Titles of Doctoral Dissertations Completed in 2014 (Alphabetical by Author)
American & New England Studies
- Michael F. D’Alessandro, “Staged Readings: Sensationalism and Class in Popular American Literature and Theatre, 1835-1875”
- Virginia J. Myhaver, “The ‘New American Revolution’: Cultural Politics, New Federalism, and the 1976 Bicentennial”
- Brian Michael Sirman, “Concrete Dreams: Architecture, Politics, and Boston’s New City Hall”
- Zachary Joseph Violette, “The Decorated Tenement: Working-Class Housing in Boston and New York, 1860-1910”
Archaeology
- Caitlin Jane Chaves Yates, “Beyond the Mound: Locating Complexity in Northern Mesopotamia During the ‘Second Urban Revolution”
- Abigail Elizabeth Crawford, “The Organization of Rural Production in Roman Central Tyrrhenian Italy, 200 BC to AD 400”
- Diana Smith Gallagher, “'Cleanly in Their Persons and Cleanly in Their Dwellings’: An Archaeological Investigation of Health, Hygiene, and Sanitation in Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century New England”
- Adam Richard Kaeding, “Negotiated Survival: An Archaeological and Documentary Investigation of Colonialism in Beneficios Altos, Yucatan, Mexico”
- Alexandra Louise Ratzlaff, “The Maintenance of Empire: The Roman Army in the Negev from the 1st–7th Centuries CE”
- Stephanie Renee Simms, “Prehispanic Maya Foodways: Archaeological and Microbotanical Evidence from Escalera al Cielo, Yucatán, Mexico”
- Eliza Napier Wallace, “From Town to City: Urban Planning in the Early Bronze Age of Northern Mesopotamia at Tell es-Sweyhat, Syria”
- Nicholas Pascal Starbuck Wolff, “At Home in Prehistory: Critical Approaches to the Built Environment in the South Italian Bronze Age”
Astronomy
- Majd Mayyasi Matta, “Modeling the Martian Ionosphere”
- Carl Andrew Schmidt, “Mercury’s Sodium Exosphere”
Bioinformatics
- Sara Baldwin Collins, “The Interdependence Between Environment and Metabolism in Microbes and Their Ecosystems”
- Jonathan Michael Dreyfuss, “Algorithms for Reconstruction and Analysis of Metabolic Networks, with an Application to Neurospora Crassa”
- Lina L. Faller, “Comparative Metagenomics to Identify Functional Signatures in the Human Microbiome”
- John Joseph Farrell, “The Prediction of HLA Genotypes from Next Generation Sequencing and Genome Scan Data”
- Joseph Peter Gerrein, “Using Gene and microRNA Expression in the Human Airway for Lung Cancer Diagnosis”
- Yevgeniy Gindin, “Modeling and Integrative Analysis with Applications to DNA Replication, Cancer, and Epigenetics”
- Irina Vyacheslavova Glotova, “Reconstruction of Lipid Metabolism Regulatory Network in Mycobacterium Tuberculosis”
- Antonio Luiz Cruz Gomes, “Computational Approaches to Deciphering Regulatory Circuits in Mycobacterium Tuberculosis from Chip-Seq Data, and Developing Theoretical Strategies to Combat Drug-Resistant Infections”
- Syeda Kahkeshan Hijazi, “The Airway Transcriptome as a Measure of Injury and Response to and Recovery from Smoking and Alternative Tobacco Products”
- Chia-Ling Huang, “A Module Based Approach for Identifying Driver Genes and Expanding Pathways from Integrated Biological Networks”
- Augustin Luna, “Formalization of Molecular Interaction Maps in Systems Biology; Application to Simulations of the Relationship Between DNA Damage Response and Circadian Rhythms”
- Christopher Domenic Nogiec, “Modeling Human Muscle Metabolism: Using Constraint-Based Modeling to Investigate Nutrition Supplements, Insulin Resistance, and Type 2 Diabetes”
- Chetanya Pandya, “Sequence- and Structure-Based Approaches to Deciphering Enzyme Evolution in the Haloalkonoate Dehalogenase Superfamily”
- Richard Won Park, “Visualization and Analysis of Cancer Genome Sequencing Studies”
- Guilhem Richard, “Affecting the Macrophage Response to Infection by Integrating Signaling and Gene-Regulatory Networks”
- Stephanie Gail Schneider, “Reannotation and Consolidation of Microarray Probes for the Meta-Analysis of Gene Expression Across Multiple Cell Types”
- Matthew Charles Schu, “New Methods for Studying Complex Diseases via Genetic Association Studies”
- Jisi Tang, “Study of Macromolecular Interactions Using Computational Solvent Mapping”
- Wen-Han Yu, “Quantitative Studies of Mycobacterial Single Cell Dynamics Using a Synthetic Gene Oscillator”
Biology
- Elizabeth Claire Braun de Torrez, “Bats, Insects and Pecans: Habitat Use and Ecosystem Services of Insectivorous Bats in a Pecan Agroecosystem in Central Texas”
- Nicholas Geoffrey Crawford, “Genomic Analysis of Macro- and Micro-Evolution in the Reptilia”
- Eva Maria Fast, “Dynamic Effects of Wolbachia on Drosophila Oogenesis and Coordination of Infection with Stem Cell Niche Morphogenesis”
- Kathryn Kovitvongsa Mosharo, “The Role of Acoustic Signals in Fish Courtship and Challenges in Bioacoustic Fish Research”
- Andrew Brett Reinmann, “Effects of Winter Climate Change on Carbon and Nitrogen Losses from Temperate Forest Ecosystems”
Biostatistics
- Caleb Andrew Bliss, “Sample Size Re-Estimation for Superiority Clinical Trials with a Dichotomous Outcome Using an Unblinded Estimate of the Control Group Outcome Rate”
- Yansong Cheng, “Some Recent Advances in Multivariate Statistics: Modality Inference and Statistical Monitoring of Clinical Trials with Multiple Co-Primary Endpoints”
- Jamie Elizabeth Collins, “Informative Censoring with an Imprecise Anchor Event: Estimation of Change Over Time and Implications for Longitudinal Data Analysis”
- Sarah Michelle Leatherman, “Adaptive Methods for Bayesian Time-to-Event Point-of-Care Clinical Trials”
- Chen Lu, “New Approaches to Identify Gene-by-Gene Interactions in Genome Wide Association Studies”
- Jacqueline Nicole Milton, “Identifying Genetic Variants Associated with Multiple Correlated Traits and the Use of an Ensemble of Genetic Risk Models for Phenotype Prediction and Classification”
- Julius Suh Ngwa, “Comparing Methods for Modeling Longitudinal and Survival Data, with Consideration of Mediation Analysis”
- Lin Ye Song, “Re-Calibration and Discrimination in Survival Risk Prediction Functions”
- Sarah Elizabeth Sullivan, “Mint-Dependent Regulation of Amyloid Precursor Protein Trafficking and Processing in Neurons”
- Jing Wang, “Biomarker Informed Adaptive Clinical Trial Designs”
- Charles C. White, “Evaluating and Extending a Bayesian Approach to Using Historical Control Data in an Actively Controlled Non-Inferiority Clinical Trial”
- Siyan Xu, “Statistical Considerations of Noninferiority, Bioequivalence and Equivalence Testing in Biosimilars Studies”
- Lei Zhu, “Procedures for Identifying and Modeling Time-to-Event Data in the Presence of Non-Proportionality”
Chemistry
- Robert Navid Azad, “Hydroxyl Radical Cleavage of Nucleic Acids: Understanding RNA Cleavage Profiles and Identifying DNA Structural Motifs”
- Sarah Elizabeth Bernard, “Development of a Method for Mapping Oxidative Damage to an Entire Genome In Vivo with a Single Experiment”
- Shaun Michael Cote, “Characterization of the Structure and Function of NF-Kappa B Essential Modulator and Its Interaction with Inhibitor of Kappa B Kinase Beta and Development of a Screening Protocol to Discover and Validate Inhibitors of the Interaction”
- Chunhui Dai, “The Total Synthesis of Syringolin A and Oxidative Photoredox Catalysis for C-H and C-O Bond Functionalizations”
- Lauren Christine Gregor, “Mechanistic Studies of Functional Mononuclear and Binuclear Non-heme Iron Enzyme Model Complexes Using Variable Temperature Stopped-flow UV/vis Spectroscopy”
- Jihoon Lee, “Application of the Silicon-Directed Annulation Reactions to the Total Synthesis of Natural Products & Studies Directed Toward the Total Synthesis of Leiodolide A: Preparation of the C13-C29 Fragment”
- Benjamin Diamon Levin, “Probing the Structure-Function Relationship of Heme C Containing Bacterial Proteins: Monoheme Cytochromes C and Dihemeb. Cytochrome_C Peroxidase”
- Xinrong Lin, “Synthesis, Characterization, and Applications of Ionic Supramolecular Assemblies”
- Andrew John Little, “Studies Toward the Synthesis of Anthraquinone-Xanthone Heterodimeric Natural Products”
- Zhiyuan Ma, “New Approaches to the Heterocyclic Scaffolds Using Diels-Alder Chemistry”
- Anna Victoria Martinez, “Using Reverse Micelles to Explore the Effects of Confinement and Hydration on Peptide Folding and Aggregation”
- Joshua S. McNally, “Synthetic and Density Functional Theory Studies of Dioxygen Activating Non-Heme Iron Model Complexes”
- Daniele Ramella, “Organocatalytic Acid Mediated Mannich Reactions and Multicomponent Boronate Reactions to Make Chiral Benzhydrils”
- Sarah Rose Soltau, “Studies Toward the Mechanism of Allosteric Activation in Phenylalanine Hydroxylase”
- Yuan Xiong, “Total Syntheses of Sanggenon-Type Natural Products and Rearrangements of 3-Substituted Flavone Ethers”
- Xiaobin Xu, “Mass Spectrometry Approaches for Profiling Protein-Protein Interactions”
Cognitive & Neural Systems
- Benjamin Orth Chandler, “Cognitive Computing: Algorithm Design in the Intersection of Cognitive Science and Emerging Computer Architectures”
- Hung-Cheng Chang, “Where’s Waldo?® How Perceptual, Cognitive, and Emotional Brain Processes Cooperate During Learning to Categorize and Find Desired Objects in a Cluttered Scene”
- Lingqiang Kong, “Functional MRI Investigations of Cortical Mechanisms in Auditory Spatial Attention”
- Robert George Law, “States and Sequences of Paired Contractive Subspace Ideals and Their Relationship to Patterned Brain Function”
- Oliver Winston Layton, “Neural Models of Inter-Cortical Networks in the Primate Visual System for Navigation, Attention, Path Perception, and Static and Kinetic Figure-Ground Perception”
- Yoon Seob Lim, “Seeing Sound: A New Way to Illustrate Auditory Objects and Their Neural Correlates”
- Jeffrey Markowitz, “Network Dynamics in the Neural Control of Birdsong”
Computer Science
- Flavio Esposito, “A Policy-Based Architecture for Virtual Network Embedding”
- Likai Liu, “Simple, Safe, and Efficient Memory Management Using Linear Pointers”
- Michel Silva Machado, “Linux XIA: An Interoperable Meta Network Architecture”
- Niky Riga, “JTP, an Energy-Aware Transport Protocol for Mobile Ad Hoc Networks”
- Richard William Skowyra, “Verificare: A Platform for Composable Verification with Application to SDN-Enabled Systems”
Earth Sciences
- Rita Ann Cabral, “A Window into the Mantle: Analyzing the Geochemistry of Melt Inclusions from the Volcanic Island of Mangaia”
- Gordana Garapic Siftar, “Constraints on Melt Migration in the Earth’s Upper Mantle”
- Elise Michelle Heiss, “Evaluating Sediment Denitrification and Water Column Nitrification Along an Estuary to Offshore Gradient”
- Anthony Michael Priestas, “The Role of Wind Waves on Salt Marsh Morphodynamics”
Economics
- Miguel Ampudia Fraile, “Three Essays on Household Finance”
- Olesya Nicole Baker, “Essays on Economics of Education”
- Jacopo Bizzotto, “Quality, Information and Certification”
- Marric Grace Buessing, “The Role of Location and Contracts in Firm Governance and Labor: An Examination of the US Coal Industry”
- Seong Yeon Chang, “Fractionally Integrated Processes and Structural Changes: Theoretical Analyses and Bootstrap Methods”
- Tianxu Chen, “Health Insurance Coverage and Personal Behavior”
- Saori Chiba, “Three Essays on Communication Games and Behavioral Economics”
- Rania Gihleb, “Three Essays on Female Labor Supply and Assortative Mating”
- Jie Hou, “Robust Parameter Estimation and Pivotal Inference Under Heterogeneous and Nonstationary Processes”
- Sudipto Karmakar, “Essays on Bank Capital, Macroeconomic Activity and Financial Deepening”
- Sarah Anne Kroeger, “Essays on the Economics of Inequality”
- Giulia La Mattina, “Essays in Development Economics and Entrepreneurship”
- Timothy James Layton, “Risk Selection and Risk Adjustment in Competitive Health Insurance Markets”
- Yang Li, “Empirical Analysis of the Airline Industry on the U.S.-China Route”
- Phuong Viet Ngo, “Essays on Monetary Economics”
- Arup Sen, “Incentives in the Labor Market: Theory and Evidence from the NBA”
- Jingwei Sun, “Three Essays on Modern Economic Development in China”
- Chun-Kai Wang, “Essays on the Impact of Openness for the Macro-Economy”
- Russell Michael Weinstein, “Firm Recruiting Strategies, Educational Attainment, and the Labor Market Return to Higher Education”
Editorial Studies
- Nora Delaney, “A Study of the Endnotes to David Jones’s In Parenthesis”
English
- Emily Griffiths Jones, “Romance, Narrative Vision, and Elect Community in Seventeenth-Century England”
- Holly Connell Schaaf, “Sights of Conflict: Collective Responsibility and Individual Freedom in Irish and English Fiction of the Second World War”
- Arielle Zibrak, “Aesthetic Counter-Traditions: Anti-Identity and Nineteenth-Century Anglo-American Literature”
French Language & Literatures
- Adeline Jo Soldin, “Proustian Performance Role-Playing, Repetition, and Ritual in a la Recherche du Temps Perdu”
Geography
- Peter Albert O’Connor, “Aspects of Energy Transitions: History and Determinants”
- Preeti Rao, “Carbon, Nitrogen, and Vegetation Along an Urbanization Gradient: A Boston Case Study Integrating Field, Remotely Sensed and Socioeconomic Data”
- Karina Véliz Rojas, “The Impact of Climate Change on the U.S. Power Sector: Price and Quantity Effects”
Hispanic Language & Literatures
- Rommy Violeta Balabarca Fataccioli, “La Representacion de los Migrantes Internos en la Narrativa y el Cine Peruanos (1980–2009): Montacerdos, de Cronwell Jara; Adios, Ayacucho, de Julio Ortega, y La Teta Asustada, de Claudia Llosa”
- Carolina Castillo Larrea, “Processo de Cartas de Amores y Quexa y Aviso Contra Amor de Juan De Segura. Edicion Critica y Estudio”
- Arlene Ovalle-Child, “Objetos de Deseo en los Cuentos de Silvina Ocampo”
History
- Andrew James Ballou, “From Pacifism to Nonviolent Direct Action: The Fellowship of Reconciliation and Social Christianity, 1914–1947”
- Michael Holm, “America in the World: Ideology and U.S. Foreign Policy, 1944–1950”
- Jonathan George Koefoed, “Cautious Romantics: Trinitarian Transcendentalists and the Emergence of a Conservative Religious Tradition in America”
History of Art & Architecture
- Katherine Caldwell Harper, “Hendrick Goudt: New Light on an Artist and Nobleman”
- Kenneth John Hartvigsen, “ Patriotism, Race, and Gender Bending through American Song: Cover Illustrations of Popular Music from the Civil War to World War I”
- Meghen Jones, “Tomimoto Kenkichi and the Discourse of Modern Japanese Ceramics”
- Benjamin Russell Witte Zweig, “Depicting the Unforgivable Sin: Images of Suicide in Medieval Art”
Mathematics
- G. Nicholas Benes, “Stability of Multi-Solitons in the Toda Model and Torus Canards in Neuroscience Models”
- Daniel Cuzzocreo, “Dynamical Invariants and Parameter Space Structures for Rational Maps”
- Elizabeth Laura Fitzgibbon, “Rational Maps: The Structure of Julia Sets from Accessible Mandelbrot Sets”
- Laura Rocío González Ramírez, “Existence and Stability of Traveling Waves in a Biologically Constrained Model of Seizure Wave Propagation”
- Chong Liu, “Functional Principal Component and Factor Analysis of Spatially Correlated Data”
- Nikolay Ivanov Nikolaev, “Some Methods for Robust Inference in Econometric Factor Models and in Machine Learning”
- Weston D. Viles, “Network Data Analysis”
- Brandon Ward, “Observables in the BC System”
- Joshua Zelinsky, “Variations on the Art in Primitive Root Conjecture”
Molecular Biology, Cell Biology and Biochemistry
- Daniel Walter Bak, “A Study of the CDGSH Protein Family: Biophysical and Bioinformatic Analysis of the [2FE-2S] Cluster Protein MitoNEET”
- Brant Clark Hubbard, “Biochemical and Mechanical Cues Tune Fibronectin Conformation and Function”
- Gabriel Daniel Sholder, “Y-Family DNA Polymerase Architecture: Three Structural Features Control Accurate Deoxy CTP Insertion Opposite N2-Deoxy-Guanine-Benzo-A-Pyrene”
- Paul Terence Toran, “A Method for Detection of Endogenous RNA in Live Bacterial Cells”
Musicology
- Alexandre Abdoulaev, “Savoy: Reassessing the Role of the ‘World's Finest Ballroom’ in Music and Culture, 1926-1958”
- Andrés Espinoza, “Una Sola Casa: Salsa Consciente and the Poetics of the Meta-Barrio”
- Ulrike Christa Präger, “Longing to Belong: Musical Practices in the Expulsion of the Germans from the Bohemian Lands”
Neuroscience
- Samuel Arnold Mckenzie, “Electrophysiological Evidence for Memory Schemas in the Rat Hippocampus”
- Randall Edward Newmark, “High Resolution fMRI of Hippocampal Subfields and Medial Temporal Cortex during Working Memory”
Philosophy
- Karolina Aldona Lewestam, “The Hare and the Tortoise: The Problems with the Notion of Action in Ethics”
- Irina Gregoryevna Mikhalevich, “Experiment and Bias: The Case of Parsimony in Comparative Cognition”
Physics
- Cory Christopher James Fantasia, “Search for Exotic Particles Decaying into WZ Boson Pairs at the CMS Experiment”
- Alan Gabel, “Emergent Phenomena and Fluctuations in Cooperative Systems”
- Alexander Luke Kitt, “Manipulating Graphene's Lattice to Create Pseudovector Potentials, Discover Anomalous Friction, and Measure Strain Dependent Thermal Conductivity”
- Philip Daniel Lawson, “Measurement of the W Charge Asymmetry in Production with Jets Using 5 Inverse-Femtobarns of Data Measured at √s=7TeV with CMS”
- Qian Li, “Social Models on Complex Networks and Econophysics”
- Wei Li, “Statistical Physics Approaches to Complex Systems”
- Kang Liu, “Critical Phenomena and Phase Transition in Long-Range Systems”
- Jason William Olejarz, “Domain Coarsening and Interface Kinetics in the Ising Model”
- Dongdong Peng, “Studies of Polymer Thin Films Using Atomic Force Microscopy”
- Sebastian Christoph Remi, “Measurement and Control of Electron-Phonon Interactions in Graphene”
- Elsa Caroline Souto Gonçalves de Abreu, “Electronic and Structural Dynamics of Vanadates and Nickelates: Effect of Temperature, Strain and Photoexcitation”
- Wei Sun, “Adaptive Optics in Nonlinear Microscopy Implemented with Open-Loop Control and EMCCD-Based Shack-Hartmann Wavefront Sensor”
- Ying Tang, “Quantum Monte Carlo Studies of Quantum Criticality in Low-Dimensional Spin Systems”
- Jingdi Zhang, “Ultrafast Photonic Control of Colossal Magnetoresistive Materials”
- Di Zhou, “Interdependent Networks - Topological Percolation Research and Application in Finance”
Political Science
- Sijin Cheng, “Fighting for Reputation: China’s Deterrence Policy and Concerns About Credibility”
- Andreea Raluca Maierean, “A Comparative Study of Lustration in Central and Eastern Europe”
- Grant Alexander Marlier, “Expanding the Circle of Protection: The Evolution of Use of Force Norms Within the UN Security Council”
- Moeed Wasim Yusuf, “Brokered Bargaining: Nuclear Crises Between Middle Powers”
Psychology
- Anu Asnaani, “The Effects of Approach-Avoidance Modification on Social Anxiety Disorder”
- Amanda Waters Calkins, “Effects of a Neurobehavioral Intervention for Depressive and Obsessive-Compulsive Symptoms”
- Caitlin Ford Canfield, “The Mediating Role of Social Cue Use in the Relation Between Infant Characteristics and Early Vocabulary”
- Justin Centi, “Autonomic Dysfunction in Parkinson’s Disease: An Evaluation of Acute and Chronic Effects on Cognition and Daily Life”
- Sonia Chawla, “Does the Pattern of Fetal Movement Predict Infant Development?”
- Claudia Cherici, “Visual Functions of Fixational Eye Movements”
- Candice Chow, “Psychosocial Distress and Anxiety in Food Allergic Youth: Identification and Risk Factors”
- Benjamin David Dickstein, “Predictors of Post-Deployment Mental Healthcare Utilization Among Active Duty Marines”
- Kaitlin Patricia Gallo, “Direct-to-Consumer Marketing of Psychological Treatments: A Randomized Controlled Trial”
- Bridget Ashley Hearon, “Establishing a Link Between Anxiety Sensitivity, Exercise Intolerance, and Overeating”
- Amy Elizabeth Lawrence, “Decision-Making Impairment in Emotional Disorders”
- Ruth Ellen McKenzie, “Testosterone in Aging Male Twins: Relationship with Physical Functioning, Quality of Life, and Depression”
- Ivy Nicole Miller, “Cognition in Parkinson’s Disease: An Examination of Clinically Meaningful Subgroups”
- Yakeel Tatiana Quiroz-Gaviria, “Brain Changes in Presymptomatic Early-Onset Alzheimer’s Disease”
- Timothy Edward Ralston, “The Influence of Depressed Mood on Alcohol-Related Self-Control Processes: The Moderational Role of Drinking Motives”
- Alice Tyer Sawyer, “Attention Retraining in Social Anxiety Disorder: An fMRI Study”
- Anne Marie Seery, “Electrophysiological Indices of Language Processing in Infants at Risk for ASD”
- Tyler Allen Zink, “The Effects of Genes and Trauma Exposure on Verbal Memory Among Male Twin Vietnam Era Veterans”
Religious Studies
- Ingrid Lisabeth Anderson, “Making Ethics ‘First Philosophy’: Ethics and Suffering in the Work of Emmanuel Levinas, Elie Wiesel, and Richard Rubenstein”
- Michelle L. Bellamy, “The Elijah-Elisha Cycle of Stories: A Ring Composition”
- Kathleen Holbrook, “Radical Food: Nation of Islam and Latter-Day Saint Culinary Ideals (1930-1980)”
- Onaje X. Offley Woodbine, “Black Gods of the Asphalt: Street Basketball, Power, and Embodied Spirit”
- Misha Andrew Tadd, “Alternatives to Monism and Dualism: Seeking Yang Substance with Yin Mode in Heshanggon’s Commentary on the Daodejing”
Sociology
- Mia Desiree Diaz-Edelman, “Working Together: Multicultural Collaboration in the Interfaith Immigrant Rights Movement”
- Courtney Lynne Feldscher, “Home Sweet Home? The Multiple Logics of Homeownership and the Politics of Conflict in a Hybrid Organization”
- Kiri Marie Gurd, “Rationalizing Values: Global Diffusion, Global Professionals, and Truth Commissions”
Sociology & Social Work
- Bronwyn Rebekah Keefe, “Can a Service Philosophy be Identified in Aging and Disability Resource Centers? A Study of Institutional Logics as Applied to the Creation of New Hybrid Organizations”
- Su-Chiu Liu, “An Analysis of Welfare and Health Policy Changes on the Health Seeking Behavior of Taiwanese Immigrants Residing in the United States”
- Michelle Novelle, “I'm Still Here’: Adolescent Social Orphans in Colombian State Care: The Process of Identity Formation in the Absence of Permanency”
Annual Report 2013/2014
From the Dean
From recruiting ever-better faculty and students to surging ahead in our capital campaign, academic year 2013/2014 was a year of great accomplishments.
Improving Undergraduate Education
CAS once again attracted our most talented class of undergraduates ever. And we laid the groundwork to serve them even better, offering expanded academic opportunities and a comprehensive first-year experience program with over 500 first-year student participants.
Strengthening Graduate Education
BU and the Graduate School of Arts & Sciences saw immediate, strong results from our new five-year PhD funding model that has increased the attractiveness of doctoral programs.
Enhancing a World-Class Faculty
The quality of a university depends on the quality of its faculty, and hiring the best and giving them a strong start is crucial. In 2013/14, CAS hired 17 new assistant professors and 3 senior professors across the humanities and social, natural, and computational sciences.
Conducting Path-Breaking Research
As the academic heart of BU and its biggest school, CAS’s dynamism is helping propel BU’s recognition as one of the finest research universities in the country. New initiatives including the Center for Systems Neuroscience, BU Initiative on Cities, and Center for Autism Research Excellence are taking our research to new heights.
Deepening Our Global Mission
This year, thanks to a generous gift from Frederick S. Pardee (SMG’54, GSM’54, Hon.’06), we laid the groundwork for the Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies, launched in September 2014 and reporting to CAS. The Pardee School builds on the substantial success CAS has had in creating strong global and international studies programs.
Stewarding Our Resources
Boston University is financially healthy, although it faces the challenges of a continuing weak economy and many other issues that require skilled and careful management in higher education today. CAS is fortunate to benefit from BU’s wise management and our own diligent stewardship of our resources.
Nurturing Connections with Alumni and Friends
Boston University and the College of Arts & Sciences have made significant steps in building a framework for alumni to engage with faculty, other alumni, and current students in ongoing learning, discussion, and inquiry. Over 6,000 of the alumni attending BU Alumni Association events around the world were CAS alumni (up 11% over the previous year).
Growing Our Capacity: The Campaign for CAS
BU is in the midst of our first-ever capital campaign, and CAS is well ahead in its progress toward our original goal of raising $100 million. More than 4,300 alumni and many other friends of CAS contributed during the past fiscal year. By the end of the 2014 fiscal year, CAS had received $83.2 million in gift funds through the campaign.
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