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News
Bridging Continents with AI: Prof. Washington Okeyo’s Vision for Entrepreneurship Education
This spring, the Obermann Center for Advanced Studies welcomed Professor Washington Okeyo as an Obermann International Fellow. Okeyo arrived in Iowa City from Kenya on March 2, 2026, and his first weeks brought a series of memorable surprises. His arrival coincided with his 70th birthday, and before long he had encountered the full range of Midwestern spring weather: unexpected snow, a tornado warning, and warm, sunny days, all within a matter of weeks.
Working closely with the Tippie College of Business, Prof. Okeyo used his fellowship to explore a rapidly evolving frontier: the integration of artificial intelligence (AI) into entrepreneurship education.
“Mass Migrations: Personal Voices”: The Iowa Writing Model Crosses Borders to Empower Venezuelan Women in Uruguay
Storytelling is intrinsic to the human experience. Since prehistoric times, we have made sense of our lives—and of ourselves—through narrative. Today, that enduring power of literature lies at the heart of “Mass Migrations: Personal Voices,” a research project co-funded by the Obermann Center for Advanced Studies at the University of Iowa and the Consortium of Humanities Centers and Institutes.
This international collaboration brings together the University of Iowa and the Universidad de la República, Uruguay’s principal public university. Led by Luis Martín-Estudillo, director of the Obermann Center, and Fernando Ordóñez of the Universidad de la República, the project centers on a population both vulnerable and remarkably resilient: Venezuelan migrant women who have arrived in Montevideo, Uruguay, seeking refuge from an ongoing humanitarian crisis.
Building Bonds That Heal: Inside UI’s Human-Animal Interactions Collaborative
This article is a special contribution by UI undergraduate Rylee Newland, a journalism and mass communication major. She wrote this piece for her Spring 2026 Reporting and Writing class.
The University of Iowa recently became home to the Human-Animal Interactions for Wellbeing Collaborative in the fall of 2025. This collaborative is one of the Obermann Center for Advanced Studies’ newest working groups. The collaborative is co-directed by Adrienne Johnson, an associate professor of instruction in the health, sport and human physiology department, and Katy Schroeder, an associate professor in the College of Education.
The Human-Animal Interactions for Wellbeing Collaborative seeks to bridge the gap between academic research and community knowledge surrounding human-animal interactions. The group brings together scholars and advocates from various disciplines, with the ultimate goal of creating a space where discussions around best practices, ethics, and education on animal-assisted interventions can be held.
Stephanie Miracle to Receive Obermann Interdisciplinary Achievement Award
We’re pleased to announce that our Advisory Board has named Stephanie Miracle, assistant professor of dance, the recipient of the inaugural Obermann Interdisciplinary Achievement Award. The new award recognizes scholars who cross disciplinary boundaries to produce insights not possible within a single field. As interdisciplinarity is a core value of the Obermann Center’s mission, director Luis Martín-Estudillo established the award, noting, “The most transformative ideas emerge when disciplines intersect […] These collaborations spark breakthroughs that expand the horizons of knowledge.”
A Universe in the Ear
What does it mean to live with a sound that has no external source? For millions worldwide, this is the daily reality of tinnitus—a complex auditory symptom that can range from a minor annoyance to a deeply distressing condition. This "universe" of sound is the primary focus of Anna Carolina Marques Perrella de Barros, an audiologist and researcher from the Tinnitus and Sound Intolerance Group at the Universidade Federal de São Paulo in Brazil. Her pursuit of advanced clinical management strategies and research collaboration brought her to the University of Iowa this spring as an Obermann International Fellow.
“Tinnitus is like a universe,” Barros explains. “The more you study it, the more you learn and encounter new variables. While it has been the subject of extensive research for a long time, there is still so much more to study.”
Building community around rural research
A pregnant woman in rural Iowa must make so many extra decisions about her and her baby’s health. It isn’t just whether she should go to the hospital about unexpected complications, but which one. If she goes to the closest hospital, will it have the expertise to treat her? If not, will it have an ambulance that can transfer her to a more urban hospital?
One Iowa mom facing these questions inspired Stephanie Radke, clinical associate professor of obstetrics and gynecology at the University of Iowa, to found the Iowa Perinatal Quality Care Collaborative (IPQCC). IPQCC is responsible for improving communication and collaboration among groups addressing obstetrical and neonatal care in Iowa, especially in rural communities.
Beyond “Not Urban”: Andy Mink on Serving Rural Communities
As part of the 2025–2026 Obermann Symposium, Cultivating Rurality: Building Community around Rural Research (March 26–27), we’re excited to welcome Andy Mink, founding director of the Smithsonian’s Rural Initiative. In his keynote “More than ‘Not Urban’: Serving Rural Communities as Places and as People” on March 27, he'll explore how the Smithsonian is redefining itself as more than a destination in Washington, D.C., becoming a public service accessible to rural communities nationwide through collaborative, community-sourced partnerships that respond to local priorities and challenges.
In advance of his visit, Obermann Program Coordinator Maria Torres Melgares spoke with Andy about his work and the ideas he’ll bring to the symposium.
Seeking Humanities/Arts PhD Student for Program Coordinator Position, '26-'27
The Obermann Center for Advanced Studies seeks an advanced (ABD) humanities or arts PhD student to work with Obermann staff to support programs and events and tell the stories of the exciting research projects and initiatives supported by the Center during the 2026–2027 school year.
Six paid summer internships available to humanities grad students through new grant
As a graduate student in film and media, internships were a formative experience for Lauren Burrell Cox, associate director at the Obermann Center for Advanced Studies. They helped her define her values and identify meaningful professional roles where her skills could be put to use across the humanities ecosystem. Now, she’s received a grant from Humanities Without Walls (HWW) to provide six paid internship opportunities with local nonprofits for UI humanities graduate students this summer.
“My goal is to make sure that humanities graduate students are equipped with robust, transferrable skills and access to pathways that lead to secure and fulfilling work,” says Cox.
The three selected nonprofits have hosted successful internships and externships in the past, through the Obermann Center’s Mellon-funded Humanities for the Public Good initiative and the Obermann Humanities Without Walls Faculty Externship. Each site will host two HWW interns this June and July.
The Texture of Memory: Pervin Saket's Project to Preserve Parsi Heritage
Imagine a small boat on large, dark sea. Imagine families of refugees, with small children and smaller bundles of belongings. Imagine them braving storms and starvation and shipwreck. It sounds like something from yesterday’s news report, but this historical exodus took place between the 8th and 11th centuries CE, when Arab Muslims conquered the once-expansive Persian Zoroastrian empire. Faced with religious persecution, groups of Zoroastrians escaped in boats and landed on the shores of Gujarat in India.
Pervin Saket’s project as an Obermann International Fellow focuses on this community, her community, in modern-day India. Zoroastrianism, the world’s oldest monotheistic religion, is now practiced by only a handful of people, and that too is threatened by extinction. Saket says, “In the version I learned on my grandmother’s lap, the Parsis (literally “people of Pars or Persia”) were taken to the local king when they washed up on the shores of Gujarat. Suspicious of the foreigners, he showed them a bowl of milk filled to the brim, to indicate his land was full. The Parsi leader responded by sprinkling a few grains of sugar on the milk. I suspect that the king had a fondness for good metaphors."
