Penn State Berks Strategic Communications interviewed Michele Ramsey, associate professor of communication arts and sciences and of women's, gender and sexuality studies, about the film "Barbie," the Greta Gerwig-directed film about the iconic doll, and now Warner Bros.’ highest-grossing domestic release. Ramsey is a frequent media contributor on issues concerning women’s studies and communication.
How do you instill an appreciation of biodiversity and a desire to preserve ecosystems in the community? A team of Penn State Berks and Lehigh Valley professors tackled this very question through a multidisciplinary research project that involved participants in a meaningful community activity, linking science and the arts.
Two Penn State Berks students will spend this summer engaged in their respective funded research opportunities. Sophomore Daniel Abramov and senior Sydney Bankert received the Erickson Discovery Grant; they are two of 50 who received the grant.
Two Penn State Berks students received an honorable mention at the Mid-Atlantic Ecological Society of America (ESA) Annual Meeting, which was held from March 31 to April 2 at the University of Delaware. Erin Horack, a second-year biotechnology major, and Quang Vinh Lu, a second-year biology major, presented their research, titled “Antibiotic-Resistant Gene Expression in Water Quality Indicators, Escherichia coli, and Enterococci, Extracted from the Delaware River Basin.”
As a Reading native, Amy Lista always felt right at home with Penn State Berks, literally and figuratively. On May 6, Lista will conclude her time at Penn State Berks as she graduates with her bachelor’s degree in kinesiology and a minor in psychological sciences.
Eve Gibbs, a senior biochemistry and molecular biology major and chemistry minor at Penn State Berks, is well on her way to an exciting career in science research. This past summer, she completed an internship with the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases. And after the spring semester ends, she will spend the summer working at the National Institute of Health through their Undergraduate Scholarship Program.
The challenges of the coronavirus pandemic led two Penn State professors — one at Penn State Berks and the other at Penn State College of Medicine — to collaborate on ideas for how health care facilities could be redesigned to provide optimal, resilient care during pandemics and other situations with mass casualties.
The Penn State Berks Center for the Agricultural Sciences and a Sustainable Environment is studying the role that telephone poles can play in monitoring and eradicating the invasive spotted lanternfly. The center continues to be one of the main research sites surveying effective procedures in the control of the invasive planthoppers through support from both the U.S. and Pennsylvania departments of agriculture, as well as other grant funding.
A new book written by Penn State Berks Professor of Latin American Studies Kirwin Shaffer explores how historical forces, people, and ideas traveled across political borders and bodies of water to shape Caribbean history. Titled "A Transnational History of the Modern Caribbean: Popular Resistance across Borders," the book discusses many of the same issues that are timely today, including same-sex marriage and LGBTQ+ rights.
Two faculty members at Penn State Berks, Jennifer Murphy, associate professor and chair of the criminal justice department, and Brenda Russell, professor of psychology, had their stigma work with students showcased at Shatterproof’s Stigma of Addiction Summit earlier this summer. Shatterproof is a national nonprofit organization dedicated to transforming addiction treatment, ending stigma, and supporting communities.
