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Capstone — College of Arts, Social Sciences, & Humanities Alumni publication

Spring 2025
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Spring 2024
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Capstone is an online magazine published twice annually for alumni and friends of UWL's College of Arts, Social Sciences, & Humanities.

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The UWL College of Arts, Social Sciences, and Humanities’ Capstone is published online in March and November, for more than 8,000 alumni and friends of the College of Arts, Social Sciences, and Humanities.

History kudos

Dean Vesperman

Dean Vesperman, History, co-authored the article "Keeping it Real: Confronting Controversy in the Classroom" in The Great Lakes Social Studies Journal published on Friday, May 9 by Michigan Council for the Social Studies. The ultimate goal of teacher education is to prepare students to be informed participant citizens in our democracy. A driving question that motivates our work is how to best prepare future secondary social studies teachers to teach about controversial or contentious issues in authentic ways. Keeping it real in the classroom necessarily includes the freedom to teach about the critical contemporary issues confronting our world and affecting our students’ lives. However, schools have become a barrier in the battleground for freedom of speech. This article focuses on how we used a simulation of a school board book ban and a structured academic controversy to help our teacher candidates explore teaching about controversial issues.

Submitted on: May 9

Dean Vesperman

Dean Vesperman, History, presented "Conquering Machine Learning: How do We Improve AI-Generated Curriculum?" at UWL Research and Creativity Symposium on Friday, May 9 in La Crosse,. Presented with undergraduate researchers Terra Clark, Zach Powley, McKiley Green, and Audrey Langworthy, preliminary data on how to improve AI-generated curriculum. This poster presentation focused on analyzing AI-gen lessons about the Kerner Commission Report (1968) through the lens of Howard Gardner's Frames of Mind. Our research demonstrated that the lessons focus on a limited number of Frames: Linguistic, Interpersonal, and existential.

Submitted on: May 9

Gita Pai

Gita Pai, History, authored the chapter "Activist Authors, Duty-Bound Arjuna, and Selfless Action in Early Indian Nationalism" in Mythologizing in South Asian Traditions: Myth, Gender, Power, and Politics published on May 1 by Palgrave Macmillan.

Submitted on: May 5

Penelope Hardy

Penelope Hardy, History, presented "Writing Your Cover Letter" at HSS/ASEH Virtual Workshop: Job Market Documents on Monday, April 21 online. This workshop explored what makes a compelling job application portfolio for academic jobs in the history of science, environmental history, and allied fields. Hardy focused on one of six job application components and then took questions from the audience. The workshop was a virtual event co-hosted by the Graduate and Early Career Caucus of the History of Science Society (HSS) and the Early Career Caucus of the American Society for Environmental History (ASEH).

Submitted on: April 21

Jennifer Trost

Jennifer Trost, History, was elected to the La Crosse City Council. Trost was re-elected by residents in District 10 on April 1 for a second, four-year term to the city council. Since 2021, she has addressed the availability and affordability of different types of housing by re-drafting regulations and mandates. She will continue working for housing reform during the update to city-wide zoning codes.

Submitted on: April 7