Every two weeks, Highlander Highlights shares with readers some of the extraordinary research and accomplishments happening on and off campus through the tireless work and curiosity of our students and faculty.
We Are Radford winner for December
The new We Are Radford employee recognition program is a monthly honor recognizing someone whose daily interactions with students and colleagues represent the best of the Radford University experience. The winner for December is Associate Professor of Theatre Robyn Berg.
“Robyn Berg is a champion for the Department of Theatre and Cinema,” wrote the person who nominated Berg. “At the beginning of the fall semester, she stepped up to lead the department in an incredibly challenging time – the opening of the Artis Center and settling into the new building. She has taken on an incredible amount of responsibility and continues to lead with kindness, respect and a true love for the art department and our students. She has mentored students in incredibly impactful, personal and meaningful projects that have helped them launch their future careers in theatre. Robyn shares her professional experiences with the world through her podcast ‘Staying Me While Being You’ and brings prestige to the university through this amazing collaborative work.”
Employees who have served at least one year at Radford are eligible to be recognized for upholding the university’s core values.
Skyrocketing attendance
The numbers are in.
For the 2024 calendar year, 5,516 visitors explored the universe through various shows in the popular Radford University Planetarium. More than 1,300 of those were people attending one of the 24 Science Days hosted by the university’s Artis College of Science and Technology.
The Radford Planetarium, located in the Center for the Sciences, is the hub for astronomy and space education at Radford University and the community. It offers free public shows and hosts numerous K12 and community groups throughout each year.
In 2024, Radford work study students, all physics majors, operated the planetarium for 183 shows.
“It’s considered the coolest job on campus,” said Radford Professor of Physics Rhett Herman, “and one that has launched the careers of notable alumni.”
Those alumni include Jordan Eagle ’16, a post-doctoral high-energy astrophysics researcher at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center; Josh Carroll ’17, a space physics research scientist with Booz Allen Hamilton; Krislyn Sourivong ’21, a Ph.D. student in astrophysics at Virginia Tech; and Matt Frazier ’04, an instructor at the Southwest Virginia Governor’s School and a Radford University physics adjunct instructor.
“The planetarium operators have been a really select group over the years,” Herman proudly noted. “I could brag on this group all day.”
Addressing ‘racial inequality in schools’
Radford University Assistant Professor in the School of Teacher Education and Leadership Max Yurkofsky is the co-author of a new article addressing “the wicked problems of racial inequality in schools.”
Yurkofsky’s article, co-written with Candice Bocala, a lecturer at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, was published in the November 2024 edition of the “Journal of Educational Change.”
“Continuous improvement methods are growing in popularity around the world as approaches to leadership and educational change,” the article’s abstract says: “There has been particular interest in using continuous improvement methods such as collaborative data inquiry to address racial inequities in schools. But these ‘wicked’ problems are, in many ways, more complex and uncertain than the kinds of problems continuous improvement methods were initially developed to address in the fields of manufacturing and healthcare.
“In this article, Bocala and Yurkofsky investigate two critical cases of school-based teams engaging in a continuous improvement process called Data Wise to address an issue of racial inequity. We find that the two schools varied in whether they viewed their problem of racial inequity as fundamentally uncertain, and these diverging understandings of the problem influenced to what extent they took a more straightforward or exploratory approach to engaging in continuous improvement.”
Two Radford faculty members share expertise on public radio airwaves
Assistant Professor of Psychology Daniel Berry spoke to the “With Good Reason” public radio program in an interview airing this week about his research program that examines mindfulness meditation practice and social behaviors
“My research finds that practicing mindfulness meditation can help to improve people's social well-being as they tend to show more empathy and acts of kindness toward others,” Berry explained. “One thing I really wanted to drive home is that practicing meditation is not some quick fix. It's a lifestyle/mindstyle change that people need to follow up to reap the lasting changes.”
Beginning Friday, Jan. 17, listeners can also hear Radford Associate Professor of Psychology Kathleen Arnold explain how artificial intelligence programs like ChatGPT have impacted learning and memory in her classroom.
Both interviews can be heard on the “With Good Reason” website or your favorite podcast app.