Faculty Experts Roundup

Dr. Corey Beck has been named as Provost Faculty Fellow for Corporate Engagement. In this role, he will support and help coordinate corporate engagement efforts across academic units, with a focus on aligning faculty expertise, student experiential learning opportunities and institutional priorities with external partners.

The National Endowment for the Humanities awarded $196,632 to support the Central Region Humanities Center’s biennial conference, as well as related teacher workshops and exhibitions.

The project, titled “250 Years: The Promises and Legacy of the Declaration of Independence,” is led by Associate Professor Mariana Dantas, director of the Central Region Humanities Center and associate professor of history. The project's steering committee includes Fred Drogula, professor of Classics and World Religions, Greta Suiter, Ohio University Libraries manuscript archivist, and Kristina Bross, dean of the Honors Tutorial College.

Learn more

For her comprehensive redesign of the graduate teaching assistant training program for Spanish instructors, Muriel Gallego, associate professor of Spanish, received the 2025 Innovation in Language Program Direction Award from the American Association of University Supervisors, Coordinators, and Directors of Language Programs (AAUSC).

Learn more

Dr. Wenyang Gao, assistant professor of chemistry and biochemistry, has received a prestigious CAREER Award from the National Science Foundation’s Division of Materials Research (DMR)—one of the agency’s highest honors for early-career faculty. The five-year award (totaling $875,763) supports Gao’s effort to rethink how materials are made at the most fundamental level. Instead of relying on traditional liquid-based chemistry, his team uses mechanical force—grinding or milling solids—to drive reactions, enabling faster, cleaner, and more energy-efficient synthesis. He was the second faculty member in the Chemistry department to receive a CAREER Award in the past 20 years. 

Larry Hayman, director of Legal Engagement and the pre-law program at the Center for Law, Justice & Culture, has been named the 2026 recipient of The Gerald L. Wilson Award for Excellence in Pre-Law Advising. Presented by the Pre-Law Advisors National Council, this prestigious award recognizes individuals who have made significant and sustained contributions to the pre-law advising community and who are widely regarded by their peers as national leaders in the field. 

Dr. Robin Muhammad, associate professor of history, published an article titled “‘I Will See that Something is Done’: African American Women and Organizing Against Workplace Bullying, Harassment, and Violence in the San Francisco Bay Area Shipyards during World War II.” Muhammad will give a related talk as part of the African American Studies Colloquia: "Below the water line and along the color line: Environmental and labor issues in U.S. Shipbuilding, 1939-1999."

In February, Muhammad gave a talk in New Concord at the Muskingum County library for Black History Month: “Game Changer: African American Football History.” 

Distinguished Professor Sarah Wyatt was honored on Wednesday, March 18, during the Distinguished Professor Portrait Unveiling and Lecture. Dr. Wyatt is an internationally renowned leader in the field of plant responses to gravity and is greatly admired by colleagues in her field for her cutting-edge research. Her research includes multiple collaborations with NASA, with five experiments conducted aboard the International Space Station. In 2023, she was also selected as one of just 18 scientists nationwide to help develop a 10-year research roadmap supporting human exploration of the moon and Mars.

Learn more

Dr. Adam Rapp, professor of sales and executive director of the Ralph and Luci Schey Sales Centre, was honored by the Mid-American Conference (MAC) with the Outstanding Faculty Award for Student Success. 

Read more

Sharon R. Boyle, director of Arts in Health and associate professor of Music Therapy, recently launched Bobcat ArtsCare based on research that engagement in the arts impacts our health and well-being in multiple ways. This non-clinical program provides students access to the arts to encourage regular creative activity for health benefits.

Robert McClure, associate professor of composition and theory in the School of Music, won his fourth consecutive Ohio Arts Council Individual Excellence Award. From the OEA website: “The IEA program recognizes outstanding accomplishments by artists in a variety of disciplines. Awards give artists the resources to experiment and explore their art forms, develop skills and advance their careers, and receive affirmation and acknowledgment for outstanding work.”

Four faculty members were honored in and end-of-year ceremony by the college. 

• Rachel Bican, assistant professor and principal investigator of the Pediatric FUNctional Mobility (FUN) Lab, received an IGNITE Award.
• Seonghee Hong, assistant professor of instruction, received the Excellence in Face-to-Face Teaching in the College of Health Sciences and Professions Award.
• Jennine Mick, associate professor of instruction and undergraduate program coordinator, won the CHSP Inspirational Teaching Award.

Read more about these awards

• Marc Barr, professor of instruction in exercise physiology, won the Dr. Bentley Andrew Krause Outstanding Teaching Award.

Kevin Lee, associate professor of biomedical sciences, has been awarded an American Heart Association Institutional Research Enhancement Award to study how nicotine use may lead to heart damage.

Learn more

HTC has selected two Faculty Fellow positions and one Faculty Fellow for Wellness. These positions are part of a new HTC Faculty Fellows initiative designed to strategically strengthen the tutorial program, acknowledge the contributions of excellent scholar-teachers, and provide opportunities for faculty leadership within the College. The goal for the HTC Faculty Fellow for Wellness initiative is to create an approach for the Honors Tutorial College to implement effective, sustainable and scalable well-being/mental health support for all its students, which can serve as a model for other colleges and universities.

• Faculty Fellow for HTC Research: Vic Matta, professor of analytics and information systems in the College of Business
• Faculty Fellow for Tutorial Policy: Spencer Smith, assistant professor of instruction in the Department of English
• Ann C. Brown and Kenneth A. Holroyd Faculty Fellow for Wellness: Dawn Graham, associate professor of instruction in the Department of Social Medicine in the Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine

On April 7, Redhawk Publications published Revival, the debut novel by Rob Ross, dean of Libraries. "Set in Akron, Ohio, in the summer of 1984, the novel follows a visiting troupe of revivalists and the desperate locals they attract. Told through interwoven perspectives, Revival illuminates nine characters at moments of quiet collapse: the grieving, the searching, the displaced, and the mistreated. As the revival continues, hidden truths surface, revealing the characters' interconnectedness and their shared yearning for grace."

Dr. Ashley Allanson, associate professor of instruction, recently delivered an online guest lecture to Wrexham University MSc Football Science and Coaching students in Great Britain.

Bilal Urkmez, associate professor in Counseling and Higher Education, was selected to receive the 2026 ASGW (Association for Specialists in Group Work) Professional Advancement Award. The award is in “recognition of an individual’s efforts to advance group work through research, new technologies, legislation, public relations or practice” and will be presented at the ASGW Conference Feb. 5-7 in Chicago, Ill.

Associate Professor Dr. Jen Newton is offering parent advocacy sessions in Meigs, Morgan, Athens, Hocking, Vinton, Pike, Ross, Galia, Washington, Scioto, Perry, and Jackson counties this spring through an Ohio Children’s Trust Fund grant in collaboration with the Southeast Prevention Council. The sessions, "Partnering for Strong Families," will empower families to manage stress and advocate for their children.

Jenell Igeleke Penn, assistant professor in Teacher Education, won the 2025 Linda Rief Voices from the Middle Award for the article, “Art and Advocacy in Action” with co-author Johnny Merry. The authors discussed their work with ninth graders in their Combined World Humanities course in an effort to sustain their civic engagement beyond their time in the class.

Assistant Professor Yahya Al-Majali in the Department of Mechanical Engineering, was featured in OHIO Today for leading “impactful, industry-focused research at Ohio University, demonstrating impressive productivity while securing major funding.” In the Institute for Sustainable Energy and the Environment (ISEE), Al-Majali bridges mechanical engineering and sustainability.

Chang Liu, professor in the School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS), delivered a seminar at Ho Chi Minh City University of Technology (HCMUT) in January. The talk covered recent advances in Generative Reward Models in Reinforcement Learning, highlighted the upcoming 2026 IEEE World Congress on Computational Intelligence (WCCI) Competition on LLM-based AI Agents for MicroRTS hosted by Ohio University, and introduced the University's graduate study and research opportunities. The seminar attracted over two dozen undergraduate students from computer science, computer engineering, and electrical engineering, generating strong engagement and discussion around AI research, international collaboration, and future academic pathways.

Josh Antonuccio, associate professor and director of the School of Media Arts and Studies, will join SXSW this year as an official mentor! SXSW is March 12-18 in Austin, Texas.

Dr. Christie Beck, professor in Communication Studies, has been named the Gerald & Barbara Schoonover Professor in Health Communication for the term beginning Jan. 1, 2026 and concluding on June 30, 2029.

Beck was also recently interviewed by Dr. Suraj Arshanapally for his Substack titled “Communicator's Guide to Social Impact” Arshanapally interviews public health officials and health communicators for the platform. The article featuring Beck’s interview discusses her decades-long research into the influence and impact of celebrity health disclosures.

Dr. Lynn Harter, professor in the School of Communication Studies, and Erica Adzimah, Communication Studies graduate student, recent published an article titled “Telltale scars of a Life Transposed” in Health Communication with Francis Ametepey, MA '25.

Harter and graduate student Colin Cameron published a book chapter titled “Creating Just and Joyful Communities through Storytelling: The Evolution of the Barbara Geralds Institute for Storytelling and Social Impact” with Ametepey and Chuck Kaminski, Ph.D. '24.

Harter and Cameron also published a book chapter with Ametepey, Kaminski, Jorge Castillo, MFA '25, and Anthony Acheampong, MFA '25,  titled “The Development and use of Digital Story Banks to Foster Place-Based Narrative Labor” in “A Multi-Perspective Approach to Narratives in Health Communication.”

Harter also contributed a book chapter titled “The Temporal and Imaginative Nature of Narrative Sensemaking: The Worlding of Possibilities Among Mis/fits” in “A Multi-Perspective Approach to Narratives in Health Communication.”

Dr. China Billotte Verhoff, associate professor in the School of Communication Studies, and Lyzbeth King, a COMS graduate student, co-authored a paper titled “Bouncing Back in Unequal Systems: Communication, Resilience, and Maternity Leave Policy,” which was accepted for presentation at the 2026 International Communication Association Conference in Cape Town, South Africa.

The following individuals won awards at Scripps College of Communication Spring 2026 Pillar Awards Ceremony on April 24:

• Discover Pillar Award Winners
  • Eric Williams, professor in the J. Warren McClure School of Emerging Communication Technologies
  • Janice Collins, associate professor and director of the Institute for International Journalism in the E.W. Scripps School of Journalism
  • Frederick Lewis, professor in the School of Media Arts and Studies
  • Gary Kirksey, professor in the School of Visual Communication
  • April Koska, special projects manager and assistant to the dean
• Work Pillar Award Winners
  • Pamela Kaylor, professor of instruction in the School of Communication Studies
  • Brandon Saunders, associate professor of instruction in the J. Warren McClure School of Emerging Communication Technologies
  • Bill Clack, assistant professor of instruction in the E.W. Scripps School of Journalism
  • Laeeq Khan, associate professor in the School of Media Arts and Studies
  • Catherine Penrod, assistant professor and undergraduate director in the School of Visual Communication
  • Josh Birnbaum, professor of instruction in the School of Visual Communication
  • Jody Grove, business manager in the dean’s office
  • Kelly Pero, director of business operations for WOUB 

Congratulations to the faculty who have received media mentions so far this year!

Learn about January's newsmakers

Learn about February's newsmakers

Learn about March's newsmakers

Do you have a faculty news item to contribute? Send us an email with the subject line "Faculty roundup" to have the item included in our next edition!