The All College Day Silent Auction set a record of $18,636 in proceeds for scholarships, which is up by more than $5,000 over last year. Sincerest thanks to the Staff Council, Collin College Foundation, and all the employees who donated auction items, volunteered at the event, or purchased auction items. Special congratulations to auction chairs Andrea Mersiovsky and Jacqueline Grayczyck for a blockbuster auction.
As part of the All College Day festivities, attendees were asked to contribute school supplies to the Court Appointed Special Advocates for Children program, CASA of Collin County. The program works within the court system to ensure children are being cared for in cases where they have been removed from their home or other special circumstances exist. The college’s staff and faculty donated 1,238 items, including 75 backpacks on All College Day, with 35 more donations coming in later. Thank you to everyone who participated
Sociology Professor Larry Stern was interviewed by WNYC’s “The Stakes” podcast for a series titled “A History of Persuasion.” Stern can be heard in the first two episodes of the series, available at https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/the-stakes.
Michelle Millen, Dean of Health Sciences and Emergency Services, is serving on the Healthcare and Public Health Sector Coordinating Council (HPHSCC). The council is a coalition of industry associations and their members which has been a platform for collaboration among health care industry leaders and the government for more than a decade to address the most pressing security and resiliency challenges to the health care sector as a whole. Thank you to her for representing Collin College well.
Leslie Hooker, a buyer in the Collin College Purchasing Department, was selected to participate in the inaugural Leaders Edge program developed by NIGP: The Institute for Public Procurement. NIGP created this yearlong development program to find and nurture rising stars in public procurement who aspire to become the next generation of executive leaders. The program is an intimate, cohort-based learning experience with a mix of in-person and online learning sessions designed to meet members’ educational needs and to close the leadership gap in public procurement. Hooker’s application was selected from more than 70 submitted for the inaugural class. Over the next year, she will collaborate with the Purchasing department on a project which she will present at the NIGP Annual Forum and Products Exposition in August 2020.
Purchasing Director Cindy White participated as a panelist in a webinar titled “Amazon Business and Community Colleges – Reducing Costs, Improving Outcomes.”
Brenda Carter, Academic Affairs Dean at McKinney Campus, was appointed to the steering committee for the City of McKinney – McKinney Thrives Project. This project examines how to improve key areas of the city of McKinney. Carter was also appointed to the City of McKinney Census Committee.
English faculty member Dr. LaToya Watkins published an article in the July 2019 edition of D Magazine titled “A Common Thing.” Look for it on pages 186-187.
Psychology Professor Joshua Arduengo attended and presented a paper at Chevron: The International Society for the Behavioral and Social Sciences in June.
Dr. Rachel Gunter, Professor of History, was interviewed for the Ruthe Winegarten Foundation documentary “Citizens at Last,” on women’s suffrage and voting rights in Texas. The documentary will be released in summer 2020 for the centennial of the 19th Amendment. Gunter was also quoted in “100 Years of Women’s Suffrage” in The Daily Texan. Read the article at www.dailytexanonline.com/2019/07/03/100-years-of-womens-suffrage.
Collin College’s Purchasing Department received the Achievement of Excellence in Procurement Award for the 14th year in a row. The award honors organizations that demonstrate excellence in innovation, professionalism, productivity, e-procurement and leadership attributes of the procurement organization. The award is given by the National Purchasing Institute and is sponsored by the National Institute of Governmental Purchasing, the National Association of Educational Procurement, the Institute for Supply Management, as well as several other organizations. Congratulations to Purchasing Director Cindy White and the entire Purchasing Department for their work in achieving this recognition.
Dr. Keith Volanto, Professor of History, published “When Was the Republic of Texas No More: Revisiting the Annexation of Texas” in the July 2019 issue of Southwestern Historical Quarterly (Journal of the Texas State Historical Association). Volanto also served as a panel member discussing the impact of the New Deal on Texas communities at the Texas New Deal Symposium at Texas Wesleyan University in Fort Worth in June.
Garry Evans, Dean of Academic Affairs at Plano Campus, was invited to participate in Leadership Plano Class 37.
Kelley Reynolds, Professor of Respiratory Care, was elected as the North Region Director for the Texas Society for Respiratory Care beginning Jan. 1, 2020.
Professor Sonia Iwanek had two poster proposals accepted for the 5th World Congress on Public Health and Health Care Management Conference (one with a Model UN Student Katie Wischmann) titled “Diversifying Access to Bioremediation” and “Rethinking Sex Education: Starting with Colleges and Universities.”
Dr. Nicole Grose was selected to participate in the Consortium Leadership and Renewal Academy (CLARA 2019-2020).
Dr. Monica Gallamore, Professor of History, completed a review for “Women on the Move: The Forgotten Era of Women’s Bicycle Racing” by Roger Gilles to be published in The International Journal of the History of Sport.
Collin College Fire Academy received 80 student applications for the 48 spots available in the fall. This is the largest group of applicants the college has seen in many years, attributed to the hiring demands by local fire departments and the opening of the new Public Safety Training Center.
Scott Donaldson and the Collin College Law Enforcement Academy will host the opening retreat for Class 11 of Leadership North Texas, Sept. 27 at the Public Safety Training Center. The class includes several regional leaders of business/industry and municipal government.
Two first-ever camps at Plano Campus attracted significant interest in July. Collin Summer Art Camp drew 23 students in grades 6-12. Nineteen students in those grades attended Collin Photography Camp. Final exhibitions were held to showcase the students’ work
Summer camps at the Frisco Campus included:
- Culinary Camp with 16 students led by Chef Reczek
- Pastry Camp with 16 students led by Chef Owles
- A new Girls Coding Camp with 18 students led by Dr. Tebring Daly and Professor Misti Clark
- Co-ed Robotics Camp with 20 students led by Dr. Greg Sherman and Dr. Yiping Wang
A CSI Camp was held at the McKinney campus with 24 students led by faculty member, Dr. Lee DeBoer.
With support from the National Science Foundation, Collin College hosted Summer Working Connections for 104 faculty from 51 colleges. The six tracks presented were: AWS Cloud Foundations; Bitcoins and Blockchains; Cyber Buffet; Hybrid Cloud; Preparing to Teach the Internet of Things; and Tableau.
Adjunct Professor of Philosophy Troy Doucet recently defended his dissertation and graduated with his doctorate from The University of Texas at Dallas.
Rachel Gunter, Professor of History, participated in a symposium at the Bullock Texas State History Museum in Austin commemorating the centennial of Texas ratifying the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The program focused on the movement for women’s suffrage within the context of this era in Texas history. It also highlighted issues that continue to be relevant to women’s rights.
The photography of Dr. Lupita Murillo Tinnen, Associate Dean at Frisco Campus, was part of a group exhibition titled “Migratory” at the Bath House Cultural Center, July 6-Aug. 3. The show explored “different types of human and non-human migration with art that studies the causes, actions, and effects of people, animals, or things moving from one place to another.”
Collin College’s chapter of Psi Beta, the community college national honor society in psychology, was recently recognized by the organization’s executive director for its accomplishments in 2018-19. In a letter to the college, Psi Beta Executive Director Valerie Senatore noted that Collin College’s chapter won a “Building Bonds” award for a collaborative project with the University of Central Arkansas’s Psi Chi chapter in addition to a Chapter Excellence Award.
Mike Dickson, Kasie Dodd, Mark Garcia, Jeramie Hicks, David Hoyt, Nicola Marshman, and Jennifer McDermott were recognized by the League of Innovation in the Community College for the Collin Mobile Application. The group won an Innovation of the Year Award. The awards “reflect capstone achievements and the continuing renewal of the spirit of innovation and experimentation upon which the league was founded.” Congratulations to them on this honor.
This year’s Nurse Camp for middle school and early high school-aged students hosted about 100 students over three days. The Nursing department worked with Nursing faculty and other health sciences departments to give these students a feel for what those in the nursing profession specifically (and health sciences professions more broadly) encounter on a day-to-day basis. Held in early June each year, this activity is a highlight of the Nursing division’s outreach activities.
Brittany Kaberline, a second year student, received a scholarship through the Respiratory Care Foundation of Texas. Her research paper ranked second of all papers submitted. She was presented with this scholarship in Waco at the Texas Society for Respiratory Care annual meeting in early July.
Collin College Respiratory Care students placed first, second, and third in the Student Poster Symposium at the Texas Society for Respiratory Care Conference in July in Waco.
Nursing students for Spring 2019 gave 4,200.75 documented hours of service to the community. Nursing administrators noted that those are “documented hours” because several students volunteer more than they turn in. The staff also noted that six graduating students gave more than 100 hours during their time at Collin and several others graduating this summer are well on their way to joining that elite club of “100+ hours.”
Professor of Speech Ceilidh Charleson-Jennings was interviewed by national radio station iHeart Media and on the Home and Family show on the Hallmark Channel about her newest book, Where the Lost Dogs Go. This is a link to the iHeart radio interview:
https://www.iheart.com/content/2019-06-18-susannah-charleston-where-the-lost-dogs-go/?fbclid=IwAR1gKi6hkXIFPvoToUDVVxsWCPCbqAu2vBH-OGhbsvii7RBm17xRqoDw
Frisco math faculty hosted Texas Mathematical Association of Two-Year Colleges (AMATYC) Southwest Regional conference in Frisco, June 7; Dr. Randy Collins and Dr. Katerina Vishnyakova co-chaired the event.
Chip Galloway, Math Professor, presented “Strange Attractors: Mathematics and Literature” at the AMATYC Southwest Regional Conference in Frisco.
Professor Dave Rice presented “Using DESMOS to Enhance Your Math Class” at AMATYC Southwest Regional Conference in Frisco.
Theatre Professor Gail Cronauer attended the Overlook Film Festival on June 2 in New Orleans for a screening of The Vast of Night, in which she stars. The film won the jury prize and was screened later in the month at the Edinburgh Film Festival. Cronauer was also a featured presenter at the Women in Film Industry Expo in Dallas, June 29. She discussed the Michael Chekhov approach to acting and led workshop participants in introductory exercises.
The first ever Collin Animation Camp ran from June 17-21 at the Plano Campus drawing 20 sixth- to eighth-grade campers. Students created daily warm-up drawings, a thaumatrope, learned about the 12 principals of animation, created storyboards and a script, and completed a walk cycle. Ultimately, students animated a 20-second segment that they took home on a flash drive.
Math and science faculty, science lab personnel and Associate Deans Melanie Yates and Dawn Richardson co-hosted the SMASH Camp with 24 middle school campers.
Professor Nick Morgan recently graduated Leadership Frisco XXII
Dr. Alaya Swann, Professor of English published “White Supremacy and Medievalism in Online Dungeons and Dragons Communities” on History Workshop Online.
Two Respiratory Care students were recipients of scholarships through the American Respiratory Care Foundation. Gustavo Lopez was the recipient of the Jimmy A. Young Memorial Education Recognition Award. Seo Yeon Park was the recipient of the Morton B. Duggan, Jr. Memorial Scholarship.