Faculty and Staff Accomplishments

Dr. William Merriman, dean of the school of education, was nominated and elected to membership in the New York Academy of Public Education. The academy was founded in 1912 to provide a forum for constructive educational thinking and leadership. Merriman was inducted into the academy at the Princeton Club in New York City on Feb. 4.

Dr. Claudia Setzer, professor of religious studies, gave the opening talk at a conference on The Human Body and Resurrection at the University of Regensburg in Regensburg, Germany, in December.

Dr. Nicholas De Lillo, professor of mathematics and computer science, recently completed the paper “Simulation of Finite-State Automata Using Java 6.0, Part 2: Advanced Concepts.” It was accepted for publication in the Technical Report Series of the Graduate School of Computer Science and Information Technology, an official publication of the Ivan G. Seidenberg School of Computer Science and Information Services at Pace University. Part one of the paper was published in November 2008.

Dr. Anirban De, associate professor of civil and environmental engineering, delivered the invited lecture Use of Geotechnical Centrifuge to Study the Effects of Surface Explosions to the Mid-Hudson Branch of the American Society of Civil Engineers in Newburgh, N.Y. this past October.

Dr. Powell Draper, assistant professor of civil engineering, co-authored a chapter in the book Felix Candela: Engineer, Builder, Structural Artist, which was named one of the best architecture books of 2008 by ArchNewsNow.com.

Dr. Nada Marie Assaf-Anid, professor of chemical engineering, served as programming board chair for the Environmental Division at the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE) Centennial Meeting in Philadelphia this past November. She chaired three sessions: One Hundred Years of Environmental Law and Policy; Water and Waste; and Inorganic Contaminants in Water. In addition, Assaf-Anid chaired the session The Global Engineer and presented the paper “Are We Preparing Our Students for a Flat World?” which was co-authored by Dr. Gordon Silverman, professor of electrical and computer engineering, William Zucker ’79 and Arthur Andrews ‘76. As a result of the conference, she will establish collaborations with engineering schools in Portugal and Brazil and attend two global conferences: The Eighth World’s Congress of Chemical Engineering in Canada and the ACHEMA Congress on Chemical Engineering in Germany.

In addition, Assaf-Anid was recently nominated chair of the Sustainability Section of the Environmental Division of AIChE. She chaired a session in December on Tutorials on Basic Technologies and Issues at the third annual AIChE Energy and Resources Conference, held at the Consolidated Edison Company of New York building, where she presented the paper “Tutorial on Water Purification Technologies.”

Assaf-Anid, Silverman and Dr. Robert Mauro, professor of computer and electrical engineering, submitted a proposal titled Fully Automated Mobile Green-Fuel Factor in collaboration with Saunders High School in Yonkers, N.Y., to the Advanced E-Team Program of NCIIA. The proposal detailed biodiesel fabrication on a truck donated to Saunders by Yonkers’ Mayor Philip Amicone ’71.

Assaf-Anid and chemical engineering graduate student Lauren De Sanctis ’08 have been invited to participate at the Youth Leadership Conference of G.O.A.L.S. for Girls: Propel Yourself Forward, to be held at the Intrepid Sea, Air and Space Museum in New York.

Dr. Jonathan Hartman and Dr. Yassir Samra, assistant professors of marketing, published the paper “Crisis Management: An Empirical Investigation of the Effects of Improvisation on New Product Development in the Chemistry and Chemical Engineering Industries” in the journal Insights to a Changing World.

In addition, Hartman and Samra published “Effect on an Improvisational Approach to New Product Development During a Crisis: An Empirical Study of NPD Teams in the Field of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering,” which Samra presented at the proceeding of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers in Philadelphia this past November.

Dr. Margaret Groarke, assistant professor of government, appeared on BronxNet on Monday, Nov. 11 from 9:00-9:30 p.m. She spoke to host Gary Axelbank about the Nov. 4 election and her new book Keeping Down the Black Vote: Race and the Demobilization of American Voters.

Dr. Natalia Imperatori-Lee, assistant professor of religious studies, presented the paper “The Significance of Mestizaje in 21st Century Theology” at the L’Institut Catholique de Paris in Paris, France, this past October.

Dr. Michelle Saracino, associate professor of religious studies, presented the paper “Beyond Magical Thinking: Maternity as a Metaphor for Theological Anthropology” at the Catholic Theological Society of America in Miami, Fla., this past June.

Dr. David Shefferman, assistant professor of religious studies, presented the paper “Transforming Tourism: Religion, Visual Culture and the Exuberance of Cuban State Spectacle” at the American Academy of Religion’s annual meeting in Chicago this past November.

Dr. Robert Geraci, assistant professor of religious studies, authored the book Human Nature and the Ethics of Progress: Power and Purpose in the 20th Century Religion, Science and Art.