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Delegation to leverage expertise in distributing humanitarian aid and local connections to deliver donations to those devastated by Hurricane Matthew.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. – Rather than ship donations overseas and hope it arrives to those in most need, a Roger Williams University professor and two alumni will soon travel to Haiti to hand-deliver money, medicine and food, using their expertise and local connections to ensure that aid gets to the people devastated by Hurricane Matthew.

The delegation from New Bridges for Haitian Success, Inc. – Bernard Georges ’14, Omar Bah ’14 and RWU Associate Professor of History Autumn Quezada de Tavarez – will bring the cash and donated items directly to some of the hardest-hit areas of Haiti, which saw the destruction of entire villages, thousands of people displaced and estimates of more than 800 dead from the Category 4 hurricane that swept the country on Oct. 8.

The trip comes amid reports that some Haitians and Haitian-Americans are skeptical about whether the American Red Cross can effectively manage the humanitarian efforts in Haiti. That skepticism is fueled by a ProPublica and National Public Radio report that the Red Cross raised nearly half a billion dollars but managed to build just six permanent homes following Haiti’s 2010 earthquake. The Red Cross has said the report’s “misleading headline” fueled “persistent myths” and that the money funded 100 humanitarian aid projects in Haiti.

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SUPERMAJOR, Matt Kenyon’s piece on the politics of oil, has taken on an unexpected life of its own.

Newly hired Associate Professor in Digital + Media Matt Kenyon is deeply interested in how art “lives as a story and as an object – in its multiple lives.” Over the years, he has embarked on a range of projects that take him beyond the studio and into the heart of complex political and economic systems – whether he’s turning his body into a barcode scanner to disrupt Nielsen market analysis (in Consumer Index) or collaborating with Syrian journalist Honey Al-Sayed and translator Laura Marris on an upcoming sculptural installation that explores the many ways translation affects the current refugee crisis.

Kenyon, a new media sculptor who earned his MFA at Virginia Commonwealth University and most recently taught at the University of Michigan, looks forward to the shift in scope afforded by RISD’s art-centered approach. “At large state schools, I’ve had opportunities to advocate for art within a larger research direction and align it with science,” he says. “But here it’s the inverse: Art is the norm, it’s the core. It’s clear that students are serious about becoming artists. This is a really special place that attracts people who are super-passionate about their work. And to me, that’s exciting.”

Kenyon has exhibited both nationally and internationally and has work in a number of permanent collections, including at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. He conducts his research under the umbrella of SWAMP (Studies of Work Atmosphere and Mass Production), a practice focused on “critical themes addressing the effects of global corporate operations, mass media and communication, military-industrial complexes, and general meditations on the liminal area between life and artificial life.”

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Community invited to President’s Distinguished Speakers Series event featuring world-renowned scholar of elections and public opinion. 

BRISTOL, R.I. – Voters are driven by partisan beliefs, they align with identity groups and they react to uncontrollable events such as drought or shark attacks. So their selection of leaders is much more nuanced than the ideal of citizens casting votes informed by an objective and thorough analysis of a politician’s positions on the issues. Christopher H. Achen, the renowned political scientist, will illuminate the realities of democratic politics and shatter the romantic notion of government by the will of the people during an appearance at Roger Williams University on Wednesday, Oct. 26.

Members of the campus community and the public are invited to spend an evening with Achen – co-author (with Larry Bartels) of Democracy for Realists: Why Elections Do Not Produce Responsive Government (2016) and the Roger Williams Straus Professor of Social Sciences at Princeton University – as part of the President’s Distinguished Speakers Series at Roger Williams University. In his presentation – “Why Do Elections Produce Unresponsive Government?” – Achen will dispel the notion that elections are driven by ordinary citizens’ rational policy positions, while offering a provocative alternative view grounded in political parties and identity groups.

“Achen is a world-renowned political scientist and premier methodologist whose most recent work is a groundbreaking study of how citizens choose presidential candidates and how elections work,” says RWU Professor of Political Science Robert Eisinger. “Many citizens believe that government isn’t representing them, or responding to their needs and wants. If we can have a civil, thoughtful conversation about what is responsive government and how elections work, I think we elevate the political discourse. Let’s do this on October 26 with one of the foremost scholars studying elections and representation.”

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