Olivia DrakeThe Department of Film Studies received a $7,500 grant from the Academy Foundation of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to support the AMPAS Speaker Series in 2011-12. The grant was awarded on May 1. Lea Carlson, associate director of film studies, is the grant's P.I. This is the third year Wesleyan received support from the Academy to fund the speaker series. Film Studies will welcome about four speakers to campus in the second half of the fall semester.
Suzanne O'Connell, associate professor of earth and environmental sciences, director of the Service Learning Center, received a grant worth $21,000 from the Keck Geology Consortium on April 27. The award will support an undergraduate research project titled "Sediment Dynamics in the Lower Connecticut River" this summer.
Fred Cohan, professor of biology, professor of environmental studies, and biology graduate student Sarah Kopac received a $20,000 Connecticut Space Grant Consortium Training Grant on March 9. The award, which is subcontracted through the University of Hartford, supports a study titled "The Speciation of Bacillus Subtilis along a natural Salinity Gradient in Death Valley."
Wesleyan's student organization Brighter Dawns received a Davis United World College Project for Peace grant worth $10,000. The funds will support Brighter Dawns' "Water Sanitation Project" in Khalishpur, Bangladesh for eight weeks this summer. Tasmiha Khan '12 and possibly Rajeeta Iyer '12 will oversee the project, which will include building tube wells, latrines and providing health seminars and jobs for women in one of the poorest slums in Khalishpur.
Pam Tatge, director of the Center for the Arts, received a $4,750 grant from the New England Foundation for the Arts. The grant, sourced from the NEFA's Sam Miller Fearless Thinking in the Arts Fund, will support the Institute of Curatorial Practice and Performance (ICPP) Scholarship in 2011-12.
Ishita Mukerji, professor of molecular biology and biochemistry, and dean of the Natural Sciences and Mathematics division, received a grant for $6,750 from the National Sciences Foundation. The grant is part of the National Science Foundation's Research Experiences for Undergraduates, which provides funding for faculty to work with an undergraduate student. The award is supporting research on “Structure and Function of Holliday Junctions Complexed with Proteins Probed by Flourescence and UV Raman Spectroscopic Methods.”
The Green Street Arts Center received a grant for $3,000 from the Bank of America Thomas J. Atkins Memorial Trust Fund in 2011. The one-year grant provided funding for scholarships to the afterschool arts and sciences program.
Wesleyan’s Center for the Arts received a grant worth $5,000 from the New England Foundation of the Arts on April 20, 2011. The grant supported the National Dance Project “Chunky Move" in 2012.
Anna Shusterman, assistant professor of psychology; Hilary Barth, assistant professor of psychology, assistant professor of neuroscience and behavior; and Emily Slusser, a postdoctoral fellow in psychology, received a grant worth $25,000 from Mattel Philanthropy Programs. The grant was awarded on March 24. The grant allows the group to explore children's ability to learn from independent play with toys. Children will receive one of four kinds of toys for a period of two months, and their parents will be asked to bring the toys out daily. At the beginning and end of the study, children will participate in a series of brief measures, many of which…
Suzanna Tamminen, director of Wesleyan University Press, received a $50,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Arts on March 21. The grant will support Wesleyan University Press’s poetry program. The funding will support publication of 12 books of poetry in 2011 and 2012, including the new volume by Pulitzer Prize winner Rae Armantrout and the collected poems of Joseph Ceravolo. In addition to helping support publication costs, the funding will be used to help authors travel to give readings from their new Wesleyan books.
Pam Tatge, director of the Center for the Arts, received a $20,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Arts to support the Breaking Ground Dance Series July 2011-June 2012. The series features cutting-edge choreography and virtuosic dancing by world-renowned companies. This is the 11th anniversary season of the Breaking Ground Dance Series at Wesleyan.
Manju Hingorani, associate professor of molecular biology and biochemistry, received a $165,038 grant from the Connecticut Department of Health to support her project titled “DNA Mismatch Repair in Tobacco Smoke Medicated Cancer.” The project will be funded for 18 months.