Board of Regents announces KU sabbaticals

The Kansas Board of Regents has approved sabbatical leaves for KU faculty members for 2003-04. The faculty members, sabbatical topics and locations are:

Academic year

Margaret Bayer, mathematics; to conduct research and professional development in combinatorial geometry resulting in articles for publication (Berkeley, Calif.; Berlin, Germany).

Nyla Branscombe, psychology; to acquire new methodological skills to access the consequences of categorization shifts for social conflict reduction in the acceptance and assignment of collective guilt (University of Jena, Germany; Australian National University, Lawrence).

Ralph Byers, mathematics; to conduct research in numerical analysis and numerical linear algebra in structured and large-scale eigenvalue computations. Result of research will include referred journals and other publications (Berkeley, Calif.; Berlin, Germany).

Rosemary Chapin, social welfare; to develop the policy-focused components of a horizontally integrated, interactive education series designed to provide the full foundations for social work education and create both a printed and Web-based text (Boston; Lawrence).

Joseph Evans, electrical engineering and computer science; to conduct collaborative research with members at Ambient Computing Inc. and to create novel intelligent systems that exploit recent advances in low-cost and pervasive wireless networks (Lawrence).

David Frayer, anthropology; to conduct research on the analysis and description of a million-year-old human fossil from Buia, Eritrea, and complete an illustrated bibliography of the Krapina Neandertal site (Croatia; Italy; Eritrea).

Deborah Gerner, political science; to synthesize and apply current research on mediator strategies and other factors affecting conflict resolution activities to analyze third-party international mediation in a specific enduring dispute – the Israeli-Palestinian conflict (Lawrence; Israel; Palestine).

Carl Luchies, mechanical engineering; to participate in a year-long career broadening experience in the Mental Retardation Research Center (KUMC) and the Sensory Motor Performance Program in Chicago in order to gain valuable professional experience with world leaders in neuroscience (KUMC, Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago).

Judith Major, architecture; to prepare a manuscript focusing on Mariana Griswold van Rensselaer a Victorian woman who was a landscape critic and historian (Manhattan; Jamaica Plain and Brookline, Mass.; possibly Portugal).

Charles Rapp, social welfare; to produce a series of articles focused on the implementation of evidence-based practices in adult mental health in the United States and abroad (England; Netherlands; New Zealand; Kansas).

W. M. Kim Roddis, civil, envirormental, and architectural engineering; to undertake the task of planning, developing, and submitting at least one major proposal to NSF to select KU as a computational site for the National Earthquake Engineering Network (Lawrence; Oakland, Calif.; Washington, D.C.; Urbana, Ill.).

Philip Schrodt, political science; to conduct research on the socio-cultural typology of political violence and produce a book-length work based on findings (Lawrence).

Fall semester

Arlene Barry, teaching and leadership; to conduct historical research on one of the first female role models, Ellen Cyr, and produce a manuscript about Cyr’s work as well as a children’s reader (New York; Massachusetts; Illinois; Oregon).

Gail Bossenga, history; to complete writing of a book that offers a synthesis of social, political and cultural history of the origins of the French Revolution (Lawrence).

John Colombo, psychology; to complete two writing projects on the developmental cognitive neuroscience of visual attention/infant behavior and development (Columbia, S.C.; Lawrence).

Ann Cudd, philosophy; to complete a book on the comprehensive theory of oppression based on exhaustive conceptual work, work in the history of ideas and in social science theory (Lawrence).

Dorice Elliott, English; to conduct research on the transportation of English criminals to Australia to explain how literary works can play a crucial role in shaping social attitudes and influence the course of history (Lawrence; Australia; England).

Charles Epp, public administration; to conduct research on litigation and administration policy reform and draft a book manuscript (Lawrence).

Gary Grunewald, medicinal chemistry; to conduct collaborative research to develop a potent and selective inhibitor of epinephrine biosynthesis that can gain entry into the brain (Ann Arbor, Mich; University of Queensland, Aus.).

Jerzy Grzymala-Busse, electrical engineering and computer science; to conduct joint research with researchers from the University of Information Technology and Management, Poland, to validate and calibrate new data mining methods (Poznan and Rzeszow, Poland).

Eric Hanley, sociology; to conduct research on the factors that promote entrepreneurial success in post-communist Eastern Europe to improve the understanding of the processes of entry into and exit from entrepreneurial activities in Hungary (Lawrence; Budapest, Hungary).

F. Allen Hanson, anthropology, to complete research and write a book examining how the automation of information has brought about transformations in what we do, who we are, and how we think (Lawrence).

John Harrington, English; to complete current book project that explores the individual’s experience of history, the fragmentary nature of memory, and the strangeness of our past and our past selves (Dyersburg and Memphis, Tenn.; Washington, D.C.; Kansas City, Mo.).

Thomas Krieshok, psychology and research in education; toauthor a text on the implications of cognitive science for the practice of career counseling (Lawrence).

Keith McMahon, East Asian languages and cultures; to conduct research on Late Imperial China under the Impact of Euro-Western Expansionism and produce two or three scholarly papers (Lawrence).

Vernon Richardson, business; to conduct research on the causes and consequences of Information Technology investment (Hong Kong University of Science and Technology; Lawrence).

Joshua Rosenbloom, economics; to extend an on-going research project on American economic growth before 1800 focusing on the Colonies and the States of the Mid-Atlantic region (Lawrence; New York; Philadelphia).

Lee Skinner, Spanish and Portuguese; to conduct research on gendered responses to the concepts of modernity and modernization in nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Latin America (Lawrence).

Val Smith, environmental studies/ecology and evolutionary biology; to complete a comprehensive survey of information on host-pathogen resource competition to be published in biomedical literature and to be used to test whether empirical data from biomedical literature is consistent with resource-ratio theory (University of Minnesota).

Edith Taylor, ecology and evolutionary biology/Natural History Museum; Conduct research on Permo-Triassic Fossil plants from Antarctica and revise textbook in Paleobotany (Beardmore Glacier area, Antarctica; Lawrence).

John Tibbets, theatre and film; to complete book that focuses on theatrical films that have depicted the lives and works of classical and popular composers and studies the impact these films have had on the general viewing public’s cultural awareness (Lawrence; New York; Washington, D.C.).

Donald Worster, history; to conduct research for a scholarly biography of the American writer and conservationist John Muir (Lawrence).

Spring semester

James Barnes, music and dance; to complete a textbook/reference book on the 2,500-year history of wind bands, the musicians who have led them, and the extensive amount of repertoire that has been composed for them (Lawrence; Lake Okeechobee, Fla.).

David Bergeron, English; to complete a book that analyzes epistles dedicatory and addresses to readers in English dramatic texts, 1558-1642 (Lawrence; Washington, D.C.).

Andrew Borovik, chemistry; to work in conjunction with leading authorities on probing dioxygen activation by metal complexes at low temperature and use knowledge gained to perform temperature experiments at KU (Stanford University; Lawrence).

Hugh Catts III, speech, language and hearing; to conduct advanced study in the area of adolescent literacy and produce several manuscripts based on the findings (England; Kansas).

Shi-I Chu, chemistry; to pursue research interactions with leading experimentalists and theorists to facilitate the development of new research ideas and theories for the explanation of atomic and molecular physics in strong fields and quantum computing (Harvard University; Academia Sinica, Taiwan).

Donald Deshler, special education; to reconceptualize the underlying principles and specific inventions included in the Strategic Instruction Model and set forth a strategic plan to guide future research (Overland Park).

Doreen Fowler, English; to complete current research on race and identity in American politics by analyzing the way six American authors grapple with the problem of asserting the difference necessary for meaning and identity without subordinating black to construct white (Lawrence).

H. George Frederickson, public administration; to conduct research on the repositioning of American public administration from competition to cooperation and to produce a book manuscript. (Lawrence; Washington, D.C.; Oxford, England).

James Guthrie, business; to conduct research on human resources policies and practices as important determinants of the success or failure in business organizations’ international ventures (University of Limerick, Ireland).

John Janzen, anthropology; to conduct research for a book on the duality of power and visions of health, healing and renewal in Western Equatorial Africa (Lawrence).

Susan Kemper, psychology/gerontology; to conduct a study comparing linguistic properties of spontaneous oral and written language samples to measure short- and long-term cognitive change (Lawrence).

Catherine Loudon, ecology and evolutionary biology; to conduct research on biomechanics of insect sensory systems and begin collaborative interacting with European sensory ecologists (Tours, France; Columbus, Ohio; Lawrence).

Christopher Morphew, teaching and leadership; to assess the utility of the Western Undergraduate Exchange Program for students, institutions, and participating states and publish academic finds and policy reports (Lawrence; Denver).

Christian Schoeneich, pharmaceutical chemistry; to conduct pilot studies to develop an experimental model to study protein-membrane radical transfer processes relevant to cell damage in biological aging and disease (Federal Institute of Technology, Switzerland).

Robert Shelton, religious studies; to conduct research on religious understandings of conflict, justice, and peace to create a new course on the subject and to produce scholarly papers and articles (Lawrence; Bradford, England; Washington, D.C.).

Prakash Shenoy, business; to investigate graphical representations of asymmetric decision problems and devise approximate methods for solving large multi-scale problems (Aalborg University, Denmark).

Jack Winerock, music and dance; to study French piano music and pedagogy and conduct workshops and master classes on American music at French conservatories (France).

Partial year

James Butler, Kansas Geological Survey; to develop new methods for estimation of hydraulic conductivity and begin work on a book on pumping tests -- the most common method for estimating hydraulic conductivity (Tuebingen, Germany; Lawrence).

Deborah Dandridge, University Libraries; to plan new methods of archival instruction for the African-American collections and produce an outline of a workshop for instructors on archival instruction (Lawrence; Marquette, Michigan; St. Paul, Minn.).