Sara S. Gronim Wins 2005 PEP Faculty of the Year Award

From left: Dr. David J. Steinberg, President, Long Island University; Jeanette Grill, Director, Professional Experience and Career Planning (PEP), Dr. Sara Gromin, PEP Faculty Member of the Year; Dr. Joseph Shenker, Provost of the C.W. Post Campus.

July 15, 2005 - Sara S. Gronim, assistant professor of history at the C.W. Post Campus of Long Island University in Brookville, was recently honored by the campus’s Professional Experience and Career Planning (PEP) office with its 2005 Faculty of the Year Award. This honor is bestowed annually by the PEP office to outstanding advocates of it award-winning Cooperative Education Program, which helps students gain work experience prior to graduating from college.

A resident of Park Slope, Brooklyn, Dr. Gronim received her Ph.D. in Early American History from Rutgers University in 1999 and after teaching for three years at the New Jersey Institute of Technology, joined the History Department at C.W. Post in 2002.

In addition to her service to the C.W. Post Campus, Prof. Gronim is the author of two award-winning articles, “At the Sign of Newton’s Head: Astronomy and Cosmology in British Colonial New York” (Exploration in Early American Culture, 1999), and “Geography and Persuasion: Maps in British Colonial New York” (William and Mary Quarterly, 2001). She is currently finishing a book titled “Nature and Knowledge: The Scientific Revolution in New York, 1650-1775.” Her interest in the colonists’ “hands on” understandings of the natural world influences her appreciation for the value of “hands on” learning experiences for students.

Dr. Gronim works with the C.W. Post Professional Experience and Career Planning Office to ensure students receive excellent internship placements that bolster hands-on experience in the field. For example, two undergraduate students, John Marcik and Carlos Shimabukuro, have internships this summer with the Maritime Museum of the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy at Kings Point. Next fall, graduate student Elisabeth Herold will intern at Sagamore Hill, the summer home of Theodore Roosevelt and a National Historic Site. Another C.W. Post student, Michael Rostoker, is currently interning at Huntington’s Walt Whitman Birthplace. Other history majors have worked at the popular Tenement Museum on Manhattan’s Lower East Side.

PEP provides paid internship opportunities called "co-ops" (which stands for cooperative learning) for students in every major. Through PEP and Co-op, students can gain hands-on work experience, build a resume, receive career counseling, and conduct job searches through on-line databases, which contain thousands of potential employers nationwide.

For additional information about PEP or Co-op, call (516) 299-2435 or visit www.liu.edu/pep.