Local Water Expert Talks to GIS Class

more to come

Jose Nogueras, Tom Simmons, and Harold Putt Tells Baseball Class About Baseball Reporting, Running a Club, and Baseball and Math

The Baseball in American culture closed out the season with a trio of excellent speakers who helped students understand many of the things that go on behind the scenes at baseball games, and also delved into the world of mathematics to discuss how the game is measured.

Jose Nogueras (pictured at left with many of the press passes he has collected over the years) led off by telling the class about the life of a beat reporter for a minor league baseball team. Nogueras, who is the Associate Director for News Services in the Department of Communications and Marketing, worked as a reporter covering the San Antonio Missions of the Texas League. He told the class that he became interested in baseball reporting as a youngster by making scrapbooks detailing the exploits of his beloved Cincinnati Reds. He mentioned that sport reporting is a job for a young man, because it requires long hours on the road and at the games. He also told students that though the career likely seems glamorous, it involves a great deal of hard work, often trying to coax quotations from players who would rather not talk to reporters. Nogueras held that establishing trust and rapport with players was the most important part of the job, and that reporters therefore did not typically write all that they knew of any individual player.

Tom Simmons, ONU's Athletic Director, and an alumni of the sports management program here, told students about his experience as an executive with the Los Angeles Dodgers organization. As a Dodger, Simmons managed the Dodgers' former spring training facility at Vero Beach, Florida. He told the class of his work, which included designing the promotions that would put fas in the seats, and providing an enjoyable experience once they arrived. A great deal of behind-the-scenes effort went into the last part, and included ensuring that the stadium was clean, that concessions were handy, and that they would be motivated to come back again. Simmons also served as the General Manager of the Memphis Bay Bears, a minor league team operated by a consortium of investors who payed very careful attention to the bottom line, a feature of the baseball business that Simmons told students became increasingly the focus of the game.

The final speaker was Harold Putt, who teaches in the ONU math department who told students about his work on seeking ever more descriptive measures of players' on the field performance. Putt does research on baseball mathematics, and mentioned that one of his students did his capstone experience on fielding statistical analysis. During the past few decades, baseball teams have been paying a great deal of attention to situational statistics to evaluate talent and create the most effective lineups. The Boston Red Sox have gone so far as to hire Bill James, one of the founding fathers of the Society for American Baseball Research as a senior consultant. Some have pointed to James' efforts as one of the reasons the team was finally able to break the Curse of the Bambino and win the World Series in 2004.

All of the speakers this year served to provide students with valuable insights into the often hidden parts of the baseball world. The class will likely be offered again during the 2011-2012 year.

Phi Beta Delta Sponsors Student Talk on Study Abroad

Several students took the time to present their experiences studying abroad to other ONU students who might be interested in traveling away from Ada in order to further their education. Phi Beta Delta, the International Scholars Honor Society, sponsored the talk, but Dr. Loughlin turned over the program to the students who did a bang up job in selling the opportunity to continue their educations in an international setting.

Among the presenters were Dan Jones, who had an internship in London, Ben Kretz, who did his student teaching at Alconbury Air Force Base in England, Lara Wood, who studied French in Morocco, Sabrina Wideman, who studied in Costa Rica, and Sheila Willamowski, who traveled to South Korea and China last summer.

Among the highlights of the students experiences were (more to come)

Western Civilization Series Addresses 20th Century Visual Art

For the final Western Civilization Series presentation, Professor William Mancuso of the Department of Art and Design discussed the changes in Western art during the 20th Century. Mancuso accompanied his presentation with images of various artists from that century, and one of his main points concerned the effect of technology on art. Mancuso told the assembled students that the rise of photography had a profound effect on artists, who increasingly wondered why they should attempt realistic depictions of nature or humans when a camera could do it better. This led to more representational art movements such as Impressionism, and Cubism, which did not seek to accurately depict their subjects, but rather present their feelings toward images.

Mancuso also discussed how the rise of the profession of Psychology led to paintings that explored the inner self, such as Edward Munch's Scream (image at left), and how the horrors of World War I led to artistic movements such as Dada, best exemplified by the paintings of Salvador Dali. The purpose of the Series is to provide students with a deeper appreciation for topics that our faculty does not have the time or the expertise to explore in great detail. Professor Mancuso succeeded in that and we thank him for his efforts!

HPJ Students Take Part in ONU Student Research Colloquium

During the recent ONU Student Research Colloquium, several HPJ students took the opportunity to show off their research in the form of a poster presentation. Ideas presented ranged from baseball to voter behavior, and this colloquium was a fantastic chance for our students to publicize the hard work that they have done this year.

Among the HPJ students that presented were Samantha LaChey, who was not able to attend, but entered her poster on the All American Girls Professional Baseball League, Katherine Frick, who presented her poster on African-American firsts in Major League Baseball, LeeAnn Sullivan who presented on the Geopolitics of Water in Africa and the Middle East, Steve Haas, who presented his research on Offender Prediction Models, and Mike Hamper and Matt Wiseman, who presented on the effect of Social Networking Media on Political Participation.