Assistant Professor Genevieve Ness, in the Department of Pharmaceutical, Social and Administrative Sciences, was selected to be a committee member of the Global Alliance of Drug Information Specialists. The committee is part of the U.S. Food & Drug Administration Center for Drug Evaluation and Research.  The committee is comprised of five members with diverse backgrounds, each chosen to represent a cross section of interests, concerns and responsibilities of their fellow drug information pharmacists.

Ness also serves as assistant director of the Christy Houston Foundation Drug Information Center at Belmont University.

Dr. Steve Murphree, professor of biology and entomologist, recently appeared on Fox News’ program “America Live.” Shannon Bream interviewed Dr. Murphree about ticks and tick-borne diseases during the show on Tues., Aug. 20.

In the most recent issue of Serve InDEED: Tennessee Journal of Service-Learning and Civic Engagement, three members of the English faculty published work connected to their service-learning practices in the classroom. In a piece titled “This Isn’t Your Mother’s English Class: Using Service-Learning Experiences to Improve Writing in the Composition Classroom,” Drs. Jason Lovvorn, Linda Holt and Charmion Gustke unpack an interactive workshop they conducted at the 2013 Tennessee Conference on Volunteerism and Service-Learning, held in Franklin, Tenn. In the workshop they shared ideas about the impact of service-learning in their writing classes, and they guided participants through a simulation and two writing exercises that showcased connections between service encounters, empathy, learning and writing. The article details this workshop experience and analyzes response data from workshop participants in terms of social justice, experiential knowledge and authentic writing.

In the same issue Lovvorn published an article titled, “‘Knowing the Why’: Personal Writing and Its Value in the Service-Learning Classroom.” He argues for the merits of personal, expressive writing because it encourages service-learning students to “synthesize intimate experience and more abstract academic knowledge. ” Using examples of student work from past service-learning classes, he shows how students can use personal writing to make important intellectual connections at the same time they produce engaging written work.

Clancy Smith, instructor of philosophy, will present a paper titled “Surplus Scarcity: A Critique and Amendment of Marcuse’s Freudian-Marxism” for the Rethinking Marxism: 8th International Conference (Surplus, Solidarity, Sufficiency) at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst in September.

Premier Guitar featured longtime audio engineering technology adjunct instructor Bil Vorndick as a Studio Legend in a recent issue, noting, “Experienced acoustic musicians know that when it comes to making stellar recordings, there are only a few engineer/producers who get the call, and Nashville legend Bil VornDick is at the very top of the list.”

Music Business Instructor David Schreiber recently presented a paper at the annual European Group of Organization Studies (EGOS) conference held in Montreal, Canada.  Of more than 2,000 submissions his study on “Strategic decision-making practices in music industry micro-firms: A Bourdieu practice perspective” was chosen to be discussed in the strategy-as-practice theme.  This paper provides a rich description into the practices of decision-making within the music industry. He has a forthcoming book review publication in the Management Learning Journal (2013).  The book titled, Practice Theory, Work and Organization: An Introduction by Davide Nicolini, addresses the multiplicity of practice theories available for organization studies today and argues for a pluralistic approach to using them in research. Schreiber also submitted his Ph.D. dissertation for examination with the University of Westminster in London, titled, “An Investigation of Influences on Strategic Decision-Making in Popular Recorded Music Industry Micro-Enterprises,” to be defended in late September.

Songwriting instructor Drew Ramsey co-wrote and produced three songs on the new Robert Randolph and the Family Band album “Lickety Split” on Blue Note Records. He also co-wrote one song and played guitar on three songs on the upcoming Jonny Lang album on Concord Records and co-wrote and co-produced one song and played guitar on four songs on the new India.Arie record on Motown Records. Along with fellow songwriting faculty James Elliot and Ginny Owens, Ramsey co-wrote the song “Don’t Waste Your Life” for Owens’ upcoming release, on which he also plays and sings. Finally, he co-wrote the song “Last Good Girl in the World” for Matt Wertz’s upcoming “Heatwave” record, and he played guitars and sang on Dave Barnes’ upcoming original and Christmas records.

James Weldon Johnson: Songwriter, a book written by Music Business Professor Don Cusic, has been released. Johnson was a noted Harlem Renaissance figure, author, poet (“God’s Trombones”) and Civil Rights leader during the 1920s and ’30s. Johnson was a popular Broadway songwriter, part of a team of writers, who wrote numerous hits like “Under the Bamboo Tree” and “Lift Every Voice.” The book collects Johnson’s early lyrics and tells the story of how he became a New York songwriter at the beginning of the 20th century.