| < CLOSE WINDOW > |
November 1, 2006 |
||||
|
On Oct. 27, Governor Jon M. Huntsman, Jr. named Katharine Coles as Utah’s new State Poet Laureate. Coles, an associate professor of English at the U, has published two novels and three collections of poetry. Her poems and short stories have appeared in numerous periodicals and anthologies. Coles has a long history of professional and community service, and has received several awards for her work. Her most recent collection of poems, Fault (Red Hen Press), will be published in 2008. “Katharine’s literary achievements and community service in teaching and writing are a tremendous asset as she helps bring poetry and the literary arts to the people of Utah,” said Governor Huntsman. “The arts are an essential element to investing in Utah’s future. We are grateful to Katharine for her representation of Utah’s fine artists.” Coles says one reason this is significant for her is that she is a “home-grown poet, from Salt Lake, and so my roots in this place are very connected both to my poems and to my feeling about this position.” She will serve a five-year term and act as the leading public advocate for the literary arts in Utah. Community groups, arts organizations, and educators are welcome to invite the Poet Laureate to speak at events throughout the state. The following poem, Numbers, was written for inclusion in Extended Vision, visual artist Anna Campbell Bliss’s installation in the Leroy Cowles Mathematics Building on the U campus, and can be seen with the rest of the installation there. The poem will be included in Coles’ forthcoming collection, Fault. Numbers Uncoupling and recoupling along a line Dead-broke as syntax, clauses so declined Equation tooled to figure life. Amount For more information on Katherine Coles, check out her faculty page here.
While fighting with the U. S. Army in Europe during World War II, Elbert L. Day, from Bountiful, Utah survived five wounds, including gunshots to the head. Left for dead on a battlefield in France, he lay unconscious for several days until he was rescued. Once in the hands of skilled surgeons, he underwent three operations before they could extract the bullets that had penetrated his skull. His doctor placed five bullets in Day’s hand. “I took them out of your head,” he said. The resulting physical damage left Day unable to walk or talk but in time, he did recover. For his actions, Day received a Purple Heart with four Oak Leaf Clusters. Elbert Day is one of 12 Utah veterans who will be honored by the University at its annual Veterans Day commemoration program on Friday, Nov. 10. A full dress military ceremony will be presented at 11 a.m. in the Olpin Union Ballroom by nearly 100 cadets and midshipmen from the military science ROTC programs. This year’s honorees represent service in World War II, the Korean War, and Vietnam and were selected from over 50 nominations submitted by Utah citizens. In addition to the ceremony, a panel discussion, Submarines in Battle, will be held in the Union’s Panorama East room from 8:45 to 10:15 a.m. The panel will include Bob Peterson, (Polaris and missile submarines); Jerry Hernandez (WWII diesel electric submarines); and Archie Andrews (fast attack submarines). Then at 1 p.m., a 1940s USO Tour big band show will be presented in the Union Ballroom. For more information, visit www.veteransday.utah.edu or call 581-6773.
Karen Dace to Leave the U Associate Vice President for Diversity Karen Dace has taken a new position as deputy chancellor for diversity, access, and equity at the University of Missouri-Kansas City. She will leave the U in February. Dace has been at the U for more than 16 years, the last seven as associate vice president for diversity. “The decision to leave was one of the most difficult of my career,” she says. “While the work has often been arduous, it has always been important and rewarding. I count myself fortunate to have had the opportunity to serve in this capacity.” Dace is confident that the person replacing her will continue to work for inclusion and social justice at the U. A search committee, headed by Ron Coleman and Ed Trujillo, is underway to find her replacement.
As
of Nov. 14 the Friday conference on ethics has been cancelled. Thursday and Friday,
Nov. 16-17 What are the issues of ethics in the public sector? Will governments be more democratic and have more integrity if they are more transparent? What prevents and what helps transparency in public administration? These are some of the questions that will be addressed at a conference on ethics Nov. 16-17 at the Eccles Health Sciences Education Building. Robert Huefner, a professor in the Department of Political Science, will open the conference with the Dalmas Nelson Distinguished Lecture on Ethics & Law titled I Know I’m Wrong, so How Can I be Right? Public Administration, Democracy, and Transparency (free and open to the public) Thursday night at 6:30 p.m. Friday’s agenda includes sessions with titles such as GRAMA, What Big Eyes You Have! and If it’s Transparent, Why isn’t it Clear? Participants include, among others, former Utah Governor Olene Walker, Salt Lake Tribune reporter Rebecca Walsh, and Steven Bloch, an attorney for the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance. For a complete schedule and registration information, visit www.cppa.utah.edu/ethics or call 581-6781.
Photo by Roger Tuttle Sendyour answer (be specific!) to FYI@ucomm.utah.edu by noon on Thursday, Nov. 2 for a chance to win two tickets to Three Mo’ Tenors on Nov. 17th at Kingsbury Hall. With a rhythmic blend of jazz, soul, gospel, Broadway, and the blues, this ensemble from Motown brings Detroit soul to Salt Lake City. The winner will be randomly selected from the pool of those submitting the correct answer. The winner will be listed in the next FYI News due out Nov. 15. Thanks to Kingsbury Hall for providing the prize! This contest is open to U of U faculty and staff only.
NWCCU
Accreditation Process From Oct. 9-11 the University went through the middle steps toward re-accreditation by the Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities (NWCCU). One previous step involved a self-assessment process culminating in a self-study document titled “The University of Utah in 2006,” available online at www.obia.utah.edu/2006Accred/index.php. The evaluation committee that visited the University consisted of 12 NWCCU members drawn from prominent universities in the West and was chaired by Larry Vanderhoef, chancellor of the University of California at Davis. Four committee members were assigned to areas that cross disciplinary boundaries: institutional mission and goals focusing on administration, financial planning and management, libraries and information resources, and student affairs. Eight team members were divided among our 15 disciplinary colleges. Each evaluator met with faculty, staff, and students and toured parts of campus. The committee chair also met with the Board of Trustees, the Commissioner of Higher Education in Utah, and the State Board of Regents. A draft of the accreditation report is being prepared and will include a set of commendations and recommendations for University action. A final report will be given to President Young when he attends a meeting of the Northwest commission in January 2007.
Last month, Baldomero “Toto” Olivera—a biologist who seeks new medications from the toxins of poisonous cone snails—won one of medicine’s top honors when he was named as a new member of the Institute of Medicine. The honor makes Olivera at least the 30th current or former U of U researcher to be elected to membership in one or more of the three groups under the umbrella organization known as the National Academies: the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering and the Institute of Medicine. University of
Utah Faculty in the National Academies • National Academy of Sciences: Anthropologist James O’Connell; geneticist Mario Capecchi; chemist Peter Stang, dean of the U’s College of Science; geologist-geochemist Thure Cerling; anthropologist Henry Harpending; anthropologist Kristen Hawkes; late anthropologist Jesse D. Jennings; chemist Cheves Walling; biochemist Sidney Velick; biologist John R. Roth; chemist Josef Michl; geneticist Ray White; late anthropologist Julian Steward; and anthropologist Jeremy Sabloff. • National Academy of Engineering: the late R. Peter King; Adel Sarofim; Sun Wang Kim; Gerald Stringfellow; Donald Dahlstrom; the late George Hill; Jan D. Miller; Milton E. Wadsworth; the late Thomas G. Stockham; John Herbst; Stephen C. Jacobsen; and Willem J. Kolff. • Institute of Medicine: Jacobsen and Kim (both also are members of the National Academy of Engineering), obstetrician-gynecologist Eli Adashi and medical informatics professors Homer R. Warner and Paul D. Clayton. A National Academies-Institute of Medicine news release about the new institute members is available at http://national-academies.org.
As director of the Center for Alzheimer’s Care, Imaging, and Research, Norman L. Foster says the disease, a common problem already, will become increasingly prevalent over the next few decades as the population in the United States ages. “This will be particularly true in the state of Utah,” he says. “Utah will have the greatest increase in the percentage of the population with Alzheimer’s disease over the next two decades—greater than any other state—and in our Intermountain West region, greater than any other region in the United States.” This is because Utah has one of the longest living and one of the fastest growing populations. “The elderly, who are the most at risk for the disease and related disorders, are among the highest percentage here in Utah, especially those over the age of 85,” he notes. “It is a significant health problem for the terrible toll it takes both on those who have the disease as well as family members and others who care for people with this disease.” In clarifying some of the medical terms, Foster says that, while dementia is a symptom, Alzheimer’s disease is the most common cause of that symptom. “Dementia is a decline in intellectual ability that becomes severe enough to effect a person’s ability to do everyday activities,” he says. “Alzheimer’s disease, the most common cause of dementia, begins gradually, usually with memory loss as the first symptom, and it remains the most prominent symptom throughout the illness.” Symptoms gradually go on to affect language and visual ability so that the patient has difficulty dressing and managing his or her own affairs. “We want to be able to identify this problem early so we can have more effective interventions and treatments,” adds Foster. Note: Norman L. Foster is a professor in the Department of Neurology, and senior investigator at The Brain Institute. To hear the entire interview, visit the U’s podcast site at www.utah.edu/podcast and click on Health Sciences. You can listen from your computer or download to your MP3 player.
•
VOTE! Proposition
Three KUED-7 Vote
Utah Debate: U.S. Senate Hinckley Forum:
Who won and why? •
Know Your U: History 101
•
Market your holiday gifts on campus •
Call for papers—Due Nov. 10 •
Winter Safety Tips
•
Frontiers of Science Lecture •
Senator Bennett to present briefing •
Faculty art exhibition reception •
First annual Utah primary care research conference •
Paul Taylor Dance Company •
Medal of Honor Rag •
Celebrate GIS Day •
Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA) Workshop for supervisors
I would like to comment on the forum presented by Mr. Laughlin McDonald on Oct. 12, 2006. His forum message was titled The Future of the Voting Rights Act: Democracy in Danger. Though I am pleased whenever people obey their inherent rights and exercises their right to vote, this lecture is a misnomer. We live in a republic. The only thing we embrace from democratic forms of government is our system for electing others to represent us in our government positions, period. It must be remembered that democracies in and of themselves are systems of government which are set up to fail from the beginning. This is why democracy has come to be known as the “demotic” government— demotic meaning“the rule of fools by fools.” This is straight from Greek translation, basically meaning that the demotic rule is the rule of ignorance masquerading as common sense. That is simply not how our government was set up. Unfortunately there has been a movement for over seventy years now to replace our republic with democratic rule. This simply will not do. Obviously there has been a widespread failure in our education process, or most everyone in this nation would be crying out against such vulgarities. This is not a rant concerning political parties, this is an informative opinion based upon the concepts and principles which were used to create this country, this republic. Political parties are a completely different animal and can only be discussed concerning those things which create differences between them. I felt this should be said, and as this is an institute of higher learning, I hope this may be addressed in a future issue, or printed for all to read. The people have a right to know, especially if they have been duped and shortchanged in their educational process. This is an election year and I encourage everyone to take this to heart and get out to vote.
|
||||
|
