Higher Education Resources and Opportunities for Exceptional Scholars a NJ Nonprofit Corporation was incorporated in the State of New Jersey on August 10, 2009 with the intent of applying for non-profit status under Section 501(c)3 of the Internal Revenue Code. We are in the process of applying for recognition as a tax-exempt organization. Please consult your tax advisor about the tax deductiblity of your contributions.
Dr. Bashe is the mother of a HEROES member and has been a child clinical psychologist for 25 years. A graduate of Brown University, she received her doctorate in Clinical Psychology from Rutgers University and her M.A. in Child Clinical Psychology from Tel Aviv University. She has lectured on parenting issues for the NJ Association of Gifted Children, Montclair State University, Rutgers University, Middlesex County College and local parent groups and maintains drelinorbashe.blogspot.com Dr. Elinor also served on the advisory board of the Cambridge School for children with learning differences.
Jason Becker got his first computer in 1986 at the age of 6 years old and has been working with and on them ever since. Jason is skilled in many computer languages including PHP, Visual Basic, C++, C, and others. He has worked with multiple different kinds of Micro-controllers and embedded systems. He as well has studied electrical engineering as well as holds a degree in Computer Science. He is also a founding member of Fair Use Building & Research Labs.
Tisha Bender is an Assistant Director of the Rutgers Writing Program and Coordinator of Expository Writing (the first year writing course at Rutgers University in New Brunswick). She also runs the Hybrid Expository Writing Program, and as such has trained faculty to be effective online teachers, as well as the Tips for Teachers series, which is a discussion group of Writing Program faculty who meet to discuss articles written about pedagogy. In addition, she has worked extensively with high school teachers, helping them to better prepare their students for college writing. She received her Ph.D. in Ethics and Urban Planning Decisions from the London School of Economics. She is the author of Discussion-Based Online Teaching to Enhance Student Learning: Theory, Practice and Assessment (Stylus 2003), "Facilitating Online Discussion in an Asynchronous Framework" published in Issues in Web-Based Pedagogy (ed. Cole, R.A., Greenwood Press 2000) and "Role Playing in Online Education: A Teaching Tool to Enhance Student Engagement and Sustained Learning" in Innovate: Journal of Online Education (April/May 2005).
Paul Bonnel is a member of the Allentown Symphony Orchestra, the Westchester Chamber Orchestra, and the Chappaqua Orchestra. Recently, he worked on a sound track with composer Phillip Glass at the Looking Glass Studios in New York City for a movie soon to be released. He was also involved in playing for the Dalai Lama's appearance during the September 2005 tour titled "Peace, War and Reconciliation" in New Brunswick, NJ. Paul performed the music of Takemistsu and Shostakovich under the direction of Christoph Eschenbach and Michael Tilson Thomas at the Pacific Music Festival in Sapporo, Japan. He worked with Lou Harrison on the occasion of his 75th birthday celebration. In the past year he performed Varese’s Octandre and Prokofiev's Woodwind Quintet Op.39, as well as pieces by Charles Wuorinen, in chamber music concerts in New Jersey.
Dr. Bonnel completed his doctoral studies in double bass performance at Rutgers University. He is on faculty in the Mason Gross Extension Division where he directs the Jazz Combo, the Ridgewood Conservatory, and the Bronxville Middle School and was invited as a guest lecturer in the Musicianship department at the Mason Gross School of the Arts.
A native of Aix en Provence, France, Paul was raised in a family where music ranging from the classical repertoire to jazz with bassists Ray Brown and Charles Mingus could be heard. After moving to Berkeley, CA at the age of 15, he pursued undergraduate studies at the San Francisco Conservatory of music and went on to obtain a Masters of Music from the Yale School of Music, where he received a Sam Stewart Scholarship. His teachers include Paul Harris, principal bass of the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, Don Palma, principal bass and co-founder of the Orpheus chamber Orchestra, and Stephen Tramontozzi, associate principal bass with the San Francisco Symphony. Mr. Bonnel lives in West New York, NJ, where he teaches and performs actively.
James Coleman has a Masters in Science Education and has been teaching physics for about ten years. Currently he teaches AP Physics at Sayreville War Memorial HS. He obtained both his undergraduate and graduate degrees at Rutgers University. For ten years he has helped Professor Terry Matilsky and the other instructors with the summer astrophysics research course which allows high school students a chance to do realistic x-ray astrophysics research.
Denise Lanchantin Dwyer is an attorney whose practice evolved from her own experience advocating for her two gifted sons and researching the laws that govern the education of gifted students. The goal of my firm is to provide parents with unbiased advice about what schools are required to do for gifted students, and to create positive communication and cooperation between parents and schools. Often, parents know that something isn’t working for their child at school, but don’t know what, whom, or how to ask for help. She has worked with districts to persuade them to provide gifted programming at all grade levels and created parent support groups that have presented programs by nationally known speakers in the area of gifted education. Previously, Denise was a successful prosecutor then civil trial attorney having earned her BA at Fordham University and her JD at New York Law School. She is a member of the New Jersey and New York bars.
David Feinblum is a sophomore at Rutgers University majoring in chemistry. He has been interested in science his entire life. In middle school, he wanted to be a doctor. That changed when he took his first chemistry class in high school. Since then, he has swayed from one subfield of chemistry to another. Currently, he is doing research at Rutgers in the Chemistry Department involving organic synthetic chemistry. He plans on going to grad school to pursue a doctorate in chemistry and ultimately become a professor.
Phil Gillhaus is the president of Fair Use Building and Research Labs, a collective of geeks, hackers, techies, and other strange and wonderful people. Phil is leading the collective to become a statewide institution recognized for it's excellence in research, knowledge exchange, and mentoring in the field of technology; for now he's happy just teaching people and making cool things. Phil has provided instructional support for programs in computer literacy, web design, and course management software at Brookdale Community College and Rutgers University. He is currently working as a web developer for NJEDge, a non-profit technology consortium of academic and research institutions in New Jersey.
Dr. Glenn is the Vice-Chair, Department of Marine and Coastal Sciences at Rutgers University and the Adjunct Scientist at Mote Marine Laboratory in Sarasota, Florida. Dr. Glenn earned his B.S. in Geomechanics at the University of Rochester and his Sc. D. in Ocean Engineering in a Massachusetts Institute of Technology/Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Joint Program. Prior to joining Rutger’s faculty, he was a Project Scientist at Harvard University. He has written over 100 scientific papers on ocean research. His current research focuses on the development of regional-scale coastal ocean observation networks.
Michael Goeller is an Associate Director of the Rutgers Writing Program and Plangere Writing Center Coordinator, in charge of writing tutoring at Rutgers University in New Brunswick. His latest focus is helping students make the transition to college writing. He helps to run the Writers House Teachers College, which trains high school teachers to better prepare their students for college standards. He also heads up the Plangere Culture Lab, which makes educational films for high school and college audiences for the Rutgers Writing Program and Writers House (some of which are available at http://itunes.rutgers.edu. He is currently directing a documentary film titled "Expos," which follows five Rutgers first-year students as they try to succeed in Expository Writing at Rutgers.
Elizabeth (Liz) Holland Hough, director of Summer and Winter Sessions for Rutgers University’s New Brunswick campus, manages one of the largest university summer academic programs in the country, with more than 1,300 course offerings and nearly 13,000 students. She returned to Rutgers in 2007, after twelve years’ service to California State University, Sacramento in continuing education and development. Before moving to Northern California, Liz worked on Rutgers University's Camden campus as assistant dean of academic services, managing the undergraduate advising program and the basic skills testing program (1992-1994). Prior to that, she served as coordinator of a grant-funded developmental advising program, faculty academic advisor, and adjunct instructor for the Psychology Department (1985-1992). Liz has also taught psychology for Glassboro State College (now Rowan University), Cosumnes River College, California State University, Sacramento, and Northwestern University. She earned her B.A. in psychology at Douglass College, and her M.A. and Ph.D. candidacy in social psychology at Northwestern University.
Charles H. Johnson is poetry instructor for the Monmouth County (N.J.) and Middlesex County (N.J.) arts high schools. His third collection, "Smoke Signals," was published in September 2009. He is a visiting poet for the Paterson school system and conducts weekly poetry workshops for the Middlesex County (N.J.) Youth Shelter . A Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation Poet in the Schools, he is a two-time Pushcart Prize nominee, and his second book, “Sam’s Place,” received a 2007 Paterson Poetry Prize for Literary Excellence. His first book, "Tunnel Vision," was a finalist for the 2004 Paterson Poetry Prize. Charles was a 1998 first-place winner of the Allen Ginsberg Poetry Awards. He was poetry editor for the online literary magazine Identity Theory from 2005-2009 and poetry reviewer for the Home News Tribune in East Brunswick, N.J. from 1995-2008. A graduate of Rutgers College in New Brunswick, N.J., he is a retired newspaper editor.
Dr. Kawahara is a phonologist and an assistant professor at the linguistics department at Rutgers University. He was awarded his BA from International Christian University in 2002 and Ph.D. (Linguistics) from University of Massachusetts in 2007. Dr. Kawahara's background in theoretical phonology gives strong basis to his current studies of phonetics. He primarily investigates phonetic bases of emergent phonological patterns. In addition to issues on the phonetics-phonology interface, he also works on the syntax-phonology interface as well as the phonology-morphology interface. He's also known for his linguistic studies on verbal art patterns including Japanese rap rhymes and puns.
Namrata Kulkarni is a junior in Biomedical Engineering at Rutgers University. She loves the idea of helping people by finding the proper and most effective solutions, which is why she is involved with research in the BME department dealing with differentiation of stem cells into bone cells for the regrowth of bone tissue after injury (a very progressive field), as well as a student organization called Engineers Without Borders, which works with international communities in third-world countries to find sustainable engineering solutions to their real-world problems. Namrata has various interests and believes strongly in the combination of education and application. Finally, she plans to pursue medical school after obtaining her engineering degree.
Colin Li is a parent of a HEROES member and an IT specialist for the Bank of Tokyo. He obtained his Master degree in computer science from New York University. He has over eighteen years of Information Technology with Output Technology, Merrill Lynch, AT&T, JP Morgan Chase, Tiaa-Cref, IBM and Bank of Tokyo. His experience includes programming development, enterprise systems and network management.
Dr. Lutz is one of the foremost authorities in the world on the ecology of deep-sea hydrothermal vents. Since the first biological expedition to these unique ecosystems in 1979, Dr. Lutz has spent countless hours on the bottom exploring thermal vents throughout the world's oceans in a variety of deep-diving submersibles.
The results of his ongoing studies at the volcanic eruption site have been featured in many scientific journals and magazines, including Science, Nature, American Scientist, and three separate issues of National Geographic. Observations made during the course of Dr. Lutz's ongoing studies in this unique "natural deep-sea laboratory" are dramatically altering our views of the rates at which many biological and geological processes are occurring on the face of the planet. Dr. Lutz was Principal Investigator on the NSF project which funded the IMAX film entitled Volcanoes of the Deep Sea and served as the film’s Science Director. This film summarizes the results described above and will be shown during the HEROES Conference on January 23.
Dr. Malinowski is Director of Rutgers Equine Science Center at the New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station. Her equine research and extension programs concentrate on improving the well-being and quality of life of the equine athlete while ensuring the vitality and viability of the equine industry, both statewide and nationally. She has received numerous awards for her work, including a lifetime achievement award from the Rutgers Graduate School in 2007, as well as the American Horse Council’s most prestigious national citation, the Van Ness Award, in 2001. She was named "Outstanding Equine Educator" by the Equine Nutrition and Physiology Society, also in 2001. Dr. Malinowski grew up and still lives in Somerset County. She has been a “horse person” since she took her first pony ride as a toddler, and she has been involved in various horse disciplines and organizations throughout her career. She holds bachelor’s, master’s and doctorate degrees from Rutgers.
Terry Matilsky has been a professor of physics and astronomy at Rutgers University for over 30 years. He has worked on many of NASA's ultraviolet and x-ray satellites, and for a dozen years has run a state-wide summer program at Rutgers for high energy astrophysics. In this 4 week intensive course, gifted high school students and their teachers participate in an authentic research environment, whereby they examine actual data from several of NASA's space missions.
Professor Matilsky's research has recently been focusing on the exploration of alternative theories of gravity. For over 50 years, the rotation of stars within galaxies has been a mystery, giving rise to the idea of dark matter. Another possibility is that we don't understand gravity at very low accelerations, and this is what he is currently thinking about.
Dr. Michelle C. Muratori is a Senior Counselor at the Center for Talented Youth at Johns Hopkins University, where she works with highly gifted students who participate in the Study of Exceptional Talent (SET) and their families. Michelle received her Ph.D. in Counselor Education from The University of Iowa (UI). As a doctoral student, she held a position at the Belin-Blank Center for four years and developed her research and clinical interests in the field of gifted education. While serving as the graduate student coordinator of the National Academy of Arts, Sciences, and Engineering (NAASE) at UI, she felt inspired to study the academic, social, and personal adjustment of the NAASE students. This research earned her recognition from the Iowa Talented and Gifted Association, the National Association for Gifted Children, and the Mensa Education and Research Foundation and Mensa International, Ltd. Michelle earned several other awards as a doctoral student including the 2003/2004 Howard R. Jones Achievement Award, the 2001/2002 Albert Hood Promising Scholar Award, and the 2001 First in the Nation in Education (FINE) Scholar Award. In addition to her immensely rewarding work with profoundly gifted students at CTY, Michelle teaches master’s level courses as a faculty associate in the Counseling and Human Services Department at Johns Hopkins. In her spare time, she enjoys writing. Michelle developed a practical guide about early college entrance that will guide all of the stakeholders through the difficult decision making process (Early College Entrance: A Guide to Success; Prufrock Press, 2007).
Rita Ostrager is the founder of HEROES, Higher Education Resources for Outstanding and Exceptional Scholars. She has hosted several gatherings for the exceptional gifted in New Jersey and has been actively advocating for the creation of educational opportunities for this unique population. In 2008, she founded HEROES to provide profoundly gifted students with information regarding existing educational opportunities, to facilitate the creation of additional resources for them and to advocate for changes in regulations and district practices that would address their unique needs. Ms. Ostrager has held numerous volunteer positions including three years on the Monroe Township Board of Education, various positions in PTOs and PTAs and troop leader, trainer and summer camp program director for Girl Scouts. As a high school student, Ms. Ostrager was fortunate to secure a research position in the Jet Noise Reduction Laboratory at NASA, Langley Research Center and was a computer programmer developing educational software for Hampton City Schools In Virginia. She hopes that HEROES will create similar opportunities for today’s profoundly gifted youth.
Nancy Pullen is the Director of Recruitment and Enrollment at Rutgers University. She has worked in the college admissions field for over 30 years. She is a proud alumna with two degrees from Rutgers University; a BA from Douglass College and a MEd from the Graduate School of Education. As the parent of a current Rutgers student, she has experienced college admissions from the perspective of student, parent, and admissions counselor.
Mr. Bruce Ralli has a Bachelor of Science degree in Secondary Education and Mathematics from West Virginia University and a Master of Arts degree in Mathematics from Georgian Court University. Mr. Ralli taught high school mathematics for 36 years at J. P. Stevens High School in Edison, New Jersey. He helped develop the honors curriculum has taught all the honors math courses including AP Calculus. Mr. Ralli was the coach for the J. P. Stevens "Odyssey of the Mind" for fifteen years, with his teams earning 14 State Championships. Mr. Ralli is currently a full time mathematics lecturer at Monmouth University
As Director of the Mason Gross Extension Division, Julie Roth works closely with department chairs to provide educational opportunities in the arts to the surrounding community. She directs the pre-college, community, teacher advancement, and summer programs at Mason Gross School of the Arts. Ms. Roth taught ‘Mason Gross Presents’ at HEROES 2009.
Dr. G. Boyd Swartz recieved his MS in Electrical Engineer from Lehigh University and his Phd in Mathematics from the Courant Institute of NYU. He served as chair of Mathematics and Computer Science Department at Monmouth University where he is currently a professor. Dr. Swartz is the author of "Computer Simulation in Logistics" and currently teaches Mathematics at Monmouth University, W. Long Branch, NJ. Dr. Swartz taught at ‘How I Named My Cat’ at HEROES 2009.
Professor Takács is the dean of the School of Arts and Sciences Honors Program. Before she came to Rutgers, she taught at the University of Oregon, at UCLA, and at Harvard where she also held the position of academic dean. Dean Takács received her B.A. in Classics from the University of California, Irvine, her M.A. and Ph.D. in History from UCLA. Professor Takács studies the Roman and Byzantine world and teaches in the department of History. Her book, Vestal Virgins, Sibyls, and Matrons: Women in Roman Religion, looks at Roman women and the role they played maintaining Rome’s socio-political structure as well as the understanding of the Roman self by means of religious rituals. Professor Takács' newest book, The Construction of Authority in Ancient Rome and Byzantium, investigates the power of rhetoric through the traditional virtues of the ancient Romans. She is also the editor of a monograph series.
John Tiedemann is the Assistant Dean in the Monmouth University School of Science and Specialist Professor in the Biology Department where he teaches marine and environmental science and coordinates the BS degree program in Marine and Environmental Biology and Policy. Mr. Tiedemann received a B.S. in Physics and Planetary Sciences from Upsala College in 1976 and an M.S. in BioEnvironmental Oceanography from the Florida Institute of Technology in 1980. A lifelong resident of New Jersey, he has been professionally employed in the marine and environmental field since 1979 and has worked in both the public and private sectors dealing with New Jersey marine and environmental issues.
His work has addressed a breadth of environmental science and management issues. The New Jersey Pine Barrens, ocean dumping in New Jersey coastal waters, impacts of coastal development on living marine resources and traditional maritime industries, fisheries management, best management practices for controlling sources of coastal pollution, and coastal resource protection and management are among the subjects he has dealt with over the course of his career. Since joining Monmouth University in 1999, his research efforts have focused on watershed monitoring, management, and restoration projects. These efforts have been funded through grants from a variety of sources including Monmouth County, the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, the United States Environmental Protection Agency as well as contracts with private environmental and engineering firms.
Donna M. Wacha is a seasoned mathematics educator with over 30 years of experience in teaching elementary and secondary mathematics. She received her BS from Trenton State College (now known as The College of New Jersey) and her MA from Georgian Court College. After retiring from teaching at Point Pleasant Borough High School (Point Pleasant, NJ) in 2003, she now teaches mathematics at Monmouth University.
Dr. William W. Ward is a world expert in the chemistry of bioluminescence, having been trained at the University of Florida and Johns Hopkins University. For the past 36 years he has focused his research on the biochemistry of green-fluorescent protein (GFP), an amazing chartreuse-colored protein found naturally in jellyfish, sea pansies, corals, and other sea creatures. He has published more than 100 research papers, run three international symposia on GFP, and created the world’s first practical application for GFP. Dr. Ward is a co-author of the now famous February 11, 1994, Science cover story describing the first successful cloning of GFP into E. coli bacteria and C. elegans round worms. From its early beginnings in the 1960’s, GFP has grown to become one of the most important proteins known to science, having been recognized with a Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2008. The gene for GFP is being used as a way to monitor, in real time, the expression of genes involved in just about every biochemical process imaginable, from embryonic development to cancer metastasis to stem cell research. In 2008, Dr. Ward was awarded a US patent for the application of GFP in measuring and “fingerprinting” proteases (enzymes that digest other proteins). His protease assay, (GFP-on-a-String), has potential applications in drug discovery and in nearly every human disease state, including Alzheimer’s, emphysema, AIDS, cancer, heart disease, and diseases of the digestive system. In 2003, Dr. Ward founded the GFP-based biotech company, Brighter Ideas, Inc
Meryl William is currently a junior majoring in Physics and minoring in Mathematics. She has been involved with research since freshman year as part of the Aresty Research Center. Her first research project was with Dr. Todd Michael at the Waksman Institute of Microbiology. She worked on the Sierra Alahambra re-sequencing project wherein she verified and analyzed the sequencing data corresponding to insertions and deletions in the plant genome. Currently, she is working with Dr. Ronald Levy, in the BioMaPS (Biology at the Interface with the Mathematical and Physical Sciences) Institute for Quantitative Biology on protein molecular dynamics. She is involved in an exciting new field where researchers are trying to understand more about the ways in which proteins fold, and correlate intricacies in structural nuances with functionality. She loves the ways in which physics and biology can be used together to understand and answer various life-sciences questions. Apart from research, she is also passionate about community service and is a part of the Rutgers University chapters of the United Nations Children’s Fund, Engineers without Borders, and Unite for Sight. She loves applying what she has learned to help people in need, and truly believes that education is a vital tool in solving many societal problems. After graduating from Rutgers University, she plans to go to medical school and continue with research.
Sean Yeager is a junior at Rutgers University and plans to major in physics and mathematics. He has done research for two summers now. In the summer of 2008, he worked with Dr. Larry Zamick, a nuclear theorist in the Rutgers physics department. Sean coauthored several reports on topics such as isoscalar magnetic moments in even-even and odd-odd N=Z nuclei, using Lawson's method for obtaining wave functions in Ar isotopes, and the relationship between static quadrupole moments of 2+ states and their B(E2)'s. In the summer of 2009, he worked with Dr. David Toback, a particle physics experimentalist from Texas A&M University. During the summer he helped write a review of the searches at Fermilab for Supersymmery, a theory which is on the cutting edge of particle physics and cosmology. The review is currently under review for publication in Modern Physics Letters A. Sean plans to attend graduate school for physics and would like to continue doing research in high energy particle physics.
Elaine Yu is a sophomore at Rutgers University majoring in Biomedical Engineering. She has been involved in breast cancer research, where she learned various analytical techniques and investigated effects of specific chemokines on cancer proliferation. She is currently working on a prostate and breast cancer imaging project as an Aresty research assistant, where she collaborates with graduate students to develop programs that are able to effectively diagnose prostate and breast cancer. By quantifying architectural features of breast and prostate cancer tissue and extracting those features from many cancerous regions on biopsies obtained from pathologists, her and her mentors are hoping to train a program to recognize cancerous regions. In addition to subjects in science and engineering, Elaine has also been involved in research in Communication. Her topic of interest was: “From High-Context Communication to Low-Context Communication: The Adjustment of International Students,” and she has presented her findings at the 2009 Undergraduate Research Symposium. Elaine wishes to be involved in research professionally in the future.