Welcome to Spring 2025!

With the spring semester in full swing, I want to take a moment to connect and share some recent highlights from across the College of Arts and Sciences. Our faculty, staff, and students continue to make great strides, including:

Our faculty continues to secure significant external funding and address critical challenges and questions.

• Dr. Jeff Bell (Department of Chemistry) received a National Science Foundation CAREER award with the goal of overcoming current limitations in the mass production of printable and ready-to-use biosensors. This research seeks to make the production of biosensors more efficient and cost effective and could revolutionize the speed in which patients, researchers, and industry are able to utilize the technology.
• Dr. Brian Collins (Department of Physics and Astronomy) and collaborators discovered a way for ions to move 10X faster in mixed organic ion-electronic conductors. This new method of ion speed could lead to advancements in many areas, such as improved battery charging, biosensing, and more. Read the article: New ion speed record.
• Dr. Melissa Parkhurst and Dr. Jacqueline Wilson co-directed the Ruth and Loran Olsen Festival of Native American Music during Native American Heritage month and introduced the Artist-in-Residence, Connor Chee, a Navajo composer and pianist.

New faculty art was installed on the WSU Spokane campus. Io Palmer’s latest mixed-media work Foxgloves and Swarms is displayed within the Medicine Building and is an interpretive installation inspired by traditional medicinal plant knowledge and existing health disparities. 

Student Success

We continue to be impressed by the number of students taking advantage of hands-on learning opportunities—from research collaborations to internships that connect classroom knowledge with real-world application.

• Plans for this year’s Seattle Experience are underway, and a new cohort of students will be selected for this enriching spring break opportunity that combines education with networking and sightseeing. Special thanks to our CAS Advisory Board members for their unwavering commitment to this student activity.
• During a five-week-long field school at the Hell Gap National Historic Landmark, students surveyed archeological artifacts that has secured a contract extension to return this summer to begin subsurface testing, the first conducted by WSU in the Northwest Plains region in decades.
• In concert with a licensed clinical psychologist, doctoral candidate student trainees based within the clinical psychology program are providing mental health support services at the WSU Psychology Clinic for regional farmers and farmworkers under the Washington’s Farm Stress Counseling Voucher Program.

Excellence in Teaching and Student Support

As a commitment to our students, faculty engage in ongoing training, education, and in developing opportunities for furthering student learning and experience.

• Faculty and staff continue to invest in Mental Health First Aid training as part of CAS’s commitment to student mental health and belonging.
• Dr. Danh Pham was named as the 2024–2025 Governor’s Arts and Heritage Educator Award.
• Maria Charisi, assistant professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy, has received a 2024 L’Oréal-UNESCO Hellenic Award for Women in Science in the field of natural sciences and will be building an international exchange group in Greece and Pullman.

These are only some of the many activities being carried out across the college. I look forward to sharing more with you soon. Thank you for your continued commitment and investment to the College of Arts and Sciences. 

Sincerely,

Courtney Meehan
Dean

P.S. I am looking forward to connecting with alumni and friends in Palm Desert on February 24, and I hope you can join for a special reception being held in conjunction with the WSU Alumni Association’s Cougars of the Desert programming.