I thought this month I'd call your attention to the sixth annual Summer Institute for Preparing Future Faculty, which will take place during the time frame May 28- July 2, 2008. I have known a number of graduate students who have taken part in the Summer Institute over the years. All have appreciated the chance to learn what it takes to put together a successful academic job search, and how to excel in a new faculty position.
There is core information about the taxonomy and culture of different kinds of academic institutions. You have the opportunity to engage in high-level training in pedagogy, and to sharpen your academic writing and editing skills. Most valuable is the extended interaction you can have with graduate students (and a few post-docs) from other disciplines all across campus and with faculty from a variety of institutions in the Bay Area.
The deadline for applications is March 3, 2008. See below for more information.
Best wishes for a great spring semester.
Andrew J. Szeri
Dean of the Graduate Division
A $6 million grant toward top humanities grad students
- A $6 million Mellon Foundation grant will help recruit top grad students in the humanities
Graduate Degrees
- The Candidacy Fee is going up in July
Graduate Fellowships
- A wide menu of possibilities to help fund your graduate education
Have ideas about child care?
- Participate in a focus group
Calendar
- Upcoming events and workshops
GSI Teaching and Resource Center
- Nominations open: 2008 Faculty Award for Outstanding Mentorship of GSIs
- Nominations open: Outstanding GSI Awards 2007-2008
- Ready for that big transition? This Summer Institute can help.
Housing
- Looking for a place to live?
University Library
- Investigate the government — via chat or email
Pacific Film Archive
- February at the PFA
Graduate Assembly
- Nominations open for awards recognizing faculty who mentor graduate students in their research
- Upcoming events presented by the Graduate Social Club
California Alumni Association
- 2008 CAA award recipients will be honored (all of whom have Berkeley graduate degrees)
- Nominate candidates for 2009 CAA awards
- Career conferences, north and south, in-person and virtual
UCTV
- Upcoming programing on UCTV
In the News
- Albert Bowker, Berkeley’s fifth chancellor, is dead at 88
- A million for Haas
- Politics: all animal behavior?
Texture
- Still more turkeys at Berkeley
Dean Janet Broughton leveling the
playing field
(Photo: Steve McConnell)
It wasn’t under the tree, but the initial good news did arrive in December. After logistical and protocol details were worked out, the official announcement came on January 28: the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation has awarded UC Berkeley a $6 million grant to create an endowment that will allow this campus to compete more effectively for exceptional students.
Janet Broughton, Berkeley’s dean of arts and humanities, said “The Mellon Graduate Student Excellence Fund will give us a major boost as we compete with leading private universities for the field’s best graduate students,” a competition she characterized as “fierce.”
Graduate Dean Andrew Szeri said, “The Fund will enable UC Berkeley to increase its fellowship awards significantly by topping off Berkeley Graduate Fellowships,” narrowing the gap between what Berkeley and competing institutions can offer students. As many as 14 prospective students will be offered Mellon-Berkeley fellowships in 2009-2010, the first year of the program, and as the endowment grows, so will the program.
Thanks to the endowment, this campus each year will be able to offer a select group of top humanities grad students a five-year financial package providing stipends of $26,000 annually.
“This remarkable grant,” said Broughton, “will help UC Berkeley secure its position of leadership in the humanities, maintaining our hallmark strengths across a wide variety of fields including the study of literature, history, art, religion, and philosophy.”
Chancellor Robert Birgeneau said “The foundation’s confidence in UC Berkeley could not be more heartening.”
TopThe Office of the President has announced that the Candidacy Fee for doctoral students will increase from $65 to $90 to cover the additional costs related to preparation and submission of doctoral dissertations. The increase is effective for all students whose advancement to candidacy forms are filed in the Graduate Division on or after July 1, 2008.
TopListed chronologically by deadline date.
Graduate Division summary of fellowships and awards for 2007-2008
Resources provided by the Graduate Services: Fellowships office
Members of Phi Beta Kappa who are enrolled as doctoral students at UC Berkeley for 2007-2008 may apply for this fellowship, which is administered by PBK’s Alpha of California Chapter, Berkeley’s local group. Additional grants will be awarded by PBK’s Northern California Association through the same application process. Further information and the application form may be found online. Applications and all supporting materials are due in the PBK office (M14 Wheeler Hall, lower mezzanine, in the College Writing Programs suite of offices) by February 20, 2008, no later than 3 p.m.
The Burton J. Moyer Memorial Fellowship was established in the 1980s by the Northern California Chapter of the Health Physics Society to honor Moyer, who died in 1973, and to encourage his ideals in the study of the safe use of radiation for the benefit of all people. The first person to receive this highly regarded national fellowship, in 1985, was a UC Berkeley graduate student. Students who are interested in health physics must submit their application no later than March 1, 2008. The application is available online (PDF), as is further information about the fellowship.
Burton J. Moyer came to Berkeley in 1942 to work in high-energy physics with Ernest Orlando Lawrence. In addition to his pioneering and productive research, at Lawrence’s request he established a professional health physics group at what is now the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. In doing so, he took on the technically difficult work of reducing radiation intensities at the Bevatron for the safety of his colleagues. The shields he designed reduced intensity by a factor of 100, and became an influential model in the design of many accelerator shields. Moyer’s innovative approach to this new aspect of his field led him to be characterized as “the father of accelerator health physics.” He was also a professor and mentor, directing the thesis research of 62 students, and chaired the physics department during Berkeley’s tumultuous 1960s.Chancellor Robert Birgeneau is convening a Child Care Work Group to advise senior administrators on policy and planning issues regarding childcare for members of the U.C. Berkeley community, including students. The group will meet twice — February 14 and April 29 — before submitting its proposals to the Chancellor.
Prior to its first meeting, the work group is seeking student input, through a focus group where students may voice opinions and recommendations.
The focus group will take place on Friday February 8, 1 to 2 p.m., in the Graduate Assembly's headquarters, Anthony Hall (the tile-roofed building with the pelican statue on the lawn, northeast of Sproul Hall, across the street from Barrows Hall). Refreshments will be provided, so RSVP if you can.
Graduate and undergraduate student representatives to the Child Care Work Group will take note of your responses during the meeting.
Please let us know if you would like to attend but have a scheduling conflict. If you prefer to email us your suggestions, please email them to Joanna if you are a graduate student or Christyna if you are an undergraduate student.
Feedback is particularly desired on the issues the Child Care Work Group has been created to address, such as:
The rain-swollen south fork of Strawberry Creek, late January 2008 (Photo: Dick Cortén)
Graduate Division Calendar
Campus Events Calendar
Denotes Graduate Division sponsored event
FEBRUARY 5 , 12, and 19 (Tuesdays)
Workshop — “Looking Beyond Academia”
5 to 6:30 p.m. First meeting will be held in Room 104A, Career Center, 2111 Bancroft Way
This series of three workshops contains information, strategies, and resources designed to help you make an informed and affirmative choice of your next career (you will likely have more than one). Topics include identifying options; job search and networking; interview strategies; and salary negotiation. The series is free, but pre-registration is required. To register, email Ph.D. counselor Debra Behrens.
FEBRUARY 6 (Wednesday)
Brown Bag Workshop: Money and Graduate School
Noon to 1 p.m., West Madrone Room, fourth floor, Martin Luther King Jr. Student Union. Sponsored byGraduate Division Academic Services (GROW) and the Graduate Diversity Program.
FEBRUARY 6 (Wednesday) and March 12 (Wednesday)
Academic Lives: Two Panel Discussions
4 p.m., Women’s Faculty Club, on the respective days
Panel discussion 1, February 6: Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences
Margaret Conkey, Anthropology; Mary Ann Mason, Social Welfare, former Dean of the Graduate Division; Kate van Orden, Music.Panel discussion 2, March 12: Laboratory Sciences, Engineering, and Professional Schools (Details to be announced.) Issues to be addressed include juggling family, personal, and professional obligations, making a difference locally and in the larger profession; making career choices; find support, personal and professional. Both events are free and open to the campus community. Sponsored by the Association of Academic Women and the Women’s Faculty Club.
Left to Right: Meg Conkey, Kate van Orden, Mary Ann Mason (Conkey & Mason photos: Peg Skorpinski)
FEBRUARY 6 (Wednesday)
Ph.D. Negotiation Skills and Strategies: How to get what you want and need
5 to 6:30 p.m., Career Center, 2111 Bancroft Way (just past the car wash) between Oxford and Shattuck, Room 104A (ground floor to the right of the elevator)
You’ve got the offer. Now: how do you negotiate effectively to get the salary you deserve and the start-up package you need to be successful in your first academic job? This presentation begins with general guidance useful in virtually all negotiating circumstances as well as more specialized advice designed for Ph.D.s and postdocs, particularly in the sciences and engineering.
FEBRUARY 7 (Thursday)
Election 2008: Looking Beyond the Bush Years
Bob Herbert, columnist, New York Times
5 to 7 p.m., Sibley Auditorium, Bechtel Engineering Center. Free.
Bob Herbert was a reporter for the Daily News, a founding panelist of a weekly discussion program on WCBS-TV in New York, and a national correspondent for NBC before joining the New York Times as an op-ed columnist in 1993.
FEBRUARY 13 (Wednesday)
LavenderCal Campus Community Forum
5 to 6:30+ p.m., Tilden Room, fifth floor, Martin Luther King Jr. Student Union
— Report on the 2007 work of the Chancellor’s Advisory Committee on LGBT Community at Cal (CAC-LGBT)
— Open discussion to gather community input to relay to the Chancellor and the Vice Chancellor
— Equity & Inclusion
The event is sponsored by LavenderCal’s “Lavender PAIS” project.
FEBRUARY 14 (Thursday)
AIGP/NAS Annual Student Welcome Back Luncheon
Noon to 1:30 p.m., Barbara Christian Conference Room, 554 Barrows Hall
Sponsored by the American Indian Graduate Program, the Department of Native American Studies, and the Vice Chancellor – Equity & Inclusion
FEBRUARY 15, 22, and 29 (Fridays)
A Short Course on Academic Writing for International Graduate Students
1 to 3 p.m., 370 Dwinelle Hall
Intended for non-native speakers of English, this course will provide UC Berkeley graduate students with information on how to write about their academic research and how to improve their writing styles and skills. The short course will meet for three Fridays in February 2008 from 1-3 p.m. It will cover various aspects of academic writing; Excerpts from participants’ own academic writing will form the basis for in-class editing. Although the primary focus of this writing group will be on written language, there will also be opportunities for working on oral skills. For graduate students in all disciplines. There is no preregistration required for this short course (it is not a course for credit). Those who wish to participate must be able to attend all three sessions. Presented by Graduate Division Academic Services.
FEBRUARY 18 (Monday)
Holiday: Presidents’ Day
FEBRUARY 20 (Wednesday)
Workshop on Teaching: Assessing Teaching and Learning
Noon to 1:30 p.m., 333 Sproul Hall
Presented by the Graduate Division’s GSI Teaching and Resource Center
FEBRUARY 20 (Wednesday)
Viewing of the Total Lunar Eclipse
6 p.m. , Lawrence Hall of Science (LHS)
Telescopes will be set up and amateur astronomers will be on hand to answer questions and assist other viewers. The moon will be totally eclipsed at 7:01 p.m.; totality will end at 7:51 p.m.
The Moon in Earth’s shadow: this is a time-lapse movie (made of 43 images) showing the March 3, 2007 total eclipse. (GIF animation by Thomas Knoblauch.) A second total eclipse last year took place on August 28.
To reach LHS, take Rimway Road above Memorial Stadium to Centennial Drive; On Centennial, go uphill about a mile. LHS is on the left before you reach the top of the hill. (Photo: Nicole Medina)
FEBRUARY 21 (Thursday) and 27 (Wednesdays)
“Human Subjects Research: What is it? How do you navigate through the IRB Process?
A two-part workshop series for graduate students
February 21, 1 to 3 p.m. , 370 Dwinelle Hall
Workshop I will cover the following topics:
- What is human subjects research?
- What are the regulations governing human subjects research?
- Is what I’m doing research that involves human subjects?
- What does it mean when your research is exempt, expedited, or full board?
- What is CPHS and who is OPHS and how do they interrelate?
- How do CPHS and OPHS relate to the Sponsored Projects Office (SPO)?
- What is the Collaborative IRB Training Initiative (CITI) Course in the Protection of Human Subjects and am I required to take it?
February 27, 9 to 11 a.m. , 370 Dwinelle Hall
Workshop II will cover the nuts and bolts of submitting a research protocol to the Office for the Protection of Human Subjects, and it will focus on the following two topics:Speaker: Rebecca D. Armstrong, D.V.M., Ph.D., director of the Office for the Protection of Human Subjects. There is no preregistration for this workshop. Although graduate students are encouraged to attend both parts of this workshop series, attendance in both is not required. Sponsored by Graduate Division Academic Services.A. Completing the Forms and Writing the Narratives
How do you get a protocol through the approval process? When do you submit amendments to protocols? How do you write a good narrative?
B. Informed Consent and the Informed Consent Process
What is informed consent? How do you write an informed consent form? What should you include?
MARCH 4 (Tuesday)
Workshop on Teaching: Teaching Research in Reading and Composition Courses
Noon to 1:30 p.m., 331 Sproul Hall
Sponsored by the Graduate Division’s GSI Teaching and Resource Center.
MARCH 4 (Tuesday)
St. Paddy’s Day music, drinks, and fun
6 to 9 p.m., Pauley Ballroom, Martin Luther King Jr. Student Union
$5 with UC Berkeley ID. Must be 21 or over. Sponsored by the Graduate Social Club and the Graduate Assembly. Other GSC/GA upcoming events: Graduate Assembly Open House, Thursday, April 10, 6 to 9 p.m.; SF Bay Cruise, Saturday, April 26 (note: changed from May 3), 7 to 9 p.m. More details will be announced.
MARCH 5 (Wednesday)
Brown Bag Workshop — “Public Speaking: Presentations, Talks, Conferences”
Noon to 1 p.m., 333 Sproul Hall
Andrew Green , Ph.D. counselor, Career Center. Sponsored by the Graduate Division’s GSI Teaching and Resource Center.
March 5 (Wednesday)
Nomination deadline for the Graduate Assembly’s 2008 Distinguished Faculty Mentor Award
See Graduate Assembly below.
MARCH 7 (Friday)
Nomination deadline for 2008 Faculty Award for Outstanding Mentorship of GSIs
See GSI Teaching and Resource Center below.
MARCH 12 (Wednesday)
Academic Lives: second of two panel discussions
(See February 6, above).
MARCH 14 (Friday)
Nomination deadline for Outstanding GSI Awards 2007-2008
See GSI Teaching and Resource Center below.
MARCH 18 (Tuesday)
Workshop on Teaching: Guiding the Work of Non-native Writers of English
Noon to 1:30 p.m., 331 Sproul Hall
Sponsored by the Graduate Division’s GSI Teaching and Resource Center.
MARCH 24 -28 (Monday - Friday)
Spring Recess
MARCH 28 (Friday)
Cesar Chavez Holiday
APRIL 17 (Tuesday)
Workshop on Teaching: Teaching and the Academic Job Market
Noon to 1:30 p.m., 370 Dwinelle Hall
Sponsored by the Graduate Division’s GSI Teaching and Resource Center.
Top
Note: See the listings in the calendar above for workshops on teaching that are coming up in the near future (February 20, March 4, March 18, and April 17).
In partnership with the California Alumni Association, the Graduate Council's Advisory Committee for GSI Affairs and the Graduate Division's GSI Teaching and Resource Center are pleased to announce the 2008 Faculty Award for Outstanding Mentorship of GSIs. This award recognizes faculty (including both Senate and non-Senate faculty) who have provided GSIs outstanding mentorship in teaching at Berkeley and preparation for the teaching graduate students may do in future careers. Nominations are sought from graduate students who have served as GSIs.
Up to three awards of $1000 each will be given. Awards will typically be presented to faculty members mentoring GSIs in multi-section courses, in stand-alone courses (e.g., foreign language or reading and composition courses), or through the teaching of a 300-level course. Recipients will be honored at a spring awards ceremony, and statements of mentoring philosophy will be posted on the GSI Teaching and Resource Center's website. The nomination deadline is Friday, March 7, 2008. Guidelines, nomination forms, and statements of mentoring philosophy from previous recipients can be found online.
The GSI Teaching and Resource Center welcomes nominations from departments for the 2007-2008 Outstanding Graduate Student Instructor Awards . Each department may nominate one GSI for every ten GSIs appointed during the academic year. The deadline for submitting nominations for the Outstanding GSI Awards is Monday, March 14, 2008. Guidelines, forms for submitting nominations, and lists of past Outstanding GSI Award recipients can be found online.
In addition to Dean Szeri’s comments above, here are some quotes from previous Institute Fellows:
“I cannot imagine becoming a faculty member without having taken this course. It demystified the process a great deal."
“A superb opportunity to learn how academia really works and to get my priorities in order."
“One of the most useful courses offered at UC Berkeley for graduate students."
More quotes can be found online (PDF)
This sixth annual Summer Institute for Preparing Future Faculty is designed to enable graduate students to excel in all aspects of academic life as they pursue an advanced degree at Berkeley and make the transition from graduate school to academic careers. If you're nearing the end of your graduate program and beginning to prepare for the academic job market, you're encouraged to apply. Approximately 40 students will be selected to be Institute Fellows for the program, which takes place May 28 through July 2, 2008. The application deadline is March 3, 2008. The program announcement, application guidelines, and forms are available online.
If you have questions, contact the GSI Teaching and Resource Center by email or phone (510) 642-4456.
(Photos: Peg Skorpinski)
Cal Housing announces the opening this summer of 324 brand new West Village Apartments at University Village in Albany. There will be additional two bedroom and three bedroom units along with 192 new one bedroom apartments for students who are married or in committed relationships. The University Village Community is conveniently located 3 miles from campus on AC Transit’s 52L and 18 bus lines, and is close to Solano Avenue and El Cerrito Plaza shopping and BART. Included in the monthly rent are all utilities (except telephone) and a parking space.
For more information about the new West Village Apartments, please contact the Family Student Housing Apartment Assignments Office by phone (510-642-4109) or email. You can download an application. The waiting list is chronological, so apply immediately if you are interested.
We also expect some vacancies for 2008-09 at Manville Apartments, and Ida Louise Jackson Graduate House. For more information, please contact the Residence Hall Assignments Office at 642-4108, reshall@berkeley.edu.
For students interested in off-campus housing, Cal Rentals is the rental resource for the UC Berkeley community, providing information about the rental market, advice for conducting a housing search, and rental listings for students, faculty and staff. Students who need a roommate can list an available room for free online.
For those seeking a rental, listings are available on-demand, online for a $20 fee which includes 3 months of online access.
Left to right: Ida Louise Jackson Graduate House, Manville Apartments, West Village Apartments. (Jackson House photo: Peg Skorpinski)
The namesake for Ida Louise Jackson Graduate House was a student here in the 1920s (B.A. ’22, M.A. ’24). She co-founded the Rho chapter of Alpha Kappa Alpha, the first African American Sorority at Berkeley. She was one of the very first African American woman certified to teach in California schools and became the first African American of either gender to teach in Oakland. She pioneered the Mississippi Health Project in her native state. In 1972 she donated hundreds of acres of her family’s Mendocino County sheep ranch to the university so the proceeds could be used to support graduate fellowships. The 120-bed College Durant residential complex became all-graduate-student housing and was renamed in Jackson’s honor in 2004. Photos: Ida Jackson as a student and in later life (Photos courtesy the Jackson Estate)Top
IM Reference. The Government Documents unit of the Library (Doe Library) will start its GovInfo Chat Reference on February 5. Hours of service will be Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday from 1 to 5 p.m. If you need assistance with research involving government publications (local, state, federal and international), use this service, which is staffed by the government documents specialists. Information and the links to the service are available online. The Government Documents unit also supports a very popular email reference service called Ask a Librarian About Government Informationthat is heavily used by researchers on campus, across the UC system and beyond.
TopThe Pacific Film Archive Theater is located at 2575 Bancroft Way. For more information, phone 510-642-5249 or visit the PFA online.
Series — “Animal, Vegetable, Mineral: Recent Experimental Documentaries”
Series — “Jean-Pierre Léaud: The New Wave and After”
Series — “African Film Festival”
Series — "The Medieval Remake"
Series — "Animal, Vegetable, Mineral: Recent Experimental Documentaries"
African Film Festival
Co-Presented by Department of African American Studies & Center for African Studies
Human Rights Watch International Film Festival
Co-Presented by Human Rights Center
Series — "Closely Watched Films: Terence Davies"
The Graduate Assembly’s 2008 Distinguished Faculty Mentor Award (FMA) honors Senate and non-Senate members of the Berkeley faculty who have shown an outstanding commitment to mentoring, developing, and supporting graduate student researchers. Three awards will be presented to the selected research mentors. Nominations are expected to come primarily from doctoral, masters, and professional students engaged in research at UC Berkeley who have been direct beneficiaries of the candidate's mentoring and can relate their experiences firsthand. This year, nominations for the FMA are only being accepted electronically, emailed as attachment in MS Word format. Nomination forms may be downloaded from the GA website or requested by email. Deadline: all nominations must be emailed to fma@ga.berkeley.edu no later than Wednesday, March 5, 2008 at 6:00 p.m. Details about the upcoming awards presentation ceremony will be announced.
See listing in calendar above under March 4.
TopThe Association’s 2008 Alumnus of the Year is civil rights advocate and U.S. District Court Judge Thelton Henderson, a 1955 political science graduate who earned his J.D. in 1958 at Boalt Hall law school.
Three alumni will be honored with Excellence in Achievement Awards: Caroline Tanner, Ph.D. '98, one of the most prominent researchers studying Parkinson's disease and other movement disorders; Lee Merriam Talbot '52, M.A. '63, Ph.D. '63, a world-renowned environmentalist; and Lawrence E. Crooks '71, M.S. '73, Ph.D. '78, a contributor to the development of MRI technology (who is also director of the Radiologic Imaging Laboratory at UCSF).
In addition, the 2008 Mark Bingham Award for excellence in achievement by a young alum will go to Anthony M. Smith '92, M.A. '93, Ph.D.'02, the San Francisco Unified School District’s deputy superintendent for instruction, innovation and social justice.
This is the second time in recent years (and perhaps in the entire history of the alumni association’s awards program) that every recipient of a major honor has earned at least one Berkeley graduate degree.
This year’s recipients will be honored at the 2008 Charter Gala on April 5 at Fort Mason in San Francisco, right on the waterfront. More information will be available on the alumni association’s website.
Judge Thelton Henderson ’55, J.D. ’58, the California Alumni Association’s 2008 Alumnus of the Year, will be honored at the Charter Gala April 5 at Fort Mason in San Francisco.
Starting this month, the California Alumni Association will be accepting nominations for its annual awards to be presented in spring 2009. The categories are: Alumnus of the Year Award, Excellence in Achievement Award, Excellence in Service Award, Mark Bingham Award (for achievement by a young alumnus or alumna), and the Brad King Service Award (also for a young alumnus or alumna). Nominations are due May 31, 2008. Nomination details are available on the Association’s website.
All-UC Experienced Alumni Career Conference: “Career Moves 2008”
An extraordinary one-day event to help you focus on your career, sharpen your strategy, discover new opportunities, network, meet hiring employers, and make the right next move. Two different days, two different sites, south (2/12) and north (3/18).
Southern California — February 12 (Tuesday), Covel Commons, UCLA. More information is available online.
Northern California — March 18 (Tuesday). Parc 55 Hotel, San Francisco. More information is available online.
Experienced Hire Real-Time Virtual Career Fair
February 19 and 20 (Tuesday and Wednesday)
Students and alumni will have the opportunity to interact in real time with company representatives through virtual chat rooms. Co-hosted by AlumWire and the California Alumni Association.
The Teacher's P.E.T. presents " Conversations with History" every Wednesday throughout the month of February. In these lively and unedited interviews, distinguished men and women from all over the world talk about their lives and their work. Interviews span the globe and include discussion of political, economic, military, legal, cultural, and social issues shaping our world. At the heart of each interview is a focus on individuals and ideas that make a difference.
Conversations with History: The War of the World, with Niall Ferguson
Conversations host Harry Kreisler welcomes Harvard historian Niall Ferguson for a discussion of his new book The War of the World. Ferguson analzyes the role of ethnic conflict, economic volatility, and the decline of empires in making the twentieth century the most violent one in human history.
Conversations with History: A Cosmologist’s Intellectual Journey, with James E. Peebles
Conversations host Harry Kreisler welcomes Princeton cosmologist Jim Peebles for a discussion of his intellectual odyssey. They discuss his contributions to cosmology and the future of the field.
Conversations with History: Women's Rights, Religious Freedom, and Liberal Education, with Martha C. Nussbaum
Conversations Host Harry Kreisler welcomes philosopher Martha Nussbaum for a discussion of women and human development, religious freedom, and liberal education.
UCTV brings you educational and enrichment programming from the campuses and national laboratories of the University of California. Options for viewing include:
UCTV has an extensive library of programs from the Graduate Council Lectures.
Top
Albert H. Bowker, Berkeley’s chancellor
from 1971 to 1980 (Photo: Dennis Galloway)
Albert Hosmer Bowker came to Berkeley in 1971, after some of its most turbulent protest years, facing the prospect of more to come. He had already been a chancellor, under that title heading the large, sometimes controversial, multi-campus City University of New York system (which grew from seven campuses to 20 in his time there, nearly doubling its enrollment to 200,000 students).
As this university’s traditional state funding eroded, he brought about a lasting new tradition of alumni support through direct appeals. He established the UC Berkeley Foundation, which during his administration raised money to construct needed campus structures, including the Bechtel Engineering Center.
He helped create new programs in health sciences and energy studies at Berkeley, as well as a small-group advising program for new students. He was burned in effigy for dismantling Berkeley’s criminology school, but drew unexpected praise for approving tenure for outspoken black sociologist Harry Edwards.
Not exactly athletically inclined, he was nonetheless a good sport, willingly body-surfing at Southern California alumni beach events and donning a toga to race barefoot in ceremonial re-creations of ancient Olympics at Berkeley’s archaeological site at Nemea, Greece.
He left the campus in 1980 to become the U.S. Assistant Secretary for Post-Secondary Education in the cabinet of President Jimmy Carter. He was dean of the School of Public Affairs at the University of Maryland in the early 1980s and returned to CUNY in the middle of that decade as vice president for planning at its research foundation.
He died January 20 after battling pancreatic cancer.
New York had been astounded when Bowker originally left CUNY for Berkeley. Its lingering affection for him was evident, even three decades later. The New York Times wrote, in his obituary in those pages, “Possessed of a statistician’s quick mind and a dry wit with a dash of cynicism, Dr. Bowker, a bulky 5-foot-11, gave an impression of rumpled diffidence but displayed toughness as an administrator. His characteristic style was displayed early when as a Stanford dean [of the graduate division there] a colleague asked him how he was doing. He replied, ‘I’m going around putting water on some fires and gasoline on others.’ ”
Chancellor Robert Birgeneau, Bowker’s fourth successor in the top job here, said Bowker “was an outstanding chancellor who paved the way for UC Berkeley into the modern era. For 28 years after stepping down as chancellor, Al Bowker remained an integral part of the Cal community, offering advice for the chancellors who came after him. I was always delighted to see him at the Faculty Club, entertaining colleagues and participating in campus life. He will be greatly missed.”
Cal alums Marguerite and Al Johnson
Al Johnson ’62 M.B.A. ’69 is clearly grateful to Berkeley’s business school, which he attended before the name Haas was attached to it (along with new buildings). Johnson, a general partner with WTI Ventures in Menlo Park, and his wife Marguerite (a 1960 Berkeley social welfare grad) have given $1 million for the school’s Socially Responsible Investment Fund. The fund was launched in September of last year with a $250,000 gift from another Haas alumnus Charlie Michaels, B.S. 78, and his wife Doris.
"The Haas Socially Responsible Investment Fund struck me as a very interesting approach to investing because it's not just about the bottom line," says Johnson, a general partner with WTI Ventures in Menlo Park, Calif. "The fund also looks at companies' social responsibility in addition to financial characteristics. In many respects, the fund combines Marguerite's passion for social welfare and my passion of business."
The fund is the first student-run investment fund at Haas and the first student-run, socially responsible investment fund at a leading business school. It exposes students interested in corporate social responsibility or finance to the investing world's complexities, challenges, and rewards. Students managing the fund are required to enroll in an elective on socially responsible investing techniques being offered by the Haas School for the first time in fall 2007.
"The goal is to provide long-term, positive absolute returns while adhering to predetermined social and environmental responsibility and corporate governance guidelines," says M.B.A. student Michael Pearce. "Investment decisions will be made based on both traditional financial and business evaluation criteria as well as detailed socially responsible investment criteria."
In addition to Pearce, the team includes M.B.A. students Margot Kane, Clayton Schloss, Elizabeth Singleton as well as financial engineering students Ambuj Chaudhary and Lance Durham. "It is my fervent desire to invest in companies that improve the lives of the world's poor, the so-called bottom-of-the-pyramid," says Durham. "Through the Haas Socially Responsible Investment Fund, I can investigate and invest in firms that serve these people. I am extraordinarily enthusiastic about it."
George Wittemyer Ph.D. ‘05 with a
representative political animal
In the total inundation of this presidential primary season, it’s hard to find a new angle, but Natalie Angier may have done so in the New York Times. She’s assembled a survey of “nonhuman animals that behave like textbook politicians,” among them rhesus monkeys, dolphins, baboons, sperm whales, elephants, and wolves. She talks to researchers who track the behavior of “highly gregarious and brainy species” and see parallels. Wolves occasionally display “populist umbrage” and overthrow a tyrannical pack leader (UMass). Rhesus monkeys can be downright Macchiavellian, combating not for food, space, or resources, but power; also, they’re insincere opportunists (U of Chicago).
She also talked to Berkeley postdoc George Wittemyer about that venerable Republican Party emblem creature, the elephant (which, in contrast to most humans, lives in a matriarchal society). Pachyderms, says Wittemyer, who received his environmental science, policy, and management Ph.D. here in 2005, spend a lot of time “debating among themselves, over food, water, and security.” The matriarch usually has the final say, but factions sometimes split off and try a different approach.
Sperm whales, according to Hal Whitehead of Dalhousie University, seem to caucus within their clans, using a vocal pattern of clicks distinctive to the clan. It’s possible they even vote that way, about when to halt, when to dive for squid, and even which males to favor or spurn. They’re evidently, in Angier’s prose, “terrible size queens,” consistently going for “enhanced male mass,” some males being as much as three times the size of the females. Top
Turkey seen the morning of 11/28/07 behind an auto shop on Broadway’s
Auto Row at 28th Street, Oakland. (Photo: Owen Solberg)
Since our report in the January issue, more local sightings of wild turkeys have been reported to this publication. Among them are these:
I couldn't imagine where they came from, or rather I could only imagine some kind of crazy story about them getting loose from a truck on their way to Thanksgiving tables. I was very interested to read the description of the Berkeley turkeys in eGrad!
Owen Solberg
Graduate student in Integrative Biology
(Two more of Solberg’s turkey pictures from that morning are online. When he’s not encountering itinerant fowl, he’s researching disease-causing bacteria, specifically Rotavirus, the world’s leading cause of childhood diarrhea and infant mortality)
Just read about the turkeys. I've seen them many times walking up the fire trail from the stadium toward Grizzly Peak. On the fields, sitting in the trees, flying over fences, blocking traffic at Centennial/Gayley. Also, my mother lives out at Rossmoor and there is a flock or two out there. They seem huge; recently I left my car door open while I brought something out from her house there and was worried that the turkeys were going to hop into my car. YIKES!
Elsa Tranter
Graduate Assistant
Sociology Department
I spotted this bird on my daily bike commute to campus — I live down near Lake Merritt. I didn't believe my eyes when I first spotted it, and as I was taking pictures of it, one of the garage mechanics came out with his own camera to snap some pics. He said they had been seeing two turkeys hanging around for a few days.
I once encountered wild turkeys in Berkeley, two or three years ago, when I was an undergrad here. I found half a dozen of them between the stadium and the oak grove (which was more pleasant then, sans tree-sitters, fences, and bright lights). They didn't react to my approach, but I gave them wide berth, because I've been led to believe that they can be ornery, and I didn't want to have my legs pecked.
Ilya Gurin
Graduate student in Electrical Engineering & Computer Sciences
An alumna in Moraga writes:
The turkeys gave up their morning trek through our yard just after they must have smelled one of their 23-pound farm-raised brethren being cooked on the ol' Weber barbecue on Thanksgiving Day. Still, we see them in Lamorinda quite frequently, One strafed the top of my head recently while gliding from a pine tree onto a friend's porch roof, barely making it.
eGrad is produced by Graduate Communications & Events, distributed by email, and archived online. Graduate students, alumni, faculty, and staff are invited to send timely news and announcements of interest to or utility of graduate students and the graduate community. Please submit items to Dick Cortén, editor, at gradpub@berkeley.edu.
