Category: Kudos

The African American Faculty and Staff Association (AAFSA) would like to congratulate Eleazar Recendiz and Kaya Russell on being recipients of the spring 2023 AAFSA scholarship.

Eleazar majors in business administration entrepreneurship and management, and Kaya majors in psychology. AAFSA is excited for the impact each of them will have on the campus and Wichita communities in the near and distant futures.

Usha Haley, W. Frank Barton Distinguished Chair in International Business and Kansas Faculty of Excellence at the Barton School, spoke to The Wire China about the country-wide legislation on purchases of United States agricultural land by the Chinese government.

An expert on China and emerging markets, Usha testified before Congress on the acquisition of U.S.-based Smithfield Foods by the Chinese company Shuanghui, what is widely considered to be a landmark, precedent-setting case on foreign investment in the United States.

The Office of Disability Services (ODS) would like to honor is volunteer note-takers this semester. Their service has helped provide accommodations to many of the students registered with the office.

ODS would like to congratulate the following students for their involvement in helping fellow Shockers:

• Kami Bartholomew
• Kathryn Blackler
• Kali Degeustein
• Dave Del Mar
• Cynthia Hoang
• Brittany Jonas
• Brandon Martin
• Grace Peterson
• Emma Smith
• Grace Ulichnie
• Riley Vandaveer

The National Cyber League competition is a biannual cybersecurity competition for high school and college students throughout the nation. More than 6,000 students competed in the spring 2023 event.

The Wichita State students below who competed are all computer science majors:

• Garret Wahlstedt, ranked 29th
• Hyacinthe Howell, ranked 31st
• Khang Tran, ranked 107th
• Quentin Nelson, ranked 141st
• Tung Wai Yip, ranked 153th
• Don Alfaro, ranked 179th
• Prem Kumar Reddy Muvva, ranked 45th in the graduate division

Additionally, WSU had six other students place in the top 500 and two place in the top 1,000.

The Department of Human Performance Studies in the College of Applied Studies was granted the maximum period of 10 year continuing accreditation to the Athletic Training Program by the Commission on Accreditation of Athletic Training Education (CAATE). The university was officially informed of the vote on April 10. Compliance with CAATE accreditation standards facilitates quality outcomes, continuous improvement, innovation and diversity to enhance athletic training education.

The CAATE accreditation standards have recently evolved to require all athletic training degrees to be master’s level. WSU has taken the steps to develop a Master of Science in athletic training (MSAT) in anticipation of the revised standards and guidelines.

The MSAT degree was approved during the fall 2021 semester and will launch in June 2023. It will replace the currently offered undergraduate degree in athletic training—the first year will overlap with the final year of the undergraduate program as it is phased out.

The 62 credit-hour degree plan consists of athletic training education, applied learning clinical experience, research/statistics and board certification. Students will rotate through various clinical settings including college and high school athletics, general and family medicine, physical therapy, industrial and occupational workplace, and emergency care.

The 19th annual Graduate Research and Scholarly Project (GRASP) Symposium was held on April 14 in the Rhatigan Student Center Ballroom.

Roughly 200 students, faculty and staff members attended the event, and 79 graduate student presenters of 40 research posters represented departments and programs from across the university.

This year’s GRASP awardees are:

• First place: Diastasis Rectus Abdominis and Urinary Incontinence, Is There any Correlation?
  • Ashley Engelland, Lauren Scott, Peyton Price, Madelyn Schartz and Madisyn Keller, physical therapy doctoral program with advisor Dr. Jennifer Celso
• Second place: Hurricane Analysis Using Twitter Data
  • Sai Teja Bheema and Shive Kumar Kothar, business analytics master’s program with advisor Dr. Sue Abdinnour
• Third place: Quantifying Paleo-Environments in the Eagle Formation Using Trace Element Concentrations
  • Julia Schwartz, earth, environmental and physical science master’s program with advisor Dr. William Parcell
• People’s Choice: The Effects of Tactile and Verbal Cues on Hip Extension Strength and Broad Jump Distance
  • Matthew Reeves, Ryan Waterson, Wyatt Kropp, Bryson Koester and Terra Daniels, physical therapy doctoral program with advisor Dr. Bryan J Lehecka

One of the methods that Wichita State students use to connect to BeoShock High Performance Computing (HPC), a powerful computing system designed to process large amounts of data or complex simulations, is by using a web browser, and Open OnDemand is the software engine that makes this possible. In April 2020, just as BeoShock HPC was getting off the ground and attracting its first users, WSU system administrators set up Open OnDemand.

During a recent talk given by the developers of Open OnDemand, Dr. Terrance Figy, associate professor in the Department of Mathematics, Statistics and Physics, praised them for putting together a tool that came in a the right time during the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

One of the reasons Figy worked hard on moving BeoShock HPC forward, with help from the system administrators from Kanas State University and WSU’s Information Technology Services, was to ensure students still had access to it at home, especially when the data analytics degree programs were getting started.

Dr. Michael Rogers, professor of human performance studies, provided advice on exercising before bedtime in an article for Consumer Reports.

Dr. Michael Rogers, professor of human performance studies, provided advice on exercising before bedtime in an article for Consumer Reports.

On March 24, the Office of Disability Services (ODS) hosted a deaf games night for students to practice American Sign Language. Kelly Adams, senior sign language interpreter at ODS, organized the event to help students who are deaf or hard-of-hearing build relationships.

Two deaf members from the Wichita Deaf Community, Shauna Leuci and Grace Wigley, helped lead the selection of games.