Tears, Smiles and Jitters Resolve in a Wonderful Closing of another Life Chapter for CMST Majors

 

On Friday May 3, 2013 at 6:00 pm the Communication Studies Department (CMST) held their Spring Colloquium in the Atkinson Room of the Lane University Center.  The Communication Studies Department Colloquium is for CMST majors who finished their Capstone experience. The eight nervous but well prepared students presented on their Capstone experience in front of their professors, other faculty, fellow communication students and guests.

The Communication Studies Capstone is the culminating experiential component of the CMST curriculum for a major, the practicum or internship experience that helps students synthesizes their learning from previous course work within a real organizational experience that focuses on development of communication skills and reflection upon communication theories. The Capstone entitled the students to work in a professional setting for a 3 credit semester long course or in other words to complete 135 hours in a semester.

The Colloquium started with a welcome from the department chair Dr. Elesha Ruminski and then the Lambda Pi Eta inductions were presented. The Frostburg State University Communication Studies has a chapter of Lambda Pi Eta (LPH), the Communication Studies honorary society, LPH was founded in 1985 at the University of Arkansas, In 1988 LPH became part of the National Communication Association (NCA) and the official honor society of the NCA in July 1995.  This spring’s LPH inductees were Lauree Nicole Holland, Zackry P. Hromanik, Taylor L. Vandergrift and Sarah Elizabeth Wampler.

The Capstone speakers were Sarah Wampler, Lauree Holland, Ebonee Walker, Allison Meads, Jeremy Martin, Genesis Martinez, Brooke Hughes and Kayla Miller. As all eight very nervous students sat at their decorative tables on the edge of their seats they all anxiously awaited their turns. As many realizd towards the end of their presentations emotions took over. As they all realized a chapter of their lives were coming to a close there were many tears.

At the end of the presentations all the capstone presenters got together for a group photo. There were many exchanges of relieved smiles, hugs and congratulations to one another. Genesis Martinez said, “My capstone was a wonderful experience and even though I was nervous I would do it again.”

The graduating seniors from the Communication Studies Department are Kayla Miller, Olivia Flisher, Lauree Holland, Sarah Wampler and Genesis Martinez. Ebony Walker is graduating next semester and said, “If it wasn’t for my experience and being a part of the Communication Studies Department I wouldn’t be where I am today and where I will be in the future.”

Other communication students who attended the Colloquium were paying close attention of what they will be doing themselves within the next semesters of their college careers. Taylor Vandergrift stated, “I took mental notes of what will be expected of me and I am slightly nervous already. All the presenters did a wonderful job and look forward to having a wonderful experience as everyone seemed to have.”

This nerve-wracking event was also a rewarding one to all graduating seniors. The happy tears and relieved smiles are only the beginning of these students’ futures.

 

 

FSU's College of Liberal Arts Hosts Undergraduate Research Symposium

by Skye Pinney

Earlier today, students from each department of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences gathered in the ARMAH of the Lane Center to represent a variety of disciplines at the second annual Undergraduate Research Symposium. After opening remarks from Provost Steven J. Simpson, who said with satisfaction that the symposium had grown since last year, they stood at their poster-board displays, answering questions for the faculty members and students who meandered about the room.

Juniors Billy Briggs, Ahmed Owokodu, Dan Herold and graduate assistant Daniel Henneberger were among some of the Computer Science majors presenting at the Symposium. They were the first group from FSU to compete in the 2012 Maryland Cyber Challenge and Conference (MDC3) that took place last Fall. The first stage of the competition required them to “harden a security system, closing back doors and ensuring a more secure system,” and in the second round they “practiced identifying encryption schemes.” They didn’t make it to the third and final round, but “we will next year,” Briggs said, smiling.

Henneberger was the group's team leader for the competition.

Some of the presentations engaged more than just the mind. Ethnobotony major Gabriel Echeverri handed out tiny paper cups of homemade root beer in front of his poster, titled “Beverages of the Burg.” “This is what root beer is supposed to be. It’s made from sassafras roots,” he said, offering someone a cup and a sassafras root to smell. His poster illustrated how to make the root beer step-by-step. According to Echeverri, the Appalachian area and the University’s arboretum are filled with useable plants like this root. He and his group hope to host cider-making events sometime in the future. 

Representing the Engineering department, seniors Jacob Owens and Philip Sharpe explained their water purification device. “It’s basically a still, but a little more complicated,” Owens says. “It works with rain, seawater, or any other water in overabundance. It’s stainless steel, so it was designed with desalination in mind.” They hope to use the $1100 device to operate the hydrogen generator in the SERF building, which requires deionized water. Their still is significant because it uses a vacuum to lower the boiling point of water, minimizing the heat input and therefore saving energy. “Typically water boils at 212 degrees Fahrenheit. In a vacuum, it boils at 165 degrees Fahrenheit,” says Sharpe.

Senior Engineering major Time Steele poses in front of his project, a conversion nozzle system for a vertical axis wind turbine. 

Junior Geography major Michael Kennedy said the Symposium was an "enriching opportunity to learn what others were doing with their research." Overall, it was a success.

College of Liberal Arts and Sciences

Get a Load of Interesting Information

        

            On May 3, 2013, Frostburg State University held “The College of Liberal Arts and Sciences Undergraduate Research Symposium Abstracts” in the Lane Center. The event lasted from 10 am to 2pm. In the Lane Center, the first floor is where the event took place. In the lobby area, on the first floor, there were two tables joined as one to provide anyone with information and booklets about the event. At the table, there were four women nicely greeting anyone approaching the table or going towards the Alice R. Manicur Assembly Hall. When approaching the table and facing the four women, looking at the background behind them was a beautiful bright sunny shinning day that looked across at the Pullen Hall building and people outside walking.

Walking into the Alice R. Manicur Assembly Hall, there were tables with exhibits from the different academic departments in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences and persons standing by the exhibits to explain more of what a visiting person would want to know about the departments and information on the exhibit.

There were speakers every thirty minutes in Lane Center rooms 111 and 113.

An interesting oral presentation that took place in Lane Center room 111 was by speaker Dana Bridges Bohrer, speaking on “The Grand Guignol Theatre: Venue of Social Change and Spectacle,” being an influential theater in the 20^th century.

Entering the Lane Center room 111, the back of the neatly rows of chairs were the first thing to see when entering through the door. All the chairs were facing the screen where Dana Bridges Bohrer’s PowerPoint presentation projected on reading, “The Grand Guignol Theater: Venue of Social Change and Spectacle.”

The presentation began with Dana Bridges Bohrer introducing herself and going right into her presentation.

The theater was the product of cultural modernism and naturalism and to open the eyes of the French, upper and middle classes, to the difficult lives of the lower class. When leadership changed hands it became a theater of horror.

By the end of the 1880’s the concept of theater changed to new ways of thinking arose because theater started to become predictable, had a view of only one class, and didn’t convey reality and creativity to where it reached the point that is was irrelevant to the lives of the people. The concept of modernism, which was the sense of old ways, expressions, and thinking were to no longer applicable to the changing scene.

In 1897, Oscar Métenier opened his theater, Grand Guignol. He intended to inspire the audience to feel sympathy for the lower class people who were betray. The name choice for the theater, Grand Guignol, showed his empathy for the lower class. The name Grand Guignol came from a popular French puppet character known as Guignol which translates to puppet show. Guignol’s character was a social commentator that criticized the upper and middle class while speaking out in favor of the lower class; adding the word Grand made it known that the performances were going to be performed by people and not by puppets.

After a year of success for Oscar Métenier, he left the Grand Guignol because he began to feel he couldn’t maintain the originality needed to keep the theater running. In 1898, Max Maurey took over directions and management at the Grand Guignol Theater. Max Maurey shifted the character of the theater from naturalism to melodrama, transitioning the venue for gore. The lower class were no longer to be empathized with but to be tortured, murdered, and victimized in order to inspired laughter and terror among the audience members.

Max Maurey had new ideas for the theater that inspired financial success rather than teaching anyone a lesson and that success was going to happen by having “‘slice-of-death’” drama. He wanted to have violent sex and spectacle while still keeping the theater alive. Indeed, the popularity of the theater grew dramatically. Max Maurey increased the brutality on the stage having the actors use animal blood and organs as props.

As presenting, Dana Bridges Bohrer used many pictures in her presentation to show the audience how these plays looked. Not only did I like the presentational aid, also did Edward Custer saying “I liked the use of photos and the slide presentation definitely aided her to cover the material.”

The Grand Guignol never portrayed plays like the supernatural but focused on the concept of the monster within us.

Having these bloody and horrifying plays, there were questions to whether it would increase the violence in the streets, shockingly there were fewer crimes.

Dana Bridges Bohrer wonderfully and effectively communicated her information and visual aid to her audience. Sophomore, Jonathan Stewart, says “To be honest I didn’t know too much about it, so it was all fairly new information to me.” Everyone left knowing something interesting about The Grand Guignol Theater.

Not knowing what to expect coming to the presentation, senior Tammi Stevens mentions, “The subject was very interesting. I learned more about theater, social classes, and more recent history.”

Just from one presentation, there was so much information and it was present very well. Go to next year’s "College of Liberal Arts and Sciences Undergraduate Research Symposium" to gain more knowledge of some interesting information you may have not known.
  

-LaVonne Sauls

Hip-Hop, Authority, And Relationships

On Wednesday, Frostburg State University hosted an event called Bust It Open. This program was designed to explain the history of hip-hop and its correlation to the roles that black males play in relationships.

This photo was taken from
the  University Of Cincinnati

website.

Dr. Derrick J. Jenkins was the host of the event. Before starting the event, Dr. Jenkins went through his quick background. He began by telling us about his personality when he was a boy. Being the only boy of four, he described himself as the surrogate husband to his mom. Yet he then went on to say, "Authority really wasn't my thing." Which ultimately lead him to military school. (His reasoning for going to this school was that he saw the logo and like the sword that was part of it.) However, Jenkins didn't really like the environmental since all military school is authority. He went on to go to the University Of Cincinnati where he majored in African American studies.

While in college, he and a couple of his buddies decided to join fraternities in order to meet new people. He later went on to talk about how some of these frats that they joined seem to always be at war with each other. "It was the Best and worst thing I've done." What he learned most from joining a fraternity was the role of identity. Jenkins described identity as creating or mirroring an identity created by popular culture. Which is how we segued into the identity created by the popular culture of hip-hop.

Before talking about hip-hop he asked the audience what a "ratchet culture" is. The audience collectively agreed that these days a ratchet culture is described as ignorant or "ghetto" people. This then lead to the mini-history lesson on the word ghetto and how these days it has been used greatly out of context. When we talked about ratchet culture, Jenkins steered the conversation to the context of hip-hop music and how it can represent a ratchet culture.

"Does hip-hop influence relationships or does it start in the home?" This was an exercise created by Dr. Jenkins. He told us to stand in three sections to express our answer to the question: Agree, Neutral, Disagree. Out of 20-25 people, only 4 people disagreed that how you act in relationships was based on how you were raised and not lyrics. Tony Mancuso said, "It starts with how you're raised. It's through experiences, not music." However, the opposing side had a lot to say. They came to the conclusion that hip-hop is a culture in itself. It forms the way we think. "It started as music or genre to voice oppression." Chris Inskeep was very adamant when explaining that hip-hop was originally how African Americans voiced their opinions and their likes and dislikes. Listening to those likes and dislikes eventually become our likes and dislikes.

The idea that hip-hop is a culture and it affecting our feelings is a prime example or media priming. Media priming is when any mass medium starts to affect our thoughts and feelings. Media Priming is how you decide you have a favorite music artist or actor. While influence does start in the home, it also is affected by anything watched, listened to, or read. Think about the information you're taking in people!

Carmina Burana: What a Wonderful Phrase

This Sunday, April 28th, the Frostburg State University Chorale performed the entire contents of Carmina Burana, a very well-known collection of songs and lyrics. The contents of the songs were performed in Latin and German, but the program gave an in-depth translation of each movement. Not only did the Chorale perform, but the Percussion Ensemble and the Cumberland Choral Society collaborated on this piece. Even the FSU's Children's Choir had a small part through the performance. Furthermore, Dr. Karen Soderberg and Judith Brown, conductor for the Cumberland Choral Society, took on the role of Conductors during parts of the performance.

The most intersting part of the performance involved the soloists. The entire Opera had a number of a solo performances. The male tenor was performed by Peter Drackley, a student at the Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore, and the male baritone was performed by Eugene Galvin, former FSU alumnus. Both men were excellent, and they had quite a range of sound. The female lead was performed by Mariana Mihai-Zoeter, a faculty member in the Department of Music. The piano pieces were performed by Dr. Jay Dewire and Thomas Hunter, both very skilled players.

For a measly three dollars, students were allowed to appreciate this excellent musical performance. It would be very easy to convince people to attend for even more money, and this was apparent by the sheer number of audience members.  The house was absolutely packed full of students, faculty members, and even members of the Frostburg city community. There were very seats left empty, and everyone seemed to be enthralled by the entire performance. Every piece was filled with energy, meaning, and feeling from the performers. During one piece, Samantha Flowers, Music major and Dance minor, performed a short ballet on the edge of the stage. She wore a very colorful dress, and her dance mirrored the attitude of the music. The performance began and ended with a brilliant performance of “O Fortuna,” and it was clearly a favorite piece for all of the participants in the performance.

Heather Wahl, Music major, said that “being in Carmina Burana was a great experience. So much effort and passion was put into the show that it was hard not to enjoy. It is something that I will never forget.” Alex Jones, a Psychology major in Chorale said that she feels "it's incredibly fun to perform. The carnality of it really resonates with a kind of basic desire and primitveness that people seem to have. It's probably my favorite work." This positive response was felt by the audience members as well. Dominic Rogers, English major, said “It was an awesome show! I have no idea how they’re going to top it next year.” Even those individuals who may not be part of the Music department had an appreciation for the performance.

What was perhaps a more endearing part of the performance was the collection of performers and family members gathered in the lobby of the Performing Arts Center. There were cameras flashing, people hugging and smiling, and performers laughing with their peers after a great performance. The energy and positivity was effusive throughout the room. Even the skeptical members of the audience left with a good feeling. At the end, there was a standing ovation, and people clapped for a good couple of minutes. Frostburg State University should be proud of their Chorale for this excellent display of artistry.

United for the Cause

Frostburg State University's students and staff gathered together on April twenty-sixth to support finding a cure for cancer in the event titled, "Relay for Life." Over sixty-four thousand dollars was raised and over eight-hundred people participated. The top company to donate was Greeks at FSU, with a total of $11,289.43. The top participant was Samantha Basile, who rose $1,690. Samantha states, “My reason for participating in a Relay For Life event is personal. My dad was diagnosed in 2012 with a Nasal Melanoma. He underwent Cyber Knife Radiation treatments and in December was scanned and it appeared the cancer was gone. Unfortunately in February of this year we found out that the cancer had metastasized to the Liver and Lymph Nodes. He received one Chemo treatment but unfortunately the Cancer was too far spread. He is now home with Hospice care and the love and support of family and friends. I am in hopes that although my dad will soon lose his battle with this insidious disease that I might in some small way help someone else from losing their battle. I hope that one day there will be a cure for all Cancer.”

Cancer starts when abnormal cells grow out of control. Normal cells grow, divide, and die, while cancerous cells continue to grow and create more abnormal cells like it. As a cancer cell grows it pushes nearby organs; this pressure may cause the signs of cancer. The disease is not contagious, but it can be transferred from one body to another in the event of an organ transplant. When a patient is about to receive an organ, doctors place said patient on medications that weaken the immune system so that it doesn't attack the new organ being placed inside. Therefore; cancer cells from the organ enter the body.

Cancer survivor Colleen shared her story for Relay on the website: "I will proudly walk the Survivors Lap at Relay For Life this year! On January 29, 2007, I got the news that no one wants to hear: You have cancer. As many can attest to, I was sick, angry, scared, devastated, and the list goes on. Mine is colon cancer. After surgery that took eight inches of my lower colon, I thought everything was behind me, and I walked proudly and emotionally in my first Relay For Life in June 2007 during the Survivors Lap. My family was with me and presented me with roses as I finished that lap. It was a wonderful feeling of pride and excitement about what this diagnosis DID NOT take from me. In February 2008, I went for my one-year follow-up colonoscopy, expecting that I would graduate to less frequent colonoscopies. Unfortunately, my worst fears were confirmed when I heard the word 'recurrence'. Although I was not able to participate in Relay last year because I was undergoing chemotherapy, I will proudly walk the Survivors Lap at Relay For Life this year! Relay For Life is a great way for all of us to recognize that cancer does not have to stop our lives. It's just a battle that can be won... one day at a time" -Colleen.

Michele and her son Eli

The top team to donate, with a total of $9,378, was Chele's Stars. Whitney Glotfelty, co-team captain with Renatta Glotfelty, states, "Chele's Stars was made in honor of my (Whitney) aunt Michele Glotfelty Eggleston who lived a beautiful, caring, and thoughtful life. She joined the ranks fo the angels after battling pancreatic cancer in her early forties. She left behind a kind and dedicated husband, Matt, and two young boys, Eli and Ian, who help tirelessly with the efforts of Chele's Stars each year. This team is comprised of many friends and family of Chele, who we know is smiling down on us each year as we take strides toward ensuring that one day the words "you have cancer" are extinct." 

A Night in Neverland

Peter Pan has made his way to the Frostburg campus. The wonderful story of “Peter Pan or the Boy Who Would Not Grow Up” was adapted by Matthew Earnest from J.M. Barrie and directed by Chris McCabe. The story starts in the nursery of Wendy, John, and Michael. Wendy would tell the most fascinating stories of Peter Pan’s adventures fighting pirates, mingling with mermaids, and local Indians. Peter Pan would visit the nursery to hear these stories of these wonderful adventures. That same night Peter came into the nursery looking for his lost shadow. As he stumbled over the furniture he woke
Wendy and her brothers. He told them of Neverland a place where “you never have to grow up.” The children were so exited but had no idea how to get there. Peter implies “you fly of course.” The audience’s eyes lit up as the performers lifted off the ground and into the air. The play embodied the story completely with actual flying stunts. It was an amazing experience seeing the character’s fly right above the audience’s head’s.   

They follow Peter into Neverland only to face the gruesome antagonist Captain Hook of course, trying to capture and kill Peter Pan. Hook wants to capture Peter Pan because he cut off his left hand and feed it to a hungry croc. The croc liked the taste of his hand so much he chase’s him to finish the rest of him.  Hook was dressed in a creative bright red jacket covered in buttons wearing his large captain hat. His crew was dressed in grungy outfits attending to the captain’s every demand. Captain Hook shouted for the crew to “fire the cannons,” but once again Peter out smarted the old Hook.  

The story of Peter is never complete without his gang of lost boys. The costumes where depicted as kids playing dress up in anything they could find in the house. They were dressed in plastic, string, fabrics, and a mix of objects. The lost boys Tootles, Nibs, Slightly, and the Twins all were immature and carefree kids following Peter Pan as there leader. Tinker bell is one of the cheekiest characters of the bunch. She was hot headed and jealous of Wendy and Peter’s relationship.

                The production Peter Pan was an amazing piece of work and very well performed.  Hannah Elliott says “l liked the play… I was shocked on how good it was.” She said, she did not expect the play to look as advanced as it did, but it was really good. Nick White also enjoyed the play he said “there where so many beautiful abstract colors. The play reminded me of my child hood days.” This play had plenty of memorable scenes, such as the action packed Peter Pan and Hook sword fight. Hannah Elliott also said her favorite quote was Peter Pan’s line “to die would be an awfully big adventure. “  The play Peter Pan is about a child hood dream becoming a reality and the character Wendy realizing the importance of growing up. If we can learn anything from this play it would be live your life as an adventure. Walt Disney always encourages his audience to believe that “the dreams that you wish will come true.”