Announcements
Spring is here and it is time once again to look toward the warm sunny days of summer vacation. But before you can do that, you have to:
- Enter mid-term/PUG grades
- Give an exam
- Advise students for registration
- Grade papers
- Give a final
- Grade the final
- Enter the grades
- Attend commencement
Whew! There is a lot of work to do in the next five weeks, but I have good news. Some of that confusion and craziness should be minimized if you had the opportunity to use the new Degree Audit tool available on Web Advisor. Students and advisors can use the “evaluate program” function to see exactly which degree requirements have been met. This feature is available in the faculty menu under your advisees. While this tool is easy to use and should aid your and your advisees during the planning and registration process for fall term, we will be providing training by division for those that request it. If you are interested, please contact your division chair or contact me anytime.
Paul Freedman , winner of the Peabody Award for his documentary Rwanda : Do Scars Ever Fade?, will be on campus for a screening of his new documentary Sand and Sorrow, a film about Darfur . The screening will be held on Tuesday, April 15, from 7:00 to 8:30 in the Olin Auditorium. The screening will be followed by a conversation with Paul Freedman.
While analyzing the historical events that have given rise to an Arab-dominated government's willingness to kill and displace its own indigenous African people, “Sand and Sorrow” examines the international community's “legacy of failure” to respond to such profound crimes against humanity in the past. But while immersed in the despairing crisis of our time, Freedman manages to give voice to the ever-growing and inspiring movement of those who wish to make “Never Again” finally mean something.
Offered exclusive and unparalleled access to the situation on the ground inside Darfur, Peabody award-winning filmmaker, Paul Freedman ("Rwanda - Do Scars Ever Fade?"), joins a contingent of African Union peacekeeping forces in Darfur while a tragic and disturbing chapter in human history unfolds. While the heroic men and women of this undermanned and under-funded mission brave harsh conditions and unfettered violence, as many as 2.5 million displaced persons have no choice but to settle inside squalid camps to wait and hope. (An estimated four-hundred thousand civilians have perished so far.)
Wednesday, April 16
3:45 - 5:00 PM – Year of the Book "Book Studies" lecture series – Dr. Dara Wegman-Geedey, Associate Professor of Biology
Tredway Library, 2nd floor, south end
Books as Fomites: How much "culture" can one good book provide? Recently, an e-mail from the After Hours poetry group informed us that "in a perfect world, your writing would be like a virus, starting with one microscopic germ and spreading uncontrollably until you've infected the page with your epic poem." Be careful what you wish for!
Fomites are inanimate objects that transfer pathogens from one host to another or from a non-living reservoir to a susceptible host. Common fomites are doorknobs, computer keyboards, used tissues, money, shared combs and the like.
Are books and other library materials fomites? To find out, microbiology professor Dara Wegman-Geedey and a team of students decided to put books, periodicals, microfilm and microfiche from the Tredway Library's collection to the test.
Please join us on Wednesday, April 16th to learn about the history of books as fomites as well as an exploration of some recent research data that suggest that different conditions and information storage materials may affect the survival of common pathogens like Staphylococcus aureus and Escherichia coli.
This is the seventh presentation in the year-long "Book Studies" lecture series, part of "From Parchment to Pixels: The Year of the Book." The next (and final!) presentation in the series will be given by Special Collections Librarian Sarah Horowitz.
Refreshments and conversation will begin at 3:45.
Week Seven Seminar (held in Week Six!)
Friday, April 18, 3:30-5:00 PM
Library, 2nd floor, south end
Dr. Dara Wegman-Geedey will lead an informal discussion for faculty on the essay by Oliver Sacks, "An Anthropologist on Mars," published in his book by that title in 1995. The essay is about the life and work of Temple Grandin, "one of the most remarkable autistic people of all: in spite of her autism, she holds a Ph.D. in animal science, teaches at Colorado State University, and runs her own business." Dr. Grandin will be the keynote speaker at the First Midwest Symposium on Autism and Inclusion held at Augustana on Saturday, April 19. Dara and Dr. Alli Haskill are involved in planning and hosting the conference. Read this well written, intriguing essay about a fascinating woman, learn more about autism, and talk it over with colleagues. The Week Seven Seminar is planned by and for faculty. The reading is available on Moodle under Library/Week Seven Seminar.
Mark your calendars for the Fall Faculty Retreat to be held August 18-19, 2008.