing from noon
to 2 p.m. on Friday, April 25, at the Kent
State University Bookstore.

Danielle Sarver Coombs, Ph.D., an assistant professor in the School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Kent State University, will sign copies of her latest book at a special event from noon to 2 p.m. on Friday, April 25, at the Kent State University Bookstore to launch retail sales for Last Man Standing.

Last Man Standing examines mainstream media coverage of the 2012 Republican primary season to identify and examine the frames used to make sense of the candidates and the race. Through an exhaustive analysis of candidate-related coverage from six major media outlets – The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, CNN, Fox News and MSNBC – Coombs weaves her examination of media frames into a compelling narrative reconstruction of the 2012 primary season.

This book features:

• Exhaustive analysis of mainstream media coverage over a 12-month period.
• Smart, insightful exploration of media frames.
• Chronological structure, which allows for analysis to address how frames shift with candidate’s fortunes.
  

“The saturation coverage of today’s presidential campaigns in all forms of media leaves many people doubting that after the votes are cast there is anything left to say or learn about a race. Danielle Sarver Coombs’ Last Man Standing proves the cynics wrong,” says David D. Perlmutter, dean and professor of the College of Media and Communication at Texas Tech University and author of Blogwars: The New Political Battleground. “Her detailed analysis of the 2012 drama (and its prologue and aftermath) is a model of both careful scholarship and novelistic pacing. It will satisfy the academic, student, journalist and interested lay reader with interesting unheralded but crucial details and incisive analysis.”

Craig Flournoy, an associate professor of journalism at Southern Methodist University, says Coombs’ study of media coverage of the 2012 Republican primaries should be a wake-up call for journalists and voters.

“For the mainstream media, Last Man Standing contains good news – their coverage mattered – and bad news – entertainment trumped substance,” Flournoy says. “For voters, Coombs’ superb analysis of political coverage has a clear message: caveat emptor. [This is] a must-read for anyone who cares about the twin spectacles of high-stakes journalism and presidential politics.”

The title sells for $65. The event will feature an author meet and greet, refreshments and discounts. The bookstore is located inside the Kent Student Center at 1075 Risman Dr. on the Kent Campus.

Coombs earned her Ph.D. in Mass Communication and Public Affairs from the Manship School of Mass Communication at Louisiana State University in 2007.

Coombs’s current research focuses on two areas: political communication and sport fandom. She has published research in such publications as the Journal of Public Relations Research, the International Journal of Sport Communication, and Sport in Society: Cultures, Commerce, Media, Politics. Coombs is the co-editor of two, three-volume anthologies: We Are What We Sell: How Advertising Shapes American Life…And Always Has and American History Through American Sports: From Colonial Lacrosse to Extreme Sports (Praeger). She is the author of Last Man Standing: Media, Framing, and the 2012 Republican Primaries (Rowman & Littlefield).

Before joining Kent State, Coombs served as senior research manager for Insight Research Group (now Insight Strategy Group) in New York City. While at Insight, Coombs specialized in uncovering consumer insights in order to inform advertising campaigns, product design and brand strategies for numerous prominent brands from a variety of clients, including television, retail, nonprofits and consumer packaged goods. During the 2004 Democratic primary season, Coombs was director of election research at Edison Media Research.

Main Street Kent Coordinates Clean Up Kent Day

“Clean Up Kent” day, organized by Main Street Kent, is
scheduled for Friday, April 25, from 2-5 p.m. 

Main Street Kent is coordinating another “Clean Up Kent” day, scheduled for Friday, April 25, from 2-5 p.m. This is the third event of its kind, after having two successful clean-up days in April and November 2013. All are invited to pitch in with the first clean-up day of 2014. Members of service organizations, scouts, business owners, community members and anyone else who is interested in sprucing up downtown that day is more than welcome to join.

Main Street Kent will set up a table at the Hometown Bank Plaza with supplies to share: trash bags, gloves, dustpans, buckets, brooms, etc. A limited number of “Clean Up Kent” T-shirts will be given away to volunteers on a first-come-first-served basis.

Call 330-677-8000 or email heather@mainstreetkent.org with any questions.

Main Street Kent is a nonprofit organization focused on the revitalization of downtown Kent. It is an affiliate of the national Main Street program and the Heritage Ohio program.