Immigration and Higher Education: Faculty Migration Stories at UK
The "Civic Life" panel series, developed by the University of Kentucky College of Arts and Sciences, is a new weekly forum exploring a wide range of issues confronting society today. Open to the entire UK campus, these lunchtime panel discussions will take place each Wednesday for the remainder of the semester, and the series kicks off Wednesday, March 22, with a discussion of immigration — a topic making headlines worldwide.
“At the core of the mission of the College of Arts and Sciences is the commitment to prepare students to be engaged citizens in our Commonwealth, in an increasingly diverse nation, and in an ever-more interconnected world," said Mark Kornbluh, dean of the college. "Faculty members across all of the disciplines of our college take this commitment seriously and are seeking to provide additional opportunities to engage students over a broad range of issues that are essential to contemporary civic life."
Wednesday's forum, "Immigration and Higher Education: Faculty Migration Stories at UK," is noon to 1 p.m. in the UK Athletics Auditorium of the William T. Young Library. It features five faculty members, all immigrants to the United States. From the College of Arts and Sciences are Beth Guiton, Department of Chemistry; Liang Luo, Department of Modern and Classical Languages; Jacqueline Couti, Department of Modern and Classical Languages; and Cristina Alcalde, Department of Gender and Women's Studies; and Keiko Tanaka, Department of Community and Leadership Development in the College of Agriculture, Food and Environment.
"Immigration is a popular topic today yet little understood. In higher education, immigration is both a topic of study and informs the lives of faculty, staff and students," said Alcalde, who organized the first in the Civic Life series. "In this panel, UK faculty draw on their own experiences to discuss intersections between migration and higher education. The goal is to foster dialogue about the role of immigration in higher education — including faculty, staff, and students’ experiences of migration."
The Civic Life panel discussion series will continue with various topics each Wednesday in March and April, setting the stage for a more in-depth focus on civic education during the 2017-2018 academic year.
"A&S will be reaching out to all colleges on the campus to co-sponsor events and join us in extending discussions on contemporary civic life beyond the walls of our classrooms,” Kornbluh said. “The issues that are being sharply contested in American civic life today go to the essence of American democracy and the future of this nation and the world. A university education is designed to help students hone their critical thinking and analytical skills. I firmly believe that it is possible, indeed that it is essential, that we address the critical issues of today and that we can do so in a way that is welcoming to different points of view and respectful to all."
The "Civic Life" panel series, developed by the University of Kentucky 
As part of the University of Kentucky Visiting Writers Series, acclaimed author Dinaw Mengestu will read from his works at 7 p.m. Wednesday, March 22, in the Creative Arts Studio (Room 153) in Holmes Hall, 111 Avenue of Champions in Lexington. Mengestu, an Ethiopian-American, has written three novels, including “All Our Names,” published in 2014.
Want to get to know the people behind some of the biggest student leadership positions on campus? We did, too! That's why we've introduced "see blue." #selfie — a series on UKNow that lets student leaders from across campus tell us a little bit more about themselves and their organizations. Up this week, College Mentors for Kids President Maddie Conrad
For the first time, the University of Kentucky is hosting the southern chapter of the American Conference for Irish Studies (ACIS), March 9-11.
Ruth Baer is a Professor of Psychology at the University of Kentucky and a licensed clinical psychologist. She completed intensive training in DBT in 1997 and has been teaching and supervising DBT in UK’s doctoral program in clinical psychology since then. Her research focuses primarily on mindfulness and on related psychological processes important in borderline personality disorder, including rumination, suppression and avoidance, and other maladaptive forms of emotion regulation. In addition to DBT, she teaches and supervises several other mindfulness-based interventions.
Heather Davis is a 4th-year doctoral student in clinical psychology at the University of Kentucky. Her clinical interests include impulsive behaviors and eating disorders. She currently works individually with DBT clients, leads DBT skills group for adults, and facilitates short-term DBT work with adolescents. Her current research interests focus on understanding mechanisms for the comorbidity between eating disorders and transdiagnostic dysfunction, including depression, anxiety, non-suicidal self-injury and problematic substance use.
Elizabeth Riley is a doctoral student in clinical psychology at the University of Kentucky. Her clinical interests include trauma recovery and PTSD, as well as impulsive behaviors, particularly substance use and abuse. She has led DBT group for adults and has conducted individual DBT therapy with adult clients in outpatient and residential settings. Her current research interests focus on understanding mechanisms of personality change and the downstream effects of intentional personality change as a result of therapeutic intervention, including substance use, disordered eating behavior, non-suicidal self-injury, and risky sexual behavior.
Dr. Jamie Ostroff is a Clinical Health Psychologist and Chief of the Behavioral Sciences Service in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSK) and Attending Psychologist in the Department of Psychiatry at Weill Medicine Cornell in New York City. She is Director of MSK's Tobacco Treatment Program. Dr. Ostroff's research has focused on addressing the psychological and behavioral aspects of tobacco-related cancer prevention and control with specific expertise in disseminating and implementing tobacco treatment in cancer care and lung cancer screening settings. Dr. Ostroff is a licensed clinical psychologist in New York trained in cognitive behavioral therapies (CBTs). Her clinical practice targets cancer patients/survivors and she has a keen interest in use of motivational interviewing and acceptance and commitment-based therapeutic approaches for health behavior change. She provides tobacco education and training to community-based health care providers working with low income and other vulnerable populations.