The National Endowment for the Arts has awarded an Art Works grant of $32,000 to the Arkansas Folklife Program in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences.  Under the direction of Mike Luster, the Arkansas Folklife Program promotes folk music in schools, folk arts apprenticeships, identification of traditional artists, and outreach assistance in the state.  Luster also helps present the annual Delta Symposium at A-State and hosts “Hand Crank Radio“ on KASU.

Congratulations to 20 faculty members who will begin the new academic year with tenure, after recommendations from the Promotion, Retention and Tenure Committee and university administration were approved by the Arkansas State University Board of Trustees.  

In alphabetical order, those achieving tenure are Timothy Bohn, Audrey Bowser-Brown, Sandra Combs, Sharon J. Davis, Julie Grady, J. Stephen Guffey, Holly Hall, Brandon Kemp, Shubha Kher, Veena Kulkarni, Marika Kyriakos, Travis D. Marsico, Zelda McMurtry, John Harlan Norris, Po-Lin Pan, Paul Sikkel, Matthew Thatcher, Christopher Wilson, Jianfeng Xu, and Hong Zhou.  A university news release summarizes all of the promotions and tenure decisions approved at the last board meeting.

At the 2014 Diversity Excellence Awards luncheon, Dr. Claudia Benavides-Espinoza, assistant professor of sports management, and Dr. Gauri Guha, associate professor of economics and finance, were recognized as co-recipients of the Diversity Excellence Awards for 2014.  Congratulations to Benavides and Guha for their leadership and contributions toward diversity at Arkansas State.

The video on A-State’s Vimeo page provides an interesting retrospective on the awards and the winners.  Other nominees for the award were the Department of Management and Marketing, the College of Humanities and Social Sciences, and the College of Media and Communication.

Dr. Don Bowyer, dean of the College of Fine Arts and Dr. Tom O’Connor, emeritus professor of music, are co-leaders of a new musical group, the Jonesboro Jazz Writers Big Band.  Comprised of area music educators, retired musicians, students and dedicated amateurs, the group plays music written especially for the band by its own members.  The next concert, to be directed by O’Connor, will be Sunday, June 1, in the Fine Arts Center.  This should be some fine springtime entertainment.