Graduate student

by Sara Cunningham

Rachel Dunnagan has always been as dedicated to the education of others as she is to her own education.

Teaching comes natural to the math and classics senior.

Her love of education began with creating pretend assignments for her younger sister when they played school as children and continued with Dunnagan’s devotion to helping her classmates with their studies in high school.

The Louisville native was scheduled to graduate summa cum laude with a Bachelor of Arts degree in math and a second Bachelor of Arts degree in Classics this past spring, and plans to progress to a graduate program to continue preparing herself for a long career in teaching math and Latin to high

Psychology Junior

by Sara Cunningham

Amanda Hatton’s honesty and passion shines as she talks about the challenges she’s faced and how those challenges have shaped her goals.

“Five years ago, I had a big setback in my life,” the psychology junior said.

On Aug. 9, 2003, Hatton and her boyfriend were in a serious car accident on their way out to her family’s farm in Woodford County. Hatton’s boyfriend was killed and Hatton was badly injured. She spent two months in a coma, Hatton said.

“I had a closed-head injury and when I did finally wake up, there was so much I didn’t remember and I had to relearn how to do a lot,” she said.

But Hatton said she found strength in her experience and in her family. She is the youngest of seven children.

"When my accident happened, I was a student at LCC and I had to take that fall

There is one 12 or 13-year-old female, with great dental work, that he can’t get out of his mind. This is a case that haunts him.

“I can’t ID her,” said Bill Bass, one of the world’s leading forensic anthropologists and alumnus of UK’s College of Arts and Sciences. “There are cold cases, but they are never really that cold. We are constantly talking about them and there are new techniques that are coming out all the time that may break the case.”

Originally from Stephens City, Va., Bass came to Kentucky in the early 50s after being drafted and stationed at Fort Knox. When his military career was up, he decided to come to UK and was admitted to the psychology program with a minor in anthropology.

“Half way through the fall semester I realized I didn’t want to spend my time talking to people about their problems all day,” he said.

It was then he

Susan (Camenisch) Eriksson started her studies at UK as a music major, with a focus on piano. But when she took an honors section of geology during her junior year, she was hooked.

“After one exam, I went up to the TA and said, I love this, I love, this, I love this!” she recalls. “I was so excited. I said I wished I had found geology as a freshman.”

Eventually, her UK professors—particularly Dr. Bill Blackburn—helped Eriksson make the switch to majoring in geology as a junior, and she was able to graduate with just one extra semester of work, in the summer of 1971.

“I was the only woman undergraduate in geology at UK when I was there,” she recalls. “That was quite a big thing. It’s traditionally a very male-dominated field.”

Professors and graduate students in the department, who became her colleagues and friends, encouraged her studies, and

Jason Cummins’ employer gave him a three-year, full-tuition college scholarship, sent him to flight school, paid him to attend one of the most prestigious MBA programs in the country, and asked him to teach economics at West Point. In May, the UK Class of 1993 alum returned to take up the leadership of the UK Army ROTC program; the same program from which he himself graduated 16 years ago.

Cummins’ office walls in Barker Hall display a scrapbook of his Army career: the tail rotor blade from an Apache helicopter, the flag of the 101st Airborne, his MBA diploma from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, a cavalry sabre, and unit pictures from Iraq and Afghanistan. In addition, Cummins also brought with him a list of ambitious goals for the UK Army ROTC program that is matched only by his seemingly boundless energy.

A Lexington, Ky. native, Cummins followed

Katherine Osborne knew UK’s Department of English was the right graduate program for her the moment she met then-DGS Ellen Rosenman during a campus tour.

"She talked about her work, but she was more interested in me,” said Osborne, a Frankfort, Ky., native and graduate of Hanover College in Indiana. “I could tell she was interested in graduate students. That was evident from the get-go. She just completely turned me on to the program.”

Now in her fifth year at UK, Osborne’s interest in 19th-century British literature has flourished under Rosenman’s mentoring. Osborne credits two of Rosenman’s courses—one on George Eliot and the other on material objects in the Victorian age—as the impetus for development of her own dissertation

by Rebekah Tilley

Third-year political science graduate student Jonathan Powell is an early riser. By 6:30 each morning the Kentucky native is usually hiking up to Patterson Office Tower to start his day. Yet political science professor Dr. Daniel Morey always manages to beat him there.

“Dan is literally here at 5:00 AM every day. When I’m walking up I can see where his office is and the light’s always on. One day I hope I’ll be here before him but it’s probably never going to happen,” Powell said, shaking his head.

The hard working habits of both professor and student paid off recently when Powell’s paper titled “Determinants of the Occurrence and Outcome of Coups d’etat” was the grand prize winner of the graduate student paper competition at the Annual Meeting of the International Studies Association – South.

by Laura Sutton

photos by Lee Thomas and Brian Connors Manke

“It’s necessary for human beings to establish laws for themselves and live according to laws, or they differ in no way from the beasts that are the most savage in every way.”

(874e-875a, tr. Thomas Pangle).

In Plato’s “Laws,” the philosopher sketches the basic political structure and laws for a proposed colony in Crete. During the Workshop on Plato’s Laws participants will concern themselves with engagement in a similar political community. The anticipated event takes place at the University of Kentucky on March 26-28, 2009.

While conference-goers won’t be founding a city as happens in the “Laws,” the group will be undergoing some of the same processes by creating standards, norms and

by Laura Sutton

photos by Lee Thomas and Brian Connors Manke

“It’s necessary for human beings to establish laws for themselves and live according to laws, or they differ in no way from the beasts that are the most savage in every way.”

(874e-875a, tr. Thomas Pangle).

In Plato’s “Laws,” the philosopher sketches the basic political structure and laws for a proposed colony in Crete. During the Workshop on Plato’s Laws participants will concern themselves with engagement in a similar political community. The anticipated event takes place at the University of Kentucky on March 26-28, 2009.

While conference-goers won’t be founding a city as happens in the “Laws,” the group will be undergoing some of the same processes by creating standards, norms and

by Laura Sutton

photos by Lee Thomas and Brian Connors Manke

“It’s necessary for human beings to establish laws for themselves and live according to laws, or they differ in no way from the beasts that are the most savage in every way.”

(874e-875a, tr. Thomas Pangle).

In Plato’s “Laws,” the philosopher sketches the basic political structure and laws for a proposed colony in Crete. During the Workshop on Plato’s Laws participants will concern themselves with engagement in a similar political community. The anticipated event takes place at the University of Kentucky on March 26-28, 2009.

While conference-goers won’t be founding a city as happens in the “Laws,” the group will be undergoing some of the same processes by creating standards, norms and

by Rebekah Tilley

photos by Tim Collins

George Patton once said that “Compared to war, all other forms of human endeavor shrink to insignificance.”

An idea verified all too clearly these days; we cannot turn on the television or open a newspaper without being confronted with the harsh realities of contemporary conflict. Two professors in the UK Department of Political Science have made war the focus of their research: Daniel Morey and Clayton Thyne.

Morey has the posture and clean-cut look of a man with a military background – though neither he nor anyone in his immediate family has an extensive history of military service. Morey’s research focuses on three aspects of international conflict: why

Was it destiny or some predisposition that led John Yozwiak to the University of Kentucky College of Arts and Sciences? Or maybe it simply was a matter of finding a great opportunity.

Yozwiak, whose grandfather was the dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at Youngstown State University, was born in Binghamton, N.Y., but found himself relocated with his family to Lexington, Ky., when he was six.

Upon graduating from Lexington Catholic High School in 1990, Yozwiak, who comes from a long line of college graduates, knew that college was certainly the next step. He used his experiences from visiting friends at UK as well as his desire to stay close to home in choosing his collegiate destination.

“My family has always valued education. Therefore, attending college was very important to me,” Yozwiak said. “In part, I decided to attend the University of

Department of Pyschology Ph.D. Student

by Joy Gonsalves

The Department of Psychology has taught Ben Freer a thing or two about learners. Though this third-year Ph.D. student from the Cognitive Development Program has “always been philosophical about why people behave the way they do,” his academic experience has challenged his perspective on the cognitive differences among us. 

“It’s important to understand people from every walk of life, not as victims, but as different, and as I’ve grown, this is the direction my studies have taken me.” 

In the middle of the summer, Freer is hard at work on several research projects, each one related to that philosophy. One uses an EEG to measure brain activity in children with ADHD to further break down current

by Robin Roenker

Five years from now, the University of Kentucky will be regarded as one of the centers for cutting-edge research on children at risk.

That’s the hope of husband and wife psychology professors Robert and Elizabeth Lorch, who have spearheaded the effort to create a new Children at Risk Research Cluster at UK.

With funds awarded through the university’s College of Arts & Sciences, the Lorches have helped oversee the hiring of five new faculty members - three in psychology and two in sociology - whose expertise and

By Kami L. Rice

May 2009

Whatever stereotypes you have of Russian Studies graduates, Phillip Stosberg probably doesn’t fit them. He arrived at UK while a drummer for a Louisville-based chaotic punk band, The National Acrobat, that was sometimes touring nationally. Because he had to find practice space somewhere outside his dorm, living in the UK dormitories for two years was “like living in oblivion as far as drumming goes.”

“Actually, I didn’t really want to be in school all that much,” Stosberg admits. But fortunately, courtesy of parents who had always messaged the importance of it, he figured it was good to go to college. He had visited his older siblings at UK. It seemed like a good place, and they liked it, so he enrolled. And, he says, “I fell in love with it when I got there.”

He found his way to Russian Studies, pointing to seeds planted by

Undergraduate Student

Like countless other youngsters, Dustin Zerrer wanted to be a baseball player when he grew up. He even earned a scholarship to play in college, but after injuries derailed his career, he found himself at Eastern Kentucky University as a turf management/sports management major. He eventually worked for minor league organizations like the Lexington Legends and Dayton Dragons as an assistant groundskeeper.

Then he called for a timeout, stepped out of the batter’s box and reassessed his life. He wanted to take a different direction.

He knew education was the key. His first go around in college he admitted to being a below-average student that had poor work habits. So, he enrolled at Bluegrass Community and Technical College (Lexington Community College at the time) to rededicate himself to academics.

Ph.D. Students

by Joy Gonsalves

When graduate faculty from the Hispanic Studies Department announce this year’s scholarly grant recipients, they’ll deliver a triple-whammy. Matthew Feinberg, Michelle Dumais, and Brian Cole were each awarded a grant of some $3,000 sponsored by the University of Minnesota to study their love of loves—Spanish culture— in Madrid. 

Titled the “Program for Cultural Cooperation between Spain’s Ministry of Culture and United States’ Universities,” this joint US-Spanish initiative is designed to promote scholarly representations of Hispanicism abroad. Given to published professors and film societies alike, Cole, Feinberg and Dumais will apply their awards toward each one’s dissertation focus. With qualifying exams now behind them, it’s time for these third-

Ph.D. Student

Whether it has been in the fields of Guatemala, the rural landscape of Kentucky, or as a government official in Japan, Kiyo Sakamoto’s interest in the social aspects of agriculture has been the one constant that has propelled his work over the past 15 years.

After receiving his Bachelor of Science in Agriculture from Chiba University in his homeland of Japan, Sakamoto then worked with the Japan Overseas Cooperation Volunteers – a group “which is similar to the U.S. Peace Corps,” he said.

That landed him in Guatemala where he worked on agricultural recommendations and management issues for fruit cultivation in the developing Central American economy.

When he returned home two and a half years later, he took a position in the Japanese government  as a technical officer in the

A wave of current research at the University of Kentucky deals with the "Kentucky Uglies.”  That's the term UK President Lee T. Todd Jr. designated to the state's long-entrenched problems that include poverty, poor health care and illiteracy. 

Sociology professor Carrie Oser has been awarded a five year, $2.6 million grant from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) for her research project entitled “African American Female Drug Users: HIV, Health Disparities, and Criminality,” – a study that she fully acknowledges will be taking on several “Kentucky Uglies” at once.

“There is this triple

There is nothing pretentious or “prude” about UK Alumni Julie Sweet and Tom Riley. This husband and wife team – now history professors at Baylor University in Waco, Texas – say their formative years as Ph.D. candidates in the University of Kentucky’s Department of History, were crucial to their future success.

“Our professors were genuinely nice people who went out of their way to help us,” Riley said. “I wasn’t the best writer, but Dr. Eller understood that.” Riley, a retired naval officer from West Virginia, focused his dissertation on his home state during World War II, combining both his childhood and military experiences to write it. Serving as a teaching assistant under Dr. Ireland, Riley named this professor as a dynamic pedagogical