SPOTLIGHT ON ACHIEVEMENT
First JCCC Faculty Cohort Selected to Receive UISFL Grant Funds The Undergraduate International Studies and Foreign Language (UISFL) Grant is awarded by the U.S. Department of Education to enhance the internationalization of STEM courses.
The following eight JCCC faculty members will receive a stipend of $2,500 upon the completion of five virtual training sessions. In addition, travel funding is provided for up to $4,000 for one trip to a region or country of their choice that will enhance their curricular efforts.
Nan Abbot, Health Care Information Systems, will travel to the Netherlands and Denmark to study the roles that inexpensive health IT interventions have played in fostering the low infant mortality rate in those countries.
Eric Elisabeth, Chemistry, will travel to Senegal to study the medicinal use of local herbs and also how scientists are addressing the global challenge of access to quality health care. Steve Giambrone, Biology, will visit labs and biological organizations in Europe to develop material on historical aspects of biological history, genetic diversity, and population genetics.
Faith Jacobsen, Chemistry, will travel to sub-Saharan Africa (either Tanzania, Kenya, or South Africa) to develop a lesson on the analytical techniques used to measure water impurities and case study on water purification in sub-Saharan Africa. Susan Johnson, Engineering, will travel to Southeast Asia to study the similarities and differences between the Asian and American approaches to design due to cultural differences, how their business set-up contrasts to American ones, and how they are approaching the goal of clean energy. Aaron Prater, Sustainable Agriculture & Hospitality Management, will travel to Thailand and Vietnam to study the use of local ingredients in their cuisines in order to assist his students in using these ingredients, increasingly grown in the Kansas City area by immigrant farmers with the organization New Roots for Refugees.
Heather Seitz, Biology, will travel to Peru to study tropical diseases and parasitology, including the role that climate change is playing in disease transmission and with endemic parasites. Deborah Williams, Environmental Science, will visit several Pacific islands to study the impact of climate change on these fragile ecosystems, particularly on their food production, studying both successful responses and failed ones.
The grant is administered by JCCC’s Office of International Education and will be offered to a second faculty cohort next year. For more information, please email Tom Patterson.
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