Conway,
Ark. (November 12, 2020) – Despite the constraints of the COVID-19
pandemic, Hendrix students and faculty are still engaging in Odyssey projects
and receiving funding. The Hendrix Committee on Engaged Learning is pleased to
announce the recipients of Odyssey grants for the October 2020 cycle. Since
2005, the Committee on Engaged Learning has awarded $4,427,335.71 in
competitive Odyssey grants to support 2,093 projects by Hendrix students and
faculty. In this cycle, 10 projects received $13,988 in grants.
Jayla King
Scientists for Social Justice Podcast
Category: Global Awareness
Sponsor: Dr. Laura MacDonald
Jayla King and Dr. Laura MacDonald will
work together to develop a new podcast that incorporates the unique perspective
of scientists. They will focus on issues of social injustice in the higher
educational system, especially as they relate to the scientific disciplines. In
the podcast, they will highlight and discuss work done by scientists from
diverse backgrounds, celebrate the accomplishments of scientists from
historically marginalized groups, review literature, and talk with guest speakers
about actionable solutions that lead to impactful change.
Bianca Littlepage
Tracking Revolutionary Art With
Brooklyn Art Museum
Category: Artistic Creativity
Sponsor: Prof. Melissa Gill
Bianca Littlepage will participate in
The Brooklyn Art Museum Sketchbook Project. Each participating artist fills a
small book and returns it to the museum. In her sketchbook, Littlepage will
track the evolution of revolutionary visual art movements, beginning with what
is considered by art historian Kenneth Clark to be the “first great picture
which can be called revolutionary in every sense of the word, in style, in
subject, and in intention”: The Third of May by Francisco Goya. When completed,
her sketchbook will join others in the museum’s archived collection that
travels to popups, exhibitions and installations across North America.
Cole McVay
decARcerate Solitary Confinement Cell
Reconstruction
Category: Service to the World
Sponsor: Prof. Ann Muse
Cole McVay will design and build a
model solitary confinement cell that can be a teaching tool to raise awareness
about prison abuses. McVay will work with decARcerate, an organization whose
goal is ending the use of solitary confinement in Arkansas. The finished piece
will be the actual scale of a real cell, and it will be transported across the
state for viewing by citizens and policy makers.
Kashti Shah
Elite Hospice Volunteering
Category: Service to the World
Sponsor: Julie Brown
Kashti
Shah will volunteer with Elite Hospice to provide companionship and assistance
to hospice patients near her hometown in North East Arkansas. She hopes to gain
experience interacting with patients, which will increase her emotional
competence when dealing with the grief and troubles of patients and family.
Working with hospice patients will also allow Shah to serve her community while
comforting and supporting others during a vulnerable time.
Rachel Stewart
Health and Legal System Lab Research
Category: Undergraduate Research
Sponsor: Dr. Jennifer Peszka
This fall, psychology student Rachel
Stewart has been working remotely for the Health and Legal System Lab (HEALS)
as a research assistant under the supervisor of Dr. Melissa Zielinski at
University of Arkansas Medical School. She has participated in projects such as
the COVID-19 Prison Project and Implementation and Effectiveness of Cognitive
Processing Therapy in Community Corrections. Stewart will present the findings
of her work at the lab to a group of both Hendrix students and fellow UAMS
colleagues through Zoom due to COVID-19.
Dr. Mark Goadrich
Solving Real-world Problems with Tools
from Mathematics and Computer Science: The COMAP International Contest in
Mathematical Modeling
Category: Special Projects
The 37th International Mathematical
Contest in Modeling (MCM) will be held Feb. 4 - 8, 2021. Sponsored by COMAP, a
non-profit organization focused on promoting modeling and applications in
mathematics education, this contest requires students to work in teams of three
over a weekend to tackle real–world mathematical modeling problems. Dr. Mark
Goadrich will supervise nine students, divided into three teams, for this
virtual contest. Over the previous six years, four Hendrix teams earned an
Honorable Mention, placing them in the top 50% of all teams, and three teams earned
a Meritorious distinction, placing them in the top 11% worldwide.
Dr. Julie Gunderson
Food and Agribusiness Webinar Series
Category: Professional & Leadership Development
One Hendrix student will work remotely
as an intern at the Arkansas Department of Agriculture during the Spring semester
of 2021, in this project coordinated by Dr. Julie Gunderson. The internship
focuses on the development of a Food and Agribusiness Webinar Series, which
will feature nationally and internationally recognized speakers. The student
will be involved in the development and management of the hardware and
software, the promotion of the Webinars via social media, and the editing and
posting of the Webinars to online platforms.
Dr. Rod Miller
Paris Residency 2021
Category: Undergraduate Research
Conditioned on the lifting of travel
bans, Dr. Rod Miller will take art students Anna Bivens, Jalache Davis, Julia
Hooper, Addie Race to Paris in May to investigate the art of the late
eighteenth, nineteenth, and early twentieth centuries. Each student will select
a work of art based on personal interests, put that work of art into an
historical and physical context, and understand it from the point of view of
the artist. Each participant will produce an in-depth research paper on
the chosen artwork.
Dr. Caitlin Scott
Lesson-plan development to introduce
diverse scientists to general chemistry students
Category: Special Projects
According to the National Science
Foundation and the PEW Research Center, Black and Latinx people are
underrepresented in the STEM fields for reasons including, but not limited to
implicit bias, race-based discrimination, the lack of Black and Latinx role
models, and discouragement to enter these fields. To encourage and support more
students from marginalized groups to continue their studies in the sciences,
Dr. Caitlin will hire three student assistants who will research and interview
chemists from groups traditionally under-represented in the sciences. The
student assistants will identify readings and create discussion boards for
students enrolled in the Spring 2021 General Chemistry II course. Based on the
questions posed in the discussion board, student assistants will contact their
chosen scientists and conduct an interview over Teams to learn about the
scientist and their background, which will be shown to the General Chemistry
students.
Dr. Martin Shedd
Hendrix Latin Play
Category: Special Projects
Dr. Martin Shedd will lead students in
The Hendrix Latin Play project, which challenges students to translate and
adapt Classical literature to modern audiences. Students select a comedy by the
Roman playwright Plautus to transform into a 30-minute script, balancing the
need to preserve the structure and situations of the ancient comedy with the
goal of producing a work that conveys humor in the present day. The script is
composed through a collaborative process that requires each student involved to
consider the author’s intention, the source and construction of comedy, and how
best to portray these features to an unfamiliar audience. The Latin Play
culminates with performances for the Hendrix campus and, if possible, the
University of Arkansas. This project is also underwritten by the Hendrix-Murphy
Foundation Programs in Literature and Language.
About Hendrix
College
A private liberal
arts college in Conway, Arkansas, Hendrix College consistently earns recognition
as one of the country’s leading liberal arts institutions, and is featured in
Colleges That Change Lives: 40 Schools That Will Change the Way You Think About
Colleges. Its academic quality and rigor, innovation, and value have
established Hendrix as a fixture in numerous college guides, lists, and
rankings. Founded in 1876, Hendrix has been affiliated with the United
Methodist Church since 1884. To learn more, visit www.hendrix.edu.