Our next staff member we are highlighting is our awesome Library Director, Hal Bright. He has been with ATSU for over 12 years.
Position title: University Library Director and ATSU-ASDOH/CCPA Liaison Librarian
What made you want to work in libraries? I worked in libraries through my university years and found that I loved helping people.
What do you like most about your job and about working for ATSU? I love working with the students and faculty about all the subjects they are studying. The breadth of subject interests keeps surprising me.
What is a fun job you had before ATSU? I was an English teacher at a Japanese Middle School
What is a fun/unique/exciting tidbit to know about you, or how do you spend your free time? I have three more states to meet my 50 state travel goal. I have to visit Arkansas, Alaska and North Dakota. South Dakota, too, depending how you are measuring.
In partnership with the Arizona Dental Foundation, A.T. Still University-Arizona School of Dentistry & Oral Health (ATSU-ASDOH) hosted the 2025 Give Kids A Smile (GKAS) event on Feb. 28, 2025, at the University’s Mesa, Arizona, dental clinic, where over 400 uninsured and at-risk children received free dental care.
ATSU-ASDOH students, faculty, alumni, and local volunteer dentists provided screenings, preventive care, and education on proper dental hygiene to children from five Mesa Public Schools elementary schools, as well as walk-in patients from the community.
Beyond dental treatments, ATSU-ASDOH students also organized an outdoor carnival, where they set up carnival games and face painting for the pediatric patients after they received their care.
The GKAS program was established nationally by the American Dental Association (ADA) in 2003, and provides free oral healthcare for underserved children with a goal to ensure access to quality oral healthcare for all.
Check out photos from this year’s event below!
A.T. Still University’s (ATSU) Office of Diversity & Inclusion will host the fourth annual GPS Golf Tournament, supporting the University’s Graduate Health Professions Scholarship (GPS) fund, at 7:30 a.m. on Saturday, April 5, 2025, at Superstition Springs Golf Club in Mesa, Arizona.
The GPS is designed to support students who are pursuing degrees in healthcare fields including medicine, dentistry, and more, accentuating the University’s unique mission of service and leadership in whole person healthcare. The scholarship is awarded to students based on their academic achievements, financial need, and commitment to their profession.
Tournament entry fee is $175 per player, and includes lunch, greens fee, golf cart, practice balls and driving range access, and golf tees. The event will include a silent auction, raffles, prize drawings, as well as awards, trophies, and plaques for various achievements by tournament participants. All proceeds will go toward ATSU’s GPS fund.
For more information on the tournament, to register, or to explore sponsorship opportunities, visit atsu.edu/gps-golf.
“This program has reminded me of the importance of taking a patient-centered approach to the care I provide, allowing me to consider the patient’s best interest with an evidence-based approach,” she said.
The MSAT program educates students through core foundations, such as clinical decision-making, that empower them to drive innovation and address real-world challenges. Completed fully online, the program also offers maximum flexibility, allowing students to complete the program in one or two years.
For Testani, who anticipates completing her MSAT in December 2025, the program’s flexibility was a key factor in her decision to enroll.
“I didn’t have to put the start of my career on pause to pursue a higher education,” she said. “Being able to work while continuing my education has been a major benefit. An online major has allowed for a lot of flexibility in when I complete my coursework, allowing me to better balance my education, work, and family.”
For athletic trainers considering the next steps in their education, the MSAT program ensures graduates are equipped to address the dynamic challenges of the practice. The program’s curriculum emphasizes the integration of advanced clinical knowledge with practical application.
“Through research assignments I have been able to stay up to date on the current evidence. Through courses such as Quality Improvement and Patient Safety, I have been able to identify areas in my own practice that I can change and refine to provide the best possible care,” Testani said.
“In many of the courses, all of the weekly modules are available ahead of time, so I am able to plan around when I will have a busy work week (such as when I may be traveling with a team) and get ahead on an assignment.”
Additionally, the program’s strong emphasis on professional development enables students to apply lessons immediately in their clinical practice and network with the broader athletic training community.
Looking ahead, Testani said, “With a masters degree, I will have broader career opportunities and this program has helped provide me with networking opportunities. I will be able to continue my professional growth after completing this program as having a masters degree will open up more opportunities for me, with the possibility of pursuing a Doctor of Athletic Training (DAT) if I wish to.”
Carbajal, who serves as the Student Occupational Therapy Association (SOTA) pelvic floor special interest group lead, organized the event, while Dr. Shearon led the session, guiding students through a variety of yoga techniques.
“I have a special and personal interest in lymphedema management so this session was specific to initiating lymph flow while working our pelvic floor and other muscles,” Carbajal said.
Selected by the American Association of Orthodontists (AAO) Board of Trustees, Dr. Park will succeed Rolf Behrents DDS, MS, PhD, who has held the position since 2013. AJO-DO is the official journal of the AAO and is the leading resource for peer-reviewed orthodontic research.
Dr. Park served as deputy editor of both AAO journals from 2020-23 and has been the publications’ deputy editor-in-chief since 2023. He is also the editor-in-chief emeritus of the Journal of the Pacific Coast Society of Orthodontists, and he has served on the editorial boards of numerous international peer-reviewed orthodontic and dental journals, including The Angle Orthodontist and Seminars in Orthodontics. Additionally, Dr. Park is the 2024-25 president of the American Board of Orthodontics (ABO), and served as past chair of the ABO Written Examination Committee and the ABO Policy Committee.
Throughout his career, Dr. Park has delivered more than 160 invited lectures internationally, published more than 410 scientific and clinical articles in peer-reviewed orthodontic and dental journals, and has edited three books and written more than 30 book chapters. He was a founding member of the AAO Committee on Conferences and Meetings and past president of the Arizona State Orthodontic Association.
Did you know that a significant and expanding benefit available to all ATSU faculty, students, and staff are the library’s agreements with publishers to ensure our researchers are able to publish their work in open access formats for free? This initiative underscores ATSU’s commitment to fostering the widest possible dissemination of scholarly research and advancing the principles of open science.
Our previous agreements included esteemed publishers like Cambridge University Press, Springer, and Wiley, offering ATSU affiliates valuable opportunities for open access publication within their renowned journal portfolios. Building on our commitment to expanding these opportunities, we are excited to announce the addition of a significant new partnership that began in February.
Thanks to ATSU’s active membership in the Statewide California Electronic Library Consortium (SCELC), under the guidance of Library Director Hal Bright, who serves on the SCELC board, we have successfully secured an agreement for open access publishing with Oxford University Press. This pivotal collaboration is the result of a concerted effort involving SCELC, the University of California System (UC), and the majority of California State University (CSU) campuses. Together, these institutions have forged a comprehensive four-year transformative open access agreement with Oxford University Press, ensuring that ATSU researchers can contribute to and benefit from the open access movement. This agreement signifies a major step forward in democratizing access to scholarly research. For a more detailed understanding of this agreement, we encourage you to explore the official announcement on the SCELC website.
To facilitate your access to these valuable resources, we have meticulously compiled a list of all our open access publishing agreements. This list provides details and links to the specific journals that qualify for fee-free open access publication under each publisher’s agreement. This resource is designed to streamline the publication process for our researchers, ensuring they can readily identify and utilize the available open access options. We encourage all ATSU faculty, students, and staff to take full advantage of these expanding opportunities to share their groundbreaking research with the global academic community.
We hope that you will consider these agreements the next time you would like to publish your work. If you have any questions, please reach out to your liaison librarian.
“I dream of giving back to the profession that has provided so much for me,” Saunders said. “My greatest hope is that I can use the knowledge and skills built here to invest into the future of athletic training.”
Through ATSU’s Doctor of Athletic Training (DAT) program, Saunders is one step closer to achieving this goal, and is already applying what she’s learning in real time.
“I chose to pursue my DAT at ATSU because I wanted to advance my skills while continuing my clinical practice. Having the ability to learn while navigating real-world professional practice helped me refine my skills quickly and effectively,” she said.
As a working clinician, Saunders sought a program that was flexible, accessible, and effective. The DAT program’s convenience of online learning allows students to tailor their education while gaining the advanced skills necessary to lead in the athletic training profession.
Throughout her time in the program, Saunders said, “I have become a skilled communicator and a scholarly, informed clinician. It has also inspired me to expand my career and research interests in clinical education.”
The comprehensive online curriculum in the DAT program emphasizes critical thinking at the PhD level, while also allowing students to bring their unique needs and challenges into the online coursework.
In addition to the ability to apply lessons immediately to the work setting, the program provides students interaction with a variety of instructors, offering them exposure to a variety of teaching styles, healthcare- and education-related backgrounds, and experiences. Saunders said she is grateful for the expertise and support of program instructors and staff.
“The learning experience cultivated at ATSU is rooted in student-centeredness,” she said.
“The faculty and staff truly care about their students. Moreover, they clearly view their students beyond their scholarly roles. I never once felt that I was ‘just a number’ or that my worth in this program was defined by my grades.
“The faculty and staff in the DAT program perceive their students as people first, and that is evident in the unwavering support they provide. I frequently felt as though my professors saw potential in me that I was not able to see in myself…yet.”
To meet his professional goals of conducting educational research and moving into an administrative role in academia, Kelley Benjamin Cooper, MS, sought a program that could provide the necessary knowledge and skills to achieve these aspirations while offering maximum flexibility.
“ATSU’s online EdD degree aligned exactly with my academic interests,” Cooper said. “I have an educational background in nursing and anatomy, and many of my students are pursuing health professional careers. This program allows me to learn how to better serve my students while also preparing me to conduct educational research, which is a professional goal of mine.”
Cooper has a bachelor’s of nursing degree from Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center School of Nursing and a master’s in anatomy education from Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.
As an educator, Cooper understood the importance of lifelong learning and knew that expanding his knowledge through a doctoral program would require finding a program that provided the appropriate work-life balance.
“Leaving my professional job was not an option, so an online program with the convenience of completing coursework at an individual pace was the obvious right choice for me,” he said.
Designed for practicing clinicians, healthcare educators, leaders, and directors who are passionate about healthcare education and teaching others, the 55-credit hour program prepares students to effectively educate and train the next generation of healthcare professionals.
“The courses I have taken so far have shown me the importance of careful course and program assessment and evaluation,” Cooper said. “Each week, I learn something new that I can quickly incorporate into my professional role as an educator.”
In addition to the program’s asynchronous curriculum, Cooper said he has also benefited from the support of ATSU-CGHS’ dedicated faculty and staff.
“All of the professors leave personalized feedback on course assignments and provide helpful learning resources for each course learning module. The staff, including academic advisors and deans, have made themselves available and open to interacting with students,” he said.
Our next staff member we are highlighting is our 3D Guru, Debra Loguda-Summers, who has been with ATSU for 24 years and the library for eight years.
Position title: Public Service and 3D Print Service Manager
What made you want to work in libraries? I moved from being the curator at the International Museum of Osteopathic Medicine to the library for a change of pace.
What do you like most about your job and about working for ATSU? I love using 3D printers and software to print learning tools for students and working with the faculty on their research projects. I enjoy interacting with my fellow library staff, visitors, and others on all the campuses.
What is a fun job you had before ATSU? I have had many of the years including working at our local TV and radio stations, but I think besides working for the Museum, the next job I really enjoyed was working for Hanger Prosthetics/Orthotics. I was the office manager and I also did mastectomy fittings and other minor adjustments to orthotics or braces when needed.
What is a fun/unique/exciting tidbit to know about you, or how do you spend your free time? I am the youngest of 10 children and a fraternal twin (my brother was seven minutes older). I love to cook and read, and my husband and I love to travel when we can. We currently have two cats: Abigail Louise (17 years old) and Pywacket (1 year old) Pywacket’s name comes from an old Jimmy Stewart movie, Bell, Book and Candle.
