Spring semester brings new faculty, programs and events to Emory

Jan. 12, 2022

The nine schools of Emory University are moving forward with big plans for the new semester, undeterred by the temporary move to remote learning for undergraduate students until Jan. 31 due to the Omicron surge in COVID-19 cases.

Here’s a roundup of things to come, including introductions of faculty and new programs and events, as listed by each school.

Candler School of Theology

New faculty: Candler welcomes Joanne Solis-Walker to the faculty as associate dean and professor in the practice of leadership.

Upcoming events: The Aquinas Center of Theology will sponsor its annual Aquinas Day lecture online on Thursday Jan. 27, at 12 p.m. This year’s speaker is Jessica Coblentz of St. Mary's College, who will address “Depression as a Wilderness Experience: Exploring One Theological Paradigm for Life with Depression.” Learn more and register.

The Aquinas Center will host its Major Catholic Speaker Lecture on Tuesday, March 15, at 7:30 p.m. Shannen Dee Williams of Villanova University, a historian of the African American experience with research and teaching specializations in women’s, religious and Black freedom movement history, will be the featured speaker. Learn more and register.

On April 8-9, Candler will sponsor “The Unfinished Search for Common Ground,” a major conference on 20th century theologian and civil rights leader Howard Thurman. Organized by Dean’s Professor of Spirituality, Ethics and Leadership Walter Earl Fluker, the conference will feature keynotes and panel responses by noted scholars and practitioners such as Luther E. Smith Jr., Barbara Brown Taylor, Gregory C. Ellison II, Peter Eisenstadt, Fluker and others. The conference is designed to introduce attendees to the work of Howard Thurman and to provide an opportunity for scholars, social activists and religious leaders to meet and consider ways in which Thurman’s understanding of community can address the issues and challenges of diversity and inclusion that we continue to struggle with today. Registration will open in early February with in-person and virtual options available.

Learn more at Candler's website.

Emory College of Arts and Sciences

ArtsLab: Piloted in fall 2021 and now fully launched this semester, ArtsLab is a visual arts studio and supply shop located in the Cox Hall Computing Center. A partnership between Emory Arts and Emory’s TechLab, ArtsLab offers students an array of supplies that are free to use on site as well as a supply shop where materials like canvas, paint, pencils and paper may be purchased. ArtsLab is open to all students Monday through Thursday from 12p.m.-8 p.m. and Friday from 12 p.m.-5 p.m. This semester, ArtsLab will host events in painting, collage, murals, clay, needlepoint and more. Learn more about ArtsLab events and offerings here.

FYRE: The First-Year Research Experience (FYRE) program welcomes its second cohort of 19 students this semester. This pilot program is designed to help second semester, first-year students enter into research quickly and includes several students who participated in the STEM Pathways Pre-orientation Program, which provides support to natural science and mathematics students who are the first generation in their families to attend college, or are in identity groups historically underrepresented in STEM fields.

The major objectives of the program are to help the first-year students identify their research interests and a faculty mentor; acclimate to their research project and environment; and set and work toward goals as a student researcher. In their second year, the students get weekly workshops geared toward professional development and assessment of how research fits into their larger life, academic and career goals.

Learn more at the Emory College website.

Goizueta Business School

Record-breaking employment outcomes: Touting the best employment rates in the school’s history, Goizueta full-time MBA graduates entered the job market in full force. Within three months of graduating, 99% of students received and accepted offers for a full-time job. Goizueta MBA graduates also garnered the highest salaries in the school’s history, reporting an average mean salary of $134,700, an increase of nearly $14,000 over the past four years.

New academic offerings: From new academic offerings including our STEM-designated Master of Analytical Finance, Online Executive MBA and Diversity, Equity and Inclusion MBA concentration to new tools and technologies such as our global classrooms and virtual reality simulations, we are giving students the skills, resources and perspectives to push beyond the boundaries of a traditional business education.

Peachtree Minority Venture Fund (PMVF): This past fall, Goizueta launched the Peachtree Minority Venture Fund, a million-dollar student-run venture capital fund focused exclusively on Black, Latinx and Native American founders. With underrepresented minority founders receiving less than 3% of U.S. venture capital investment, this fund aims to address systemic racial inequity in the business world, while also providing hands-on learning experience for students.

Learn more at Goizueta’s website.

Laney Graduate School

English Language Support Program (ELSP): ELSP provides language support to graduate and professional students, postdoctoral fellows and scholars with diverse linguistic backgrounds. Learn about ELSP programs.

Grant writing coaching: LGS offers students in the humanities and social sciences an opportunity to receive mentorship and feedback on grant proposals. Spring 2022 applications are due Feb. 21.

Leadership: Laney Graduate School welcomed its new dean, Kimberly Jacob Arriola, in September.

Learning About Laney: In October, LGS-EDGE hosted its third annual Learning About Laney visit. The fully-funded visit offered prospective doctoral students from diverse backgrounds the opportunity to learn about LGS graduate programs, faculty, staff and current scholars.

LGS-SOAR: LGS-SOAR hosts potential non-Emory undergraduate scholars with an interest in graduate research. Scholars will be matched with LGS faculty to explore, experience and conduct full-time independent and mentored research for the summer.

LGS Three-Minute Thesis Competition (3MT®): The 3MT contest challenges LGS students to present a concise, intriguing lecture on their theses to a non-specialist judging panel.

Research symposium: LGS-EDGE hosted its 2nd Annual Research Symposium on Racial & Social Disparities, Inequities and Injustice in November. The student-driven showcase featured 10-minute speed talks from LGS students.

Student honors: Juan Rodriguez, a doctoral candidate in the genetics and molecular biology doctoral program, was awarded the prestigious Kharen Fulton Diversity Graduate Award for 2021-2022.

Welcoming students: LGS created Explore and Thrive in LGS, a site offering information and checklists to help new students get settled. It also has a chat feature so students can talk with one another or with LGS staff.

Learn more at the Laney Graduate School website.

Nell Hodgson Woodruff School of Nursing

New faculty: Xiao Hu, most recently of Duke University, joins the Nell Hodgson Woodruff School of Nursing in January 2022 as acting professor, tenure track. Hu will also serve as the associate director of the Center for Data Science. Many in the field believe him to be the expert in signal processing of clinically relevant physiological waveforms. Hu brings a unique set of skills and scholarship in machine learning, artificial intelligence and the quickly emerging field of predictive analytics monitoring. He has created knowledge advancing the relationship among clinicians, scientists, engineers, innovators, policymakers and health care administrators.

New study and learning space: The School of Nursing will add 70,000 square feet of teaching space in downtown Decatur, Georgia. This building, the Emory Nursing Learning Center, will provide the school with a new Simulation and Skills Lab with mock hospital settings and state-of-the-art equipment. This center is anticipated to open later in 2022.

Emory Nursing Experience: ENE has partnered with Canopy Innovation, Inc., to offer two new programs to our students and practicing nurses at a discounted rate: Canopy Learn Medical Spanish Course and Canopy Credential Bilingual Medical Proficiency Assessments.

Language of Lesions: This is a new two-hour module provides practitioners with a means to communicate effectively and efficiently. The goal of the Language of Lesions course is to present participants with the knowledge they need to describe skin conditions and lesions accurately, using the proper dermatologic nomenclature and terminology. In addition, this course also helps learners differentiate between various types of skin lesions and uses 3D augmented reality images to give up-close views.

Business Case for Nursing Summit: The Nell Hodgson Woodruff School of Nursing and Goizueta Business School are proud to present the Business Case for Nursing Summit: a one day, one-of-a-kind event bringing together health care, business, and nursing thought leaders to explore trends in the nursing workforce. The summit, set for Tuesday, Feb. 15, will incorporate the School of Nursing’s Ada Fort Lecture, featuring Peter Buerhaus, PhD, RN, FAAN, FAANP.

Learn more at the School of Nursing’s website.

Oxford College

Oxford is proud to welcome its first ever Spring Start cohort of students to campus in January. This inaugural spring class includes 50 students both international and from all over the United States. Following a semester where we welcomed our largest and most talented and diverse class of first-year students, we look forward to what this new class will contribute to our community.

Learn more at the Oxford College website.

Rollins School of Public Health

New dean: M. Daniele Fallin has been appointed as the new James W. Curran Dean of Public Health at the Rollins School of Public Health. She will join Rollins July 1, 2022, at which point Dean James W. Curran will join the faculty in epidemiology and global health. Read more.

Student success: Fourteen Rollins students were selected from Rollins for the 2022 Presidential Management Fellows Program. This is the largest cohort to ever be selected from Rollins (surpassing last year’s record number). Directed by the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, the Presidential Management Fellows program is the federal government’s flagship leadership development program at the entry level for advanced-degree candidates. Students selected for the two-year paid fellowship include Sarah Bair, Jacob Berry, Lauren Dempsey, Rachel Devine, Andrew Durkin, Jasmine Irish, Molly Neill, Ashrita Rau, Ananya Reddy, Danielle Richard, Coralis Rodriquez Morales, Audrey Sommer, Maria Walawender and Melat Weldeselasie.

First cohort: The new Global Health and Development PhD Program welcomed its first cohort of students in fall 2021. The goal of this program is to train leaders and scholars who use science to improve public health policy and practice for underserved populations around the world. This is one of the only programs in the world that specifically offers a doctoral degree in global heath and development.

Center renewal: The Georgia Center for Diabetes Translation Research was renewed for another five years, enabling the center to continue its high-impact work in diabetes research at a global level.

Learn more at the Rollins website.

School of Law

New faculty: Darren Hutchinson has been named as director of the newly formed Center for Civil Rights and Social Justice.

Faculty accomplishments: North-West University has awarded Johan van der Vyver its Lifetime Achievement Award. Martha Albertson Fineman has been recognized as the third most cited scholar in family law and the tenth most cited scholar in critical theories of law for 2016-2020, according to the latest Sisk citation rankings. Nicole Morris will expand her work of including researchers and students from underrepresented communities in research ecosystems with financial support from a new grant from Google. Abdullahi Ahmed An-Naim will be the 54th speaker for the Martin Luther King Jr. Crown Forum at Morehouse College on Thursday, Jan. 20.

Curriculum: In February 2022, Emory Law will hold the inaugural 1L Workshop on Race and Law for first-year JD students. The program will consist of two panels of faculty who will present their academic research on issues related to race and a third panel of practicing attorneys who will discuss their work in which race is a frequent issue.

Emory Law students will continue to commercialize new technology through a new research partnership with the National Nuclear Security Administration and the TI:GER technological innovation program.

Morehouse School of Medicine has established a Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (CAP) Fellowship, the first HBCU to do so. Barton Law and Policy Center director Melissa Carter and Juvenile Defender Clinic director and law professor Randee Waldman will serve as adjunct faculty to formalize and institutionalize the partnership. This year, CAP Fellows will complete clinical rotations with the Barton Juvenile Defender Clinic and the Legislative Advocacy Clinic, which provides another multidisciplinary experiential opportunity for Barton Clinic students.

Upcoming events: On Tuesday, Jan. 18, at 7 p.m., Emory Law will present an online panel discussion on the documentary “Ali’s Comeback: The Untold Story.” A code to watch the documentary will be provided to registrants in advance. Register to watch here.

The Emory Public Interest Committee (EPIC) Inspiration Awards will conclude its 25th anniversary with an online event honoring students, donors and alumni on Tuesday, Feb. 1, at 5 p.m.

The annual Randolph Thrower Symposium, this year titled “First Amendment: Gateway to Social Justice,” will be held online Thursday, Feb. 3, from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Register for the symposium here.

John Lewis Chair for Civil Rights and Social Justice Darren Hutchinson will deliver Emory Law’s annual Martin Luther King Jr. lecture, titled “Anti-Antiracism: Fighting Backlash, Building Justice,” on Tuesday, Feb. 22, at 5 p.m. in Tull Auditorium. Click here to register.

Emory Law Alumni Weekend (ELAW) will be held Friday, May 20, through Sunday, May 22.

Learn more at the Emory Law website.

School of Medicine

Strategic planning to transform medical education: Over the past year, SOM has developed a medical education strategic plan that focuses on transformative and innovative educational models for future learners. Year 1 priorities include building a functional structure to support a new cross-cutting “core” model for medical education and reimagining the education curriculum across all degree programs. Under the educational core model, four proposed cores have been outlined. Spanning across the continuum of medical education, including our health professions programs, the cores will support student success; innovation and transformation; instructional design and educational technology; and diversity, equity and inclusion.

Health Sciences Research Building II: Construction continues on the largest research building at Emory to date, set to open in summer 2022. HSRBII will include substantial investments for core functions including advanced imaging, flow cytometry, a biorepository, genomics and other state-of-the-art technologies. The building will also house an innovation zone including an accelerator space for start-ups and entrepreneurial research designed to promote translation of scientific discoveries.

Expanding our pipeline of physicians and scientists: Our Office of Multicultural Affairs will continue several outreach programs this spring. The Emory Health Careers Opportunity Program Academy provides support for students from high school to completion of their health profession or medical degrees and will train 84 ambassadors this year through its Ambassador Program. Our Summer Science Academy (SSA) and Health Professions Readiness Education Program (HealthPREP) programs are also back in 2022 with applications opening in January.

Physician Assistant Program 50th anniversary: Emory has the second oldest physician assistant (PA) program in the country, and it celebrated its 50th anniversary in 2021. In addition, Emory’s PA program has been ranked in the top 5 since rankings for PA programs began.

Learn more at the School of Medicine website.

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