Department Newsletter
Recent News
Recent Graduate Running for Congress
Political ambitions have brought Mike Denklau (BS ’06) back to his home state as a candidate for Congress in Iowa’s 5th District. After growing up in the small farming community of Blue Grass, Mike came to the University of Iowa and developed an interest in international business and geopolitics during a semester abroad at Bogazici University in Istanbul, Turkey. After graduating he was an investment banker in New York City, advising a broad range of businesses on finance and tax issues, securities law, and mergers and acquisitions. He also worked on several international finance projects and traveled extensively in Europe, the Middle East, and Latin America. Matt has now returned to Iowa and is a resident of Council Bluffs. He announced his candidacy for Congress on October 15.
Alumnus Ron McMullen is US Ambassador to Eritrea
Ronald McMullen has been the US Ambassador to Eritrea since November 2007. A native of Northwood, Iowa, he earned his doctorate in political science from Iowa in 1985. Ron has over 26 years of diplomatic experience and has lived, worked, or traveled in 87 countries. In Burma he worked closely with Nobel Peace laureate Aung San Suu Kyi and pro-democracy groups. While posted in Fiji he helped prevent civil conflict after an armed takeover of parliament. He was shot at during a riot in Sri Lanka and helped train mongooses to detect heroin. He survived a voodoo curse in the Dominican Republic and took Hillary Clinton on a tour of South Africa’s Robben Island with Nelson Mandela. Between foreign assignments, Ron served for three years as Visiting Professor at the Military Academy at West Point, where he taught International Relations and Comparative Politics. He has authored many scholarly works and is a three-time recipient of the State Department’s Superior Honor Award.
Buttorff Awarded Dissertation Research Fellowship
Gail Buttorff was awarded an ACOR-CAORC Dissertation Research Fellowship for the Spring/Summer of 2009. She spent five months in Jordan collecting archives and conducting interviews about election boycotts and the broader issues of election reform and democratization. A particular focus of her fieldwork was the activities of the Muslim Brotherhood and its political party, the Islamic Action Front. She met with leaders and members of both organizations to discuss their policies and decision-making processes. A particular highlight of her research was her one-on-one interviews with the former Prime Minister, and other high-level government officials. After completing research in Jordan, she was able to travel to Yemen where she met with a coalition of opposition parties to discuss similar issues of reform and democratization.
Journeys in World Politics Workshop
On October 15-18, 2009, Kelly Kadera and Sara Mitchell will host the 5th annual Journeys in World Politics Workshop. The Journeys workshop brings together junior and senior women working in International Relations, including graduate students and junior faculty from over a dozen different institutions. The weekend experience is highlighted by research presentations by junior scholars, feedback on research from conference participants, sessions on career and gender topics, and oral autobiographies by senior scholars. In previous workshops, group discussions have covered a variety of topics, such as networking, mentoring, balancing family and work, gender issues in the classroom, negotiation strategies, and what to expect in the tenure track. The featured senior scholars for the 2009 meeting are Professor Mary Caprioli, University of Minnesota Duluth and Professor Xinyuan Dai, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Professor Caprioli's research focuses broadly on conflict and security studies, including interstate and intrastate violence. She is interested in understanding why states, societies, and individuals engage in violent behavior and more specifically in assessing the role of gendered structural inequality in predicting violence. Professor Dai's research examines domestic political processes, international institutions, and compliance. She develops game theoretic models to show how domestic actors influence states' willingness to join international institutions and the likelihood that governments will comply with the terms of the treaties.
Undergraduate Career Workshop, November 10
On November 10, the workshop was designed to provide students with information on legal careers. Matthew Whitaker, United States Attorney for the Southern District of Iowa, spoke about the journey that took him from being a student at the University of Iowa to a prestigious appointment with the U.S. Department of Justice. Matthew Whitaker was nominated by President George W. Bush to serve as the United States Attorney for the Southern District of Iowa on February 3, 2004. Matt's nomination was unanimously confirmed by the U.S. Senate on June 3, 2004, and he was sworn into office on June 15, 2004. Prior to his appointment, Whitaker was an attorney at the Finley Alt Smith law firm in Des Moines. The United States Attorney for the Southern District of Iowa has offices in Des Moines, Council Bluffs, and the Quad Cities. As United States Attorney, Matt prioritizes working closely with local, state and federal law enforcement. Prior to his appointment, Matt worked for the law firms of Finley Alt Smith in Des Moines, Iowa; Briggs & Morgan in the Twin Cities; and corporate counsel for a national grocery company, SUPERVALU. In addition, Matt was also a successful small businessman. Matt received his undergraduate degree from the University of Iowa in 1991. In 1995, he graduated with distinction from the University of Iowa College of Law and also received a Master of Business Administration. He is admitted to practice before the state and federal courts of Iowa and the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit.
Hawkeye Poll: Chicago's Digital Divide
A city-commissioned study, conducted as a partnership between the UI and the University of Illinois-Chicago in 2008, showed that 40% of Chicagoans have little of no internet access and also illuminated a digital divide that exists between different demographic groups in Chicago. Professors David Redlawsk and Caroline Tolbert, along with graduate student Daniel Bowen and University of Illinois-Chicago's Professor Karen Mossberger, collected the data via telephone survey and prepared a report for the city last summer. Chicago Mayor, Richard Daley, praised the research, noting that it narrowed down to the neighborhood level where and why internet access exists. Mayor Daley shared the results of their research at a July 21 news conference, where he unveiled an initiative to address the digital divide between the city's rich and poor neighborhoods. The initiative will provide free wireless broadband access to underserved neighborhoods, as well as better technology centers. The researchers will do a follow-up study in two years to see if free wireless spurs economic development in depressed urban areas.
View the digital excellence report on the City of Chicago's website.
Covington Meets Alumni at Conference in Korea
On Thursday, July 16, Cary Covington presented a paper, titled “Deterring Presidential Abuses of Power: Lessons from the United States,” to an international conference hosted by the National Assembly of the Republic of Korea. The conference, which commemorated Korea’s 61st Constitution Day, discussed constitutional reforms that might improve Korea’s ability to protect human rights and to redress the imbalance of power between the presidency and the National Assembly. Other presenters included constitutional law professors from France, Germany, and Portugal as well as political scientists and constitutional law professors from leading Korean universities. They spoke to members of the National Assembly and academics as well as a national television audience. Two Korean professors who earned their Ph.D.’s at The University of Iowa also participated in the conference. Nam Young Lee, the current president of the Korean Political Science Association, helped organize the conference. Wook Kim participated in a panel of Korean scholars and elected officials to discuss past constitutional reforms and the prospects for future changes. On Friday night, Cary capped his visit by having dinner with Wook Kim, two recent recipients of Iowa Ph.D.s (Dong Hun Kim and San-shin Lee) and two students who are planning to begin their graduate studies at Iowa in the near future.
Left to right: Dong Hun Kim, Cary Covington, Wook Kim, and San-shin Lee.
Inner-City Chicago meets Small Town Iowa
Professors David Redlawsk and Tom Rice directed a week-long workshop in July that brought 28 Chicago high school students to Iowa to learn about public opinion polling. The students are involved with Mikva Challenge, a celebrated Chicago youth service organization that engages young people in politics and policy. During their visit the students learned how to design, execute, and analyze a public opinion poll. For hands-on experience, the students conducted a poll of the residents of Washington, Iowa on issues important to the city government. When the survey was complete, the city government hosted the students to an evening meal at the Washington YMCA. After dinner the students presented the results of the survey to the mayor and the city council. Following the presentation everyone went to the town square for a concert featuring the community band.
For local news coverage of the event, go to this article from The Daily Iowan.
Mikva Challenge high school students
Summer Road Trip
This summer as a part of RAGBRAI, a non-competitive bike ride across the state of Iowa, this team of bicycling faculty dipped their tires into the Missouri River at the start of the ride. The after-the-ride photo is not being released!
From left to right are Professors Jennifer Sessions (History), Andrew Ho (Iowa Testing Programs), Amanda Owen (Communication Sciences & Disorders), along with Professor Jae-Jae Spoon and her husband, C.J. Voci. Riders come from all over the world to participate in this annual Iowa ride, and they participate in teams or clubs—which is what adds to the fun. Along the way, the professors met many interesting characters, such as in this photo below of a banana-man riding in a banana-bike. The banana-man was often found hanging out at the Iowa Conservation Team Tent along the route, where riders could get their free daily banana.
Summer Teaching Abroad
Fred Boehmke taught at the Essex Summer School in Social Science Data Management, August 10-21. The course, entitled Advanced Programming in Stata, focused on generating and interpreting quantities of interest from nonlinear regression models.
Summer Workshop on Grant Writing
A dozen political science faculty have been participating in a grant workshop this summer organized by Sara Mitchell. The first session, which took place on June 11th, involved a discussion of tips for successful grant writing, especially for the National Science Foundation, as well as guidelines about creating budgets. Participants received a list of typical funding agencies for political science research. Elizabeth Constantine from the College of Education visited during the second workshop on June 25th to talk about internal sources of funding, as well as strategies for dealing with external funding agencies, such as the U.S. Department of Education and the International Research and Exchanges (IREX) Board. The participants also discussed proposals considered at NSF in past funding calls and they discussed initial drafts of project descriptions put together by some of the workshop participants. The goal is to produce at least four grant applications among participating faculty for the upcoming summer NSF deadline and for internal grant deadlines this fall, such as the Social Sciences Funding Program.
Summer Leadership Institute
Four undergraduates with a political science major were a part of the the 2009 Iowa National Education for Women's (N.E.W.) Leadership class. Alicia Mundy, Molly McAndrew, Sarah Milani, and Patrice Hawkins participated in the program on May 31 through June 5, 2009. The program was designed to help undergraduate women develop public leadership skills, learn about civic involvement, and build relationships with women who are involved in public leadership on the local, state, and national level. The Women's Resource and Action Center (WRAC) at The University of Iowa welcomed a total of 27 undergraduate women to campus to participate in this summer institute. For more information, you may visit the WRAC website.
College of Liberal Arts and Sciences names Collegiate Scholar
Caroline Tolbert is the new Collegiate Scholar, honored for excellence in teaching and scholarship or creative work. Linda Maxson, dean of the college, presents the Collegiate Scholar award to mid-career faculty recently promoted to full professorship. Awards are made on the advice of the college's committee on faculty promotion and tenure. The scholars receive discretionary funds to support their teaching and research. The Collegiate Scholar award is funded by an unrestricted gift to the college.
Poster Sessions as a Teaching Tool
Several of our faculty have found it beneficial to use a poster session to present research results at the end of the semester. This is an uncommon approach in political science, other than at the large conferences. This spring semester Professors Kelly Kadera and David Redlawsk each asked their graduate class to present their final research project at a poster session. All faculty and graduate students were invited to attend. In the photo below, you see the students faced with questions from fellow graduate students and faculty--and certainly they were rewarded with valuable feedback!
Announcements
William Ailliw Day was born August 27, 2009 at 3:03 AM. He is 9 pounds 13.8 ounces and is 21.25 inches long. The middle name is pronounced: iloo, where the i is long.
Adelaide Joy Bowen was born to Dan and Elissa on early in the morning on July 11. She was 6 lbs. 13 ounces and 21 inches long.
Hoi Ok Jeong and Su-Yeul Chung's first baby girl was born on June 23 in Seoul, Korea. Seo-Young weighed 6 pounds, 81 ounces, and was 19.29 inches tall at birth. As many Korean names have meanings, "Seo" means auspicious (happy) and "Young" means long and forever.
Benjamin Darr and Christine Darr are now the proud parents of Neal Vincent Darr. Neal was born on May 29 at 7:43 a.m., just one hour after the Darrs arrived at the hospital. Ben tells us that Neal was born weighing 6 pounds and 6 ounces, and is as healthy as a horse.
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