It was treating this part of the condition that introduced Gifford to the sport she loves. “I got into swimming when I was around eight years old after having leg lengthening surgery,” said Gifford. “Swimming is one of the things they have you do in physical therapy, so I’d go to the YMCA with three other kids that had the same surgery as me. And I loved it.”

When Gifford left the hospital and returned home to Columbus, Indiana, she joined a local club team. Swimming on the team allowed her to continue her rehabilitation and participate in a sport that she was quickly falling in love with. In swimming Gifford had found a release, something she could do with her friends, something she could excel in.

Gifford went on to compete for four years on the varsity swim team in high school. As she neared graduation, her coach suggested that she look into competing in the Paralympics. Her interest piqued, Gifford immediately began a search for all the information that she could find on the Paralympics.

“I read all of the requirements for competing and found out that I met all of them,” she said. “There are different classes of disabilities, based on the extent of your impairment. I compete in the 10th class because I have full range of motion unlike some athletes. It took a while for them to put me in a class, because I can move around like most people because my body has learned how to compensate in certain areas.”

At the 2008 trials in Minneapolis, Gifford discovered she could do more than just compete. She set a new U.S. record in the S9 division of the 200-meter breaststroke with a total time of 3:45.31.

“It was amazing. I just went out there to have fun. I was not expecting to win anything, let alone set a new record,” she said.

Competing in the Pool and the Classroom

Since she came to Lewis & Clark, life in the pool hasn’t changed much for Gifford. In her first year she helped guide Pioneer women’s swim team to a third-place finish at the Northwest Conference Championship.

She has also continued to pursue her dream of swimming for the United States in the Paralympics. At the 2009 U.S. Paralympics Spring Swimming Nationals/Spring Can-Am Championship in Gresham, Oregon, she participated in six individual events. While at nationals, Gifford once again dominated the 200-meter breaststroke, finishing in first place, and took second in both the 50-meter breaststroke and 100-meter freestyle. In the 50-meter breaststroke, Gifford shattered her previous best time of 53.46 seconds, this time touching in at 47.71 seconds.

“It felt good to get out there and compete with my peers,” she said. “This meet helped me get closer to making the U.S. National Team, so that I can hopefully go to the 2012 Paralympics in London.”

Outside of the pool, however, Gifford’s life has changed in some ways since coming to Lewis & Clark.

“I went to a public high school where academics were important, but everyone competed to be on the swim team. Now in college, everyone is competing in the classroom rather than in the pool,” she said. “Don’t get me wrong, my teammates and I are competitive with each other in the pool, but it’s different. We just go out there and have fun and cheer each other on. But in the classroom, everyone competes for the best grades, which is just the polar opposite of high school.”

Planning for the Future

Gifford is going to face more challenges in the coming months. She is set to have hip surgery over the summer to reset her right hip, which sits higher than her left. As a result of the surgery, Gifford is facing the prospect of five weeks of extreme pain and not being able to sit at more than a 70-degree angle. Doctors have told Gifford that it will be nearly three to four months before she gets back to normal, and that there is no guarantee that she’ll be able to return to the water. But if you ask Gifford, there is nothing that will keep her away.

“I have no doubt I’ll be back in the pool after my surgery,” she said. “It might take me a little bit to get used to the way that I swim with my new hip, but it should be fine. Right now my left leg moves normally in the water, and I have to think about moving my right leg a specific way while swimming, so hopefully the surgery will make them work the same. If not, then I’m sure I can make it work. Once I’m healed I’ll resume my training for the 2012 trials.

These are among the new tenure-track professors joining the undergraduate faculty at Lewis & Clark next fall, continuing what Dean Julio de Paula calls the school’s remarkable streak of success in attracting exciting new teachers who are also accomplished scholars and artists.

“It’s exciting for all of us in the College of Arts and Sciences—and especially for our current and future students—to have professors like these joining our faculty,” de Paula said. “When you mix in these newcomers with the outstanding faculty already in place, you have the makings of an exhilarating academic experience.”

Here is a brief look at the new tenure-track professors joining the Lewis & Clark faculty next fall:

Paul Allen, mathematics
Allen’s research is primarily focused on problems in geometric analysis, which involve addressing geometric questions by studying an associated partial differential equation, and can be applied to the study of physics. He has previously worked at the University of Washington at Tacoma, in Sweden at the Mittag-Leffler Institute, and in Germany at the Max Plank Institute for Gravitational Physics. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Oregon in 2008.

Garrick Imatani, art
Imatani’s work has been exhibited galleries in New York, Massachusetts, Maine, and California. He comes to Lewis & Clark from Ursinus College, and previously worked at the Columbia University and Maine College of Art, where he taught sculpture and graphic design in addition to other courses. Imatani received a Good Idea Grant from the Maine Arts Commission and was a resident artist at the Contemporary Artists Centre in North Adams, Massachusetts. He received his M.F.A. from Columbia University.

Bryan Sebok, communication (media studies)
Sebok is a digital media industries scholar and film producer. His research focuses on the innovation and diffusion of digital technology. His forthcoming book, The Golden Goose: DVD and the Transformation of Home Entertainment, examines the industrial, cultural, regulatory, and technological factors contributing to the success of DVDs. His most recent film, Dance With The One, is currently in post-production. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Texas at Austin in 2007.

Bjørn Southard, communication (rhetoric)
Southard’s research concerns public arguments about race and the law. His current interest is the African colonization movement in early-19th-century America. His work has appeared in the journal Argumentation and Advocacy and the edited volumes Engaging Argument and Critical Problems in Argumentation. Southard will serve as codirector of Lewis & Clark’s Speech and Debate Team. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Maryland.

Eric Tymoigne, economics
Tymoigne’s current research includes money matters (nature, history, and theory), the detection of aggregate financial fragility and its implications for central banking, and the theoretical analysis of monetary production economies. He has published in the Journal of Post Keynesian Economics and the Journal of Economic Issues, and he has contributed to several edited books. Tymoigne received his Ph.D. from the University of Missouri at Kansas City with a specialization in monetary theory and financial macroeconomics.

Christopher Wendt, political science
Wendt’s research interests include elections, parties and party systems, and ethnic politics, particularly West European voting behavior and the politics of immigration. His dissertation examined how small, programmatically-focused (“niche”) parties increase their support in previously stable party systems, specifically examining the rapid growth of West European anti-immigrant, or nativist, parties in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Wendt received his Ph.D. from Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Associate Professor of Psychology Jerusha Detweiler-Bedell has won the Outstanding Baccalaureate Colleges Professor of the Year Award from the Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE) and the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching.

The CASE/Carnegie prize is the only national award for excellence in undergraduate teaching and mentoring.

Lewis & Clark President Tom Hochstettler says the award honors Detweiler-Bedell’s “extraordinary commitment to her students and to psychological research. It highlights the ways Lewis & Clark faculty are transforming undergraduate education with innovative methods.”

Hands-on teaching

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.

“The class was designed to mimic a graduate school course,” says Melanie Cohen ’09, a senior psychology major. “I visited Jerusha’s office weekly to discuss my ‘patient.’”

Colleague Sheila Woody, professor of psychology at the University of British Columbia, describes Detweiler-Bedell as “deeply committed to the intellectual growth of her students and the scholarly life of the university, putting herself wholeheartedly into her roles as teacher and mentor.”

Innovative mentorship

With her husband, Associate Professor of Psychology Brian Detweiler-Bedell, Jerusha runs the Behavioral Health and Social Psychology Lab. The laboratory offers undergraduates a chance to participate in real-world collaborations and help design original psychology research projects.

Student researchers in the lab work in teams of three with a senior psychology major as team leader, a sophomore or junior psychology major as associate researcher, and a student new to the field as research assistant. In this unique approach, senior members practice leadership skills while less advanced students learn research skills and assume increasing responsibility.

With the Detweiler-Bedells as collaborators, students carry out experiments, present findings at psychology conferences, and publish in scholarly journals. “Students are not just research assistants. They’re also involved in the creative process,” says Jerusha Detweiler-Bedell.

In June 2008, the lab received a grant from the National Science Foundation’s Course, Curriculum, and Laboratory Improvement Program. The grant will support ongoing projects and help the Detweiler-Bedells publish a book on their unique approach to undergraduate teaching.

“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,” says Julio de Paula, dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, of the award.

Students acknowledge that Detweiler-Bedell is one of many Lewis & Clark professors dedicated to outstanding teaching. As Richie LeDonne ’11 puts it, “Jerusha embodies one of many great opportunities students have here. Professors at Lewis & Clark will take you as far as you want to go.”

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Related Material

• Awards Luncheon: Student Introduction by Former Student Shannon Brady B.A.’06
  
• Awards Luncheon: Video Snippett of Jerusha Detweiler-Bedell’s Acceptance Speech [full text of speech]
• Chronicle of Higher Education: 4 Faculty Members Are Honored as U.S. Professors of the Year
• The Oregonian: Lewis & Clark professor wins national education honor
• The Oregonian: Podcast: Lewis & Clark professor wins national award for giving students practical experience
• The Oregonian: Lewis & Clark prof among tops in nation
• U.S. Professors of the Year: CASE, Carnegie Name Top U.S. Professors of the Year

About the Award

The Council for Advancement and Support of Education and the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching selects one Professor of the Year in each of four categories—baccalaureate, master’s, and doctoral institutions, and community colleges. In addition, one professor from each state is eligible for a state award. Professors must be nominated by colleagues or administrators at their home institutions and submit several letters of support, including student recommendations. More information regarding the awards program can be found at www.usprofessorsoftheyear.org.

You never know on a given Monday morning who might drop in on a Lewis & Clark classroom and review the latest political developments with undergraduates, especially with a political scientist like Associate Professor Robert Eisinger on the faculty.

Eisinger—whose classes frequently connect with political scientists, leaders, and pundits via speaker phone—e-mailed political science majors over a recent weekend announcing that he had made last-minute arrangements for a classroom visit by E.J. Dionne Jr., who was in the area for another speaking engagement. Dionne, the author of Souled Out: Reclaiming Faith and Politics After the Religious Right and Why Americans Hate Politics and a syndicated political columnist, spent more than an hour talking with a dozen students and a handful of faculty members.

Among the topics covered during the coffee-fueled exchange were the nuances of the presidential election polls, the evolving debate over abortion, the future of the religious right, and the momentous nature of this year’s election.

Dionne said the 2008 presidential contest might turn out as pivotal as the history-altering elections of 1932 and 1980.

“We’ve hit the end of an era, where people have decided that a whole set of principles doesn’t work anymore,” Dionne said. He argued that the less-regulation, less-government philosophy of the conservative era is clearly “out the window” in an election season that finds a Republican administration advocating massive government intervention in the financial system, with the support of many GOP leaders in Congress.

Dionne, who argues in his latest book and other writings that the era of the religious right is over, acknowledged that Sarah Palin’s emergence—and religious conservatives’ enthusiasm for her vice presidential nomination—has probably slowed the decline of politically conservative evangelicals in the political arena. But he said that decline is inevitable nonetheless, especially in view of a mounting body of polling data showing a sharp disconnect between young and old-guard evangelicals on political and social issues.

Dionne clearly delighted in his exchanges with the assembled Lewis & Clark students, asking each to state his or her name, hometown, and career plans. When one announced his intention to “change the world,” Dionne quipped, “Great, it needs it.”

As the Washington-based pundit made clear, Eisinger is hardly his only close connection to Lewis & Clark. Ben Brysacz, a senior majoring in political science who was at the event, has interned for Dionne. “I want my kids to grow up to vote for Ben some day,” Dionne said.