Deep Jungle

Roman Dial

Roman Dial was recently featured in Nature’s Deep Jungle, shown nationally on PBS and internationally on the National Geographic Channel. Deep Jungle takes viewers to the Bornean rainforest where Roman conducted research for his “open space hypothesis,” the idea that more open forests lead to the evolution of more kinds of gliding animals, like “flying” squirrels, lizards, frogs, and even “flying” snakes. His work supports an earlier claim by Louis Emmons and Alwyn Gentry about the relative number of species of gliding animals and hanging animals in Asian, African, and Neotropical rainforests.

Deep Jungle shows Dial moving from tree to tree, collecting data and observing the exotic arboreal wildlife of Borneo’s tree tops, like “flying” lizards and orangutans. By using special climbing gear, Dial is able to remain in the tree canopy for days at a time. Using laser mapping, he was able to create a simple 3-D model of the jungle, advancing his hypothesis. The methodology he uses was developed with APU graduate students Benjamin Bloodworth, Andrew Lee, and Jeff Heys from 1999-2002.

Dial has four degrees, two in mathematics and two in biology, and has taught ecology, mathematics, and outdoor skills courses–including three classes to Borneo–at APU since 1992. He has published photos and articles on his wilderness trips and his research in magazines, newspapers, and peer-reviewed journals. The video Deep Jungle brings Roman Dial’s exciting mix of science and adventure to life. It is well worth watching.

Utility, Rationality and Beyond

Sukanto Bhattacharya

In his book Utility, Rationality and Beyond–From Behavioral Finance to Informational Finance, Sukanto Bhattacharya proposes and discusses resolvable risk, i.e. “systematic investment risk which may be attributed to actual market movements” as opposed to irresolvable risk, which he says is primarily born out of the “inherent imprecision associated with information gleaned out of market data such as price, volume and open interest.” His work is quite possibly the first in the area of applied finance that postulates a formal approach marrying classical investments theory based on the utility maximization paradigm with well-known results from mathematical information theory, thereby allowing for an objective, computational measure of investor utility.

Published in 2005, Bhattacharya's book is based on the work he did for his doctoral qualifications in computational finance at Bond University, Australia, and has been cited by the Mathematical Reviews (Issue 2005m) of the American Mathematical Society. Now an assistant professor of finance and director of the MBA–Global Finance program at Alaska Pacific University, Bhattacharya is sharing his doctoral knowledge of the subject he knows best-finance. In addition to his latest book, Bhattacharya has published many articles in leading international journals, conference proceedings, and peer-reviewed monographs.

Bhattacharya has been invited to deliver a lecture at the Third International Conference of Applied Mathematics, to be held at Plovdiv, Bulgaria from August 12–18 2006. The conference organizers hand-picked the guest lecturers for the conference from over 32 countries worldwide, and Sukanto says, “I am very happy to have been considered worthy of this honor and will certainly do my best to take APU's name 'out there!'”

Telecommunications Expert

Dale Lehman

Dale Lehman, Associate Professor of Economics and Director of the Masters of Business Administration in Telecommunications Management Program, was one of two expert economists invited to testify at a special meeting of the Federal-State Joint Board on Universal Service on June 7, 2005.

The Federal-State Joint Board on Universal Service was established in March 1996 to make recommendations to implement the universal service provisions of the Telecommunications Act. This joint board is comprised of FCC commissioners, state utility commissioners, and a consumer advocate representative.

Alaska receives more universal support per person than any other state and the meeting was devoted to controversies surrounding how the support is to be calculated and awarded in the future.

Race and Nature

Dave McGivern

During his sabbatical last year McGivern traveled 40,000 miles in his Volkswagen Euro Van, collecting on-camera interviews with interpretive professionals in national parks all across the United States. He asked two central questions: Why are the national parks the exclusive domain of white America? And, who will be the public land constituents 25 years from now? McGivern has been interested in the subject of race and nature for some time but had never made a movie before. To prepare, he arranged six days of one-on-one video training with the Denver Art Institute. After that, he was on his own. He used his own camera (a Sony PD 170), lighting kit, remote audio system and editing software. The project was very well received, not only by the National Park Service, but by state, municipal, and private parks as well. McGivern is very grateful and more than a bit astounded by the cooperation he received.

McGivern's travels took him from Alaska to Mexico to Washington, D.C. to California and finally home. Between park service interviews there were visits with family and friends, climbing trips, music festivals, training seminars in swift water rescue and vertical rope rescue, a six-week fellowship at the National Outdoor Leadership School (working on a film project), and lots of long, glorious weeks alone and on the road. “I became quite adept at camping along Forest Service access roads, in old Southern church yards, and of course, in WalMart parking lots. Everywhere I went I met generous, helpful people who took one look at my Alaska plates and pretty much said the same thing, 'Son, you're a long way from home.'”

Neopragmatism and Theological Reason

Reverend Greg Kimura

Reverend Greg Kimura, University Chaplain, Assistant Professor of Humanities, and Chair of the Liberal Studies Department, recently attended graduation ceremonies at Cambridge University to receive his Ph.D.

Kimua left APU in 2000 to take up research in philosophy of religion. He was a member of Peterhouse, the oldest of Cambridge's 31 colleges.

Three chapters of his dissertation Neopragmatism and Theological Reason have been published or presented at conferences. Most recently, he contributed a chapter on American philosophy to Faith and Analysis: the Impact of Analytical Philosophy on the Philosophy of Religion, edited by Harriet Harris and Christopher Insole.

A degree is not the only blessing brought home from England; Kimura and wife Joy had their son Julian William while 'across the pond.'

ECOS Rió Plátano Educating Teachers in Hondurus

Erik Nielsen

Nielsen founded ECOS Rió Plátano three years ago as he was finishing his dissertation field work in the Mosquito Coast Region of Honduras.

ECOS-Rió Plátano (Education for Conservation and Sustainability) was formed as a partnership between the Honduran nonprofit MOPAWI, local indigenous community leaders, and a group of returned Peace Corps volunteers whose lives were forever enriched from their experiences in the Honduran Rió Plátano region. The group's mission is to help protect Central America's greatest natural asset by strengthening the capacities of the people who live there.

The organization works exclusively in the Río Plátano Biosphere Reserve located in the northeast of Honduras. It is a region of extremely high biological diversity and has also been designated a World Heritage Site for its cultural and natural importance.

Conservation actions taken without building strong human capacity are shortterm measures to address long-term problems. Experience shows that the most environmentally active individuals in rural Latin America are those with a high school education or better, but educational quality and opportunities are limited in the Rió Plátano Biosphere Reserve. “We believe better educational opportunities will lead to improved conservation,” Nielsen says.

Through individual donors and a local and international all–volunteer staff, ECOS provides educational merit scholarships to deserving indigenous youth of the region. At the end of this year the first graduates will be the first teachers and professionals in their community and hope to strengthen bi-lingual and environmental education efforts in their community. For more information, visit www.education-for-conservation.org or contact Erik Nielsen, founder and president, at Nielsen_e@yahoo.com

Featuring Females

Kim Kjaersgaard, Ellen Cole, Lynn Paulson

Featuring Females: Feminist Analyses of Media, published in 2005 and edited by Ellen Cole and Jessica Henderson Daniel, offers a diverse exploration of how the media influences ideas of cultural and gender roles in our society. Chapters were contributed by a highly esteemed group of scholars and researchers, including APU Professors Kim Kjaersgaard, Counseling and Psychology Department, and Lynn Paulson, Liberal Studies Department.

Ellen Cole is a professor of psychology at Alaska Pacific University. She holds a B.A. from Boston University, an M. Ed. from Harvard University, and Ph.D. from the Union Institute Cole is a nationally certified sex therapist–currently the only one in Alaska. She has edited several books, and journals, including the journal Women & Therapy and the book series Innovations in Feminist Therapy. Cole teaches several courses at Alaska Pacific University, such as Intimacy, Relationships, and Sexuality; Psychotherapeutic Uses of the Wilderness; and Professional Ethics. Cole thoroughly enjoys teaching and believes in the importance of writing for publication.

Kim Kjaersgaard is also a professor of psychology at Alaska Pacific University. She has a B.A. and M.S. in counseling psychology from the University of Alaska Anchorage and a Ph.D. from the University of Chicago. In this book, Kjaersgaard writes a chapter called Aging to Perfection or Perfectly Aged? The Image of Women Growing Older on Television.

Lynn Paulson has been a professor of communication at Alaska Pacific University since 1993. She holds a B.A. from Penn State University and both an M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Paulson states that, “APU renewed my belief in the power of education to support people in following the beat of their own, unique drum.” Paulson contributed a chapter called Mama Bears, Bitches, and Monsters: Motherhood and Violence in Popular Film. In this section, she writes about the media's perception of female aggression and how it appears “thrilling.”