Who we Are

Maria T. Iacullo-Bird, Ph.D, as Assistant Provost for Research and Clinical Associate Professor of History. Dr. Iacullo-Bird provides leadership for university-wide undergraduate research and grant programs.  She prioritizes arts and humanities initiatives, civic engagement service-learning projects, and social justice programs that advance educational access and achievement for under-resourced students.

She is an elected councilor to the nationally based Council on Undergraduate Research (CUR), served as Arts and Humanities Division Chair, and currently is a member of both CUR’s Executive Board. She also is a member of the Alliance for Global Undergraduate Research (AGUR) Steering Committee that is an advisory board for the World Congress on Undergraduate Research.

Madison Turunen, Class of 2023, is a double major in History and Peace & Justice Studies, with minors in Women & Gender Studies and Politics. Madison began working on this project in the inaugural Fall 2020 course. Starting in the Spring of 2022, she began as Dr. Iacullo-Bird’s research assistant in the Center for Undergraduate Research Experiences to further develop the project into its digital format. In the Summer of 2022 Madison and Dr. Iacullo-Bird were awarded the Dyson Student-Faculty Undergraduate Research Grant, allowing further interviews to be conducted. Madison continued as research assistant on this project through the Spring 2023 semester.