The St. Petersburg Conference on World Affairs has been awarded the Nikolai Khaladjan International Award from the American Association of University Administrators. The conference is recognized as a model partnership between campus and community.
The Conference itself will be held from February 26-28. Further details are available at http://stpetersburgintheworld.com/conference/.
Congratulations are of course due to all involved, and in particular Dr. Thomas Smith of the Department of History and Political Science.
Partly thanks to the efforts of Dr. Judithanne Scourfield McLauchlan of the Department of History and Political Science, USFSP undergraduate student Tyler Lewis is interning at the White House this semester. 
USFSP student Joey Vars recently was a guest speaker at the SciCafe at the Dali Museum, a companion year-round program associated with the St. Petersburg Science Festival. Mr. Vars aims to become a space historian. He also has completed a a semester-long internship with NASA in Washington, D.C., and has attended many NASA launches.
A number of members of the Department of Environmental Science, Policy and Geography were recently elected to leadership positions for the Florida Society of Geographers. Dr. Dona Stewart was elected to the Executive Board, while Dr. Barnali Dixon was elected assistant treasurer this year and will transition to the post of treasurer next year. In the meantime, Dr. Rebecca Johns Krishnaswami continues her service as Secretary. 
Tina Neville, Librarian and Head, Library Research & Instruction in the Nelson Poynter Memorial Library, has been chosen as the Vice-Chair/Chair Elect of Florida Library Association Conference Planning Committee. 
Entrepreneurship students Nick Price (left) and Lance Brackett (right) have won the Tampa Bay Startup Week/ Tech Cocktail Pitch. They will advance to a national competition in Las Vegas with their idea for a waterless carwash service called City Sleekers. The win is even more remarkable because they did not just compete against other students; they also competed against existing technology startups.
Dr. Deby Cassill, Associate Professor in the Department of Biological Sciences, recently had a peer-reviewed paper published in the Journal of Bioeconomics. The paper, which is entitled “What can ants tell us about collective behavior during a natural catastrophe?”, was written jointly with, among others, Alexander Casella, an honors student.
Dr Donny Smoak, Professor of Biogeochemistry in the Department of Environmental Science, Policy and Geography, has been selected for a Fulbright Specialist grant in Environmental Science. Dr Smoak will be traveling to Shenyang Agricultural University, China, this summer, where he will be teaching and conducting joint faculty colleagues. 
Earlier this month, the blog announced that, thanks to the efforts of Dr. Elisa Minoff and Dr. Larissa Kopytoff, both from the Department of History and Political Science, USFSP will be hosting a series of events focused on President Lyndon B. Johnson’s call made 50 years ago to build a Great Society. The full program is now available at 
Academic Affairs at USF St Pete 