Faculty/Staff Accomplishments 3/25/26

In this issue, we celebrate the accomplishments of faculty and staff in child development, communication, financial assistance, and political science.

Associate Professor of Political Science Whitney Ross Manzo and Professor of Political Science David McLennan spoke on a panel at the North Carolina Political Science Association (NCPSA) annual meeting, which was held March 20-21, at Elon University. The panel was a retrospective on what was learned about North Carolinians’ political attitudes and polling during the 2024 election. They were joined by academic pollsters from East Carolina, Western Carolina, Catawba, Elon, and High Point. Meredith senior Lizzy King also presented a poster at the conference. During the meeting, Manzo was re-elected as the NCPSA’s treasurer, and McLennan became the organization’s past president after a year of service as president. 

Associate Professor of Child Development Pamela Norcross has a newly published manuscript titled “Through a child’s eyes: A systematic review of how children’s literature portrays adult cancer” in the Journal of Psychosocial Oncology, with co-author Sydney Ehinger-Beene from Duke Medical Center. Dr. Norcross also served on an alumni career panel for the graduate program in the Department of Human Development and Family Studies at UNC Greensboro in February. 

Associate Professor of Communication Lynn Owens was a featured speaker at the CBC-UNC News Media Multiplatform Fellowship at WRAL-TV on March 19. Dr. Owens led a session on voice and diction for broadcast news. 

Nicole Pawelski, Financial Assistance Office Coordinator and Counselor, wrote a sidebar called “When the Path Changes,” that was published in a new textbook, Library staff development: Supporting your most important resource (2nd Ed.), by Mary Grace Flaherty. The book was published by Bloomsbury Libraries Unlimited in 2026. Flaherty, Pawelski’s mentor in graduate school, asked her to write about pivoting in a different direction with a degree in library science.