Amber Caulkins

Seven local men, all over age 70, publish “500 Years of Living”

Six local men and their editor, all over 70 years of age and members of Salve Regina’s Circle of Scholars program, have published a collection of their memoirs documenting “500 Years of Living,” which they will officially launch at 2 p.m. Thursday, July 6 in the McKillop Library.

“500 Years of Living: Memoir Essays by the Men of WriteLife” follows these men as they present vignettes from memorable moments in their lives. The memoirs emanate from “WriteLife,” a Circle of Scholars writing course taught by Jack Galvin.

Three years ago, Galvin challenged six men who had taken his class a number of times to take on the project, prompting them with questions such as “How did you learn about hard work?” “What fight/argument did you win?” and “At a crossroads, what did you lose in your choice?”

The group met once a month to work on the project, ultimately creating 24 essays ranging from 3-5 pages each. Their stories appear in three sections: The Early Years, The Family Years and The Work Years.

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RWU Criminal Justice Alumnus Developing a National Framework for School Policing

BRISTOL, R.I. – One of the fastest growing areas of law enforcement today is happening on the campus of the nation’s K-12 schools, reflecting the steadily increased presence and expanding roles of school-based law enforcement programs in recent decades. Although police have been present in schools since the 1950s, researchers are just now beginning to uncover issues ranging from undefined, changing roles to the lack of adequate training for school-based officers. Among those researchers is Roger Williams University alumnus Joseph McKenna ’11, who is helping to frame a first-of-its-kind national model on how to best implement school-based law enforcement programs to aid school communities.

As associate director of research and evaluation for the Texas School Safety Center at Texas State University – where he earned his master’s and doctorate in criminal Justice – McKenna is part of a team conducting research examining the use of law enforcement in K-12 schools in order to put together a nationwide framework for educators and school-based officers to use.

The study and framework is being funded by a four-year $4.3 million grant by the National Institute of Justice. Taking other research as well as their own, the researchers at the center created the framework as a flexible template schools around the nation can adopt based on their own community. To determine if the framework is effective, McKenna and the researchers at Texas School Safety Center are conducting a randomized controlled trial with over two dozen Texas K-12 schools. Half of the participating schools are being guided by the research-based framework for implementing their school-based law enforcement program that McKenna and the team of researchers helped developed.

“It’s really become a specialized type of policing” which requires specialized training, said McKenna, who was a criminal justice and psychology double major at RWU.

In his research, he’s seen the predominant role of school-based officers change since they were first introduced in the 1950s. He has seen focus shift from safety and security during the school day to include educating students on a variety of topics related to crime and law and then to officers serving as mentors and role models. Today, officers play hybrid roles that very much depends on the school campus they are on, McKenna said. They act as mentors, counselors, surrogate parents – giving advice, emotional support and even material items like clothes – along with serving as educators and, when necessary, law enforcers.

What McKenna and many researchers are trying to do is define a shared set of roles and training that communities nationwide can adopt for their school-based law enforcement program to encompass and define the various roles officers play now. The framework involves setting custom goals that are agreed upon by all stakeholders, training for officers and school staff, and using data-driven decision making to make program adjustments and solve problems.

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Supporting Cross-Cultural Engagement

Music fills the first-floor studio of the Metcalf Building where a digital design by Sara Al Ahbabi and Shaikha Al Ketbi is being transformed into a colorful textile on RISD’s high-tech Jacquard loom. “I’m in love with this machine,” Al Ahbabi effuses as Al Ketbi squeezes past, her arms loaded with spools of richly colored thread.

“Architecture and design programs in the UAE are very strong, but there seemed to be a need to strengthen fine arts programs, which is why RISD got involved.” TEXTILES DEPARTMENT HEAD ANAIS MISSAKIAN

Al Ahbabi and Al Ketbi are two of the 15 fellows from the UAE who visited RISD in May and early June as part of the 10-month Salama bint Hamdan Emerging Artists Fellowship (SEAF) program. Jointly designed and directed by RISD and the Salama bint Hamdan Al Nahyan Foundation in Abu Dhabi, the program selects some of the UAE’s most promising emerging artists in order to help them develop a sustainable artistic practice and potentially prepare to apply to MFA programs across the globe. Once they’re accepted, it then covers their tuition.

“Architecture and design programs in the UAE are very strong, but there seemed to be a need to strengthen fine arts programs, which is why RISD got involved,” explains Professor Anais Missakian 84 TX, head of RISD’s Textiles department and academic program director for SEAF. “The expectation is that alumni of the program will go back to the UAE and drive a community of serious artists—maybe as teachers or maybe by starting arts-related nonprofits.

Now in its fourth year, the program has surpassed expectations in terms of the number of fellows who have gone on to pursue MFAs at top-tier institutions like the Royal College of Art in London, Yale University and RISD. “We’re currently supporting 10 graduate students across the US and the UK, and nine more will be matriculating in the fall,” says SEAF Program Manager Khulood Al Atiyat, who visited RISD for the third time this spring. “SEAF has been an experiment for everyone,” she adds. “It’s so exciting to watch the fellows’ practices expand in response to the experience.”

This two-week visit to the US—which includes workshops and critiques at RISD as well as studio, museum and gallery visits in New York City—is a small component of the 10-month program. A team of RISD faculty members travels to SEAF’s studios in Abu Dhabi four times per year to work directly with fellows, who also complete a series of online seminars administered by Amy Horschak, Associate Director, Graduate Commons. “The online community was created to keep the fellows and faculty in contact throughout the year,” explained Horschak. “It provides a platform for discussions and virtual studio spaces where works in progress and ideas are shared.”

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For PC’s first Luce scholars, summer is all about science

By Vicki-Ann Downing

A summer of paid research, a full-tuition scholarship for senior year, and the chance to develop a program to encourage young women in the sciences — those are the opportunities enjoyed by Emma Burgess ’18 and Bianca Saliba ’18, the first Clare Boothe Luce scholars at Providence College.

The Luce program is made possible by a $288,538, four-year award PC received from the Henry Luce Foundation to encourage women in the study of science, engineering, and mathematics. Burgess and Saliba were selected based on their academic standing, commitment to the sciences, and interest in pursuing an advanced degree or career in their fields of study.

They each received a $4,000 stipend to spend the summer on campus in research with faculty. Burgess, from Huntsville, Ala., an applied physics major and mathematics minor, works in the lab of Dr. Seth T. Ashman, assistant professor of physics, on computational and experimental projects. Saliba, from Johnston, R.I., is a chemistry major working with beta-Carbolines in the lab of Dr. Seann P. Mulcahy, associate professor of chemistry.

Burgess and Saliba, who are students in the Liberal Arts Honors Program, are among about 70 science students doing research on campus this summer. As part of the Luce grant, they will continue the research for academic credit during the 2017-18 school year and will undertake a service project to encourage young women to study science.

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