A Moot Court Team from Belmont University College of Law recently competed in the Regional ABA National Appellate Advocacy Competition. One of the two teams who participated won every round (on points or ballots) and emerged as regional champions. This team was made up of Jake Beggin, Emmie Futrell, Destiny Powell and Sarah Sims.
They defeated teams from LSU, Chapman, UCLA, Washington University and Michigan State. They also had the 4th best brief in the region out of 28 briefs and will be advancing to the National Finals tournament with another 23 teams from 6 regions to compete in Chicago in April.
A second team, comprised of students Caralisa Connell, Andy Goldstein, and Hannah Zeitlin, beat Faulkner but did not advance to the next round.
Student pharmacists Markesha Cook and Caleb Darensbourg recently represented Belmont at a Graduate School Fiar hosted by the Tennessee Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Participation (TLSAMP). Held on Feb. 23, the Fair was conducted in conjunction with the TLSAMP Annual STEM Undergraduate Research Conference. Drs. Edgar Diaz-Cruz and Marilyn Odom represented the College of Pharmacy faculty.
The Alliance is composed of 10 institutions in Tennessee — Fisk University, LeMoyne-Owen College, Middle Tennessee State University, Nashville State Community College, Southwest Tennessee Community College, Tennessee State University, Tennessee Technological University, University of Memphis, University of Tennessee-Knoxville and Vanderbilt University.
Associate Professor in Belmont’s Theatre and Dance Department Brent Maddox was recently singled out by the Nashville Scene for his role in Studio Tenn’s production of “The Elephant Man,” which ran from February 16-26 at the Factory at Franklin. Maddox performed as Frederick Treves, a surgeon who rescues one of the main characters and cares for him at a hospital until his death. The Scene’s review of the play says, “Maddox’s finely etched portrayal of Treves is the necessary complement to the production’s overall success, in much the same way that the play Equus is about a troubled young man but is just as certainly the story of his psychiatrist. You can’t have one without the other.”
The review also mentioned theatre alumna Rebekah Lecocq, musical theatre alumnus Matthew Rosenbaum, theatre BFA performance student Mckenzie Wilkes and musical theatre students Anna Dewey and Jake Perotti, all of whom were a part of the production’s cast.
For more information on Belmont’s involvement in this production, including alumni and student behind-the-scenes roles, click here.
Members of the Belmont Vision staff recently traveled to the University of Mississippi to compete in the Southeast Journalism Conference, bringing home many awards as souvenirs. The student-led news organization beat 29 universities from seven states by winning Best College Website of the year. Additionally, the team received second place in the Best Overall News Team category and ranked third for the Best College Video News Program for the weekly video sports production Bruin Blitz. Members of the staff were also awarded individually:
Kelby Bibler – sixth, news writer
Rebecca Arnold – second, arts and entertainment writer
Taylor Andrews – sixth, feature writer
Samuel Cowan – fourth, sports writer
Kat Miller – fourth, magazine writer
Riley Wallace – fifth, special events reporter
Lexi Brunk – fourth, TV news feature reporter
The conference also involved an onsite competition where staff members competed in 10 categories including copy editing, news writing and photography. “The onsite competition is about deadline writing and precision,” said Vision Faculty Adviser Dorren Robinson. “That’s probably a more accurate predictor of how students will do in the work world.” Individual onsite awards included:
Riley Wallace – second, current events
Zach Gilchriest – third, feature writing
Sara Scannell – second, arts and entertainment writing
Hunter Morgan – third, sports photography
Melissa Kriz – first, copy editing
Rebecca Arnold – first, media ethics/history
To learn more about the Belmont Vision and to see its award-winning website, click here.
Justin Weaver, Curb College of Entertainment and Music Business, recently had two songs released on Brantley Gilbert’s latest album, “The Devil Don’t Sleep.” Weaver’s songs including “Bro Code” and “In My Head.”
He will also have a song on Josh Turner’s “Deep South,” set to be released March 10. That song is titled “All About You.”
Dr. Doyuen Ko, assistant professor of audio engineering technology, received a 2017 Juno Awards nomination (Canada) for his engineering work for “Brahms: String Quartets, Op. 51 NOS. 1 & 2, New Orford String Quartet (Bridge Records).” The album is nominated in the Classical Album of the Year: Solo or Chamber Ensemble category.
Ko was responsible for recording and mixing of the entire album and this is his fourth Juno nomination. A recent review of the album from a prestigious classical music magazine “Gramophone” can be found here.
The Juno Awards are presented annually to Canadian musical artists and bands to acknowledge their artistic and technical achievements in all aspects of music. New members of the Canadian Music Hall of Fame are also inducted as part of the awards ceremonies. A complete list of award nominees is shown here, and the awards will be presented on April 2.
Local Nashville Sculptor Tony Novak recently finished restoring the last two historic Belmont statues in a series of 14, a process that he has been working on with the University for nearly 11 years. Novak began restoring the statues in the summer of 2006 when he met with Judy Fisher and Mark Brown, executive director of the Belmont Mansion, to look at the original pieces in the basement of the Leu Center for the Visual Arts.
Due to weathering and erosion that had occurred from spending many years in the harsh outdoors, several of the statues were missing limbs and even heads. The ones that still contained all of their original parts were so worn that many of the details, such as facial expressions, noses, ears, eyes and hair, had been washed away from acid rain and tough cleanings. Two of the 14 originals no longer existed and had to be completely recreated through the study of detailed photographic records, which were also closely examined to determine exactly what details could no longer be found on the originals.
Through records obtained by the Belmont Mansion, Brown was able to estimate that the statue series was most likely created in Italy around 1853. The first statues bought by Adelicia Acklen, whom owned and resided in the mansion in the early 1800s, were placed on the estate grounds in the fall of 1853. Acklen likely bought them on a stateside shopping trip after they were imported from Italy to be sold to wealthy Americans. The collection is the largest 19th century cast iron collection in the United States, and may also be the largest collection of mid-19th century marble garden statues in the country.
“The use of statuary in gardens had been common since the time of the Romans. They started the tradition,” Brown said. “In Renaissance Italy, this tradition of marble statues and urns was fully developed. By the time you get to the building of Belmont, in the style of an Italian Villa placed in what they would have considered Italian style gardens, the use of marble classical statues was essential. [Acklen] was able to supplement the marbles with American-made cast iron statues as well.”
OriginalRestored
Novak’s restoration process involved several steps: cleaning, reconstructing and gluing on broken sections. Reconstructions are then sculpted over with temporary clay “skin” to detail over the worn areas. Molds are made of these re-shaped statues, then all of the clay reconstruction is removed from the originals. The molds are used to create cast-stone replicas, which are then placed back outside on campus grounds.
“There has been something endearing to me about these statues, which inspired me to restore them,” said Novak. “It is as if they each have a mysterious, quiet soul which reaches out and whispers, telling me who and what it is. All the while, prompting, enticing me to play a guessing game. They have shown me how to re-shape them. They taught me how to become a better sculptor.”
In addition to restoring these historic statues, Novak has created several original commissions for the University in years past. “Solomon: A Wise Ruler,” the largest sculpture, is located in the rotunda of the Baskin Law Center. The statues of “Peril” and “Folly” in the niches of the Trout Theater are also Novak’s original works.
“I have been blessed by Belmont with incredible challenges that pushed me into the most rewarding work I could have ever imagined doing,” Novak said. “I’ve been honored to contribute to such a beautiful campus with a genuine heritage.”
Working in Nashville over the years, Novak has restored plenty of other architectural and masonry elements, statues, planters, urns and even a Tang Dynasty terra cotta horse from the 10th century. His next challenge is to restore the “Two Dragons” sculpture of Fannie Mae Dees Park, located just down the road from Belmont. The dragons are considered a Nashville icon, and they are currently fenced off and closed to the public. Novak looks forward to this new challenge.
Belmont University research librarians Claire Wiley and Judy Williams were recognized in the January 2017 issue of “Keeping Up With…,” an online current awareness publication of the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL) that highlights emerging trends in academic librarianship. The issue, titled “Keeping Up with Academic Advising,” notes Wiley and Williams’ contributions in this area, citing their 2015 article from the NACADA Journal that presented student and institutional benefits of librarians serving as academic advisors.
Belmont occupational therapy students Thu Can and Lexi Herrera were recently selected to participate in the 2nd annual Summer Institute for Future Scientists in Occupational Therapy, sponsored by the American Occupational Therapy Association (AOTA). The Institute is a 1-day program that aims to match potential student scientists with doctoral and post-doctorate mentors. The selection committee at AOTA received over 80 applications nationwide and selected Can and Herrera to complete a cohort of 30.
Participants of the Institute will meet with leading occupational therapy scientists in June to address topics such as possibilities within OT science, considerations when evaluating potential doctoral programs and career opportunities. Additionally, the students are invited to attend the 6th annual 2-day Occupational Therapy Summit of Scholars at Boston University.
For a Study Abroad program in May 2016, Dr. Scott Hawley, physics, wrote “Polar Pattern Plotter,” an iOS app used for measuring sound directivity of loudspeakers and microphones. The app was released on the App Store last year. He also wrote a journal paper on the app, “Visualizing Sound Directivity via Smartphone Sensors,” (written in collaboration with Nashville sound engineer Robert McClain, Jr.) that has just been accepted for publication by the The Physics Teacher. A pre-print of the paper is available here.
Hawley has made the app Open-Source in order to foster its development as a community tool. The code is available here.
Dr. Doyuen Ko, assistant professor of audio engineering technology, received a 2017 Juno Awards nomination (Canada) for his engineering work for “Brahms: String Quartets, Op. 51 NOS. 1 & 2, New Orford String Quartet (Bridge Records).” The album is nominated in the Classical Album of the Year: Solo or Chamber Ensemble category.
For a Study Abroad program in May 2016, Dr. Scott Hawley, physics, wrote “Polar Pattern Plotter,” an 
