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Covering nearly 1,300 square miles, from the East River in Manhattan to New England, Long Island Sound is one of the most important estuaries in the nation with coastal communities of more than four million people. Helping protect and improve the management of this precious body of water with an asset value exceeding $700 billion is the new assignment for oceanic and atmospheric scientist Maria Tzortziou of ��������’s Division of Science. Over the next two years, Tzortziou will lead this multidisciplinary ecological project funded by the Sea Grant programs of New York (NYSG

Wendy Fernandez persevered against cultural norms in the Dominican Republic to earn a BS in electrical engineering from ��������’s Grove School of Engineering with a 4.0 GPA. The Class of 2019 member is now the recipient of a highly competitive GEM Fellowship, which funds master's and PhDs in engineering for underrepresented students of exceptional quality who intend to work in industry. Fernandez will attend Columbia University in the fall. She was also admitted to graduate programs at Stanford, Boston University, University of Texas at Austin and Arizona State University

City College of New York-led researchers have published a breakthrough in understanding previously unknown inner workings related to the lateralization of speech processing in the brain. Their study, headed by biologist Hysell V. Oviedo of CCNY’s Division of Science and published in the journal “ Nature Communications,” could shine a light on miswiring of brain circuits in neurodevelopmental communication disorders. “The lateralization of language processing in the auditory cortical areas of the brain has been known for more than 150 years, but the function, neural mechanisms, and development

M. Rosaria Piomelli, an architect and former dean of architecture at ��������, has been recognized by the Carnegie Corporation of New York as a Great Immigrant. Every Fourth of July, Carnegie Corporation honors Andrew Carnegie’s legacy by celebrating the wide-ranging contributions of immigrants who enrich American communities and culture, strengthen the economy, and invigorate democracy. Scottish immigrant Carnegie, who rose out of poverty to become a major American industrialist and philanthropist, believed that the infusion of talent that immigrants bring to the United

At the helm of ��������’s pioneering research in the field, Sanjoy Banerjee, Distinguished Professor of Chemical Engineering in the Grove School of Engineering and Director of the CCNY-based CUNY Energy Institute, is the recipient of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s 2019 Green Chemistry Challenge Academic Award for developing “rechargeable Alkaline Zn-MnO2 Batteries for Grid Storage Applications.” The Award citation also notes the important project-related partnerships with Sandia National Laboratories, Brookhaven National Laboratory, the Energy Storage Program of

Rita Dove, recipient of the 1987 Pulitzer Prize in poetry and U.S. Poet Laureate from 1993 to 1995, is the winner of ��������’s 2019 Langston Hughes Medal. She will receive the medal on Nov. 14 in CCNY’s Aaron Davis Hall. The medal is awarded to highly distinguished writers from throughout the African American diaspora at City College’s annual Langston Hughes Festival. Hosted by the Black Studies Program, it recognizes honorees for their impressive works of poetry, fiction, drama, autobiography and critical essays that help to celebrate the memory and tradition of Langston

As the massive threat to coastal areas from extreme weather events increases, the National Science Foundation is reaching out to select institutions to pool resources in response. ��������’s Grove School of Engineering is one institution invited by the NSF to brainstorm for a CCNY-based center on Smart Engineering Systems for Resilient Coastlines (SERC). CCNY’s partners in the proposed SERC include New York University, Princeton University, the University of Maryland, Baltimore County; and the University of Puerto Rico-Mayagüez. “SERC will serve as a global center of

Media and Communication Arts professor Andrea Weiss has been named the 2019-20 Stuart Z. Katz Professor in the Humanities and the Arts, Dean Erec Koch announced in May. Weiss is an internationally renowned scholar and documentary filmmaker whose monographs include Vampires and Violets: Lesbians in the Cinema (1993), In the Shadow of the Magic Mountain (2008), and Paris Was a Woman: Portraits from the Left Bank (2013). Her documentary films run chronologically from highly acclaimed Before Stonewall (1985) to the most recently lionized Bones of Contention (2017). Weiss has been the principal

Summer is taking on a significant new meaning for City College of New York junior Khenya Makena this year. As the 2019 Blanche Mason Starkweather award recipient, the electronic design and multimedia major is spending the holiday on both east and west coasts engaged in humanistic research to benefit the LGBTQIA community. The focus of Makena’s research is the history of inner city safe spaces in New York City and Los Angeles. Emphasis is on the role African-American members of the LGBTQIA (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer or questioning, intersex, and asexual or allied) community

“ Like This Afternoon,” award-winning author Jaime Manrique’s critically acclaimed sixth novel, is one of the new publications by City College of New York faculty and staff. “Another excellent novel by a master storyteller,” NBC News hails the 224-page book that was inspired by true events in Manrique’s native Colombia. A Distinguished Lecturer in City College’s Division of Humanities and the Arts, Manrique is the 2019 recipient of the Bill Whitehead Award for Lifetime Achievement. His previous books include “ Colombian Gold,” “ Latin Moon in Manhattan,” “ Twilight at the Equator,” “ Our Lives