College of Education
Dr. Karyn Allee, associate professor of elementary education, with Dr. Brittany Adams of the University of Alabama and Dr. Nance Wilson of SUNY Cortland, co-authored the paper “The Climb Model of Reading: A strategic framework for comprehension, metacognition, and classroom practice,” published in the Early Childhood Education Journal.
Dr. Robert J. Helfenbein, professor of curriculum studies, received the Society of Professors of Education 2026 Outstanding Book Award honorable mention for the edited book Methodology and Praxis: Thinking with Patti Lather, published by Myers Education Press.
Dr. Sybil Keesbury Martin, professor of education, presented “Strengthening Fieldwork Education: Training and Supporting Adjunct University Supervisors” at the 2026 National Field Experience Conference in Magnolia, Arkansas, on March 19.
Dr. Katherine Perrotta, associate professor of middle and secondary education, and Dr. Jennifer Curl, assistant professor of English language arts at the University of West Georgia and College of Education alumna, published the textbook Teaching Historical Empathy: Bridging Past and Present with Peter Lang.
School of Engineering
Dr. Philip B. Gallagher, assistant professor of human-centered information design and technology, and students Sydney Taylor and Hope Bull will present “Accessibility Beyond Compliance: How Students with ADHD Navigate Academic Program Information” at the International Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Professional Communication Society conference in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, in July. The full paper will also be published in the conference proceedings. The student-led research project features the results of an accessibility and user experience study of undergraduate students with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder navigating university academic program websites to provide means to improve accessibility beyond compliance toward satisfying, inclusive design experiences.
School of Law
Heather Baxter, professor of law, was re-elected to the board of directors for the Legal Writing Institute (LWI), a nonprofit organization dedicated to improving legal communication and elevating the legal writing discipline. LWI has nearly 3,000 members, hosts a variety of conferences and events throughout the year and celebrated its 40th birthday on April 3. Board members serve four-year terms, with about half the members elected every two years.
Ismael Gullon, associate law librarian for collections and technical services, was a panelist for the webinar “Journey of Legal Cataloging, Part 2” hosted by the American Association of Law Libraries Technical Services Special Interest Section Professional Development Committee on March 19.
David Hricik, professor of law, updated and authored the leading treatise on Georgia products liability law for “Georgia Products Liability Law,” 2026 edition, Thomson Reuters 2025; authored an update to the leading treatise on Georgia tort law in “Georgia Law of Torts,” 2025-26 edition, Thomson Reuters 2025; and authored the leading treatise on the Georgia code of evidence for “Agnor’s Georgia Evidence,” 2025-26 edition, Thomson Reuters 2025.
Meagan Hurley, assistant professor of law, served as moderator for the “Beating the Rap” session at the Georgia First Amendment Foundation’s annual Georgia Bar, Media and the Judiciary Conference in Atlanta — a discussion with Georgia attorney Brian Steel, defense counsel for celebrities Jeffery Williams (“Young Thug”) and Sean “Diddy” Combs, about criminal defense advocacy in high-profile cases. Hurley was also selected as a member of the Greater Macon Chamber of Commerce’s competitive 2026 Leadership Macon class; published “Catching Up With the Constitution? Georgia Fixes its Fatal Burden of Proof for Findings of Intellectual Disability in Capital Cases” in the Mercer Law Review, articles edition; published the article “The Dangers of Denying Prosecutorial Independence: Wrongful Convictions, Official Misconduct, and Public Corruption” in the Stetson Law Review; and presented oral argument on behalf of petitioner in Gibson v. Head at the Supreme Court of Georgia on Jan. 20. The petitioner was represented by the Mercer Habeas Project.
Najiva Timothee, administrative support associate, is the founder of Girls Dig Deeper Initiative, a girls group mentoring and youth development program serving middle and high school girls ages 13-17 in Macon-Bibb County. In honor of Women’s History Month and the celebration of National Association of Women in Construction Week, the Girls Dig Deeper Initiative and Sleep in Heavenly Peace built, assembled and delivered beds to kids in need. Six families and 18 children received their own beds.
Scott Titshaw, professor of law and associate dean for faculty research and development, was quoted and cited for his forthcoming Georgetown Immigration Law Journal article “Adding Family Complications to Birthright Citizenship” by New York Times‘s Chief Legal Correspondent Adam Liptak in articles on March 26 and on April 1 (the day the Supreme Court heard the birthright citizenship case Trump v. Barbara). Titshaw was also cited on birthright citizenship by David Chen in the New York Times and by Akhil and Vikram Amar in SCOTUSblog. Additionally, he published the blog “President Trump’s Birthright Citizenship Executive Order: Too Much Detail, Too Little Authority” in the legal blog Dorf-on-Law and published an op-ed in The Hill. Both articles were co-written with retired Cornell Professor of Immigration Law Practice Stephen Yale-Loehr and were published on March 27 in anticipation of the April 1 oral arguments in Trump v. Barbara.
Pam Wilkins, associate professor of law, presented “Georgia Tort Reform: Five Questions about Negligent Security Claims” at the John Marshall Law Review Symposium on March 13.
College of Liberal Arts and Sciences
Dr. David A. Davis, professor of English, delivered the talk “Bad Boys Make Good Roads: Incarceration and Infrastructure in the Modern South” at the Society for the Study of Southern Literature conference at Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee, on March 28.
Dr. Andrew Garder, lecturer in integrated studies, published the article “‘Patriotic Christians’: Nationalism, Imperialism, and the Origins of Theological Education in the United States” in the Journal of Church History.
Mehakpreet Kaur, lecturer of computer science, presented the paper “Evaluation Metrics in Knowledge Graph-Based Recommendation Systems: A Scoping Review” at the seventh International Conference on Artificial Intelligence, Robotics, and Control, held April 8-10. The paper provides a comprehensive analysis of existing evaluation methods and identifies critical gaps in assessing knowledge graph-enhanced recommendation systems. The work contributes to the development of more rigorous, reliable and interpretable evaluation standards in artificial intelligence and data science. Following a rigorous peer review process, the paper has been accepted for publication in the conference proceedings, which will be available online and indexed by Ei Compendex and Scopus.
Dr. Anastasia Kerr-German, assistant professor of biological psychology and neuroscience, received the Faculty of the Year award from the Student Government Association on April 10.
Dr. Paul Lewis, professor and chair of religion, chaired the session “Ancient Freedom and God(s)” and presented the paper “The Results of Freedom Untethered” at the annual meeting of the Association of Core Texts and Courses in Tempe, Arizona, March 19-22. He also led three sessions during Lent on the Gospel of Mark titled “Where in the World is God?” for the adult Christian Education class at Northminster Presbyterian Church in Macon.
Dr. Maggie Meadows, associate professor of chemistry, co-authored the poster presentation “Progress Toward the Synthesis of a Colorimetric Sensor for Phthalate Esters” with undergraduate research students Whitney Wallace and Sahithi Doddaka at the 150th American Chemical Society National Meeting in Atlanta. The poster was presented as part of the Undergraduate Research Posters: Organic Chemistry Symposium.
Dr. Jacqueline Pinkowitz, assistant professor of media studies, presented “(Re)Constructing the Confederate (Un)Dead in MONUMENTS” at the Society for the Study of Southern Literature Conference at Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee, in March.
Dr. Katherine Roseau, associate professor of French, and alumna Arely Cuevas-Flores co-authored the article “‘You can always hold out a piece of bread in the void’: Food and Duras’s War of Waiting” in Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature.
Dr. Bryan J. Whitfield, Howard Giddens Chair in the Department of Religion, presented the paper “Howard Thurman, Freedom, and the Search for Common Ground” at the 31st Annual Conference of the Association for Core Texts and Courses in Tempe, Arizona, on March 20.
Dr. Fletcher Winston, professor of sociology, presented the paper “Framing Across the Divide: Environmental Movement Organization Appeals for Support to Address Climate Change” at the Eastern Sociological Society annual meeting in Washington, D.C., on March 5.
School of Medicine
Dr. Keisha R. Callins, professor, was nominated by state Rep. Tangie Herring to receive the Nikki T. Randall Servant Leadership Award. The prestigious honor, presented by the Georgia Women’s Legislative Caucus during Women’s History Month, recognizes exceptional leadership, advocacy and commitment to strengthening communities across Georgia. Dr. Callins was honored during the Yellow Rose Ceremony on March 10 in Atlanta.
Dr. Abraham M. Enyeji, assistant professor of cardiovascular medicine in community medicine, co-authored the article “Evaluating the Associations Between Leapfrog Scores and Patient Safety Culture,” published in Hospitals. The work examines important connections between hospital safety performance metrics and organizational culture, contributing to ongoing efforts to improve patient outcomes and transparency in patient care quality.
Dr. Chefetz Menaker, associate professor of pharmacology, moderated the symposia “Cancer, chemoresistance, and cancer stem cells” as part of BEAR Day. Undergraduate students from her laboratory presented three oral presentations during the symposia: Shivani Trivedi presented “Characterizing and assessing AKR1 gene family as novel target for second-line ovarian cancer therapy;” Arushi Cumer presented “Evaluation of tumor-initiation capacity using a clonogenicity assay in high-grade serous ovarian cancer,” and Aditya Vayalapalli presented “Pathway and Amino acid frequency analysis reveal mechanisms of response to Olaparib treatment in ovarian cancer.”
Dr. Kimberly Roth, assistant professor in the community medicine department, received a Community Needs grant from the Georgia Healthy Family Alliance. Dr. Janine Chalk-Wilayto, associate professor in the biomedical sciences department, family medicine resident Dr. Amanda Kierzkowski, and second-year medical student Celia Sada are also on the team that is partnering with East Georgia Healthcare Center to provide flu vaccines to Georgia farmworkers.
Mercer Engineering Research Center (MERC)
The following MERC employees were recognized by the Dixie Crow chapter of the Association of Old Crows (AOC) during the 50th annual Dixie Crow Symposium, March 23-25, held at the Museum of Aviation in Warner Robins: Mike Hopf, senior principal electrical engineer, received the AOC Technology Hall of Fame award for providing decades of electronic warfare expertise on a wide variety of projects. Dr. Steven Britt, mathematician, presented the paper “Visualizing the Invisible: Accelerating EW Insights with Data Visualization,” and he received the Electronic Warfare Modeling and Simulation award for his outstanding work on multiple electronic warfare modeling and simulation tools. The Electronic Warfare Avionics Integration Support Facility team received the Test and Evaluation award; MERC electrical engineers Ed Britten-Kelly and Malik Pierre, along with threat analyst James Williams, who are part of the team, provided significant test and evaluation support for a variety of test events. Gerry Ringe, technical director, was elected to serve on the Board of Directors of the Dixie Crow chapter.
College of Nursing
Dr. Kathy Davis, clinical assistant professor, was chosen as the 2025-2026 Distinguished Faculty Member of the Year by the College of Nursing.
Dr. Seongkum Heo, professor and Piedmont Healthcare Endowed Chair, co-published the article “Emergency nurses’ perspectives on advance care planning and their role in end-of-life decision-making: A focus group study” in BMC Nursing.
Dr. Andra S. Opalinski, associate professor, and Dr. Daphnee Stewart, clinical assistant professor, presented “Improving Pediatric OSCE Performance: Standardized Diagnosis Reasoning Instruction in FNP Students” at the National Organization of Nurse Practitioner Faculties 52nd Annual Conference in Dallas. The presentation focused on strategies to strengthen diagnostic reasoning and improve objective structured clinical examination performance among nurse practitioner students. Dr. Opalinski and Dr. Stewart, with the School of Medicine’s Dr. Sarah Rotschafer, associate professor, presented “Improving Autism Spectrum Disorder Identification in Rural Georgia Through a Community — Engaged Program” at the 2026 Southeastern Regional Clinical and Translational Science Conference, held at Calloway Gardens in Pine Mountain.
Dr. Humberto Reinoso, associate professor, and Dr. Stephanie Bennett, clinical assistant professor, presented “A Competency-Based Transition-to-Practice Course: Synthesizing the 3Ps Through Interdisciplinary Case-Based Learning” at the National Organization of Nurse Practitioner Faculties 52nd Annual Conference in Dallas. The presentation highlighted an approach to integrating advanced practice core content through competency-based, case-driven instruction.
Dr. Sonique Sailsman, assistant professor of nursing, published the article “Let’s Practice: Experiencing Patient Report Before the First Day of Clinical Practice” in Nurse Educator. She was also invited by the journal’s Editor-in-Chief Dr. Marilyn Oermann to record an online video abstract to support the article and an episode of the “Nurse Educator Tips for Teaching” podcast.
Dr. Linda A. Streit, professor of nursing, was invited to speak on the topic “From Bedside to Courtroom: Consideration of Legal Perspectives on Nursing Assessment Omissions” at the Southern Ohio Northern/Kentucky-Indiana Consortium annual conference in Cincinnati in March.
College of Pharmacy
Dr. Clinton Canal, associate professor, received $50,000 in funding from the FRAXA Research Foundation for the project “Preclinical Development and Target Deconvolution of Non-Hallucinogenic Substituted Tryptamines for Fragile X Syndrome.”
Dr. Martin D’Souza, professor and director of Ph.D. programs, and Dr. Mohammad N. Uddin, associate professor, co-authored with graduate students Mahek Anil Gulani, Yash Harsoda, Dedeepya Pasupuleti and Snehitha Akkineni, “Investigating the In Vitro Immunomodulatory Potential of Microparticulate β-L-Adenosine in Particulate Vaccine Candidates” in Vaccines. Dr. D’souza and Dr. Uddin also co-authored with graduate students Gulani, Harsoda, Tanisha Manoj Arte, Amarae Ferguson, Aditi Satoskar, Pasupuleti, Sarthak Shah, Emmanuel Adediran and Akkineni, “Design of Experiments in the Formulation and Characterization of 3D-Printed Vaginal Films Loaded With Curcumin Solid Lipid Nanoparticles for Cervical Dysplasia” in Pharmaceuticals.
Dr. Nicole Metzger, clinical professor, co-authored the comment on “Adopting race-free estimated glomerular filtration rate for unifying medication-related decision-making: An opinion of the Nephrology Practice and Research Network of the American College of Clinical Pharmacy” in the Journal of the American College of Clinical Pharmacy.
Dr. Nader H. Moniri, associate dean for research and professor of pharmaceutical sciences, and doctoral student Mohsina Mukti published “Fueling the fire or dousing the flame? The unclear role of the free-fatty acid receptor-4 (FFA4/GPR120) in colorectal cancer” in Biochemical Pharmacology. He also published “The roles of free-fatty acid receptors in the pathophysiology of renal disorders” in the Journal of Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics. Additionally, Dr. Moniri co-authored with graduate student Farnoosh Moghaddam and postdoctoral student Monika Binwal “Agonism of FFA4/GPR120 activates tyrosine hydroxylase and confers neuroprotection from 6-OHDA-induced cytotoxicity in PC12 cells and in a rat 6-OHDA model of Parkinson’s disease” in Biochemical Pharmacology.
College of Professional Advancement
Dr. Tugba Ertan Bolelli, assistant professor of science, completed the Governor’s Teaching Fellows Program for the 2025–26 academic year. She was one of only 16 faculty members from institutions of higher education across the state selected for this prestigious program. As part of the program, Dr. Ertan Bolelli participated in six immersive three-day seminars held in September, October and November 2025 and in February, March and April 2026. The program focused on teaching practices, faculty development and course design, while guiding participants through a course design or redesign project or another instructional improvement initiative. As a fellow, Dr. Ertan Bolelli redesigned her Organic Chemistry I Lab course for online delivery, helping expand access for working adult students who need flexible learning options while maintaining meaningful engagement with laboratory concepts. This redesign will also support her future teaching by creating a more accessible, student-centered course model that can better meet the needs of diverse learners.
Dr. Brooke Bullard, assistant professor of biology, was first author of “Panaxynol mitigates chemotherapy-induced intestinal mucositis by improving the colonic microenvironment in murine models,” published in The American Journal of Physiology-Gastrointestinal and Liver Physiology. The study identifies panaxynol, a bioactive compound from American ginseng, as a novel therapeutic candidate for chemotherapy-induced intestinal mucositis. In a murine 5-fluorouracil model, panaxynol attenuated mucosal injury, reduced cytopenia, suppressed pro-inflammatory immune cells, and altered gut microbial community structure. Importantly, panaxynol exhibited sex-dependent effects, with stronger immunological and microbial modulation in males. These findings highlight panaxynol’s pleiotropic protective actions and underscore the importance of sex as a biological variable in mucositis therapeutics.
Dr. Jacqueline S. Stephen, assistant professor and director of instructional and learning design, published the book Designing Learner-Centered Online Courses: Practical Strategies for Instructors, Instructional Designers, and Administrators with Springer in April. In the book, she offers a comprehensive and practical guide to designing high-quality online and blended learning experiences that are both engaging and effective. Bringing together established instructional design models, instructional events and learner-centered principles, the book presents a flexible framework that instructors, instructional designers and administrators can use to support meaningful learning. Grounded in an ecosystem perspective, it emphasizes that learner-centered course design is a shared responsibility and includes applied tools, templates, reflection prompts and practical strategies that help bridge theory and practice while supporting learner persistence, engagement and success across higher education and professional learning contexts. Dr. Stephen also published the Association for Talent Development blog article “One Talent Development (TD) Profession, Many Titles: What Job Titles Reveal About the Future of Learning and Talent Development.” Based on a study of learning and development professionals across higher education, corporate learning and other organizational settings, the article examines how fragmented job titles influence role clarity, team structure and workforce planning. It identifies patterns in how titles cluster around design, technology, leadership and hybrid responsibilities and offers practical recommendations for aligning titles with competencies, clarifying expectations, and strengthening learning and talent development functions.
School of Theology
Dr. Denise Massey, professor of pastoral care and counseling and J. Truett Gannon Chair, was the keynote speaker for the Center for the Study of Narrative lecture on March 25. She delivered “Narrative Theology as a Resource for Deep Understanding and Effective Helping,” as part of the annual Narrative Showcase held on the Atlanta campus.
Staff and Administration
Lauren Shinholster, associate director of engaged learning, presented “The Visionary Student Panel: How Mercer University Advances Student Innovation and Community Impact” at the 2026 Gulf-South Summit, held March 26–28 in Houston. She also led the workshop “From Trust to Transformation: An Interactive Workshop on Cultivating Sustainable Community Partnerships” and presented the poster “Pathways to the Polls: Faculty and Staff Roles in Advancing Student Voter Engagement,” which received a poster session award for innovation.
