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Recognizing exemplary outreach teaching, research and service These Penn State faculty members are sharing research with individuals, organizations and communities to make life better
Dr. Joanna Cain
University Professor and Chair of Obstetrics and Gynecology Director, Division of Obstetrics and Gynecology Penn State Geisinger Health System The Milton S. Hershey Medical Center	Dr. Cain’s main outreach goal has been to provide quality health education and services to women across Pennsylvania to help them make informed health decisions for themselves and their families. Part of this goal includes a 40-county initiative to promote health education, advocacy and access to state-of-the-art services and information for both rural and urban women and their families. She has spearheaded several successful outreach efforts to address issues facing a broad spectrum of women, among them “As a Woman, ” a newsletter that reaches 30,000 Pennsylvanians, a bereavement program for families that lose unborn babies and a Women’s Health Institute, which delivers a variety of community health education programs. In addition to securing multiple grants and gifts to support her projects, she has recently begun a campaign to raise $1 million to support the development of additional outreach activities. Her colleagues praise her ongoing commitment to providing excellent teaching, research and service particularly for women who face health care barriers due to gaps in insurance coverage, lack of transportation, limited finances, extensive family responsibilities and physical disabilities. Dr. Cain continues to be a role model for medical students and colleagues in her pursuit of reaching out to women from all walks of life.
Dr. Elizabeth J. Corwin
Assistant Professor of Nursing and Physiology Coordinator, Family Nurse Practitioner Program Penn State, University Park	Through her outreach initiatives, Dr. Corwin connects Penn State’s expertise and resources with rural medically underserved communities throughout the Commonwealth. Her $800,000 federally funded, three-year grant for the Family Nurse Practitioner (FNP) Program Expansion to Rural Pennsylvania provides critically needed education to rural nurses by enabling the School of Nursing to offer FNP courses via videoconferencing technology to geographically dispersed classroom sites. In addition, the grant secures funding for part-time nurse practitioner faculty members at each site to facilitate student learning. Also as a result of her work, enhanced partnerships and increased collaboration have developed between primary care practitioners in rural communities and Penn State faculty. By bringing a high-quality training program directly to rural nurses, Dr. Corwin helps to ensure that nurse practitioners use their newfound education to benefit medically underserved communities. Through this and other outreach initiatives, rural nurse practitioners are able to provide superior health care to enhance the quality of life of rural residents.
Dr. Andris Freivalds
Professor of Industrial Engineering Director, Center for Cumulative Trauma Disorders Research Penn State, University Park	Dr. Freivalds is engaged in a variety of outreach activities, primarily through providing technical and instructional assistance to business and industry in Pennsylvania and throughout the world. In 1994, with the support of the Ben Franklin Technology Center, he established the Center for Cumulative Trauma Disorders Research to study the impact of ergonomics in various workplace settings. Companies benefit from his research by reducing their employee medical costs and maintaining a high level of productivity and profitability. The center has served 23 Pennsylvania companies since its inception. In addition, Dr. Freivalds and a team of graduate students have developed a computerized Cumulative Trauma Disorders risk assessment tool that is used for field-based measurement of job stressors. Dr. Freivalds offers several ergonomics short courses to smaller industries across the Commonwealth through Continuing Education and continues to provide instructional assistance both nationally and internationally.
Dr. J. Robert Nuss
Professor of Ornamental Horticulture Penn State, University Park	Dr. Nuss conducts numerous outreach programs in conjunction with Penn State Cooperative Extension agents on the selection, use, culture and maintenance of woody ornamental plants such as trees, shrubs and ground cover. His programs are designed to serve both as in-service training for county extension staff and Master Gardeners and to enhance the knowledge of homeowners, nurseries, garden centers, community officials and professionals in related industries. In 1997, he conducted 37 county, regional and statewide programs with 2,140 participants, covering topics including management of woody materials, plant science, plant propagation and pruning practices. In addition, he regularly provides horticultural assistance to commercial audiences and government organizations and routinely expands the instructional outlines for Master Gardener courses and textbook chapters on a variety of plant-related topics. Dr. Nuss also has a weekly garden column that is prepared and released to the news media, and he has appeared on Penn State Public Broadcasting’s television series “Take Note.”
Dr. Elwood L. Shafer
Professor of Environmental Management and Tourism Penn State, University Park	Dr. Shafer concentrates his outreach efforts on developing sustainable tourism and solving ecological impact issues within the Commonwealth and throughout the nation and world. In addition to providing traditional classroom instruction, he enhances his students’ learning by leading an educational trip to Jamaica during spring break, where students study the challenges and solutions to sustainable tourism development. He has designed a process that Caribbean governments use to prioritize a wide range of tourism planning and development options that considers various political, economic, social and environmental issues. He also conducted a series of two-week seminars on tourism marketing and economics for the World Tourism Organization in Mexico City and the Dominican Republic. In addition, Dr. Shafer has documented the amenity values of wildlife for the Pennsylvania Game Commission and has prescribed solutions to the recreational boater waste-disposal problem for the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission.
Dr. Wieslaw Grebski
Associate Professor of Engineering Penn State Hazleton	Dr. Grebski disseminates knowledge and resources to industry and communities in the Commonwealth and beyond. When several companies in the Hazleton region expressed a need for increased technical support to modernize their manufacturing methods, he responded by developing a cooperative program. It is jointly sponsored by the Northeastern Pennsylvania Industrial Resource Center, the Ben Franklin Technology Center, area businesses and the Penn State Hazleton Mechanical Engineering Technology program. As a result of his outreach initiatives, companies have realized enhanced use of computer-based technologies, introduction of just-in-time production procedures and adoption of improved quality assurance methods. Local industry has become increasingly competitive in the marketplace and has experienced growth and retention of jobs. Dr. Grebski also participates in the Wilkes-Barre Area Business Incubator Center, where he serves both as a technical consultant to start-up companies and as an evaluator of entrepreneurs’ product ideas.
Dr. Henry Gerhold
Professor of Forest Genetics Penn State, University Park	Throughout his career, Dr. Gerhold has sought to extend expertise in urban and community forestry to citizens, industries and communities in the Commonwealth and beyond. As leader of the Urban and Community Forestry Extension project, he provides forestry assistance to communities with the help of regional urban foresters, as well as through partnerships with state agencies and other Penn State faculty. In addition, he is founder of the Metropolitan Tree Improvement Alliance, an organization dedicated to developing better trees for metropolitan landscapes. He also leads the Municipal Tree Restoration Program, which assists communities in enhancing urban forestry programs in conjunction with the environmental objectives of regional power companies. Since the 1950s, Dr. Gerhold’s ongoing research for the Pennsylvania Tree Improvement Alliance has resulted in the creation of seeds of genetically improved Christmas trees to the nursery industry. This research has resulted in the development of four improved varieties of Scotch pine.
Dr. James M. Herman
Associate Dean for Primary Care Hershey Foods Corporation Professor and Chairman The Milton S. Hershey Medical Center	Dr. Herman focuses his outreach efforts on increasing access to care for the medically underserved, enhancing community health and improving the quality of the health professions’ workforce. As architect and director of the Pennsylvania Area Health Education Center (PA AHEC), he has developed and implemented a statewide model of decentralized health professions education which serves to increase citizens’ access to primary health care. The PA AHEC also targets recruitment and retention efforts for health care providers in medically underserved areas and has provided community-based training for more than 1,900 health professional students and primary care residents in rural and urban regions. As a result of his efforts with the PA AHEC, high school and college students interested in entering the health professions benefit from such community-based activities as health career clubs, shadowing and mentoring opportunities and networking. In addition, the PA AHEC has provided 89 continuing professional education programs to 4,710 physicians and health care providers via traditional and nontraditional instructional methods throughout the Commonwealth.
Dr. Kenneth B. Kephart
Associate Professor of Animal Science Penn State, University Park	Dr. Kephart extends Penn State’s expertise and resources to residents of the Commonwealth by studying the impacts of large-scale animal agriculture on local communities. He works closely with county extension agents to provide swine management information for both large and small pork producers and assists the industry in adopting appropriate management and business practices to minimize negative effects on nonfarm neighboring communities. He has developed a project to research and provide updated swine manure figures to local pork producing facilities. This information is vital in developing nutrient management plans and in assuring surrounding communities that the facilities are adequately addressing environmental impact concerns. In addition, he has initiated regional in-service training throughout the state to keep extension agents informed of agricultural production and industry/community conflict issues. Dr. Kephart also leads several public education forums on swine production throughout Pennsylvania.
Kevin Berland
Associate Professor of English and Comparative Literature Penn State Shenango	Dr. Berland’s outreach activities focus on the use of technology to create Web-based discussion groups on 18th-Century Studies. Prior to his technology initiatives, most typical interactions among colleagues in his field occurred through the traditional channels of professional conferences and journals. His efforts have created a unified community of international enthusiasts for whom his Web-based discussion groups serve as important scholarly forums. He has received universal support from his colleagues and is considered a trailblazer within his field’s more traditional paradigm. His technology initiatives were acknowledged by the American Society for 18th-Century Studies in 1993. In addition, he has conducted a workshop on electronic resources for teaching and scholarship and gave a presentation titled “Harnessing the Tide: Using Electronic Resources to Support Graduate Research Techniques and Bibliography Courses” at the spring 1999 conference of the American Society for 18th-Century Studies. He continues to publicly advocate the use of technology in his field as a means of generating new opportunities for intellectual exchange.
Dr. Charles D. Ghilani
Associate Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering Surveying Program Chair Penn State Wilkes–Barre	As program chair and faculty member of Pennsylvania’s only accredited surveying program, Dr. Ghilani is actively involved in providing outreach services to surveyors throughout Pennsylvania. His main activities focus on promoting an understanding of theoretical concepts underlying the application of technologies, including new survey equipment, in the surveying profession. In conjunction with Continuing Education, he has offered several workshops and review courses via videoconferencing to a wide audience of surveyors who are preparing to take professional licensure examinations. Along with a surveying Internet home page, he has developed several Web-based courses for surveying students who otherwise would not have access to an educational degree program. In addition to his services to the Commonwealth, Dr. Ghilani contributes his expertise to the American Congress on Surveying and Mapping (ACSM). Through his efforts with this national organization, Penn State Wilkes–Barre has been chosen as the site for the 2001 ACSM Surveying Teachers’ Conference.
Dr. James W. Travis
Professor of Plant Pathology Penn State, University Park	As the lead faculty member for the Penn State fruit pathology extension program, Dr. Travis trains county agents in Pennsylvania and in neighboring states and other nations about emerging issues in fruit pathology and production. His outreach efforts also include increasing the management skills of producers through educational programs, communicating new research findings to county extension agents and conducting applied research on issues of importance to growers. Specifically, he has developed several computer-based decision support systems for growers that provide farm-specific environmental information for use in disease management. These systems currently are being implemented in both Pennsylvania and Australia. In addition, Pennsylvania growers using Dr. Travis’ weather disease forecast system are reporting reduced pesticide use. It is estimated that a 20 to 30 percent reduction in pesticide use will be realized when the system is fully implemented in the Commonwealth.