Highlander Highlights: Week of Aug. 24, 2026

Esports Center comes online

With a total of 80 gaming stations, a competition arena, media space and team rooms - not to mention 7 ½ miles of wire to hook up cool features yet to come - Radford University's new Esports Center is open for business and pleasure in Peters Hall 121 on the main campus.

During and after Club Fair today (Aug. 28), esports staff will offer tours of the facility, including a few areas that aren't quite ready yet and will be closed during normal operation. "We're going to have extra staff, like our student staff, available to be taking people in one-on-one and in small groups, really explaining and letting people put their hands on things," said Doug Benedict, associate director of esports.

And for those interested in taking their games up a notch, team tryouts will take place this weekend, allowing students to compete for a spot on esports teams and experience the new facility firsthand.

While the center serves as a home for Radford's competitive esports teams, Benedict said community remains at the heart of the program. The new facility should offer ample opportunities for everyone from casual gamers to aspiring esports professionals.

"Gaming is for everybody," Benedict said. "We know that almost all college students play some kind of video game, whether it's on their phone, whether it's on a console, whether it's on a PC. That's the big reason we wanted to build."

The Esports Center will be open noon to midnight daily and remains free for students. Students can access the community space by swiping their university IDs at the front desk.

Benedict says he expects the center to be fully complete closer to Homecoming, with additional design elements, virtual reality and racing simulator equipment on the way.

Assistant professor's book looks at educator autonomy

What happens when educators are given the tools - and the authority - to solve problems within their own schools?

That question is at the heart of a new book co-authored by Maxwell Yurkofsky, assistant professor of education at Radford.

"A Chance to Solve Their Own Problems: Inside the New Methods Seeking to Remake Public Schools," published by Harvard University Press, explores emerging approaches to educational improvement and the growing movement to give educators a greater role in shaping solutions.

The book, released Aug. 11, examines four approaches to improving public education: improvement science, design thinking, design-based implementation research and the data wise improvement process. Between 2017 and 2020, Yurkofsky and his co-authors studied how the methods were adopted across five school districts in North America. The approaches gave educators greater agency to understand problems and develop solutions within their own schools and districts.

Yurkofsky said the research found that successful applications of the methods were "less industrial and more relational," recognizing that education requires flexibility and adaptation.

One key lesson, he said, is the importance of "holding data lightly" - using data as a tool for inquiry rather than a recipe to be followed. Successful users of the methods employed considerable judgment: applying the right method to the right problem, feeling out how to bound the problem and discerning valuable measures and sustainable solutions.

Addressing burnout among nurse educators

Burnout among nurse educators is an increasing concern, with implications for the future of the nursing workforce. About 85% of nursing faculty report moderate to high levels of burnout, which can stem from demanding teaching loads, research expectations, committee work, faculty shortages and the difficulty of maintaining work-life balance.

In a recent American Nurse Journal article, Laurie Dellosso, assistant professor of nursing at Radford University, explores the factors contributing to nurse educator burnout and offers evidence-based approaches to address it, underscoring the importance of supporting the emotional, mental and spiritual well-being of nursing faculty as they prepare the next generation of nurses.

We Are Radford winner for August 2026

The We Are Radford employee recognition program is a monthly honor recognizing an individual whose daily interactions with students and colleagues represent the best of the Radford University experience. The winner for August is Jessy Rose '22, office manager for the Office of Marketing and Communication.

"Jessy always has a smile on her face," her nominator wrote. "She is engaging and supportive of the student workers in Marketing and Communication. Jessy is eager to help at events and interact with the campus community. She knows the university well, serving both as a graduate and employee."

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