SOLA Travel Grant Description and Awards

School of Liberal Arts

The School of Liberal Arts offers a scholarly travel grant program to provide additional support for faculty international scholarly travel and for faculty-student scholarly travel.  It is one of the strategies Dean Hughes has implemented to advance academic distinction in the School of Liberal Arts, in service of the first goal of Saint Mary's Strategic Plan.  The program is funded through the SOLA Dean's Fund for Academic Distinction.  If you are interested in supporting this program and other initiatives to advance academic distinction in the liberal arts, please consider contributing to the Dean's fund for Academic Distinction. 

The grant program makes awards of up to $1,000 toward scholarly travel costs.  Information about the grants awarded is included below.

Grants Awarded in 2018-2019

Cathy Davalos, with undergraduate students Catalina O’Connor and Micah Sallid and graduate student Hailey Yaffee, performing at Radical Acts of Love: a festival of dance, music and poetry in Panicale, Umbria, Italy, in July 2018.

Dana Lawton was invited by the International School of Bangkok with her company, Dana Lawton Dances, where she conducted workshops with students of the school and culminated in two performances at the International School of Bangkok Chevron Theater in August 2018. 

Rosemary Graham undertaking a 3-week writing residency at the Tyrone Guthrie Centre in County Monaghan, Ireland, in July 2018, to continue work on her novel, “Simple Lessons in Irish.” $500. 

Lysley Tenorio traveling to The Bogliasco Foundation in Italy, where he was awarded a one-month Fellowship to work on his third book. The Bogliasco Fellowship is awarded to distinguished artists and scholars who have made significant contributions in their fields.

Aeleah Soine attending Monarchy and Modernity, a conference at the University of Cambridge to present her paper "Modern Princesses at Work: Examining Women’s Subjectivity and Agency in 19th-century Anglo-German Monarchies."

Velina Brackebusch traveled to Vancouver, B.C., to attend the North American Society of Sport Sociology annual conference, where she presented her paper titled "Using Data Visualization in Sport for Social Change Nonprofit Management" from Oct.31-Nov. 3rd, 2018.

Dana Herrera and Anthropology and Economics student Naa Kordai Addy conducted research on combining anthropology and economics to address questions of
development on the African continent. Naa Kordai Addy is presenting her findings at the 2019 Human Development Conference, which is sponsored by the Kellogg Institute for International Studies at the University of Notre Dame.

Elizabeth Hamm and Integral student Laine Corfield attending the Fourteenth Biennial History of Astronomy Workshop at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana in June, 2019. The research presented at this conference covers a large time span and is presented by graduate students, as well as established scholars in the field of history of science.

Grants Awarded in 2017-2018

Jessica Coblentz (TRS), presenting research on “Comedy, Tragedy--or Glory?  Another Christian Story of Suffering and Salvation” at Urshaw College at Durham University, UK, January 8-10, 2018. $1,000.

Brenda Hillman (ENG), member of the first delegation of US poets to Cuba since the revolution. July 8-16, 2017. $1,000.

Lino Rivera (PERFA), Piano Adjudicator at the International Music Competitions at Hong Kong Schools Music and Speech Association, Hong Kong, February-March 2018. $1,000.

Maria Luisa Ruiz (WLC), presenting research on Novelas and Telenovelas and La Reina del Sur at 4th Congreso Internacional in Cuernavaca, Mexico, August 3-4, 2017. $1,000.

Lysley Tenorio (ENG), Visiting Writer at Yale/National University Singapore, March 11-18, 2018. $1,000.

Joseph Drexler-Dreis (TRS), with students Symone Williams, Collin Harris, and Savannah Williams, presenting research (a student panel) on US indigenous theology at the AARWR (western region), at the Institute of Buddhist Studies, Berkeley, CA, March 23-25, 2018.  $430.

Ron Ahnen (POL), working with student Ablavi Alagno. Ablavi presented her research on Development in China at the undergraduate student Human Development Conference at the University of Notre Dame, February 23-24, 2018. $1,000.

Makiko Imamura (COM), presenting a paper in the Intercultural Communication Division and participating in a panel as a facilitator in the Intergroup Communication Division at the International Communication Association’s annual conference in Prague, Czech Republic in May 2018.  $1,000.

Robin Dunn (KINES), presenting research at the I’Association pour la Recherche sur I’Intervention en Sport, International Sport Conference in Lile, France in June 2018.  $1,000.

Grants Awarded in 2016-17

Ron Ahnen (Associate Professor, Politics) is traveling with four Politics students to participate in the Sacramento Legislative Seminar.

Manisha Anantharaman (Assistant Professor, Justice, Community & Leadership) is presenting at the 3rd International Conference of the Global Research Forum on Sustainable Production and Consumption, held at the University of Sussex, UK.  Her panel session is titled "Circular Economy Curricula:  Innovations in Sustainable Consumption Teaching."

Costanza Dopfel (Professor, World Languages & Cultures and Art + Art History) is presenting on the iconography of birth at an interdisciplinary conference on Pregnancy & Childbirth in Bologna, Italy.  She is also serving as an organizer of this conference.

Rebecca Engle (Professor, Performing Arts) traveled with 14 theatre students who had, through juried selection, been invited to participate in the Irene Ryan National Acting Scholarship competition in Denver, CO.  Three SMC teams (of out 250 competing in the ten-state region) went on to advance to the semi-finals.

Rosemary Graham (Professor, English) is taking up a writing residency at Tyrone Guthrie Centre in Ireland to work on her historical novel manuscript, "Simple Lessons in Irish."

Tereza Kramer (Director, Center for Writing Across the Curriculum) is presenting research with students at the Crossings writing conference in Reno, NV.  They will be presenting on three panels: "Whose line was it anyway? Collaboration and Intellectual Property in Writing Centers," "Building Codes: Scaffolding Writing Through Interdisciplinary Engagement," and "Taboo Topics: Becoming Comfortable with the Uncomfortable."

Helga Lenart-Cheng (Associate Professor, World Languages & Cultures) is presenting a paper titled "Mapping Our Spaces by Mapping Our Stories" at the International Auto/Biography Association (IABA) Europe Conference: Life Writing, Europe, and New Media.

Molly Metherd (Associate Professor, English) will present at the American Comparative Literature Association, held at the University of Ultrecht in the Netherlands. She is presenting a paper titled "The Latina/o Author as Transnational Intellectual" as part of a panel titled "The Globalization of U.S. Latino/Latin American Literatures and the Latino/Latino American Novelization of the Global."

Cynthia Van Gilder (Associate Professor, Anthropology) and Dana Herrera (Associate Professor, Anthropology) are co-presenting at the Architecture et Tourisme conference at the Sorbonne, Paris.  Their presentation is titled "(Re)Presenting Paradise: The Hawaiian Imaginary in Las Vegas."

Deanna Zibello (Assistant Professor, Performing Arts) worked with student Jordan Lampi on scenic design for Twelfth Night, which Jordan will present at the U.S. Institute for Theater Technology (USITT) National Conference in St. Louis.