This section of the News and Media Services department site tracks stories in print and broadcast media that feature Auggie faculty, students, and staff. The area also is home to material developed for University-related programs, events, and more.
Elaine Eschenbacher leads civic and community engagement at Augsburg University, but when COVID-19 hit, she was tapped by the first lady of Minnesota and Augsburg’s president to help the state get through the pandemic. She became the higher education operations lead for the COVID-19 Testing Work Group at the State Emergency Operations Center (SEOC).
In this role, she collaborates with members of the testing workgroup, leaders at colleges and universities, the team of epidemiologists at MDH that focuses on higher education, and others. Eschenbacher remains employed by Augsburg, which has a contract with the state for her time.
Paul Pribbenow, president of Augsburg University, has been appointed to the Young Women’s Initiative Council by Gov. Tim Walz.
The Young Women’s Initiative is a partnership between the Governor’s Office and the Women’s Foundation of Minnesota. It aims to eliminate the barriers young women face and center and engage those most impacted by those barriers to create long-term solutions.
On January 20, William Green, M. Anita Gay Hawthorne professor of critical race and ethnic studies at Augsburg University, gave a lecture titled “What Happened in This Region to Create the Disparities That Black Americans Continue to Experience Today?” The lecture was part of a series on racial justice sponsored by the St. Croix Valley Foundation. In it, Green spoke about moments in history, such as the Civil War, when people addressed injustice; reflected on whether or not the protests following the death of George Floyd signaled major change; and spoke about the need for leaders to make racial equity a priority if the work is to continue.
Margit Berman, program director for Augsburg University’s PsyD program in Clinical Psychology, and Mark Carlson-Ghost, clinical associate professor at Augsburg, received the 2021 President’s Award from the National Council of Schools and Programs of Professional Psychology.
The award was given to recognize their outstanding leadership during the closure of the Minnesota School of Professional Psychology, ensuring that their students and faculty found an educational home at Augsburg.
More than 1,000 Augsburg University undergraduate students were named to the 2020 Fall Semester Dean’s List. The Augsburg University Dean’s List recognizes those full-time students who have achieved a grade point average of 3.50 or higher and those part-time students who have achieved a grade point average of 3.75 or higher in a given term.
President Paul Pribbenow was quoted extensively in “Private college presidents turn focus from pandemic to insurrection,” an Inside Higher Ed story about how college and university presidents are responding to the recent attack on the U.S. Capitol. Pribbenow and others learned of the violence during a plenary panel he was leading as part of the Council of Independent Colleges’ virtual Presidential Institute. Among the topics he addressed were concerns about how the historic trauma faced by students of color can be exacerbated by images from January 6 and the need for institutions of higher education “to model healthy democratic engagement.”
Professor Jeanne Boeh, chair of business administration at Augsburg University, was one of three experts in WCCO’s “Good Question” segment on December 28, 2020. Boeh and two other economists answered the question, “How is the economy doing?” She expressed concern based on the unemployment rate and spoke about the potential for foreclosures if people don’t get back to work soon.
The December 17, 2020, MPR news story “‘Who you are is valuable’: How Black male teachers in Minnesota are recruiting others to the profession” opens and closes with the story of Augsburg student Kaiyre Lewis ’23. Because there are so few Black male teachers in Minnesota, the nonprofit organization Black Men Teach is working to recruit Black male high school and college students for teaching careers. Lewis has connected with Black male teachers through the nonprofit and recently decided to change his major from political science to elementary education.
How can Minnesotans face the truth about racism, past and present? Columnist Myron Medcalf explored that subject recently in the Star Tribune and interviewed Augsburg History Professor William Green.
Green said reading a wide range of material about Black history is the key to knowing the steps that have led to this critical moment. Many Minnesotans were surprised that George Floyd could happen here in part because so many hadn’t grappled with the state’s true history of race relations. “Some people throw their hands up and say, ‘What am I supposed to do?’ ” Green said. “The conclusion is they do nothing. But that’s not the solution.”
Mill City Times recently interviewed Augsburg Professor Joseph Underhill about River Semester. Underhill teaches courses in Environmental Politics, International Relations, and Political Methodology, and regularly takes students off campus for experiential and interdisciplinary learning. An experiential education is a hallmark of an Augsburg education and Undehill has been key to helping Augsburg live it out. He has directed the International Relations Program and Model United Nations programs at Augsburg since 1998 and taken students to New Zealand, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Egypt, and Tanzania.
For the past fifteen years, Underhill has taken students out on the Mississippi River to study the impact of human activity on the river ecosystem. Students in the program earn a full semester of college credits with a customized curriculum focused on environmental justice and social change in the Mississippi watershed. The River Semester is a regular part of the programming offered by Augsburg University’s Center for Global Education and Experience (CGEE).