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5/27/09
— TAA Council member Mary Kay Switzer, an associate professor in the communications department at California Polytechnical State University in Pomona, directed her adaption of "Harvey" for the Pass Area Performing Artists (PAPA) in April 2009.
4/30/09
— Nick Sciullo published "Atlantean Prose and the Search for Democracy" in the crit: a critical legal studies journal run by the University of Idaho School of Law. Sciullo also spoke at a conference entitled "The Evolution of Street Knowledge: Hip Hop's Influence on Law and Culture" at the West Virginia University College of Law. The keynote speakers for the two-day conference were Dr. Cornel West and hip hop artist Talib Kweli. The conference proceedings are being submitted as a book proposal.
1/23/09
— Terry Bazzett won a 2009 New England Book Show award from Bookbuilders of Boston (www.bbboston.org) for his college textbook, An Introduction to Behavior Genetics, published by Sinauer Associates.
1/8/09
— The sixth edition of Robert Christopherson's Elemental Geosystems (® 2010) will be published in February 2009.
1/5/09
— Matt Stevens, author of Managing a Construction Firm on Just 24 Hours a Day, and a consultant with Stevens Construction Institute, has been hired to run a program to help newly formed Minority Business Enterprise firms understand the essentials of running a construction company. The program, The Contractors Book Camp, is being funded by a Workforce ONE Maryland project grant awarded to Associated Builders and Contractors (ABC) for Base Realignment and Closure-related workforce development efforts done at Ft. Meade, Maryland.
12/16/08
— Mary Kay Switzer. Two original plays and a folk opera written by Mary Kay Switzer, an associate professor of communication at California Polytechnical State University in Pomona, California, will be performed by the Cultural Alliance of the Pass Area Performing Artists in March, April, and May. Kate DiCamillo has also agreed to allow Switzer to adapt her Mercy Watson series for the stage. DiCamillo is the author of Winn Dixie.
10/18/08
— Mary Kay Switzer, a professor of communication at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, was selected to develop a theatre arts initiative in her county. She serves on the board of the Pass Area Performing Artists, and directed the premiere performance of "Our Town" which got rave reviews. She is also a member of the Cultural Alliance in her county. Mary Kay has been a TAA member for 12 years, and served two terms as TAA Council Secretary. She now serves as a TAA Council member.
10/18/08
— Clifton K. Meador, M.D., clinical professor of medicine at the Vanderbilt School of Medicine and Meharry Medical College and director of the Meharry Vanderbilt Alliance, recently published Symptoms of Unknown Origin, Vanderbilt University Press (2006) and Puzzling Symptoms, Cable Publishing (2008). He was also honored with the National Vanderbilt Alumni Achievement Award for 2008.
10/8/08
— A. Jane Birch, Brigham Young University, and Tara Gray, New Mexico State University, will be presenting two sessions at the Professional and Organizational Development Network (POD Network) Conference, October 22-25 in Reno, Nevada. "Ten Ways to Let Your Database Do Your Work For You", will demonstrate the ten ways a database can be used by faculty developers -- and will help participants identify and clarify the data needs and solutions of their own centers. "Facilitating Scholarly Writing Circles That Work," will present proven strategies that help scholars improve their writing and increase their productivity by a factor of four. Click for more
6/16/08
— Andrew Johnson (North Mankato, MN) recently published an article in Gifted Child Today (2008, 31, 41-29) entitled, "Internet Strategies for gifted students." His latest book, Teaching and writing: Research-based strategies for teachers, tutors, parents, and paraprofessionals, Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, will be out in September 2009. He is also under contract to write a second edition of his social studies textbook, Making connections in elementary and middle school social studies, Thousand Oaks, CA, Sages.
5/23/08
— Guesna Dohrman, a professor of mathematics at
Tallahassee Community College, recently started a non-profit organization
called SOMETHINGPOSITIVE. Based in Tampa, Florida, it's mission
is to encourage and promote physical activity for people with
MS in the Tallahassee and Tampa, Florida areas.
5/23/08
— William Koenecke received tenure from the Murray State
Univeristy Board of Regents on Friday, May 16, 2008. He has also
signed a contract with Kendall Hunt for a book to be published
in December 2008. It has the working title: "Improving the
Writing Skills of Tomorrow's Teacher."
5/23/08
— Jean A. Lukesh received her doctorate in education
(Ed.D.) from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln on May 9, 2008.
Lukesh is the author of the award-winning history textbook, The
Nebraska Adventure.
5/12/08
— Judith Haynes retired from Linfield College at the
end of fall semester 2007, and started her own business, Haylo
Education Solutions, LLC (http://www.hayloes.com)
in January 2008. Haylo assists students and teachers with their
education issues. They help teachers catch up with the twenty-first
century by modifying or preparing their curriculum to be presented
on-line in an inter-active, easy to use format. They also help
people who teach or make presentations as part of their work,
but haven't been trained in teaching techniques. Consultations
are done on-line or in person, in classroom or workshop settings,
or on a one-to-one basis.
4/9/08
— TAA Executive Director Richard Hull published the second
edition of Ethical Issues in the New Reproductive Technologies by
Prometheus Books in 2005, as a revised, updated, and expanded
version of the first edition, published in 1990 by Wadsworth.
An electronic edition of the book, self-published by Hull, is
available through his website, http://www.richard-t-hull.com.
Hull also
published an article in Free Inquiry (vol 28, nos 2&3), entitled,
"Can We Survive? The Changes Required to Deal Effectively With
Global Warming," with co-authors Stephen Paley and George K. Oister.
He is also completing, with coauthors Paley and Oister, an academic
version of the two-part article, that will appear in a volume
edited by Paul Kries and Randall Osborne, Global Community,
Global Security, which will be published in 2008 by Editions
Rodopi.
4/4/08
— Matt Stevens was interviewed by the journal of the
Design-Build Institute of America, Design-Build Dateline,
about his book, Managing a Construction Firm on Just 24 Hours
a Day. Read the interview: Click
here
1/11/08
— Jerry D. Wilson, the author of nine physics or
physical science textbooks, recently published a trade book, Best of the Curiosity Corner, a compilation articles
from newspaper columns he wrote for 26 years. Visit the book's
website: Click
here
11/1/07
— TAA member Kimberly Davies recently published
her first textbook, "The Murder Book: Examining Homicide," with
Prentice Hall.
9/11/07
— At the Hollywood Book Festival 2007, TAA member Helen
Gordon earned an award for best book in the category of historical
fiction for her novel, Voice of the Vanquished: The Story of
the Slave Marina and Hernan Cortes. The contest was judged
on the basis of the author's story-telling ability plus the potential
for the novel to translate into other media such as a movie or
television series.
Click
for more |
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Featured
Member Profile Archive
Featured Member Judi Nath:
Author’s first text teaches medical terms with foreign language approach
By Kim Seidel
Judi Nath
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Biology professor Judi Nath used her experience studying foreign language to successfully author her first textbook, Using Medical Terminology: A Practical Approach, published by Lippincott, Williams & Wilkins in 2006. She is currently working on the second edition.
When Nath wrote Using Medical Terminology, there were no other textbooks on the market that utilized the foreign language/total immersion approach to teaching medical terminology. The book’s purpose, she said, is to teach medical terminology within the context of applied anatomy and physiology.
“I realized that learning the language of medicine and anatomy was equivalent to learning a foreign language, so I wrote the book using the techniques that a foreign language teacher would utilize,” Nath said. “I was well-equipped to do this, because in addition to studying biology in both my undergraduate and graduate programs, I also majored in German. In fact, I studied at the University of Salzburg in Austria and taught high school German for one year before returning to graduate school to earn my doctorate.”
She earned her doctorate at the University of Toledo, and her master’s and bachelor’s degrees from Bowling Green State University. For the past 17 years, Nath has been a professor in the biology and health science department at Lourdes College in Sylvania, Ohio.
Her first textbook was born out of her anatomy and physiology lecture notes. “My students were struggling with the vocabulary associated with science, so I addressed the issue by beginning each lecture with an introduction to medical roots, prefixes, suffixes, and combining forms, which were applicable to the lecture and textbook topics,” Nath said. “My textbook is geared for students who have no background in medical terminology or health science.”
Using Medical Terminology can be studied across disciplines in any arena in which medical terms are found. “It effectively teaches students by using an interactive immersion approach to learn the language of medicine, anatomy, and physiology,” Nath said.
When writing her first textbook, Nath brought considerable experience reviewing textbooks and writing the ancillary materials that accompanied author Ric Martini’s suite of anatomy and physiology textbooks. Nath has worked in various capacities with Martini for more than a decade, most recently as a co-author.
“Furthermore, my professional contacts within the publishing industry assisted in shaping my proposal and steering me toward an appropriate publisher,” Nath said. “David Brake, president of Content Connections and former editor at Prentice Hall, along with Martini, initially guided me through the process. It took nearly three years to complete the writing, reviewing, and revising process. During the second year of working on Using Medical Terminology, I was on a year-long sabbatical from Lourdes College.”
While on sabbatical, Nath treated writing as if it were a full-time job from her home. “That is, I got up every morning and was at the computer and writing desk by 8 a.m. or sooner every day,” Nath said. “I enjoy writing in the comfort of my home office. In fact, it is the only place where I can create and work uninterrupted.”
Today Nath uses the textbook in her own classes, and students shape every edition of each textbook that she authors. “It should also be noted that all royalties received from textbooks sold to my students are willingly donated back to Lourdes College,” she said. “I consider it unethical to do otherwise.”
In addition to Using Medical Terminology, she is also the co-author of Martini’s Fundamentals of Anatomy and Physiology. Published by Pearson Benjamin Cummings, the eighth edition (which has been available since January 2008 but has a copyright date of 2009) is the first that she co-authored. Plans are under way for her to co-author future editions as well.
“In my relatively brief history within the publishing arena, I now realize that once the textbooks are in continuous revision cycles, authoring can be likened to a giant conveyor belt. However, I’m honestly living my dream – to be a teaching professor who writes books,” said Nath, who is an award-winning teacher. She received the Lourdes College Faculty Excellence Award in 1997. “It is an honor to receive such an award, because both students and faculty nominate instructors. Public recognition of a job well done is rewarding."
Nath describes Martini as an “extraordinary mentor.” It’s important for an author to have a mentor, she said, because it diminishes the learning curve. At the same time, it lessens the mistakes of inexperience.
“I have learned that for a book to sell, you need the publisher, marketing department and sales force behind you 100 percent,” Nath said. “Bookshelves are replete with mediocre texts, while there are plenty of excellent texts that never reach publication. Another valuable lesson is to always write with a non-fatigued mind.”
New authors should not underestimate the amount of time involved in writing and/or revising a textbook, Nath said. “Working on a book is the equivalent to having another entity living in the house – it is like a behemoth that just will not go away,” she said. “I would also advise that there must also be an incredible amount of passion for both the topic and for the writing process itself.”
Yet, she also advises other authors to schedule one day off every week. “For many years, I did not take a vacation and worked every day – including holidays,” she said. “I finally realized that how I spent my days was, obviously, how I lived my life, and I really was not getting a break from researching, writing, or faculty obligations.”
Nath resides on the southern shore of Lake Erie in Sandusky, Ohio, with her husband, Mike, and their two dogs, Gabbi, a German Shepherd, and Bear, a Rottweiler. They truly enjoy spending time engaged in outdoor activities with their dogs; and without the canines, they like to bicycle, especially around Kelley’s Island.
Kim Seidel is a freelance writer based in Onalaska, Wis.
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