I am a native of Washington, D.C. and a “three-time” Terp, with three degrees in French Language and Literature from the University of Maryland. In my position as Senior Scholar for the Adele H. Stamp Student Union – Center for Campus Life, I work in the areas of academic partnerships, scholarship, and assessment.  I am involved in projects to increase faculty-student interaction in the building and through our programs. I also serve as chair of the campus-wide Coalition for Civic Engagement and Leadership. I’m very excited about our new website, Terp Impact,

 www.terpimpact.umd.edu. Previously, I served for 15 years as the director of community service-learning. My research interests include civic engagement, service-learning, and the collegiate experience of commuter students. My current book project, with the working title of Civic Engagement in Higher Education, is about why and how colleges and universities should provide opportunities for students to learn about and practice civic engagement. I have enjoyed developing and teaching French courses using service-learning. My academic home is in the Department of Counseling and Personnel Services.

Shenglin Chang,
Department of Plant Science and Landscape Architecture

Shenglin Chang received her Ph.D. at UC Berkeley in 2000, and is currently an Associate Professor at University of Maryland’s Landscape Architecture Program. Born in Taiwan, she has developed and implemented innovative approaches to public involvement in environmental issues through civic arts, community design participation, and social-political activism. She received the 2004 CELA Award of Recognition for Excellence in Research, Teaching and Service in Landscape Architecture (CELA – Council

of Educators in Landscape Architecture). She is currently researching the transformations of Asian and Latino immigrants’ lifestyles and identities in the suburban DC-Maryland region. Her book, The Global Silicon Valley Home: Lives and Landscapes within Taiwanese American Trans-Pacific Culture, has recently been published by the Stanford University Press (2006). Her recent essays include: "Transcultural Home Identity Across the Pacific," in Urban Ethnic Encounters (Routledge, 2002); “Breaking Silicon Silence,” in Challenging the Chip (Temple, forthcoming); “Home here, Home There,” in Landscape Review 9(1); and, “Seeing Landscape Through Transcultural Eyes” in Landscape Journal 24(2). She has edited and co-authored two books (translated into Chinese) with Randy Hester: Living Landscape and A Theory for Building Community. Her teaching focuses on issues related to landscape and identity across world cultures.

Marvin W. Scott,
Department of Kinesiology

I am a product of the Philadelphia public school system and the Pennsylvania State Higher Education system where I graduated from East Stroudsburg University with a major in physical education and a minor in health education. I obtained my masters from Ohio State University and my doctorate from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro where I studied curriculum theory and development. My first job was at Miami Dade Community College where I taught, coached and administered student and community programs for four years.

Later, I took a position at Howard Community College where I worked for eight years and utilized my curriculum development/revisions skills and gained additional administrative, counseling and teaching experience. For the last twenty years I have been at the University of Maryland in the Department of Kinesiology where I currently serve as an instructor and Coordinator of the Kinesiological Sciences Program. My educational interests lie in the areas of curriculum transformation, institutional culture, and cultural diversity. Throughout my years at UMCP, I have taken advantage of professional development opportunities and have served the university in a variety of different capacities. For me, participation in the Lilly Program is an opportunity for additional personal and professional development through my association with the university’s most prestigious faculty development program.

Penelope Koines,
Department of Biology

I am a Washington D.C. native, began my academic life as an art history major, and worked for five years at the Museum of Modern Art before leaving for life in Fairbanks, Alaska for four years. That experience convinced me that the natural world is a better place, so on returning to Washington I got my degree here in the Botany Department. In my 23 years here, I have taught many classes, including courses in botany, global change, the plant kingdom, environmental 

science, the Chesapeake Bay, and ecology of marsh and dune vegetation. In most of them I have added field trips in order to increase students' appreciation of the natural world. I am especially interested in water issues in the Southwest, and created a course which spends spring break in the Arizona desert. Seeing how plants, animals, Native Americans, and the current exploding population adapt to living in the Sonoran desert has been a great experience for my students. I look forward to meeting my fellow Lilly Fellows.

Robert T, Jackson,
Department of Nutrition and Food Science

Dr. Robert Jackson is an Associate Professor of International Nutrition in the Department of Nutrition and Food Science at the University of Maryland in College Park, MD. He received his master’s and doctoral training at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York. Dr. Jackson has published over 60 articles in referred and professional journals and has also been a consultant for the World Health Organization, the

United States Agency for International Development and the Pan American Health Organization. He has trained numerous students at the master’s and doctoral levels and has traveled and worked extensively in African, the Middle Eastern and Asian countries. He has won a variety of prestigious awards including a Senior Research Fulbright Fellowship, a World Women in Development Fellowship. Dr. Jackson is the Co-Editor of the Ecology of Food and Nutrition. He has also won several teaching awards, including the College of Agriculture and Natural Resources Poffensburg Award for Teaching and Mentoring. He is currently a 2007-2008 Center for Teaching Excellence Lily Teaching Fellow.

Randy Ontiveros,
Department of English

I was raised in the San Francisco Bay Area and remain a committed fan of Giants baseball, though I still don't know how I feel about Barry Bonds breaking the home run record. I received my undergraduate degree in English from Biola University ('97) and my Ph.D. in English from the University of California, Irvine ('06). My dissertation-turned-book-project is a study of the cultural politics of Chicano movement. It examines how art framed the

debates of the Mexican-American civil rights movement, as well as how those debates are relevant in the present. In the English department I teach on a wide range of topics: critical theory, feminist thought, Chicana/Latina film, literature, art and history, critical race theory, and contemporary American literature. I'm very much looking forward to the Lilly program!

Leslie Felbain
Department of Theatre

Leslie Felbain graduated the University of Wisconsin, Madison as a pre-med major and then focused her life toward the performing arts. She has been involved with dance, circus and theatre as a director, teacher and coach. After completing her theatre training in Europe she remained in France as a core member of le dal Theatre. As a solo performer she toured throughout Canada, Europe and The United States, and was featured at The Oval House Theatre’s Women in Theatre Festival in 1983 and 1984. Speaking several languages, her work

integrates influences of culture on gesture and expression. Since returning to the United States Leslie has been movement coach for Barry Humphries as he transforms into Dame Edna. Leslie recently moved to the Washington DC area to become a faculty member in the Department of Theatre Arts at The University of Maryland, College Park. She continues to teach in the MFA program at The American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco where she was based before moving east. Recent work in the Bay area include directing The Green Bird at The College of Marin, staging The Master and Margarita and Pericles at Zeum for the MFA program at ACT, character coaching A Christmas Carol at ACT, directing The New Pickle Circus, and Movement Directing The Rules of Charity and Pain and Pleasure at The Magic Theatre. This year Leslie participated as an Artist-in-Residence at Colgate University. In the DC area Leslie was the movement and character coach for A Blues Journey at the Kennedy Center (director Scot Reese) and for The Oracle at The African Continuum Theatre (director Jennifer Nelson). This spring she adapted an original translation of Carlo Gozzi’s The Green Bird at The Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center. In 2005 Leslie founded Infinite Stage, an ensemble based company with dramaturg Susan Haedicke and several graduates of ACT’s MFA program. In their first year Infinite Stage performed Chez Moi at The Players Theatre in NYC and Site-Seeing at The Inaugural Capital Fringe Festival in DC and The New York International Fringe Festival. This summer Infinite Stage will premier Hamlet? That is the Question at the second annual Capital Fringe Festival. In addition to her theatrical work, Leslie is a certified teacher of the F.M.Alexander Technique and Cranio-Sacral Therapist.

Janet Coffey,
Department of Curriculum and Instruction

Janet is an assistant professor in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction with an emphasis in science education. Her research focuses on the intersections between learning and everyday assessment, and she is particularly interested in student participation in more informal assessment. She is currently a co-PI on a project that studies what teachers attend to in the classroom and the influences on that attention. She is also a co-PI on a large multi-disciplinary project that is studying Baltimore as an urban ecosystem. Janet has an undergraduate degree in human biology from Stanford University and a PhD in Science Education, also from Stanford.

Todd J.Cooke,
Department of Cell Biology and Molecular Genetics

I am a professor of plant biology in the Department of Cell Biology and Molecular Genetics. I received a B. A. from Antioch College and a Ph.D. from Cornell University. My research interests focus on the structure, development, and evolution of green plants, for which I have received several awards, including a Guggenheim Fellowship. In my 28 years at Maryland, I have a taught many different

undergraduate and graduate level courses ranging from non-majors courses in introductory botany to advanced graduate seminars. I am deeply concerned about several issues including: 1) how to deal with the academic diversity of our students (with respect to prior education institutions, academic background, study skills, career goals, personal expectations, extracurricular activities, etc.) in large enrollment courses; 2) how to engage the departments providing general science courses for BSCI students in meaningful communication about the education of BSCI students; and 3) how to establish a non-hierarchical research lab environment where undergrads can work on collaborative projects. I am really looking forward to the opportunity to address important issues in teaching and learning with the talented Lilly fellows from other departments.

David Hawthorne,
Department of Entomology

I am an associate professor of insect genetics in the Department of Entomology. I took bachelors degrees from Kent State University in economics and biology before finding my true entomological path and heading to North Carolina State University for a masters degree in entomology. I then earned a Ph.D. from Cornell in insect

genetics, studied maize molecular genetics at the University of Oregon, and returned to Cornell for additional post-doctoral work in insect evolution and genetics before landing here in College Park. I’ve contributed to research and regulatory efforts at the sustainable use of transgenic corn, and I study insect speciation, particularly that driven by adaptation to different host plants. I teach both the most advanced graduate students and the non-majors undergraduates. In both cases, I am very concerned about the primitive state of the art of science education. It is my hope that participation this year in the Lilly fellowship program will boost my expertise in pedagogical methods and help me to both improve my teaching and to know where future teaching innovation is needed.