“Can I swab a shrimp?”

A young woman in chest-high waders is ready to join the activities of her companions, who are gently swiping cotton along specimens: anchovies, tiny crabs, shrimp. On a strip of shore by the dam at Guana-Tolomato Matanzas National Estuarine Research Reserve, Flagler College assistant professor Terri Seron’s biology students have gathered little squirming things from a net with latex-clad hands.

Someone asks Dr. Seron if she’s collected enough of whatever she was supposed to get; the samples don’t appear much different than they did before sliding across a crustacean’s back. “Don’t worry,” Seron says. “Those bacteria will be all over that swab.”

The students are getting their first taste of the local, hands-on research opportunities that inspired Seron and Barbara Blonder, assistant professor and coordinator of natural sciences at Flagler, to launch a new environmental science minor. It’s the first natural sciences minor Flagler College has ever offered, and it’s drawing the interest of students with majors in communication, education, business and more.

Awareness and Resources
With news about global warming and “green” living making headlines around the country, the environmental science minor also has good timing. Back in her office, Seron pulls out the September 2008 issue of “Nature” magazine. The cover doesn’t feature plants or animals or a DNA double helix; it shows close-ups of Barack Obama and John McCain. Science has become one of the hottest topics of public debate in the United States.

“Awareness,” Seron said. “People are really starting to be aware that our planet is in some trouble … You pick up any newspaper or magazine, and they’re talking about these issues: stem cell research, flu shots, antibiotic resistance.”

Seron’s background is in biology. She focuses on very specific issues in her research, spending her summers at coral reefs in Bermuda. In her postdoctoral work, she used molecular biology to determine the coral genes that respond to heat, chemicals and tissue injury — the stressors that are bleaching and decimating reefs.

In the classroom, she helps students understand the impact of what they’re studying: how science intersects with politics, ethics, business and health.

“The cells we’re talking about in class are not some abstract idea – you’re made up of these, and more than half are bacteria cells,” Seron said. She adds that her classes analyze everything from atoms to the human brain, “learning about themselves in ways they probably haven’t thought about.

“Why do we have all the problems we have when doctors have laid out the entire human genome?” she said. “Should we ever rule out things to study? What about ‘designer’ babies? We can do that today, but should we?”

Blonder’s experience is a bit broader, more systemic. She’s focused on ecology and conservation; she worked for The Nature Conservancy for nine years, and another 10-plus years doing research on “everything from spiny lobsters to gopher tortoises to fire ecology.”

The professional connections she made during those years – along with Seron’s – will yield a variety of unique opportunities for Flagler environmental science minors. When they graduate, Blonder said, they’ll have the competitive edge of “practical field and research experience” and the relationships built from it.

“They are going to practice science, and these partnerships are really important,” Blonder said. Possible research locations include the marshy Guana Reserve, the Atlantic Ocean, the St. Johns River, the Ocala National Forest and a variety of state parks. “The college is now poised to take advantage of our unique bio-geographic setting,” Blonder said.

Making a Living in the ‘Green’ Movement
In addition to conducting hands-on research, Flagler environmental science minors are preparing for careers in a variety of fields.

Denise Liberi is a graphic design major who recently added the environmental science minor. She creates advertising and digital 3-D architectural models for the Green Home Store, a St. Augustine business that designs and builds sustainable, energy-efficient homes. She hopes to leverage her experience at thecompany – along with her new minor – into a career as an architect.

“The classes are not only ones that interest me, but they will also help me in my future career goals,” Liberi said. “We have a long way to go and a lot of work to do, but I’ve been inspired by the rapidly expanding ‘green’ movement. There are people all over the world who are working to educate and change our environmentally detrimental lifestyles.”

Education majors can benefit from environmental science studies and go on to remedy the “absolute dearth of science teachers,” Blonder said. Business majors, she added, will gain knowledge that’s “very marketable for today’s economy.” One of the real-world projects Blonder requires students to complete is a cost-benefit analysis for reducing the environmental impact of a department on campus.

Flagler communication majors have taken a special interest in environmental science, as well. Students Aslyn Baringer and Nathan Edwards will graduate too soon to add and fulfill all the requirements of the new minor, but they recently decided to focus production of FCTV Journal, a Flagler-produced community news program, on local environmental issues. They’ve produced shows on topics like beach erosion, reusable shopping bags and alternative transportation.

“Really, every major needs to know this kind of stuff,” Baringer said. She believes environmental education will continue to grow as people see a need for it. The “green” movement could be mistaken for a passing trend among her generation, she said, but she thinks it has sticking power. She and Edwards have seen a rise in concern for environmental issues coming from their parents’ generation, as well.

“It’s come into sight and into view because it’s necessary,” Baringer said. “It’s not just because you can get a shirt that says ‘Go Green.’ ”

“I think it’s definitely a fad, but through this fad people are being educated,” Edwards said, adding that the price of oil will continue to encourage sustainability in the long run: “You have a lot of people who are being forced to change because of their wallets.”

In the Future
About a month after these interviews, Barack Obama was elected president. Gas prices in St. Augustine fell to $1.64, and similar averages were seen throughout the country. The economic crisis demolished many people’s savings and retirement, and unemployment was rising steadily.

Changes came, and the reactions to them ranged from elation to utter fear. Some people have speculated that environmental issues will draw less attention until the cost of oil rises again, but Blonder said she remains optimistic about the future of the “green” movement.

“I lived through the first gas crisis in the ‘70s, and 20 years later, everyone’s driving SUVs,” Blonder said. “But this feels different to me. If we continue to have beach erosion like we’ve had and hurricanes like we’ve had … it’s been directly correlated with a change in the temperature.

“I don’t think this is a short-term trend. All these things seem to be converging at once … If we can equip our students with the skill sets to go out into the market in a time when environmental careers and technology are really starting to gain momentum, they’re going to be on the ground floor of this at a time when other job markets are shrinking.”

Innovation is the key to creating worldwide awareness and improving environmental conditions, Blonder said. There are tough global issues to address, like how to reduce the pollution and waste being produced by burgeoning economies in India and China – countries that, given their recent growth rates, will soon exceed the United States’ contributions to green house gasses.

Those kinds of problems are exactly what Flagler environmental science minors are hoping to learn about and, eventually, have a part in solving.

“Do we stop them [India and China] from their economic development, when they’re simply doing what we did 50 years ago?” Blonder said. “We can develop and export technology like nobody else, cleaner and greener technology … that’s more efficient, and that’s what it comes down to.

“We need to give them alternatives they’re not going to be able to ignore … I think there’s a real turnaround from science phobia to seeing science and technology as a solution, and I think our students are going to be uniquely positioned to take advantage of these opportunities.”

On the Ground
At the Guana Reserve, Seron’s students are releasing their shrimp and other living samples back into the water. They’re packing up equipment and heading to the other side of the dam to do more tests: salinity, wind velocity, temperature, acidity, water clarity.

The last student to leave is walking away when something catches her eye. She freezes, turns around and heads back to the site. She stoops to pick up a small slip of paper from the sand, and places it carefully in the trash. Seron looks back and sees this.

“Thank you,” she says, and then more firmly: “Thank you.”

Web Exclusive Story: Flagler goes a little greener
Find out what Flagler is doing to reduce its carbon footprint.

The recycling effort has been spearheaded by the Flagler Outdoors Club, which was founded by students two years ago. Melissa Kafel, a sociology major and president of the club, said recycling on a large scale can get surprisingly expensive.

“The Outdoors Club received a grant from an anonymous donor for $10,000, and then the senior class of 2008 donated $3,700 to the recycling fund,” Kafel said. “We could never have gotten the program running without them.”

The group has hired a company to collect and recycle materials from the 15 plastic and 20-plus paper bins around campus. The Outdoors Club also works on other conservation-related events, including beach clean-ups, plastic-to-cloth bag drives and an eco-fun festival.

“We all live on this planet,” Kafel said, “and it is our moral obligation to start taking care of it.”

Flagler hired GreenSpace Interior Design to help with the summer renovation of Kenan Hall. GreenSpace worked with a local architect to create an improved atmosphere for students while increasing efficiency in the lighting and reducing environmental impact.

From sound-absorbing panels to new counter tops, nearly all the renovated features are made from recycled materials. The carpet, for example, is made of recycled content, has an eco-friendly backing and comes in individual tiles that will be recycled by the manufacturer when they’re worn and need replacement.

Compact fluorescent light bulbs are being used in the building, and Vic Cheney, Flagler plant superintendent, said maintenance staff have been making similar energy-saving changes throughout campus. They include:

• Changing approximately 90 percent of incandescent bulbs to CFLs
• Replacing air conditioning units and updating digital controls to create greater efficiency in Kenan Hall, Ponce Hall, the Florida East Coast Railway buildings, the Student Center, Wiley Hall and the Communication Building.
• Using green-rated soap and multi-purpose cleaners in all public facilities

“A conservative estimate to date shows a decrease in our kilowatts-per-square-foot by 20 percent,” Cheney said. “That is huge.”

Related: Educating the future of the ‘green’ revolution
Find out more about Flagler’s new environmental science minor.

“I am thrilled that our college has been accepted for membership in the Peach Belt Conference, a well-established athletic conference with a solid record of competitive athletic programs at its member institutions,” said Flagler President Dr. William T. Abare Jr. “We are eager to compete against some of the top NCAA Division II programs in the nation.”

The Peach Belt Conference was formed in 1990, and its members have won 26 national championships. “This is one of the most important things that has ever happened to the Peach Belt,” said Conference Commissioner David Brunk. “It’s not just expansion in the number of schools we have. It’s bringing in two quality institutions that meet our academic criteria and provide real competition on the field.”

“The prospect of being in a conference will certainly enhance our athletic image,” said Flagler Athletic Director Dave Barnett. Flagler has already been competing in NCAA Division II, but until now has not had a conference affiliation. The college decided to make the move to the NCAA in 2005 after almost three decades in the NAIA.

Teams will now be able to compete for conference championships in the 2009-2010 season. Current members of the Peach Belt are: Armstrong Atlantic State University in Savannah, Ga.; Augusta (Ga.) State University; Clayton College and State University in Morrow, Ga.; Columbus (Ga.) State University; Francis Marion University in Florence, S.C.; Georgia College and State University in Milledgeville; Lander University in Greenwood, S.C.; North Georgia College and State University in Dahlonega; the University of North Carolina at Pembroke; and the University of South Carolina at Aiken.

Flagler will be the only private school in the Peach Belt, as well as the conference’s only Florida school.

The trip is over and the bags are unpacked, but nine Flagler College students just can’t stop talking about Peru. This past summer, Assistant Professor of Spanish Aggie Johnson and her students travelled to Cusco, Peru – the former center of the Inca civilization – to learn, volunteer and see the sights. The group stayed with local families and attended classes at a center known for its research on the highland people.

Most students found the service aspect of the trip especially rewarding. They built clean-burning stoves in the rural village of Huatata, and they helped construct a bathroom made of adobe bricks and mud for a school in Pongobomba. Working hand-in-hand with Peruvians turned out to be excellent Spanish practice.

Slideshow: Images from Peru

“I felt like we really contributed to the community while learning so much,” said Flagler junior Virginia Mason.

The students were impressed by the incredible work ethic of the Peruvians. In the bitter cold of the Andes Mountains, they hauled loads of bricks, peeled piles of bamboo by hand and climbed barefoot into mud and manure. At the construction site, the group quickly learned the Spanish names for words rarely used in class.

The most memorable word was “cuy,” the Spanish word for guinea pig, which gets its name from the high-pitched sound it makes. In Peru, a cuy is not a pet – in fact, cuy is a delicacy. When the group ordered cuy at a restaurant, they received a leg and foot with little toes still attached.

Classes in Cusco were slightly more traditional than the local cuisine. Peruvians taught Spanish classes, and the students were excited about their language improvement.

“I learned more in my five weeks there than in the four semesters of Spanish I’ve had here in America,” said Flagler senior Ben Haley. “I had to use the things they were teaching when I got home to my family in the afternoon … things just seemed to click there.”

Sánchez describes her art as “exploding optimism.” A colorful mix of shapes and textures, the effect is quite upbeat, but Sánchez, ’97, says that is rarely her intent.

“The movement and colors that are used take this happiness because of the colors,” she said. “And I don’t intentionally create happy paintings. That just comes out.”

To say she works in mixed media would be an understatement. Sánchez’s art is an intriguing medley of acrylic paint, markers, pens, highlighters, paint pens, cut paper, pencil and ink. She creates on both canvas and paper. But most surprising of all is what inspires her distinctly geometric work.

After graduating from Flagler with degrees in fine art and graphic design, Sánchez didn’t set off to start her career as an artist. Instead, she joined the Peace Corps.

“I wanted to serve, and I didn’t want to focus on me,” she said. “I joined the Peace Corps to get a different perspective on life and to serve the community.”

Those experiences had an effect on her art, but Sánchez says she didn’t realize it until a few years later.

“The colors in Africa really influenced my work,” she said. “I was in a rural mud hut, with a thatched roof, hours away from a city. I just couldn’t get over that three-quarters of my frame of vision was sky.”

She was equally entranced by the African lifestyle.

“There is no frivolity,” Sánchez said. “Everything you do in a day is to survive. You spend time going to get water, collecting wood for burning. I remember thinking that I was privileged that I could paint — that I had the materials and time that I could paint.”

And that freedom to paint has helped her earn a grant from the Northern Manhattan Arts Alliance and a residency with the Robert M. MacNamara Foundation as well as exhibits in galleries in New York, Chicago, San Francisco and Atlanta, to name a few. Ultimately, she credits her love of color and her understanding of it to a class she took at Flagler with art professor Don Martin.

“I got a lot of support at Flagler,” she said. “No one was competitive, like a lot of art schools can be. If someone’s strong point was color or sculpting in clay or casting, that was the person you went to for advice and help. Everyone played off everyone else’s strengths. Everyone helped each other.”

For more of Jennifer Sanchez’s art, visit www.miss-sanchez.com.

In a secluded graveyard, simple labels like “mother” and “grandmother” peek out from slabs of cement, colored brightly with shades of pink and blue. Love is apparent there, as is the lack of money loved ones have to spend on deceased relatives.

But right next to the makeshift plots, separated only by a transparent fence, sits the pristine and modern Evergreen Cemetery. Visitors would have to move branches and step through weeds and overgrowth to get back to this “other” area, where the dates on the markers are as recent as 1990.

Audio Slideshow: Photo Essay by Haley Walker

Senior Haley Walker found this stark contrast between the haves and have-nots in West Augustine while completing a project for a Flagler College photojournalism class that also ran in The St. Augustine Record’s monthly publication, Drift.

“[The plots are] old, but not from a time when people should have to be doing this to bury their loved ones,” Walker said.

The communication major and editor of the Flagler newspaper, The Gargoyle, wanted to learn more about the cemetery and its lonely neighbor, but she wanted to tell the story in a different way.

“I didn’t want to interview anyone and intrude to ask what this [area] was,” Walker said. “So I started taking photos to document the difference between the areas.”

The link she found between the life a person lives and his ability to pay for a final resting place comes across in her photos. In this, the poorest community in St. Augustine, some could only afford simple concrete slabs, plastic fencing and acrylic paint, while others had granite monuments and manicured lawns.

“The things we see in life will also carry over into death,” she said. “They’re still in poverty. The people who cannot afford to buy a house can’t afford to pay for a gravestone for their loved ones. So they have to make their own gravestones … right next to beautiful, granite stones.”

When St. Johns County Sheriff Deputy Ricky Domingo and 911 Emergency Systems Engineer Michael Banks submitted proposals for a grant writing class, they got what they asked for. Banks received $850,000 in grant money from the State of Florida for a new 911 emergency communication system for St. Johns County. Domingo landed a $1,000 grant from Wal-Mart to purchase seven tracking bracelets for the Sheriff’s Department.

“It’s a win-win for everybody because the county doesn’t have to go and spend those monies,” Banks said. “And we get additional equipment that is critical for us to maintain the infrastructure.”

The tracking bracelets Domingo secured are designed to locate children with mental disabilities or Alzheimer’s patients who might endanger their own lives by wandering away. The tracking system has already helped one local family find their lost son.

Launched in 2003, Flagler’s public administration program is designed specifically for nontraditional-aged students. Many of them already work as law enforcement officers or firefighters.

A close friend of Art and Design Professor Don Martin, Emerson has visited the campus several times to talk with students since shooting to stardom. So as this highly anticipated season of “Lost” gets rolling, Flagler Magazine asked 2006 alumnus and “Lost” fanatic Tom Iacuzio to catch up with Emerson and discuss everything from teaching at Flagler to playing a character who loves to make viewers squirm.

For a fan of ABC’s “Lost,” it’s hard not to get a chill when the phone rings and it’s “Lost” baddie Benjamin Linus on the other end. But when the chill wears off after a few seconds you realize that not only is Michael Emerson not the murderous, manipulative character he plays on television, he’s actually very polite and quite likeable.
 
Q: First off, congratulations on crafting a stellar character in Benjamin Linus.
That’s exciting, thank you. I’m glad he’s working for you. I think the character is really well written. I’m happy that whatever my bag of actor tricks is, it seems to be appropriate for this role.
 
Q: Your life has taken you many places. One of those places was St. Augustine. What brought you here?
 I was many years ago married to a woman from St. Augustine. We met in New York City and she begged me to leave the rat race and move on to a more gracious climate and there I was for several years.  
 
Q: You taught drawing at Flagler College for a while in the early ‘80s. How did that happen?
 This was before I was an actor. I had been a freelance magazine illustrator in New York City where I met (Flagler Art Professor) Don Martin. He said, “Hey, we have an opening for a drawing instructor. Would you like to do it?” It sounded interesting to me and I took it and taught sort of entry-level drawing there for two or three semesters in the Art Department.
 
Q: What do you remember about your time at Flagler?
 I remember the facility. Such a fabulous bunch of buildings. I mean what other college looks like Flagler? I remember for me that it was a revelation how educational teaching is for the teacher. I know it sounds trite. I’m sure every other teacher says the same thing, but it’s perfectly true. It’s one thing to do a “thing.” It’s another to be forced to articulate it to others. I found it to be very exciting.
  
Q: Your character that you play on “Lost” started out as Henry Gale and was only supposed to be around for three episodes. How did you feel when you learned that the paycheck would be a bit more steady?
 As soon as I got the script, I thought, “This is a really intriguing character and he’s mysterious enough that they ought to let it run for a while.” I guess all of us guest spot actors, though, have this kernel of a dream somewhere that we’re gonna’ make such an impression in our little guest spot that somebody’s gonna’ want to keep us around.
 
Q: You’ve played Zep Hindle in “Saw,” won an Emmy as serial killer William Hinks on “The Practice” and now Ben Linus. Are you drawn to these bad-guy roles?
 No, but somebody is drawn to the idea of me playing them. I don’t know who that is and I’m not sure whether to thank them or give them a smack. In my life on the stage, I’m usually in funny plays. It’s a little bit of a mystery to me. That seems to be what’s so interesting about the character, that there is that manipulative genius angle, but also a bit of vulnerability and compassion. Yeah, I think as season four progressed, Ben (was) being moved inch by inch towards the more sympathetic end of the scale. Something’s going on there. I’ve always maintained, sort of half in jest, that eventually Ben would be the good guy.
 
Q: How familiar were you with “Lost” before you were cast in it?
 I was fairly familiar with it. I mean the fanatic in our house was my wife (Carrie Preston). She never missed an episode. I’d sort of catch some while she watched and I was doing dishes or something.
 
Q: And she wound up playing your character’s mother in your flashback episode.
 That was kooky. It’s great to have your spouse on the set with you, although we didn’t have any scenes together, and now she’s a bona fide member of the “Lost” family. And I’m thinking maybe that’s not the last time we see her. Something has to be revisited there in Ben’s childhood.  
 
Q: What lengths do producers go to prevent spoilers on a show like “Lost”?
 Sometimes they go to crazy lengths. The script in last season’s finale had a secret scene. There usually is at the end of the season. But they went a step better last year. When they filmed the secret scene, they filmed three different versions of a moment in it so that even the people that were on the set didn’t know how the season would end.  
 
Q: This past season, the show has seemed to ditch the straight flash format and has moved on to something else.
I think everything is flash now. Flash forward, flash back, flash present, flash other present. Other time zone, other geographical zone. They’ve done what they do every year, which is crank it one more notch in terms of narrative device. Every year they invent a device to tell the story they want to tell. It’s chaotic, but stimulating.
 
Q: What kind of reaction do you get from fans on the street?
 Mostly people react to me with pleasure, but in general it’s a kind of guarded pleasure. They are happy to see this face and voice that they know belongs to a character that they enjoy, but part of them can’t fully disassociate me from the part I play. So they worry a little bit that I might actually be somewhat dangerous.

WFCF Exclusive: Jean Rahner Interviews Michael Emerson

Look to the walls of J. Michael Butler’s office and you’ll learn pretty quickly about his research interests. Posters for Lynyrd Skynrd hang next to public signs from the segregation era. There’s a Robert E. Lee ceramic Jim Beam flask, a Frederick Douglass hand puppet and a vial of “authentic” Elvis sweat.

A history buff with a penchant for studying Dixie rock, Butler might be best known for his interest in civil rights, which has been his primary area of research over the years. This mild-mannered Southern gentleman with a heavy Alabama accent becomes animated when talking about history.

“It’s alive. It’s exciting. It’s based on the interpretation of the facts,” Butler said. “I’m engaging students in a topic that they don’t think is important. It’s American history – it’s not just black history.”

Butler, a new assistant professor of history who joined the Flagler faculty from South Georgia College, says his goal is to open students’ minds to how modern Southern history impacts Americans today.

Since graduating from University of Mississippi in 2001 with a doctorate in history, Butler has built on his dissertation work on the civil rights era to bring his research to a wider audience. Butler co-wrote “Victory After the Fall: The Memories of Civil Rights Activist H.K Matthews” in 2007.

Butler first met Rev. H. K. Matthews while he was doing research for his dissertation. It became apparent that race was not only an issue in his research, but also in his ability to do research on such a sensitive topic. His first challenge was to find African American activists, and his second was to get them to agree to talk to him.

“Most of my work is tearing down barriers,” Butler explained. “The Rev. Matthews wondered why a white boy from Alabama was calling him up asking him complicated questions.”

At first, Matthews would only agree to a very limited meeting with Butler. “We were supposed to talk for 30 minutes the first time we met,” he said. “Three hours later, we were still talking.”

The rest, as they say, is history. After Matthews saw Butler’s dissertation, he wanted Butler to work on his memoirs with him. Such an offer was a major compliment to Butler; he’s been fighting stereotypical assumptions about his accent for a long time, often having to tell people, “Don’t assume I share your prejudice.”

Butler continued to challenge issues of racial tension with his second book, “Beyond Integration: The Post-1964 Black Freedom Struggle in Pensacola, Florida,” which is under review with the University of Florida Press. The book will address social and racial tensions that took place after integration.

“Integration was not the end of the civil rights era,” said Butler. “Feelings intensify after it. The bigger battles didn’t happen in Pensacola until the 1970s. I wondered why.”

Like a good scholar, Butler sought primary research sources to answer that question. As expected, his search brought many challenges.

“I had to be creative in my research on this,” he said. “The newspapers locally intentionally played it down and downplayed the number of protestors. There wasn’t a lot there to work with, so I had to go to police files and legal documents.”

Many of the key activists that Butler sought to interview were already dead. A widow he had arranged an interview with canceled on him, saying the memories were too painful for her. He had prominent white community members hang up on him and refuse to speak to him. Fortunately, Matthews had kept audio recordings of meetings from the civil rights era and trusted Butler with them.

“This humanizes a historical era. These were real people going through this,” Butler said. He eventually was able to interview many important people relevant to the civil rights era, including former Florida Governor Rubin Askew.

Pensacola is an example of how many Southern cities dealt with sometimes hostile race relations. Butler says his hometown of Mobile, Ala., took a similar approach.

“Race relations in Mobile was a great unspoken. The racial tension there was swept under the mat,” Butler recalled. “How little I knew about the civil rights era when I entered graduate school. I’m not sure how you grow up in the South with such an important topic being ignored.

“It was very divisive. Some of my teachers had lived through it, and it was very painful for them. It was the moral issue of the day.”

Butler’s next research agenda turns to Southern rock and masculinity. He thinks pop culture can tell us a lot about Southern society. “Elements of race are always there,” he said. “It defines us as a region. You can’t understand civil rights, the Confederacy or Southern rock without looking at it.

“I want to know why people react to the song ‘Free Bird’ the way they do. Grown white men will hear that song in public and cry openly.”

Butler is as fired up about answering this research question as any other that he has addressed.

“I just love what I do,” Butler said. “One of the good things is that I wouldn’t change what I do for anything. I love to teach. I love to research. I love to write.”

All Butler’s work begs the question, “What does it mean to be Southern?” He said despite the controversy of his work, he still loves where he comes from.

“You can be from the South and still be proud of it,” he said.

Butler sees a major connection between his research and his ability to make history vibrant for students.

“I try not to divorce the two elements of teaching and researching. Anything I can use to engage the students, I use,” he said. “Things that are sensitive have a historical background. We have to understand that to get along.”

In the civilian world, Greg Teisan works as a sales representative for a pharmaceutical company. But in Afghanistan, he held responsibilities that ranged from organizing a bazaar for local merchants to coordinating polio and tuberculosis vaccinations for thousands of people.

During his year as a major in the U.S. Army Medical Service Corps, the ’88 Flagler alumnus spent most of his time arranging training, supplies and other logistics for medical missions and emergency health care. Teisan had been a member of the National Guard for nearly 20 years, living in South Carolina with his wife and two children, when he was asked to deploy to Afghanistan.

Audio Slideshow: Alumnus Greg Teisan Narrates His Year in Afghanistan

“We planned it and all just kind of talked each other into it,” Teisan said, adding that several longtime friends deployed with him. “There was an excitement … and if I didn’t volunteer, I was probably going to be going anyway.”

While Teisan had some fears for his safety in Afghanistan, he quickly adjusted to the dangerous situations he encountered. He was most vulnerable to insurgent attack when on the move.

“It was really a hassle,” he said. “We had gunners on top [of the truck] and we had call signs … we really tried to portray a force, a real intimidating force, to avoid any problems.”

Al Qaeda and Taliban militants have begun using more suicide bombers to attack U.S. troops. Through luck and caution, though, Teisan steered clear of these attacks. In fact, he returned home in May 2008 having suffered just one injury: a broken thumb, acquired during a particularly competitive game of volleyball.

Teisan said he felt fortunate that his home overseas, Camp Alamo – dubbed “the most dangerous place in the world” by British newspaper The Sun – was hit by only two mortar attacks during his stay. Camp Alamo is located just inside the walls of the Kabul Military Training Center where, at any given time, the U.S. Army National Guard is attempting to train about 8,000 new Afghan recruits.

But it’s not an easy task. Local fear of reprisal from militants is strong, he said. His interpreter carried Western clothing with him and changed only when he was inside the training center gate.

“If the Taliban or the insurgents realized they were organizing the government of Afghanistan, supporting the United States Army … they became targets,” he said. “We have as many people leaving [the Afghan army] now as we have going in.”

Now home, Teisan juggles work in Charleston with long weekends in St. Augustine, where his wife relocated to be closer to family while he was overseas. His lasting impression of Afghanistan is that of “desperate people that needed help.”