The University of Missouri–St. Louis began a new academic year in 2024 by turning the page on a 12-month celebration of its 60th anniversary. While alumni, faculty, staff and students had plenty of fun ringing in six decades of success, it’s clear there’s still much to look forward to.

UMSL is positioning itself to serve students and the St. Louis region for many more years to come with an ambitious plan to transform the university academically and physically.

“At UMSL, our vision is clear: campus sustainability and innovation for the future,” Chancellor Kristin Sobolik said this August in her annual State of the University Address. “We are committed to supporting our academic community while uplifting north St. Louis County, the broader St. Louis region, Missouri and the world. To achieve this, we must position our university as the inclusive economic growth engine that our region needs – not just for today, but for generations to come.”

The university is taking steps toward the future by renovating campus, welcoming new leadership, expanding academically and more. Look back at 2024 with some of UMSL Daily’s top stories from the past year.

Transform UMSL

In 2024, members of the UMSL community have seen the impacts of the Transform UMSL plan all around them. The initiative includes more than $110 million in construction and renovation projects, reimagining the academic core on North Campus with state-of-the-art facilities and improved accessibility.

This spring, the new Geospatial Advance Technology Lab began serving students. Recognizing the importance of developing talent to feed the region’s growing geospatial sector, the state of Missouri directed more than $1 million in funding through the MoExcels Workforce Initiative to establish the lab on the fourth floor of Benton Hall. The university provided matching funds toward the project.

The lab includes GIS and virtual reality labs to serve students in all branches of geospatial science, including geographic information systems – or GIS – remote sensing, digital image processing and analysis, drone classes, spatial analysis, cartography, human geography, data visualization and GPS.

In April, Gov. Mike Parson visited campus to take a tour of the newly renovated lab. UMSL’s agile mobile robot dog was waiting to greet Parson and First Lady Teresa Parson before Sobolik and Geospatial Collaborative Director Reda Amer led a tour of the space.

In October, the College of Nursing unveiled a the newly renovated and expanded Nursing Learning Resource and Simulation Center. The $7 million, 21,000-square-foot immersive learning center offers state-of-the-art space, equipment and technology for the College of Nursing to train the next generation of nurses. The new facility, which kicked off construction in November 2020, has increased the number of simulation rooms from five to 11, allowing the college to grow the number of pre-licensure BSN students it graduates by 20% annually.

During the same month, the university began the demolition of the the Social Sciences and Business Building Tower. The Quad served as a staging area during the removal of the tower and the modernization and expansion of SSB to follow as part of the Transform UMSL initiative.

New leadership

In April, Shu Schiller assumed her position as the dean of the College of Business Administration after a nationwide search. Schiller, who joined the faculty at Wright State University in 2006, served as interim dean of its College of Graduate Programs and Honors Studies since November 2022 and before that spent nearly four years as associate dean in the university’s Raj Soin College of Business. Before becoming associate dean, Schiller served more than four years as chair of the Department of Information Systems and Supply Chain Management.

In July, the College of Nursing also welcomed new leadership. Norma Hall-Thoms assumed the role of dean and was also named the Dr. Donald L. Ross Endowed Chair for Advancing Nursing Practice. Hall-Thoms previously served as the dean of the University of Indianapolis School of Nursing from 2017 to 2023. Before that, she was the school’s graduate program director, overseeing the MSN and DNP programs from 2013 to 2017.

Ann Taylor retired as dean in July after 10 years of service to the College of Education, eight as dean. Nancy Singer is currently serving as interim dean as a nationwide search is conducted.

Other areas of campus also saw change as longtime leaders stepped down.

David Gerstenecker began his new role as chief information officer in March. Before coming to UMSL, Gerstenecker spent more than 26 years working in information technology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He follows Ken Voss, whose tenure at the university spanned nearly 29 years.

Holly Sheilley succeeded retired Director of Athletics Lori Flanagan in September. Sheilley spent the past 11 years as the vice president for athletics and director of athletics at Transylvania, an NCAA Division III university in Lexington, Kentucky. In November, Flanagan, who served UMSL for 18 years, was inducted into the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame as part of its 2024 class.

The university appointed Marisa Smith as the next chief of police and director of institutional safety after former Chief Dan Freet retired. Smith, who spent 21 years with the UMSL Police Department, the past seven as deputy chief of police, took over in September. Chancellor Sobolik awarded Freet the Chancellor’s Medal at the annual State of the University in recognition of his service to UMSL over the past 11 years.

School of Engineering

UMSL is committed to preparing students to meet the workforce needs of the St. Louis region and beyond, and the demand for trained engineers in Missouri remains particularly high.

With that in mind, and with the support of local elected officials and business leaders, the university is preparing to establish a new School of Engineering in the fall of 2025. Missouri’s Fiscal Year 2025 budget directed an initial capital investment of $15 million to the university to support the planning, design and construction of labs, classrooms and student community spaces in the Science Complex that will be used to train more engineering students.

Earlier this month, the initiative was bolstered by a $8 million grant from the James S. McDonnell Foundation, one of the largest one-time philanthropic gifts in the history of the university. The grant funds immediate and endowed scholarships that will support students over the school’s first five years and for decades into the future, training students for in-demand careers with high earning potential.

The school will operate alongside the UMSL/Washington University Joint Undergraduate Engineering Program. It is also intended to build upon the joint engineering program’s 30-year track record of success with ABET-accredited Bachelor of Science degree programs in civil, electrical and mechanical engineering. Whereas the joint engineering program is designed to cater to the needs of nontraditional learners by offering courses in the evening, the new school is expected to serve more traditional, full-time students with classes on the UMSL campus.

Catch up on what happened the rest of the year:

January

Criminologist Richard Rosenfeld, a national expert on crime trends and crime statistics, dies at age 75

Richard Rosenfeld, a Curators’ Distinguished Professor Emeritus in the Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice, died this past January after a battle with cancer.

Rosenfeld was a founding faculty member in the university’s renowned doctoral program in criminology and criminal justice and a national expert on crime trends and crime statistics. He often did research on behalf of government organizations, including the Department of Justice, and was frequently sought after by national and local news outlets for his insight.

In a distinguished career that spanned more than four decades, Rosenfeld was elected president of the American Society of Criminology for 2009-10 and later received the organization’s prestigious Edwin H. Sutherland Award, which honors senior scholars for careers’ worth of contributions to the field.

In 2020, Rosenfeld was named to the Council on Criminal Justice’s inaugural membership class, and a year later, Academic Influence named him one of the world’s five most influential criminologists.

Read more

More notable reads from January:

Finance Professor Yiuman Tse earned a master’s degree in computer science nearly 30 years after earning his PhD.

UMSL graduate Nikki Engelbrecht is helping improve healthy food access in north St. Louis County as director of community wellness for A Red Circle.

February

Michael Nichols conducting NIH-funded research into chemical mechanisms that lead to brain inflammation in Alzheimer’s patients

Michael Nichols has spent more than two decades exploring the chemical imbalances in the human brain associated with Alzheimer’s disease.

Nichols, a professor of chemistry and biochemistry at UMSL and the director of its biochemistry and biotechnology program, has focused his research on the inflammation in the brain that occurs as part of the neurodegenerative disorder. He hopes to understand what causes it – and how – so that one day there might be a therapeutic developed to prevent the disease.

Nichols is building on that work over the past 20 years with the support of a new, $459,279 grant awarded last fall from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences, part of the National Institutes of Health. He is studying the mechanisms with which the amyloid-β protein – commonly referred to as Aβ and believed to play a central role in Alzheimer’s disease – activates a group of three proteins known as NLRP3 inflammasome to cause inflammation inside immune cells in the brain. Supporting Nichols is a research team that includes graduate research assistants Ryan Domalewski, Samir Benbakir, Cristina Sinobas Pereira and Nathan Zeller and undergraduate Noor Yousaf.

Read more

More notable reads from February:

Benard Diggs earned a PhD in education after a decades-long career at UMSL. His doctoral research focused on the unintended consequences of the Supreme Court’s Brown v. Board of Education decision.

Criminology and criminal justice doctoral student Ellie Lyne won the 3 Minute Thesis competition for her research on pretrial detention cases.

March

UMSL men’s soccer team tests itself in friendly match with St. Louis CITY SC Academy team

Amidst St. Louis’ St. Patrick’s Day festivities, a small crowd of dedicated soccer fans gathered around Field 3 of the St. Louis City SC training facility in the heart of the city.

The three dozen spectators set up lawn chairs and coolers, not seeming to mind the revelers clad in green passing by, as they settled in to watch a friendly match between the UMSL men’s soccer team and the St. Louis CITY SC Academy U20 team.

The off-season scrimmage was arranged by Alexander Langer, St. Louis CITY SC’s director of goalkeeping and first-team goalkeeper coach, and built on UMSL’s position as the official higher education partner of the local Major League Soccer team.

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More notable reads from March:

Assistant Professor Lei Xu explored the conditions that can foster entrepreneurship and innovation in entrepreneurial ecosystems. Xu and his research collaborators published their findings in the Academy of Management Journal.

DNP student Stephanie Faulkingham has combined her passion for karate with experience in psychiatric mental health. Faulkingham owns and operates Gateway Shidokan Karate in Maryland Heights.

April

Education alum Samantha Lurie receives $50,000 Food City grant to support Show Me The World Project

On Saturdays at the Tower Grove Farmers’ Market, shoppers perusing local artisan goods and fresh produce are likely to find a crowd gathered at the Show Me The World Project booth.

Local high schoolers run the operation and chat freely with potential customers as they sell sustainable, single-origin coffee from countries including Costa Rica, Ethiopia and Peru. Over the past 11 years, the Show Me The World Project has helped more than 150 students from eight area high schools embark on their first international trips. The initiative offers much more than a study abroad experience, though. The yearlong program focuses on developing skills in cultural awareness, entrepreneurship, finance, leadership and STEM through weekly workshops.

It has grown significantly since UMSL alum Samantha Lurie started it as a biology teacher at Vashon High School in 2013. What began as a grassroots fundraiser has become a 501c3 non-profit organization and sustainable entrepreneurial endeavor, with Show Me The World Coffee serving as the flagship product.

An investment from Food City, a Serving Our Communities program, ensured that work will continue. The Show Me The World Project received a $50,000 grant from the organization in December, which, at that point, was the largest single grant or donation the program had ever garnered.

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More notable reads from April:

Astrophysics major Jacob Arbogast contributed to a national research project on the April 8 eclipse. Arbogast assisted with a project led by former UMSL postdoctoral fellow and faculty member David J. Horne, now an assistant professor at Gannon University in Erie, Pennsylvania.

Assistant Professor Mohi Saki and his research partners were granted 13 hours of observation time on NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope. They are studying the composition of six Halley-type comets with high-resolution spectroscopy.

May

UMSL entomologists Sara Miller and Aimee Dunlap are excited for historic event featuring billions of cicadas emerging in Missouri

Less than a month after an incredible natural phenomenon captured everyone’s attention – the solar eclipse on April 8 – another spectacle of nature dominated headlines and fascinated Missourians. The emergence of the cicadas.

Billions of periodical cicadas (yes, with a ‘B’) have spent the past decade plus tucked away safely underground, and they’re about to rise and shine. You won’t be able to miss them, visibly or audibly.

UMSL Department of Biology entomologists Sara Miller and Aimee Dunlap were kind enough to join UMSL Daily for a conversation about the phenomenon.

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More notable reads from May:

Biology Professor Michi Tobler, the E. Desmond Lee Endowed Professor in Zoological Studies, has developed a research focus on livebearer fish that have adapted to live in the presence of hydrogen sulfide.

The College of Nursing’s Community-Based Clinical Education program enables future nurses to deliver health care in a variety of settings outside of the traditional acute care hospital experience.

June

UMSL alum Georgeann McLemore, fresh off White House internship, heading to Northern Ireland on prestigious Fulbright scholarship

Georgeann McLemore has mastered the art of productive traveling. During her time as an undergraduate at UMSL, she took advantage of opportunities presented through the school to advance her education and gain valuable real-life work experience in the United Kingdom, South Korea and Amsterdam.

McLemore, who graduated from UMSL in May 2023 with a BS in information systems and technology with a focus on cybersecurity, spent the spring in Washington, D.C., as a White House intern in the Office of Digital Strategy. In September, she began a year-long adventure in Belfast, Northern Ireland, studying at Ulster University as part of the prestigious Fulbright U.S. Student Program.

“The trip to South Korea is what sparked it,” McLemore said of her now-insatiable travel bug. “I saw what I could do. Nobody in my family has gone abroad before, so I’m first generation. I want to make sure that I’m laying out a path to make sure that my nieces and nephews see that this isn’t all there is. You can do more, go to school, go to college and apply yourself. I don’t care how big or how small it is. Just do it. You never know what might happen.”

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More notable reads from June:

Art and Design Professor Jeff Sippel shared unique lithography techniques during exhibitions in Serbia. Sippel exhibited work alongside a former student, Nebojsa Lazić, who lives in Serbia.

The College of Education’s New Leaf Literacies initiative promotes the joy of reading and nature at Woerner Elementary School. The three-week program integrated hands-on lessons about gardening and the environment with responsive, project-based literacy education.

July

MBA helps 2-time UMSL grad Maggie Rapplean make partner at Moneta Group

Maggie Rapplean is a goal-oriented person. That mindset is one of the reasons the two-time UMSL graduate has been so successful in her career as a financial advisor, and it’s also one of the reasons that running is so appealing to her.

Finish the 5K. Finish the 10K. Finish the half-marathon. Set the goal, accomplish the goal. A couple years ago, she set two very big life goals.

“I wanted to grow my family, and I also wanted to pursue partnership,” she said. “So I pursued partnership while pregnant.”

Rapplean was determined, and to the surprise of exactly zero people who know her, she accomplished both goals. Her son Roman was born in June 2023 – joining her daughter, Maddy, and oldest son, Chase – and she was approved as partner by the board at Moneta Group Investment Advisors on Dec. 13.

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More notable reads from July:

This summer, three longtime faculty members retired after decades of service to the School of Social Work. Shirley Porterfield, Uma Segal and Patricia Rosenthal contributed significantly to the school’s growth from a program in the College of Arts and Sciences to a freestanding academic unit.

Accounting student Angela Truesdale was honored as a recipient of the prestigious Remington R. Williams Award. Truesdale, who interned with Boeing’s finance department this summer, was nominated for the award by Marcia Countryman.

August

Succeed student and Tritons swimmer Lawrence Sapp headed to Paris 2024 Summer Paralympic Games

Lawrence Sapp is no stranger to competing on the world stage. As a member of Team USA Swimming, he has graced medal stands across the globe.

Sapp, a native of Waldorf, Maryland, won gold in the 100-meter backstroke at the World Para Swimming Championships in Mexico City in 2017 and earned a silver in the 100-meter butterfly at the 2019 championships in London. He went on to compete at the Tokyo 2020 Summer Paralympic Games, which were held in 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, placing fifth in the 100-meter butterfly.

Sapp, who is autistic and is a second-year student in the Succeed Program at UMSL, added to his international record when he competed in the Paris 2024 Summer Paralympic Games, which ran from Aug. 28 to Sept. 8. Sapp swam in the 100-meter butterfly and was among 4,400 athletes from around the world competing in 22 sports across iconic venues in Paris, including the Eiffel Tower, the Chateau de Versailles and the Grand Palais.

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More notable reads from August:

UMSL and the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department have partnered to provide educational opportunities to officers looking to advance their careers.

Since May, Tonya and Tyler Haynes have served as ambassadors for Autism Speaks. As part of the new Champions of Change program, Tonya and Tyler have attended events across the country and spoken with national media outlets.

September

UMSL alum Lúcia G. Lohmann named next president of the Missouri Botanical Garden

UMSL alum Lúcia G. Lohmann is set to become the eighth president of the Missouri Botanical Garden and will be the first woman to hold that title, the Garden announced in September.

Lohmann, who currently serves as a professor in the Department of Integrative Biology and director of the University and Jepson Herbaria at the University of California, Berkeley, is scheduled to assume her new role on Jan. 2, when she’ll succeed retiring President Peter Wyse Jackson.

“I relate deeply to the Garden’s mission ‘to discover and share knowledge about plants and their environment in order to preserve and enrich life,’ as this reflects my own purpose in life,” Lohmann said in a press release announcing her appointment. “Assuming the presidency at the Garden is a homecoming for me, full circle. I lived around 300 feet from the Garden for eight years during graduate school and obtained an exceptional botanical education here.”

A native of Brazil, Lohmann first came to St. Louis to study in UMSL’s Department of Biology in 1996 after earning a bachelor’s degree in botany at the University of São Paulo. She studied ecology, evolution and systematics, focusing on the biogeography and evolutionary history of the trumpet-creeper plant family, with support from what was then called UMSL’s Center for Tropical Ecology, now the Whitney R. Harris World Ecology Center.

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More notable reads from September:

Biology PhD alum Eliot Miller has tapped into new data sources to study bird populations and advocate for habitat preservation. As a staff member at the American Bird Conservancy, Miller is using AI tools to help create an index to value the biodiversity of birds in Central and South America.

Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky honored UMSL political science alum Luke Coffey with the Order of Merit Award.

October

Grace Desjardins finds common ground to make change as 2024-25 Newman Civic Fellow

From a young age, Grace Desjardins clocked the stark differences between her hometown of Garden City, Missouri, and the wealthier suburbs surrounding the nearest city.

“I am from essentially very rural, small-town, poor Missouri, so I saw a lot of inequity in my community,” she said. “When I looked at other areas around Kansas City, I knew that that was an issue. I knew that I wanted to be able to bring equity everywhere. Even from a young age, you could notice it.”

By the time Desjardins was in middle school, she knew that she wanted to push for social change by pursuing civic endeavors. Her path as a changemaker began at Sherwood High School, where she first proved her aptitude as a problem-solver participating in the American Legion Auxiliary’s Missouri Girls State.

At UMSL, Desjardins has continued to demonstrate her commitment to community engagement and empowerment as a student leader. This past semester, she served as the president of the Political Science Academy, the president of the UMSL chapter of the Associated Students of the University of Missouri, senator and assembly speaker of the Student Government Association and treasurer of Pride Alliance.

Patricia Zahn, director of community engagement and outreach, nominated Desjardins to serve as UMSL’s Newman Civic Fellow during the 2024-25 academic year in recognition of her ambition and generous spirit.

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More notable reads from October:

Associate Professor Emerita Chikako Usui was honored with the the Order of the Rising Sun, Gold and Silver Rays, by the Japanese government for her outstanding contributions to Japan-U.S. relations.

UMSL alum Tommy Wasiuta is reinforcing the idea of tap dance as music with his debut album, “Drum Shoes.” Wasiuta has worked as a professional tap dance artist in New York City since 2021.

November

UMSL’s Community Innovation and Action Center gives local youth a voice in developing programming at the Saint Louis Zoo’s upcoming WildCare Park

When Akshaya Boopathi’s mom told her about the opportunity to work on a project with the Saint Louis Zoo, she was immediately in. A lifelong animal-lover, the 13-year-old imagined she might be able to help decide what animals to bring to the zoo and jumped at the chance.

That wasn’t exactly what Boopathi, an eighth grader at Southwest Middle School, ended up doing over the course of three months earlier this year, but she’s still walking away from the experience feeling energized and excited.

Boopathi teamed up with two dozen other middle school and high school students from across the St. Louis region to develop ideas for youth educational programming they’d like to see at Saint Louis Zoo WildCare Park, the zoo’s new world-class safari park and conservation center slated to open on 425 acres in north St. Louis County in 2027.

Through a unique co-design process facilitated by the Community Innovation and Action Center at UMSL, the group of 25 students, ranging in ages from 13 to 18, worked together to brainstorm and workshop ideas. Over just four sessions between April and June, they developed three distinct possible youth programs to offer at the park: Digital Habitats, Nature Race and STEM Animal Tracks.

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More notable reads from November:

This spring, United States Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland tapped Theresa Coble to lead a federal initiative recognizing women’s stories across national parks, lands and programs.

Biochemistry and biotechnology major Jay King is planning to pursue a PhD in oncologic research after graduation. During her time at UMSL, King was highly active on campus with organizations such as the University Program Board.

December

Digging up the past: Michael Cosmopoulos helps students explore archaeology and culture in Greece

Rebecca Bolin never had trouble getting up ahead of the sun this summer in the Peloponnesian Peninsula of southern Greece.

While some college students might have been yawning or wiping the sleep from their eyes at 6 a.m. as they boarded a bus outside their hotel lobby in the coastal town of Pylos, or dozing off again during their roughly half-hour drive along the winding roads that carried them into the countryside, Bolin was always raring to go.

The UMSL senior gazed out the window at the rusty red landscape zipping by her window, feeling as if she had been dropped into a magical land she grew up fantasizing about in her childhood.

“I was obsessed with Greek mythology from when I was really young,” Bolin says. “I have some of these myths memorized still to this day.” Bolin, now 26 and majoring in liberal studies with an emphasis in anthropology and sociology, joined students from UMSL and elsewhere in making that drive six days a week for three weeks this summer.

She had the same excitement as that little girl might have had each morning as she stepped off the bus, eager to begin the approximately 15-minute hike uphill, past groves of olive trees, to their ultimate destination, an ancient palace called Iklaina that is referenced in Homer’s Iliad.

The Late Bronze Age capital sat on a plateau in the low hills overlooking the vivid blue waters of the Ionian Sea. It had been lost to time for thousands of years, but for much of the past two decades, it has been the site of an active archaeological excavation being carried out by the Athens Archaeological Society under the direction of Michael Cosmopoulos, the Hellenic Government-Karakas Foundation Professor in Greek Studies at UMSL. 

To support the project, Cosmopoulos has received external grant funding totaling more than $700,000 over the years from both federal agencies and private institutions, including the National Science Foundation, National Endowment for the Humanities, Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada and National Geographic Society. 

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More notable reads from December:

This month, Keagan Bland became first graduate of UMSL’s Business Accelerated Master’s program. Bland chose to pursue information systems and technology when she transferred to UMSL, and she took a full summer course load to finish the Accelerated Master’s program this winter.

Biology graduate Kordell Hamilton gained invaluable research experience while preparing to launch his career. Hamilton has had internships at the Donald Danforth Plant Science Center and with Virginia Tech’s The Ecology of Bird Loss Project in the Northern Mariana Islands of the Pacific Ocean.