Faculty Profile: J. William Harmless, S.J.
J. William Harmless, S.J., Professor in the Department of Theology, has been at Creighton for more than seven years. During this time, his scholarly work has ranged from early monasticism to mysticism to women of the early Church. But he keeps coming back to St. Augustine.
His interest in St. Augustine began with his parish experiences in the early 1980s, which eventually led to his dissertation at Boston College in 1990. The opportunity of a lifetime came when the director of Catholic University of America Press contacted him in 2004, asking him to consolidate the St. Augustine writings in the Fathers of the Church series from 30 volumes to one. In doing this, he has published one of the most critically acclaimed books on Augustine to date, Augustine in His Own Words, published in August 2010.
Harmless used the Fathers of the Church volumes as a core of his anthology, but a third of the volume includes his own new translations drawn from the breadth of Augustine’s corpus. Among those are the 31 new letters discovered by Johannes Divjak in 1980 and the 26 new sermons discovered by Francois Dolbeau in 1990. Augustine’s prolific writing and eloquent long-windedness can be overwhelming not only to newcomers, but even for experts. In designing each chapter, Harmless consulted leading Augustinian scholars around the world, including Allan Fitzgerald, J. Patout Burns, Carol Harrison, and Roland Teske, S.J.
Fr. Harmless spends one chapter devoted to each of Augustine’s masterpieces (Confessions, On the Trinity, and City of God) and one to each of his best-known controversies (against Manichees, Donatists and Pelagians). He also explores many overlooked facets of Augustine’s career, namely, his everyday work as a bishop, preacher and interpreter of the Bible. The book, although intended as an introduction for first-time readers of Augustine, is extremely thorough in explanation of the subjects. Fr. Harmless states that his goal with the new book is to bring people up to speed with the scholarly discussion of matters and to correct many widely-held misconceptions.
The first of these misconceptions is the popular image of Augustine, the lonely scholar. To dramatize this, Harmless points to Vittore Carpaccio’s famous oil painting "Saint Augustine in His Study," which "portrays Augustine seated in a desk, stylus in hand, his right arm raised in the air, poised between thoughts, ready to transcribe the next great theological inspiration. Scattered about his desk and beneath his feet are books, some piled up, others lying open, all expensively bound. He sits completely alone in a spacious, elegant study. A beautiful painting, but inaccurate.
Harmless stresses instead that Augustine was a North African bishop who "spurned fineries and dressed with great simplicity, likely in the rough robes of a monk....It is almost impossible to imagine the historical Augustine spending long hours alone writing. He seems everywhere and always surrounded by people, by close friends and clamoring parishioners: preaching extemporaneously to large and noisy crowds in Hippo and Carthage; listening in frustration to lawsuits between contentious local litigants; chewing over the Bible with his monks and clergy as they shared their common meals or deliberating long hours in council with his fellow North African bishops."
"Augustine was certainly an author, but few writings were likely written with his own pen. He mostly spoke his books, dictating them, often late at night, to stenographers who worked on the staff of his government-supported church. We think of Augustine as a great writer, but contemporaries knew him as a great talker."
Assuring an accurate understanding of the Christianity is fundamental to Fr. Harmless’ research, and in turn, is also the reason that he continues to teach Christianity in Context, an introductory level course. He says, "People don’t have the basics of knowledge. It is the same as trying to teach calculus to someone who doesn’t know how to add or subtract.”"
It’s not difficult to find a professor at Creighton who mixes teaching and scholarship with a desire for service work as well, but it is more difficult to find one with Fr. Harmless’ tenacity and drive to help others.
Augustine in His Own Words can be purchased at cuapress.cua.edu.
Energy Technology Program: Unique in Design and Development
Just last summer, Creighton installed a double row of massive plates over the Burt Street parking lot, stretching more than a city block and composed of more than 400 individual panels. They turn the sun’s rays into clean, renewable power that is helping wean the University off the city’s grid. The University also installed two solar tracking arrays, one in the Burt St. parking lot and one on the south side of the Lied Education Center for the Arts. These track the sun’s path across the sky allowing for an optimal collection angle to be achieved throughout the day. Less visible on campus are the 143 separate 23-foot-long photovoltaic laminate arrays on the south-facing roof of the Kiewit Fitness Center.
The newest addition, just out the front door of the Lied Education Center for the Arts are four vertical access wind turbines which take advantage of the turbulent air flow. Unlike the turbines typically seen across the Midwest, these vertical turbines are quieter, begin rotating at lower speeds and are more accepting of rapid wind direction changes. The four turbines are mounted at staggered heights, measuring 10 feet, 20 feet and 30 feet, for the new Energy Technology Program students to study the optimal height for peak electrical production. Michael Cherney, Ph.D., director of the Energy Technology Program and professor of Physics, said "the optimal height is dependent on the installation cost and the energy output which is normally larger for a larger height."
All together, the University’s new additions are capable of producing about 120 kilowatts of power on a sunny day, enough to power three large buildings on campus, or the equivalent of about 40 homes.
They are also helping Creighton save about $24,000 annually, according to Lennis Pederson, associate vice president for Administration and director of Facilities Management.
These are in addition to the four new energy-related teaching laboratories on campus. The labs are designed to reinforce mathematical and scientific concepts. They have a focus on electrical testing and measurement, design and rapid prototyping, solid-state chemistry, and material science and computer simulations.
The solar arrays, turbines and labs were a joint enterprise between Creighton and the Omaha Public Power District. The largest investor was the U.S. Department of Energy, with a $1.14 million grant for the physical equipment and an additional $1.2 million grant to establish the related educational program.
Cherney’s typical course of study is relativistic heavy ion collisions using the STAR experiment at Brookhaven National Laboratory in Upton, New York and the ALICE Experiment at the European Center for Particle Physics (CERN) in Geneva. Much of his research effort is focused on controls systems for nuclear physics, but he finds helping to shape the new Energy Technology Program fulfilling, and one that he says is "built on the Ignatian values of stewardship and service and justice."
Cherney carries over a lot of his Physics core to the Energy Technology Program, which has converted Brianna Baca, a sophomore who changed her intended physics major to the Energy Tech Program after a discussion with Cherney. "I was interested because of the physics base but also because the programs included the Ignatian principles and focus on changing our reliance on foreign energy."
The program consists of two degrees, a Bachelor of Arts, which focuses on the policy of sustainable energy, and a Bachelor of Science, which focuses on the engineering and science of such systems.
The design of the program is what is truly unique, coming from a student-up approach. The faculty, comprising nine departments, originally asked students what they wanted to learn, which led to a conference last August with students, faculty and industry leaders. The conference was coordinated with the help of three faculty members from the Frank W. Olin College of Engineering in Needham, Mass., the 8th-ranked engineering school in the country. Cherney explains, "Olin is a pioneer in hands-on teaching, in a way that is very compatible with the Ignatian pedagogy.
"The process in creating the program first started with a discussion with students and potential industry partners concerning what they want. It is not enough to give them what they want, but we want to put them in a situation that will mimic the way of learning embodied in the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius. The final step is to create a place where this experience-based learning style can be actively realized."
This includes limited time in classrooms and more time in labs and doing projects. During this time, the students are evaluated for their strengths and weaknesses and encouraged to pursue the things that they are not good at or familiar with. Finally, the students reflect on the experiences they have had, reliving the experience and finding out what they got out of the situations and where they will continue to grow.
Cherney believes the new energy technology program is rooted in the five characteristics of Jesuit higher education. "We’re taking the best innovative science, mathematics and engineering that the U.S. has to offer but shifting the motivation for study. We’re going from a purely entrepreneurial direction to that of a Catholic or Jesuit faith perspective. It’s about Catholic social teaching and its emphasis on human dignity.
"It is also rooted in the way that Jesuits taught Jesuits and is governed by a combination of rational thought and instincts. It is important for the students to learn the required discipline, but also to integrate it into themselves, to make it a pattern of thought, not just a set of skills. It is the faculty’s duty to teach the way of thinking that becomes second nature, and, second, to give them the experience necessary to succeed upon graduation. Finally, they will create lifelong learners and team players that have a reverence for the world that we live in.
"We’re calling for a reverence, for an ongoing reflection on the human experience and the world in which we live. Our model is one of creative companionship as we address environmental stewardship from a multidisciplinary perspective. We are shifting the faculty member’s primary role from lecturer to mentor. We are calling for justice and solidarity through a focus on efforts that go beyond the classroom."
This fall there are 15 students enrolled in the program. The goal is to accept up to 25 students in subsequent years. This summer, the enrolled students spent a significant amount of time helping design the program. They also spent up to 40 hours a week in the lab, building a photovoltaic system that will purify water. At the end of the project, the system that works best and is the most economical to produce will be review by non-governmental organizations working in the Dominican Republic.
The Program attempts to set itself apart from the traditional Jesuit schools through its focus on project-based and team-based learning and its interdisciplinary approach. Much of the curriculum is built around hands-on engineering and group-based design projects.
"The hands-on aspect is what stood out," said Mark Richwine, an incoming freshman, "that and the collaboration with faculty to establish the idea of what I want to learn about. It’s not the standard pedagogy of college. I’m going to learn about things that interest me."
This project-based teaching begins in the students, first year, or in the case of this year, prior to their first year, and culminates in a senior project involving a renewable energy product or an internship related to the energy industry. There are already a handful of companies eager to give internships to students, even though the programs, classes just started this fall.
Meghan Freeman Studies Classics at Yale
Meghan C. Freeman graduated from Creighton in 2009 with a degree in Classical Languages. You see her here standing in front of the library at Yale University, where she is now pursuing the PhD in the Classics Department.
Meghan had an extremely distinguished career at Creighton. She amassed a stunning series of accomplishments, not least (but not only) in her major field. She began, in the Fall of her Junior Year, to study a portrait of the Roman emperor Augustus in the Joslyn Art Museum, a project which would occupy her until graduation. This work was carried out with Professor Gregory S. Bucher of Creighton's Classical and Near Eastern Studies Department. In the Spring of that year, against stiff national competition, she won a Manson Stewart Scholarship from the Classical Association of the Middle West and South and admission to the prestigious Intercollegiate Center for Classical Studies in Rome. She also, against strong competitors, won the Creighton Honors Program's Bisenius Summer Research Scholarship to pursue the study of her portrait. On top of that she was invited to give a talk on her research at the Wisconsin State Latin Day that semester.
In that spring of her Junior Year, she began helping organize a Symposium on Roman portraiture to be held at Creighton in the following spring, taking the lead (while Bucher was away in Rome) in writing a successful grant application to the Nebraska Humanities Council.
After her summer of research, grant writing, and conference organizing, she headed to Rome and spent the Fall of her Senior Year at the Intercollegiate Center, carrying out, while there, numerous museum visits to study comparative examples for her research project. Upon her return she started writing her thesis in earnest, while also carrying out duties helping to conserve the Joslyn portrait at the Gerald R. Ford Conservation Center and plan a small exhibition at the Joslyn, for which she co-wrote the didactic plaque. She had been awarded a special grant for the conservation and exhibition by the Dean of Creighton's College of Arts and Sciences.
The climax of her undergraduate career was an extremely mature talk she wrote and delivered flawlessly at "The Good, The Bad, and the Altered" Symposium at Creighton University on 21 April 2009, alongside internationally prominent scholars. Expanded versions of the symposium papers were published after peer review in the 2010 volume of the Memoirs of the American Academy in Rome, with Meghan co-authoring both the introduction to the collection and an article publishing the Joslyn Augustus portrait. The icing on the cake was a coveted College of Arts and Sciences Senior Award which Meghan received at graduation (summa cum laude).
Desiring to go on to graduate school, Meghan was advised first to take a year to cement her classical languages more firmly. She was admitted to The University of Pennsylvania's Postbaccalaureate Program in Classics for the 2009-10 academic year, and was then duly admitted, with a full scholarship, to study toward the PhD at Yale the following year. At Yale she has been an intern at the Yale University Art Gallery and has been admitted, again against stiff competition, to study in the Summer Sessions of the American School of Classical Studies in Athens.
Eileen Burke-Sullivan Named First Holder of Chair in Pastoral Liturgical Theology
Dr. Eileen Burke-Sullivan, S.T.D., Associate Professor of Theology, Director of Creighton’s online Master of Arts in Ministry program, and Associate Director of the Master of Christian Spirituality program became the first chairholder of the Barbara Reardon Heaney Chair in Pastoral Liturgical Theology in Creighton’s College of Arts and Sciences. An inaugural ceremony was held on Wednesday, Feb. 23, at 4 p.m. in the Hixson-Lied Auditorium at the Harper Center.
Eileen has dedicated her life to serving the Church and society as a pastoral minister, administrator and educator. She has been a full-time faculty member since 2003. Prior to joining Creighton, Eileen served as a pastoral liturgical minister in parishes and dioceses, offering program leadership, ministry formation courses, retreats and spiritual direction in both Catholic and Protestant churches throughout the United States and Canada. 
Among her professional ministerial roles, she served as director of music and acting director of liturgy in the Archdiocese of Omaha’s Office for Divine Worship for three years. With her brother, the Rev. Kevin Burke, S.J., she is co-author of The Ignatian Tradition. Eileen said, “Liturgy is the fire that fuels the life of the Church,” and that public liturgies communicate and, at the same time, nourish the heart of the Christian experience. Her goal as an educator is to tie formal, academic theology to the practices of liturgy and spirituality.
Eileen Burke-Sullivan completed her Doctorate of Sacred Theology at Weston Jesuit School of Theology in Cambridge, Mass., (now the School of Theology and Ministry at Boston College). She also holds a License in Sacred Theology and master’s degrees in theology and music.
The Barbara Reardon Heaney Chair in Pastoral Liturgical Theology is a gift from the family and friends of the late Barbara Reardon Heaney, MD’51. In speaking about establishing this chair, Robert P. Heaney, BS’47, M.D., the John A. Creighton University Professor, recalls that his wife’s love for liturgy first drew her to his attention.
Recent Grad Evan Carlson
Evan Carlson is an 2008 Creighton graduate who majored in Greek and Classical and Near Eastern Civilization. Evan's father, Dr. James Carlson, is an Associate Professor of Mathematics with a secondary appointment in the Department of Computer Science. Evan recently graduated with the Anthropology MA from Columbia and is enroute to the Ph.D. Program in Archaeology at UCLA. He recently reflected on his experience in the Classical and Near Eastern Studies Department, saying –
“My involvement in the Classical and Near Studies Department at Creighton was one of the major turning points of my life. I do not exaggerate in saying that after taking courses in Classics and meeting the department faculty, I went from a failing student to a straight A student. The faculty of the Classics Department are some of the most committed to the success of their students as any I have known from universities coast to coast. They have been and continue to be a source of support and encouragement long after graduation. It is true that a Classics education is one of the best degrees to have going into law or health sciences, but the importance of a degree focusing on the study of the ancient world should not be taken for granted either. For students interested in history, linguistics, art, and archaeology, the CANES Department is the means to cultivate those interests and the best stepping stone at Creighton into pursuing such fields. For those who find a lack of motivation or question what pursuit to take upon finding themselves in college, take a look at the CANES Department; you might find exactly what you are looking for. In my opinion, any student who has taken a course in the Classical and Near Eastern Studies Department has studied under some of the best professors in the business.”
Bridget Keegan and Khloe Keeler Receive Prestigious Awards
Dr. Bridget Keegan, Professor of English, and Khloe Keeler, a College of Arts and Sciences junior, received the 2011 Mary Lucretia and Sarah Emily Creighton Awards during Creighton University’s annual Founder’s Week luncheon on Feb. 10, in the Harper Center Ballroom.
Keegan served as Chair of the English Department from 2001-2005 then as an associate dean in the College of Arts and Sciences and interim chair for the Department of Modern Languages. While chair, she led the revision of the department’s curriculum resulting in a more student-focused agenda. She is also the recipient of the College of Arts and Sciences Advising Award and is considered an outstanding teacher, adviser and leader, according to her students and colleagues. A passionate advocate for scholarships and fellowships, she serves as a personal role model for the success of female faculty and served as a former chair of the Committee on the Status of Women. “Dr. Keegan embodies the Jesuit mission. She espouses cura personalis along with academic excellence,” said nominator Gail Jensen, Ph. D., Dean of the Graduate School. “Her actions and contributions are true evidence of her commitment to women and men for and with others.”
Keeler spends much of her time with the Student Support Services Program, assisting incoming Native American students and others. She is involved in numerous service work projects, and has been a mentor for Peer2Peer, Boy’s and Girl’s Club, RAISE (Recognizing American Indian Success in Education) and Omaha Boy’s Town. Last semester, Khloe served as the Decurion for a Ratio Studiorum Program class headed by English professor, Mary Longo, Ph. D., in which she helped freshmen make the transition to Creighton and college life. “Khloe embodies several of the Jesuit values that Creighton promotes and inculcates; she serves as a wonderful model of behavior and accomplishment for young women,” Dr. Longo said.
The All University Committee on the Status of Women presents the Mary Lucretia and Sarah Emily Creighton Awards every year during Founder’s Week to persons associated with Creighton University. Recipients must create an environment that supports women’s achievements; serve as role models for accomplishments for women; and encourage women faculty, administrators, staff or students in the development and use of their talents.
Energy Technology Initiative
The Creighton College of Arts and Sciences is engaged in an initiative to address issues of sustainable energy. To date, this initiative has involved two projects, each funded by $1.2 million federal grants. The first is a joint venture with the Omaha Public Power District (OPPD) to study the capacity of solar collectors and wind generation to supply electricity to operate a portion of the Creighton campus facilities. A second phase of the existing effort involves the development of a curriculum in energy technology. This curriculum is being designed to use the latest pedagogies and research on effective engineering/technology curricula.
Consultants from two of the leading engineering programs in the nation have provided input into the development of integrated project-oriented learning opportunities that will enable Creighton to become a regional center for workshops on energy performance education. This part of the initiative seeks to create partnerships with Metropolitan Community College in Omaha, the Peter Kiewit Institute in Omaha, and the University of Nebraska system to offer collaborative degree programs in energy production and sustainability. Creighton, drawing on its values and heritage as a Jesuit, Catholic university, seeks to develop learning experiences that will advance a comprehensive understanding of the ethics of energy production, distribution, and consumption.
A third element of this initiative is represented in a grant proposal, currently under consideration, that would establish a Center for Alternative Energy Performance, Policy, and Ethics. This Center would draw on existing faculty expertise in energy physics, atmospheric and environmental sciences, quantitative modeling, environmental ethics, and sustainability to conduct scholarly inquiries supported by external grants, to collaborate on multi-disciplinary research projects and curricular programs, and to formulate educational workshops and seminars that would provide opportunities for knowledge exchange with area, regional, and national audiences. These efforts would be highly collaborative with other area educational institutions, including community colleges. Input from public utilities such as OPPD, regional and national energy industries, and national scholars would inform and shape the development of this knowledge exchange. The Center would provide policy papers, project consultations, workshops, and scholarly productions to address community, regional, and national challenges in alternative energy performance, policy, and ethics.
These three efforts will place Creighton at the forefront of efforts to advance our understanding of alternative energy development, and will provide critical opportunities to inform advances in energy performance with the values of Creighton's Jesuit, Catholic Mission.
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Ferlic & Scott Research Scholars
The Ferlic Summer Science Research poster presentation was held at 4:30 p.m. on Tuesday, Nov. 2, 2010, in the Suzanne and Walter Scott Jr. Atrium of the Hixson-Lied Science Building. The presentations by the 2010 Summer Research Scholars summarized the work done by undergraduate students over the summer on a variety of sciences. The Ruth Scott Arts and Sciences Scholars also presented their research projects at the same event. See photographs from the event.
The 2010 Ferlic Summer Research Scholars and their projects:
- Emily Adams of Omaha, Neb. She performed her research under the supervision of Assistant Professor Dustin Stairs, Ph.D., from the Psychology Department. Adams’ project title is “Does Exposure to Novelty during Development Alter the Cross-Sensitization of Nicotine and Amphetamine during Development in Rats?”
- Ashley Altrichter of Pine Island, Minn. She performed her research under the supervision of Assistant Professor Carol Fassbinder-Orth, Ph.D., from the Biology Department. Altrichter’s project tile is “A Study of Anti-Viral Immune Responses of House Sparrows.”
- Craig Baker of Kearney, Neb. He performed his research under the supervision of Assistant Professor Michael Miller, Ph.D., from the Chemistry Department. Baker’s project title is “The Synthesis of Silicon-Substituted Fullerenes.”
- Kaitlyn Brittan of Omaha, Neb. She performed her research under the supervision of Assistant Professor Soochin Cho, Ph.D., from the Biology Department. Brittan’s project title is “Testing the Hypothesis of the Evolution of the Alpha-Amylase Gene during Human Adaptation to a Starch Diet.”
- Michelle Clevenger of Leo, Ind. She performed her research under the supervision of Assistant Professor Erin Gross, Ph.D., from the Chemistry Department. Clevenger’s project title is “Paper-Based Microfluidics in Point-of-Care Testing.”
- Tana Friesth of Urbandale, Iowa. She performed her research under the supervision of Assistant Professor Patricia Soto, Ph.D., from the Physics Department. Friesth’s project title is “Structural Characterization of Inhibitor Prion Peptides.”
- Nick George of Wichita, Kan. He performed his research under the supervision of Assistant Professor Karin van Dijk, Ph.D., from the Biology Department. George’s project title is “Effector Protein Release Succession in the Type III Secretion System of Pseudomonas Syringae.”
- Erin Johnson of Owatonna, Minn. She performed her research under the supervision of Associate Professor Julie Soukup, Ph.D., from the Chemistry Department. Johnson’s project title is “Antibiotic Development by Investigation of the glm S Riboswitch.”
- Nathan Messbarger of Kearney, Neb. He performed his research under the supervision of Assistant Professor Stephen Gross Ph.D., from the Chemistry Department. Messbarger’s project title is “Biocompatible Self-Healing Dental Composites.”
- Alicia Muhleisen of Lincoln, Neb. She performed her research under the supervision of Associate Professor Mark Reedy, Ph.D., from the Biology Department. Muhleisen’s project title is “Timp2 Migration in Avian Neural Crest Cells.”
- Donald Thomas Schrack of Bellevue, Neb. He performed his research under the supervision of Associate Professor Julie Soukup, Ph.D., from the Chemistry Department. Schrack’s project title is “Structural Characterization and Analysis of Pre-Queuosine Riboswitch.”
- Zachary Paul Stewart of Harlan, Iowa. He performed his research under the supervision of Assistant Professor Charles Brockhouse, Ph.D., from the Biology Department. Stewart’s project title is “Identification of a Protein Marker for the Female Reproductive State in Black Flies (Diptera Simuliidae).”
The Ruth Scott Arts and Sciences Research Scholarship winners and their research projects are:
- Michael Davidson of Omaha, Neb. He performed his research under the supervision of Assistant Professor Steven Gross, Ph.D., of the Chemistry Department. Davidson’s project title is “A Study of Membrane Ionic Permeability for Dental Application”
- Zach Fuller, Centennial, Colo. He performed his research under Assistant Professor Soochin Cho of the Biology Department. Fuller’s project tile is “Genetic Basis of Sex-Reversed Females in the South American Field Mice, Akodon.”