THE GRADUATE SCHOOL

The Alumnae of Northwestern University Awards $70,000 in Grants to Northwestern Projects

After a review of 65 proposals, The Alumnae of Northwestern University has awarded full or partial funding to 15 projects sponsored by Northwestern entities or schools. This year’s grant recipients came from Alumni Relations and Development; Bienen School of Music; the Block Museum; School of Communication in Qatar; McCormick School of Engineering and Applied Science; Medill School of Journalism, Media, Integrated Marketing Communications; and Weinberg College of Arts and Science, among others. 

Alumnae grants provide funding for a wide range of projects, including research support for faculty and graduate students, technological improvements, classroom equipment, curricular programs, podcast/film projects, symposia/meetings, and support for theatre and the arts on campus.

“With the monies we had available, we were pleased to be able to fund proposals from a variety of schools and campus entities,” note Carolyn Krulee and Holly Sunshine, chairs of the committee. “The Grants Committee was impressed by the quality and variety of proposals submitted. It was quite a challenge to choose recipients from among them.”

The proposals are listed alphabetically by their sponsoring organization or school.

ALUMNAE RELATIONS and DEVELOPMENT

• Dale Duro Latin Dance Co. Annual Spring Show
  Mary Kate Clifford, associate director, Special Events

  Dale Duro Latin Dance Co.’s Annual Spring show is a place for the Northwestern Latinx community and people who appreciate Latinx culture to display their Latin dance skills, all while celebrating Latinx culture, creating community among Northwestern students, promoting teamwork, and increasing awareness of the multicultural diversity at Northwestern. 

BIENEN SCHOOL OF MUSIC

• Voice Savvy Application and Sensor
  Theresa Brandaccio, senior lecturer, Voice and Opera
  

  Continued research and development of vocal health technology include a wearable sensor and application that measures vocal effort that gives a real-time alert to help busy voice users avoid vocal fatigue and injury.

• Lucy Gayheart Opera Libretto Project
  Kurt Hansen, senior lecturer, coordinator of Voice and Opera

  I am proposing a 10-day writing residency in Red Cloud, Nebraska, the childhood home of Willa Cather, the author of Lucy Gayheart. The goal is to complete a final draft of the libretto and text and to submit these to a composer in order to create an opera based on the Cather novella, Lucy Gayheart.

BLOCK MUSEUM OF ART, Mary and Leigh Block Museum of Art

• Selections from Rosalie Favell’s series Facing the Camera
  Lisa Corrin, executive director, Ellen Phillips Katz director

  Selections from Rosalie Favell’s ambitious, ten-year series Facing the Camera (2008-2018) will open at Northwestern University’s Block Museum of Art. With this portrait series, Favell has built a contemporary, international archive of Indigenous artists and arts professionals that oppose colonial photographic practices by prioritizing the agency and personality of each sitter. The Block’s exhibition will follow a Spring 2023 artist residency hosted at the museum in which Favell will relaunch the project with a photoshoot of Indigenous artists in Chicagoland. The presentation of approximately 100 portraits will include these new works alongside selections from the original series, highlighting the vitality of the Indigenous art world today.

SCHOOL OF COMMUNICATION in QATAR

• Global Pandemics - A Story of Human Resilience
  Spencer Striker, associate professor, Digital Media Design

  The global pandemic digital learning series combines digital storytelling with interactive learning to craft a rich, complex pedagogical experience that immerses students in the power of story – narrating the experiences of diverse people, from around the globe, who lived through history’s worst pandemics – interwoven with rich, multimodal learning content.

McCORMICK SCHOOL OF ENGINEERING AND APPLIED SCIENCE

• Principles of Circular Design
  Ordel Brown, associate professor, Instruction; academic advisor, Undergraduate Engineering

  Principles of Circular Design is the creation and delivery of a new, undergraduate, project-based course that uses design methods to address challenges defined under the circular economy. The circular economy seeks to decouple economic growth and development from the consumption of finite resources. Circular design attempts to preserve and enhance natural systems while creating environmental, social, and economic values. 

• How Do Muscle-Tendon Units Adapt to Orthopedic Repair of Muscle Tears?
  Wendy Murray, professor, Biomedical Engineering

  We propose to use innovative medical imaging techniques and strength testing studies to study how the biceps muscle changes following tendon injury and surgical repair. We will compare muscle structure and function in patients with the same tendon injury who have undergone different procedures for their orthopaedica surgical repair. We expect our research to provide novel information to surgeons that will aid individualized, clinical decision-making and optimize clinical outcomes.

• Reparation of Porosimeter for Material Science Research
  Alesssandro Rotta Loria, assistant professor, Civil and Environmental Engineering Department

  This proposal seeks funds to repair a mercury intrusion porosimeter available to Prof. Rotta Loria and shared with various colleagues across the McCormick School of Engineering and the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences at Northwestern to support the latest advances in materials science research. This apparatus has recently stopped working due to an issue in its hardware, does not benefit any more from the vendor warranty, and needs to be repaired to allow future experiments devoted to characterizing the microstructure of materials such as concrete, soils, polymers, bones, and porous materials at large. Since funding to repair lab apparatus is typically not provided by federal agencies, such a request is presented to The Alumnae with the hope that it may be accustomed through this funding opportunity.

MEDILL SCHOOL OF JOURNALISM, MEDIA, INTEGRATED MARKETING COMMUNICATION

• Black Women Professor Magic (tentative title)
  Ava Greenwell, professor, Broadcast Journalism, Video Department

  This documentary highlights the work and experience of some of Northwestern University’s first tenured and clinical Black women professors. So far, nine faculty and several other academics have been interviewed about the trailblazing role these women took on for students and the institution.  

NORRIS CENTER

•  Acquisition of a Camera Controller
  Bryan Clark, technical specialist

  The purchase of this camera controller will not only free up resources our technicians are having to expend during events but will vastly improve the levels of professionalism we can provide for not just Alumnae Continuing Education courses, but all hybrid events in the future. The camera controller is portable and can be used in both McCormick Auditorium and the Louis Room.

PRITZKER SCHOOL OF LAW

•  AI Transcription Model
  Emily Kadens, professor

  We are building an AI model that automatically transcribes Early Modern English handwritten script called "secretary hand." Secretary hand is difficult to read in general, and most challenging, but the most historically significant of the legal documents written in secretary hand are depositions, or witness testimony. We are seeking funding to train our model to read the deposition script.

STUDENT AFFAIRS

• Acquisition of TC Ion Lighting Console for Student Performance Groups
  Hayley Kretchmer, Student Organizations and Activities, Campus Life

  TC Ion Lighting Console (lighting equipment) for Student Performance Groups is used in more than 75 campus performances by more than 300 students each year, but much of the existing lighting equipment is broken or in disrepair. This grant will go toward the purchase of a new light console and additional lighting equipment to be shared across more than 30 different student-run performance groups. This vital equipment will be used weekly, empowering students to create high-quality immersive experiences for performances, save money in the long run on costly rentals and repairs, and provide safer and more equitable access to up-to-date equipment. 

WEINBERG COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES

• Love While Incarcerated
  Eli Finkel, professor, Psychology

  We are studying the relationships of those with an incarcerated romantic partner. We are in the current stages of recruitment for our intake survey. We are hoping to use this grant to follow these couples over the course of a year to understand what helps and what hinders their relationships.

• In Vivo Assessment of the Aqueous Formulation of 1,18-Octadecanedioic Acid-Paclitaxel:Cyclodextrin
  Nathan Gianneschi, Jacob and Rosaline Cohn professor, Chemistry 

  We have developed a new anticancer therapeutic with significantly enhanced safety and ability to target tumor issues. We propose this therapeutic as a replacement to the toxic frontline chemotherapeutic, paclitaxel, which is currently the most prescribed anti-cancer drug in the world. We propose to conduct a pilot study in mouse modes of cancer, to validate our hypotheses regarding safety and targeting, and hence progress the therapeutic to pre-clinical stage drug development.

• Stable Laser to Enable Study of Entangled Photons in Undergraduate Course
  Timothy Kovachy, assistant professor, Physics and Astronomy Department 

  Quantum technologies are playing an increasingly large role in the world. Entanglement is a fascinating phenomenon that lies at the heart of quantum mechanics and associated technologies. This proposal is for funds to procure a laser that will enable students in the undergraduate Optics Laboratory class at Northwestern to observe and study entanglement.

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 The Alumnae of Northwestern University is an all-volunteer organization of women that raises funds for a wide range of projects to benefit the University and showcases the University’s academic resources with the community through its Continuing Education Program, now in its 54^th year. Founded in 1916, The Alumnae has given more than $9.5 million to the University in the form of grants, fellowships, scholarships, and an endowed professorship, as well as funding special University projects and summer internships. For more information, visit The Alumnae’s website (www.nualumnae.org).

Categories: Around Campus, Other