Nutrition Science & Dietetics News
Remembering nutrition professor Jean Bowering, Ph.D.
Jean L. Bowering, Ph.D., retired Syracuse University Professor of nutrition, passed away April 1 in Ithaca, New York.
Born in 1939 in Yonkers, New York, Dr. Bowering completed her undergraduate degree at Cornell University in 1960. There, she was a member of the sorority Chi Gamma, banned by the national organization for pledging a Black member. She worked two years as a research chemist before returning to Cornell to earn her master’s degree in nutrition. One summer during her graduate studies, Dr. Bowering traveled to Guatemala to study nutrition and malnutrition in a developing nation. She later earned her Ph.D. in 1969 at the University of California Berkeley, where from her laboratory she experienced the 1968 tear gassing of anti-war demonstrators. She spent one year at Children’s Hospital in Washington, D.C. as a post doctoral research nutritionist before returning to Cornell to serve as an Assistant Professor teaching biochemistry and other nutrition subjects and doing important research on human iron requirements. Another research project involved numerous trips to New York City, as a leader of the East Harlem Nutrition Education Program. She was a member of the “Friends of the Cornell 11” action to sue the University for not equally granting tenure to women.
In 1977, Dr. Bowering left Cornell to join Syracuse University as an Associate Professor, later promoted to full Professor. During her time at Syracuse, she served as director of the graduate program in nutrition and enjoyed two-semester assignments at Syracuse University’s London program, where one of her courses was World Cuisine. A highlight of her research was the first survey in New York State to include both upstate and downstate cities to ascertain the economic situation and food program usage of clients of food pantries and soup kitchens. Dr. Bowering and her friend and colleague, Kate Clancy, Ph.D., oversaw the work and analyzed the data.
“Jean was a wonderful friend for 54 years,” says Dr. Clancy, former Syracuse University Professor of nutrition. “She was a devoted teacher and guided many students through their doctoral and master’s degrees on a wide variety of topics. She stayed in touch with most of them over many years, and I’m sure they will continue to remember her as a mentor and a friend.”
Dr. Bowering retired from Syracuse University in 2002. In retirement, she was active as an advisor for Health and Nutrition Studies at the Tompkins County office of Cornell Cooperative Extension.
Besides food and cooking, Dr. Bowering had many other hobbies and skills, including gardening, sewing, woodworking, photography, and reading. As an avid outdoors person, camping was a favorite vacation activity for Dr. Bowering and her husband, often combined with canoeing. She also enjoyed snorkeling and sailing, as well as winter sports such as cross-country skiing. She traveled to all seven continents. Especially enjoyable was the company of distant Australian relatives discovered through genealogical searching.
Nutrition program achieves 100% dietetic internship match rate for Spring 2020
This Spring 2020, the Falk College nutrition program achieved a 100% match rate, with all 16 graduate and undergraduate students in the accredited dietetics major matching to dietetic internships. These supervised dietetic internship positions are the final step before students take the national exam to become a registered dietitian. Since the establishment of pass rates more than 10 years ago, Falk pass rates consistently exceed the national average annually. Congratulations to our motivated students, outstanding nutrition faculty, state-of-the-art learning resources and personal guidance and support from the Didactic Program in Dietetics Director.
| Year | National Match Rate | S.U. Match Rate | Number of Students | Undergraduate | Graduate |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 | 61% | 90% | 21 | 15/17 | 4/4 |
| 2018 | 61% | 89% | 19 | 13/15 | 4/4 |
2020 Falk College Scholars Announced
Falk College Scholars from the Class of 2020 represent undergraduate students in the College who display academic excellence, exceptional campus and community engagement, independent research and creative work, evidence of intellectual growth and/or innovation in their disciplinary field, and personal integrity.
“Congratulations to our students named Falk College Scholars. Their outstanding accomplishments exemplify academic excellence, creativity, personal achievement and commitment to the campus and local communities, and they are exceptional role models for their peers,” says senior associate dean of academic affairs, Eileen Lantier.
The Falk Scholars from the Class of 2020 include:
April M Hill, Nutrition
Alizee Mclorg, Public Health
Bijal Patel, Public Health
Connor David Monzo, Sport Management
Brandon M Pollack, Sport Management
Nicholas Richard Riccardi, Sport Analytics
Alexandra Tulowiecki, Social Work
“The combination of their outstanding academic accomplishments and dedication to sharing knowledge and experiences outside of the classroom to engage the world represents what Falk College is all about: social responsibility, social justice and service to others,” adds Falk Dean, Diane Lyden Murphy.
Coronavirus pandemic shows the importance of our food system
The faculty of the Department of Nutrition and Food Studies recently submitted a commentary to The Post Stanard showing how the COVID-19 pandemic lays bare important contradictions within the modern food system. Faculty expounded how critical the food system is, with its workers, managers, business owners, and firms. However, the inequalities in the system have become apparent during this crisis: Workers in the food system are precarious, lack adequate pay and health benefits, and yet are asked to take risks to ensure food is available so we all can eat.
Professor Mary Kiernan asked her students in a sustainable food business course: “How do you think the COVID-19 pandemic will change the supply chain in food and foodservice purchasing in the future?” To answer this question her students needed to examine the entire food system including, agricultural production, cross-border food networks, labor relations and rights, immigration policies, food manufacturing and distribution, and nutrition science and education. We take the food system for granted as we shop, prepare our meals or purchase our food. This might change after the pandemic eases.
Understanding how the crisis affects the food system begins by looking into the vast U.S. farm system, from industrial-scale farms to many small- and medium-sized family farms. These farms rely on workers from other countries, largely from Mexico and Central America. These workers, as well as those who prepare our food and stock the shelves, drive and load and unload the trucks etc., are continuing to work and put themselves, and family members, at-risk.
The Department of Nutrition and Food Studies has always appreciated the important role of the food system and all who make it function so well; and, they hope that the current emergency situation will highlight how important this system is to our elected officials, policy-makers and to the public in general.
Read the full article at Syracuse.com
Falk senior “seeing nutrition as a matter of health and social justice”
This semester, senior April Hill ’20 worked with Salt City Harvest Farm to conduct environmental audits of food acquisition sites in Syracuse. She helped determine how community gardens may promote food security and cultural preservation among New Americans. This research will support her applications for doctoral nutrition programs, which she plans to pursue in addition to becoming a registered dietitian. Her ultimate goal is to become a research professor at a university. “Currently, I plan to study health disparities and ways nutrition and nutrition programming can be leveraged to combat inequity.”
While this is her most recent research project, it is far from her first. Her freshman year, Hill joined Falk professor Dr. Tanya Horacek on getFRUVED, the healthy campus environmental audit project. It was “one of my most valuable experiences here at Syracuse,” she says. “I learned a lot about conducting research, both in literature and in practice.” And the experience opened the door to even more opportunities for Hill.
Hill was one of ten individuals selected for Iowa State University’s Cyclone Scholar Summer Research Experience, an eight-week research internship during which Hill developed culturally competent diabetes education programming for Black men in the Midwest. “Through this program, I revised the Balanced Living with Diabetes curriculum and organized taste testing trials for a hands-on cooking component of the class. I selected recipes from a special diabetes cookbook, prepared the foods in their learning kitchen, and collected participants’ responses, which I then analyzed using descriptive statistics and presented at the end of the eight weeks.”
During her time there, she also got involved in other exciting research projects with faculty mentors. “This experience was instrumental in my decision to become a research professor. I realized I love doing interactive, qualitative research. I also became especially passionate about recognizing cultural differences in how nutrition education is framed and fighting for equity in all areas as it relates to human nutrition—not just in food access.”
“I don’t think I would have been able to get my assistantship at Iowa State without the experience I gained working with Dr. Tanya Horacek,” she adds.
Hill is a double major in nutrition and citizenship and civic engagement, with a minor in Spanish. “Being a double major has really challenged me to view nutrition from a variety of different lenses, seeing it as a matter of health and social justice.”
As a student, Hill also had the opportunity to study abroad in Santiago, Chile, which “was one of the most rewarding yet challenging experiences of my life,” she says. “I learned about social interactions and societal norms, and how these impact interactions and policies. As far as it relates to nutrition, I gained valuable knowledge about cultural differences to account for when working with diverse populations and how these cultural differences will dictate which strategies will be effective.”
While abroad, she attended classes at La Universidad de Chile, where she dove right into a research project with her fellow students at a local public health clinic. They managed everything, from identifying objectives and strategies to conducting surveys and analyzing the data. They used their research to design a nutrition education campaign aimed at reducing obesity tied to poor nutrition in adolescents. “The research that we did will go on to have real-life implications,” she says. “The students in my group are currently using this report in their other classes to develop nutrition education materials, and this project might even be implemented at the clinic in the future.”
For Hill, receiving Falk College’s Human Dynamics Scholarship helped open the door to Syracuse University and its opportunities. “This scholarship made it possible for me to attend Syracuse University, as well as go abroad and pursue opportunities like my internship at Iowa State,” she says. “These are experiences that have been so formative, especially my abroad semester, and I’m thankful that Falk helped make them possible for me.”
When Hill visited Syracuse University’s campus for the first time as a high school senior, “I remember everyone being really friendly and kind of getting that feeling that I’d just come home,” she recalls. Reflecting on her time here four years later, her first impression proved accurate. “Truly everyone in the nutrition department have been supportive of my life academically, professionally, and socially,” says Hill. “Whether it’s been making me aware of opportunities inside and outside the university or helping us through the dietetic internship or even listening to me talk about things that are bothering me, I really think my professors are what made my college experience what it has been.”
For more information about the Department of Nutrition and Food Studies at Syracuse University’s Falk College, please visit the Falk College website.
Food Busters Receives a 2020 Orange Circle Award
Food Busters, a nutrition program in the Shaw Center, is among the 2020 Orange Circle Award winners. Other winners include Lisa Gordon G’90, president and chief executive officer of Atlanta Habitat for Humanity, Marcelle Haddix, chair of reading and language arts and a dean’s professor in the School of Education, and student organizations Black Reign Step Team and a Hand for Wuhan.
Food Busters strives to improve literacy skills and public health awareness of fellow students in the Syracuse community. The organization was created in 2014 by ShawFood Busters group photo Center nutrition volunteer coordinators Jennifer La ’14 and Katelyn Castro ’15 and Engagement Fellow Victoria Seager G’15. It sends Syracuse University volunteers from the Shaw Center into local schools to teach students to implement lesson plans designed around content they are learning in their school or college.
This year, Food Busters worked with Henninger High School students in hands-on, STEM-focused lessons designed to explore the relationship between food, nutrition, health and media, while also increasing these students’ comprehension in the fields of literacy, mathematics and science. Along with nutrition students from the David B. Falk College of Sport and Human Dynamics, the Henninger High School students learned to perform their own food science experiments based on the lesson plans.
Fifth Annual Ann Selkowitz Litt Distinguished Speaker Series features Rob Skinner
Falk College is pleased to welcome Rob Skinner, MS, RD, CSSD, CSCS as the featured speaker of the Fifth Annual Ann Selkowitz Litt Distinguished Speaker Series. We invite you to join us Tuesday, February 25, 2020 at 6:00 p.m. in Grant Auditorium, Falk Complex for his lecture, “From the Military to the Olympics: Nutrition for Sport Performance Enhancement.” The event is free and open to the public. Light refreshments will be served prior to the lecture at 5:30 p.m.
Skinner is the Senior Sports Dietitian at the United State Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, Colorado. He brings 22 years of experience working as a dietitian and exercise physiologist with athletes at all levels, including positions with the Washington Redskins as a Sports Dietitian/Nutritionist, the U.S. Navy SEALs as a Performance Dietitian, the University of Virginia as Director of Sports Nutrition, and several positions with Georgia Tech.
In his lecture, Skinner will share about his role preparing athletes to compete at the highest level with the United States Olympic Team in the Tokyo 2020 Summer Olympics, as well as insights from his career experiences preparing professional and collegiate athletes for competition and military forces for combat.
“Rob’s extensive experience in nutrition and sports intersects numerous disciplines and interests. He has worked with many different populations, particularly with the military and with professional and collegiate athletes,” says Kay Stearns Bruening, PhD, RDN, FAND, Falk College associate professor in the Department of Nutrition and Food Studies. “We are thrilled he will share his insights with us for this year’s Litt Lecture.”
Skinner holds a master’s degree in exercise science from Georgia State University, as well as bachelor’s degrees in education and nutrition from the University of Georgia and Georgia State University, respectively. He is a registered dietitian with the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics (AND) and holds certifications with AND, the National Strength and Conditioning Association, and the American College of Sports Medicine. Skinner is author and co-author of several publications, including chapters in AND publications, Sports Nutrition: A Guide for the Professional Working with Active People and Working with the Collegiate Athlete and Weight and Body-Focused Sports.
Now in its fifth year, the Ann Selkowitz Litt Distinguished Speaker Series is named after Falk College nutrition alumna Ann Selkowitz Litt ’75, a nationally known nutritionist who helped children and adolescents with eating disorders and assisted developing athletes in reaching their full potential. The nutrition consultant to CosmoGirl magazine, Litt was the author of “The College Students’ Guide to Eating Well on Campus,” “Fuel for Young Athletes” and “The ADA Guide to Private Practice.” She was the nutritionist for the NFL’s Washington Redskins and served as spokesperson for several media campaigns during her career, including the “Got Milk” campaign. After her death, the Ann S. Litt Foundation, Inc., was created to support nutrition education.
For information about the Ann Litt Lecture and for accommodations requests, please contact Annette Hodgens at ahodgens@syr.edu or 315.443.9816.
Dean Murphy welcomes Falk students to campus
Wednesday, January 15, 2020
Dear Falk College Students,
Welcome back to campus, returning Falk students. And welcome to new and transfer students joining us this spring. We are so glad to have you join our Falk family. I hope that your winter break was filled with family, friends, and loved ones, and plenty of time for both restful and exciting activities.
As the Spring 2020 semester begins, I would like to offer you a few reminders and updates:
Falk faculty, staff, and I as your Dean, are here to support each of you on your journey here as students, as people, and as citizens. Our doors are always open to you.
In addition, you were invited to an open house with me and Falk College faculty and staff on January 14. It was great to see many of you there for the first in a series of regularly scheduled events that we will continue this semester and into future semesters. I welcome your feedback for future College activities.
As we face challenges on our campus, and as our students advocate for a better Syracuse University, you have my assurance as Dean that Falk College is fully committed to playing a critical role in these efforts, doing what we can to strengthen and build the campus community we know we can be.
Some of you are actively involved in the Falk College Dean’s Committee on Diversity and Inclusion, established in 2018. We are so grateful for the action and positive change resulting from the efforts of our members, which include faculty, staff, graduate students and undergraduate students from all academic programs in Falk College. There is much work yet to do, and we strongly encourage you to be part of it. Committee meetings are held monthly throughout the academic year. Students interested in being involved in the Committee should contact Professor Chandice Haste-Jackson at cmhaste@syr.edu or the Falk College Dean’s Office at tbattist@syr.edu.
I’d like to remind all students that Falk College Student Services is your dedicated support system. Student Services counselors are here to provide you with private academic advising and help you meet your requirements and goals. In addition, they are your resource for private consultation related to student social and emotional concerns. If you have any concerns throughout your academic career, please contact Student Services or visit 330 Barclay Hall in the Falk Complex.
Particularly for new students, I encourage you review my Fall 2019 welcome message, which contains helpful information about other important resources like Falk Career Services, the Falk Student Lounge, Falk Café, and our computer labs. You’ll also find information about campus resources, such as health and counseling services in the Barnes Center at the Arch, spiritual life through Hendricks Chapel.
To those of you who will be graduating in May, I give you a special word of encouragement to make the most of this semester to maximize your academic and personal growth, and of course, enjoy it! To all our students in Falk College, I wish each of you an excellent Spring 2020 semester.
Go Orange!
Diane Lyden Murphy, M.A., M.S.W., Ph.D.
Dean
Falk College
Falk College offers graduate program scholarships for 2020
Alumni admitted to one of Falk College eligible master’s program for 2020: All Syracuse University alumni can apply for a scholarship equivalent to 25% of tuition for one of Falk College’s eligible residential master’s degree (listed below). In addition, GRE tests and application fees waived.
Scholarship is for residential programs, only.
All students who are full or part-time Syracuse University alumni and do not qualify for the 50% Forever Orange discount are eligible for this scholarship; this includes students already admitted to a Falk master’s program for 2021.
Falk graduate programs include:
- Exercise Science M.S.
- Food Studies M.S.
- Food Studies C.A.S.
- Applied Human Development & Family Science M.A.
- Human Development & Family Science M.S.
- Marriage and Family Therapy M.A.
- Child Therapy C.A.S.
- Trauma Informed Practice C.A.S.
- Nutrition Science M.A., M.S.
- Dietetic Internship C.A.S.
- Integrative and Functional Nutrition C.A.S.
- Public Health MPH
- Addiction Studies C.A.S.
- Global Health C.A.S.
- Sport Venue & Event Management M.S.
Interested students should contact Falk Admissions, submit their application, and must formally matriculate. For more information, please contact the Falk College Office of Admissions at 315.443.5555 or email falk@syr.edu. Award is subject to change.
Joan Christy Lecture Series Presents Culinary Demonstration with the Iroquois White Corn Project
Falk College and its Department of Nutrition and Food Studies hosted the Iroquois White Corn Project for a culinary demonstration and tasting on Thursday, November 14 in Falk (MacNaughton Hall) 104.
The Iroquois White Corn Project aims to bring Iroquois White Corn back as a staple of the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) diet through the production of hand grown, picked, and processed products from heirloom seeds dating back at least 1,400 years in Haudenosaunee communities. Iroquois White Corn products are nutritious, non-GMO, gluten-free, and have a low glycemic index.
Lauren Jimerson, Seneca, Heron clan, resides with her son Angel Jimerson in ancestral Seneca territory near Victor, NY. With her passion for cooking and nutrition, Lauren developed several plant-based recipes during her time as the Interim Project Manager for the Iroquois White Corn Project. Lauren currently provides outreach and Angel works as the Iroquois White Corn Project Coordinator.
The Joan Christy lecture series is made possible by The Christy Food and Culture Fund, established in 2005 through the generosity of Syracuse University nutrition alumna Joan Christy ’78, G’81 to provide support for a lecture series in the nutrition program at the University.
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