Smith has received a $19,380 grant from the Gray Family Fund of the Oregon Community Foundation to train teachers in the West Linn School District on environmental issues. The Environmental Education Program seeks to encourage a strong local land ethic, sustainable communities, and stewardship of the natural environment by citizens throughout Oregon. The Fund is committed long term to institutionalizing a series of age-appropriate experiences that build a sense of place and responsibility towards Oregon and the region.

The Sustainability Education Initiative is a program of professional development coursework and activities for K-12 teachers in the West Linn-Wilsonville School District. During three courses offered in 2009, Smith will prepare 50-60 teachers to incorporate sustainability issues into their classrooms and help them implement school or community projects that will enhance local natural and social environments. Participants will be eligible for small seed grants to fund start-up projects. The grant aims to increase the number of teachers implementing sustainability projects in schools, and increase student and educator awareness of local natural systems, ecologies, and social needs.

Detweiler-Bedell, who joined the psychology faculty in 2001, immerses students in interactive and challenging lessons starting in their first psychology course. Students in her Introduction to Psychology class, for example, handle a human brain and imagine themselves as subjects in classic psychology experiments. More advanced students in her Clinical Psychology course assume the roles of therapist and patient as they learn to solve realistic problems. “CASE and the Carnegie Foundation saw in Jerusha what we also see in her: an inspiring and very talented teacher whose pedagogical approach in the classroom and laboratory is informed by excellent scholarship,” said Julio de Paula, dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, of the award.

For additional details about Detweiler-Bedell’s award, including her acceptance speech, visit this Lewis & Clark site.

The Chronicle of Higher Education (Washington, D.C.) 4 Faculty Members Are Honored as U.S. Professors of the Year

Inside Higher Ed (Washington, D.C.) Top Profs

USA Today (McLean, Va.) 2008 Professors of the Year prepare students for lifelong learning

The Oregonian (Portland, Ore.) Lewis & Clark professor wins national educator honor

For Vissell, this experience was life changing. After his group asked the Dalai Lama how to obtain lasting happiness, Vissell noted, “He sat silent for a while, then responded, ‘Well, I don’t know.’ It was the perfect answer. This was the pinnacle of our work on this project. We ascended the mountain and as soon as we met with him on the summit, he sort of brought us back down to where we started.”

Santa Cruz Sentenial (Santa Cruz, Calif.) Spreading ‘Happiness’ worldwide - one young person at a time

Wahab contributed his expertise on the situation in Afghanistan as part of the Winter Soldier Northwest forum this month, an event held at First Unitarian Church in Portland. Winter Soldier hearings have been convened across the country to give U.S. veterans an opportunity to testify about their military service. In addition, panels of scholars, veterans, journalists, and other specialists give context to the testimony.

The panel discussion in which Wahab participated was titled, “Eyewitness Accounts of War: Local Soldiers, their Families, Iraqis and Afghans Testify on the Human Cost of War.”

“The average family [in Afghanistan] lives on one dollar per day,” Wahab said at the forum. “Two million people are seriously mentally ill, 70 percent of Afghanis are traumatized.”

Wahab splits his time between Lewis & Clark and Afghanistan, devoting six months of service each year to the Afghan Ministry of Higher Education. He is dedicated to helping normalize conditions in Afghanistan, and he believes “quality, equal and universal education is the key to establishing peace, security, democracy, harmony, and a healthy, stable economy in Afghanistan.”

Read more about Wahab and the Winter Soldier event online.

Shagoury published a book about educating young writers. “Raising Writers: Understanding and Nurturing Young Children’s Writing Development” (Allyn & Bacon, 2008) explores how primary educators can nurture young learners through the transition from spoken to written language.

In April, Campbell served as a keynote speaker at the the Kansas Reading Association conference in Junction City, Kansas. Campbell’s presentation was titled “Less is More: Using Short Texts in Support of Adolescent Readers.”

In May, Campbell presented “Less is More: The Power of Essays to Engage Adolescent Readers” with Janet Allen and three YA authors at the International Reading Conference.

In March, Aguilera presented “Restoring and Preserving Indigenous Languages: Three Indigenous Communities’ Successes with Language Immersion Models” at the American Education Research Association conference in New York. Aguilera’s presentation analyzed the language immersion models that are meant to revitalize and preserve the native languages of indigenous communities in grades K-12.

In February, Christensen hosted the OWP Writing Renewal Day for 100 educators from the tri-country area.

In January, Allen gave a presentation titled “Umbrella Partnerships: How the MSP Investment Can Build Enduring Capacity for the Ongoing Improvement of Math and Science Education” at the NSF Math Science Partnership Learning Network Conference in Washington D.C. The presentation was based on Allen’s work with the Appalachian Mathematics Science Partnership (AMSP) and Inverness Research, who work towards improving K-16 math and science education in some of our nation’s most impoverished countries.

This fall, Earll was named a board member to both Girls Inc. NW Oregon and the Northwest Women in Educational Administration (NWEA).

During the fall semester, Aguilera received a $1,500 grant from the Oregon Department of Education. Her project was titled “ODE TRENS Research Project.”

This fall, Campbell published a book about the power of teaching students using short, thought-provoking text. “Less Is More: Teaching Literature with Short Texts, Grades 6-12” (Stenhouse Publishers, 2007) examines multiple genres of short text, including short stories and graphic novels.

Aguilera has been appointed board member of the International Foundation for Culture and Ecology.

On October 25, Aguilera presented “Academically Sound and Culturally Resilient: Native Students’ Educational Success through Native Hawaiian, Alaska Native and American Indian Immersion Education” at the National Indian Education Association Convention in Honolulu, Hawaii.

Aguilera published an article in the October issue of the Journal of American Indian Education, 46 (10). The article, coauthored with three colleagues, is titled “Examining culturally responsive schools serving American Indian, Native Hawaiian, and Alaskan Native student populations.”