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Dr. Michael Hickey Elected to Florida Space Grant Consortium Leadership

Mike Hickey Daytona Beach, Fla., April 28, 2009 -- Dr. Michael Hickey, associate dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at Embry-Riddle’s Daytona Beach campus, was recently elected to a one-year term as associate director of the Florida Space Grant Consortium (FSGC).

The Consortium supports the expansion and diversification of Florida's space industry by providing grants, scholarships, and fellowships to students and educators involved in Florida higher education.

FSGC is composed of 17 top public and private colleges and universities in Florida, all of the state’s 28 community colleges, the Astronaut Memorial Foundation, the Higher Education Consortium for Math and Sciences, Kennedy Space Center, and the Orlando Science Center.

“Mike is a highly regarded administrator and researcher whose new role with the Florida Space Grant Consortium reflects Embry-Riddle’s continuing leadership in securing the future of Florida’s aerospace industry,” said Dr. William Grams, dean of Embry-Riddle’s College of Arts and Sciences.

Dr. Hickey also serves on the board of directors of Space Florida, a public-private partnership of leaders in government, education, military, and business established by the Florida Legislature to develop and promote the state’s aerospace resources.

A professor of physics, Dr. Hickey has published approximately 50 papers in peer-reviewed journals describing numerical simulations of acoustic-gravity waves in the terrestrial and planetary atmospheres, and has received almost $4 million in funding for his research programs. He was previously a contractor at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center for several years, providing expertise on the upper atmosphere environment.

Dr. Hickey received the Embry-Riddle Outstanding Researcher of the Year Award in 2005, and two years later he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Meteorological Society. He is a member of the American Geophysical Union and the American Meteorological Society.

Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, the world’s largest, fully accredited university specializing in aviation and aerospace, offers more than 30 degree programs in its colleges of Arts and Sciences, Aviation, Business, and Engineering, educating more than 34,000 students annually in undergraduate and graduate programs. Doctoral programs in aviation and in engineering physics are pending approval by the Commission on Colleges of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS) for the University to offer programs at the doctoral level. Embry-Riddle educates students at residential campuses in Prescott, Ariz., and Daytona Beach, Fla., through the Worldwide Campus at more than 130 campus centers in the United States, Europe, Canada, and the Middle East, and through online learning. For more information, visit www.embryriddle.edu.