Retiring Department graduate secretary Bonnie Parker is retiring on July 1. She came to work in the department in August 1992. Send Bonnie your good wishes!

Mohan Dutta-Bergman, assistant professor, was selected to receive the department's 2005 Redding Award for Instructional Excellence. He also had 10 publications and three book chapters in 2004-2005, including papers in Qualitative Health Research and Communication Theory. He was also an invited presenter at the Oxford University Round Table concerning “Information Security and Privacy."

Erina MacGeorge, assistant professor, received a Purdue Alumni Association Faculty Incentive Grant for her work on "Cultural Influences on Advice Interactions: Comparing Chinese and Americans."

Howard Sypher, professor, has been named as one of Purdue's first two Regenstrief Center for Healthcare Engineering Faculty Fellows. In this capacity, Sypher will work as a liaison and organize research projects between Purdue's Regenstrief Center, Indiana University's Medical Center and other healthcare entities in Indiana.

Beverly Davenport Sypher, professor, has an article, "Reclaiming Civil Discourse," that is one of three finalists for the 2004 Article of the Year award from the Southern Communication Journal.

Robin Clair, associate professor, was elected second vice-chair of the Division of Ethnography at NCA.

Brant Burleson, professor, and Amanda Holstrom, Ph.D. student, co-authored a paper titled "Some Consequences for Helpers Who Deliver "Cold Comfort": Why It's Worse for Women than Men to be Inept When Providing Emotional Support" that has been designated a "Top Four" paper in the Interpersonal Division at the 2005 ICA convention. Burleson also was listed among the 25 top-ranked active researchers in communication studies in a report published in Communication Quarterly in 2004, and he was an invited guest scholar and keynote speaker at the undergraduate honors conference hosted by DePauw University, March 31-April 3, 2005.

Eric Wignall, Ph.D. student, was named to the program committee for the International Association of Science and Technology for Development International Conference on Education and Technology to be held July 4-6 in Calgary, Alberta, Canada.

Jennifer Thackaberry, assistant professor, received a Dean's Research Incentive Grant to travel to Missoula, Mont., in April to collect data at the 10th anniversary Human Factors Summit sponsored by the International Association of Wildland Fire. She will also deliver a short paper examining the historic relationship between work ethics and safety rules, as part of a larger research program examining the impact of the Forest Service's historic root military metaphor on the management and practice of safety in wildland firefighting.

Charles Stewart, professor, will be teaching a short course at the Central States Communication Association conference in Kansas City on April 8 titled "Teaching the Large Lecture Course in Persuasion." He will also be on a panel discussing the 2004 presidential campaign on April 7. He had a review essay titled "Back to Our Roots: The Library of Presidential Rhetoric," published in Rhetoric & Public Affairs.

Webb honored with top teaching award

Professor Ralph Webb has been named the 2005 recipient of the College of Liberal Arts Educational Excellence Award. Webb, who also serves as the department's director of undergraduate studies, is in his 40th year teaching interpersonal and cross-cultural communication at Purdue.

News hires in organizational communication to join faculty

Stacey Connaughton, Karen Myers and Tyler Harrison will join the faculty in fall 2005 in the area of organizational communication. Connaughton Connaughton received her Ph.D. from the University of Texas at Austin and is currently an assistant professor at Rutgers University. Her research focuses on organizational identity. Myers is a doctoral student finishing her dissertation at Arizona State University. Harrison is an assistant professor at Kean University in New Jersey. His research focuses on negotation and conflict.

Patrice Buzzanell, professor, and Meina Liu, Ph.D. student, published "Struggling with maternity leave policies and practices: A poststructuralist feminist analysis of gendered organizing" in the Journal of Applied Communication Research. Buzzanell also will chair a panel on training and development implications of work-family research programs at CSCA.

Sorin Matei, professor, had a book and six articles accepted for publication in 2004-2005, including pieces in the Journal of Communication and the Journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media.

Kristen Lucas and Erik Garrett, Ph.D. students, were awarded year-long Purdue Research Foundation grants.

Glenn Sparks, professor, reviewed "The 11 Myths of Media Violence" by W. James Potter in the Journal of Communication. Sparks also taught for two weeks in Ethiopia at Addis Ababa University in February.