CSI Today

The City University of New York (CUNY) has announced its latest team of award-winning “All-Star” students and CSI’s Ain Richardson is in the line-up.

When asked how she feels about receiving this honor, Richardson said, “When I was first contacted about becoming a CUNY All-Star I was quite confused, not only because it was around 7:30am but also because I didn’t really understand what an honor it was. I just knew it was something that CUNY wanted so I agreed. The weight of it all didn’t hit home until my mother called me to tell me I was in the paper and I received many different Facebook messages saying ‘I saw you in the paper and just wanted to say congrats on your All-Star’. The more and more I see the reactions of the people who helped me reach this point, the more and more I understand what it means. I am now a person who was chosen to not only represent my school, but all of CUNY. I feel proud of my tasks, and sometimes still can’t believe that I was able to make what at first was just an idea become a piece of reality that will always live with me. I now also know that I have the ability to both tell and prove to other students that they can do the same thing if they are willing to work hard, stay focused, and never even think about giving up.”

Richardson, a graduate of Port Richmond High School, is a sophomore majoring in International Business, who, as a Benjamin A. Gilman International Scholar, received a grant this year to study in China at Nanjing (Nanda) University through the College Consortium of International Studies. She has studied Chinese since she entered CSI with the ultimate goal of working for an international firm in the world’s largest market.

CSI President Dr. Tomás Morales, who had the opportunity to meet Richardson while he was in China last semester, noted, “It is an honor to have another CSI student make the CUNY All-Star team. Ain’s accomplishments, both at CSI and in China, as a Gilman Scholar, exemplify the exceptional caliber of students at the College. On behalf of the College, I congratulate Ain for her many ongoing achievements.”

Regarding the latest team of All-Stars, CUNY Chancellor Matthew Goldstein said, “We are enormously proud of their significant academic achievements and, to recognize their success…Because increasing numbers of CUNY students are competing successfully for ‘major league’ awards we selected our team from a deep pool of talent. They boast impressive statistics and have earned superb reputations reflected either in highly competitive awards won or the prestigious graduate or professional schools that have accepted them for advanced study.”

C.W. Anderson, Assistant Professor of Media Culture at CSI, has recently received the first annual Gene Burd Urban Journalism Research Prize for his dissertation, entitled “Breaking Journalism Down: Work, Authority, and Networking Local News, 1997-2009.” Anderson received the prize at the most recent International Communication Association (ICA) meeting in Singapore.

Commenting on his award, Anderson said, “Obviously, receiving any academic award from a prestigious association like the ICA is an honor. Receiving it for research that I think sheds light on current public debates — what’s the future of American journalism?– is a particular honor. And I’m excited to be able to continue to build on this research here at CSI, with the support of the school and the fantastic Media Culture faculty.”

Cindy Wong, Chairperson of the Department of Media Culture, stated, “The Department is very proud that Professor Anderson is the first recipient of the Gene Burd Urban Journalism Research Prize. His dissertation on local Philadelphia media examines how journalism has changed in this very important juncture where traditional print journalism is facing challenges imposed by the development of online, digital journalism, both in the gathering as well as dissemination of news. Instead of giving a simplistic view on the projected demise of print journalism, Anderson provides a nuanced understanding of what new journalistic work entails and examines the changing standard of journalistic authority where the digital bloggers can no longer be ignored.”

Dr. Wong added, “With his deep understanding of this very complex new journalistic landscape, the Department is looking forward to Professor Anderson’s leadership in redesigning a new curriculum that will provide our students with the most up-to-date journalistic theories and practices to empower them to become journalists of the new 21st century digital environment.”

CSI English Professor Maryann Feola has recently been elected as a Parliamentarian of the Calandra Institute’s Italian American Faculty and Staff Advisory Committee (IAFSAC) for a three-year term. As a result, she is also a member of the IAFSAC’s Executive Committee.

“My reaction to the election of Parliamentarian of the Calandra Council is a happy one,” Dr. Feola says. “It is an important service to a body dedicated to representing Italian Americans–students, faculty, and staff–at CUNY and promoting cultural events. I look forward to working with Council President Donna Chirico and Calandra Dean Anthony Julian Tamburri. My PhD dissertation and a subsequent book discuss the parliaments that shaped events in 17th-century England, so I have a special interest in this work.”

Dr. Feola received her PhD at the Graduate Center of The City University of New York, where she pursued her interests in the various cultural aspects of the Renaissance and 17th century. Her research includes 16th- and 17th-century radical writers, including Christopher Marlowe, John Milton, early Quakers writers, and the literature of kingship and regicide. She also writes about the experience of Italian American women who have challenged boundaries. Dr. Feola has published articles on instructional approaches to the teaching of reading and writing to college students. At the College of Staten Island, she teaches such courses as the English Renaissance, 17th-century English Literature, John Milton, Medieval and Early Modern Culture, Women and Literature, and College Writing. She is also the Coordinator of Master of Arts Program in English.

Dr. Feola has received a Mellon Fellowship and several funding opportunities from The Folger Shakespeare Library. In 2003 she received the CSI Dolphin Award for Excellence in Teaching, and she has been recognized by The City University Access to Excellence program. She was the co-founder and former co-editor of The Journal of College Reading, and has written several biographies for Oxford University Press’s The Dictionary of National Biography, as well as reviews of books and plays concerning Renaissance literature, Italian American studies, and pedagogy. Her articles have been anthologized and appear in publications, including New Light on George Fox and Curraggia: Writing by Women of Italian Descent. Her George Bishop: Seventeenth Century Soldier Turned Quaker (1997) was published both in England and the U.S. She is working on an article concerning reflections of the Protestant Reformation in the plays of Christopher Marlowe, and a multi-genre book, tentatively titled: Geography of Shame: A Not-Too-Fictionalized Memoir, which explores southern Italy and the lives of Italian and Italian American women.

During the fall 2010, Dr, Feola will finalize the preparations for a conference that will be at CSI’s Green Dolphin Lounge on March 24, 2011. The conference, “Remembering the Triangle Fire of 1911,” will commemorate the March 25, 1911 tragedy that took the lives of 146 factory workers, most of whom were members of NYC’s Italian and Jewish immigrant communities.