Monday, January 26, 2009

Today’s Response
Middle Tennessee State University

Lauded by librarians

The January 1 issue of Booklist, the American Library Association’s major library media review publication, has selected a reference work co-edited by two MTSU professors as a 2008 Editors’ Choice/Reference pick. In a starred review in Booklist, Janice Lewis praises the Encyclopedia of the First Amendment as “an excellent resource for anyone who wants to learn more about broadcast regulation, the establishment of religion clause, students’ rights, or a myriad of other topics involving the First Amendment and its political, cultural and legal significance … highly recommended for academic, public and law libraries.” The Encyclopedia of the First Amendment, published by CQ Press, was co-edited by Dr. John R. Vile, Dean of the University Honors College, and David Hudson, adjunct political science professor and scholar at the First Amendment Center at Vanderbilt.

Contact Vile at 615-898-2596.
jvile@mtsu.edu

The burden of autism

A recent study in Pediatrics magazine shows that the parents of autistic children are three times more likely to have to quit their jobs or reduce work hours to care for their kids than the parents of other kids with chronic health care needs. Ed Evans, president of Students for Autism Awareness at MTSU and father of two autistic children, says, “My wife left the military for this very reason. We went through as many as eight daycare providers in one year due to lack of their understanding of how to care for our oldest son. Most of it is due to behavioral outbursts, mostly construed as an unruly child that has lacked discipline from the parents. We have had our youngest son (six years old) suspended from after-school care for this very reason.”

Contact Evans at 615-439-7379.
edevans43@comcast.net

We can be heroes for more than one day.

An annual hallmark of Black History Month at MTSU since 1996, the 2009 Unity Luncheon honoring “unsung heroes” in the community will be held at 11 a.m. Tuesday, Feb. 3, in the Tennessee Room of MTSU’s James Union Building. This year’s honorees are Annie M. Cox, James E. McAdams Sr., Rev. James Thomas, Carl Wade, William Washington and Katie F. Wilson. Tickets for the Unity Luncheon are $20 for adults and $8 for students. No tickets will be sold at the door.

For more information, contact Valerie Avent at 615-898-2718.
vavent@mtsu.edu

TR EXTRA

A WORD ON WORDS--Middle-school and high-school students who have a way with words will vie to determine verbal supremacy in the Third Annual Linguistics Olympiad at MTSU on Saturday, Jan. 31, on the second floor of the Business and Aerospace Building. More than 80 students representing eight schools in the region are enrolled in junior and senior levels of competition. Traditional challenges in the Olympiad include such exercises as identifying the word formation of a foreign language based on the information presented, deciphering proverbs from other languages, finding commonalities among English words, and decoding cryptic messages. “Following the competition, we have organized fun activities for the students while judges are scoring, including Swahili 101, Word Games, and Psycholinguistic Experiments,” says Dr. Aleka Blackwell, associate professor of English. Contact Blackwell at 615-898-5960 or ablackwe@mtsu.edu.

THE WISDOM OF WOMEN--The President’s Commission on the Status of Women (PCSW) is accepting applications from MTSU faculty for three grants of $1,800 each to be awarded in summer 2009 for integrating women’s issues into the curriculum. The grants are for use by tenured or tenure-track professors for the revision of a course, revision of a general education course for the Study Abroad program, the creation of a new course, the re-conceptualization of a current minor, or the creation of a new minor. Proposals will be reviewed by the Academic Affairs Subcommittee of the PCSW. The deadline for faculty to submit grant applications is Friday, Jan. 30, 2009. Details are available at http://www.mtsu.edu/~pcsw/grants.htm. Contact Dr. Samantha Cantrell in the Office of Research Services at 615-494-8751 or scantrel@mtsu.edu.

CONFEDERATES UNCOVERED--Learn about a significant but little-known Tennessean at the next “Between the Lines: Reading About the Civil War” book discussion group, a free and open activity that is meeting on Thursdays in January 2009. During the upcoming discussions, the group will consider Sam Davis Elliott’s Soldier of Tennessee: General Alexander P. Stewart and the Civil War in the West (1999), a book that has been praised as providing “a fresh look at an often ignored but important figure.” The group meets at 7 p.m. at the Heritage Center, 225 West College St. in Murfreesboro. The book discussion group is sponsored by the Tennessee Civil War National Heritage Area, Linebaugh Public Library, and the Heritage Center of Murfreesboro and Rutherford County. Contact Dr. Antoinette van Zelm at 615-217-8013 or avanzelm@mtsu.edu.