Category: Academics

Three Generations Visit the College of Psychology

On Monday, April 4, College of Psychology alumni Caryn Wachsler, Psy.D., and her daughter, Jana Wachsler, Psy.D., visited the College. The purpose of their visit was to introduce Jana Wachsler’s daughter, Emilie, to the school.

During the visit, the family met with Dean Grosby, several faculty including Charles Golden and Tom Kennedy, and college staff. They toured the Maxwell Maltz building and learned about the College’s graduate programs. While reminiscing about her time at NSU, Jana Wachsler remarked that she was pregnant with Emilie when she was a student in the Clinical Psychology Psy.D. program.

In addition to earning her Psy.D. from NSU, she also completed her MS in Mental Health Counseling from the school. Dr. Jana Wachsler operates a practice in Canandaigua, N.Y. Her mother, Dr. Caryn Wachsler, earned her Psy.D. in Clinical Psychology from NSU in 1991 and operates a practice in Boca Raton.

Posted 04/10/22

Interdisciplinary Effort Merges Strengths on Arts and Sciences

For the past five years, the Halmos College of Arts and Sciences faculty has been engaged in interdisciplinary efforts to combine science and art at NSU through a program where undergraduate art students visit the microbiology lab to learn how to use bacteria as “paint” and agar plates as their “canvas” to create art.

In March 2022, Julie Torruellas Garcia, Ph.D., and Katie Crump, Ph.D., from the Department of Biological Sciences, Kandy Lopez Moreno, M.F.A. from the Department of Art + Design, and former NSU visiting Professor Véronique Côté, M.F.A., published an article titled “Creating an Interdisciplinary Curriculum within the Undergraduate Arts and Sciences Through Agar Art,” in the Journal of Microbiology and Biology Education.  In their article, they shared the agar art curriculum including learning outcomes and assessment tools and discussed the benefits of integrating science into the arts.

Check out the full article.

Posted 04/10/22

Student Tobacco Use Project Shows Outstanding Early Results

NSU’s Student Tobacco Use Education and Prevention Project is a product of many outstanding students, faculty, academic, and community partners who have worked so diligently and effectively to develop and implement the project.

This project has been designed to promote community awareness of the immense importance of tobacco cessation and prevention by utilizing teams of dedicated students from the Dr. Kiran C. Patel College of Osteopathic Medicine’s many health professions training programs to develop a series of monthly social media posts and emails focusing on the deleterious health impact of tobacco use.

Toward this end, eight sets of posts were developed and disseminated on our AHEC Facebook Page, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Twitter accounts during the initial phase of our pilot period. This monthly series of posts highlighted the impact of tobacco use on health areas such as: (1) Oral Cancer; (2) Lung Cancer; (3) Cardiovascular Disease; (4) Other Cancers; (5) Emphysema and Chronic Lung Disease; and (6) Reproductive and Pregnancy Complications. Two additional sets of posts were also developed and disseminated, including: (7) The Impact of Tobacco Use on Poor COVID Outcomes; and (8) a special Video Posting also focusing on Tobacco and Cancer. To assure for maximum spread of these social media messages throughout the community, we developed a Founders Group (recently renamed our Tobacco Champions Circle) to support and disseminate these monthly sets of posts.

Our early results are outstanding and well beyond our initial expectations. Our Tobacco Champions Circle has already grown to more than 250 individuals and community organizations. Our posts have already had more than 150,000 views and several thousand engagements (e.g., likes, comments, shares). In addition, many major organizations have learned about our Group Tobacco Cessation Services from these posts and are now interested in bringing these services to their patients, clients, and employees.

A new set of student teams will be developing posts highlighting the impact of tobacco use on health areas such as (1) Diabetes; (2) Rheumatoid Arthritis; (3) Ocular Disease; (4) Wellness; and (5) Tobacco Use in the LGBTQ Community. A sixth team will focus on designing special holiday posts such as “New Year’s Resolutions to Quit Smoking” and/or an “All I Want for Christmas is For You to Stop Smoking” appeal.

“As we continue in this second phase of our pilot period, we want to thank you and all of the many fine members of our Champions Circle for all of your ongoing support and efforts to date,” said Steven B. Zucker, D.M.D, M.Ed., Director of the Area Health Education Center (AHEC) Program. “We hope that you and everyone in our Champions Circle takes enormous pride in what you have already helped achieve; and we certainly look forward to continue working with you on this important mission going forward.”

Posted 04/10/22

Halmos Faculty Members Publish Viral Genome

Halmos faculty members Katie Crump, Ph.D., and Julie Torruellas Garcia, Ph.D., in the research laboratory for HHMI SEA Phage Discovery Training.

Halmos College of Arts and Sciences’ Department of Biological Sciences faculty members Julie Torruellas Garcia, Ph.D., and Katie Crump, Ph.D., recently participated in the 2021 Faculty Phage Genomics Workshop as part of the HHMI SEA-PHAGES program at NSU. During their training, Crump and Garcia worked on a team to annotate the genome of a Mycobacterium phage called Madiba. The complete genome was published in GenBank, a comprehensive public database: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nuccore/2180079159

PHAGES, or Phage Hunters Advancing Genomics and Evolutionary Science, is a program where students collect soil samples in hopes of finding new viruses, called phages, that attack bacteria. Once the phages are isolated from the soil, they are identified using a genetic approach. These newly identified phages could potentially be used in the future to treat antibiotic resistant bacterial infections.

Students interested in participating in this research can sign up for BIOL 1000 and BIOL 1001 Introduction to Biological Research I and II. These three-credit courses are open to freshman and sophomore students with any major.

Posted 04/10/22

Halmos Student Wins Esteemed NAEP Award

Amber Orr

Amber Orr, a student in the Halmos College of Arts and Sciences, has been selected as the 21st recipient of the Charles F. Zirzow Memorial Student Award presented by the National Associate of Environmental Professionals (NAEP).  The award is given to a current college student or recent graduate who has been recognized for outstanding academic achievement, and this is the first time a Nova Southeastern University student has received this award.

Per NAEP’s website, the organization is “a multi-disciplinary association for professionals dedicated to the advancement of the environmental professions, a forum for state-of-the-art information on environmental planning, research and management, and a network of professional contacts and exchange of information among colleagues in industry, government, academia, and the private sector.”

Orr was nominated by Halmos Department of Biological Sciences faculty member Paul Arena, Ph.D. and will receive the award at the National Association of Environmental Professionals’ Annual Conference, held May 16-19, 2022.

Posted 03/25/22

MD Students Present for National Latino Medical Student Association

On March 3-5, the Latino Medical Student Association held its 50th annual meeting providing the opportunity to pre-med and medical students to present their research and service projects. The NSU MD LMSA chapter medical students attended and presented posters at the conference.

Second-year student physicians Andrea Roca, Darisel Ventura, Laura Molina, Marla Fortoul, Brian Macias Martinez, Jose Garcia, and Adrian Alepuz worked together to develop a community outreach program, METAS (Medical Students Encouraging and Teaching Aspiring STEAM Students). They presented their findings with a poster titled “The Impact of Medical Students as Mentors of aspiring STEAM LHS+ High School Students.”

Second-year student physicians Laura Molina, Marla Fortoul, and Brian Macias Martinez presented on “Developing a Comprehensive, Culturally Competent Spanish Curriculum for Medical School.”

The first-year student physician Heli Patel won 1st place award for her poster presentation at the 13th annual Southeast Regional LMSA conference, which was held on February 25-27. Her presentation was titled “Maternal Mortality – A critical Analysis of Trends in Florida.”

Congratulations to all the students!

The NSU MD Latino Medical Student Association Chapter has been established with the intent to develop a network of Hispanic/Latinx medical students at NSU MD with a central mission aimed at increasing the diversification of the South Florida medical community. For more information:  https://md.nova.edu/diversity/outreach.html

Posted 03/25/22

Study: Drug Overdoses Rise During COVID-19, Creating ER Disparities

Nova Southeastern University professors conducted a landmark study on drug overdoses in Florida during COVID-19 and found unexpected results regarding disparities by age, ethnicity, and insurance status.

Among their key findings:

  • There were more opioid and stimulant overdoses reported by emergency departments (EDs) during COVID-19 in Florida than before the pandemic.
  • ED visits among those under age 18 were more likely to involve drug overdoses during COVID-19 compared to before COVID-19.
  • ED visits among those on Medicaid or without insurance were more likely to involve drug overdoses during COVID-19 compared to before COVID-19.
  • There were no disparities according to ethnicity or race. Drug overdoses were problematic for all groups during COVID-19.

The interdisciplinary, multi-college, multi-university study was conducted by Professors Timothy F. Page and François Sainfort from NSU’s H. Wayne Huizenga College of Business and Entrepreneurship, Professor Julie Jacko from NSU’s Dr. Kiran C. Patel College of Allopathic Medicine, and Professor Weiwei Chen from Kennesaw State (Ga.) University’s Department of Economics, Finance and Quantitative Analysis. Their study of disparities in drug overdoses during COVID-19 was the first research of its kind in the state of Florida.

The researchers compared ED data from April to September 2019 (before the pandemic) to the same time period in 2020 (during the pandemic). While opioid overdose visits increased during the pandemic, visits for other causes declined as activity was restricted during the pandemic.

“This type of research has broad impact in the scientific community. It advances our knowledge of drug abuse during the pandemic and therefore helps us help society,” said Andrew Rosman, Dean of the H. Wayne Huizenga College of Business and Entrepreneurship.

The opioid crisis continues to persist in Florida as well as the United States, fueling thousands of overdose deaths. In 2019, the CDC’s National Center for Injury Prevention and Control awarded Florida a new Overdose Data to Action grant, which was expanded in the scope of previous drug overdose surveillance to include more non-opioid related overdoses and strengthened funding of prevention efforts.

For details on the study go to https://www.liebertpub.com/doi/epdf/10.1089/pop.2021.0369 or contact Professor Timothy F. Page at tpage1@nova.edu

Posted 03/15/22

USchool Students Selected as 2022 National Merit Scholarship Finalists

NSU University School is proud to announce that all four seniors who were named Semifinalists in the prestigious and highly competitive National Merit Scholarship Program have advanced to Finalist standing!

Madison Draizin, Nicole Steinberg, Zachary Hardgrave, and Brian Zhi represent the top 1% of program entrants and will be considered for Merit Scholarship awards based on their academic abilities, skills, and accomplishments.

Congratulations to all!

Posted 03/13/22

Criminal Justice Students Get Hands-On Demonstration from Brevard Sheriff

A group of undergraduate students at NSU’s Abraham S. Fischler College of Education and School of Criminal Justice got a hands-on opportunity to learn about criminal justice from a Florida Sheriff.

The students, along with criminal justice Professors Grace Telesco, Ph.D., and Jennifer Allen, Ph.D., were invited by Brevard County Sheriff Wayne Ivey to participate in an exciting and realistic virtual experience involving the MILO, or Multiple Interactive Learning Objectives.

MILO is a scenario-based firearms training system that is used by all branches of law enforcement, military, security, and public safety agencies across the country and the world. Along with the first-hand virtual experience and a lunch outing with Sheriff Ivey, the students also got a chance to meet Junny, the sheriff’s bloodhound.

Posted 03/19/22

Graduate Assistant Coordinator Partners with Story Booth

Bianca Oliveira

Bianca Oliveira, NSU Writing and Communication Center Graduate Assistant Coordinator (GAC) and M.A. student in the Department of Communication, Media, and the Arts’ Composition, Rhetoric, and Digital Media program, partnered with NSU’s Department of Humanities and Politics’ (DHP) community series, Story Booth, in collecting stories from the student body and community during Banned Books Week of the Fall 2020 semester, September 28 – October 2, and 2021 Carnival season, February 16 – March 16.

As the former undergraduate English major ambassador of DHP, Oliveira worked with Aileen Miyuki Farrar, Ph.D., DHP Associate Professor and Associate Chair, to encourage students to tell their stories. Fall 2020’s installation of Story Booth, “Ban Me,” asked participants to consider the constraints and liberties of censorship. Responses were posted to the Story Booth website, accessible here. Oliveira’s contribution was featured in the 18th volume of Digressions, NSU’s literary and arts journal. The Winter 2021 “Carnival” Story Booth asked students about the carnivalesque. Participants joined a Zoom recording booth to speak about their experiences with Carnival; Oliveira spoke on the history and cultural impact of Brazil’s Carnival. You can access all students’ stories here. Other Story Booth themes have included “Book to Film Adaptations,” “Two-Minute Memoirs,” “A Collaborative Truth,” and “Haunted Histories,” and “Friendship.”

The Story Booth series fosters community at NSU through literature and language, asking questions that prompt participants to create their own stories. Each Story Booth story helps connect the NSU community across the disciplines and cultures by sharing unique experiences of the authors. When asked how Story Booth relates to her work at the WCC, Oliveira asserts that “we need to question how we interact with others. When students visit the WCC, consultants are assigned roles larger than 45-minute tutors. Being cognizant of this can allow us to holistically assist those who seek our help.”

To learn more about Story Booth, you can visit their website at https://nsudhp.wixsite.com/storybooth.

More Information about the NSU Writing and Communication Center can be found here.

Posted 03/13/22

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