School of Dentistry to host free Mouth Guard Clinic
Athletes who will participate in sports this fall and winter can receive a free, customized mouth guard during the U-M School of Dentistry’s annual Mouth Guard Clinic on July 29. Athletes ages 5 and older, including those who wear braces, are invited. Dental and dental hygiene students, supervised by clinical faculty members, will make mouth guards for the first 120 athletes who register on a first-come, first-served basis. Registration is from 8 a.m. to 10:30 a.m. on the second floor of the School of Dentistry, 1011 N. University Ave. A parent or guardian must accompany children under 18 years old. Mouth guard clinic participants can park free in the Fletcher Street parking ramp on the north side of the School of Dentistry. For more information, call 734-531-9426, or email mouthguardclinic2017@umich.edu.
New director for Center for Middle Eastern and North African Studies
Samer Mahdy Ali, associate professor of Arabic and Islamic culture, LSA, has been appointed as the new director of the Center for Middle Eastern and North African Studies. The appointment was effective July 1. Ali is the author of “Arabic Literary Salons in the Islamic Middle Ages: Poets, Public Performance and the Presentation of the Past,” as well as the co-editor of the CALICO Journal: Special Issue on Hebrew and Arabic. Ali said he plans to build up the center’s development efforts; reach out to constituencies in the Midwest including K-12 teachers, community college educators and local Middle East immigrant communities; and nurture relationships with U-M units.
Institute for Humanities announces grant
The Institute for the Humanities has announced the New-Model Humanities Publication grant, a pilot program to support faculty experimentation with and planning for new concepts of hybrid scholarly publication in the humanities and humanistic social sciences. The program is open to tenured and tenure-track faculty, and five grants are available, up to $10,000 per award. Funding may be used to hire graduate or undergraduate students, hire tech consultants, attend a seminar or short-course on new modes of scholarly communication or purchase software to enhance and support the publication project. Applications are due by Oct. 1. For more information, contact Sheri Sytsema-Geiger at sytsema@umich.edu or visit tinyurl.com/yb2refbf.
UM-Dearborn to launch new LGBTQ studies certificate this fall
The University of Michigan-Dearborn’s new 12-credit LGBTQ studies certificate in the College of Arts, Sciences and Letters will prepare students professionally and personally by concentrating on diverse forms of sexual orientation, gender identity and gender expression. It will be available to degree-seeking students or to those who wish to take it as a post-baccalaureate standalone. LGBTQ Studies Certificate Program Coordinator Amy Brainer said the goal of the certificate is “engaged and integrated learning that will create positive change” for students and for the communities in which they live and work.
MICHR receives $2.3M grant to lead national effort
The Michigan Institute of Clinical & Health Research is leading the effort to identify and evaluate competency-based training for clinical and translational science researchers. Several universities will examine training methods in a new three-year, $2.33M grant project called Development, Implementation, and Assessment of Novel training in Domain-based competencies. The funds come from the Clinical & Translational Science Award program, which is administered by the National Institute of Health’s National Center for Advancing Translational Science. Through this grant, teams from MICHR, Ohio State University, Rochester University and Tufts University will seek to address problems with the quality and efficiency of how clinical trials are carried out by examining existing training programs, categorizing them, creating assessments, and cataloging all programs. MICHR serves as the coordinating center for this project.
College of Engineering to launch new grad program
The new Engineering Education Research graduate program at the College of Engineering will identify strategies to improve teaching and learning in engineering, to diversify science, technology, engineering and mathematics education and the engineering workforce and to design solutions in the nation’s toughest engineering education challenges. The inaugural class will begin in the fall of 2018. The graduate students, who must have at least a master’s degree in engineering, will be able to earn Master of Science and Doctor of Philosophy degrees in engineering education research.
— Compiled by Safiya Merchant, The University Record
