visit author page

Patricia F. Mead, Ph.D., earned the doctoral degree in Electrical Engineering with a concentration in Electrophysics from University of Maryland, College Park, in 1994. She joined the faculty of Norfolk State University (NSU) as Professor of Optical Engineering in summer 2004. Since her appointment, Dr. Mead has been active in the development of innovative curricula for Optical Engineering courses, and she serves as Education Director for the NSF funded Nano- and Bio-Inspired Materials and Devices Center for Research Excellence in Science and Technology (CREST). Dr. Mead also maintains an active laboratory group that develops laser systems for optical sensing and LIDAR applications. Dr. Mead has previously served as Senior Program Officer at the National Academy of Engineering and served as study director for the pivotal report, Engineering of 2020: Visions of Engineering in the New Century.

visit author page

visit author page

Gwen Lee-Thomas has been an external consultant for over 12 years serving businesses as well as private and public colleges and universities in the state of Washington, California, Florida, Indiana, Illinois, Nebraska and Virginia in diversity, STEM education, organizational culture, and leadership strategies. Gwen has conducted over 30 workshops and presentations on cultural, racial, and generational diversity; assessment, evaluation, and accreditation; teaching and learning; and leadership.

Gwen teaches organization administration and culture, internship experiences, multicultural university, project management capstone course, and strategic planning and institutional effectiveness at Old Dominion University in the graduate program of the Darden College of Education. Prior to ODU, she was the Executive Assistant to the President from 2004 – 2005 and Director of Assessment from 1998 through 2004 at Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology—a small private STEM college in Indiana. She has also served as an editorial associate of a literary journal and office manager of a multi-million dollar construction company. Additional teaching experiences have included Career Switchers of the U.S. Department of Education and The Diversity Institute—both of which are housed at Old Dominion University.

Gwen’s leadership service has included State Board Chair of the Indiana Minority Health Coalition—which is a legislated grassroots organization that provides education, advocacy, and research to eliminate health disparities among minority populations in the state of Indiana; and Commissioner on the Indiana Commission for Higher Education appointed by the late Governor Frank O’Bannon. Other service has included, serving on the community relations board for the U.S. Penitentiary of Federal Bureau of Prisons, the United Way Grants Sub-Committee of Vigo County, and Academic Business Council of the Greater Terre Haute Chamber of Commerce in Indiana.

visit author page

visit author page

Abe Eftekhari.

Ph.D. in Mathematical Science, University of Texas
M.S. in Nuclear Engineering, MIT.

Abe Eftekhari has is presently the Dean for Mathematics, Science & Engineering at NVCC (since July 2007). He is also a Environmental/Energy consultant with Picket Consulting and On-Location.
He served as the Chairperson of the Computer Science and Information Technology Department of Southeastern University (1998 - 2007).
Before joining SEU, he was the Chief Scientist responsible for Research and Development Programs at Mnemonic Systems (FBI pattern recognition contracts) in Washington, DC. (1996 - 1998).
He has worked as a Research Scientist at the NASA Langley Research Center while teaching at Hampton University as a full professor (1989 - 1996).
Principal Engineer at Reuters Information Service in Long Island (1987 - 1988).
Bio-mathematician at the Cornell University Medical College (1985 - 1987).
Postdoc./Physics Lecturer at UTA (1982 – 1985).
Manager of the training department at Bell Operation Corporation -Textron in Hurst, Texas (1978 - 1980).

Abe Eftekhari is also an adjunct member of the faculties of Johns Hopkins University, George Mason University, George Washington University, and the Maryland University. His previous teaching positions were with Hampton University, Dowling College, Tarrent County Junior College, and the University of Texas at Arlington.

Abe Eftekhari has been recipient of several research grants from NSF, NASA, Space Grant Consortium, and NIH. In recent years he has been the Principal Investigator of three research grants in data-mining, satellite communication and Web-enabled Intelligent Tutoring System.
Abe Eftekhari publishes in Physics and Material Science Journals under the subject of “Positron Annihilation Spectroscopy and Micro/Nano-structural Characteristics of Material”. He has patented five inventions, including a table-top low-energy positron accelerator apparatus.

visit author page