The College of Pharmacy partnered with University Ministries for an international spring break Immersion trip geared towards health professional and pre-health professions students. The team was comprised of four faculty and staff members, one professional medical interpreter, eight undergraduate students with an interest or major in healthcare-related fields and two fourth-year pharmacy students. Together they provided diabetes, asthma and vision screenings, as well as nutrition, hygiene and first-aid education to migrant workers at Finca la Azotea coffee plantation in Antigua, Guatemala. Additionally, the team spent one day working with at Escuela Proyecto la Esperanza, a nongovernmental organization school for underprivileged children assessing height weight and vision percentile projections.

Immersion activities included learning about the processes of growing, harvesting, roasting and packaging coffee, grocery shopping in a neighborhood market, visiting a private university, Universidad Francisco Marroquín, touring the Moore Pediatric Surgery Center and attending religious services on Ash Wednesday.

“The impact we may have had from simply educating the plantation employees may save lives one day. We had a few patients share they had family members who died or had been in danger because they did not know basic first-aid.  According to our partner in Guatemala, who initiated and helped organize this trip, many other coffee plantations are now expressing interest in collaborating with Belmont to provide similar services at their locations in the future,” said Jordan Tarter, a fourth-year pharmacy student.

Dr. Rachel Rigsby and Dr. Alison Moore, both associate professors of chemistry, took five students to the National Meeting of the American Chemical Society (ACS) that was held March 16-20 in Dallas, Texas. The ACS’ 247th National Meeting & Exposition featured thousands of presentations on new discoveries in science. The topics included food and nutrition, medicine, health, energy, the environment and other fields where chemistry plays a central role. Some connected with the meeting’s theme of “Chemistry and Materials for Energy,” which showcases energy technologies. The National ACS meeting is host to more than 15,000 chemists from all disciplines and career paths, including undergraduate and graduate students, teachers, professors, post-docs, researchers and industry representatives.  

Belmont students Vickie Lim, Daniel Beagan and Lee McGill presented research posters at the conference.  Bavly Daowd, Vickie Lim and Leena Patel presented a poster on Belmont’s Student Chapter of the American Chemical Society’s (SMACS) activities. They also accepted a Commendable Award for their SMACS chapter activities for the 2012-13 academic year.

Nine students and six faculty members recently attend the Mathematical Association of America (MAA)’s 2014 Southeastern section meeting at Tennessee Tech in Cookeville, Tenn. The Southeastern Section of the MAA (MAA SE) advances the mathematical sciences within the states of Alabama, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Tennessee. The conference was held March 13-15. Math majors Max Shenfield, Jackson Streeter, Annie Brunelle and So “Sara” Chung competed in the Math Jeopardy tournament. Senior Mathematics major Angela Gaetano gave a presentation on “The Impact of Censoring on Estimator of Slope Parameter in a Simple Regression Model” and junior Mathematics major Annie Brunelle gave a presentation on “Brownian Motion and Probability Simulations.” Other students that attended the conference included Mary Yang, Savannah Halliday, Geoffrey Gross and Isak Wilson.

Mathematics faculty were also actively involved at the conference. Dr. Andy Miller completed his three year term as Tennessee state director and gave a presentation on “Real World Projects, Real World Writing.” Dr. Robin Lovgren gave a presentation on “Herding Cats – Using Attendance App to Learn Names and Keep Up with Your Students.” Dr. Mike Pinter spoke on “Ideas for Ending a Course Effectively.” Kay Geving presented her work titled “College Algebra Course Redesign.” Dr. Sarah Ann Fleming gave a presentation in the Graduate Student Workshop on “Job Application Materials.” Dr. Danny Biles was also in attendance at the conference.

Two trial advocacy teams from Belmont University College of Law competed in the Louisville, Kent., regional of the 2014 American Association for Justice (AAJ) Student Trial Advocacy Competition. Both teams went undefeated until they met each other in the championship round.  The team of Emily Cole, Dayne Geyer, Robert Martin and Patrick Ober narrowly bested Ardath Griffin, Rachel Hogan, Ron Laffitte and Sara Page to win the regional.

Director of Advocacy and Associate Professor of Law Amy Moore said, “The College of Law is extremely proud of both of these teams’ performances. The championship team won every single round; in fact, of the multiple judges hearing each round, our championship team won over every single judge — not one judge voted for the opposing team! Our mock trial students have put in so much time and effort, and this weekend they were able to showcase their skills and the Belmont College of Law. No one could believe that this was only our second year with an advocacy program at such a new law school. These students are what Belmont Law is all about.”

Advocacy teams competing in the Kentucky regional hailed from law schools at Indiana University, the University of Arkansas, the University of Illinois, the University of Mississippi, the University of Missouri, the University of Tennessee and Washington University in St. Louis.

Belmont’s trial advocacy teams were coached by Middle Tennessee attorneys Margaret Garner and Andrew Caple-Shaw. In a few weeks, the championship team will travel to Santa Monica, Cali., to compete in the National Tournament against 13 other mock trial teams from across the nation.