Two University of Wisconsin-Platteville faculty members are being recognized for their innovative ideas to improve living and working environments in Wisconsin. A yearlong competition, sponsored by Foxconn Technology Group in partnership with the University of Wisconsin System, among others, invited participants to submit innovative ideas that enhance quality of life, improve working environments, expand transportation networks, inspire creative city planning and promote sustainable energy solutions. After narrowing down an initial 325 participants, officials recently announced the top 12 final winners, which include Dr. Hanwan Jiang, assistant professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, and Dr. Fang Yang, assistant professor of electrical engineering in the UW-Platteville Engineering Partnerships Program.

University of Wisconsin-Platteville alumnus Charlie Schoenberg '18 was initially drawn to the field of education because he wanted to walk in the footsteps of the amazing educators who had challenged him to think, grow and reflect as a learner. He never imagined, however, that someday, he would be a member of a living and learning community in southeast China, at a foreign language school that hosts more than 3,000 students and teachers from six countries.

Schoenberg, a Roscoe, Illinois native, earned a Bachelor of Arts in secondary social studies education with an emphasis in history from UW-Platteville in May 2018. Soon after he graduated, he accepted a position as a social studies teacher and student academic mentor at Guangwai-Pacelli High School, an international pathway school in Fuwan, Guangdong, a coastal province nestled in southeast China.

After earning her Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering from the University of South Carolina, LeAnn Clark thought she’d finished her education. She’d secured a job at Boeing, the world's largest aerospace company, as a mechanical systems design engineer. In that role, she performs everything from the development and documentation for environmental control systems to system maintenance and modification. Each day brings new challenges as she works with customers, suppliers, and colleagues.

Clark, however, has never been afraid of challenges. Her hobbies include everything from video games and volunteering at animal shelters to motocross racing and road trips on her BMW F700GS motorcycle. She has a drive to improve no matter the circumstances, and this lead her to the UW-Platteville Master of Science in Engineering program.

Five University of Wisconsin-Platteville geography students and faculty members recently presented their research at the American Association of Geographers annual conference April 3-7 in Washington, D.C. The conference featured more than 6,900 presentations, posters, workshops and field trips by leading scholars, experts and researchers in the field.  More than 8,500 geographers from 62 countries attended.

The UW-Platteville cohort was led by Dr. Chris Underwood, assistant professor of geography, and Dr. Evan Larson, associate professor of geography. Both are also research associates in the university’s Tree-Ring, Earth, and Environmental Sciences Laboratory.

A college education, like many things worth pursuing, isn’t always easy—especially when life’s other responsibilities start to get in the way. With the advent of online learning, however, juggling coursework and life’s duties has become more manageable for students and teachers alike, and perhaps no one knows this better than Wendy Brooke.

Brooke is an instructor for UW-Platteville’s School of Business who retired in 2017. Starting this semester, however, Brooke returned to the Platteville community to teach exclusively online, dividing time between the virtual classroom and her consulting work down in Florida, where she helps various supply chain warehouses improve their processes.

Eighteen University of Wisconsin-Platteville physical education, adapted physical education and health education students recently planned and conducted “Physical Education Active Engagement Seminar” for more than 16 licensed K-12 educators from throughout southern Wisconsin.

The goal of the seminar, held at the university’s Williams Fieldhouse, was for UW-Platteville students to provide an interesting, interactive learning experience that enabled K-12 educators to learn new perspectives on best practices in physical education programming and new activities that encourage critical thinking skills beyond game play.

Nine University of Wisconsin-Platteville student winners of the 2019 Thomas Hickey Creative Writing Contest recently read their winning works alongside Pushcart Prize-nominated writer Yasmin Boakye at the 12th annual Creative Writing Festival in the Nohr Gallery, Ullsvik Hall. The contest was open to all students enrolled at least part-time at UW-Platteville.

The Creative Writing Festival was sponsored by the university’s College of Liberal Arts and Education’s Department of Humanities, the Office of Campus Climate and the Office of Multicultural Student Affairs.

Winners in the fiction and creative nonfiction categories were chosen by featured writer Boakye, whose prose has appeared, or is forthcoming in, “Refinery29,” “TRACK//FOUR,” “Puerto del Sol’s Black Voices” series, “Bird’s Thumb” and “The Seventh Wave.” Boakye is currently based in Iowa City, where she is pursuing a Master of Fine Arts degree in nonfiction at the University of Iowa.

In a long-running partnership between the university and local community, University of Wisconsin-Platteville health and human performance majors are teaming up with members of the homeschool community through the UW-Platteville Physical Education Homeschool Program. This is a mutually-beneficial opportunity for children to learn about physical activity, personal health and well-being while also teaching future educators how to write and execute lessons for various skill levels and age groups.

The UW-Platteville Physical Education Homeschool Program is a free class that has been running for about 10 years on campus. The program began when a family contacted the university about physical activity opportunities for homeschooled children within the community. Assistant Professor of health and human performance Tim Swenson was one of the leading professors to start this program with about six families.

The second annual Pioneer Creative Activities and Research Day was held on April 24 and showcased the creative and scholarly activities of University of Wisconsin-Platteville students, faculty and staff. One of those projects was the Animal House, which has a mission to educate the Platteville community by introducing people to exotic organisms in order to generate interest in the biological sciences and teach the importance of conservation efforts, proper animal care and providing animal care, enrichment research and outreach experiences for zoology and animal science students.

Dr. Jodi Prosise has been selected as the next chair of the Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, and will join the University of Wisconsin-Platteville on Aug. 1, 2019.

“We are delighted to welcome Dr. Prosise to the College of Engineering, Mathematics and Science in this critical leadership role,” said Dr. Molly Gribb, dean of the College of EMS. “The MEIE department plays an important role on our campus as the largest academic department with over 1,200 students pursuing mechanical engineering degrees and 180 pursuing industrial engineering degrees, and is a critical source of engineering talent in Wisconsin and the Tri-State area. Dr. Prosise brings a wealth of experience developing and leading mechanical and industrial engineering programs, as well as grantsmanship and development skills that will serve the faculty, staff and students extremely well and help propel the department forward to even greater success.”

Eight University of Wisconsin-Platteville students and two academic staff members from the Office of Multicultural Student Affairs traveled to Minneapolis, Minnesota, to engage in community based service. The learning project took place from April 16-20 with the goal to promote knowledge, skill development in students’ social justice leadership, cultural competency and prompt self-reflection of agency, according to UW-Platteville OMSA Advisor Jeremy Payne.

“The opportunity allowed the students to engage in a diverse community to build a sense of oneness with respect to diversity, address basic needs, combat oppression and xenophobia and build skills sets,” said Payne.

The collegiate soils team at the University of Wisconsin-Platteville recently competed in national contests in Kentucky and California. Both events involve intensive study of soils and landscapes of a region and culminate in competitions, which test the participants’ abilities to describe and classify soils using industry-accepted guidelines.  The contestants also determine limitations of the soil for specific land uses, such as building sites and septic systems, based on specific soil properties. Scoring is based on the agreement between the contestants’ descriptions and those of professional soil scientists serving as contest officials.

The University of Wisconsin-Platteville College of Liberal Arts and Education recognized several faculty and staff members at its 2019 Award Recognition Reception, held April 25 in the Nohr Gallery, Ullsvik Hall.

Awards were presented to the following individuals:

Excellence in Professional Development Award:

Dr. Kara Candito, Department of Humanities, English

This award is given in recognition of excellence in professional development activities such as research, writing, performance, artistic production or activity in professional organizations.

Outstanding Academic Advisor Award:

Dr. Shan Sappleton, Department of Social Sciences, Political Science

Recipients of this award exemplify the best qualities of faculty and academic staff advisors.

Thirteen University of Wisconsin-Platteville School of Education students recently explored different early childhood programs during a field excursion to the Madison Public Library, the Overture Center and the Children’s Museum, all located in Madison, Wisconsin.

Students are enrolled in the Pre-K Methods for Cognitive Development course, taught by Dr. Wonim Son, an associate professor in the School of Education at UW-Platteville.

At the Madison Public Library and the Overture Center, students viewed different portions of “The Wonder of Learning - Wisconsin 2019: Opening Doors to Early Learning” exhibition from the world-renowned schools of Reggio Emilia in Italy. Students viewed and reflected on different aspects of the display, including “Dialogues with Places,” “Dialogues with Materials,” “The Enchantment of Writing,” the “Ray of Light” project and “Ideas and Projects.”

A team of University of Wisconsin-Platteville students in the Building Construction Management and Building Construction Safety Management programs recently competed against 21 other universities at the national Associated Builders and Contractors Construction Management Competition, held in Long Beach, California. UW-Platteville team members included Trevor Meyers, Sam LeRoy, Adam Masters, Zac Johnson, Mackenzie Arnold and Peter Schumacher.

Held during the ABC National Convention, the annual competition provides teams an opportunity to experience an actual project that exhibits unique characteristics and issues. This year’s project focused on construction of a new events center and replacement of the Aquatic Center at Edgewood High School in West Covina, California. This included upgrades and improvements to the selected site and area development.

University of Wisconsin-Platteville students showcased their senior design projects, research and scholarly activity at the second annual Pioneer Creative Activities and Research Day. It took place on April 24 in Velzy Commons, Ullsvik Hall.

The event featured two poster sessions, with the first one highlighting projects funded by the Student Research and Engagement Fund through engagement grants and senior design projects from the College of Engineering, Mathematics and Science. The second session focused on scholarly and creative activities from across campus.

One hundred and seventy-one projects were shown throughout the day from a variety of disciplines. Theatre majors Sam Klaas and Blair Schuler discussed their research with the UW-Platteville production of “Fool for Love” by Sam Shepard.

The University of Wisconsin-Platteville Department of Performing and Visual Arts and Pioneer Players will conclude their theatre season with the annual One Act Festival: An Evening of Short Plays. The production opens on Thursday, May 2 at 7:30 p.m. and continues with evening performances on Friday, May 3 and Saturday, May 4 at 7:30 p.m. All performances will be held in the Center for the Arts-Theatre at UW-Platteville.



Ann Farrelly, associate professor of theatre at UW-Platteville who teaches the upper-level directing course, said that putting the theories and techniques the students are learning in the classroom into practice is a vital component of the theatre major and minor at UW-Platteville. This year’s directors are all directing for the second time and participating in an advanced directing independent study.

The University of Wisconsin-Platteville had a strong presence at the fourth annual 4W Summit on Women, Gender, and Well-Being and the 42nd annual Wisconsin Women’s and Gender Studies Conference held April 11-13 at UW-Madison, with four students and 10 faculty, staff and alumni showcasing their research on women, gender and well-being in a variety of panels and other formats. 

The UW Dairy Innovation Hub was approved in the new state budget. The University of Wisconsin-Platteville dairy program would grow significantly under a proposed University of Wisconsin Dairy Innovation Hub bill introduced this week to the state legislature.

The bill provides $7.9 million annually to UW System to increase offerings at UW-Platteville, UW-Madison and UW-River Falls. More than $1.8 million of that would fund approximately four UW-Platteville Dairy Science faculty positions, research opportunities and equipment in the Russell Hall laboratories and at Pioneer Farm.

The proposal, authored in part by local representatives Sen. Howard Marklein (R-Spring Green), Rep. Travis Tranel (R-Cuba City) and Rep. Todd Novak (R-Dodgeville) among others, calls for disciplines in four areas:

When University of Wisconsin-Platteville alumnus Jason Weitenhiller had Raine Voigts as a student in his second-grade classroom his first year of teaching at Belmont (Wis.) Elementary School in 2005, he had no idea he would be inspiring a future teacher. He also didn’t know that throughout the next 14 years, their paths would cross several times, most recently this spring, in a classroom at Westview Elementary School in Platteville.

Thanks to a practicum course offered by the university’s School of Education, Weitenhiller, now a fourth-grade teacher at Westview, and Voigts, now a junior elementary education major at UW-Platteville, have once again found themselves in the same classroom. This time, however, Voigts is the teacher, and for an hour each day, three days per week, he teaches science and social studies to 23 students in Weitenhiller’s classroom.

Twenty-four University of Wisconsin-Platteville undergraduate students and three Master of Science in English Education students from China recently learned strategies to teach English language learners at a World-class Instructional Design and Assessment workshop, “Differentiation for Linguistically Diverse Students,” at UW-Platteville. The workshop was sponsored by CESA III, a state agency that provides professional development and other support services to meet the unique needs of schools and children in southwestern Wisconsin.

The University of Wisconsin-Platteville Dairy Challenge Team recently placed fourth on their farm in the 2019 North American Intercollegiate Dairy Challenge, held in Tifton, Georgia. UW-Platteville was one of 44 universities competing in the event, totaling 240 students. The UW-Platteville team was comprised of Emmy Hastreiter, Ryan Smith, Julia Mitchell and Allison Foster.

The Robert and James Wright Center for Non-Traditional and Veteran Students continues to grow at the University of Wisconsin-Platteville since opening five years ago in April of 2014. On April 10, the center is celebrating its anniversary with an open house from 9 a.m.-3 p.m. in Royce Hall. The center is inviting veteran students, non-traditional students, faculty and staff to attend.

“We are excited to have people come, visit and talk about the new programming and see how the Wright Center has grown,” said Greg Tremelling, Wright Center coordinator. The center is developing programs to help make veteran and non-traditional students feel more connected to campus along with helping them reach their educational goals.

Nearly 20 students from the three University of Wisconsin-Platteville campuses participated in the 16th annual Research in the Rotunda on April 17 in Madison, Wisconsin. More than 120 undergraduate researchers and their faculty mentors from across the UW System filled the Capitol and presented their findings with legislators, state leaders, alumni and the public.

UW-Platteville had the most research projects selected from the UW System with nine. “The students are what the enterprise of higher education is about. You represent the best, the brightest, the most energetic and tremendous students on our campuses,” said Chancellor Dennis J. Shields. “You are great leaders and you demonstrated the value the University of Wisconsin-Platteville represents for the state of Wisconsin.”

To help combat the shortage of teachers in southwestern Wisconsin, especially in rural communities, the University of Wisconsin-Platteville’s School of Education has begun offering a dual credit course option for high school students.

This spring, twelve Platteville High School students enrolled in the dual credit course, Introduction to Education, taught by Dr. Jennifer Collins, assistant director of the School of Education at UW-Platteville. Collins will serve in this position until July 1, when she will become director of the School of Education. 

In the course, students are exploring what it means to be a teacher, beginning the development of their professional identity as well as gaining hands-on experience in lesson planning and design. Upon completion of the course, students will earn two credits. 

Sixteen University of Wisconsin-Platteville elementary education students recently led “Power Up Your Math Skills Night” for students at Darlington (Wisconsin) Elementary School and their families.

The goal of the event was to provide worthwhile, exciting mathematics explorations for the Darlington elementary students and their parents and a meaningful public relations connection between the Darlington Title I program and the Darlington community. For UW-Platteville students, it was an opportunity to research and prepare enticing investigations and deliver them, tailoring them to the widely diverse audience of children and parents as they came to participate in the activities.

The UW-Platteville students are enrolled in Teaching Elementary Mathematics, taught by Dr. Jodean Grunow, senior lecturer in the Department of Mathematics and academic staff member in the School of Education at UW-Platteville.

The University of Wisconsin-Platteville will host its sixth Senior Design Open House on Wednesday, May 15 at the Markee Pioneer Student Center. Nearly 220 students from the College of Engineering, Mathematics and Science are participating in the event.

The Senior Design Open House will feature 42 projects in the areas of mechanical engineering, industrial engineering, sustainability and renewable energy systems, computer science, software engineering and engineering physics.

Provost and Vice Chancellor of Academic Affairs Dr. Joanne Wilson announced that Dr. Jennifer Collins is the new director of the University of Wisconsin-Platteville's School of Education.

"We are very pleased to have Dr. Jennifer Collins as the director for the School of Education," the provost said. "She is very passionate about education, and that energy shows through in all she does. Dr. Collins also brings a wealth of experience to the position."

Collins, an associate professor of education and assistant director in the School of Education, has been at UW-Platteville since 2015. She earned the university's inaugural Nimocks Family Faculty Appreciation Award in 2017.

For Wayne Miller, success is found in the journey, not the destination.

It’s a somewhat tired saying, but works well to describe Miller’s new position as Manager of Market Implementation at TDS Telecom—a telecommunications company headquartered in Madison, WI—of which he has been a part of for over 22 years.  

At TDS, Miller’s biggest responsibility involves the implementation of a new company-wide portfolio management system, an initiative aiming to end the company’s use of spreadsheets and other more obtuse systems. With the project affecting over 3,500 employees upon completion, Miller’s task is understandably a gargantuan one, but he’s up for the challenge. After all, the reformation was Miller’s idea, and first originated when he was completing his capstone for the online Master of Science in Project Management program at UW-Platteville.

Seth Oren, a junior agriculture and technology education major at the University of Wisconsin-Platteville, has helped to expand a branch of the agriculture technology company Crop Search into his hometown of Edgerton, Wisconsin. There are two other Crop Search locations in Okeechobee, Florida, and Vermillion, Ohio.

Crop Search was founded in 2018 by David Hille. According to the website, Hille has been involved in the agriculture industry for his entire life. After working with Eric Jackson, who has an education in plant science, Hille came up with the idea to use drones for crop scouting.

Crop Search is a tech-based company that strives to assist “growers, producers, and end users maximize yields of the highest quality products with the smallest environmental impact.”

Four University of Wisconsin-Platteville students are contributing to research that will assess the effects of honeybees and surrounding habitat on native pollinators. They will present their research at the 16th annual Research in the Rotunda event on Wednesday, April 17 in the capitol building in Madison, Wisconsin.



The idea for researching this topic all started when Alex Harman, a senior biology major with an ecology emphasis, discovered rusty-patched bumble bees on campus. Having been interested in insects since the age of three from a biologist grandmother who taught at UW-Platteville, Dr. Elizabeth Duewer, Harman knew he had spotted the endangered species. Knowing that an advisor was working on bringing honeybees on campus, Harman became concerned that the honeybees, which were brought to North America by colonial settlers, may outcompete the native rusty-patched bumble bee species.

Although his higher education career hasn’t always taken a traditional path, Chris Hynek has always known about history, in particular his father’s own public history work documents.  Hynek has painstakingly archived and digitized the quarterly journal Prehistoric American, of which his father was the long-time editor.

Hynek will share his research with legislators, state leaders, alumni and the public at the 16th annual Research in the Rotunda event in the state capitol in Madison, Wisconsin on Wednesday, April 17.

Paul Arellano spent last summer and fall as a student at the University of Wisconsin-Platteville Baraboo Sauk County, taking surface water samples from six points along the Little Baraboo River. That’s not one of the major tributaries of the Wisconsin River, but it is its second-largest source of contaminants like phosphorus and nitrates. Since surface water quality impacts not only the aquatic ecosystem and the local water supply, but also agriculture and tourism, “it’s important to maintain and preserve the quality of our streams,” said Arellano, from Muscoda, Wisconsin.

Arellano, who now studies at UW-Platteville, will share his findings with legislators, state leaders, alumni and the public at the 16th annual Research in the Rotunda event in the state capitol in Madison, Wisconsin on Wednesday, April 17. He hopes it can help connect agriculture practices with their impact on the river’s surface water quality.

In her years growing up on her family’s farm near Portage, Wisconsin, Esther Considine, the fourth of 10 children, moved through many chores, from feeding chickens, to sheep, and then to goats. The farm’s 230 goats annually produce thousands of gallons of milk that is turned into goat cheese after being shipped to Illinois.

Dominique Kornely, a senior psychology major at the University of Wisconsin-Platteville, will present research on the effect of psychosocial stress on substance use in college students while at the 16th annual Research in the Rotunda event on Wednesday, April 17, in the Capitol Rotunda in Madison.

Kornely was one of approximately 100 students across the UW System selected to present their undergraduate research. The event provides an opportunity for Wisconsin students and faculty members to share their research findings on a variety of important topics with legislators, state leaders, UW alumni and other supporters.

Kornely, a native of Manitowoc, Wisconsin, examined the link between stress and decisions to engage in risky substance use behavior.

On March 30, University of Wisconsin-Platteville faculty, staff and community members had the opportunity to learn about privilege and its effects at the “Let’s Talk About Privilege” workshop at the Platteville Public Library.

The workshop was presented by Dr. Edina Haslauer, assistant professor of education at UW-Platteville, and Dr. Frank King, assistant professor of ethnic studies at UW-Platteville. The event was planned and organized by Emma Radosevich, outreach librarian at Platteville Public Library.

The goal of the workshop was to define privilege and hold an open and honest conversation about how privilege works to maintain invisible power structures in society and examine how people are affected by those structures.

After Radosevich conducted a “Privilege for Sale” group activity that encouraged participants to think about the different types of privileges that exist, Haslauer discussed that privilege comes from group memberships.

From an early age, Marissa Wildeck was fascinated by how her parents and contractors seemed to know what would work for each component of her family’s many house projects. This interest inspired her to pursue a career in engineering and she took the first step toward that goal with the University of Wisconsin-Platteville. UW-Platteville’s engineering program stood out to her because of its reputation, however, the family connection that sparked her interest in engineering intertwined with the university’s past, as well.

The University of Wisconsin-Platteville will host the UW System Representatives’ Inclusivity Summit Friday, April 12 through Saturday, April 13 in the university’s Markee Pioneer Student Center with a film showing in Lundeen Lecture Hall. The conference is free and open to all UW-Platteville students, faculty and staff.

The summit is sponsored by the UW System Student Representatives, the statewide student governance body that represents all 180,000 students from each of the 26 campuses within the UW System. The group works to actively promote shared governance, represent student interests, and advocate for student rights at both the state and federal level. Funding for the summit is being provided by the university’s College of Liberal Arts and Education.

Caleb Dykema, a senior mechanical engineering major at the University of Wisconsin-Platteville, is currently working on advancing his second prototype of 1Swipe. 1Swipe is a new product that assists professors when they are using whiteboards or blackboards, helping to cut down the time they spend erasing.

“The idea for 1Swipe came to me in class during fall 2017. I was watching my professor erase [the board], and I could just remember him twirling his hand in small swipes. It would take forever,” Dykema, a native of Allenton, Wisconsin, said. “I remember watching everyone lose focus, falling asleep, getting bored, or going on their phones. I started thinking there has to be a better way to erase whiteboards, but after doing some research, I realized that there really is nothing else but those small handheld erasers or rags.”

The University of Wisconsin-Platteville Industrial Studies Department received an equipment donation valued at more than $300,000 from Rockwell Automation, Inc. The presentation was acknowledged in an appreciation ceremony Thursday in UW-Platteville’s Russell Hall.

The Industrial Studies program received six complete brand new model motor control centers (also known as MCC), which provide a compact modular grouping for motor control and electrical distribution components, controlling some or all electric motors and some process controllers from a central location.

Chesney Snow, an award-winning, New York City-based theatre artist and an alumnus of Platteville High School (’97), will present “American Inequality and the Functionality of the Arts” and the documentary “American Beatboxer” at the University of Wisconsin-Platteville’s Lundeen Lecture Hall on Wednesday, April 10 at 4 p.m. and 6 p.m. The event is free and open to all.

Snow’s presentations are sponsored by the university’s Platteville Community Restorative Justice student organization and the Department of Campus Climate, and are being held in coordination with National Crime Victims’ Rights Week, April 7-13.

The University of Wisconsin-Platteville’s Department of Performing and Visual Arts-Theatre and Pioneer Players will continue their 2018-2019 season with the sinister and popular musical “Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street.”

Performances are Friday, April 5; Saturday, April 6; Thursday, April 11; Friday, April 12; and Saturday, April 13 at 7:30 p.m., and Sunday, April 7 and Sunday, April 14 at 2 p.m. There also will be a special matinee at 11 a.m. on April 10. All performances will be held in the Brodbeck Concert Hall at the Center for the Arts, UW-Platteville.

Daniel Zellmer, a junior software engineering major at the University of Wisconsin-Platteville, has been researching the topic of emotion mining on Twitter. The Green Bay, Wisconsin native will present his research at the 16th annual Research in the Rotunda on April 17 in Madison, Wisconsin.

Zellmer is being mentored by Dr. Suboh Alkhushayni, assistant professor of computer science and software engineering. They are classifying the tweets into one of seven emotions: anger, sadness, guilt, joy, surprise, fear and disgust. “We are trying to narrow it down to just one of these emotions per tweet. It may not be the only emotion, but to find the strongest emotion from that tweet,” said Zellmer. “We took certain hashtags and certain buzz words that correspond to each of our seven emotions and we use those words as a filtering criteria to establish a baseline for comparison.”

As part of its ongoing commitment to improving campus climate, the University of Wisconsin-Platteville will recognize Sexual Assault Awareness month in April with a number of events. According to the National Sexual Violence Resource Center, Sexual Assault Awareness Month is a campaign to raise public awareness about sexual violence and educate communities on how to prevent it. Throughout April, the UW-Platteville Dean of Students office will be hosting a number of events regarding victim-blaming, supporting survivors and bystander intervention as well as tabling sessions.

The University of Wisconsin-Platteville Pioneer Farm is being awarded for its cattle and quality of milk. The farm was recently recognized as one of the Top 10 BAA College/University Herds from the Holstein Association USA Inc. and received the Excellent Quality Milk award from Foremost Farms USA.

According to Cory Weigel, Pioneer Farm dairy enterprise and crop production manager, there are 150 milking cows at the farm and every seven months each one is classified. “A Holstein classifier comes out and gives a score to all the animals on how well they look for their type, how good their udder is, their frame and feet and legs, and their overall dairyness,” he said.

The University of Wisconsin-Platteville School of Agriculture offered three new short-term education abroad programs over the winter break, which allow students to take a course taught abroad by one or more UW-Platteville faculty members. A total of 40 students and six faculty and staff members participated in these new programs with destinations to New Zealand, Spain and Thailand.

Dr. Staci Strobl, associate professor of criminal justice at the University of Wisconsin-Platteville, recently presented at the 63rd session of the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women held March 11-22 at the United Nations Headquarters in New York.

Every year, representatives of member states, United Nations entities and non-governmental organizations meet to disseminate evidence on policies and practices affecting women globally. The 10-day session included a ministerial segment with round tables and other high-level interactive dialogues, a general discussion, as well as interactive and expert panel discussions.

More than 325 middle school girls from across the tri-state area gathered at UW-Platteville on Feb. 26 and March 26 to explore careers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics. The Alliant Energy Pioneering Your Future in STEM is coordinated by faculty, staff and students from the Women in Engineering, Mathematics and Science Program in the College of Engineering, Mathematics and Science and the College of Business, Industry, Life Science and Agriculture. Amanda Trewin, chair of the biology department and Nadia Sifri, biology advisor, are co-chairs on the PYF Committee along with Kim Sargent, Women in EMS Program Manager. The event was open to girls in fifth through eighth grade.

The University of Wisconsin-Platteville, in partnership with the Tommy G. Thompson Center presents An Evening with Rick Hess. The event will take place on Tuesday, April 9 at 6 p.m. in Velzy Commons, Ullsvik Hall.

Hess is a resident scholar and director of education policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute, where he works on higher education issues. He is also the author of an education blog “Rick Hess Straight Up” and contributes to the business magazine Forbes and political newspaper The Hill.

Hess’s talk will be based on his book “Letters to a Young Education Reformer.” The book focuses on the key lessons he’s learned about education reform. He will also reflect on his experiences with politicians, philanthropists and school leaders from around the world.

The 2016 Olympic Games held in Brazil were overshadowed by the Zika pandemic that had gripped the country since 2013. During that time, popular media became an outlet for disseminating concern about the health and well-being of international athletes competing in the games. The virus gained much attention because of its connection to microcephaly and other birth defects and how it is transmitted.

On Thursday, April 4, the University of Wisconsin-Platteville’s College of Liberal Arts and Education will host a faculty forum, “Mapping the Ecology of Fear: Mosquitoes, Tropics and Globalization,” in Room 136 Doudna Hall from 5-6:30 p.m. The forum will address issues related to the evolution of the Zika virus, analyze the use of social media and press as a vehicle for gaining and disseminating information and examine the historical relationship between tropical disease and international policy.