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Alumni Notes

Two History Ph.D. Alums Win Prizes for Their First Monographs

At the May 2012 Congress of he Interdisciplinary Latin American Studies Association in San Francisco the Bryce Wood Book Award will be presented by the President of the Association to Jody Pavilack (Ph.D. History '03), whose book Mining for the Nation: The Politics of Chile's Coal Communities from the Popular Front to the Cold War (State College: Penn State University Press, 2011) was chosen from among 131 books reviewed by the prize committee. Mining for the Nation will also be honored later in March 2012 with the McGann Prize for an outstanding book by the Rocky Mountain Council for Latin American Studies, an interdisciplinary regional area studies association.

Another history alum, Thomas D. Rogers (Ph.D. History '05) will receive the 2011 Warren Dean Memorial Prize for The Deepest Wounds: The Laboring Landscapes of Sugar in Northeast Brazil (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2010). His work will also be honored with The Agricultural History Society's Henry A. Wallace Award for the best book on any aspect (broadly interpreted) of agricultural history outside the United States.

Sara Becker (Ph.D. Psychology & Neuroscience ’09) joined the faculty at Brown University Medical School as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior in September 2011.

Kate Calder (Ph.D. Statistical Science ‘03), currently Associate Professor of Statistics at the Ohio State University, and Maria de Iorio (Ph.D. Statistical Science ‘01), currently Reader in Statistics at University College, London, have been elected to the Board of Directors of the International Society for Bayesian Analysis—the worlds leading professional organization for Bayesian statistics and related disciplines. They will each serve as Board members for 2012 through 2014. See www.bayesian.org.

Mark David Carlson (A.M. Public Policy ’88) was elected to the board of directors for the California Healthcare Insitute.

Anna Harwell Celenza (Ph.D. Music ’96) has written Duke Ellington’s Nutcracker Suite (Charlesbridge Publishing), a book for young readers. She is Thomas E. Caestecker Professor of Music at Georgetown University.

Bin Chen (Ph.D. Electrical and Computer Engineering ’08), assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering at Purdue University, has received an Outstanding Scholar award in recognition of his research in biomedical imaging, biological and medical image processing and analysis, mathematical modeling, simulation, and visualization.

Joshua Dwight Esty (Ph.D. English ’96) has written Unseasonable Youth, Modernism, Colonialism, and the Fiction of Development (Oxford University Press). He is associate professor of English at the University of Pennsylvania.

Reid Fontaine (Ph.D. Psychology & Neuroscience ’01) has published a new book, “The Mind of the Criminal” (Cambridge University Press).

Peter Frankel (Ph.D. Psychology & Neuroscience ’88) will receive an award from the American Family Therapy Academy for Innovative Contributions to Family Therapy in May 2012.

Thomas W. Heilke (Ph.D. Political Science ’90) has been named the dean of graduate studies at the University of Kansas. Heilke is a professor of political science and the director of the Center for Global and International Studies.

Katherine Lambert-Pennington (Ph.D. Cultural Anthropology ’05) received the Ernest A. Lynton Award, which recognizes an early career faculty member who connects teaching to community engagement.

Alex Loney (Ph.D. Classical Studies ’10) has received the American Council of Learned Societies New Faculty Fellows award for 2012-14.

Vinicius Mayrink (Ph.D. Statistical Science ‘11), currently Assistant Professor of Statistics, Federal University of Minas Gerais (UFMG) received Honorable Mention for an outstanding doctoral dissertation in the area of Statistics. He will receive his award at the Latin American Congress of Probability and Mathematical Statistics to be held in Valparaiso (Chile) in March. 

Kristina McDonald (Ph.D. Psychology & Neuroscience ’08) has accepted a position as Assistant Professor in the Psychology Department at the University of Alabama beginning September 2012.

Juliette M. Rogers (Ph.D. Romance Studies ’90) has received tenure as an associate professor in the French and francophone studies department at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minn.

Rita Arlene Sheffey (Ph.D. Chemistry ’82) was elected president of the Atlanta Bar Association.

Michelle vanDellen (Ph.D. Psychology & Neuroscience ‘08) has recently accepted a tenure-track faculty position at the University of Georgia in the Psychology Department.

Jini Kim Watson (Ph.D. Literature ’06 & Certificate in Women’s Studies), Assistant Professor of English, Comparative Literature has just published The New Asian City: Three-dimensional Fictions of Space and Urban Form (University of Minnesota Press, 2011).

Barbara Elizabeth Will (Ph.D. Literature ’93) has published Unlikely Collaborations: Gertude Stein, Bernard Fay, and the Vichy Dilemma (Columbia University Press).