Kwesi Brookins, Vice Provost for University Outreach and Engagement
Looking Back and Moving Forward
As we begin a new year, many of us will take time to reflect on the joys and challenges of the past 12 months and the opportunities for growth that lie ahead. That’s especially true for me, as January 1 marked one year since I returned to MSU to become vice provost for University Outreach and Engagement.
What I have most enjoyed also happens to be what matters most to me: relationships. It’s been rewarding to get to know our diverse, talented team here at UOE and, by extension, our partners on campus and across the community. I have also appreciated the warm welcome from our students, faculty, staff, and senior leadership at MSU.
Looking back, I am proud of the ways UOE has engaged with the broader community this past year. We have introduced several initiatives, including ...
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Featured MSU Engaged Scholars
- Gail Richmond, Ph.D.
- Associate Chairperson and Professor
- Director of Teacher Preparation Programs
- Department of Teacher Education
- College of Education
When Detroit public school teacher Shirley Brezzell introduced a unit on squirrels and their habitats, she took her eager third graders outside.
The children looked all around the school grounds, but they did not see a single bushy tail. She asked them to think about why.
“They realized that there were no trees,” she recalled. “So there were no squirrels.”
Brezzell took matters into her own hands, launching a transformation of the school grounds that has provided her students with an outdoor oasis where they can learn about science—and just be kids ...
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- Nihar Mahapatra, Ph.D.
- Associate Professor, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, College of Engineering
- Ann Marie Ryan, Ph.D.
- Professor, Department of Psychology, College of Social Science
- J. Scott Yaruss, Ph.D., CCC-SLP, BCS-F, F-ASHA
- Professor, Department of Communicative Sciences and Disorders, College of Communication Arts and Sciences
For people who stutter, Siri, Alexa, and other voice-activated artificial intelligence (AI) technologies can feel like foes rather than friends.
These technologies—hailed by most for their efficiency and convenience—fail on all counts for people who stutter like Jia Bin, an MSU doctoral student from China who leads the East Lansing chapter of the National Stuttering Association and belongs to the World Stuttering Network ...
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- Amanda Flaim, Ph.D.
- Assistant Professor of Sociology
- James Madison College
- Department of Sociology
- College of Social Science
The Mekong River has long been referred to as a “biological treasure.” The river winds through six countries in Southeast Asia—China, Myanmar, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia, and Vietnam—providing an abundance of resources, including fresh water, food, and transportation, for the nearly 60 million people who live along its 2,700-mile-long bank. The biodiversity of the river is said to rival that of the Amazon, with thousands of species of plants, fish, birds, mammals, and more calling the Mekong “home.”
In recent years, the river has begun to experience the detrimental effects of industrializing agriculture, water grabbing (unequal distribution ...
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