Thank you to everyone who joined us on April 22 for the 2023 Research Day!

Congratulations to the competition winners below!

Faculty Competition: Dr. Michael Mickler
Student Competition: Savjola Konja

We invite you to watch the recording of the program here.

Below, you may view the submissions of all the competition finalists.

Faculty Competition

Dr. Drissa Kone, Associate Professor of Conflict Resolution and Ministry
Reconciling the Tension Between Sovereignty and Humanitarian Intervention in the International Legal Order

Dr. Michael Mickler, Distinguished Professor of Historical Studies
Five Lessons from Early Christianity for Unificationists

Student Competition

James Edgerly, Student in the Master of Arts in Religious Studies Program
A Solution to the Korean Question: A Neutral Reunified Korea

Christopher Kenedy, Student in the Master of Arts in Peace Studies Program
The Impact of Media on Attitudes towards Peace Initiatives

Savjola Konja, Student in the Master of Arts in Religious Studies Program
Discovering ‘Me’ While Learning About Love (10th grade)

Myoga Molisho, Student in the Master of Arts in Peace Studies Program
China-India Conflict, Is the End Near?

Bakytbek Toktorov, Student in the Master of Arts in Peace Studies Program
Ethiopia Conflict

Non-Competitive Category

James Fleming, Charles A. Dana Professor of Science, Technology, and Society, Emeritus, at Colby College, and 2023 UTS Research Day Judge
Climate, Cosmos, and Causation: James Croll’s Harmonization of Science and Religion

Thomas Ward, Professor of Peace and Development
Is the United States of America establishing an Official “Religion” of the State?

Judges

Dr. James R. Fleming

Jim Fleming is the Charles A. Dana Professor of Science, Technology, and Society, Emeritus, at Colby College. He has earned degrees in astronomy (B.S. Penn State University), atmospheric science (M.S. Colorado State University) and history (Ph.D. Princeton University). He graduated from the UTS Divinity Program in 1982.

Jim has earned a national and international reputation as a leading scholar in the history and public policy dimensions of the atmospheric sciences. Current research projects include “James Croll as a Cosmic Thinker” and “The Anthropocene and the Deocene: A Bigger Big History.”

Jim is a Fellow of the American Meteorological Society and a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). He also received the Eduard Brückner Award for interdisciplinary climate research, but his greatest honor is earning a CheonBo Award in 2021 (with Miyoko Fleming).

Prof. William Lay

Prof. William D. Lay is an attorney and Former Director of the School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Bridgeport, where he also served as Founding Chair of the Criminal Justice and Human Security graduate and undergraduate programs. He also served as President of the University of Bridgeport’s Faculty Council.

He is a graduate of Columbia Law School, where he was senior editor of the Columbia Law Review and a Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar (all semesters). He clerked for Judge Joseph W. Bellacosa of the New York Court of Appeals, and practiced law for twelve years at the Fried Frank and Skadden Arps firms in New York City, before opening his own law office in 2005.

Prof. Lay has authored published articles on International Law and the South China Sea Disputes (in the Harvard Asia Quarterly) and the Comfort Women Controversy (in East Asia); In 2019 he also co-authored Park Statue Politics on Comfort Women Memorials in the U.S. (E-International Relations Publishing), which was #1 in books of this category on Amazon.com for much of 2019.

Mrs. Lynn Walsh

Lynn Walsh taught Sociology and Behavioral Science courses for over 15 years at the University of Bridgeport and Mercy College including Human Sexual Behavior, Gender Role Dynamics, Approaches to Parenting, Marriage Enrichment, Family Issues Today, and Marriage and Relationship Education.

She has been teaching as an Adjunct Lecturer at the Unification Theological Seminary for over ten years. Lynn is the Director of the Universal Peace Federation's Office of the Family and represents UPF at the UN. Lynn serves on the Executive Committee of the NGO Committee on the Family, NY at the United Nations and served two terms as the Co-chair from 2014 to 2018.

Earlier in her career she was an adolescent and family therapist at Fair Oaks Psychiatric Hospital in New Jersey and a couples’ counselor for the Blessed Family Department in New York for many years. Lynn is certified to teach numerous relationship education programs. Her publications include the chapters “The Family and Eradicating Violence against Women” in Family Capital and the Sustainable Development Goals, “Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment” in The Family and Achieving the MDGs, and "Intergenerational Solidarity: The Springboard for Societal Well-Being" in Family Futures, as well as numerous articles for UPF International. She and her husband, Dr. Thomas Walsh, have two sons and two granddaughters.

Dr. Thomas Walsh

A 1979 graduate of Unification Theological Seminary, Dr. Walsh went on to earn his Ph.D. at Vanderbilt University’s School of Religion where he specialized in the study of Religion and Ethics.

Since his graduation, Dr. Walsh has taught courses at a number of colleges and universities as well as at Unification Theological Seminary.

As he became more involved with the academic and ecumenical activities of the Unification movement in the 1990s, he also continued to teach on a part-time basis in higher education for many years. Dr. Walsh has worked closely with UTS Co-Founders Rev Sun Myung Moon and Dr. Hak Ja Han Moon in the establishment and in the leadership of the Universal Peace Federation (UPF) where he serves as International Chair. UPF holds General Consultative Status with the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC).

Dr Walsh has edited more than twenty books and publications for the Universal Peace Federation and he serves as Executive Editor of Dialogue & Alliance, an academic journal indexed by the American Theological Library Association.