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Faculty, Professional Staff to Speak on Concentrations at Forum on Feb. 17

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Four distinguished members of the Southern Virginia University faculty and professional staff, President Reed N. Wilcox, Interim Provost Scott Dransfield, Dr. Jeremiah John and Cameron Crowther, will deliver a forum on Friday, Feb. 17, centered on academic concentrations.

President Wilcox has served as president of Southern Virginia since Sept. 1, 2014. He is a co-founder of Clene Nanomedicine, an advanced nanotechnology company focused on creating medicines using nano-forms of proven therapeutic ingredients. Wilcox also co-founded and served as senior managing director of General Resonance, Clene’s parent company.

Prior to his time at Southern Virginia, Wilcox was a worldwide partner at The Boston Consulting Group — a global leader in corporate strategy that is now a multi-billion dollar professional service firm. He has co-founded and served as managing director of The Flagship Group, creating joint venture innovation partnerships with large corporations and investment firms. Wilcox has lived and worked internationally for more than 10 years in Europe, China, Japan and West Africa and holds more than 20 U.S. patents.

Dr. Dransfield is a professor of English at Southern Virginia University and is currently serving as interim provost. He joined the Southern Virginia faculty in 2001 after holding faculty positions at Gordon College in Barnesville, Georgia, and at Waynesburg College in Waynesburg, Pennsylvania. While he has many academic interests, his research concentrates on Victorian literature and culture. Dransfield has published articles in Victorian Poetry, Dickens Studies Annual, Prose Studies, and other journals, as well as presenting his work regularly at the Victorians Institute Conference.

Dr. John is the interim associate provost and an associate professor of politics at Southern Virginia. He joined the faculty in fall 2007 and currently contributes to the politics program as well as the core curriculum. Prior to joining the faculty at Southern Virginia, John graduated summa cum laude from Hampden-Sydney College in 2000. In January 2008, he earned his doctorate in political theory and comparative politics from University of Notre Dame, with a dissertation on law and morality in Hegel’s political philosophy.

Cameron Crowther graduated with a Juris Doctorate from Washington and Lee in 2015. While in law school he was the Submissions Editor of the German Law Journal, the recipient of the H. Crim Peck Memorial Scholarship, the President of the W&L J. Reuben Clark Law Society, and President of the Humanitarian Law Society. Crowther was raised in Las Vegas, Nevada and served a LDS mission in Costa Rica. He volunteers in human rights advocacy and international development in Nepal where he lived for part of 2013.

Community members and Southern Virginia faculty, staff, and students are invited to attend campus forums and devotionals each Friday morning at 11 a.m. in the Stoddard Center. Recordings of past forum and devotional speeches may be accessed on svu.edu.