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THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
MONDAY, JAN. 18, 2016 | VOLUME 131 ISSUE 1
While marriage age is trending upwards some people still opt to marry younger
HIGHER GPA FOR SCHOLARSHIPS. New scholarship requirements at the University may make it more difficult for students to keep their financial aid. News >> PAGE 3A
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Green and yellow take up the majority of space — green for the teaching side of her job, yellow for the service, and red for her research responsibilities.
Lizette Peter sits at her desk and turns' her computer screen around. Her calendar stares back with three prominent colors — green, yellow and red — splattered across the screen.
Peter is an associate professor in the School of Education and has been since she joined the department in 2005 after receiving her doctorate from the University of Kansas. Her teaching focuses on second-language acquisition, and most of her research to date has focused on the revitalization of the Cherokee language.
Peter describes her current job as finding the perfect balance between multitudes of responsibilities.
"Finding that balance between 40 percent teaching, 40 percent research and 20 percent service often gets out of whack," she said. "What I find is that my window for conducting research and publishing gets squashed because I spend too much time teaching and advising students and doing service for the University and other places."
professor.
Peter is also the chair of the committee that deals with the KU Core and was on the search committee for the vice provost of undergraduate studies. This qualifies as service, an obligation that falls under one of the requirements of an associate
Despite all the work she does and as full as her calendar is, Peter said she doesn't feel like her plate is too full.
On top of that work for the University, Peter also reviews papers as a member of an editorial board for an academic journal, The Journal of Immersion and Content-Based Language Education, which is independent of the University.
"I think I do enough. Sometimes it's more than others," she said. "Just like with students, we have our cycles. The end of the semester can get pretty busy. I don't think I do too much. I think it's just about right."
The path to being a professor that focuses on language is one that started in Montana, where she grew up. Her family would go to Canada, the way a family in Kansas might go to Colorado or Missouri. While in Canada, she encountered French language, and, from there, her passion grew.
“[1] was always fascinated by the French signs and the French candy wrappers and all of those kinds of things,” Peter said.
Peter went on to obtain her bachelor's degree from the University of Montana. Following college, she spent three years in the Peace Corps in Sri Lanka.
"It was life-changing," she said. "Like I said, I grew up in Montana, so I was pretty callow, even though I had been overseas as an exchange student and did a study abroad in high school. I was never prepared to work or live in an underdeveloped country."
in Peter's heart, as it is where she learned about the influence English has in the world. It's this lesson that she remembers every day and hopes to pass on to students who aspire to teach the English language to people who don't have the same lives and privileges.
Sri Lanka holds a special place
"If I have any impact on my students who want to teach English abroad, it's what I learned from living in a place like Sri Lanka, and realizing that even though English may be seen as a language that will help people gain economic prosperity or find better jobs or find better educational chances, it's also a language that has a lot of power, and that those who are teaching it have to be responsible with that power," Peter said.
Peter says that her main source of joy on a daily basis is teaching and interacting with students.
"I can be having a really crappy day, but, when I can go into a class and get them engaged, so it's not just me lecturing — when you get to that place in your teaching, I think it really charges you and gives you a lot of energy," Peter said.
Going forward, Peter said she sees herself making a positive impact on the University as she takes on more leadership roles and attempts to leave her mark on the lives of students.
"I think me and my colleagues have an opportunity to do things and make changes that will leave a lasting legacy," she said. "There's a lot of potential."
- Edited by Dani Malakoff
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saut Prevention and Education Center.
The center was established in October to centralize the University's sexual assault prevention methods. Previously, education and prevention efforts were coming from several different offices, including Public Safety, Student Affairs, Watkins Health Center and the Office of Institutional Opportunity and Access.
["Before the center], there [were] no centralized folks, so sometimes our efforts weren't as effective as they could be if
Vice Provost of Student Affairs Jane Tuttle said the new center will initiate its own programs as well as help steer other offices to ensure all components are on the same page.
Tuttle said she believes Brockman is the best person for the director position because of her experience.
Brockman, who will begin Jan. 20, has a history of tackling sexual assault issues. After getting a bachelor's degree in criminology and sociology with a focus in victimology from Drury University, Brockman went on to get her master's in organizational leadership from Gonzaga University.
Brockman served as a sexual assault prevention educator at the University of Arkansas, and most recently, executive
She has since gone on to work in several sexual assault prevention coalitions in the Midwest.
"I think KU is positioning itself well to really have an intentional approach and effort to curb and eliminate sexual violence on the campus," Brockman said.
Brockman said she thinks University students are poised for helping prevent assault.
"You're high-activist,high-energy,and you've got students who already ready to go," Brockman said.
The first item on her to-do list is to build trust and cooperation within the community by understanding the culture and the components at work, Brockman said.
"I think the first step is to really understand KU's culture and make myself available and
a few ideas she's got in mind. The center's main focus will be prevention work, offender accountability and behavior recidivism work, that is, working to curb patterns of repeating sexual violence.
The University currently offers several options for students who have experienced sexual violence, including off-campus advocates, medical and psychological counselors and resources for filing a com-
Brockman also said she looks forward to working with the University to make sure its policies are "reflective of the work and the philosophical standing of the center's charter" as well as developing victim resources.
Brockman said the center will hire two more employees sometime in the spring. She said the hires will be two educators, one focused on male engagement and bystander intervention, and the other on dating and healthy relationships.
"We need to be able to promise them we have their back," Brockman said.
Although Brockman said she feels nervous about being the first director of the newly-established center, she's said she's excited to get started.
"There's a lot of unknown, but this is really the opportunity to create something amazing from scratch," Brockman said.
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