News Release
September 2005
Bethlehem, Pa., September 29, 2005— Moravian College’s
Leadership Center will host a panel discussion Hurricane Katrina: Short- and Long-Term
Implications on Tuesday, October 4, at 4 p.m. Guest speaker, Dr. Lynn Koplitz, professor
of chemistry, Loyola University of New Orleans, will be joined by Moravian College
president, Dr. Ervin J. Rokke, and faculty members, Dr. John Reynolds, Dr. Janet Sipple,
Dr. Sean Mulholland, The panel will discuss the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina from
military, environmental, health, economic, and political perspectives. The discussion
will be held in the Priscilla Payne Hurd Academic Complex, room 102. The public is
welcome and admission is free of charge.
Koplitz received her undergraduate degree from Muhlenberg College,
and earned both her master’s and doctoral degrees from Princeton University.
Prior to joining the faculty at Loyola University of New Orleans, she worked as a visiting
assistant professor at Pomona College and as an adjunct assistant professor and post-doctoral
research candidate at UCLA. Koplitz began at Loyola University as an assistant professor
in 1988 and was named professor of chemistry in 2003. She is a member of the American
Chemical Society, the Council on Undergraduate Research, and Phi Beta Kappa. Koplitz
is also the director of the University Honors Program at Loyola University of New Orleans.
John Reynolds teaches political science at Moravian College. He
earned his undergraduate degree at Lehigh University and his doctoral degree from Rutgers
University. Reynolds interests are the formulation and implementation of public policy,
interest group advocacy, politics and popular culture, diversity issues, and the political
and economic implications of Internet technology. In addition, Reynolds serves as the
director of the Promise of the Rainbow Diversity Initiative; as vice-chairperson of
the Children’s Coalition
of the Lehigh Valley; and as the program chair for the Bethlehem Area Education Foundation.
Janet Sipple is the chair of the Department of Nursing, as well
as professor of nursing. She is dean of St. Luke’s School of Nursing. She earned her Bachelor of Science
in Nursing at West Virginia University, the Master of Science in Nursing at the University
of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and her Nurse Practitioner – Adult certificate
from the University of Missouri at St. Louis. She also received a doctorate of education
from the University of South Carolina at Columbia. Her interests include nursing in international
and multicultural contexts, nursing and political action, prevention of child abuse,
and therapeutic touch. Sipple is the founder and U.S. coordinator of the American-Australian
Nurses Exchange Program.
Mulholland serves as assistant professor of economics and business at Moravian College.
He accomplished all his degree work at Clemson University, and his teaching interests
include environmental economics and science, economic growth, labor economics, and the
economics of education. Mulholland has researched questions involving the private protection
of the environment, the production of education, and the importance of human capital,
physical capital, and total factor productivity on the growth and variation of income.
In 2001 he received the Property and Environmental Research Center Fellowship.
Rokke has served as president of Moravian College since August 1997.
He earned a Bachelor of Science degree from the U.S. Air Force Academy, and a master’s and doctorate
degree in international relations from Harvard University. Rokke served 35 years in the
U.S. Air Force, holding positions as staff plans officer at NATO Headquarters in Brussels,
associate director for support to military operations at the National Security Agency,
and Dean of Faculty at the U.S. Air Force Academy. He retired from the Air Force in 1997
with the rank of lieutenant general. Prior to his presidency at Moravian College, Rokke
was president of the National Defense University. Currently his is the Director of Central
Intelligence’s Advanced Technology Panel. He is a member of the Council on Foreign
Relations and serves on the boards of the Falcon Foundation, the National Defense University
Foundation, the National Museum of Industrial History, and the Lehigh Valley Industrial
Park.
Moravian College is a private, coeducational, selective liberal arts college located
in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. Tracing its founding to 1742, it is recognized as America's
sixth-oldest college. Visit the web site at www.moravian.edu
