For the Record: Cheers

Cheers is a monthly listing of honors and awards received by faculty, staff and students plus recent appointments and promotions. Contributions must be submitted in writing and be accompanied by a phone number.

 

Saarnio wins prestigious Rome Prize fellowship

By Amy Cowles
Homewood

Robert E. Saarnio, director of historic houses and curator of university collections at Johns Hopkins, is one of 30 leading artists and scholars to win a Rome Prize in the American Academy of Rome's 109th annual competition.

Saarnio will be awarded a fellowship, including a stipend and room and board, to spend 11 months in Rome studying stewardship and interpretation techniques used at the city's historic sites in order to inform best practices at similar urban historic sites in the United States.

Structures of historic and architectural significance housing cultural collections pose distinct stewardship challenges, Saarnio said. They must balance the environmental needs of the building itself, the collections and human occupants, such as staff and visitors. Often the optimal conditions for the furnishings and collections inside the building are at odds with what's best for the building itself, or for visitor comfort, Saarnio said.

His project also includes an assessment of Italian heritage-site professional practice regarding target periods of significance, as exemplified by the distinction between a single date or tightly focused period that determines the furnishings plan and tour content, versus a multidecade or multiple-generation approach with differing periods furnished and interpreted.

"North American house museums have been working very actively in recent years to identify principles and adopt guidelines that can serve as a basis for such fundamental interpretive decision making," Saarnio said.

Saarnio will also study how officials are putting more pressure on historic sites to maximize attendance as a sole metric of success and thereby boost local economies in an era of increasing reliance on cultural tourism.

"Issues of legitimate carrying capacity and physical impact on historic fabric and collections are often subsumed, as boards and ownership organizations equate raw growth in visitor numbers with fiscal health, and as tourism officials celebrate ticket counts in a turnstile economy," Saarnio said. "I propose to examine Italian heritage-site practice in these realms, with a particular focus on management of optimal carrying capacity and visitor access-loading in historic interiors."

Saarnio, a curator, architectural historian and specialist in historic preservation, has been director of historic houses at Johns Hopkins since 2002, responsible for Evergreen and Homewood, two landmark historic houses owned by the university and open to the public as museums and centers for art and history in Baltimore.

He came to Johns Hopkins from Cranbrook Educational Community in Bloomfield Hills, Mich., where he was curator and collections manager for the community's cultural properties. Previously, he was curator of architecture at the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Mass. Saarnio is a 1992 graduate of Harvard with a concentration in the history of architecture. He earned a master's degree in historic preservation in 1994 from the University of Pennsylvania.

Saarnio will maintain an affiliation with Johns Hopkins as a research associate during his fellowship.

The Rome Prize is awarded annually to 15 emerging artists and 15 scholars through an open competition judged by leading artists and scholars in different fields. Established in 1894 and chartered by Congress in 1905, the American Academy in Rome is a center that sustains independent artistic pursuits and humanistic studies.

 

Bloomberg School of Public Health

Keith P. West Jr., a professor in the Department of International Health and its Center for Human Nutrition, was installed May 27 as the inaugural George G. Graham Professor in Infant and Child Nutrition. During his tenure at the School of Public Health, Graham and his colleagues discovered copper deficiency in malnourished Peruvian children and demonstrated that this trace mineral is essential to human health. His research on food proteins and child growth guided the development of commercial formulas used to feed millions of infants worldwide.
   West has worked in international health for 28 years, concentrating on the epidemiology and prevention of malnutrition in the developing world. He is currently directing a large, collaborative research project on the prevention of maternal and child micronutrient deficiency in northern Bangladesh. West received his bachelor's degree from Drexel University and his doctorate in public health from Johns Hopkins.

Scott L. Zeger, chair of the Department of Biostatistics and acting director for the Biostatistics Consulting Center, was installed May 17 as the inaugural Frank Hurley and Catharine Dorrier Professor in Biostatistics. The professorship was endowed by Frank Hurley and his wife and colleague, Catharine Dorrier. Hurley is chair and chief scientific officer of RRD International, a health care product development company that he co-founded in 2002. Dorrier is a senior technical adviser at the company. The couple believes that the key to improving international public health is turning data into information, and information into useful knowledge.
    Focusing on the collection and analysis of data from biomedical studies, Zeger's research involves using statistical methods in time series and longitudinal studies. His specialty is drawing inferences from data collected over time on cohorts of individuals. He has made major contributions to studies of smoking and health, mental health and environmental health.
    Zeger received his bachelor's degree in biology from the University of Pennsylvania in 1974 and his doctorate in statistics from Princeton University in 1982.

 

Health Divisions Administration

In this year's Council for Advancement and Support of Education Circle of Excellence competition, Change, edited by Patrick Gilbert, senior associate director of publications in Corporate Communications, took home the grand gold medal in the Internal Audience Newsletters category. The grand gold is the organization's top honor in the category. Hopkins Medicine, edited by Edith Nichols, director of publications, won a gold medal for cover design in the Visual Design in Print category and a bronze in the Magazine Publishing Improvement category.

 

Johns Hopkins Bayview

Daniel Buccino, licensed clinical social worker and an assistant professor in Psychology and Behavioral Sciences at the School of Medicine, has been appointed to a three-year term on the Maryland Board of Social Work Examiners, the group that regulates the practice of social work in the state. Buccino has been part of Bayview's community psychiatry program for 15 years.

Martin Makary, assistant professor of general surgery, and Simon Mears, assistant professor of orthopedic surgery, have been selected for the Jahnigen Career Development Scholars Program, which promotes geriatric training for specialists in various fields. The program provides two-year development awards, funded by Atlantic Philanthropies and the John A. Hartford Foundation. Only 10 specialists nationwide are selected each year.

 

Krieger School of Arts and Sciences

Olga Y. Lubman, a postdoctoral fellow in biophysics, has received the Dimitri V. d'Arbeloff Postdoctoral Fellowship, which will support her research into the basic biochemical mechanisms underlying cancer and neurogenerative diseases. The award takes its name from the founder and former chairman of the Millepore Corp., a multinational bioscience company. Lubman will receive $30,000 for one year.

Katherine L. McDonough, a rising senior, has won a prestigious Beinecke Scholarship, which defrays the cost of a doctoral education in one of the traditional liberal arts, with an emphasis on the humanities. A Hodson Scholar majoring in history with minors in music and French literature, McDonough spent most of the academic year studying French history at the Universite de Haute Bretagne in Rennes, France, where she also taught English to high schoolers at Lycee Emile Zola and conducted independent research about the life and motivations of Jean-Baptiste Leclerc, a musician and prominent political figure of the French Revolution. The Beinecke Scholarship Program was established in 1971 by the board of directors of the Sperry and Hutchinson Co. to honor Edwin, Frederick and Walter Beinecke, three brothers who had led the company. Each scholar receives $2,000 immediately prior to entering graduate school and an additional $30,000 while attending graduate school.

Paul Smolensky, professor and former chair of the Department of Cognitive Science, will receive the $100,000 David E. Rumelhart Prize and give the Prize Lecture at the 27th Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society in Stresa, Italy, July 21 to 23. The prize, announced in 2004, was created by the Glushko-Samuelson Foundation to honor David E. Rumelhart, a cognitive scientist who exploited a wide range of formal methods to address issues and topics in cognitive science.

Nancy Van Prooyen, a doctoral candidate in the Biology Department, is one of the first six recipients of a Gilliam Fellowship honoring the late James H. Gilliam Jr., a charter trustee of Howard Hughes Medical Institute, who spent his lifetime fostering diversity and opportunity in education and science. Created by HHMI, the fellowships provide up to five years of support for doctoral studies in the life sciences to disadvantaged students, including underrepresented minorities, who participated in the institute's Exceptional Research Opportunities undergraduate summer research program.
    Van Prooyen earned a fellowship in that program as an undergraduate at Reed College, working in the lab of Eric Kandel, a Nobel Prize-winning neurobiologist and HHMI investigator at Columbia University. At Johns Hopkins, she's working toward a Ph.D. in cell, molecular and developmental biology, and biophysics in the laboratory of Michael Edidin.

James Gilliam was chief counsel at Knickerbocker LLC, a private investment firm. An alumnus of Morgan State University in Baltimore, he served as secretary of community affairs and economic development to Delaware Gov. Pierre S. du Pont IV and was executive vice president and general counsel at Beneficial Finance Corp. before joining Knickerbocker.

 

Multidisciplinary

At its annual spring luncheon, the Johns Hopkins University Women's Network honored Karen Gosnell, Ilene Busch-Vishniac and Kerry Dunbar for their outstanding leadership. The three, selected by the organization's three chapters, received the 2005 Women's Leadership Awards recognizing their ability to motivate women in their work and community, develop leadership skills in others, mentor, increase employee knowledge of critical issues and strengthen the faculty's and staff's commitment to the university. Gosnell, a former chair of the APL chapter, is group supervisor in APL's Business Services Group. Busch-Vishniac, selected by the Homewood chapter, is a professor of mechanical engineering and former dean of the Whiting School of Engineering. Dunbar, from the JHMI chapter, is an instructor in the Department of Medicine and assistant chief of service at The Johns Hopkins Hospital.

 

Nitze School of Advanced International Studies

Kathryn Mohrman, executive director of the Hopkins-Nanjing Center Washington Office, received an honorary degree from Grinnell College on May 23 in recognition of her leadership and passionate support for higher education. Mohrman received her undergraduate degree from Grinnell and served on the college's board of trustees for 13 years.

Nathaniel Thayer, Yasuhiro Nakasone Professor and former director of the Asian Studies Program, will be awarded the Japanese government's Order of Rising Sun, Gold Rays with the Neck Ribbon at a ceremony July 11 at the ambassador's residence in Washington, D.C. The honor recognizes Thayer's accomplishments in the promotion of understanding of Japan and the strengthening of Japanese studies in the United States.

 

School of Medicine

Rhoda Alani, associate professor of oncology, dermatology and molecular biology and genetics, and Lisa Cooper, associate professor of internal medicine, have been elected to membership in the American Society of Clinical Investigation. Alani was recognized for her research on melanoma; Cooper for contributions to research on health care disparities and patient-physician communication.

Edward E. Cornwell III, chief of adult trauma, has won the Greater Baltimore Urban League's Whitney M. Young Jr. Award. The league aims to improve the socioeconomic conditions and quality of life for African-Americans and other minorities in Baltimore.

Christoph Lehmann, assistant professor of pediatrics and health information sciences, has been appointed chairman of the Continuing Medical Education Advisory Board.

The American Society for Clinical Oncology, the world's largest professional society for cancer clinicians, has selected eight Kimmel Cancer Center researchers for its awards program. Kala Visvanathan, assistant professor at the schools of Medicine and Public Health, is one of 13 recipients of ASCO's Young Investigator Career Development Awards; in her fourth year as a full-time faculty member at Johns Hopkins, Visvanathan will receive $170,000 as part of a three-year grant. ASCO Young Investigator Awards were given to fellows Christine Hann, Antonio Jimeno, Yvette Kasamon, James Kim, John Lee, Ido Paz-Priel and David Wang for their outstanding research proposals; they will receive $35,000 for one year.

 

School of Nursing

Patricia Abbott, assistant professor in Graduate Instruction, was recently appointed to the editorial board of Hispanic Healthcare International, the official journal of the International Association of Hispanic Nurses.

Jackie Campbell, Anna D. Wolf Professor and associate dean for faculty affairs, is the first nurse to win the American Society of Criminology's Vollmer Award. The award recognizes a criminologist whose research scholarship has contributed to justice or to the treatment or prevention of criminal or delinquent behavior.

Martha Hill, dean, was awarded an honorary degree at the commencement of the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey. Hill was recognized for her work in eliminating health disparities.

Miyong Kim, associate professor in the Doctoral Program, has been chosen as a Robert Wood Johnson Executive Nurse Fellow for the 2005-2008 training period. The program offers participating nurses experiences and skills to advance in executive leadership positions.

Robin Newhouse, assistant professor, is guest editor of the current issue of Excellence in Nursing Knowledge, a new online nursing journal. Newhouse wrote the featured article, "Building Capacity for Evidence-Based Practice."

Sharon Olsen, assistant professor in Graduate Instruction, received the 2004 American Journal of Nursing Book of the Year Award in the category of Nursing Research for her book titled Instruments for Clinical Healthcare Research.

Cynda Rushton, associate professor in Undergraduate Instruction, has been appointed to the Federal Advisory Committee for the National Children's Study and will serve on its ethics subgroup. The study is the largest longitudinal study of children and health in the United States.

Carol Smith, assistant professor in Graduate Instruction, and her co-workers at the Center for Addiction and Pregnancy Clinic at Bayview Medical Center have been awarded the 2005 Child Health Promotion Award from the Maryland Childhood Immunization Partnership in recognition of the high quality of health care they provided.

Julie Stanik-Hutt, assistant professor in Undergraduate Instruction, has been appointed to the editorial board of the Journal for Nurse Practitioners.

Betty Jordan, assistant professor; Daphine Miller-Clarke, senior administrative assistant/supervisor; and Mary O'Rourke, director of admissions, are recipients of this year's Dean's Awards. The awards are given annually to employees who display excellence and innovation, show outstanding achievement above and beyond their regular job, and demonstrate favorable impact within or beyond their own offices. Marie Nolan, associate professor, and Lee Swartz, project coordinator at the Institute for Johns Hopkins Nursing, were recognized with honorable mentions.

The Johns Hopkins Nursing Evidence-Based Practice Model and Guidelines has been selected as the recipient of the 2005 International Research Utilization Award. The creators of the model, Robin Newhouse, Sandi Dearholt, Stephanie Poe, Linda Pugh and Kathleen White, will receive the award at Sigma Theta Tau International's 38th Biennial Convention, to be held November 12 to 16 in Indianapolis.

 

School of Professional Studies in Business and Education

Edward F. Pajak, interim associate dean and director of the Graduate Division of Education, received the Johnnye V. Cox Award from the University of Georgia College of Education's Educational Administration and Policy Program. The award recognizes an individual for significant contributions in supervision and leadership. Pajak, who taught at UGA for nearly 20 years, has been a leader in the field, serving as president and secretary/treasurer for the Council of Professors of Instructional Supervision. At SPSBE, Pajak is also chair of the Department of Teacher Development and Leadership.

 

University Administration

Tom Hyland, a postal clerk in the Gilman Mail Center at Homewood, is the author of Bawlmer, Merlyn — Home of the Hons, a memoir published by Publish America.

 
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