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Maryland Moments, April, 2003 University Initiatives (Rankings, Awards, Numbers) With the release of the 2004 graduate school rankings, Maryland had 67 programs overall in the magazine's Top 25 rankings. Smith School of Business: No. 42 overall, up one spot from 2003 Specialties: Part-time MBA No. 11, up two spots; management No. 24, down one spot; business information systems No. 8, up one spot; entrepreneurship No. 14, up one spot Education: No. 21, same as 2003 Specialties: Counseling/personnel services No. 1 (same ranking), curriculum/instruction No. 11, up eight spots, educational psychology No. 10, up one spot, education policy No. 11 (same ranking), elementary education No. 11, up two spots, higher education administration No. 10, down one spot, secondary education No. 14, up two spots, special education No. 5 (same ranking) Clark School of Engineering: No. 16 overall, up three spots from 2003 Specialties: aerospace engineering, No. 10, up five spots; computer engineering No. 18 (same ranking) Health and Human Performance (Health Disciplines) Specialty: Community health No.12 (first time ranked) Agriculture and Natural Resources (Health Disciplines) Specialty: Veterinary medicine (Virginia-Maryland Regional College of Veterinary Medicine) No. 14, up three spots
The Smith School of Business was in the first tier of 12 schools in Entrepreneur Magazine's ranking of the best entrepreneurial programs. Those joining Smith included Harvard University, University of Pennsylvania (Wharton), Massachusetts Institute of Technology, University of California-Berkeley and Stanford University. The magazine noted the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and UM were the only schools rated in the Top 10 by both alumni and peers.
For the first time in five outings, Maryland Day saw appreciable rainfall. But that did not deter a huge audience from venturing out to College Park to see the diversity of academic riches offered by a major research university. The over 300 separate events enthralled, entertained and educated from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on the last Saturday of April.
The John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation awarded fellowships Ira Berlin, distinguished university professor of history (movement and place in African-American life, 1650-2000), and Richard Evan Schwartz, professor of mathematics (connections between real and complex hyperbolic discrete groups.)
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the National Wildlife Federation presented the university with awards for recent environmental achievements at a nationl greening conference co-hosted by UM. The EPA recognized the university for its new combined heat and power plant project. The plant, which replaces the old oil and gas-powered facility, will reduce the university's energy consumption by more than 30 percent. The NWF presented an award for the university's new Master Plan, which outlines how the university will develop aesthetically and ecologically over the next 17 years.
During the environmental conference co-hosted by UM and the National Wildlife Federation, the university dedicated a new rain gardens. Located beside a parking lot near the Comcast Center, the rain gardens will reduce the amount of runoff and filter out pollutants such as sediments, oil and metals from car brakes. They will also be used by university faculty for research and education.
Susan Schwab, dean of the School of Public Affairs, was nominated by President Bush to be first vice president of the Export-Import Bank of the United States. (Philip Merrill, for whom the Merrill School of Journalism is named, was sworn in as president and chairman of the Export-Import Bank in December.)
Recent data released by the Maryland Higher Education Commission indicate minority student graduation rates are increasing dramatically in the state's public colleges: African Americans earning graduate degrees are up by 63 percent compared to 1993; Hispanics are earning 64 percent more bachelor's degrees than a decade ago. Fifty-eight percent of African Americans who enroll graduate at the university (up from 49 percent from 2001), mirroring the state-wide average for all students. Society & Culture
The book, Generations of Captivity: A History of African-American Slaves, authored by professor of history Ira Berlin (ARHU), earned praise from both the New York Times and Washington Post. "Berlin, Distinguished University Professor at the University of Maryland, is arguably the foremost scholar of American slavery, and this compact volume offers an impressive overview of historic transformations and regional variations in the institution."
Charles Howell, curator of the Library of American Broadcasting, received a NEH grant of $98,585 for "Preserving and Improving Access to the Collections of the Library of American Broadcasting. Science & Technology
Sarah Tishkoff, assistant professor of biology, led DNA research that reported the "150,000-year-old female ancestor of every person on Earth may have lived in Tanzania or Ethiopia." Tishkoff: "They appear to be the oldest lineages identified in Africa to date."
At the Computer-Human Interaction Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, the San Jose Mercury News profiled advances which let computers do the work more effectively for humans. First on the list was a partnership between Microsoft and the University of Maryland called �Datelens,� described by the newspaper as �a calendar on steroids for the Pocket PC."
Natural resource sciences and landscape architecture students leaped in one year from No. 27 to NO. 13 in the Associated Lands Contractors of America Student Career Days Competition. Students enrolled in horticulture and landscape architectural programs in colleges and universities nationwide competed in one of the country's largest academic event for three days.
A team of scientists led by Maryland physics professor James Drake found what may be one of the final pieces to a puzzle scientists have been trying to solve for almost 40 years: how magnetic fields produce the explosive releases of energy seen in solar flares, in magnetic storms at the edge of Earth's atmosphere and in many other powerful cosmic events throughout the universe.
Marc Pound, assistant research scientist in astronomy, and colleagues are mapping the Horsehead Nebula, a dusty cloud of gas near Orion's belt. "This beast is 10 million times more massive as the Earth, and it's galloping away at 10 kilometres per second." The Berkleley-Illinois-Maryland Association (BIMA) array of radio telescopes in Hat Creek, Calif. is the primary research tool. More Maryland Moments in April
Digene Corp., a resident of the Technology Advancement Program, received Food and Drug Administration approval for its two-in-one test for cervical cancer as a primary screening tool, giving the test the same commercial weight as the 50 year-old Pap smear.
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 Information provided by the Office of University CommunicationsEmail University Communications at emailum@umd.edu |
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