What’s New at UVenus:

• Sarah Emily Duff at UVenus at the Guardian with Dispatches From South Africa: Making the Case for Vocational Training [2].
• Liana Silva at UVenus at the Guardian with My Graduate School Journey - Eight Years On [3]
• If you missed our recent #femlead [4] Twitter chat on Public Engagement, Higher Education, and Women’s Leadership, led by Mary Churchill [5], you can catch up by reading through the archives on Storify [6].

What’s New With Our Writers:

• Dr. Liana Silva successfully defended her dissertation on April 23rd, 2012 at Binghamton University.
• Anamaria Dutceac Segesten participated with a paper on religion and nationalism at the 17th Convention of the Association for the Study of Nationalities, Columbia University, New York
• Melonie Fullick joined the McMaster Public Intellectuals Project [7] (Twitter page is here [8]) working on social media management and research/editing.
• Janni Aragon participated in a presentation about Twitter Outside and Inside the Classroom; gave a presentation on the 2012 Presidential Election to Silver Threads, a local Active Seniors organization; and co-organized-Breathe Now, a women's conference.  Janni is finishing up her first year as the Chair of the Academic Women’s Caucus and looks forward to next year’s array of event.
• Afshan Jafar was a speaker at TEDxConnecticutCollege [9], April 14, 2012. The theme for the event was “Rethinking Progress” and she spoke on the subject of “Women’s Bodies”. Link to videos coming soon!

Our Writers At Other Blogs:

• Melonie Fullick wrote about the norms of classroom behaviour that make “introverts” and “extroverts” [10] stand out; she also posted a new Prezi based on her TEDx talk, “Building paths to impact: Academics using social media [11]”.
• Elizabeth Lewis Pardoe rotated through Motherhood 360 [12] and placed the current debate on Republican Mothers [13] in historical perspective.
• Liana Silva posted at Words Are My Game [14] about making it to her Dissertation Defense Day [15].
• Bonnie Stewart explored the unbearable lightness of being...digital [16], framed Bourdieu’s concept of distinction in terms of social media [17] and wished somebody important a happy sixth birthday [18].
• Anamaria Dutceac Segesten on the Danish Flag Controversy or the Importance of Political Symbols [19] at her blog European Political Symbols and Communication [20]
• Lee Skallerup Bessette wrote about Degrassi and Abortion over at BitchFlicks [21].
• Janni Aragon wrote about the importance of reflecting about the term [22], catching her breath [23], needing to take time out for yourself [24], and thinking about reviewing student work [25].

Coming Up:

• Don’t miss the next #Femlead [4] Twitter chat, on Academic Leadership Opportunities for Graduate Students, led by Bonnie Stewart (@bonstewart) on Tuesday, May 8, 2012 from 2-230pm EDT.
• Bonnie Stewart is developing and teaching a week-long course (May 7-11) on Digital Identities in “Mother of All MOOCs”: #Change11: Education, Learning, and Technologies Massive Open Online Course [26]