Pam Parry, associate professor of journalism, won two awards Oct. 10 from the American Journalism Historians Association meeting in Birmingham. She took home two Honorable Mention Awards for her paper titled “Second Fiddle, Not Second Rate: Associate Role Obscures Anne Williams Wheaton’s Contributions to Public Relations.” She received Honorable Mention for the Maurine Beasley Award for the Outstanding Paper on Women’s History and for the Robert Lance Memorial Award for the Outstanding Student Paper. Parry is pursuing a doctor of philosophy degree in mass communication with an emphasis in public relations history. Thirty-five graduate students from across the country submitted conference papers, and 14 were selected to present at the conference, representing a 40 percent acceptance rate.
Parry Receives Two Awards
Massey Students and Faculty Build Habitat House
Belmont students and faculty from the Jack C. Massey School of Business teamed up with employees from Cat Finance on Sept. 19 to build a house for Habitat for Humanity. The group helped build a house for a single mom and her 5-year-old daughter in north Nashville.
The service project was the third in a series of service events organized by the Massey Graduate Council to provide students an opportunity to give back to the community and network with other students and alumni.
PKT Hosts Rave: The Paint Party
Zeta Alpha Chapter of Phi Kappa Tau put on one of the largest social events sponsored solely by a Greek organization on Belmont’s campus recently. The event, “RAVE: The Paint Party,” the event attracted more than 400 students on a Saturday night for a dance party involving techno music, fog, lights and body paint. Headed up by senior Mark Noel, the chapter built an outdoor room so as to leave no visible footprint.
“This event has proven to be successful because of its unique nature, and truly brings the entire chapter together to provide a fun night for everyone,” said social chair Mike Chapman. “Not only does it showcase our brotherhood, but also our strong supportive presence on campus, not just the Greek community.”
Perry Crowned Miss Tennessee 2010
Tucker Perry, a junior commercial music major, was crowned Miss Tennessee USA 2010 last weekend. Perry will compete in the Miss USA pageant on April 18, 2010, and the show will be broadcast live from Las Vegas.
Perry said, “Belmont has been so dear to my heart since the moment I stepped foot on this campus almost three and a half years ago. I feel so honored to be able to represent not only the state of Tennessee, but also Belmont University, and most importantly, the School of Music. I am so excited about this opportunity.”
Nursing Professor Recognized Locally as ‘Health Care Hero’
![Jane Shelby[1].jpg](http://forum.belmont.edu/achievers/archives/Jane%20Shelby%5B1%5D.jpg)
The Nashville Business Journal honored Dr. Jane Shelby, professor of nursing and the former director of the university’s undergraduate nursing program, as a “Health Care Hero” on Sept. 25.
“I am very honored and humbled by this award,” said Shelby. “It really is not an award for me personally but for all the faculty and staff in the School of Nursing who work so hard to prepare our students for their profession.”
Shelby was recognized in the “Behind the Scenes” category along with other local leaders, including Aileen Katcher of Katcher, Vaughn and Bailey Public Relations, Julie Warner from the Matthew Walker Comprehensive Health Center and Jonathan Uttz from Psychiatric Solutions. This was the third annual luncheon to “help celebrate the accomplishments of the leaders, innovators, strategists and caretakers, whose work is helping to grow the region’s health care industry and reinforcing Nashville as the health care capital of the nation.”
Pharmacy School Holds First Annual Practice-Site Poster Forum
Second year Student Pharmacists who have completed their first practice experience rotations presented posters summarizing their experience in the Frist Lecture Hall on Oct. 6. Fifty-six posters in all were displayed showing unique characteristics of the practice sites and the learnings achieved at these sites. First year pharmacy students, who will begin their practice rotations in January, attended to get tips on site selection, and pharmacy faculty attended to learn about student involvement at the sites.
According to Dr. Mark Chirico, assistant professor of pharmacy practice, who is course coordinator for the P-2 practice experiences, “This forum presented a unique learning opportunity for all participants. It exemplified the practical nature of our program and the hard work our student pharmacists are putting into their education.” The School of Pharmacy has more than 100 sites for training student pharmacists in dispensing and patient care across greater Nashville, and the number of sites is growing every semester to accommodate the growing student body.
Shaffer to Lead BarCamp Session
Brent Shaffer, a recent Belmont honors graduate, is leading one of the sessions at the 3rd annual BarCamp on Oct. 17. His session is titled “Test Your Might: Symfony vs. Rails – Framework Combat.” Shaffer works at Centresource Interactive Agency as a Web Developer and Architect. BarCamp is Nashville’s free “un”-conference for the digital and technical community. BarCamp has become the premier technology conference in Nashville, bringing together the best minds and representation of the hottest companies in the internet, entrepreneurial, new media and software industries, among others.
Students Participate in ‘The Big Read’
The Student Tennessee Education Association (STEA) chapter at Belmont University participated in The Big Read on Oct. 1 at the Hendersonville Public Library. Faculty and students from the Department of Education hosted a craft table for children to create bookmarks, do apple stamping and select a free book of their choice. The department partnered with VSA arts of Tennessee and the Hendersonville Public Library for the program, which is designed to revitalize the role of literature in American culture. The Big Read is an initiative of the National Endowment for the Arts in partnership with the Institute of Museum and Library Services and Arts Midwest.
Dr. Nunn Baruzzini Presents Active Learning Session at Conference
Dr. Deborah Nunn Baruzzini, director of organizational development and adjunct instructor of pharmacy, presented a session titled “Active Engagement in the Graduate Classroom” at the 2009 Lilly Conference in Traverse City in September. The session focused on demonstration of a variety of active learning strategies with strong participant engagement. The conference theme was “Evidence-Based Learning and Teaching,” which was chosen to reflect that approaches to teaching and learning should be based on scholarly activity. Baruzzini co-presented with Dr. Esther Swink, dean of education at Trevecca Nazarene University. They were “invited presenters” based upon evaluations and recommendations from the participants in their 2008 Lilly Conference session.
Belmont University Announces New College of Law
Belmont University announced today the opening of a College of Law, the first new law school in Middle Tennessee in nearly 100 years. Belmont’s College of Law represents the university’s seventh college and fourth doctoral program. The College will begin classes in fall 2011, and when at full capacity, it will enroll approximately 350 students.
Belmont President Dr. Bob Fisher said, “Announcing the launch of Belmont’s College of Law today is a perfect way to celebrate the one-year anniversary of hosting the 2008 Town Hall Presidential Debate. This university is focused on offering students a transformative education that enables their own civic engagement. Given the public role of many legal professionals, we believe a vital element of the Belmont Law education will be preparing our students for roles as community leaders and change agents.”
Belmont’s College of Law provides a natural extension of the university’s mission and vision, which emphasize challenging academics, a service-minded approach, real-world experience and community leadership. Belmont law graduates will be practice-ready attorneys, empowered by their education and co-curricular experiences to provide legal counsel in a variety of settings, with commitment to high standards of expertise and ethics. The College of Law will be housed on campus in a new building that will include a state-of-the-art Law Library.
W. Scott Sims, the 2008 president of the Nashville Bar Association and a member of the law firm Walker, Tipps & Malone PLC, said, “The Belmont University College of Law will be a wonderful addition to Nashville and to the entire region. As the legal landscape continues to evolve and our society faces new opportunities, it’s important to have bright, young minds who can engage new dilemmas of justice and the law. It’s easy to see from the fine graduates Belmont has produced as well as the incredible job the university did last year in hosting the presidential debate, that Belmont can tackle any challenge and succeed. I welcome the fresh perspective the Belmont College of Law and its students will undoubtedly bring to the legal community.”
A recent feasibility study indicated increasing need over the next decade for attorneys in Tennessee as well as in the region. Tennessee currently has fewer lawyers per capita (8.2 per 10,000) than nearly all of the states in which new American Bar Association (ABA)-approved law schools have opened in the past 10 years. In addition, there are hundreds of individuals interested in attending an ABA-approved law school in Tennessee who are currently unable to do so—in 2008, nearly 6,800 individuals applied for entrance to Tennessee’s three ABA-approved law schools, but only 1,773 were issued offers of admission. Other factors leading to Belmont’s decision to open a College of Law include the following:
• The U.S. Department of Labor projects that the employment of lawyers will increase 11 percent between 2006 and 2016. This is almost certain to outpace the growth of law school graduates, which has increased by only 2.5 percent over the past five years.
• Without new law schools, the number of lawyers per capita in Tennessee will decrease over the next 20 years, as the population of the southern United States is projected to increase much faster than the national average.
• Nationally in 2008-09, there were 83,371 law school applicants and only 49,414 available first year seats. Thus, 41 percent of law school applicants were unable to secure seats.
• A review of the roster of persons sitting for the Tennessee bar exam shows that many of these individuals are leaving the state to attend law school. In 2008, there were 797 first-time takers of the Tennessee bar exam. Of those, only 386 attended law school in Tennessee.
• There are no other new law schools scheduled to open in the southeastern United States between now and 2011.
Perhaps the best reason for a Belmont University College of Law, however, is the unique approach Belmont can offer. Provost Marcia McDonald noted, “As proven by this university being named a U.S. News top ‘School to Watch’ two years in a row, Belmont University continually embraces innovation that strengthens the quality of our education. Like all of our programs, the College of Law will link academically-challenging coursework with real-world experience and will provide an innovative curriculum that will put us at the forefront of legal education. The College of Law will increase our opportunities for campus engagement with legal, civic and justice issues, a focus emphasized by our hosting of the debate last year.”
The College will be integrated into Belmont’s main campus and offer specialties in areas that complement the university’s nationally-known undergraduate program offerings, including healthcare and entertainment business. In initiating the new graduate program, Belmont will work closely with experts in the field, both locally and nationally, to prepare lawyers for the needs and types of legal practice for the future.
