Rewarded for Making a Better Community

Maritza Martinez, assistant dean for Academic Affairs, and responsible for six University-wide programs within the Office of Academic Support Services, is a recipient of the Hudson Mohawk Association of Colleges and Universities� 1998 "Creating a More Welcoming Community" annual awards.

Presented with the Association�s university staff award on Oct. 7 in a ceremony in the Campus Center, Martinez was chosen from a group of four nominees from Capital Region colleges and universities.

President Hitchcock said of the award-winner, "Ms. Martinez is a major force in a wide range of campus groups that share a common goal: to support the success of people of color, people with disabilities, and women at the University at Albany and thus to support the success of the academic and social environment for all persons at the University."

Martinez earned her master�s degree in social work from the University in 1983 and in the late 1980s worked as a counselor in the Educational Opportunities Program (EOP). She returned to the staff as assistant dean in 1995. Included among her duties is coordination of the five-week Pre-College Summer Program for EOP students.

She is a past recipient of the Office of Disabled Student Services� Outstanding Achievement Award and the Governor�s Hispanic-American of Distinction Medal, and she was a YWCA "Women of the �90s" award winner.

Dean of Undergraduate Studies John Pipkin presented the award to Martinez.

Institutional Research Guru Moves to National Stage

After 12 years of responsibility for the statistical reporting that supports the University�s campus-planning, budgeting, evaluation and policy-making. James Fredericks Volkwein decided he had better start assessing the nation�s higher education as a whole.

Volkwein, since 1986 director of Institutional Research, and also an adjunct faculty member of the Department of Educational Administration & Policy Studies, will be leaving Albany at the end of the month to become director and senior scientist for the Center for the Study of Higher Education (CSHE) � which has for decades and to this day remains the premier center for the study of higher education in the U.S. and possibly the world.

On Oct. 30, a 30-year relationship with the University comes to a fond farewell. "Albany has indeed been kind to me," said Volkwein at a University send-off in the Campus Center. "Each year has been filled with new challenges. From (presidents) Van Collins, Lew Benezet and Emmett Fields to Vince O�Leary, Pat Swygert and Karen Hitchcock, I have learned a great deal . . . and received a generous audience for my policy analyses and proposals."

Volkwein was assistant dean in the Office of Graduate Studies from 1968 to 1976, then Assistant to the President under the administrations of both Emmett Fields and Vincent O�Leary from 1976 to 1986. As director of Institutional Research, he generated data and information to comply with state and federal requirements, and to aid special studies on various issues and the maintenance and development of several on-campus databases.

He first saw the University at 1963�s Spring Commencement. "Having seen Albany through the eyes of my sister-in-law (who graduated that day), I formed several early impressions: 1) Albany had a faculty that exercised high standards and cared about its students; 2) Albany had ambitions to become a research university � one that trained its graduate students to become scholars and researchers; 3) Albany had strong and benevolent leadership.

"I submit to you that these three ingredients � a strong and caring faculty, ambitious goals for the future, and solid leadership � are still true today and guarantee a bright future for this institution."

Patrick Terenzini, Volkwein�s predecessor in Institutional Research before moving on to head CSHE at Penn State, will now yield to Volkwein in order to devote full-time to research. Volkwein will be overseeing Terenzini and another nationally renowned researcher who once worked at Albany, Alberto Cabrera.

"I don�t think the connection of the center with this University is mere coincidence," said Volkwein. "Albany�s a great place and the University hires great people, and keeps them for a good amount of time. Just as with the number of former vice presidents here who are now college and university presidents elsewhere, when people high in the academic and administrative ranks move on, it�s very often for much higher, often nationally prominent, administrative positions."

Volkwein served two years as president of SUNY�s Association for Institutional Research and Planning Officers, chaired the Advisory Committee on Outcomes Assessment for the Middle States Accrediting Association, and authored more than 100 papers, reports and journal articles, giving high priority to co-authored scholarships with his University doctoral students.

A consulting editor for three higher educational journals, in 1995 Volkwein became the new editor-in-chief of the Jossey-Bass series, New Directions for Institutional Research.

"The University is losing not only an experienced administrator, a nationally respected researcher, and a caring and dedicated teacher, but a friend and mentor to many of us," said President Hitchcock. "Yet Fred�s methods of analysis and evaluation will inform the University in many critical areas for years to come. With deep gratitude, I join so many his colleagues here in wishing him tremendous success and happiness in his new challenge at Penn State University."

After receiving a Bachelor�s Degree from Pomona College and a Ph.D. from Cornell University, Volkwein held a variety of administrative posts, working at SUNY-Binghamton and Cornell University before coming to Albany.

Seneca Nation Native Given First Hearst Public Health Fellowship

By Suzanne M. Grudzinski

"We must be alarmingly enterprising,
and we must be startlingly original...
and do new and striking things
which constitute a revolution."
                 - William Randolph Hearst

The University at Albany�s School of Public Health has chosen Steven Tome as the recipient of its first William Randolph Hearst Endowed Fellowship.

Established to promote academic and creative excellence in public health among underrepresented minority students, the scholarship and $10,000 stipend will support a student of African-American, Hispanic, or Native American descent for one year.

Tome, a member of the Seneca Nation of Indians and resident of the Allegany Reservation in western New York, has been admitted to the University�s Master�s of Public Health program. Tome received his B.S. in Environmental Health Sciences from Western Carolina University, Cullowhee, N.C. He has also taken graduate courses in epidemiology at the University at Buffalo. Tome has worked as a sanitarian with the Commissioned Corps of the Public Health Services (PHS), Indian Health Services (IHS) since 1991.

Tome began working in the public health field around the age of 23 when he was hired as an environmental health technician for the Seneca Nation Health Department, part of the IHS.

Through the Seneca Nation Health Department, Tome became involved in a study during the late 80�s on the drinking water of the Cattaraugus reservation in western New York. All of the 2,000 people living on the reservation had wells, and the team established that these wells contained high concentrations of barium. Tome, then a field technician working under the direction of an IHS sanitarian, helped sample the wells for barium content, which was then correlated with the high number of hypertension cases on the reservation.

Following the study, the Seneca Nation received a Congressional appropriation for $6.5 million to construct a water line to the Cattaraugus reservation.

Tome said that studies like this are "a way to actually be able to address environmental issues and the health concerns related to them in a meaningful way." He adds "I am very thankful the committee chose me. This program has given me the opportunity to return to school to learn more about environmental health, an opportunity that I otherwise would not have had."

University Medal Goes to DNA-Researcher Hotchkiss at Nov. 6 Symposium

By Christine Hanson McKnight

The University�s Department of Biological Sciences will honor DNA research pioneer Dr. Rollin D. Hotchkiss on Friday, Nov. 6, at a day-long symposium marking the 50th anniversary of his discovery of 5-methylcytosine, the fifth base in DNA, which plays a critical role in human gene regulation.

President Hitchcock will present a special University Medal to Hotchkiss, one of the first scientists to study DNA and its role as the genetic material, at the culmination of the symposium, which is titled, "50 Years of DNA and RNA Methylation." The event will be held in the Recital Hall in the Performing Arts Center.

Jon Jacklet, chair of the Department of Biological Sciences, explained that the four major bases in DNA � adenine, thymine, cytosine and guanine � are better known than 5-methylcytosine. Recently, however, it has become apparent that the methylation of cytosine is one of the most important mechanisms for controlling gene expression, and the true significance of 5-methylcytosine is now becoming appreciated. It has a critical role in gene regulation in human biology, including development of the embryo, sex determination, and diseases such as cancer.

Hotchkiss, now retired and living in Lenox, Mass., joined the Department of Biological Sciences faculty in 1982 and maintained a research laboratory in the department. The University awarded him an honorary doctor of science degree in 1986. His remarks will be followed by a series of talks by distinguished scientists on their discoveries and insights on the role of 5-methyl cytosine in biological processes. These speakers are:

Hotchkiss earned his Ph.D. in organic chemistry from Yale University and then joined Rockefeller University in 1935 to work with a team of scientists who identified DNA as the material of the genes. It was during this period that he discovered that there was a fifth base in DNA, using recently developed chemical isolation techniques.

He also developed methods for quantitative study of transformation, a natural process through which genes are transferred from one bacterium to another; investigated the mechanism by which DNA enters a cell and expresses its function; and evolved methods for following the fate of DNA during transformation.

This work was made possible by his pioneering application and exploration of mutant types of DNA that cause bacteria to undergo genetic conversion from sensitivity to resistance toward sulfanilamide or specific antibiotics. Similar work is now the basis of gene transfers in the modern biotechnology of DNA.

Hotchkiss was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1961 for his pioneering work. After his retirement from Rockefeller University, Hotchkiss became affiliated with the University.

Das Sought Worldwide for His Travels into Physics Theory

By Vinny Reda

For some 30 years after World War II the field of hyperfine interactions was the leader in materials physics, opening paths to future applications of technologies. Those technologies are upon us now, and applied technology in computer chips has a commanding position in the field.

But commanding the future of materials physics may still be much in the hands of those physicists who, like the University�s Tara Prasad Das, "ask �Why? � why do certain materials behave this way?�"

When the International Conference on Hyperfine Interactions had its 11th in a series of meetings � held every three years among worldwide leaders in the field � in Durban, South Africa, in late August, Das and three of his former Albany graduate students presented five papers on their recent studies. In addition, Das presided over a discussion section on "Accuracy and Efficiency of Current Theoretical Methods for the Study of Electronic Structures and Hyperfine Interactions in Solid State and Biological Materials."

The degree of Das�s participation in the conference, attended by invitation only, underscored the degree to which his work has been esteemed over the last 40 years � the last 28 of those as a member of Albany�s Department of Physics.

So, too, did the range of research the five papers represented at Durban: studies of magnetic materials, semiconductor surfaces, detection of controlled substances, and semi-metallic systems through investigations of their electronic structures and hyperfine properties.

October has found him no less in demand internationally. From Oct. 7-9 he participated in the Associated International Symposium on use of Muons in Materials Research and Fusion Techniques for Energy Production at the Institute of Physical and Chemical Research (RIKON) in Wako-Shi, Japan.

From there he went to Bangalore, India, for the Oct. 13-16 meeting of the International Union of Materials Research Societies, where he presented a review of the current understanding of ferromagnetism in solid state systems at the conference�s magnetism and magnetic materials section.

In January, Das is scheduled to attend an international workshop organized by the University of Zurich in Switzerland in order to discuss his research group�s theoretical efforts over the past six years into the understanding of magnetic and hyperfine properties and electron distribution in high-temperature super-conducting materials.

More than trains and planes, the word "understanding" transports Das in his world of materials physics and biophysics. "I am involved with the theoretical aspects of my science," he said. "The question �What?� is technology. But the understanding of �Why?� to me, is physics.

"Now, with my current students, I make sure that while they involve themselves with the theoretical science, that they also understand application, because that may very well prepare them for their future careers.

"But I do believe that my work, much of it confined to accelerator investigations into every material � where we ask, �how are the electrons distributed?� and �why?� � will give us a much deeper understanding of what will be the technologies of the future. These areas will include magnetic materials, semiconductor surfaces, the physics of extremely small particles, biophysics and the science and technology of fusion energy."

For the past eight years, Das has created joint research projects with his University research theory group and the RIKON group in Japan�s muon science investigation group. The subatomic particles muons, said Das, will be the next huge advance in solid state materials.

"These research efforts have resulted in four Ph.D. theses from my Albany students since 1992, and they currently involve four other students right now," he said. "It has also been beneficial to both groups and resulted in 15 joint publications in the past eight years. So I am very proud of that."

Das also looks with pride to the next International Conference on Hyperfine Interactions, in 2001, because it will be held in Park City, Utah.

"The first conference in the field in the 21st Century will be held in the U.S.A. � which was preeminent in the field in the middle part of this century up to the 1970s. We hope the conference will be helpful in inspiring our younger scientists to become productive in this field of physics, because it has become a major tool in the study of properties of new materials as they continue to evolve."

Excellence in Teaching

By Carol Olechowski

Peter Johnston and Anne McGill-Franzen

Department of Reading colleagues Peter Johnston and Anne McGill-Franzen have discovered a new use for videotape: enhancing their Remediation of Reading Disabilities course. With the help of video, they�re promoting reflective learning and developing student teaching skills.

According to department chair Richard Allington, videotaping takes place in the School�s Literacy Lab, located on the Downtown Campus. There, three "practicum courses," under direct supervision of Johnston or McGill-Franzen � with 6:1 student to teacher ratios � take place.

"The students are videotaped tutoring young children, one on one, and then in the course they discuss why they made particular decisions at what times," said Allington. "Other students and faculty supervisors participate in discussion and sometimes debate over the choices and the options that were available for the tutor."

It is a course, said Allington, with rewards for the instructors, but free time is not one of them. "When the clinical practicum course began, Jim Fleming � now the dean � taught it, then I replaced him," he said. "Two other faculty members took it over from there, and then Peter and Anne.

"It is essentially an overload course, meaning the school counts it as only one, even though it�s two nights per week and six credits. The teachers in it still have to teach another prerequisite course. For anyone to want to do that, they must enjoy working with their students a whole lot.

"Well, Anne and Peter have both hung in there much longer than anyone else � now over a decade."

Allington, however, is not particularly surprised. Johnston is "a remarkably gifted teacher of teachers who works hard developing reflective teachers," he said.

"With me, he co-directs the Exemplary Teacher Project out of the National Research Center for English Learning and Achievement, a five-state national study of the best elementary teachers around. Peter not only leads the effort but is out there in classrooms documenting the effective practices of these teachers on a regular basis."

Johnston, who hails from New Zealand, received a bachelor�s degree in experimental psychology from Victoria University of Wellington, as well as teaching diplomas from Dunedin Teachers� College and the University of Otago. He earned a Ph.D. in educational psychology/reading from the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana�s Center for the Study of Reading.

A former primary school teacher in New Zealand, he came to Albany in 1981. His other courses include Whole Language and Children�s Literature, Reading in the Elementary School, Organization and Supervision of Reading Programs, and Early Detection and Prevention of Reading Failure.

He is the author of numerous books, including Knowing Literacy: Constructive Literacy Assessment (Stenhouse), which Allington calls "a new classic text . . . Peter�s writing is superbly informed by the research, and yet it is accessible and entertaining."

In addition to teaching, researching, and writing numerous books, journal articles, and other publications, Johnston serves on the board of directors of the National Reading Conference � "the largest organization of literacy researchers in the world," Allington notes. "Peter�s election to that position is but a small indication of his standing in the profession. His service in that post, among others, keeps the department�s visibility high."

When asked for an assessment of McGill-Franzen�s work, Allington graciously demurred, explaining, with a chuckle, "a minor technical problem: Anne and I are husband and wife, so I�d be glad to tell you how wonderful she is! But as her immediate supervisor [Dean] James Fleming would probably be glad to talk about her."

McGill-Franzen, associate dean of education, is director of the America Reads project, a federally sponsored program that takes University work-study students � not necessarily education majors � and trains them to tutor grade 1-4 students after school. More than 100 work-studies from Albany are currently out tutoring in the Albany, South Colonie, and Guilderland Schools systems.

Fleming said McGill-Franzen�s ability to generate enthusiasm within students is evidenced by America Reads. "I�ve rarely seen such spontaneous response from so many undergraduates, who volunteer under Anne�s overall supervision � particularly given only a two-day notice at the beginning of the Fall Semester. More than 100 young people showed up to participate. Incredible! And heartening."

Besides the clinical practicum course, McGill-Franzen has taught such courses as in Reading in the Elementary School, Teacher Research Seminar, and Seminar on Reading Disability.

She has also been a research fellow for the national research centers on Literature Teaching & Learning and English Learning & Achievement, as well as a Child Research & Study Center fellow. Her other professional experience has included work with the Albany City Schools� Strategic Planning Committee, State University College at Oneonta, the Center for Women in Government; and the city schools of Niskayuna and Norfolk, Va.

Fleming has had a decade-long association with McGill-Franzen, and remains impressed with her work. In fact, her book Shaping the Preschool Agenda: Early Literacy, Public Policy and Professional Beliefs, published by SUNY Press in 1993, was based on her 1988 dissertation, which Fleming chaired.

She has also contributed chapters to books, written journal articles and is in demand as a conference presenter; during the past year alone, she gave presentations for the International Reading Association, the American Educational Research Association, the Children�s Television Workshop, and the National Reading Conference. She serves on the editorial advisory boards of Language Arts, the Reading Research Quarterly, and Reading Teacher.

Her professional service includes membership on the International Reading Association�s Reading/Language in Early Childhood Committee. She has also been a member of the School of Education�s Urban Forum and the School�s Faculty Council.

Her research has attracted support from agencies such as the International Reading Association and the OERI National Research Center on English Learning & Achievement. She has received numerous awards, including a Revson Foundation Legislative Fellowship, and the International Reading Association�s Nila Banton Smith Research Dissemination and Albert J. Harris awards.

A graduate of Gannon College in Erie, Pa., McGill-Franzen received her M.Ed. in reading and language from the University of Pittsburgh. She earned both a C.A.S. in educational administration and policy studies and her Ph.D. from Albany.

New Faces

by April Sherman

François Cooren

François Cooren, an authority on the processes of organizational formation, coalition, and change, is a new member of the Department of Communication faculty.

"François Cooren applies a socio-semiotic perspective to the analysis of social processes," said Robert Sanders, department chair. "His approach enriches our offerings in the area of organizational communication by taking into account the achievement of organization itself, using analysis of the organization of and within coalitions in an environmental controversy as a case in point.

"His work on this case study also is of value to our students in political communication", said Sanders. "Further, Cooren�s expertise in semiotics and narrative provides an important resource to our students in interpersonal and intercultural communication whose work concentrates on language meaning and social interaction."

Cooren received his Ph.D. in communication studies from the University of Montreal in 1996, and master�s degrees in disciplinary teaching techniques and communication studies from the Universite de Paris, France in 1990-91. A French citizen, he has in addition received an M.A. in agronomic engineering from I.A.A.L. in Lille, France (1988), and a general B.A. from the Universite de Lille, France (1985).

His most recent academic appointment was as a research assistant professor in the communication department at the University of Cincinnati from 1997-1998. Cooren has also worked as a lecturer in undergraduate course in the communication department at the University of Sherbrooke, Canada, from 1996-1997, a lecturer in graduate and undergraduate courses in the communication department at the University of Montreal, Canada from 1994-1997, was an invited scholar at the Center of Philosophy of Law at the Universite catholique de Louvain-La-Neuve in Belgium in 1996, and a designer of televised pedagogical courses for Ecole Polytechnique de Montreal in Canada from 1990-1991.

Among his many articles and papers are "Organization as an Effect of Mediation: Redefining the link Between Organization and Communication" and "The Institutional and Rhetorical Modes of the Organizing Dimension of Communication" in Communication Theory, and several articles in the French journal Revue philosophique de Louvain.

He is also the recipient of many awards, including the 1997 merit award from the University of Cincinnati, The Charles Redding Award for the best dissertation in organizational communication, and the Government of Canada Awards (1992-95) from the International Council for Canadian Studies.

Cooren is very active in different professional groups, including membership in the National Communication Association (1994-present), The Semiotic Society of America (1997-present) and the International Association of Pragmatics. His also a reviewer for Management Communication Quarterly.

Cooren�s teaching responsibilities will include the subjects of organizational communication and rhetoric.

Nancy Claiborne

Nancy Claiborne joined the School of Social Welfare this fall, bringing with her a vast background in social welfare, psychology, and the care of medical patients.

Dean Lynn Videka-Sherman said of Claiborne�s contribution to the department, "She can expand our expertise in health care and mental health, particularly in coping with chronic and debilitating illnesses � that�s her specialty."

Claiborne holds a Ph.D. from the University of Houston�s graduate school of social work (1998), as well as a M.S.W. from the University of Southern California (1982) with a concentration in community organization and public administration, and a B.S. in psychology from Portland State University (1976).

Claiborne�s was as a social worker at the Epilepsy Foundation�s Rochester & Syracuse Regions in Syracuse from 1997-98. She has also worked as a research analyst/social worker at the Spinal Treatment Evaluation Process Program at Texas Orthopedic Hospital in Houston, Texas from 1996-97, program director of the Geropsychiatric Program at Horizon Mental Health Management in Houston from 1993-96, and director of professional and community services at HCA Belle Park Hospital in Houston from 1991-93.

Claiborne has had research published, including "Measuring quality of life in back patients: Comparison of health status questionnaire and quality of life inventory," in the journal Health in Social Work this year, and "Outcomes management through a spinal treatment evaluation process" in the Journal of Rehabilitation Outcomes Measurement in 1997.

An 18-year member of the National Association of Social Workers, she was chair of its Houston chapter�s Committee on Aging, and was interviewed by Dr. Art Ulene on NBC-TV�s "Today Show" in 1986 on the topic "Eating Disorders."

She was the co-author of Community Program Evaluation, a federal grant for the community education and reduction of adolescent alcohol usage by the University of Houston Graduate School of Social Work and Fort Bend County, Texas (1995 and 1996).

Claiborne has been spoken to business and industry, mental health professionals and the public on clinical and administrative subjects ranging from chronic spinal illness and mental illness; hospital regulatory requirements; and patient rights and ethical conduct. She developed and conducted a team-building retreat for senior management at a psychiatric hospital in 1996 and was a clinical consultant to a psychiatric hospital from 1995-97.

Claiborne said that being at the University "gives me the opportunity to pursue research as well as teach. It gives me a balance, and it has an excellent reputation." She will primarily teach macro practice in social work � which she calls "essentially social work in the community and in organizations."