Michigan Promise Scholarship / Ranger Challenge / Thesis awards / Student Paper Competition

CMU students credited with helping to create Michigan Promise Scholarship

Nearly two years ago, CMU students created a project that they now claim has helped to spur the creation of the new Michigan Promise scholarship touted by Governor Jennifer Granholm and for good reason. The Governor and key legislators acknowledge the important role played by these undergraduates in implementing the new award.

In Griffin Endowed Chair Bill Ballenger’s spring 2005 political science seminar, the students created a compromise they believed encompassed the best aspects of the Merit Award and Granholm’s proposed changes - without costing more money. This new plan would convert the current $2,500 Merit Award program into what will become the $4,000 Michigan Promise. They then presented their plan before members of the State Senate on June 8, 2005, at the Capitol in Lansing.

“Initially, I would have never imagined that our plan would make it out of the classroom as anything more than a semester assignment,” said St. Joseph senior Heather Chiarello, a student involved in the project. “But after we were asked to testify in front of a joint committee in Lansing, the possibility of making some kind of impact became real.”

“There is no question that Bill Ballenger’s students at CMU were the catalyst needed to encourage the Legislature and Governor to add more dollars to the Michigan Merit Award,” said former state Senator Mike Goschka (R-Brant), former chairman of the Senate’s higher education spending panel.

“Without these students coming before the Legislature to present their proposal, there simply would have been no increase in the program. Clearly, this is grassroots representative government in its purest form; the students presented a bona fide plan, and elected leaders responded by incorporating parts of it into the new award that was ultimately adopted.”

The whole of the students’ proposal has not made it into law - at least not yet. Still, in the tradition of political give-and-take, the core principles of the students’ agenda were encompassed by the new statute, including increasing the amount of the award and rewarding students who do well on the state-administered ACT exam by giving them half the money before they begin college.

“The CMU students can take satisfaction in having highlighted the need for some frontloading of the scholarship monies,” said Liz Boyd, Governor Granholm’s press secretary.

The Michigan Promise scholarship, signed into law by Governor Granholm on Dec. 21, 2006, provides up to $4,000 to high school graduates for successfully completing two years of postsecondary education beginning with the high school graduating class of 2007.

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ROTC cadets show off strength at Ranger Challenge

Several ROTC cadets marched away with two top honors at the Ranger Challenge at Camp Atterbury, Ind., in October.

CMU’s five-person team placed first in the Army physical fitness test and the 10 km forced march while carrying a rucksack and equipment weighing about 35 pounds. Overall in the competition, the team came in fourth out of fourteen.

The cadets who made up the team included: Mark May, a senior from Warren; Trystyn Seaman, a senior from Wixom; Aaron Roehrig, a senior from Newaygo; Mike Allen, a junior from North Branch; Jacqueline Brun, a junior from East Jordan; and Ben Boettcher, a junior from Mount Pleasant.

The Ranger Challenge is the only varsity sport in ROTC. It consists of competitions between five- and nine-person teams such as day and night land navigation, an Army physical fitness test, weapons assembly, an obstacle course, litter carry, Humvee pull, one rope bridge crossing and a 10 km forced march.

Two nine-person teams also competed in the event for CMU. Overall, this was the school’s best performance in recent history.

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CHSBS graduates receive awards for thesis and dissertation projects

Five CHSBS graduates have received awards recognizing their dedication and perseverance in completing their capstone projects.

The Outstanding Thesis and Dissertation Award, established by the College of Graduate Studies in 1984, recognizes excellent scholarly activity by CMU graduate students who have completed a thesis, dissertation or Plan B paper.

Each year, up to eight awards are presented to students nominated by faculty members or department chairs. This year’s recipients include:

• Nicholas Dey of Saginaw for his thesis, “The Effects of Oral Administration of the Substituted Pyrimidine KP544 in a Transgenic Mouse Model of Huntington’s Disease.”

Dey researched the effects of the drug KP544 as a possible treatment for Huntington’s Disease. By comparing the performance of mice treated with the drug to a group of untreated mice, Dey found that the treatment delayed the onset and decreased the severity of Huntington’s Disease-like symptoms.

Dey, who was advised by psychology professor Gary Dunbar, earned a master’s degree in applied experimental psychology in August of 2006. His thesis was CMU’s nominee for the Midwestern Association of Graduate Schools Distinguished Master’s Thesis Award.

• Kirsten Gobeski of Cedar Falls, Iowa, for her thesis, “Why Retirees Work: Differential Prediction of Types of Bridge Employment,” which examines environmental characteristics and self-reported attitudes of retirees in relation to post-retirement employment, also known as bridge employment.

Her research found that retirees’ attitudes and situational factors can be used to differentiate between retired individuals who work in their previous career field, work in a different field, or do not work at all after retiring. Portions of the research were presented at the national conference of the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology last year.

Gobeski, who earned her master’s degree in industrial/organizational psychology in May of 2006, was advised by psychology professor Terry Beehr.

• Koichi Kato of Tokyo, Japan, for his dissertation, “Controlled versus Automatic Processes in Retrieval-Induced Forgetting,” which investigates why individuals forget.

During his research, Kato examined a situation in which individuals forgot information after recalling related information. He investigated whether this type of forgetting is automatic, meaning that forgetting is a natural consequence of activating a part of the brain, or controlled, during which individuals intentionally suppress the competing information. He concluded that the phenomenon is based on controlled processes and that individuals have the ability to suppress information that is competing with what they are trying to remember.

Kato, who received his doctoral degree in applied experimental psychology in December, was advised by psychology professor Hajime Otani.

• Joel Lewis of Mount Pleasant for his dissertation, “Youth Against Fascism: The Construction of Communist Youth Identity in Britain and the United States.”

His work uses the Young Communist Leagues in Britain and the U.S. as case studies to trace the origins and development of western communism and address how young people in these cultures understand communism and the propaganda techniques used to attract them.

Lewis, who received a joint doctoral degree in comparative modern European history from CMU and the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow, Scotland, in December, was advised by history professor James A. Schmiechen.

• Katherine Metropoulos of Saginaw for her Plan B paper, “Entre el príncipe azul y la realidad: Análisis del sujeto femenino en las novelas de Zoé Valdés y Cristina García” (English translation: “Between Prince Charming and Reality: An Analysis of the Female Subjects in the Novels of Zoe Valdes and Cristina Garcia”).

Using poststructuralist feminist theory as a theoretical framework, Metropoulos analyzed the narrative structures and female protagonists in four novels written by authors Valdes and Garcia, finding “feminine identity” in the narratives to be multiple, changing and open to different interpretations.

Metropoulos, who earned her master’s degree in Spanish in May of 2006, was advised by Krzysztof Kulawik, an associate professor of Spanish.

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Winners selected for 2006 Student Paper Competition

The College of Humanities and Social and Behavioral Sciences is proud to recognize the winners of the 2006 Student Paper Competition. Each graduate student receives $750 and each undergraduate student receives $500 from donations from faculty, staff, alumni and friends of the college.

The winners are selected by a committee of CHSBS faculty members. Students may submit essays, theoretical papers, creative works, research papers or reviews of research completed for 300 level and above classes during the previous year.

Graduate Students

Dan Forbes

“The First Reconstruction of the Republican Party:  Michigan and the Election of 1876”

Faculty Sponsor: Jennifer Green

Katherine Metropoulos

“Entre el principe azul y la realidad:  Analisis del sujeto femenion en las novelas de Zoe Valdes y Cristina Garcia”

Faculty Sponsor: Krzysztof Kulawik

Amanda Papke

“Anna of Denmark and the Court Masque”

Faculty Sponsor: James Daybell

Undergraduate Students

Kevin Alt

“A Cheap Loaf of Warm White Bread:  A Study in the Industrialization of the Nineteenth Century British Bakehouse”

Faculty Sponsor: James Schmiechen

William Kiesgen

“Toto, We’re Stuck in Kansas:  The Pros and Cons of Scientific Realism”

Faculty Sponsor: John Wright

Jonathan Pohl

“A Catholic School and a Public School:  The Case of St. Mary’s in Westphalia, Michigan, and its Changing Relationship with the State of Michigan, 1936-1961”

Faculty Sponsor: Timothy O’Neil

Matt Smith

“A Critique of Searle’s Solution to the Mind-Body Problem”

Faculty Sponsor: Gary Fuller

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