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H9N2 Avian Flu Strain Has Pandemic Potential Back To School Experts - 2008 Edition UM Wins International Robot Competition UM's Fall Semester to Focus on All Aspects Of War |
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Highlighted News Items, August 15
College Presidents Seek Debate on Drinking Age
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Maryland Moments, August, 2001
Towards Being Best:
Rankings, Numbers, New Programs, Events
Maryland is working with the government of Uzbekistan to create the Central Asian country's first virtual university. The goal of the Virtual University of Maryland is to use distance-learning techniques to bring an American-style agricultural-extension system to the former Soviet republic. The online university would make existing Maryland courses available through distance learning but would also create new courses specifically for Uzbek students, according to Don Riley, vice president and chief information officer.
The university is the academic coordinator of a agreement between Global Telecommunications, a branch of Lockheed Martin, and Kazakhtelecom to wire all Kazakh educational establishments with Internet and e-mail facilities. There are 160 higher educational institutions and 8,600 secondary schools in the former Soviet Republic.
The university brings educators and policy makers from national to local levels together for a two-day brain trust focused on the issue of the ever-broadening minority achievement gap. Achievement - A Shared Imperative, is set for Sept. 13-14, and will be hosted by the Maryland Institute for Minority Achievement and Urban Education and co-sponsored by the Maryland State Department of Education and the Maryland Higher Education Commission, with corporate support from Lockheed Martin.
The Motion Sciences Organization was launched in August as a 21st century advanced international physics research and development organization. Scientists joined from NASA, Lockheed Martin, MIT, Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, Enrico Fermi Institute at the University of Chicago, the University of Maryland an Princeton University.
Faculty, Staff, Student Achievement
Converge magazine picked 30 individuals and one organization as "shapers of the future." Among the eight higher education choices is Allison Druin, assistant professor of human development, faculty member of the Human Computer Interaction Laboratory, and part-time visiting professor at the Center for User Oriented IT Design (CID), Royal Institute of Sweden.
Making the list of most powerful women in the nation's capital are: Susan Farr, director of the Clarice Smith Center for the Performing Arts at Maryland; Susan Schwab, dean of the School of Public Affairs: and Donna Brazile, adjunct professor at the Burns Academy of Leadership.
Robert Henry won the New Orleans International Piano Competition over runners-up from Russia and Belarus. His 50 minute concert, featuring works by Debussy and Godowsky, won a $12,000 first prize and an engagement with the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra.
President C. D. Mote Jr. was presented with an honorary doctorate of engineering from The Ohio State University at its summer commencement. A former doctoral student of President Mote's at the University of California, Berkeley recommended him for the honor.
Torney-Purta Recognized for Solving Social, Political Problems
Judith Torney-Purta, professor of human development, receives the Nevitt Sanford Award from the International Society for Political Psychology. The award honors exemplary achievement in creating knowledge that can be applied to solve social or political problems.
When Condoleeza Rice, President Bush's national security advisor, invited a select group of Middle East analysts to brainstorm solutions to the on-going tensions there, one of the guests was Shibley Telhami, Anwar Sadat Chair for Peace and Development.
Benjamin Barber, Kekst Professor of Civil Society, was named by the French government a "Chevalier dans l'Ordre des Palmes Academiques" (Knight in the Order of Academic Lauels). Barber's book "The Truth of Power: Intellectual Affairs in theClinton White House" is published this month.
Publishers Weekly gives "The Quest for Global Dominance," a book written by Vijay Govindarajan of Dartmouth College and Anil Gupta, professor of management and organization at the Smith School of Business, a "rousing" review. "In this rousing call to arms, the authors...lay out three persuasive reasons why corporations need to increase their global presence." August 6
Junior history major Peter Van Do is selected as one of the top 10 Asian Pacific American student leaders in the U.S. by aMagazine. English major Angela Lagdameo and government and politics major Cezar Lopez were selected to the top 10 a year ago.
Research: Significant Discoveries,Grants
A collaboration between the University of Maryland, NASA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the U.S. Forest Service is allowing U.S. firefighters and land managers to view wildfires and their aftermath quickly and with better detail. The university and its federal partners are using NASA's Terra satellite and new streamlined processing methods to detect active fire locations and to provide images and maps of wildfires, a particularly valuable tool in the raging fires of the west.
Daniel Lathrop, associate professor of physics, and graduate research assistants Daniel Sisan and Woodrow Shew have contacted the campus fire marshal about their experiment to discover how the earth produces its magnetic field. They will compact 14 tons of sodium into a three-meter wide ball, heat it to 110 degrees, churn the resulting liquid and spin it seven times a second to mimic the Earth's rotation. Forutnately, the experiment will be encased in a metal box.
Outreach: Campus People Aiding The Community
A collaboration between the University of Maryland, NASA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the U.S. Forest Service is allowing U.S. firefighters and land managers to view wildfires and their aftermath quickly and with better detail. The university and its federal partners are using NASA's Terra satellite and new streamlined processing methods to detect active fire locations and provide images and maps of wildfires, a particularly valuable tool in for tracking the raging fires of the West.
The university brings educators and policy makers from national to local levels together for a two-day brain trust focused on the issue of the ever-broadening minority achievement gap. "Achievement - A Shared Imperative," is set for Sept. 13-14, and will be hosted by the Maryland Institute for Minority Achievement and Urban Education and co-sponsored by the Maryland State Department of Education and the Maryland Higher Education Commission, with corporate support from Lockheed Martin.
Undergraduate Kelly Riordan worked with Catherine Fenselau, professor of chemistry and biochemistry, on breast cancer research this summer. Prepping for her time in the lab, she biked 330 miles from Raleigh to Washington on an AIDS ride in June.
Professor emeritus Francis Gouin of the department of natural resource sciences and landscape architecture performed treegrafts on plantings done by George Washington on his Mount Vernon estate. A total of 13 trees�two tulip poplars, two white ashes, a white mulberry, a hemlock and seven American hollies�will each have 50 duplicates grown, and those trees will be returned to Mount Vernon for planting.
The university is in the first year of a formal partnership with the National University of Rwanda to provide expertise to rebuild educational infrastructure wracked by civil war. Kelvin Wong, faculty research assistant in government and politics, directs the project. "Many Rwandans were lost in 1994 during the genocide that occurred there, and many of the teaching faculty at the university were killed or became refugees."
Newsmakers: University People Earning Media Attention
Professor emeritus Francis Gouin of the department of natural resource sciences and landscape architecture performed tree-grafts before electronic and print media on plantings done by George Washington on his Mount Vernon estate and gardens. A total of 13 trees�two tulip poplars, two white ashes, a white mulberry, a hemlock and seven American hollies�will each have 50 duplicates grown, and those trees will be returned to Mt. Vernon for planting.
Building for the Future
Watch Our Construction Dust
- Birthing buildings has become routine on campus, even big buildings, like the just-finished Clarice Smith Center for the Performing Arts ($120 million) or the rising basketball arena, the Comcast Center ($125 million), and its adjoining 6,000 car garage ($16.5 million). But there's more:
- Summer construction dust is coming from the chemistry building wing ($33 million), a computer sciences center ($8.5million), and a headquarters building for the Maryland Fire and Rescue Institute ($5 million).
- Getting ready to rise in the not too distant future are the Samuel Riggs IV Alumni Center ($21 million), a parking garage at the south end of campus ($18 million), an engineering/applied science building ($51 million), a research greenhouse ($18 million), an addition to the campus health center ($14 million), and a football team building ($5 million).
- More than 32 projects with a collective price tag of about $430 million have been or will be launched between the years 2000 and 2005.
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Information provided by the Office of University CommunicationsEmail University Communications at emailum@umd.edu