Faculty and Staff Highlights: Ćosić, Gregg, Kaiser, and Smith

Webster faculty & staff highlights offers a roundup of recent Webster faculty and staff activity and achievements. 

Zlatko Ćosić

School of Communications Lecturer Zlatko Ćosić will have his exhibit, THE BUBBLE POPS / MOVEMENT STRATEGIES displayed at Aspen Ideas: Climate 2023 at Miami Beach Convention Center from March 6-9. The Bubble Pops Popsicle Project is a participatory installation that values adaptive experiences as we face the climate crisis. Visitors and locals will be able to view collective responses– and contribute their own. Laurencia Strauss, a Miami local, collaborated in this project with Zlatko Ćosić.

Ryan Gregg

Ryan Gregg, associate professor of art history, has been selected to participate in the Council of Independent Colleges seminar entitled “Power and Absence: Connecting Renaissance Art to Diverse Audiences,” to be held at the Memphis Brooks Museum of Art, June 18–23, 2023. Gregg is one of just 20 faculty members selected for this seminar.

DJ Kaiser

DJ Kaiser, professor & director of teaching English to speakers of other languages, was the keynote speaker for Day 2 of the 2023 Symposium on Emergent Multilingual Learners in Early Childhood. His keynote "Collaborating to Create Responsive Plans to Engage Families and Communities in Supporting Success for Multilingual Learners” focused on materials developed for and data generated from Webster University TESOL program's National Professional Development grant.

That same day, Kaiser was featured on the Administrator Panel to discuss ways that educators can meet the needs of multilingual learners in early childhood programs.  This symposium was organized by the Mid-State Regional Bilingual Education Resource Network (RBERN), New York State Education Department (NYSED), Office of Bilingual Education and World Languages, and NYSED Office of Early Learning. 

In December, Kaiser was also featured in a podcast from Mid-State RBERN English as a New Language (ENL) Resource Specialist’s podcast series “RBERNing Questions.”  The purpose of the podcast is to connect teachers of English Language Learners with experts in the field who will address timely and specific questions relating to instructional practices, teacher collegiality, and outreach to students and their families. Mid-State RBERN ELL Specialist Collette Farone-Goodwin interviewed Kaiser for a segment titled, “Empowering Teachers to Build Connections for Student Success.”

Julie Smith

School of Communications Instructor Julie Smith has been officially added to the U.S. State Department’s Speakers Bureau. This came after she led a State Department briefing on online disinformation for visiting journalists: Julie Smith Leads State Department Briefing on Online Disinformation.