Man on Board, for the Long Haul

As the tanker that would haul oil to Bahrain by way of Aruba and Naples picked up its crew in the slicing wind off Brooklyn Flats, Robert Brustein thought, “I’m going to be the loneliest man in the world.” It was 1945, and although the war had ended, his hitch in the service had a year and a half to go. He was 18 years old.

Following an accelerated course of study at the High School of Music and Art in New York City with a final year at Columbia Grammar School, Brustein graduated at 16 and entered Amherst College in 1943. The war had swept most of the students from the pristine New England campus, leaving only the underage and the 4Fs, those deemed physically unable to serve. “We ruled,” he says. “We were the football team, the baseball team, the drama club. One hundred-fifty kids.”

Enlisting for service in April 1945, he entered the Merchant Marine, which capped four months of basic training in San Mateo, California with six months at sea, eight months at the Merchant Marine Academy at King’s Point, Long Island, and the rank of Cadet-Midshipman in the Naval Reserve. On one of his seven-hour monthly leaves from basic training on August 15, 1945, Brustein witnessed V-J day in San Francisco. “It was orgiastic. Women tore their clothes off in the street. People climbed to the top of huge statues. I’ve never seen a city go so berserk. And all I did was watch. The envious observer.” Read more

It’s A Musical Life

In New York, where you can see productions originating from Africa to Iceland, you can also see musicals this year that came from your own back yard, Suffolk University.

Three musicals originally developed by the Boston Music Theatre Project (BMTP), a program of the Suffolk University Theatre Department, had professional New York area debuts this season. The incredible circumstances are not the triumph of coincidence, but the result of a carefully crafted model and the tenacity of Theatre Department Chair Marilyn Plotkins.

Plotkins founded BMTP in 1987 as the first professional organization in the Greater Boston area dedicated exclusively to the development of new work in musical theatre. “I have a life-long interest in musicals,” says Plotkins. “BMTP was a natural outgrowth of my training, experience and professional interests.”

For the next 10 years, Plotkins partnered with local and national organizations and artists to develop new work, including Elmer Gantry, produced by the Nashville Opera and the Peak Performances series at Montclair State University in January, 2008, and Look What a Wonder Jesus Has Done, featured in the New York Music Theatre Festival this September.

In 1999, Plotkins integrated BMTP into the academic framework of the newly formed Theatre Department to engage Suffolk students in the development process. Crossing Brooklyn, a new musical by Laura Harrington and Jenny Giering, premiered off-Broadway in the fall at the Transport Group and was the first BMTP piece developed with students—but it certainly won’t be the last.

The hands-on experience of BMTP is a unique facet of the Suffolk Theatre Department and has inspired other in-house professional development opportunities, such as Wesley Savick’s National Theatre of Allston and Richard Chambers’ professional design apprenticeships. As the program continues to grow, so will the opportunities. Plotkins is currently in negotiation with two New York writers for the next BMTP project, slated for spring, 2009.

Story Time With Uncle Joe

“The department chairman asked me what I wanted as a retirement gift so I told him I wanted an iPod,” says Education and Human Services (EHS) Professor Joseph McCarthy in reference to his sell-out Popular Songs seminar.

McCarthy, who retired in 2007, first came to Suffolk in the early 70s and has taught in both the EHS and History departments. Had he been an Oxford don in the 19th century, he would probably have been classified as a generalist. Then again, this would be an atypical Oxford don with his blue jeans, sneakers and Claddaugh earring.

McCarthy’s teaching career at Suffolk has moved from one area of interest to another. He created the university’s master’s degree program in Higher Education Administration, advised graduate students, taught freshmen, encouraged young history majors in their baccalaureate pursuits, and taught courses about World War II, medieval popular culture and the theory and practice of history.

“I always marvel at Joe,” says Dean Kenneth Greenberg. “He is such a great scholar who knows so many of these different ways of learning and knowledge. It’s remarkable.”

McCarthy taught his students that the worker, the scholar or the professional should have an unfettered intellectual curiosity. From the first day of a new course, he would say that his course would not be a pedantic regurgitation of names, facts and half-baked analysis, just “story time with your Uncle Joe.”

In the words of an old 70s soul song, there ain’t no stopping McCarthy now, because he’s on the move. On the South Shore of Massachusetts, he presides over a bit of the old agrarian Massachusetts where he splits logs and raises chickens that have claimed the blue ribbon at the annual Marshfield Fair for two years running, all the time looking after his grandchildren.

McCarthy will continue to teach and informally advise at Suffolk. He is a living connection to Suffolk’s days as that small upstart Beacon Hill institution educating commuter students. No matter what course he teaches, the fundamental lesson will always be the same: never lie about facts and never be afraid of ideas.

Anatomy in the Earbuds

Students from Eric Dewar’s Anatomy and Physiology course huddle around a softball-sized orb balanced on a short metal tripod at the corner of his desk. They’re working on an extra credit project, recording a podcast into the space-aged looking microphone for class.

Dewar, a paleontologist and assistant professor in the Biology Department, is one of several professors in the College using podcasting in his courses, uploading lectures and class recordings to iTunes University and making course content as mobile as a browser or mp3 player.

“Part of what I wanted to do with this is meet students where they are,” he says. “But I also wanted to show students that scholarship or research in science isn’t something that requires a ton of buildup, it’s just what we do when we’re scientists and any way we can communicate our ideas is positive.”

The podcasts might be 10-15 minute lecture recaps or topics examined by students in small groups. “The thing I like about being able to involve students in the podcast is creating a sense of ownership,” he says. “Students have had tons of science by the time they get to college. But have they ever really done science? I want to model what a professional scientist does. Students can do this. It’s like an Amish barn raising, and when we’re done we have something we built ourselves and it looks nice.”

Students post the recorded podcasts online for their classmates. Eventually, some podcasts may reach a wider audience. “I’m hopeful that some student projects can be made publicly available,” he says, anticipating results from project-based laboratories, surveys, or data gathered from the basketball team, for example, to see what their oxygen consumption is like on a treadmill. “That’s the kind of thing we can post up on the public site and say, here’s what students are doing at Suffolk.”

“A student told me she was driving in her car, and her boyfriend was looking at her iPod and said, ‘What’s this anatomy thing you have? Oh hey let’s listen to it.’ To know that I’m somewhere between Beyoncé and 50 Cent in my students’ playlists I think is very funny.”

Classics Galore

For the first time in the University’s 101-year history, the College is offering a concentration in ancient classical literature. Students will be able to immerse themselves in the epics of Homer, Virgil and Dante. They will be charmed by Ovid and challenged by Aeschylus. They will sit on the shoulders of Tacitus and Suetonius in observing Imperial Rome at its apex.

For Professor George Kalogeris BS’78, the Classics program’s guiding force, it is the first time in a 20-year teaching and writing career that he can work full time with two things he loves most: ancient writers and the students who want to study them.

“When young people engage with these texts it helps them to develop an inner life, whether they know it or not,” says Kalogeris.

Raised in Winthrop with the smell of the oceans and the sounds of rebetika—a style of Greek folk music popular among 1930s day laborers—Kalogeris’ interest in words and language came from his mother, who understood and conversed in nearly every regional dialect of modern Greek. As an undergraduate, Kalogeris took the Blue Line for four years to Suffolk University where he studied literature and psychology. His undergraduate thesis was on Jim Morrison’s allusions to Sophocles in The Doors’ tune, “The End.”

After a brief stint as a psychologist, Kalogeris entered the University Professors Program at Boston University where he earned master’s and doctoral degrees in Comparative Literature. He recently released a collection of his translation of Albert Camus’ diary notebooks, Carnets (Pressed Wafer Publishing, 2006) and had his translation of a C.P. Cavafy poem read before a commencement audience at Oxford University.

Kalogeris believes the most valuable lesson he has learned as a Suffolk professor is the importance of students. “It’s about people seeing things for the first time,” he says. He fosters this awareness in students, from giving out his home phone number and taking calls night and day to spending countless hours hosting informal poetry discussions. “I kind of hate English and classical literature,” said a student at a discussion on Sappho, “but I like Kalogeris and I could never miss this seminar.”

Ready, Set, Vote

Since becoming an assistant professor in 2006, Rachael Cobb has already put her stamp on the Government Department of Suffolk University by being a catalyst for two innovative programs, the University Poll Workers Project and the Boston Area Colleges Election Project.

The University Poll Workers Project, which Cobb established, recruits and trains a diverse array of students to be the next generation of poll workers. It has already yielded positive results, with over 100 Suffolk students working the polls for the City of Boston on Election Day during the past two years. The program will continue to be a resource for students and the community in the fall 2008 Presidential election.

The Boston Area Colleges Election Project is a collaborative effort between the Suffolk and Harvard University Government Departments and Harvard Law School. Through the project, students help to gather data on voter satisfaction in the city of Boston.

“I am passionate about our political processes, and these two programs will enable our students to be even more politically competent by taking action in our democracy,” says Cobb.

Cobb was born and reared in Cambridge, where she still lives with her husband and two young children. She graduated Magna Cum Laude from Bryn Mawr College and received her PhD from MIT.

Now, as a professor on Beacon Hill, Cobb is motivated by the eagerness of her students and appreciates Suffolk’s dedication to small class sizes. Her passion for public service is contagious. “Rachael has a remarkable ability to work with all kinds of people,” says professor and chair of the Government Department John Berg. “She is excellent at bringing people together and making things happen.”

Distinguished Visiting Scholars 2007-2008

The Distinguished Visiting Scholars Program of the College of Arts and Sciences brings prominent, nationally and internationally renowned scholars, artists, and intellectuals to the Boston campus for stays ranging from one week to a month. The scholars contribute to the intellectual vitality of the entire college community by teaching courses, holding workshops and roundtables, and delivering public lectures. In its fifth year, the program hosted the following scholars during 2007-2008:

Billye Avery

“Know that your health is the most important thing you have,” says health care activist Billye Avery. “It is really one of the only things you own.” Avery, founder and president of the Avery Institute for Social Change and founder of the National Black Women’s Health Project, believes that health care is a human right, and for 25 years has advocated for patients’ access to insurance, health records, and equity in the health care system. “Get involved. Learn the issues. Start small,” said Avery. “Find a few like-minded people and start with a small group discussion. What do we want to have as a legacy?” she asks. “We want to engage people around change, vision and a better future.” See related story.

Stephen Breyer

“What’s the most important thing we want to teach students?” asks US Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer. “Democracy.” The participation of citizens in the democratic process, what Breyer calls “active liberty,” is necessary to having a workable government. “We judges cannot insist that Americans participate in that government, but we can make clear that our Constitution depends on it.” Get involved in the community, participate on any level of civic engagement, including politics, school boards and other organizations, he says. “Unless most of you do something like that—participation—the document I work with every day just won’t work.” Breyer has published numerous books on administrative law, economic regulation and the Constitution, including Active Liberty: Interpreting Our Democratic Constitution (2005). See related story.

The Faye Family

A family of Senegalese men in crisp yellow tunics and dyed patterned pants sat side by side, their drums in arms’ reach and their smiles bright as costumes. Representing the Faye family of griots, or ‘praise singers,’ from Dakar, Senegal, they tuned the line-up of hourglass shaped drums—one still dangling an airline luggage tag—by tightening wooden pegs around the rims. One after another the drums came to life, creating a rhythm for movement and a language for reaching across villages. The drummers—Vieux Sing Faye, the patriarch and chief griot of Dakar; Aziz and Mouhamadou Moustapha Faye, sons of Vieux; and Malik Ngom, grandson of Vieux—presented the gewel drumming tradition, taught traditional dance moves, and performed at a concert in the C. Walsh Theatre. See related story.

Charles Fried

“Liberty expresses who we are: thinking, judging and choosing individuals. Liberty is that individuality,” says Charles Fried, former associate justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court. “Yet we must somehow draw boundaries. There are things that we need and want government to do, like drawing lines for the betterment of the community.” But does government limit liberty, or put a floor under it? “I don’t think it’s possible to come up with an algorithm for this,” he says. “I know it when I see it—a law which is designed to suppress liberty, and when the purpose of a law is to let a thousand flowers bloom.” Fried is the author of eight books, including Modern Liberty and the Limits of Government (2006). See related story.

Maxine Hong Kingston

“What can we do to engage the young?” asks writer and professor Maxine Hong Kingston. “I come from UC Berkeley, and I notice the demonstrations are organized by the faculty, the white-haired people from the 60s. Back in the old days, it was the students who did it and yelled for the faculty to come out and join them.” Writing can be a political action, she says. “I have this faith that you write your story, you write your poem, and you can write your way home from war. You do public acts of writing and you get it out there so other people can hear it.” Kingston’s books include The Fifth Book of Peace (2003), To Be the Poet (2002), and The Woman Warrior (1975). See related story.

Emil Kirchner

“The European Union is challenged by globalization, by the US, China and other countries,” says Emil Kirchner, an international leader in the research and teaching of European politics. Discussing the Treaty of Lisbon, developed in 2007 to govern and help the expanding EU respond to changing political and economic issues, he says the future of the EU is one of unity and diversity, with the EU able to accomplish more together than the countries could individually. “I think what we have in the EU is the equivalent of a security community—one where you have peaceful expectations and if there is a conflict it will be resolved peacefully. If we look at European history over centuries, this in itself is a big achievement.” See related story.

Frances Moore Lappé

Citing the statistic that 854 million people go hungry in the world each day, Frances Moore Lappé, an internationally acclaimed social and environmental activist and co-founder of the Small Planet Institute, remains devoted to the causes that propelled her into the public eye 30 years ago when she wrote the bestseller, Diet for a Small Planet. Nine books later, including the recent Getting A Grip: Clarity, Creativity and Courage in a World Gone Mad, she continues to focus on the social and economic systems that fail to produce fairness in the world, advocating for “democracy as a living practice in which all voices are empowered—democracy as a way of life, a set of values and mutual accountability grounded in basic fairness and the inclusion of all of us.” She advises taking purposeful risks in life. “Trust,” she says. “And go into thin air.” See related story.

Vivian Pinn

Women pursuing biomedical science careers often face challenges ranging from lack of female role models and mentors in their fields to family responsibilities, racial bias, and sexual discrimination. “We need to identify what the barriers are and see what we can do to make it an easier path for women,” says Vivian W. Pinn, PhD, director of the Office of Research on Women’s Health at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). “Careers in science are so exciting; it brings you inner pride that you’ve been successful.” The recipient of nine Honorary Degrees of Law and Science since 1992, Pinn launched a web site through the NIH to promote the advancement of women in biomedical research careers (http://womeninscience.nih.gov). “If science turns you on, make sure those battles don’t keep you from doing what you love.” See related story.

Hugo Salcedo

“Mexican theater has many pages still to write about the new faces of violence, drug cartels, kidnappings, and extortions,” says award-winning playwright Dr. Hugo Salcedo, speaking through a translator after students gave a dramatic public reading of his most famous play, El viaje de los cantores/The Crossing, the tragic story of 18 Mexicans trying to cross the U.S. border illegally only to meet with their death trapped in a railroad boxcar. “Never before did the act of staring at an empty computer screen offer the possibility of writing topics of utmost importance.” Salcedo, a professor of humanities at Universidad Autónoma de Baja California, is also a poet, essayist, and critic, and has written more than 40 plays that have been published and performed in the US, Mexico, France, Spain, Germany, the Netherlands, and Venezuela. See related story.

Designing for tomorrow, today

Future friendly furniture. Self-generating hydropower faucets. Recycled rubber flooring. No paint polymer siding. Cardboard fiber countertops.

These and other innovations were on display at a green/sustainable design trade show hosted by Professor Karen Clarke’s Sustainable Design for Interiors class last spring. Students discussed product life cycles, chemical composition, and the environmental impacts of materials as they examined carpet recreated from “mining office buildings instead of the earth,” and fabrics made from crushed water bottles broken down to polymers, melted, spun, dyed, and then woven into new textiles.

The trade show, “Design for the Environment,” provided real-world examples of a growing market dedicated to green building. “This is out there now,” says Clarke. “Students want to be green designers, and it’s important because that is what the industry is demanding.”

The July/August issue of New England Home notes, “Interior designer Karen Clarke co-chairs one of the best-kept secrets in the country: the interior design program at New England School of Art & Design at Suffolk University.” But it’s no secret that Clarke has long been an advocate for sustainability. “She has really taken green issues on, not only on behalf of our students but also the University. It was she who pushed for University-wide recycling, for example,” says Sara Chadwick, director of administrative services at NESADSU.

Clarke guides students through the industry standard for sustainable building: the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Green Building Rating System, set by the US Green Building Council. Her goal is to prepare students to take the LEED exam and become accredited professionals. “Architecture is changing, and we have to be respectful of the environment and incorporate design that takes into account the future now,” she says. “There are requests for sustainability and builders who want to go for LEED certification. Clients need people who specialize in this area.”

“In the next 10 years, every project, every product will have some sort of green aspect to it,” says Clarke. “As interior designers, we shape and design buildings for the users. Good design is being responsible socially and environmentally. And since 95% of our time is spent in interior environments, it’s important that our environments are healthy.”

Spotlight: Unmatched–Psychology PhD Program is a Collaborative Gem

During one cold weekend at the end of February, nearly 70 of the most highly ranked PhD hopefuls from more than 60 colleges and universities across the country and beyond, don their interview-best and huddle in the crowded hallways of the Donahue Building, hoping to meet their “match.” They’ll experience Suffolk’s clinical psychology program up close during two demanding days of individual and small group interviews and info sessions designed to enable the candidates, faculty, and current PhD students to get to know one another, and their research interests, work styles, and career objectives. After the weekend-long mix of grueling questions and more casual get-togethers, the psychology department will identify those faculty-student matches with the greatest synergy and potential for success.

Training researchers, practitioners, and teachers

Suffolk’s Psychology PhD program graduated its first class in 2000, and attracted 314 applicants for just 13 program openings this year. According to Department Chair Krisanne Bursik, it is the scientist practitioner model of training that distinguishes the College of Arts & Sciences’ highly competitive program from other more applied programs in the area. “Our research component is front and center,” she says. “And our students are trained to be active researchers, clinical practitioners, and teachers. We’ve developed a program that provides training and supervision in all three areas, and this absolutely sets us apart.”

Throughout the six-year program, students and faculty work side by side in the research lab and classroom, and in clinical placements. “Though all of our faculty members serve as teachers and mentors to all 85 doctoral students currently enrolled in the program, the bond that naturally forms within each faculty-student research team is a very close and critically important one,” says Bursik. “Faculty members actively pursue their research interests with their student collaborators, while making a significant long-term investment in the career development and success of each of their students.” Read more