Everything Nac

The Stephen F. Austin State University School of Art and the Friends of the Visual Arts will present a free, one-night screening of “Bombs to Birds” at 7 p.m. Friday, June 2, in The Cole Art Center @ The Old Opera House in downtown Nacogdoches.

A documentary by award-winning photojournalist Richard Michael Pruitt, “Bombs to Birds” explores the rich history of the Caddo Lake National Wildlife Refuge, 7,000 acres set aside to protect one of the highest quality old-growth bottom land hardwood forests in the southeastern United States and the wildlife that inhabit it, according to information at imdb.com.

Home to a munitions plant from 1941 to 1994, the EPA designated the land as a Superfund site in 1990. The Army’s Base Realignment and Closure Division was tasked with cleaning the Refuge’s acreage in 2000. Today, little progress has been made to clean the original fouled acres, and they remain closed to the public. Community inquiries about the status of the cleanup and Freedom of Information requests have gone unanswered, the website explains.

Narrated by Texas author and performer Kinky Friedman, the 57-minute documentary was filmed in 2012.

This screening is part of the School of Art’s monthly Friday Film Series and is sponsored in part by William Arscott, Nacogdoches Film Festival, Karon Gillespie, Mike Mollot, David Kulhavy, Brad Maule, John and Kristen Heath, Galleria Z, Jill Carrington, Jean Stephens, Jim and Mary Neal, Richard Orton and Main Street Nacogdoches.

The Cole Art Center is located at 329 E. Main St. For more information, call (936) 468-1131.

Stephen F. Austin State University’s College of Liberal and Applied Arts partnered with the Office of Research and Sponsored Programs to encourage faculty members to apply for grants by sponsoring a grant-writing competition. The competition tasked faculty members with finding a source of at least $25,000 in grant funding for the 2018 calendar year and presenting a preliminary research prospectus to the dean’s office.

The dean’s office selected five finalists, who will work closely with the ORSP throughout the summer and fall to craft their final applications. The finalists will be awarded a $2,000 stipend to help with their efforts, contingent on completion of the grant application and review by the ORSP and the College of Liberal and Applied Arts’ dean’s office.

“The competition is to encourage faculty members to explore grants as a resource supplement to support teaching, scholarship and program development,” said Dr. Brian Murphy, dean of the College of Liberal and Applied Arts at SFA. “Faculty in the liberal arts have fewer grants available to them, and the grants they do have are highly competitive.”

The competition and ORSP’s support will help faculty members learn about the grant-writing process and identify funding sources, Murphy said. The ORSP will provide the finalists a general orientation to the grant-writing process and help them with some of the more intangible aspects that can aid their proposals.

“We’ll assess their grant capabilities, like whether or not they’ve written one before or have been a co-investigator, and if they have a good mentor to help them develop their research components,” said Jennifer Hanlon, interim director of the ORSP. “Once we do that, we’ll tailor our assistance to their specific needs.

“We plan on helping the finalists develop a timeline for their proposal components and a budget, draft letters of support, offer data management plans, and oversee the submission,” Hanlon said. “We’re in a supportive and instructive role. Hopefully, this will ease some of the daunting aspects of the grant-writing process.”

The finalists comprise a broad spectrum of disciplines and research goals, representing the number of research opportunities in the humanities and liberal arts.

Dr. Jose Carbajal, assistant professor in the School of Social Work

Carbajal proposes to research Eye Movement Desensitization and Processing, a method of treatment for PTSD and other trauma-induced disorders. The therapy combines bilateral eye movement, or stimulation, and psychotherapeutic memory, behavior and belief reprocessing. Carbajal plans to focus on the therapy’s use of negative cognition and investigate how and if that mechanism enhances the treatment’s efficacy.

Dr. John C. Pruit, assistant professor in the Department of Anthropology, Geography and Sociology

Pruit will research first-generation college students and their experiences, challenges and development during their first-year of college. The proposed research will benefit the SFA community in a couple of ways: first, by adding to the body of research centered on the first-generation college student experience; second, by identifying programs and departments that help first-generation students and helping those departments and programs orient their students more successfully to college life.

Dr. Sudeshna Roy, assistant professor in the Department of Languages, Culture and Communication

Roy’s research will focus on media coverage of the Syrian refugee crisis. She will analyze data that will help the international community understand refugee communities, race, ethnicity, transnationalism, marginalization, discrimination and national identity of people displaced from their war-torn countries.

Drs. Courtney Wooten and Megan Condis, assistant professors in the Department of English and Creative Writing

Condis and Wooten’s proposal involves the digital humanities, a relatively modern research avenue that focuses on the intersection of technology and traditional research in the humanities and social sciences. Condis and Wooten’s grant application will be used to remodel current classrooms into more interactive labs, where students and faculty members from different disciplines can come and collaborate. It’s the first step in increasing the capability for research in the digital humanities at SFA.

Competition finalists will be expected to complete their grant proposal by the end of the 2017 fall semester. The finalists will the submit their grants to their respective funding institutions for approval during the 2018 spring and summer semesters.

When opportunity came knocking on the door of Ana Romero, Stephen F. Austin State University Rusche College of Business alumna, she answered with a determined curiosity.

“My friend messaged me one day and said there was a position opening at Amazon and I should apply,” Romero said. “I thought, ‘I’ll go for it. There’s no harm in trying.’ I had heard Amazon’s interview process was brutal, so I didn’t know what my odds were.”

During the first round of interviews, Romero took preliminary exams to test her finance and sales skills. In round two, she underwent a phone interview then was flown to Amazon headquarters in Seattle for an in-person interview, which involved six back-to-back interviews with multiple people. That same evening, Amazon extended her an offer.

“I always wanted to do something big for the Rusche College of Business and one day become a distinguished SFA alumna,” Romero said. “It makes me really proud and excited to know that among all Amazon’s candidates they picked me, an SFA alum, and I get to represent everything the college has invested in me.”

Romero said this is her dream job and that she has hopes to work at Amazon until retirement.

“Amazon has so many opportunities, and it is growing so much. It’s going to be a constant challenge for me with new markets to explore and new things to learn,” Romero said.

In early April, Romero relocated to Seattle to begin her new position as brand specialist in the lawn and garden category for Amazon.

“I help position my brand on the site, run deals and ensure their marketing is focused on the correct areas, while also working to improve sales and in-stock rates,” Romero said. “I am the face of Amazon to my brand, and it is my goal to obtain 100 percent customer satisfaction within the lawn and garden category.”

Romero has been a go-getter from the beginning. She was an honors student at SFA and was active in the School of Honors. She participated in a study abroad trip to Italy, Germany and Switzerland, where she visited many well-known companies. Romero also was one of the first students to study abroad at Group Sup De Co Business School in La Rochelle, France.

During an internship with an apartment complex in Nacogdoches, Romero helped the complex expand and market to tenants. She also interned with Kimberly Clark in Mexico City in the international commerce department. Additionally, she worked at SFA’s Student Recreation Center’s front desk and taught workout classes. After her 2016 graduation from SFA with a bachelor’s degree in international business, Romero worked for Aon Hewitt, a human resource solutions company.

“I owe everything that I am professionally to the Rusche College of Business and so many people within it, including Dr. Grubbs, Dr. Lindsey, Ms. Henderson, Dr. Culpepper, Ms. Wittliff and especially Dr. Thornley,” Romero said. “The professors in every department invested so much in me and took the time to share their knowledge and become my mentors. I’m really thankful and blessed that I crossed paths with everyone in the college.”

Romero also credits SFA’s faculty members with helping teach her how to achieve success.

“Dr. Thornley gave me meaningful advice. He said, ‘Don’t be afraid to take the first contract job even if it’s not your dream job. Don’t be afraid to take the first step because eventually your dream job will come around,” Romero said. “This was really hard for me to hear because I wanted my dream job right when I graduated. He changed my perspective, and he was so right.”

Stephen F. Austin State University’s sports business program, housed within the AACSB-accredited Rusche College of Business, is making a name for itself in higher education in Texas.

AACSB accreditation is the hallmark of excellence in business education, and less than 5 percent of the world’s business schools have earned this recognition, according to the AACSB website. Dr. Jason Reese, sports business program director and advisor at SFA, explained how SFA’s program is a leader in the field.

“Most programs like this around the country and Texas are in non-business or non-accredited business schools,” Reese said. “In fact, SFA is the only public higher education institution in Texas that has a program like this at the undergraduate level in an AACSB-accredited college of business.”

The Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board approved the program in 2015, and SFA’s extensive alumni network of sports business professionals helped create the program and its content.

“Courses were created with the input of current sport industry executives,” Reese said. “We wanted to create a program that provides students with tangible skills that can help them in entry- and management-level sport industry careers.”

SFA students who graduate from this program obtain a Bachelor of Business Administration in sports business. The program utilizes experiential learning, where classes provide students with opportunities to work with real businesses in the industry to solve real-world problems.

Course content includes case studies to help students connect content to application. Students learn from scenarios and apply their understanding of the subject to help solve them.

The core courses taught in the program include: sports marketing, sports analytics, international sports business and sports economics. Students also are required to complete an internship, as well as select a track of interest. Students can choose from five tracks, including sales and management, athletic administration, mass communication, hospitality administration, and outdoor recreation management.

For more information about SFA’s sports business program, contact Reese at reesejd1@sfasu.edu.