Research, Creativity and Scholarship 2018-2019
Improve Lives and Society through Research, Creativity and Scholarship
New MSU lab focuses on the study of human movement
JULY 6, 2018
BOZEMAN — Inside a Montana State University laboratory on the south end of campus, a student lies prone on a table and flexes her calf. Her muscle activity appears as a burst of blue lines on a screen across the room, and her movement is captured via cameras mounted on the wall and thimble-sized sensors placed on her body.
The data transmits to a computer and, along with other information collected, allows researchers in the laboratory to analyze the motion. The information could be helpful in studies seeking to understand more about the mechanics of human motion, as well as in developing a rehabilitation plan for an injured person.
The new laboratory – called the MSU Neuromuscular Biomechanics Lab – is headed by Jim Becker, an assistant professor in the Department of Health and Human Development in the College of Education, Health and Human Development, and Scott Monfort, assistant professor in the Norm Asbjornson College of Engineering’s Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering. Biomechanics is the science that is concerned with analyzing how and why bodies move in the way that they do.
MSU hosts more than 100 educators at international symposium focused on rural education
AUGUST 3, 2018
BOZEMAN — Successful rural schools are able to create innovative school-community partnerships to ensure both the schools’ and the communities’ sustainability, and they have an ongoing commitment to pre-service teacher education and school-university partnerships, according to professor Simone White, an educator and expert in rural education from Australia who spoke Thursday at Montana State University.
White’s remarks were part of a keynote address she delivered at the International Symposium for Innovation in Rural Education held Aug. 1-3 on the MSU campus in Bozeman.
The symposium, “Communities and Partnerships: Strengthening Rural Education,” was designed to bring together educators from across the globe to share research findings and discuss innovative ideas related to rural education, all with a goal of strengthening rural education.
JANUARY 11, 2019
BOZEMAN — As a middle school language arts teacher for more than a decade, one of the biggest challenges Sarah Pennington said she experienced was how to effectively motivate her students to read. Motivation was particularly challenging with students who didn’t view reading as something at which they were successful, added Pennington, who is now an assistant education professor in Montana State University’s College of Education, Health and Human Development.
Searching for effective solutions, Pennington recently completed a pilot research study on one music-based program’s effectiveness at both motivating students and bolstering their reading skills. Pennington said the study’s results are promising and show there are strong potential benefits to using music to teach reading.
“These results are strong and exciting,” she said.
The pilot research study, completed this summer, examined one music-based program’s effectiveness at both motivating students and bolstering their reading skills. Called Tune into Reading, the program uses music to help engage and teach students.
BOZEMAN — Research by a Montana State University professor has been featured in an article published by a prominent international science journal.
Selena Ahmed’s more than decade-long research into how long-term changes in weather and shifting patterns of precipitation impact the quality of tea, farming communities and land-use strategies was featured in an Outlook media piece in the Feb. 6 issue of Nature magazine. Called “How climate change might affect tea,” the article authored by Anna Nowogrodzki detailed how changes in temperature and rainfall patterns can affect the growing season, flavor and health benefits of tea.
BOZEMAN — Two Montana State University faculty members have recently launched projects aimed to strengthen behavioral health in youth in Gallatin and Park counties and across the state.
Mark Schure and Katey Franklin, both in the College of Education, Health and Human Development’s Department of Health and Human Development, have received grants to help fund their projects.
As part of her work, Franklin is collaboratively developing a curriculum for a local at-risk youth program’s participants that is infused with well-being perspectives, behavioral health strategies and more information about addiction. For the project, Franklin is partnering with Big Sky Youth Empowerment, or BYEP, a local nonprofit designed to help adolescents in grades 8 through 12 navigate teenage life.
