College of Sciences and Arts Newsblog

Author: Windy Veker

Social Sciences Associate Professor Awarded Fulbright

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Social Sciences Associate Professor Mark Rhodes temporarily stepped away from Tech’s campus to complete his 2025-2026 Fulbright-Schuman European Union Affairs Scholarship in Edinburgh, Scotland.

Mark Rhodes, associate professor of geography in Tech’s social sciences department, is one of two scholars selected as a 2025-26 Fulbright US Scholar within the Fulbright-Schuman European Union Affairs Program.

Rhodes’s research leverages Michigan Tech’s unique focus on industrial heritage and archaeology and environmental and energy policy to understand the policy process behind Europe’s industrial heritage. Tech offers the world’s only industrial heritage and archaeology PhD program in the world.

“So many communities around the world, including those in our own back yard and where I’m from in the Illinois Rust Belt, are struggling to navigate deindustrialization,” said Rhodes. “Europe seems to have gotten much more creative in how to not only continue sustainable industrial production but use those former facilities in innovative ways that preserve communities and economic livelihoods.”

Mark Rhodes smiles at the camera, wearing a zip up Michigan Tech branded fleece in front of a scenic view of trees, hills and a lake on a cloudy day.
Mark Rhodes is spending six months continuing his work on European heritage site policies, designation, and narratives.

Rhodes noted that Europe, known as one of the first regions in the world to begin a shift away from extractive and manufacturing economic activities, has also been a global leader in preserving, interpreting, and managing difficult cultural and economic transitions. Europe has 48 industrial World Heritage Sites, as designated by UNESCO, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization. In addition, the European Route of Industrial Heritage connects more than 2,400 individual sites. Rhodes’s work explores how EU policy shapes the relationships and laws impacting site designation and narrative, along with understanding how the two are interconnected. His research—spanning the EU—combines in-depth interviews, archival work, and institutional analysis to better understand and inform industrial heritage best practices.

He’ll spend six months in Halle, Germany, hosted by Martin Luther University’s Center for Interdisciplinary Area Studies and Institute of Geosciences and Geography. The Fulbright-Schuman Program, is administered by the Fulbright Commission in Belgium, is jointly financed by the US Department of State and the European Union’s (EU) European Commission. The fellowship aims to strengthen international relations between the US and EU by supporting policymakers and scholars focused on US-EU relations, EU Policy, or EU institutions.

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Rodica Curtu Named New Mathematical Sciences Chair

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Rodica Curtu stands outdoors on a sunny day in front of the walking bridge between the Van Pelt and Opie Library and Rekhi Hall.
Rodica Curtu joins the College of Sciences and Arts as the new mathematical sciences department chair.

Michigan Tech’s College of Sciences and Arts welcomes Rodica Curtu as the new chair of the Department of Mathematical Sciences, effective July 1. Curtu comes to Michigan Tech from the University of Iowa, where she recently brought the math graduate program into the Internship Network in the Mathematical Sciences and served as faculty senate president.

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Chemistry Alumna Earns National Award

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Aimee L. Modic poses at an awards ceremony with the 2025 James Bryant Conant Award in High School Chemistry Teaching, presented by the American Chemical Society. Three ceremony attendees stand next to her.
Alumna Amiee (Larchar) Modic ’84, a high school chemistry teacher at Duchesne Academy of the Sacred Heart in Houston, Texas, has been honored with the 2025 James Bryant Conant Award in High School Chemistry Teaching, presented by the American Chemical Society. (Image credit: EPNAC.com)

Michigan Tech chemistry alumna Amiee (Larchar) Modic ’84 earned the 2025 James Bryant Conant Award in High School Chemistry Teaching for her authenticity, enthusiasm, and ability to inspire.

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“Try Everything”: Undergraduate Commencement Speaker Passes Down Father’s Advice

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Mary Stevens sits at a table in Michigan Tech’s Writing Center next to a window. The windowsill is lined with books, notably a thesaurus and dictionary among others.
Spring ‘25 undergraduate commencement speaker Mary Stevens took advantage of every opportunity at Michigan Tech, gaining experience as a volunteer, tutor, author, podcaster and more.

Mary Christine Stevens, undergraduate student speaker for the 2025 spring commencement, has sampled much of what Michigan Tech has to offer during her time as a student—a philosophy she happily passes on to current and future students. As Stevens prepares to graduate from Michigan Tech and Pavlis Honors College, she looks back on the time spent earning her bachelor of arts in English with a minor in French, she recalls the advice she received from her father when she first started her college journey.

“He told me to try everything,” Stevens said. “College is the last time in life you’ll have this much freedom and these few responsibilities.”

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College of Sciences and Arts Entomologist Celebrates Releasing Third Volume on Fruit Flies

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Thomas Werner, center, poses outside with Jasmine Segar, left, and Jessica Kreais, right, two campers he met on his travels studying fruit flies. The campers hold copies of volumes 1 and 2 of the Encyclopedia of North American Drosophilids.
Thomas Werner, center, is celebrating his third encyclopedic volume of North American fruit flies in an upcoming book release celebration at the Van Pelt and Opie Library at Michigan Tech. He met the two campers Jasmine Segar, left, and Jessica Kreais, right, while collecting fruit flies in 2023. Both of them joined Werner and his family on their next trip in 2024. (Photos courtesy of Thomas Werner.)

Thomas Werner, a North American fruit fly expert, entomologist and biological sciences professor of genetics and developmental biology is celebrating the release of his latest volume documenting fruit flies across the continent—and Huskies are invited.

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Spring Break: Huskies Do It Differently

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Nine people stand on a beach in front of a large dumpster filled with hurricane debris. Four on the left and one on the far right are flexing their right arms proudly. Taylor Piering flexes both of his arms and the other three students have their arms crossed. All are smiling.
The stereotypical spring break experience for college students is a party on the beach or a veg-out on the couch. Others take an alternative route, like these Huskies who spent spring break 2024 cleaning up shorelines in Florida. From left are Huskies Kimberly Ann Dahl, Skyler Spitzley, Karoline Lenczewski, Lilly Glenn, Taylor Piering, Benjamin Skoning, Mary Stevens, Isobel Bowker, and Amelia Mundinger. (All photos courtesy Michigan Tech Student Leadership and Involvement)

Whether it’s a rave in the hot sun throwing beach balls and sipping fruity drinks or a long, relaxing week on the couch, the spring-breaker stereotype doesn’t typically involve long hours of learning and labor. But thanks to Michigan Tech Student Leadership and Involvement (SLI), Huskies have options. Alternative Spring Break (ASB) gives students across campus the opportunity to spend their time off serving communities around the world—and having a different kind of fun in the process.

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Rising Scientist Shares Interdisciplinary Inspiration In Award-Winning Essay

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Nyasha stands outside on a sunny patio at Ashesi University in Ghana.
Nyasha Milanzi has pursued an interdisciplinary academic path and encourages others to do the same. (All photos courtesy of Nyasha Milanzi)

Nyasha Milanzi wasn’t entirely surprised to win the Rising Black Scientists Award. She had a feeling. And she’d worked hard on her application.

“This is probably coincidental, but I actually wrote in my diary that I was going to win the prize after I submitted it,” said the graduate research assistant, who is slated to receive her master’s degree in sustainable communities this year. “I felt my essay was well written and thought I was going to win the prize, so I wrote it down.”

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VPA Student’s Interactive Mural Asks Who We Carry With Us

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Two people stand writing on a large mural in black permanent marker. The mural has a bright yellow background, with a desaturated painting of a woman’s shoulders and face. Red lipstick, pink earrings, white pearls and a blue shirt stand out brightly against her grayscale skin tones and hair. There are many other writings visible on the yellow background surrounding the painted woman. Allison Lewis and Terri Frew.
Theatre and entertainment technology major Allison Lewis ’26 invited her fellow Huskies to share personal stories by sharing her own as part of an interactive mural of her mother. (Images courtesy Allison Lewis and Terri Frew)

Michigan Tech visual and performing arts students explore big questions through art. Allison Lewis ’26, a theatre and entertainment technology major and art minor, approached the final project for her art and design class by inviting others to share their experiences. The project prompt, “the human condition,” inspired Lewis’ interactive mural of her mother.

The size of the project is deliberate.“My mom is a really large influence in my life and I feel like I carry her with me the most,” said Lewis, “I wanted to not only celebrate her but let people celebrate the people in their lives who influenced them and who they are made up of.”

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A Day in the Life of a Michigan Tech Math Student: Solving Problems, Building Community—and Eating Soup!

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Discrete mathematics student McCoy Ziehl gestures to a math problem on a white board in the Math Learning Center while talking to another student.
Michigan Tech math students explore everything from discrete mathematics and ice skating to statistics and soup parties.

Discrete mathematics student McCoy Ziehl and fellow Michigan Tech Class of 2025 member Emily Ruf, who is double-majoring in statistics and discrete mathematics, share an inside look at what MTU math majors do in and out of the classroom.

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