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Dina Alsowayel, PhD, has been a post doctoral fellow in religious studies at the University of Houston where she currently is a clinical adjunct lecturing on the religion, history and other aspects of the Middle East. She also has taught various courses at Rice University. Dr. Alsowayel’s research and publications deal with conflict, gender and history as well as other topics and projects. She leads study tours to the Middle East each year in an effort to complement student class time with actual experience. In addition to the academic setting, she worked in the oil industry in Houston and abroad for 20 years. Dr. Alsowayel holds a bachelor’s degree from Wellesley College, a JD from the University of Houston and a PhD from Rice University.
Constantine Armeniades, PhD, professor emeritus in chemical engineering, taught at Rice University for 39 years. His work has included the modeling of stress distribution in collagenous and elastic tissue and the design of instrumentation to control intraocular pressure during eye surgery. In addition to his research, Dr. Armeniades has developed a consulting practice in equipment and process design, operation and safety. He is a member of the New York Academy of Sciences, the Society of Plastics Engineers and the American Society for Cataract and Refractive Surgery. Dr. Armeniades holds a master’s degree from Case Institute of Technology and a PhD from Case Western Reserve University.
Nancy Gisbrecht Bailey, PhD, received her undergraduate degree in music from the University of Redlands (California) and a M.A. and Ph.D. in musicology from the University of Southern California. She is a Lecturer in Vocal Studies for the Shepherd School of Music, Rice University. She also teaches at the Women’s Institute and taught for Continuing Studies, Rice University from 1984 through the present. Dr. Bailey does pre-performance lectures for the Houston Symphony Orchestra and Houston Grand Opera, has done radio work for Col canto (a vocal performance group in Houston) and the Houston Ballet, and has lectured for the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. She has been with Col canto since its inception and, in addition to speaking at most of their concerts, is program consultant and vice president of the board of directors. She is currently writing Song, Lieder, Mélodies, Canzone: A Discussion of the Literature for Voice and Piano.
Deborah J. Barrett, PhD, is Professor of the Practice of Professional Communication and Director of the Program for Communication Excellence at Rice University, where she directs a university-wide communication program and teaches leadership communication and applied leadership to the undergraduates. In addition, Deborah conducts classes in leadership communication, effective writing and presenting, global negotiations and influence, change management, and team dynamics in graduate and in executive education programs at Rice University and at Jacobs University in Germany. Deborah has published and presented numerous articles and papers, and her book, Leadership Communication (McGraw-Hill), the third edition of which will be out in 2010, is one of the top selling texts in professional communication programs. In addition to her scholarly research, Deborah is currently writing creative non-fiction and has attended writing workshops at the University of Iowa’s Summer Writing Festival since 2007. Deborah earned her B.A. in English and speech and her M.A. in English from the University of Houston and her Ph.D. in English from Rice University.
Newell D. Boyd, PhD, is a semi-retired professor of history whose primary teaching field is Victorian Britain and the Empire. He has presented papers at academic meetings and been published regularly in a variety of books and scholarly journals in the field of British history. He holds a PhD in history from Texas Tech University and has done post-doctoral research at the Universities of London, Birmingham, the London School of Economics, Oxford and Edinburgh. He has been a fellow at the Institute of Historical Research at the University of London and is a member of England's Society of Authors and the Royal Historical Society.
Bill Dawson is an independent journalist and writer as well as a lecturer for the Rice University Center for the Study of Environment and Society. He is a regular contributor to the Yale Forum on Climate Change and the Media. He has previously served in senior writing positions for the Environment Writer, a publication of the University of Rhode Island, and for the Center for Public Integrity, a Washington DC-based organization dedicated to investigative reporting in the public interest. From 1984 to 2001 Mr. Dawson reported on environmental issues for the Houston Chronicle, where he produced a number of in-depth investigative and explanatory projects on subjects including air quality, global warming, forests, cancer incidence, biodiversity, wetlands and Galveston Bay. He holds a BA in history and behavioral science from Rice University and an MA in journalism from The University of Texas at Austin.
John W. Freeman, PhD, is professor emeritus and research professor in physics and astronomy at Rice University, where he has taught for more than 35 years. He also serves as director of the Master of Liberal Studies program at Rice. A former staff scientist at NASA headquarters in Washington, DC, he directed a number of satellite instrumentation projects, including an experiment deployed on the moon by the Apollo astronauts for which he received the NASA Medal for Exceptional Scientific Achievement. Dr. Freeman holds two patents, including a solar energy conversion device for space. His current primary research interests include computer modeling for the earth’s magnetosphere for space weather specification and prediction. Dr. Freeman holds a PhD in physics from the University of Iowa.
Eugenia Georges, PhD, is an associate professor of anthropology at Rice University. She joined the Rice faculty in 1988 and has been the recipient of the George R. Brown and Nicholas Salgo awards for excellence in teaching. Her major interests are in medical anthropology, the cultural study of reproduction, labor migration and economic development. She is currently interested in researching the new reproductive technologies, medicalization of the life cycle, relationships among social class, ethnicity and disease. Dr. Georges holds a PhD in anthropology from Columbia University.
Alison Henning, PhD, is a lecturer in earth science and the associate director of the School Science and Technology Project at Rice University. She is currently involved in K-12 teacher professional development and also teaches graduate courses in earth science. Dr. Henning received the 2007 Virginia and Griff Lawhon Digital Education Award which supports the exploration of new and innovative applications of information technology for teaching and learning. She holds a PhD in earth science from Rice University and has conducted research on the tectonics of the West Iberian continental margin.
Matthias Henze, PhD, is the Watt J. and Lilly G. Jackson Associate Professor of Religious Studies at Rice University, where he has taught since 1997. He is also editor of the Journal of Biblical Literature. His research interests concern the Jewish literature of the Hellenistic and early Roman periods, with special attention to the social histories of the groups detected behind this literature, their self-understanding, religious disputes, and the evolution of their ideas. A major focus of his work is on the diverse eschatological branches of Early Judaism, including the Qumran community, Enochic Judaism, and nascent Christianity. His published work has focused on the book of Daniel, the reception of Daniel in Eastern (Syriac) Christianity, and biblical interpretation in the Dead Sea Scrolls. At present he is working on a commentary on 2 Baruch. Dr. Henze is the 2003 recipient of the Rice University Phi Beta Kappa Teaching Prize. He holds a Ph.D. in Hebrew Bible/Old Testament from Harvard University.
J. Dennis Huston, PhD, is professor of English at Rice University where he has taught since 1969. He has won a number of George R. Brown teaching awards, the Nicholas Salgo Teaching Prize and received the 1990 Professor of the Year award from the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education and the Carnegie Foundation. In 1990, Houston Metropolitan magazine named him one of the “Ninety Best Things About Houston.” Over the past ten years at Rice he has taught humanities, drama, public speaking and Shakespeare on film, and he is the author of the book Shakespeare’s Comedies of Play. Dr. Huston holds a PhD from Yale University.
Walter Isle, PhD is Professor Emeritus of English and Environmental Studies at Rice University. He is co-director of the Center for the Study of Environment and Society and a Past-President of the Association for the Study of Literature and Environment (ASLE). His research interests include environmental literature and history, Native American literature, and history and literature of the American West. A member of the Rice faculty since 1962, he has twice received the George R. Brown Award for Superior Teaching. Dr. Isle received his Ph.D. in English from Stanford University.
Lawrence Jablecki, PhD, is a part-time lecturer in sociology at Rice University, where he teaches courses on criminology, the criminal justice system and the theory and practice of punishment. He also serves as an adjunct faculty member at the University of Houston-Clear Lake, where he teaches behavioral sciences and humanities courses to prison inmates. Dr. Jablecki was also director of the Brazoria County adult probation department for 18 years. He holds a PhD in philosophy from Manchester University in Manchester, England.
Steven W. Lewis, PhD, is the Fellow in Asian Studies at the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy at Rice University as well as faculty advisor for the Jesse Jones Leadership Center Summer in D.C. Policy Research Internship Program. He is also professor of the practice in humanities and director of the Asian Studies Program at Rice. His research interests focus on exploring the growth of a transnational Chinese middle class, the influence of advertisements in new public spaces in Chinese cities, the development of privatization experiments in China's localities and the reform of China's energy policies, national oil companies and international energy relations. He has served as head of the Transnational China Project at the Baker Institute since 1997. Dr. Lewis is widely published and a frequent commentator on Chinese affairs for U.S., Chinese and foreign media. He is also chairman of the programming committee of the board of advisors of the Asia Society of Texas, a member of the Houston Council on Foreign Relations and an academic advisor to the U.S.-China Working Group of the U.S. House of Representatives. He holds a PhD in political science from Washington University in St. Louis.
Michael Maas, PhD, is professor of history and classical studies at Rice University and the recipient of several teaching awards. He teaches history of the ancient Mediterranean world, specializing in the Roman Empire and late antiquity. His recent research covers the 6th century and the emergence of Byzantine civilization at Constantinople. Dr. Maas is the author of The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Justinian. He holds a PhD in history from the University of California at Berkeley.
Fred von der Mehden, PhD, is professor emeritus and James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy scholar at Rice University. He served as the Albert Thomas Professor of Political Science at Rice from 1968 to 1998 and was also professor of political science and director of East Asian Studies at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. Dr. Von der Mehden has written extensively on Islam in Southeast Asia and has completed field studies in the area assessing attitudes towards the Middle East. He holds a PhD from the University of California-Berkeley.
Linda Neagley, PhD, teaches a range of courses in medieval and early Renaissance art and architecture in Northern Europe at Rice University. She has taught in the school of architecture at the University of California - Berkeley and in the art history departments of the University of California - Los Angeles, the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor and Colgate University. She was the director of three plan survey projects in France funded by National Endowment of the Arts Interpretive Research Grants and the University of Michigan. In 1999-2000, Dr. Neagley was appointed the Samuel H. Kress Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts of the National Gallery of Art and has served on a number of national review boards including the NEH, the ACLS and the International Center of Medieval Art at the Cloisters. Her research focuses on French late Gothic architecture and sculpture, and she has published Disciplined Exuberance. The Parish Church of Saint-Maclou and Late Gothic Architecture in Rouen. Dr. Neagley holds a PhD from Indiana University.
Alma Moon Novotny, PhD, has lectured in the department of biochemistry and cell biology at Rice University for the last seven years, where she has taught immunobiology, developmental biology, genetics and an interdisciplinary course with the anthropology department. She also serves as an associate at Will Rice College and as the faculty advisor for the Students for Organ Donation Awareness. Prior to coming to Rice she taught a variety of plant, animal and philosophy of science courses in other Houston-area universities. Dr. Novotny holds a PhD in biological sciences from Purdue University.
James R. Pomerantz, PhD, a cognitive psychologist specializing in human visual perception and attention, is professor of psychology at Rice University and an adjunct professor of neuroscience at Baylor College of Medicine. He is president of the Foundation for the Advancement of Behavioral and Brain Sciences in Washington, D.C., where he also serves on the board of the Federation of Behavioral, Psychological and Cognitive Science. Dr. Pomerantz is president-elect of Psychology Works, Inc., and served as dean of social sciences and director of neuroscience at Rice. He was a professor of cognitive sciences and linguistics and served as provost and acting president of Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, and he taught at Yale, Johns Hopkins and the State University of New York in Buffalo. Dr. Pomerantz holds a BA with distinction and high honors in psychology from the University of Michigan, a PhD from Yale University and is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association, the American Psychological Society and the Society of Experimental Psychologists.
Ronald L. Sass, PhD,is the Harry C. and Olga Keith Wiess Professor of Natural Sciences; Professor of Biology, Chemistry, and Education; Past Chair of the Ecology and Evolutionary Biology Department; and Co-Director of the Center for Education at Rice University. A member of the Rice faculty since 1958, Dr. Sass has been a four-time recipient of the highly prized Brown Teaching Award, was named a Minnie Stevens Piper Professor of 1999, and a has been the recipient of the Salgo-Noren Distinguished Professor Award and the Rice University Award of Highest Merit. Dr. Sass holds a Ph.D. in physical chemistry from the University of Southern California. He served as a postdoctoral fellow at Brookhaven National Laboratories, a Guggenheim Fellow at Cambridge University, and a National Research Council Senior Fellow with NASA.
David Schneider, PhD, is professor of psychology at Rice University, where he teaches courses in social psychology, the history of psychology, stereotyping and prejudice, and the psychology of beliefs. He was chair of psychology at Rice from 1990-1996. He has taught at Amherst College, Stanford University, Brandeis University, The University of Texas at San Antonio and Indiana University. Dr. Schneider is the author of several books, including Person Perception, Introduction to Social Psychology and The Psychology of Stereotyping. He holds a PhD in social psychology from Stanford University.
Richard J. Smith, PhD, is George and Nancy Rupp Professor of Humanities, professor of history and director of Asian Outreach in the Center for Education at Rice University. A specialist in modern Chinese history and traditional Chinese culture, he has won 12 teaching awards while at Rice, including the Piper Professorship, the George R. Brown Certificate of Highest Merit, the Sarofim Distinguished Teaching Professorship, the Nicholas Salgo Distinguished Teaching Award and the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching “Texas Professor of the Year” Award. Dr. Smith is the author and co-author of several books on Chinese history and culture, and he is currently working on three additional books, one on the evolution of the Yijing (I-Ching or Book of Changes) in China, one on the “globalization” of the Yijing and one on traditional Chinese ritual. Dr. Smith holds a PhD from the University of California, Davis.
Gale Stokes, PhD, is Mary Gibbs Jones Professor Emeritus of History and past chair of the history department at Rice University. A three-time winner of the George R. Brown Award for Superior Teaching at Rice, he specializes in the history of Eastern Europe, Balkan History and Nationalism. Dr. Stokes is the author of From Stalinism to Pluralism: A Documentary History of Eastern Europe Since 1945; The Walls Came Tumbling Down: The Collapse of Communism in Eastern Europe; Three Eras of Political Change in Eastern Europe and The West Transformed. He received the 1994 Vucinich Prize for the best book in the field of Russian, Eurasian and East European studies from the American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies. He holds a BA from Colgate University and an MA and a PhD from Indiana University.
Richard J. Stoll, PhD, is professor of political science and associate dean of social sciences at Rice University. He also serves as the chair of the Master of Liberal Studies Faculty Steering Committee. In addition to being well known as one of Rice University’s outstanding teachers, Dr. Stoll is an accomplished scholar of international conflict. He has used computer simulation techniques to study such issues as defense spending, arms races and collective security. A member of the Council of the Correlates of War Project, Dr. Stoll recently participated in a ten-university effort funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) to collect data on militarized interstate disputes. Along with Devika Subramanian of Rice's computer science department, Dr. Stoll is engaged in an effort to create events data from online news sources and to predict the outbreak of serious international conflict. This research has been supported by the NSF. Dr. Stoll is the recipient of numerous teaching awards, including the Nicolas Salgo Distinguished Teaching Award and several George R. Brown awards for Superior Teaching. He holds a PhD in political science from the University of Michigan.
Julia Smith Wellner, PhD, is visiting assistant professor of geosciences and co-director of the Geoscience Learning Center at the University of Houston and holds a research appointment in the Rice University earth sciences department. Her primary research interest is in Antarctic glacial history and marine geology, and she has completed six field seasons in offshore Antarctica. She also works in the Gulf of Mexico on projects related to coastal change. Dr. Wellner holds a master’s degree from the University of Alabama and a PhD from Rice.