Dr. McBrien was recently recognized for her outstanding research in the field of engaged scholarship by the Florida Campus Compact. Over the past 3 years, McBrien has done research on the war-affected town of Lira, Uganda. The people in this Northern Ugandan area suffered from over 20 years of war with the Josephy Kony’s Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), forcing most residents into ill-equipped internally displaced people’s camps. “Research is critically important in higher education, both in serving the global community of scholars and policymakers and in serving our students,” McBrien said. “It is what separates teaching and learning in community colleges and state colleges from research universities.”