University of Pittsburgh

News

Annoucements

2009

Students: Avery Award, Teaching Award, Hummon Research Award, Mellon Fellowships

  • Aaron Arnold received the 2009 Avery Award for Undergraduate Students. Samantha Goldberg and Amira Rhamin are Avery Award runners-up.
  • Amy McDowell received the 2009 Norman P. Hummon Memorial Research Award
  • Spencer Foster received the 2009 Sociology Teaching Award.
  • Kim Creasap and Jane Walsh recieved 2009-2010 Mellon Fellowships.

Undergraduate Honors Certificate Recipients 2007-2008

    • Jean FitzGibbons thesis entitled, “Knowledge of and Attitudes Towards Emergency Contraception Among College-Aged Men.” Thesis Advisor, Dr. Salvatore Babones
    • Rachelle Gish thesis entitled, “Exploring the Relationship Between Sexuality and Religious Expression.” Thesis Advisor: Dr. Lisa D. Brush
    • Samantha Goldberg thesis entitled, “Gay and Lesbian Parents: An Analysis of Research Themes and Conclusions from the 1950's to the Present.” Thesis Advisor, Dr. Dan Romesberg
    • Larry Miller Jr. thesis entitled, “Prison Sexuality: A Look at Current Research.” Thesis Advisor, Dr. Cecilia Green
    • Taichi Nakatani thesis entitled, “The Japanese School System Abroad: A Study on the Role of International Secondary Schools among Japanese Students in America.” Thesis Advisor, Dr. Akiko Hashimoto
    • Anne Richardson thesis entitled, “Recidivism Among Juvenile Sex Offenders: Causes of Reoffending After Court-Mandated Treatment.” Thesis Advisor, Dr. Phyllis Coontz
    • Elyse Sherman thesis entitled, “A Systematic Review of the National Cancer Institute's Research-Tested Intervention Programs for Adolescent Smoking Prevention.” Thesis Advisor, Dr. Brian Primack
    • Sarah Sterner thesis entitled, “The Manifest Functions and Latent Dysfunctions of State Mandatory Minimum Sentences for Drug Offenders: An Assessment of Mandatory Minimum Sentences for Drug Offenders.” Thesis Advisor, Dr. Dan Romesberg

     

    Graduate Student Awards for 2007-2008

  • Women's Studies Program Student Research Fund awarded two of our sociology graduate students this year with a $1000 monetary award to go towards their sociological research. Kim Creasap will be using her award in her travels to Sweden to collect data for her dissertation and Kelsy Burke willing be putting her's towards transcription work on her field research.
  • Kim Creasap was also awarded the Summer Foreign Language and Area Studies Fellowship from the European Studies Center at Pitt. Kim will use her fellowship for an 8 week intensive Swedish course in Uppsala, Sweden.
  • Kathleen Gray won the SAGE/ Pine Forge Teaching Innovations and Professional Development Award this past year, which means $500 for her to apply to attending the ASA Section on Teaching and Learning's pre-conference workshop this August.
  • Kai Heidemann recieved the Spencer Fellowship. The Spencer Foundation (est. 1962) is intended to investigate ways in which education, broadly conceived, can be improved around the world. The Foundation has been dedicated to the belief that research is necessary to the improvement in education.The Spencer Foundation Dissertation Fellowship Program seeks to encourage a new generation of scholars from a wide range of disciplines and professional fields to undertake research relevant to the improvement of education. These full-time fellowships aim to support individuals whose dissertations show potential for bringing fresh and constructive perspectives to the history, theory, or practice of formal or informal education anywhere in the world."

  • This year the department of sociology awarded 4 summer research fellowships to post-MA graduate students. The graduate Committee reviewed 7 applications and decided on the basis of the merit of the proposals and the students’ progress in the program.

    The recipients of the four awards were:

1) Tim Vining, who is beginning his Overview phase, and is using the fellowship to collect data in connection to his dissertation on narratives and the making of social movements in Post-Katrina New Orleans.

2) Jane Walsh, who is in her Comprehensive phase, and is using the fellowship to collect data for her dissertation on migrant labor mobilization. The fellowship was particularly useful in supporting her interview visits to the United Farm Workers Union in Keene and Delano, both in California.

3) Amy McDowell, who is using the fellowship to collect data for her post-MA research, focusing on the relation between culture and the performance of resistance. The fellowship is particularly useful in supporting her travel to Gospel revival music festivals, which she is studying as part of her larger dissertation project.

4) Maria Dillard, an excellent new student who entered the program this past year with an MA. She is using the fellowship to develop her research topic on community activism and the environment in the US Virgin Islands and East Carolina. Through the fellowship she was able to visit these locations, in addition to Yale University’s School of Forestry and Environmental Studies, in order to coordinate with local researchers.

  • This year the department admitted five graduate students with funding. Of those, one (DaShanne Stokes), received the enhanced Irvis Minority Fellowship, which allowed us to recruit our first Native American student. Mr. Stokes was a highly accomplished candidate with two Master’s degrees, and we expect him to do very well here. In this case, the 2-year Irvis fellowship was part of a 5-year funding package, 3 of which will be in the form of teaching assignments.
  • Chen Jye Thum and Carolyn Zook were each awarded an Arts and Sciences Fellowship for the 2008-2009 academic year.

Congratulations go out to all of our graduate and undergraduate students for all of their awards and accomplishments!

Faculty:

  • Kathleen Blee has been honored with three awards this year, the Chancellor’s Distinguished Teaching Award, Provosts Award for Excellence in Mentoring, and the Award for Distinguished Contribution to Scholarship from the Pennsylvania Sociological Society. Dr. Blee has been with the University since 1996 and has spent much of her life’s work researching racist movements and hate groups.