Two long-term faculty members to expand role in the College of Arts and Sciences
The College of Arts and Sciences at Mississippi State University has added two faculty members to serve as interim assistant deans for academic affairs for the largest college within the land-grant university.
Melanie E. Loehwing, an associate professor in the Department of Communication, and Kathy M. Sherman-Morris, a professor in the Department of Geosciences, were selected by Arts and Sciences Dean Rick Travis to step jointly into the role while the current associate dean for academic affairs, Tommy Anderson, shifts his responsibilities to other areas.
Travis said Loehwing and Sherman-Morris joined his team in January of 2020 as Dean’s Administrative Faculty Fellows to provide leadership in student retention strategies, revising core curriculum, assessing faculty and graduate student workloads, and increasing distance education courses throughout the College.
“Little did we know how fortuitous their joining would be with the onset of COVID and our need to convert more than 1,600 lecture or lab sections to an online format in March of 2020,” Travis said. “Since that time, they have demonstrated their ability to adapt and respond to a myriad of challenges related to the fast-changing nature of higher education.
“On July 1, they will assume the positions of interim assistant dean for academic affairs -- three quarter time positions. Given that our current associate dean for academic affairs, Dr. Tommy Anderson, is serving as the interim dean for the University Libraries through the rest of this calendar year, and is slated to be the interim dean of the Judy and Bobby Shackouls Honors College beginning in January 2022, we are lucky to have Dr. Sherman-Morris and Dr. Loehwing available to help us.”
Melanie E. Loehwing
Loehwing will focus her leadership on increasing student success including retention and graduation rates. She will serve as the primary point of contact with the Office of Student Affairs. Loehwing also will work to expand and modernize undergraduate curriculum.
“Dr. Loehwing is an expert in communication and civic engagement,” Travis said. “This expertise will serve her well in the coming year.”
Kathy M. Sherman-Morris
In her new position, Sherman-Morris will focus on graduate education, student success at the graduate and undergraduate level, and faculty workload issues.
“Dr. Sherman-Morris previously has served as the distance education coordinator for the largest distance education program at MSU with her home department -- the Department of Geosciences,” Travis said. “She has served in other various service capacities at MSU including the chair of MSU’s University Faculty Senate’s faculty affairs committee.”
A native of York, Pennsylvania, Loehwing has been an MSU faculty member for 8 years. Her research focuses on rhetoric and democracy with special focus on protests, social movements, and advocacy campaigns that revolve around economic inequality and political polarization.
She is a research fellow for the Social Science Research Center and an MSU Community-Engaged Learning Fellow, and has served as faculty advisor for several student groups on campus. Loehwing received her bachelor’s and master’s degrees, and her Ph.D. from Indiana University.
A native of Easton, Pennsylvania, Sherman-Morris has been an MSU faculty member since 2003. She received her bachelor’s degree from Mansfield University, her master’s degree from MSU and her Ph.D. from Florida State University.
Sherman-Morris’s research focuses on communication of weather information and the response of individuals during extreme weather. She has served as secretary for the Southeastern Division of the Association of American Geographers, a board member and president-elect for the National Weather Association, state coordinator for the Community Collaborative Rain, Hail and Snow Network and chair of the American Meteorological Society Board on Societal Impacts.
MSU’s College of Arts and Sciences includes more than 5,000 students, 323 full-time faculty members, nine doctoral programs, 14 master’s programs, and 27 undergraduate academic majors offered in 14 departments. It also is home to diverse units for research and scholarly activities, including natural and physical sciences, social and behavioral sciences, and the humanities. For more details about the College of Arts and Sciences, visit www.cas.msstate.edu.
MSU is Mississippi’s leading university, available online at www.msstate.edu.
Sarah Nicholas | College of Arts and Sciences
