The University of Virginia is renowned for the experience it affords students who come to Charlottesville. Now the University is also being lauded for some of its online education programs as well.

U.S. News & World Report gave high marks to UVA’s online programs in education and engineering in its 2022 Best Online Programs rankings, announced Jan. 25. The School of Education and Human Development’s online master’s programs tied for eighth nationally out of nearly 300 schools, while the School of Engineering and Applied Science’s online master’s offerings tied for No. 42.

The annual rankings score institutions across five variables: engagement, expert opinion, faculty credentials and training, services and technologies, and student excellence.

In addition to its overall ranking, the School of Education and Human Development had four specialty master’s programs ranked among the national top 10: Administration and Supervision (No. 9), Curriculum and Instruction (No. 10), Instructional Media Design (No. 10) and Special Education (No. 5).

“Our ranking reflects the dedication of our faculty to ensure our students receive a high-quality online experience,” Jenny Provo-Quarles, the school’s director of online initiatives, said. “While the pandemic brought many challenges, it also gave us an opportunity to add even more programming and support services for our fully online students. Online learners are coming to us because they know how much we’ve invested in their success in the classroom and after graduation.”

In addition to its overall ranking, the Engineering School saw its online civil engineering program rated No. 5 overall. The school also ranked No. 26 in online master’s programs for veterans.

The Princeton Review Ranks Darden in Top 10 in 11 Categories

UVA’s Darden School of Business has the best professors in the nation for the fifth year in a row, according to the Princeton Review. (Photo by Sanjay Suchak, University Communications)

The Princeton Review ranked the Darden School of Business among the top MBA programs in a number of key categories, including the top ranking in the “Best Professors” category for the fifth year in a row.

The organization’s “Best Business Schools for 2022” ranking assesses 241 MBA programs and ranks schools across 18 categories based on a combination of information provided by schools and student surveys.

Among all MBA programs, Darden earned more top-10 rankings than any other school, placing in 11 categories.

Darden is ranked in the top 10 in the following categories:

• 1 — Best Professors (No. 1 for the fifth year in a row).
• 1 — Best MBA in Consulting (Top 5 for the fifth year in a row).
• 2 — Best MBA in Management (Top 3 for the fifth year in a row).
• 3 — Best Classroom Experience.
• 5 — Best Career Prospects.
• 5 — Most-Family Friendly.
• 8 — Best MBA in Finance.
• 8 — Best MBA in Marketing.
• 9 — Best Campus Environment.
• 9 — Best MBA in Nonprofit.
• 10 — Best Resources for Women.

Darden’s strong performance comes on the heels of a year of immense momentum, with record-breaking career metrics for the Class of 2021, consistently strong rankings and new programs intended to support the school’s goals of inclusive excellence, including Women@Darden, and the Darden School Foundation’s Impact Fellows and Breakthrough Scholars.

Education Scholars Listed Among Nation’s ‘Most Influential’

Top row, from left: Daniel Willingham, Carol Tomlinson, Bob Pianta and Sarah Turner; bottom row, from left, Jim Wyckoff, Daphna Bassok, Ben Castleman and Derrick Alridge. (Contributed photos)

Eight UVA education professors were among those ranked in the 2022 RHSU Edu-Scholar Public Influence Rankings. The 12th annual ranking identifies the 200 university-based faculty members “who had the biggest influence on educational practice and policy.”

The “Rick Hess Straight Up” rankings are assembled by Rick Hess of the American Enterprise Institute with the assistance of a 33-member selection committee and published by Education Week magazine.

“Simply being included in this list of 200 scholars is an accomplishment, given the 20,000 or more who might qualify,” Hess wrote in announcing the 2022 list.

Daniel Willingham, a professor of psychology in the College of Arts & Sciences, was the highest-ranking UVA scholar, climbing to No. 11 from No. 18 last year. Willingham also is a faculty affiliate with the School of Education and Human Development’s Center for Advanced Study of Teaching and Learning.

Professor emerita Carol Tomlinson’s ranking rose to No. 12, up from No. 16 last year. Tomlinson is an expert on differentiated instruction, the way a teacher structures lessons to effectively teach students who range widely in proficiency. Bob Pianta, dean of the School of Education and Human Development and an international expert on teacher-student interactions, climbed nine spots to land at No. 31 in this year’s ranking.

Other faculty recognized in the ranking were Sarah Turner, professor of economics and education (123); Jim Wyckoff, professor and director of the EdPolicyWorks research center (159); Daphna Bassok, the Batten Bicentennial Associate Professor of Early Childhood Education and associate director of EdPolicyWorks (166); Ben Castleman, the Newton and Rita Meyers Associate Professor in the Economics of Education and director of the Nudge4 Solutions Lab (181); and Derrick Alridge, the Philip J. Gibson Professor of Education and director of the Center for Race and Public Education in the South (196).

New York Times Lauds Dove’s Collection

English professor Rita Dove’s “Playlist for the Apocalypse” was the only poetry collection included in The New York Times’ list of the top books of 2021. (Photo by Sanjay Suchak, University Communications)

A book by Rita Dove, the Henry Hoyns Professor of Creative Writing, was the only poetry collection among a number of fiction and nonfiction publications named a “Top Book of 2021” by The New York Times.

Of the poems compiled in “Playlist for the Apocalypse,” Times critic Dwight Garner wrote, “Dove’s books derive their force from how she so deftly stirs the everyday – insomnia, TV movies, Stilton cheese, rattling containers of pills – into her world of ideas and intellection, in poems that are by turns delicate, witty and audacious.”

Three Law Professors Elected to American Law Institute

From left, Michael Doran, Richard Schragger and Pierre-Hugues Verdier recently became the 29th, 30th and 31st UVA Law professors selected as members of the American Law Institute. (Contributed photos)

School of Law professors Michael Doran, Richard Schragger and Pierre-Hugues Verdier were recently elected as members of the American Law Institute.

The latest election means that 31 members of the UVA Law faculty are currently affiliated with the institute, which produces scholarly work meant to update or otherwise improve the law. The organization includes judges, lawyers and law professors from the U.S. and around the world who are “selected on the basis of professional achievement and demonstrated interest in improving the law,” according to the institute’s website.

Doran is The Honorable Albert V. Bryan Jr. Research Professor of Law. His research interests include tax policy, executive compensation and legal ethics. A member of the UVA Law faculty since 2014 and from 2005 to 2009, Doran has also served on the faculty of the Georgetown University Law Center. He teaches courses in tax, property, legal ethics, federal Indian law, Native American law and employee benefits law.

Before turning to academia, he was a partner at Caplin & Drysdale in Washington, D.C., practicing federal tax and federal pension law. He also served twice in the Office of Tax Policy at the U.S. Treasury Department.

Schragger, who joined the faculty in 2001, is the Perre Bowen Professor of Law, and Martha Lubin Karsh and Bruce A. Karsh Bicentennial Professor of Law. His scholarship focuses on the intersection of constitutional law and local government law, federalism, urban policy, and the constitutional and economic status of cities. He also writes about law and religion.

He has written articles on the Establishment and Free Exercise clauses, the role of cities in a federal system, local recognition of same-sex marriage, takings law and economic development, and the history of the anti-chain store movement. A faculty senior fellow at UVA’s Miller Center, he teaches property, local government law, urban law and policy, and church and state.

Verdier, who joined the faculty in 2009, is the John A. Ewald Jr. Research Professor of Law and director of the Graduate Studies Program. He specializes in public international law, banking and financial regulation, and international economic relations. Verdier’s current research focuses on the reception of international law in domestic legal systems, foreign state immunity and customary international law.

He is the author of the book “Global Banks on Trial: U.S. Prosecutions and the Remaking of International Finance.” His paper, “International Law in National Legal Systems: An Empirical Investigation,” co-written with professor Mila Versteeg, was cited by the Supreme Court of Canada in a precedent-setting ruling that holds Canadian companies accountable for human rights abuses.

Prior to joining the faculty, Verdier was a law clerk for the Supreme Court of Canada, practiced corporate and financial law with Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton in New York City, and was a visiting assistant professor at Boston University School of Law.

Building Goodness Foundation Honors Recent UVA Retiree as Top Volunteer

Charlottesville’s Building Goodness Foundation honored Jody Lahendro, left, as its Volunteer of the Year. (Contributed photo)

The Charlottesville-based Building Goodness Foundation recently named Jody Lahendro its 2021 Skip Wootten Volunteer of the Year.

Lahendro, a historic preservation architect who retired from UVA Facilities Management in July after a 16-year tenure, has volunteered with the nonprofit construction organization for more than a decade. The foundation seeks to connect skilled volunteers from the design and construction industries with international and local opportunities to use their professional skills for a good cause.

Internationally, the foundation has built six clinics, nine schools and more than 1,130 houses for vulnerable communities. Locally, it serves more than 9,000 residents annually.

Lahendro, currently the volunteer architect leading a restoration of the St. John Rosenwald School, has volunteered for numerous foundation projects, including a trip to Haiti in 2013, where he worked on the St. Pierre Church. He has also devoted many volunteer hours to working at Camp Holiday Trails, where he also served on the board of directors and as the architect of their medical staff cabins.

“Being involved with BGF has given me this incredible connection to the building and construction professionals in town,” Lahendro said in December, at a small outdoor gathering where he received the award. “And these people all care so much about the community, and care about giving, and want to help. Being part of that really brings you closer to the community. Charlottesville is blessed to have this organization.”

“All of us at BGF are grateful to have the expertise and passion that Jody brings to every interaction,” Courtney Polk, the foundation’s executive director, said. “Jody embodies the spirit of service in all of his work in the community.”

UVA-Affiliated Poets Earn Half of State’s Annual Artists Fellowships for Poetry

English professors Debra Nystrom, left, and Kiki Petrosino are among six poets to receive 2021-22 poetry fellowships from the Virginia Commission for the Arts. (Left, contributed photo; right, photo by Dan Addison, University Communications)

Two UVA English professors and an alumna are among six Virginia poets to receive 2021-22 poetry fellowships from the Virginia Commission for the Arts.

The UVA awardees are Debra Nystrom and Kiki Petrosino, both professors in the Creative Writing Program, and 2002 MFA program alumna and Virginia Tech professor Erika Meitner. Fellowships, of $5,000 each, are awarded annually to artists residing in Virginia in recognition of creative excellence and to support their pursuit of artistic excellence.

Nystrom is the author of four poetry collections: “A Quarter Turn,” “Torn Sky,” “Bad River Road” and most recently, “Night Sky Frequencies, New and Selected Poems.” Her poetry, fiction and nonfiction have appeared in numerous journals and anthologies, including Best American Poetry, The New Yorker, Ploughshares, Slate, The Kenyon Review, Narrative, Georgia Review, Harvard Review, Yale Review and The American Poetry Review, and her work has been featured by Poetry Daily, The Writer’s Almanac and The Poetry Foundation’s American Life in Poetry.

Nystrom has received the James Dickey Award from Five Points Magazine, The Virginia Quarterly Review’s Balch Poetry Award, the James Boatwright Prize from Shenandoah and The Virginia Prize for Poetry, and has been awarded fellowships from the Virginia Commission for the Arts and Virginia Humanities.

Petrosino is the author of four books of poetry and one memoir: “Fort Red Border,” “Hymn for the Black Terrific,” “Witch Wife,” “White Blood: A Lyric of Virginia” and the forthcoming “Bright: A Memoir.” She is a 2001 UVA alumna and holds graduate degrees from the University of Chicago and the University of Iowa Writer’s Workshop.

Among her awards are the Rilke Prize from the University of North Texas, the Spalding Prize for the Promotion of Peace and Justice in Literature, a Fellowship in Literature from the National Endowment for the Arts, a Pushcart Prize, and research fellowships from the Kentucky Arts Council and Virginia Humanities. Petrosino directs UVA’s Creative Writing Program.

Meitner is the author of five books of poems, including “Ideal Cities,” which was a 2009 National Poetry series winner; “Copia”; and “Holy Moly Carry Me,” which won the 2018 National Jewish Book Award in Poetry and was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award and the Library of Virginia Award in poetry. Her sixth book of poems, “Useful Junk,” is forthcoming in April.

Meitner’s poems have been anthologized widely, and have appeared in publications including Best American Poetry, The New Yorker, Virginia Quarterly Review, The New York Times Magazine, The New Republic, Poetry, Orion, and The Believer. Other honors include fellowships from MacDowell, the Wisconsin Institute for Creative Writing, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, the Hermitage Artist Retreat, Bethany Arts Community, The Betsy Writer’s Room and Blue Mountain Center. She was also the 2015 U.S.- U.K. Fulbright Distinguished Scholar in Creative Writing at the Seamus Heaney Centre for Poetry at Queen’s University Belfast, and the winner of the 2021 Cecil Hemley Memorial Award from the Poetry Society of America.

Legal Theorists Recognized for Scholarship

UVA Law professors Rachel Bayefsky, left, and Frederick Schauer were recently honored for their scholarship in legal theory. (UVA Law photos)

The Association of American Law Schools in January recognized School of Law professors Frederick Schauer and Rachel Bayefsky by for their scholarship in legal theory.

Schauer won the Hart-Dworkin Award in Legal Philosophy, given annually to a scholar who has made significant and lasting contributions to the philosophical understanding of law, according to the AALS.

Schauer is a David and Mary Harrison Distinguished Professor of Law at UVA, and he is among the most recognizable names in the legal academy. His expertise has been demonstrated in hundreds of books, book chapters, articles, essays, classes and personal appearances. Schauer is a world-renowned expert in the areas of constitutional law, evidence, legal reasoning, freedom of speech, and jurisprudence and the philosophy of law.

In 2020, Schauer was elected a corresponding fellow of the British Academy in recognition of his distinguished contributions to academic thought. He received an honorary doctorate from the Vienna University of Economics and Business in 2019. Among his other accolades, he is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, a recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, and has been chair of the Section on Constitutional Law of the AALS and of the Committee on Philosophy and Law of the American Philosophical Association.

Bayefsky won “Best Untenured Article on Federal Jurisdiction” for her paper “Remedies and Respect: Rethinking the Role of Federal Judicial Relief,” published in the Georgetown Law Journal. She argues that “a remedy that takes effect by expressing respect for the party whose rights were violated is a constitutionally legitimate, normatively desirable, and practically feasible exercise of federal judicial authority.”

Bayefsky, who joined the faculty in the fall, writes about constitutional law, federal courts, civil procedure and legal theory. Her work addresses both the practical workings of legal institutions and underlying philosophical ideas such as dignity and equality.

She clerked for U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. She also taught at Harvard Law School as a Climenko Fellow and Lecturer on Law, and worked as a litigator at Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld in Washington, D.C.

Professor Awarded for Research on Interrupted Education

Chris Chang-Bacon is an assistant professor in the School of Education and Human Development. (Contributed photo)

Chris Chang-Bacon, an assistant professor in the School of Education and Human Development, has been named as this year’s recipient of the TIRF James E. Alatis Prize for Research on Language Planning and Policy in Educational Contexts.

The Alatis Prize, established by the International Research Foundation for English Language Education in 2014, recognizes an outstanding article or chapter in the field.

Chang-Bacon’s award-winning article is entitled “Generation Interrupted: Rethinking ‘Students with Interrupted Formal Education’ (SIFE) in the Wake of a Pandemic” (Educational Researcher, Vol. 50, Issue 3, pp. 187-196).

His research focuses on equity in multilingual and multicultural contexts. He studies how teachers interpret educational policy, particularly in ESL, dual-language and bilingual education contexts.

“This award is an incredible honor,” he said. “This has been such an extremely difficult year for teachers and students alike as we continue to grapple with the COVID-19 pandemic. I hope my article sheds light on some ways we might engage these challenges as well as reaffirming the incredible work that teachers and their students have done in this time of ‘interrupted formal education.’”