This website is best viewed in a browser that supports web standards.
Skip to content or, if you would rather, Skip to navigation.
After some years of moving from one building to another, the department will soon get a new home in what is now the basement of the Valk building. Construction on classrooms will begin soon, and should be completed by the Fall of 08. This will be followed by a second phase, with the construction of offices and two additional classrooms, and a seminar room. The entire project should be completed by the Fall of 09.
Mike Steiner is currently working on several projects, aside from teaching and coordination of the social science program, on local history in Nodaway County. Due for publication in Spring 08 is a photographic history of Nodaway County he is compiling for Arcadia Publishing. The book will contain over 200 photographs, accompanied by interpretive text, largely from 1880-1920 from local collections. He is also currently working on a three-part program as President of the Nodaway County Historical Society under a grant he received from the Missouri Humanities Council on the aesthetic heritage of Nodaway County. Three historical displays, accompanied by lectures and performances, are occurring at the Historical Society's museum in Maryville during 2007-2008 interpreting the amateur photographic, musical, and artistic heritage of Nodaway County. The first program, on local photography, began September 19 with a program introducing a museum display that will remain installed until late October. The second program, on musical heritage, will occur in March 2008 with the third program to follow in September.
The social science education program remains strong with about 85 majors currently enrolled and a large group of excellent Senior majors preparing to student teach in both the Fall and Spring.
The department's chair Richard Frucht attended an Oxford Roundtable in England last July, presenting on trends in teaching in the social sciences in relation to the emphasis on math and science. He will be presenting on Romania and the EU at the American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies in November in New Orleans. Also, his Eastern Europe: An Introduction to the Peoples, Lands and Cultures was named one of Library Journal's best source books for 2004.
Richard Fulton and a former Northwest colleague, Kevin Buterbaugh, have completed a text exploring the World Trade Organization that will be published this January (2008). It is called The WTO Primer: Tracing Trade's Visible Hand through Case Studies. It contains a fundamental discussion of the development of the WTO and the substance of its operation fleshed out by the inclusion of specific case studies.
With Dr. Frucht retiring, Dr. Falcone has assumed the responsibilities of the Alpha Chi Senior Honorary Society. The induction for the new members will be Monday, November 26, 2007. She hopes to take several Alpha Chi students to the regional conference in Springfield, MO in the spring of 2008. Dr. Falcone is also on the Graduate Council this year (2007-08).
On November 15th 2007 the Philosophy Club sponsored a forum on the ethical and legal issues raised by the rapid technological advancements of today's world. The event was entitled "Privacy and Technology: Encroachments to Privacy in a Technological World." There were three speakers for the event. Fred Lamer of NWMSU's Mass Communications department spoke about the forms of technology that pose issues of privacy. Daniel Smith of our department spoke about the legal issues of privacy, and James Okapal, a philosopher and ethicist from Missouri Western State University, spoke on the relevant ethical questions. About a hundred people attended the forum.