Experts on anything from flirting to severe thunderstorms can be found on the NIU Experts Guide Web site.

The guide is a listing of campus experts, mostly faculty and some staff, said Melanie Magara, assistant vice president of Public Affairs. It’s there for students, the media and anyone else who needs information.

The site, www.experts.niu.edu, can be searched in three ways: by searching through the list of areas of expertise, the list of academic departments or by doing a keyword search.

When a category is chosen, a list of experts will come up. The name of the expert, contact information and his or her specialty is provided.

“NIU has a tremendous depth in terms of faculty expertise on many subjects,” Magara said.

Public Affairs is adding new categories to the site constantly because faculty research interests grow and evolve.

“It was printed originally, but we took it totally online about two years ago,” Magara said.

Jennice O’Brian, communications manager for electronic media, said the printed version was about 76 pages long.

“We went online because it is so much easier to keep up-to-date,” she said.

Professors on the Web site typically are chosen through the department heads, Magara said.

“Sometimes a faculty member will come to us,” she said. “Other times, we will learn what a faculty member is an expert in when we are working with them on a news story,” she said.

Communication professor David Henningsen is considered an expert on gender issues. His specialty is sexual harassment, flirting and group and jury decision-making.

He is an expert in these areas because he also is an attorney and has done extensive research and reading on these topics, he said.

Geography professor Mace Bentley is an expert in meteorology who specializes in severe thunderstorms and weather-related hazards.

“My Ph.D. research was on these topics, so I continued with it,” he said. “My new research is on better identifying the aftermath of storms on people and property.”

Both professors said they have been contacted through the experts guide, but only a couple of times and only by journalists.

“I’ve been contacted by newspaper reporters once or twice, but that’s all so far,” Bentley said.