The 3 Minute Thesis competition began in Australia less than a decade ago, but has already begun to spread internationally. The competition challenges students to present their research in a simple, yet engaging fashion. Over the past three years, the Graduate Student Association (GSA) has helped Baylor join the over two hundred schools now hosting the event. On October 18th, eleven graduate students, representing eight different departments, came together in the Incubator to share their research with family, friends, and colleagues.

There were two groups in the competition: PhD candidates and Master’s students. In each group, there were prizes for first ($300), second ($100), and third ($50), as well as, an audience choice prize ($30). The judges for the night were Dr. Larry Lyon, Dean of the Graduate School, Pattie Orr, Dean of the University Libraries, and Dr. C. Kevin Chambliss, Professor of Chemistry. They rated each presenter on two main categories: comprehension/content and communication/engagement.

The competitors were as followed:

Sarah Rude (English) spoke about her work of sight perception in Medieval Literature. Sarah is studying how the trend from extramission to intromission effected literature during the thirteenth century.

Su Jin Kang (Sociology) presented on her research on inequality studies. Su Jin is looking at the effects of social status on potential health outcomes in the United States, Japan, and South Korea.

Michael Spiegel (Chemistry) shared his findings on the new drug selenomaltol. Michael is researching the effects of the drug on heavy metal poisoning and its potential to be selective in that process.

Bethany Smith (Sociology) talked about her research into entrepreneurial success. Bethany is interested in finding the motivations for financial success in women and minority groups to eventually make their business plans more effective.

Andrew Cox (Biology) relayed information about his studies to develop a new genetically modified nectar in impatiens. With malaria affecting over two million people every year, Andrew’s nectar would be toxic to the parasite that causes the disease, but not to the plant nor the mosquito.

Bekah Burket (Environmental Science) displayed her research over the last year of looking at the waste water of Hong Kong. Bekah is gathering information to discover how healthy communities are during different seasons of the year.

Scott Prather (Religion) presented his research on the evolution of penance. Scott shows how different factions of Protestantism evolved in their own ways to use penance for social control.

Ian Anthony (Chemistry and Biochemistry) spoke about his exploration of chemical identification. Ian is using both a mass spectrometer and a vacuum ultraviolet spectrometer to more accurately and fully identify a chemical.

Tim Orr (Religion) introduced his examination of communities in sixteenth century Europe. Tim argues that different communities were both resonant and dissonant of each other, but eventually, because of their stubbornness, choose the latter.

Lauren Bagwell (Curriculum and Instruction) talked about her belief in adding spoken word poetry to social studies classes. Lauren believes that it can help with bettering the class’s curriculum, as well as, each student’s relationship to each other and with themselves.

Jared Hanson (Geology) shared his findings on the Marcellus Shale. Jared is researching the importance of how the Shale grew both laterally and vertically to help extract more of its naturally gas.

Everyone did excellent, but in the end there had to be winners. The Master’s student winners were Andrew Cox (1st), Lauren Bagwell (2nd), and Jared Hanson (3rd), while the PhD candidate winners were Ian Anthony (1st), Tim Orr (2nd), and Scott Prather (3rd). The audience choices were Andrew Cox and Bekah Burket. After the prizes were presented, Dr. Lyon admired everyone’s research and spoke about how important a skill it is to succinctly discuss it to someone with little previous knowledge.

While the 3 Minute Thesis is still in its infancy at Baylor, GSA hopes to keep building it and possibly send representatives to national and international competitions soon. As for now, it serves as a great way to support and celebrate fellow students and their research.

By Matthew Doyen

In July, the USATF Mountain, Ultra, and Trail Running Council announced the team for the 2016 International Association of Ultrarunners (IAU) Trail World Championships. The 52-mile race will be held at the end of October and will traverse the beautiful mountainous border between Portugal and Spain. Incredibly, one of the ten athletes (five male, five female) selected is not only an accomplished ultrarunner, but also a successful Baylor PhD candidate in Philosophy.

Growing up in the Appalachian Mountains of Northern New Jersey, Sabrina Little came to Waco after receiving her undergraduate degree at The College of William and Mary in Virginia. There, she raced competitively for the Griffins, but her love for running can be traced back even further. “My first ultramarathon was a bit of an accident,” she recalls. “My mom was in remission from cancer. I like grand gestures, so I ran 100 miles as a fundraiser for the National Ovarian Cancer Coalition to celebrate her. It was published in the local papers and I received a lot of phone calls about it being one of the fastest 100-mile times in country that year. I actually had no idea it was a sport at that point.” Sabrina immediately enjoyed success in her new sport by winning both 50 and 100 mile races. At the 2013 World Championship, she even set the national record in the 24-hour run by traveling a little over 152 miles and helped lead Team USA to gold.

To compensate for spending 80+ hours a week training, Sabrina likes to intertwine her scholarly interests and personal goals with her athletic pursuits. For instance, training and racing is part of her overall approach to a well-ordered life. “I appreciate the discipline it offers, and it helps me to be a good steward of my body. I sleep, eat, and train intentionally. I try to be very present.” A healthy version of one’s self is important to a lot of the students and professors in the department. “It’s funny because I think the caricature of philosophers is that we can be a bit abstracted and adrift in the cosmos, but people in our department bike, run, rock climb, and garden. They’re not like what I might expect reading Walker Percy.”

Another way Sabrina combines academics and training is through moral pedagogy, or how we teach virtues. She explains, “It’s very easy to read in a book that perseverance is to ‘remain under a burden.’ It’s a very different thing to have those moments daily – in the middle of workouts, when I have to tell myself to remain. Virtues are hard. They feel awful to learn, and I don’t think we understand that just by reading about them. I think I am a more courageous person because I give myself the opportunity to be brave so often in running.”

Sabrina, and her husband, David, have made Waco home. They both attend Baylor and coach a local cross country team at Live Oak Classical School. Because of the city’s elevation of only 38 meters, which she calls “comical” when training for mountainous races, the ultrarunner has to do a lot of hill repeats. “I like them – up and down. It’s like Sisyphus.” She’ll keep training on those hills for the next few weeks before heading to Peneda-Geres National Park in Portugal for the big race.

We wish her the best of luck! Sic’em Sabrina!

Wencong Chen grew up a world away from the low-hanging trees and sunny skies of Waco in the southeastern coastal province of Fujian, China. Despite being one of the most affluent provinces in the country, his early life was littered with poverty and “battle-testing” moments. Still, he persevered and graduated top of his class from Zhejiang University of Technology in Hangzhou. After graduation, he received a position at a test agency that dealt with Japanese and Korean languages, but his curiosity soon got the better of him. He would often wonder the difference between a passing and failing mark among the thousands of test records he was handling. As a result, he came to the United States and enrolled at New Mexico State (NMSU) in Las Cruces, where his wife was obtaining her PhD, to pursue a master’s degree in statistics.

While at NMSU, he discovered that his true calling was to be a statistician. He continued toward his dream when he joined the Baylor family in 2013 as a doctoral student. The decision to choose Baylor was admittedly a difficult one as other schools from around the area were also interested in the recent Aggie graduate. Ultimately, he was most impressed by our beautiful campus, small class size, recent awards (we were honored by the American Statistical Association with the Statistical Partnerships among Academe, industry, and Government Award in 2012), and cutting-edge Bayesian research.

As he was researching pharmaceutical companies to intern at over the summer, the doctoral student was also welcoming a baby to his family. Unfortunately, his newborn daughter could not be taken home and was keep in the NICU of the Baylor Scott and White Medical Center under the watchful eye of Dr. Patel. After some observation, the doctor strongly suggested that Wencong’s daughter had to take the Fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) genetic test, which maps the genetic material in a person’s cells. It is usually used to visualize specific genes or portions of genes and to help spot abnormalities.

The new father was at a loss. He didn’t know if his newborn had a genetic disease that was still baffling the science community. He didn’t know how to tell his wife that their baby girl might not have a “normal” life. He didn’t know if he was ready for such heavy responsibilities. He didn’t know what to do. Then, a colleague reached out and encouraged him to share a picture of his daughter with their department. What came next can only be described by Wencong as a “happy blessing from our warm community.”

The next few weeks were some of the longest and hardest as they waited for the test to return from a genetics lab on the West Coast. While still searching for a summer internship, Wencong lived in the parking lot of the hospital during this period to “save small pieces of time” and to make sure that his daughter was never alone. He made it through the screening process at one of the only companies still recruiting, Ultragenyx Pharmaceutical, which, according to their site, is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company committed to bringing to market novel products for the treatment of rare and ultra-rare diseases, with a focus on serious, debilitating genetic diseases.

After two more rounds of interviews, Wencong finally got the offer. He had to divert from his preferred topic of survival analysis and his dissertation work on time-to-event data, which was challenging since his entire time at Baylor had been devoted to the subject, to topic that is required for most genetic drug developments: longitudinal data analysis. Fortunately, he had an understanding mentor in Dr. James Stamey, a professor in the statistical science department, who lent his support the throughout the process. Wencong’s internship experience at Ultragenyx in Novato, California shocked him. The soon-to-be Baylor grad never realized the large amount of genetic diseases that lack the available drugs to cure. In fact, he said that there are over 7,000 types of rare diseases in the world and three million people in the United States who suffer from them. It’s no surprise that after graduation he returned to Novato to work at Ultragenyx as a biostatistician.

During our email conversations, Wencong shared a Washington Post article about Julianna, a four-year-old girl in Washougal, Washington. She was diagnosed with Charcot-Marie-Tooth Disease (CMT), which, according to the article and to the National Institutes of Health, is one of the world’s most common inherited neurological disorders. There are many mutations of CMT that have symptoms that range in severity. Unfortunately, Julianna had one of the worst cases and, after speaking with her parents about it for weeks, decided one day to forgo the painful treatment. She passed away soon after.

Wencong wanted to share his story, but, more importantly, wanted people to know that Baylor grads are fighting to find the cure for these rare genetic diseases. Baylor is also a leader in the research of cancer, which, according to the American Cancer Society, affects more than one million people in the country each year. As written in the spring edition of the university’s Arts and Sciences Magazine, “Arts and Sciences faculty have helped Baylor bring in more than $5 million in grants and other funding during the past six years to study cancer, and the University’s current strategic plan, Pro Futuris, provides a foundation for even more growth in the future.”

I love going to the football, basketball, and baseball games, but these stories and accomplishments make me more proud to be a Baylor Bear then anything that happens inside a stadium or arena. It shows that our university is trying to make a difference and I really couldn’t ask for anything more. As for the results of Wencong’s daughter’s FISH tests, they came back negative and she will enjoy a long, healthy, and happy life.

By Matthew Doyen

Behind every great student is a great teacher. Such is the reason why Baylor has been implementing a policy that all Teachers of Record must receive training appropriate to their role in the university. Sometimes, however, that teacher just happens to also be a student, a graduate student. Aware of that fact, the Graduate School, in partnership with the office of the Executive Vice President and Provost, offers training sessions each semesters that any graduate student can attend.

Every semester, the Graduate School and Baylor recognizes the very best of these educators, who were able to balance their own work and responsibilities as students while demonstrating excellence as classroom instructors, with the Outstanding Graduate Student Instructor Award. Dean Lyon has finally pulled back the curtain and revealed the Fall 2015 semester’s honorees. They are:

Nathan Cartagena (Department of Philosophy)

Grace Aquino (Department of Environmental Science)

Olivia Carroll (Department of Political Science)

These three individuals were selected by a committee of graduate faculty and graduate students based on five documents: recommendations from their supervising faculty, student evaluations and letters from students in their classes, their teaching philosophy statements, and their records of participation in professional teaching development. They will be given the opportunity to attend teaching conferences, as well as a plaque commemorating their achievement. Join the Graduate School and Baylor in congratulating these special individuals!

You can find a list of past winners here and the benefits for graduate school Teachers of Record here.

By Matthew Doyen

In the fall of 2013, I started my senior year as an Elementary Education major. Senior year is the year of your internship as a teacher in a classroom. My intern experience started off fairly similar to everyone else… full of excitement and joy around the students, yet while everyone else was figuring things out and getting more comfortable, I began to discover that the classroom did not seem to be a good fit for me. Slowly my teaching and planning started to suffer and I began to have anxiety problems surrounding school, because I could not quite figure out what direction to pursue. Luckily I had great professors to talk to and help me through this time. Dr. Barbara Purdum-Cassidy and Dr. Sandi Cooper spent lots of time with me, giving advice, providing encouragement, and working to explore other possibilities. My whole world shifted when one of them suggested the idea of Informal Education.

I spent the rest of the fall semester researching “informal education” (education in museums, aquariums, libraries, zoos, etc.) while my professors were looking into possible internships in Waco. Before we left for Christmas break, I had interviewed and agreed to do an internship at Cameron Park Zoo with the education department in the Spring 2014. During my time at Cameron Park Zoo I worked closely with the Education Curator, Connie Kassner. She taught me how to handle animals and gave me responsibilities with the care of the education animals. I helped update/ lead outreach programs and on grounds programs, I wrote new scavenger hunts, helped coordinate volunteers and also assisted in organizing events at the zoo. The outreach programs took up most of my mornings. A partner and I would take a group of the education animals to a school where we would present different lessons we had created and connected to TEKS before we would present the animals. I loved getting to see children react to the animals. It made the ideas and concepts we were talking about so much more meaningful and tangible. Students could actually see and feel the differences of reptiles and mammals rather than just talk about them or look at pictures. Cameron Park Zoo has several education programs and events throughout the year. Events such as National Amphibian Day, Bear Awareness, Big Cat Day and many others that spotlight different animals. Another event I participated in was the Poison Safety Safari, a collaborative event with the Poison Control Center, where visitors learn about poison hazards and venomous animals. These events are intended to add to visitors experience and education.

During my internship, I was able to take two classes in the Museum Studies program at Baylor– Museum Educational Programming and Introduction to Museums. I loved the opportunity to take these courses while working at the zoo, because many concepts overlapped and I was able to discover lots of connections. Connie and I would have lots of discussions that stemmed from ideas we learned in class and I was able to see how it differed in a zoo setting.

During the semester I was working at the zoo, I had the great opportunity to lead a group of Education students in a collaborative project with the Baylor Chamber. The Baylor Chamber is a group of students responsible for the bears on campus. They also lead presenations for area school children when they make a campus visit to see the bears. Chamber wanted to make their programming more educational and more marketable to teachers. My team took the previous information chamber presented to groups and wrote them into age/grade appropriate presentations. The project also included connecting TEKS (Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills) to the different presentations so that Chamber could market their presentations to schools as more relevant to the state standards.

Even though my work at Cameron Park Zoo has ended, my connections are still strong. I try to volunteer and help out with events as much as possible. I was able to help organize and participate in the Texas Aquarium and Zoo Educator conference in January 2015 at Cameron Park Zoo. There I got to meet and learn from informal educators all over the state of Texas.

I am currently a graduate student about to complete my Masters of Science in Education in the department of Curriculum and Instruction, with a cognate/specialization in informal education. With help from my professors, I was able to individualize my program to fit my area of study by taking several courses in the department of Museum Studies. The Curriculum and Instruction classes have been very easy to connect to museum education as well as connecting the Museum Studies courses to education. I believe Baylor University has provided me a well-rounded knowledge of informal education through the individuality of my degree program and the support of my professors.

My hope is that the Baylor School of Education and Museum Studies could partner to create an official program for students like me. Amazing professors who truly care about their students and their success have blessed me and helped me get to where I am. Without their guidance, I might not have graduated college or would not have the hopes of a future career.

by Natalie Saleh

“I’ve learned so much through football. How to overcome adversity, how to persevere, how to work hard and achieve something you’ve worked for. To me, it’s more than a game, and I want to be able to give that back to other kids,” says Nelson Ehirim.

Not only is Nelson on Baylor’s football team, but he is also a graduate student and veteran.

After earning a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice at Midwestern State, Nelson earned a commission as an officer in the United States Army, where he served four years on active duty. Nelson currently serves in the Army Reserves while working on a master’s degree in sport pedagogy and playing football at Baylor University.

For many years, Nelson has dreamed of playing for Art Briles’ team, a dream that began in 2006 when Briles had recruited Nelson to play for the University of Houston. Then a senior in high school, Nelson was not able to attend due to an injury and would subsequently play at Midwestern State University. Now, eight years later, Nelson is finally able to fulfill his dream.

“My experience on the team so far has been great. A lot of the younger guys really look up to me and like listening to my boring military stories. The coaching staff has been very welcoming. Coach Kazadi (strength and conditioning) and Coach Briles along with my position coach have really helped me feel at home,” says Nelson.

Nelson’s humility and work-ethic are characteristic not only of his time practicing for the football team but also in his classes. Though he has worked hard to earn his place at Baylor, Nelson attributes much of his academic success to the help of the Veteran Educational and Transition Services (VETS) program, which provides student veterans with support and resources to help with the transition from military service to college.

Dr. Janet Bagby, coordinator of the VETS program, and LaNette Thompson, VETS transition coach, worked closely with Nelson to ensure his successful transition to graduate school at Baylor.

“Janet and LaNette went out and used the VETS funds and bought me all kinds of study materials. And because of that, I was successful with the GRE. That, and she [Dr. Bagby] actually went and talked to Dr. Kramer in the graduate office and vouched for me,” says Nelson.

Not only did the VETS program provide Nelson with the resources he needed to meet Baylor’s rigorous acceptance requirements, but Vets in Transition, the new student experience course for veterans, provided him with emotional support during his transition back to college.

”What that class provided me was a debriefing zone,” explains Nelson. He describes his relationship with his classmates as “a family, because at one point in time, you swore that you would die for each other.”

Though you may not see Nelson on the field just yet, keep an eye out for him cheering on his teammates from the sidelines and playing in the seasons to come.

If you’d like to learn more about the VETS program and the great things Baylor is doing for its student veterans, click here.

Baylor alumna and doctoral candidate Sarah Stair’s interest in science, math and engineering began innocently enough, as she built Lego towers and entered egg drop contests as a child. These days, her work is a little more advanced-and it’s bringing quite a bit of attention to bother her and Baylor. Read the full story on Baylor Proud.

By Natalie Saleh

Baylor University’s School of Engineering and Computer Science is a center of innovative new research. Professors and graduate students are working on many exciting projects, as Baylor is a high research university.

Willis Troy is one of the many electrical engineering and computer science graduate students who came to Baylor to pursue new avenues of research.

“I do electronic warfare, which is basically modeling mission planning scenarios with escort jamming support,” explains Willis. “What that means is you’re basically flying somewhere you don’t want radars to detect you, and you have another plane that jams the radars as you go.”

Willis completed his undergraduate degree at Baylor in electrical engineering. After graduating, he spent some time studying at Virginia Tech, but he was eventually drawn back to Baylor for the opportunity to conduct research alongside Baylor professors.

“I decided to come back, more so because the relationship the professors have with the students is so personal which allows a lot of freedom,” says Willis. “They lead you where you’re going. It seems like genuinely all the professors care about you, not just on an academic level but a personal level.”

Willis spends most of his time researching in the Baylor Research and Innovation Collaborative (BRIC), which houses state-of-the-art research equipment. In addition to the many meeting and work spaces, the BRIC houses many technologies that aid in graduate research, including a powerful scanning electron microscope.

“We obviously have plenty of computers and there’s lots of space. I have access to several labs. We have radars, VNAs, antennas, and there’s space so I can construct models here. It pretty much has all you need,” says Willis.

After graduating, Willis hopes to continue researching and teaching at a university. He is excited about the opportunity to work independently on research projects while impacting his future students. Though he could find employment in the private industry, he prefers to go the academic route.

“There’s more resources available to teachers. Plus it’s nice to be doing something where you’re helping someone else. In the industry, it’s kind of self-preserving. You ask, ‘What do I do to maintain my job?’ As a professor, you ask ‘how do I help these students learn?’”

With all of Baylor’s resources and support for engineering research, Willis is sure to have all the experience and knowledge he needs to be a great researcher and professor after he graduates.

To learn more about the research and opportunities in Baylor’s School of Engineering and Computer Science click here.

By: Natalie Saleh

Baylor is clearly an excellent place for graduate students to further their education. However, what many students don’t realize is how many great opportunities there are to live, work, and serve alongside their neighbors in the Waco community.

This is exactly the opportunity graduate students will have if they choose to live at Good Neighbor Settlement House.

Good Neighbor is a nonprofit organization based on the settlement house movement which started in England in the late 19th Century as a way to serve the urban poor. Settlement houses often included daycares, literacy classes, and spaces for community gatherings. A century later this movement inspired Dr. Laine Scales to establish a settlement house in a historic Waco neighborhood.

Currently, Good Neighbor has two settlers, or residents, Hannah Hanover and Katie Robbins, both of whom are Baylor graduate students.

“For graduate students, it’s easy put ourselves in our own bubbles and only view this period of our life in graduate school as transient, as a means to an end,” explains Katie. “And I think by doing that, we devalue a potentially transformative experience. Good Neighbor allows more opportunities to get plugged into the community. Whether you want to live in Waco long-term or not, you’re giving back to a community that has really given a lot to Baylor and to its students.”

Currently, Good Neighbor is in its early stages of development, and the settlement house is still in need of repairs before it can begin its full operations. In the meantime, Hannah and Katie spend their time getting to know their neighbors so they can discern how to best serve their neighborhood in the future.

Often this includes taking walks around the neighborhood, attending community events, and raising awareness of Good Neighbor’s mission to serve Waco. Both Hannah and Katie have enjoyed the opportunity to live in such a diverse neighborhood with people from all walks of life, a diversity they would not find in an apartment near campus.

“My undergraduate school, Houghton College, always emphasized the concept of scholar servants, which means that you are a scholar so that you may serve better. That’s part of the reason I came to graduate school, to use my talents so that I can serve better,” explains Hannah.

Hannah sees Good Neighbor as a great way to not only become more involved in the community but to serve others. Similarly, Katie sees her role in Good Neighbor as a “mission at home.”

“I considered going on a mission this past December but I didn’t feel like God was calling me to it. When I learned about Good Neighbor, I became more attracted to the idea of being on a mission at home. I think it gives you a new perspective, and it makes you look at your own city differently,” says Katie.

Living at Good Neighbor is a rewarding but challenging experience. Though Hannah and Katie have a heavy course load, they are intentional about staying organized to ensure that they have plenty of time to complete five to ten hours of service a week.

Katie offers the following advice to anybody interested in becoming a settler at Good Neighbor: “Be open to trying new things, open to meeting new people from a variety of backgrounds, and be prepared to learn a lot about yourself and other people.”

Whether on “a mission at home” or serving as a “scholar-student,” Good Neighbor provides graduate students with the opportunity to find their place not only on Baylor’s campus but in the Greater Waco community.

To learn more about how to get involved in Good Neighbor visit the website at goodneighborwaco.org.

By Natalie Saleh

Baylor graduate students are passionate about using their talents to serve others in their community. This passion is obvious in the graduate students who work at The Baylor Clinic for Assessment, Research, and Education (CARE), a program which provides assessments and therapy for children with cognitive and developmental disabilities. Baylor CARE therapists are all graduate students in the educational psychology program who are specializing in applied behavior analysis.

CARE therapists devote much of their time to helping clients improve communication, social, adaptive, and other life skills. The program serves children ranging from three to eighteen years old and from very low to very high-functioning. Therapists also work with parents to teach them new strategies to help their children.

“We don’t know what it’s like to be in their shoes. But the things that we’re working on in the clinic and the research that goes on there, I hope is contributing in some way to being helpful in their everyday lives,” says Rachel Scalzo, CARE therapist and PhD student in educational psychology.

To ensure that CARE therapists are ready before they start therapy, they start out shadowing other therapists. Once they are assigned to work with a child, they also spend time getting to know the child and building trust before beginning formal therapy sessions. In addition, CARE therapists have plenty of help throughout their time working at the clinic, both from their peer therapists and from CARE Director, Dr. Tonya Davis and Behavioral and Educational Services Director Kristen Mainor.

“It really is just a big family of us who work there,” says Jayden Conte, CARE therapist and graduate student in educational psychology. “Tonya Davis and Kristen Mainor are always there to help you if you need anything at all. They’re very supportive, very knowledgeable, and very helpful.”

Though working with children with disabilities can be difficult at times, CARE therapists feel blessed for the rewarding opportunity to serve their clients and help them grow.

“One client never ever talked. It was a big deal if he even uttered a sound. Now he’s talking, talking, talking. It’s just really cool to see that progression,” says Jayden.

After graduation, Jayden plans on continuing to work at a clinic with disabled children, grateful for the invaluable experiences she has had with the CARE program.

Baylor CARE is always accepting donations to provide scholarships for needy families. If you are interested in donating, contact Tonya_Davis@baylor.edu. If you would like to read more about the great ways CARE is helping children with disabilities and their families click here.