Sarah Holland

Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter School for Peace and Conflict Resolution

College of Science

Department of Geography and Geoinformation Science

Festival management class puts students at the heart of cultural conservation and celebration in Washington, D.C.

Sarah Holland — Tue, 23 Jul 2024 16:00:36 +0000

Festival management class puts students at the heart of cultural conservation and celebration in Washington, D.C. Sarah Holland Tue, 07/23/2024 - 12:00

If you visit the National Mall in Washington, D.C., during the last week of June, you’ll be greeted with the sights and sounds of a multicultural celebration at the Smithsonian Folklife Festival. Music and dance performances, cooking demonstrations, hands-on workshops, and education sessions: Every tent offers a view of the world from a different cultural perspective.

And for ��AV students in the cross-listed Folklore and Festival Management course, it’s the internship opportunity of a lifetime.

Supported by an Office of Student Creative Activities and Research Curriculum Impact Grant and led by Lisa Gilman, professor of folklore and English, Karalee Dawn MacKay, director of the arts management program, and Carole Rosenstein, professor of arts management, the course gives students hands-on, real-world experience in festival management.

Along with a term-length group project to plan their own festival, students also learn from guest speakers from the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage (CFCH), tour the CFCH offices, and complete applications for summer internships with the CFCH Folklife Festival.

Recently, the George Mason team established a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with the Smithsonian Institution to formalize the partnership.

“The Folklife Festival is an international, national, and local event: a confluence you’re only going to get in Washington, D.C., where every neighborhood and community is a mix of international, national, and local,” explained Rosenstein. “Being able to leverage the connections of our George Mason faculty to national agencies and institutions all over the region gives our students unique opportunities that will set them up for success.”

“We want the folklore and arts management fields to mirror the populations we work with,” said Gilman. “Mason has this incredibly diverse student body, and through this course and our MOU we are creating real pathways for these students to work in the arts and culture sector.

“This course is only one piece of it,” she further explained. “There’s a lot of potential for collaboration around research and education in the future.”

Arts management and folklore studies are both necessary perspectives in producing this kind of large-scale cultural event. But, as Rosenstein noted, the two fields don’t often interact in an academic setting.

“It’s a unique opportunity for graduate students, in particular,” she said. “As an undergraduate, you know, you’re in classes with a variety of majors all the time. But for graduate students with more focused studies, it’s not often they get to share and learn across areas of expertise. And it’s great career practice, because arts management and folklore professionals will be working together at the same institutions in their careers.”

“We get into deep discussions about how each program would approach these same questions and challenges differently, as well as looking at how we have the same motivations and goals but are perhaps using different terminology or theories,” said MacKay. “It’s amazing to see how much they learn from one another.”

Because of the cross-disciplinary nature of the course, students and faculty engage with all parts of festival production at a much deeper level. Students might consider the theoretical concepts behind ethical and equitable folklore conservation and presentation one day, and the next they’re debating how many bathrooms will be needed for the predicted crowds.

“That’s one of the amazing things about this course and the focus on planning a festival,” said Rosenstein. “It gives them the opportunity to go all the way from high-level theory to what’s happening on the ground at any given minute of the event.”

Everything in the course comes back to building and sustaining relationships. From vendors to sponsors to performers to guests, students learn how proper festival management leads to long-lasting, mutually beneficial relationships that support the access and preservation of artistic, creative, and cultural expression.

“This class opens up folklore and arts management students to so many different career possibilities in the arts and culture,” said MacKay.

“It’s an important reminder for students that there are all kinds of creative life and expression everywhere you look,” said Rosenstein. “It’s not just in big art museums or symphony orchestras: you can find it in every community.”

This summer, we spoke with three of the students who worked on the Folklife Festival.

Stephanie Aitken

Photo by Ron Aira/Office of University Branding

Master’s student in English with a concentration in Folklore Studies

What are you most excited for about interning with the festival?

Seeing it all come together. We’ve learned so much about it in class, and we’ve heard from so many guests who are directly involved in curating or producing the festival. So seeing it all come together in front of my eyes will be an incredible experience.

I’m not from this area, and I’ve never heard of the Smithsonian Folklife Festival before. Now I’m doing an internship. And I don’t think I would have gotten the internship without this class because of the connections we made to all these people related to the festival.

How did this course and the internship prepare you for a career in folklore studies?

I feel like public-sector folklore has grown more and more, especially with a more modern awareness of being respectful of cultures, reciprocity when engaging with cultures, particularly those of marginalized groups. So preparing students with those skills and that perspective is really valuable, and the opportunities it provides makes George Mason’s folklore program unique.

Chris Esswein

BA English and Economics ’24

What was your biggest takeaway from the course?

I did a dual degree in economics and English with the hope of going to law school. But there was this looming feeling that I was going to go to law school, end up working for a Big Law firm doing work that I hated, only to burn out and leave after a few years. But this class and the internship opened up a whole new world of opportunity to me. I care deeply about the ethics of representation and public folklore festival management. I could see job possibilities in law at the Smithsonian, or any number of other public or private arts programs. Even in the class, I felt like my practical way of thinking was embraced and encouraged: asking about permits, security, costs, etc. There’s a place for economics and law and the practical in the world of the arts, and maybe there’s nowhere that needs it more than those areas.

Noelani Talamoni

Photo by Evan Cantwell/Office of University Branding

Master’s student in English with a concentration in Folklore Studies

What are you most excited for about interning with the festival?

I’m Indigenous Hawaiian, and although I’m very aware of my culture and my background, I haven’t had the opportunity to really work with people in my community. And because the festival theme this year is Indigenous Voices of America, the internship gives me the opportunity to get closer to a part of my heritage that I hadn’t had before, and a chance to uplift my community. It’s also an opportunity to put my research and my classroom experience to use in a very real, tangible way.

What was the cross-disciplinary class experience like?

I feel like we [folklore students and arts management students] learned a lot from each other that we can take into our careers. In our mock festival in class, for example, the arts management students helped me understand these very important, practical aspects of planning, like sound checking for musicians and land use guidelines for where stalls can be placed. And I helped them think through who we were inviting, what communities were being highlighted, how to support unheard voices. Cooperation and camaraderie are a huge part of putting together a festival. In my internship, I’m seeing how experts from multiple fields and backgrounds can work together effectively.

Study the tales and traditions of the world in the folklore program

Position yourself for a successful career through arts management

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Topics

Graduate Education

College of Humanities and Social Sciences

folklore

Summer Internship

Smithsonian

College of Visual and Performing Arts (CVPA) Arts Management Program

English Department

Arts Management News

“I will respond to your email when I return”: Psychology professor explores how to be better at taking vacation

Sarah Holland — Wed, 10 Jul 2024 16:41:16 +0000

“I will respond to your email when I return”: Psychology professor explores how to be better at taking vacation Sarah Holland Wed, 07/10/2024 - 12:41

With schools out and summer in full swing, many of us take advantage of ��AV’s location to spend some vacation time at the nearby beaches, local mountains, or even just at home. For most of us, it’s relaxation. For Lauren Kuykendall, it’s research.

Kuykendall, an associate professor of industrial-organizational psychology at George Mason, is working to define the relationship between out-of-office availability and organizational culture in order to help employees and employers be better about taking restful, recuperative vacation time.

She started her research last year with a survey of away messages.

Lauren Kuykendall. Photo provided.

“We wanted to see how people signal availability, and how that aligns with their perceptions of the norms of their team or work group,” she explained. “Most people don’t want to check emails on vacation, but if this is normalized in your work group, you start to worry about what others will think if you’re gone for two weeks.”

They found evidence that people in groups with high expectations for responsiveness, for example, were more likely to avoid setting firm no-contact boundaries in their away messages.

This inspired Kuykendall to design a more robust research model. During summer 2024, she will be conducting more comprehensive surveys with research participants before and after their vacations to better understand how workplace social dynamics impact vacation experiences.

As an expert in employee well-being, burnout, and work-nonwork balance, Kuykendall believes that “people do things because they are desirable and because they are feasible. Vacations are desirable, but they don’t always feel feasible because of the repercussions: hundreds of emails, working long hours right before in order to be able to go on vacation, so on and so forth. So people sometimes choose not to bother. They don’t see the net positive of it.”

But she believes there are ways employees can set up themselves and their teams for vacation success. First, through forming habits around recuperative and restful behaviors. “Habits are essentially self-controlled behavior, and it’s funny to think about leisure as a self-controlled behavior,” she said. “But it’s important for us to have these leisure activities that are habits for us to create that separation between work and nonwork. It’s a great protection against burnout.”

Second, Kuykendall emphasized that a group’s culture of work-nonwork boundaries is established through modeling. “The leaders, supervisors, and organizations as a whole have a crucial part to play in making it easier for people to set and maintain the balance,” she said. “And there are practical things that teams and leaders can do, like encouraging their team to plan for expected absences.”

She uses the phrase “pausing requires planning.” People don’t go on vacations because there is a fear that taking time away doesn’t feel feasible, whether you’re working on complex projects, running interdependent research, or supervising employees or students. But even the act of preparing others for your absence can make a huge difference.

“The sooner you tell people your plans, the more time everyone has to prepare and set up alternative workflows to accommodate,” she said. “And, if you’re in a leadership position, it models for employees that vacations are possible.”

Kuykendall said it’s become more commonplace, now, for colleagues in her department to let others know their upcoming out-of-office dates well in advance, a behavior that was modeled by a former department chair so everyone could plan accordingly for his absence. Several of her colleagues now include their upcoming unavailability in their email signatures.

These practices aren’t just for multi-week vacations. “There’s a place for all lengths of vacations and breaks in our work-nonwork balance,” she said. “Everything from lunch breaks to week-long vacations have a purpose in restoring us.”

Skipping lunch every day but taking a two-week sojourn every six months, for example, isn’t an effective long-term solution for most people. It’s about the total package, Kuykendall said, and how we prioritize healthy work-rest rhythms in both the short- and long-term that will protect us from burnout.

Kuykendall is teaching and researching over the summer. But she also has her own vacation coming up in August to the Pacific Northwest. Talking about her upcoming vacation served as a reminder to for her to send an email with further information about her departure and what to expect while she’s gone.

“It’s PTO,” she joked. “I have to Prepare The Others."

Enhance human potential in the Department of Psychology

Topics

College of Humanities and Social Sciences

Department of Psychology

Summer 2024

Through NSF funding, graduate students and community partners find novel solutions to public health problems

Sarah Holland — Fri, 21 Jun 2024 16:18:40 +0000

Through NSF funding, graduate students and community partners find novel solutions to public health problems Sarah Holland Fri, 06/21/2024 - 12:18

One of the ways ��AV is All Together Different is its approach to research. Students in the Center for Adaptive Systems of Brain-Body Interactions (CASBBI) NSF Research Traineeship (NRT) Program learn how to apply interdisciplinary, community-focused research to find solutions to the world’s grand challenges.

2023-24 NRT cohort members. Photo by Sarah Holland

Since the program began in 2019 with the support of the National Science Foundation (NSF), the NRT Program has bought together graduate students from engineering, data science, and social science for one-year fellowships. Students work in multidisciplinary teams of other fellows and community partners to define a problem within the community and co-develop creative solutions. Thus far, 82 graduate students have participated in the five cohorts.

“No one is doing this level of interdisciplinary convergence,” explained Samuel Acuña, research professor in the Department of Bioengineering and assistant director of CASBBI. “You'll see other programs with, say, mechanical engineers working with electrical engineers, but we have groups with computer scientists, social workers, and linguists working together. Psychologists, engineers, and neuroscientists. It’s novel.”

In the program, students are assigned to groups and matched with community partners working to solve public health problems. The groups work with these partners to establish a project that will best meet their needs: This could be anything from data collection to mobile application development to further developing the work of the previous cohort.

Some groups have even continued their work long after their time in the program concludes; iConnect, an app to connect those suffering from substance abuse to local resources and support, continues beyond the program with their community partner The Chris Atwood Foundation.

“To have, say, a computer science student work with the community and think about people and problems in a way they wouldn’t otherwise, that’s the type of experience that they can draw on for years and years to come,” Acuña said. “The fellowship helps them think more deliberately about how they approach their research through a toolbox of techniques. So, when they’re done, they can approach any issue or problem they might be assigned from this perspective.”

Community-centered and human-centered research is a big draw for some NRT fellows. Morgan Lamarre, BA Dance ’22, BS Bioengineering ’24, master’s student in bioengineering and a member of the 2024-25 cohort, said, “Many of us hope that our careers are in community-facing work, so to have these skills and experience in engaging with the community will be really helpful. And these methods are different from what we see in our classrooms and labs.”

“As engineers, we’re often given a problem to solve how we want and how we think is best without input from the community, and there’s a bit of mistrust between the overall community and the scientific community as a result,” said Kirubel Tadesse, BS Bioengineering ’24, current master’s student in data analytics engineering and incoming cohort member. “But through this method, we’re actively engaging with the community and stakeholders to ensure that our designs are meeting their specific needs. We’re bridging that gap.”

2023-24 Team FIRE (First-responers, Innovation, Research, and Exploration) presents their research at NRT orientation. Photo by Sarah Holland

“It’s a completely new way for us to approach our work,” said Brady Stinson-Smith, master’s student in bioengineering, and fellow member of the incoming cohort. “We can be so siloed in our fields, but this program helps us make the connections between not only the community, but also with researchers in other fields like sociology, psychology, and social work who can help us think better and differently about our approaches and solutions.”

This is the philosophy upon which the NRT program is built. “No one field is enough to solve these problems,” said Acuña. “The leaders of tomorrow need to know how to navigate across multiple disciplines and groups of stakeholders in order to create impactful change.”

“We all come from different approaches,” said Yosef Shaul, PhD student in kinesiology and 2023-24 cohort member. Shaul was a member of team VIRTUE (Violence Intervention and Resolution through Unifying Efforts), focused on addressing barriers to domestic violence prevention and management in Northern Virginia. “Everyone brings their own advantages and attributes. It makes the whole greater.”

Now that he has completed the fellowship, Shaul plans to adjust his research process for his PhD to incorporate more community-centered practices. “My outcomes,” he said, “will now better meet community needs.”

See how CASBBI works to change the world

Topics

Center for Adaptive Systems of Brain-Body Interactions

graduate students

National Science Foundation

College of Engineering and Computing

Department of Bioengineering

Dance

Data Analytics Engineering

School of Kinesiology

State Department initiative brings Carter School students to the forefront of peacebuilding

Sarah Holland — Thu, 06 Jun 2024 20:13:07 +0000

State Department initiative brings Carter School students to the forefront of peacebuilding Sarah Holland Thu, 06/06/2024 - 16:13

Presentations aren't an uncommon final exam component. But few are as high stakes as presenting research to the U.S. Department of State in the hopes of paving the pathway to peace in fragile countries.

Photo provided

As part of the new Academic Centers of Conflict Anticipation and Prevention (ACCAP) initiative, ��AV students in the new Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter School for Peace and Conflict Resolution course Fragile States Policy had the opportunity to work with the U.S. Department of State on priority research.

ACCAP is a national academic partnership between American higher education institutions and the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Conflict and Stabilization Operations (CSO) to anticipate, respond to, and prevent conflict in the global system that impacts U.S. national security interests.

“No matter how great the expertise of our staff or contractors, there’s only so much capacity we have to address some very critical topics,” explained Keith E. Noble, CSO’s Chief Data Officer and Advanced Analytics Office Director, who served as the instructor for the course in Carter School. “The idea for ACCAP is that we can reach out to our university partners to get supplemental analysis, research, and data that can help us expand our priorities.”

The U.S. Department of State initiated a search for the inaugural cohort of institutions conducting research in the conflict and stabilization space. The Carter School was, according to Noble, one of their first picks.

“The Carter School, which is the largest school in the country focused on conflict and stabilization-related issues, is right in our backyard,” he said. “And there was unique alignment in CSO’s core mission and the Carter School’s expertise, values, and willingness to engage the department to help us make better data-driven decisions in this space.”

This first cohort includes eight institutions, with hopes for expansion.

Based on conversations with its office directors and other agencies, CSO compiled a list of research opportunities pertaining to countries represented in the Global Fragility Act (GFA). Each institution can then claim the opportunities through a database, based on whether they have faculty with expertise, or interest in teaching a course or capstone around a relevant topic. The Carter School took it one step further: what if Noble himself taught a course based on this consortium, and selected the topics for Carter School students to research?

Noble, who saw this as an opportunity to demonstrate how CSO wanted each institution to approach their selected research, agreed.

For the course, Noble selected topics that he thought would be achievable within the semester time frame as well as appropriately challenging for the students—Coastal West Africa: Social Network Analysis (Ghana and Togo); Women, Peace, and Security (Haiti); Women in Politics (Haiti); and Communal Impact Mining (Papua New Guinea).

Chad Cline, MS in Conflict Analysis and Resolution ‘24, was on the Women, Peace, and Security team. “I learned so much about each country in the GFA,” he said of his classroom experience. “It gave me a different perspective.”

With ACCAP’s goal being delivering valuable research to CSO, Noble wanted stakeholders involved in his students’ research from the start. “We wanted this to be an iterative process where department staff spent time investing in the students, providing mentorship and building relationships so the department could, first, get a better final product, and second, show these students that CSO could be a destination after they graduate,” Noble said. “It was mutually reinforcing incentives.”

At the end of the course, Carter School students presented their work at the U.S. Department of State; George Mason was the first institution to submit completed projects.

Chief Data Officer and Advanced Analytics Office Director Keith Noble. Photo provided.

“It was a mix of anticipation, preparation, and planning, as well as a deep sense of responsibility,” recalled Hamad Aldhlea, a PhD student in conflict analysis and resolution. His team worked on Coastal West Africa: Social Network Analysis. “I received invaluable feedback, and it was an excellent opportunity to build a network with State Department officials.”

The course is planned to run again in the fall.

“There are any number of internships and opportunities for students within this department and other USG agencies that offer great experience, but rarely reach the critical point where the work the students are doing is impacting policy,” Noble said. “This work, however, is filling critical gaps and will have real and practical impacts on our offices and the work we do. We’re looking to the Carter School to make substantive contributions to our global mission.”

Karina Valenzuela, a PhD student in conflict analysis and resolution, also worked on Women, Peace, and Security. “It’s one thing to write a paper for a grade and quite another to present research to a group of professionals working in these complex situations who tell you the work you’ve done is valuable,” she said.

Noble believes that the Carter School’s proximity to Washington, D.C. and the expertise and quality of its faculty and students will allow it to play a leading role in the developing ACCAP community.

“I think this will not only enhance the prestige of the university, but will help deliver real-time, value-added analyses that will help this government make better data-informed decisions,” Noble said, “and that’s something the Carter School should be very proud of.”

Help build peace through the Carter School

Topics

Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter School for Peace and Conflict Resolution

State Department

graduate students

Blimps and business collide at the Mason Innovation Exchange

Sarah Holland — Fri, 24 May 2024 15:01:55 +0000

Blimps and business collide at the Mason Innovation Exchange Sarah Holland Fri, 05/24/2024 - 11:01

Building a drone and building a business are, at first glance, two very different tasks. Academically, you’d be hard pressed to find a robotics course in a business school, and vice versa. But at the Mason Innovation Exchange (MIX), all that separates these two is a staircase.

From the fabrication floor to the incubator’s loft, the MIX is demonstrating how principles of entrepreneurship and innovation aren’t so easily siloed with two new courses: BLIMP and Student Innovator Mastermind.

The MIX BLIMP workshop was an outgrowth of an Office of Naval Research-funded Bio-inspired Lighter-than-air Instructional Mechatronics Program, developed to expand unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV)—or drone—education, with a desire to build a pipeline for students to participate in the biannual Defend the Republic lighter-than-air robotics competition. In this course, students learn introductory concepts of UAVs and, within small interdisciplinary groups, build their own blimps with flapping wing mechanisms.

Daigo Shishika helps students flight test their blimps in the Mason Autonomy and Robotics Center (MARC). Photo by Evan Cantwell/Office of University Branding

“We use organic life as the inspiration for these builds,” said instructor Daigo Shishika, assistant professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering. “Students study the biomechanics of fish, insects, and birds, and then use those principles of flight and motion to create their own blimps.”

Each group learns how to build, program, and control flying robots. Using balloons made of mylar films, the students construct the blimp bodies and mount the electronic components—circuitry, motors, and microcontrollers—while ensuring that the blimp is well balanced.

At the end of the course, groups present their design and describe what creatures inspired their works: butterflies, stingrays, tuna, and even dragons were referenced when building.

“This process is meant to be exploratory,” explained Shishika. “I didn’t want to discourage the groups from trying out-of-the-box ideas. The dragon, for example: I wasn’t confident it would work. But they proved me wrong, and demonstrated some technical benefits of that type of wing.”

“As much as we’re teaching them the basics,” Shishika continued, “they’re teaching us new ways of thinking about design and fabrication.”

Along with the microcredential the students earn upon completion of the course, Shishika hopes they leave with a better sense of creative design and confidence in their ability to design, develop, and deploy robotics.

“It’s fun to build something from scratch and see it fly,” he said.

BLIMP flight testing in the MARC aviary. Photo by Evan Cantwell/Office of University Branding

The Student Innovator Mastermind course uses a similar approach: building foundations while allowing space for creativity and innovation. George Mason alum Lisa Shapiro, BA Psychology ’03, Med ’06, is a seasoned business owner and entrepreneur. When she started at Mason as the MIX’s assistant director of entrepreneurship programs, the entrepreneurship incubator on the MIX’s second floor was empty.

“I wanted to reinvigorate the space and provide student innovators with a place to share ideas, develop their businesses, and form a community with other entrepreneurs,” she said.

The Student Innovator Mastermind program is a six-week mastermind group where 10 Mason student innovators and business founders gather for peer-to-peer collaboration and workshops. The inaugural mastermind cohort included students developing video games, a skincare line, mobile applications, and a business that supports the elderly population with nutritional needs—which was one of the finalists in the 2024 Patriot Pitch competition.

A key part of the programming was what Shapiro calls “transformational talks”: presentations from industry professionals that the students can immediately apply to their work. Speakers cover topics such as mindset, marketing and branding, goal setting, customer segment, and advice for business ownership.

“Being able to take what they’ve learned and immediately apply it is super important,” said Shapiro. “Entrepreneurship is super hard. You need the right mindset to be able to handle the ups and downs. I want to get them started off in the right way so they’re better prepared.”

The incubator is also a space for the students to learn from each other. Sharing ideas and challenges is, Shapiro said, a necessary part of the process. “We’ve had a phenomenal response from the students,” she said. “They’re helping each other, recommending professors and other people to meet that could help with their ideas.”

Honors College student Sahil Jagtap, who is majoring in computer science, participated in the Mastermind and the drone-prototyping programs this semester. “I have a passion for building, making, and breaking stuff. I love doing research on new and unique technologies and their potential to solve real-world problems,” he said.

The course offerings at the MIX were an opportunity for Jagtap to get hands-on experience in developing and launching tech-based solutions. “The skills I acquired from both programs, such as project management, teamwork, and technical expertise, are invaluable,” he said. “In addition, the mentorship and networking opportunities have connected me with industry professionals and potential collaborators, which will be beneficial as I continue my career in technology and entrepreneurship.”

Most of all, Shapiro and Shishika both hope that this type of programming keeps students coming back to the MIX.

“Now that they’ve had a taste of the full process,” Shishika said, “they can focus on the aspect they enjoyed the most and dig deeper, whether that’s robotics, electronics, fabrication, or something else.”

“The MIX is a space for prototyping,” Shapiro said. “It’s a place for anyone with an idea to come and try to make it a reality.”

Photo by Evan Cantwell/Office of University Branding

Create and innovate at The MIX

In This Story

Daigo Shishika

Topics

College of Engineering and Computing

The MIX

Honors College

entrepreneurship

Mason Autonomy and Robotics Center

George Mason Ice Hockey Club

A sport for everyone: George Mason Ice Hockey Club builds lasting connections with the community

Sarah Holland — Wed, 15 May 2024 15:05:14 +0000

A sport for everyone: George Mason Ice Hockey Club builds lasting connections with the community Sarah Holland Wed, 05/15/2024 - 11:05

Andrew Nash, BS in Sports Management ’17, MS in Sports Management ’18, has played a lot of sports in his lifetime. Nothing, he says, is like hockey.

Andrew Nash, left, on the ice at the annual charity game. Photo by Matt Ricciardi

“Maybe it’s the travel, or the difficulty of the sport, but it really bonds you together like no other sport I’ve played,” Nash said. “The sense of community is stronger than I ever felt.”

Community is the foundation of the ��AV Ice Hockey Club, a philosophy that extends beyond the barriers of the rink and past the stadium’s aluminum bleachers. In partnership with the Washington Capitals and Prince William County, George Mason Ice Hockey is working to expand access to hockey through an outdoor ball hockey rink right next to their home ice in Prince William Ice Center.

While a fantastic sport, ice hockey can be inaccessible. Players need access to an ice rink and need to be able to skate adeptly; they need full-body padding and a means to transport and care for that equipment; they need to be able to pay club fees, rink fees, and travel fees.

However, ball hockey—also called street hockey—opens the door to opportunity. Players only need sneakers, a stick, and a ball, and you’re ready to play.

“Ball hockey is a fantastic way to expand access to ice hockey,” said Steve Hyjek, former head coach of the George Mason Hockey Club. “It gives more people the opportunity to try the sport, to love the sport, and to become future players or fans.”

Hyjek, who retired from his role as head coach this year at the team’s 2024 charity game, wanted his players to be active and engaged citizens, giving back to their communities long after their time at George Mason has ended.

The annual charity game is one component of that. Prior to the game, for example, players meet with the people for whom they’re fundraising. “I want them to understand who they’re helping, and why we’re helping them,” Hyjek said. “It makes them feel more connected to the cause, and to the community that supports them, but it also makes this act of giving back almost like a muscle memory. So when they graduate, they keep doing it.”

This philosophy is one that has shaped his players’ careers.

During his junior year, Nash got an internship at the Washington Capitals thanks to Hyjek and the other coaches’ connections. Nash has worked for the Capitals ever since, now as the manager for youth hockey development. His job is expanding accessibility of hockey to the Washington, D.C., Virginia, and Maryland community, through off-ice clinics in the form of ball and inline hockey.

“There will always be people who can’t afford to play ice hockey, or for whom an ice rink is too far from them to make regular games and practices feasible, but we don’t want to push them aside and say, ‘you can’t afford it, you’re not close to a rink, so you don’t matter,’ ” Nash said. “The hope with these workshops is that we show kids and families that there are alternatives, and further develop a community for the Capitals through increased interest in the sport.

“Without the community,’ Nash said, “there is no team.”

Steve Hyjek at his final charity game as head coach. Photo by Matt Ricciardi

Mae Whitesides, BA Criminology, Law and Society ’19, managed the team’s social media and website during her time at George Mason. Like Nash, her time in George Mason hockey opened the doors for a career in sports with the Washington Capitals marketing department and, more recently, social media for MLB Network and NHL Network. The dedication to supporting each other and the community was, she said, one of her fondest memories from her time at George Mason.

“The charity game my senior year was standing room only,” she said. “We would not be who we are today if not for that support from the community, and the work people like Steve put into building up our team.”

Hyjek agreed. “When you expand the community of folks who are playing the game or who are interested in the game, it helps the sport. For us, we hope that our work brings more players interested in George Mason and Mason Hockey, or even just more fans.”

This hypothesis has already proven to be true: After spending the day at a local elementary school, teaching kids how to play ball hockey, he’s seen some of those students in the stands of their games, as well as at Learn to Skate clinics. With the new ball hockey rink, he hopes that interest will continue to grow, not just in hockey but in George Mason as well.

“You’re planting seeds,” Hyjek said. “Planting seeds so that George Mason can be on their list when the time comes.”

Hit the ice with George Mason Ice Hockey Club

Find your team with George Mason club sports

Topics

Alumni

School of Sport Recreation and Tourism Management

College of Education and Human Development

College of Humanities and Social Sciences

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Graduating Carter School student is trailblazing a new path to peace

Sarah Holland — Tue, 07 May 2024 19:31:22 +0000

Graduating Carter School student is trailblazing a new path to peace Sarah Holland Tue, 05/07/2024 - 15:31

Keil Eggers is the first to admit that his research methods are unique to the world of conflict analysis and resolution. But as he is hooded at the 2024 Commencement ceremony at George Mason, his unorthodox approach is becoming the standard for George Mason Peace Engineering Lab in the Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter School for Peace and Conflict Resolution.

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Eggers, who is graduating from Mason with his PhD in Conflict Analysis and Resolution, has been a champion of complexity-informed conflict transformation, futures, and SenseMaker: a technology that applies a quantitative framework to narrative data submitted and interpreted by the subjects themselves.

“My professors have always been willing to let me experiment and have supported me in trying new things,” he said. “That’s one of the biggest strengths of the Carter School, how it allows people to explore unique combinations of scholarship, ideas, and disciplines.”

As a Kansas native with an interest in international politics, Eggers knew he wanted to be in the center of the action in the Washington, D.C., region when applying as an undergraduate. George Mason was the perfect fit. After a year in the international politics degree program, however, he took a course in the Carter School, and “it sealed the deal,” he said.

“I found it to be a much more helpful approach to problem-solving. It’s less about protecting one country’s interests and more about building international relationships based on dialogue, mutual learning, and mutual respect. It creates much more fulfilling relationships.”

After graduating with his BA in Conflict Analysis and Resolution from the Carter School and the Honors College in 2015, Eggers received his MA in International Peace Studies from the UN-Mandated University for Peace before returning to George Mason for his PhD.

Eggers’ approach to research using sensemaking technology is unique, particularly in academia, and very few programs could accommodate it. The Carter School, however, was interested in Eggers’ methodology and had a fellowship with that topic in mind. He was the first to receive the Peace Engineering Fellowship, one of the Provost PhD Awards designed to support the creation of the Peace Engineering Lab, where conflict analysis and resolution experts would work with engineers to create innovative technologies for peace building.

“More and more often, engineers are put on the front lines to solve social conflict through designing infrastructure or new technologies,” Eggers explained. “But their solutions also have social impact, which needs to be accounted for and considered during the design process. They need more tools to understand that impact and how it will affect peace, which we can provide. And, on the other side, we need support in developing and implementing new analytical technologies.”

Part of Eggers’ work with the lab included setting up internal and external partnerships, including with the Cynefin Centre for Applied Complexity: the creators behind the SenseMaker tool. The lab has used SenseMaker in local, national, and international research projects.

“I saw my role as creating a strong intellectual foundation for the lab, trying to figure out what our unique approach as the only conflict analysis and resolution school in the broader peace engineering field could be,” Eggers said. “We were building the plane as we were flying it, so to speak. We had a strong belief that this is an emerging field and a gap that needed to be filled. We keep showing up, putting in the work, and we’re cementing our role in the field as being at the forefront of this.”

Through the largest grant ever given to Carter School, the lab recieved funding to expand into one of the university's research centers. It plans to relaunch in fall 2024.

Meanwhile, Eggers simultaneously completed his dissertation, utilizing the same sensemaking technology he worked to implement in the lab. With the support of partnering organizations Horizon Project and Common Ground USA, “Us Against When: Futures and Complexity-Informed Conflict Transformation in the United States” looked at five states with higher risk of political violence, collecting data from 800 subjects. He presented his work at the Alliance for Peacebuilding’s PeaceCon2023, and used his research to build the syllabus for and teach Honors 360: "Us Against When: Exploring Peaceful Futures for the United States."

After graduation, Eggers hopes he can continue his work to develop complexity-informed approaches to research, sensemaking, and futures methodologies through a postdoc position. He also has a dream of putting together a music festival for peace at the Carter School's Point of View facility.

“Your destiny is in your hands when you enter a PhD program,” Eggers said, when asked what advice he would give to a first year PhD. “Explore what you like, craft the experience you want. Believe in your own power to be persistent and pave the path you want to see.”

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Mason researchers support local school communities through decade-long collaboration

Sarah Holland — Mon, 06 May 2024 14:34:49 +0000

Mason researchers support local school communities through decade-long collaboration Sarah Holland Mon, 05/06/2024 - 10:34

An old African proverb says, “it takes a village to raise a child.” But when that village faces structural and systemic barriers, perhaps it takes a little more. A research team, for example, dedicated to community-based participatory action research.

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For the past decade, a team of researchers from ��AV’s College of Education and Human Development (CEHD) has worked with mothers from Latine immigrant communities in Alexandria to help define specific structural and systemic barriers faced by caregivers and children in school and find solutions that meet community expectations and needs. Using an approach to research called community-based participatory action research (CBPAR), this team is helping transform how Alexandria public schools supports its immigrant students and their parents.

“CBPAR flips the script of traditional research,” explained Colleen Vesely, associate professor of early childhood education and member of the research team. “We partner directly with communities, often those which have been pushed to the margins, to do research with them, as opposed to research on them.”

A key part of CBPAR work is the formation of an advisory board. Amigas de la Comunidad—the board formed as part of this project—brings Latine mothers from Alexandria together to act as the liaison between researchers and the Latine immigrant community, as well as the Latine immigrant community and children- and family-serving organizations, institutions, and systems. They serve as co-researchers, directing the Mason team and helping them connect with local schools and community leaders, so together, Amigas and the research team can understand which projects will directly benefit the community.

“‘The spirit of a fighter’: Mixed-status Latine immigrant families' experiences during COVID” is their most recent publication: A study formed as a direct result of the advisory board’s concerns around how COVID-19 lockdown was impacting families and children. The paper details two years’ worth of interviews with families throughout the lockdown.

“We’re hearing and seeing concerns in local schools around bullying, substance abuse, and suicidal ideation in the aftermath of lockdown,” said associate professor of counseling Rachael Goodman, another member of the research team. “We’re hoping the data we gathered from these conversations during lockdown can help contextualize why this is happening, and how we might be able to mitigate some of that trauma.”

Because CBPAR is responsive to a community’s needs, this means outcomes of the research can lead to more immediate solutions. After hearing a need for support in the COVID-19 study, the team has worked with the advisory board and the school system to develop parent support groups. The team also had a hand in improving food distribution systems during lockdown, when the school meal distribution system wasn’t aligning with the needs of the community.

“Our project on mixed-status Latine families during the COVID-19 lockdowns was just one of many projects we’ve done with this group,” explained Vesely.

Bethany Letiecq, associate professor of research methodology and one of the researchers, noted that over the years of this work, the Alexandria school system has learned the role Amigas de la Comunidad plays in building bridges between the immigrant community and the surrounding systems and structures.

“Amigas has become their go-to group to make sure they’re aligning their services to the needs of the Latine immigrant community,” she said. “They’re sitting with the superintendent and other school leaders, they’re able to directly ask for needed resources, and the school system administrators value their knowledge and expertise. That’s huge.”

While their work with Amigas de la Comunidad continues, the researchers hope that by publishing this particular study this approach will become a model for family engagement and community work to change systems one step at a time.

“There are so many communities in this country where families feel marginalized and who don’t feel that they have a say in their communities,” said Professor Emerita of Education and research team member Betsy DeMulder. “We want to change that.”

“Ultimately,” Goodman said, “the goal of this kind of work is to change structures and systems to better support and serve marginalized communities.”

This mission extends to the academy as well. Amigas de la Comunidad is included in the author line of the team’s published works. DeMulder said that doesn’t happen in other forms of research, “but these women are involved in every step. They have their own expertise that is critical to our work. We wouldn’t be able to do this without their support and trust.”

That same trust and support is apparent among the team members as well. “It’s deeply collaborative research, and it requires a very high level of trust and teamwork between us in order to be successful,” said Vesely. “Including how we position each other at different stages of our careers and highlight each person’s role in the work. This collaboration and partnership has been incredibly important and meaningful to me.”

“We learn from and rely on one another,” Letiecq said. “To form a partnership with other women who are committed to supporting each other's liberation and empowerment, to resisting further marginalization and overcoming those barriers, has been so rewarding.”

“These are long-term commitments and therefore long-term relationships, both amongst us as the research team and with the community. It’ll be a decade this year that we’ve sat around the table with these women, and that’s a radical difference from the ways research is traditionally done,” said Goodman. “It makes our work better, and the impact of our research more sustainable.”

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