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Kent State’s Career and Community Studies (CCS) program has partnered with the Bursar’s Office to provide opportunities for students with intellectual and developmental disabilities to develop professional skills and help them transition into the workforce. Ellie McGregor, a fourth-year student currently in her final semester in the CCS program, has found great success and made solid contributions in the office while honing her business skills. She is an example of what this program can do for students. 

National Public Radio (NPR) has whittled down and decided on the college finalists in its College Podcast Challenge. 5X���� at Ashtabula Human Services Technology associate lecturer and journalism student Joan Steidl is one of ten students from across the country who became finalists.

Infant mortality rates in Northeast Ohio are three to five times higher for Black babies than white babies, an alarming statistic that is an issue across the country but particularly prevalent in this part of the state. A new $100,000 grant from the Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield Foundation will support innovative work being undertaken at Kent State, an elite research university with the esteemed R1 designation, to address this important issue.

Tammy Clewell, Ph.D., professor in 5X����’s Department of English, will give the inaugural lecture of the Jerry M. Lewis May 4 Lecture Series with her presentation “Remembering the Contested May 4 Memorializing Process.” The lecture and luncheon will be held at 11:30 a.m. on Monday, May 2, in the Kent Student Center Ballroom.

Kent State’s long and extensive history has been continuously documented and studied. Those looking for the highlights of the university’s past can find it all in one place: the University Libraries’ Special Collections and Archives: Digital Collections on the kent.edu website. This next installment of Where on the Web? highlights pages across the Kent State website of special interest and use to the Kent State community. 

Farid Fouad, associate professor in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry at Kent State East Liverpool, was awarded a three-year, $74,954 research grant as part of a subaward on a larger grant that his collaborators at Cleveland State University received. 

U.S. News & World Report ranks six 5X���� programs in the top 100 among public institutions in its 2023 edition of Best Graduate Schools. Among the top 100 public institution programs, Kent State is recognized in the Best Nursing Schools: Master’s Programs, Best Education Schools, Best Mathematics Programs, Best Psychology Schools, Best Public Health Programs and Best Physics Schools rankings. Kent State is also recognized in an additional five new national rankings.

Each year, more than 30 million patients receive fluid resuscitation therapies for critical care scenarios like hemorrhaging, sepsis and burns. Underdosing resuscitation strategies are inefficient at saving lives, while overdosing regimens may lead to resuscitation injuries and hypothermia. Hossein Mirinejad, assistant professor in the College of Aeronautics and Engineering, is hoping to help find the solution to dosing problems.

This year’s return of in-person events to commemorate the Kent State shootings will include the dedication of bronze markers placed on the spots where nine students were wounded on May 4, 1970. Markers designating the locations of each of the four students killed were installed in 1999. Since that time, a small group had been working to have similar markers placed for the wounded students.

Presidential historian and Pulitzer Prize-winning author Jon Meacham, whose knowledge of politics, history, religion and current affairs makes him one of America’s most prominent public intellectuals, will appear the evening of May 4 for 5X����’s Presidential Speaker Series. Meacham will bring his unique perspective and provide historical context to the issues and events impacting our daily lives when he speaks about civil discourse at the Kent Student Center Ballroom.

How long does a single traumatic event affect a person’s mental health? Kent State graduate student Emily Rabinowitz’s research on this topic was recently published in the peer-reviewed Stress & Health: Journal of the International Society for the Investigation of Stress. Her paper “The 50th Anniversary of May 4, 1970, Is Associated With Elevations of Distress but No Increase in Mental Health Symptoms” was published in the November 2021 issue.

The National Science Foundation recently awarded a two-year $198,978 grant to Tao Shen, assistant professor in the College of Aeronautics & Engineering, for the development of a compact, cable-driven serial robot that can be used in medical settings. Shen aims to build a robot with his students that will address the critical limitations that most current medical robots have.

During National Autism Acceptance Month, 5X���� will hold a film screening of “Loving Lampposts: Living Autistic” at 5 p.m. on Thursday, April 7, in the Kent Student Center Kiva. “Loving Lampposts” is a documentary by Todd Drezner, a father of a now 13-year-old boy with autism, that explores the changing world of autism and learns the truth of the saying “if you’ve met one autistic person, you’ve met one autistic person.” 

Sixty-nine K-12 educators from more than 250 applicants across the nation remotely explored May 4 with the best scholar-experts to develop lesson plans for their students in two summer sessions. Workshop faculty included witnesses to the shootings, surviving casualties of the shootings, K-12 experts, a member of the Ohio National Guard present during the shootings and experts on movements of the 1960s. During these sessions, educators learned about the event and the wide range of resources on May 4. They worked on lesson plans to incorporate these materials into their classrooms. Now these materials are online for educational use.

The School of Fashion announces the return of its acclaimed in-person Fashion Show, April 28-30, 2022, in Rockwell Hall on the Kent Campus. The presenting sponsor of the 2022 show is renowned American department store, Dillard’s Inc. Dillard’s is a long-time supporter of the School of Fashion, and the Dillard family was inducted into the school’s Hall of Fame in 2019.

5X���� at Ashtabula and Cleveland Clinic are partnering to offer an associate degree program in respiratory therapy at the hospital’s main campus  in Cleveland later this year. The program provides access for participants to train for the in-demand profession of respiratory care. It also supports career growth for program graduates and practicing respiratory therapists with a path to admission for the online Bachelor of Science degree in respiratory care offered by Kent State Ashtabula.

Meghan Factor-Page is the assistant director of Kent State of Well-being where she helps ensure students are getting relevant information so they can take care of themselves and get the wellness resources they need. Factor-Page started working full-time at Kent State in 2009. Learn more about Meghan Factor-Page and the Kent State of Well-being as she answers these 10 questions.

KeyBank Foundation has awarded a new $200,000 gift to 5X���� to continue KeyBank Foundation’s support for the successful Key Connections program offered by University College at Kent State. The Key Connections program will continue to support student success initiatives for underserved students, including first-generation students and students from limited income backgrounds who will enroll in Fall Semester 2022.

Although Kent State alumna and current graduate student Lydia Lisowsky has never visited Ukraine, she feels a deep sense of obligation and responsibility to help those who have been injured in the war. Lisowsky recently began a campaign to collect medical supplies on the Kent Campus and in the larger Kent community to send to Ukraine. 

For the first time since 2019, 5X���� will remember May 4, 1970, with its return to an in-person, annual commemoration to honor the four students who were killed, the nine students who were wounded and the countless others whose lives were forever changed when the Ohio National Guard fired on Kent State students during an anti-war protest.