Volume 126 Issue 30
kansan.com
Wednesday, October 16, 2013
SOCIAL WELFARE
School of Social Welfare Professors Alice Lieberman (pictured above) and Becci Akin received a $2.5 million grant to screen adopted children in order to improve treatment for past trauma
CODY KUIPER/KANSAN
CODY KUIPER
ckuiper @kansan.com
Two University professors are doing work that could help improve the lives of hundreds of thousands of children across Kansas and the entire country.
Alice Lieberman and Becci Akin, professors in the School of
Social Welfare, received a five year, $2.5 million grant to create a centralized system for the state that screens adopted children for trauma and better treats them for it.
In a time when the state legislature is cutting social service spending, Lieberman said it was crucial to bring in the large grant.
"It's important for us to bring the federal money in because it's a huge source of assistance to agencies that don't have the money to do the kind of training they'd like to do," Lieberman said. "I knew that I wanted to be helpful if I could and this is the one way I could do it."
the Children's Bureau of the Administration for Children and Families, a federal agency focused on improving the lives of children and families.
The grant money comes from
Lieberman said many children in the foster care system carry traumatic experiences with them, such as physical or sexual abuse, neglect or living in prolonged periods of fear, that could begin to resurface during adolescent years. Lieberman and Akin's plan is to create an evidence-based system that detects the impact of the trauma on the children and allows social workers to evaluate their emotional state as the adoption progresses.
Lieberman thinks their work
will better prepare parents and adopted children for when the effects of trauma start to show and hopefully prevent the adoption from failing.
"When you overlay trauma on top of everything else, these
SEE GRANT PAGE 2
ENGINEERING
Student's design stands strong in international competition
KATIE MCBRIDE
kmcbride@kansan.com
CONTRIBUTED PHOTO
Senior Leslie Montes' faucet design, Arc Tap, made the list of Spain's national finalists for the James Dyson Award competition.
Last year in her apartment in Spain, as her wet, slippery hands struggled to grip the faucet knobs to stop the running water, Leslie Montes asked herself: Why not make hand-washing a little bit easier?
Montes, a senior from Houston, spent the last school year studying abroad at the Istituto Europeo di Design in Madrid, where one of her industrial design classes challenged students to develop an "inclusive" design — one that the greatest range of users can utilize.
Montes, along with her project collaborator, Pablo Rocha, spent around three months refining a design: the "Arc Tap," an innovative take on the common kitchen or bathroom faucet. To turn the water on and off, the user simply pushes a lever back and forth instead of dealing with trying to twist knobs.
The Arc Tap also incorporates an integrated soap dispenser: the user can pull the water flow lever in a way that stops water flow and then dispenses soap. This ends up saving water.
Lastly, a main feature of the design is a thermal feedback system. An internal water circuit transmits the temperature of the water to the temperature control lever, so the user immediately knows what temperature water will come out of the faucet when they touch the lever.
The design is ideal for any user and is "easy and pleasant to use" even if they have motor or visual
impairments, said Whitnes. The students in the class were encouraged to enter their projects into an international design competition for engineering and industrial design students, the James Dyson Award, which prompt competitors to "design something that solves a problem."
impairments, said Montes.
“In class, usually the project ends, and that’s it. We had something bigger to work towards besides just a grade in a class.” Montes said. “We really believed that it was an interesting idea and that other people would see the merit of it, so we worked hard to make it better.”
Montes and Rocha ended up being the only ones in their class to enter the competition.
"She's kind of fearless," said Lance Rake, one of Montes' industrial design professors from the University of Kansas. "She's bold enough to try new things and is not afraid of success or failure. Some people are so afraid that they're not going to be accepted that they hold back, but that's not Leslie."
Montes said she gets her inspiration from products that utilize minimal design, particularly those from Japanese designers, and
Their project did not make the cut for the top 20 international entries, but they made the list of Spain's national finalists for the competition.
SEE DESIGN PAGE 2
CAMPUS
FILE PHOTO/KANSAN
Despite Ad Astra winning as a coalition, Student Senate is considering a resolution eliminating coalitions from the election process.
Student Senate works to ban coalitions in future elections
KAITLYN KLEIN
kklein@kansan.com
Ad Astra campaigned for election reform and transparency in Student Senate and when the coalition beat long-reigning KUnited, Student Body President Marcus Tetwiler said students' voices were heard.
Today Senate committees will meet to discuss a resolution that would ban coalitions in the student election process.
"We had to build a coalition to
take down a coalition," Tetwiler said. "That's what we [Ad Astra] said we were going to do and we're looking to do that job."
Tetwiler said coalitions may have served a purpose in the past, but now coalitions are exclusive and limit individual students from being represented in Student Senate.
The resolution is part of a broader election reform package Tewilier hopes to pass in the coming weeks, but he said he understands it won't be easy, which is why the coalition resolution
When the resolution reaches the Senate floor, it'll provide a simple yes-or-no vote on coalitions, then authors of the election reform bill can tailor their bill based on the resolution vote.
will come first.
"If one thing fails, the greater picture doesn't get lost," Tetwiler said.
Coalitions have dissatisfied students and limited the potential
CLASSIFIEDS 9
CROSSWORD 5
SEE SENATE PAGE 2
CRYPTOQUIPS 5
OPINION 4
SPORTS 10
SUDOKU 5
contents, unless stated otherwise, © 2013 The University Daily Kansai
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