I write this time from a plane on my way to a research conference. In my 20 minutes in the limelight at my conference, I'll have the opportunity to learn first-hand the reaction to what I have to say. Have you had the opportunity yet to present your work? It's well worthwhile to put your thoughts together for a poster or a talk. Good for developing an appreciation of how much progress you've made, and what needs to be done. The connections you can make at a research conference can be very valuable, often in unexpected ways. Graduate Division can be of assistance, with Academic Services to help with presentation skills.
Communication is my theme this month. You may have noticed starting with June's eGrad, we are now emailing directly to graduate students. That's an effort to improve our communications and outreach. What's your plan to improve yours? Is there a suitable conference this year, perhaps nearby, where you might practice your communications and outreach?
Best wishes for a healthy and productive July.
Andrew J. Szeri
Dean of the Graduate Division
Reminders
- Expecting a check?
- Receiving financial aid?
Graduate Fellowships
- Fulbright Scholar Grants
- New Fulbright CSIRO Postgraduate Scholarship to Australia
- Carnegie Scholars Program
University Health Services
- Got dependents in need of health insurance?
Recognition
- Richard Karp wins the Kyoto Prize
Texture
- Street smarts
Starting this month all support paid to students by paper check through the Campus Accounts Receivable System (CARS) will be held for pickup for 21 days at the Billing and Payment Services Office, 140 University Hall. Checks that aren’t picked up in that interval will be mailed to the student’s local address on file in BearFacts. If you’ve signed up for Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT), CARS “refunds” (payments to you) may be deposited directly to your personal bank account. EFT can mean you receive the funds sooner, and avoid problems such as returned mail due to an outdated address. You can sign up for EFT online.
Complete registration for the fall 2008 semester as soon as possible by enrolling in required units and paying a minimum of 20 percent toward registration fees. Resolve any past-due balance on your CARS account and any block on your registration. You can monitor your aid package, registration status, address information, and CARS refund activity online via BearFacts.
TopListed chronologically by deadline date.
Graduate Division summary of fellowships and awards for 2008-2009
Resources provided by the Graduate Services: Fellowships office
The competition for the 2009-2010 round of Fulbright Scholar Grants is open. The application deadline is August 1, 2008. Grants typically begin about one year following the application deadline. As a traditional U.S. Fulbright Scholar you can enjoy an experience of a lifetime, one that will provide broad cultural perspectives on your academic discipline or professional field and connect you with colleagues at institutions around the globe. Grants typically range from three months to an academic year. More information and materials to download are online.
J. William Fulbright (1905-1995) was a U.S. Senator from Arkansas for three decades and had been a Rhodes Scholar and served as president of the University of Arkansas. His 1945 bill to use surplus war property to fund the “promotion of international good will through the exchange of students in the fields of education, culture, and science” created what became the Fulbright Program.CSIRO, the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization, is Australia's national science agency, and one of the largest and most diverse research agencies in the world. Through this program, it is offering Fulbright scholars an opportunity to work in Australia as part of your American Ph.D. program. Valued at $34,000, this scholarship supports an American citizen to undertake eight to 12 months of postgraduate research in Australia, related to your American Ph.D., with one of the nine CSIRO National Research Flagships, on challenges in climate, energy, water, health, and more. Applications and deadlines are available online through the Institute for International Education. Information about the Fulbright CSIRO Scholarship is available from the CSIRO website.
Is your scholarship focused on Islam and Muslim communities? Candidates for the 2009 Carnegie Scholars Program may range from recent Ph.D.s to more established scholars or individuals with equivalent professional experience or degrees. Women and minority nominees are especially welcome. All candidates must be U.S. citizens or permanent residents.
Carnegie aims to "build a critical mass of thoughtful and original scholarship that adds to our fund of knowledge regarding Islam as a religion as well as the cultures and civilizations of Muslim societies and communities, both in the United States and abroad." The Corporation is particularly interested in scholars who can communicate their work beyond the academy. For details about the program, past recipients and their scholarship, and this year's timeline, consult the Carnegie Scholars website. Information for nominators is in this section. Deadline for receipt of nominations to the Academic Senate Faculty Awards Committee (320 Stephens Hall #5842) is August 8, 2008.
Andrew Carnegie (1835-1919) built his fortune in industry, founding Carnegie Steel, which eventually became U.S. Steel. Often regarded as the second-richest man in history, he may have been the first to state publicly that the rich have a moral obligation to give away their fortunes, which he did, creating seven philanthropic and educational organizations in the United States, and several more in Europe. He and the Carnegie Corporation (the sponsor of this fellowship) built 2,509 libraries throughout the English-speaking world.
The Goldman School of Public Policy’s original building. The school was founded in 1969 at 2607 Hearst Avenue in what for many decades had been the “Beta house,” the Northside quarters of the Beta Theta Pi fraternity. The highly-rated school has since expanded, adding a new building next door and more nationally-known faculty.
(Photo: Dick Cortén)
Graduate Division Calendar
Campus Events Calendar
Denotes Graduate Division sponsored event
AUGUST 18 and 19 (Monday and Tuesday)
New International Student Orientation
Monday 8 a.m. to 12:30 p.m., Tuesday 8:30 a.m. to noon
International House Auditorium
More information: Berkeley International Office
AUGUST 20 (Wednesday)
Reception for New International Students
2 to 4 p.m., International House Auditorium
More information: Berkeley International Office
AUGUST 21 (Thursday)
Fall semester begins
AUGUST 21 (Thursday)
Fall Teaching Conference for International GSIs
Teaching in the U.S. Classroom
8:30 a.m. to 3 p.m., Dwinelle Hall
More information: GSI Center
AUGUST 22 (Friday)
Fall Teaching Conference for GSIs
(for all GSIs, Domestic and International)
8:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. Plenary session in Wheeler Hall, breakout sessions in Dwinelle Hall
More information: GSI Center
AUGUST 25 (Monday)
New Graduate Minority Student Orientation: an orientation for all focusing on issues facing underrepresented students
10 a.m. to 2 p.m., Martin Luther King Jr. Student Union
All new graduate students are invited
AUGUST 26 (Tuesday)
Orientation for New Graduate Students
9 a.m. to 4 p.m., Pauley Ballroom and other rooms in the Martin Luther King Jr. Student Union (registration is from 8:30 to 9 a.m.). Presented by the Graduate Division and the Graduate Assembly. Curious? Check out coverage of last year’s event.
AUGUST 27 (Wednesday)
Instruction begins
AUGUST 27 (Wednesday)
Reception Honoring American Indian/Alaska Native Graduate Students
5 to 7 p.m., Heller Lounge, Martin Luther King Jr. Student Union
AUGUST 28 (Thursday)
Fall Meeting for Faculty Advisers and Assistants (Graduate Student Affairs Officers)
9 to 10:30 a.m., Lipman Room, eighth floor of Barrows Hall
AUGUST 28 (Thursday)
Workshop: Applying for a Fulbright-IIE Grant
1 to 3 p.m., 370 Dwinelle Hall
Further information is available online
AUGUST 28 (Thursday)
Dean’s Reception for New Graduate Students
4 to 6 p.m., Lipman Room, eighth floor of Barrows Hall
Curious? Check out coverage of last year’s event.
SEPTEMBER 1 (Monday)
Academic and administrative holiday
SEPTEMBER 10 (Wednesday)
Reception Honoring Graduate Diversity
5 to 7 p.m., Toll Room, Alumni House (just north of Zellerbach Playhouse)
Feeling Green? Take a look at upcoming events in the UC Berkeley Environmental Events Calendar.
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The Student Health Insurance Office (SHIO) will hold four health insurance workshops for students with dependents. A variety of coverage options are available for spouses, partners and children of students. It can be challenging to determine which plan is best for your family, and SHIO can help. Kathy Gage, Insurance Advisor for students with dependents, will explain how to choose and enroll in a plan that meets your family's needs.
Dependent Insurance Workshops
August 21 — 3:30 to 5 p.m.
August 27 — 3 to 4:30 p.m.
September 3 — 3 to 4:30 p.m.
Tang Center, 1st Floor, Education Center, 2222 Bancroft Way
These workshops will provide a general overview of individual health insurance for adults and children and cover both public programs and private plans.
Coverage for Children and Pregnant Women
September 12 — 2:30 to 4 p.m.
Tang Center, 1st Floor, Education Center, 2222 Bancroft Way
This workshop is devoted to individual health insurance options for children in low income families and for pregnant women. The format includes a panel discussion by insurance and public program representatives who will provide in-depth information on benefits, eligibility requirements, the enrollment process and premiums, deductibles and co-insurance costs.
RSVP to ship@uhs.berkeley.edu. Questions? Contact the Student Health Insurance Office (SHIO) at 642-5700 or check the UHS web page.
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Anthony Hall, headquarters of the Graduate
Assembly (Photo: Dick Cortén)
The GA is one of only two organizations (the other is the GSI union) in which you get to meet and interact with graduate students from many other departments.
GA President Miguel Daal
(Photo: Peg Skorpinski)
Web: http://ga.berkeley.edu
Email: Miguel Daal (President)
Phone: 510-642-2175
Campus Headquarters: Anthony Hall (a.k.a. the Pelican Building)
Summer Hours: Through August 22, summer hours are in effect (Monday through Friday 10 a.m. to 3:p.m.)
Richard Karp
(Photo: Peg Skorpinski)
“Japan’s equivalent of the Nobel Prize” is the way the Kyoto honor is described in the west to make its order of magnitude clear. The 2008 winners, three in number, were announced in June, and Richard Karp of the Berkeley faculty won the prize in the advanced technology category, which focuses on information science. At the presentation ceremony in November, he’ll receive a 20-karat gold Kyoto Prize Medal, a diploma, and 50 million yen (approximately $460,000).
The Kyoto Prize was established in 1985 by Kasuo Inamori, founder of Kyorcera and KDDI Corp., partly as a complement to the Nobel Prize, which has no honors for engineering or computer science.
At Berkeley, Karp holds joint appointments in the mathematics, bioengineering, and industrial engineering and operations research departments. He is a University Professor, a designation bestowed by the UC Regents on exceptional scholars and teachers. His career on this campus began in 1968.
Karp receives the Kyoto Prize in recognition of his lifetime achievements in the field of computer theory. Berkeley’s engineering dean, Shankar Sastry M.S. ’79, M.A. ’80, Ph.D. ’81, says Karp “practically defined the field of theoretical computer science” and helped develop it as a discipline on this campus, “where it produced many important alumni and a spectacular record of achievements.” In 1985, Karp won the Turing Award, which is often called the “Nobel Prize of computing.” The following year, proving research isn’t his only strong point, he received Berkeley’s prestigious Distinguished Teaching Award.
This year’s other Kyoto winners also have been connected with UC Berkeley. Toronto’s Anthony Pawson, the winner in basic sciences, was a postdoc here from 1976 to 1980, and Charles Taylor, the arts and philosophy winner, was a visiting professor in philosophy twice (1974 and 1983). A previous Kyoto winner, Kurt Wüthrich (who is also a chemistry Nobel Laureate), was a postdoc here for two years under Robert Connick B.S. ’39, Ph.D. ’42.
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Sometimes the boundary is sharp: in Uganda’s
Bwindi Impenetrable Forest, human-dominated
land use abuts the reserve, giving no buffer for
the vulnerable mountain gorillas who reside within.
(Photo: George Wittemyer)
Protecting nature areas doesn’t discourage human activity in the surrounding territory, as many have thought. Instead, the reverse appears to be true. Berkeley researchers analyzed 306 rural protected areas in 45 African and Latin American countries and found that, on average, human population grew along the edges at nearly twice the rate of rural areas not as close to parks.
The usual perception, frequently used by people who oppose the reserves, is that rural populations “lose out when conservation areas restrict their access to traditional lands and natural resources,” says postdoc George Wittemyer Ph.D. ’05. His research partner, Justin Brashares, says, “If these protected areas are a detriment to local livelihoods, we should see little or negative population growth at their borders. Instead, people consistently move closer to them.” Both are affiliated with the Department of Environmental Science, Policy, and Management, in which Brashares is an assistant professor.
Coexistence: In northern Kenya, local
herders are allowed access to the Samburu
National Reserve during periods of excessive
drought, so their livestock can share scarce
water with elephants and other wildlife. While
60 percent of the cattle in other parts of the
pastoral region died in two recent droughts,
herding communities on the reserve borders
fared better. (Photo: George Wittemyer)
They studied changes during the last 30 years, during which nature reserves have grown explosively, with protected land increasing by 500 percent. Local people, says Brashares, see areas near (and in) parks today as “areas of opportunity,” with jobs, water, fish, good soils, and timber.
And, unfortunately, the influx of people near the protected areas is strongly linked to illegal harvesting of timber, poaching of antelopes and other wildlife, fire frequency, and species extinction. A balance needs to be struck, say Brashares. “The edges of parks have become battlegrounds for control of resources. These battles are only going to intensify over the next decades, and we have to plan for that.”
Their NSF-supported study appeared this month in the journal Science. Brashares’ and Wittemyer’s co-authors, all from ESPM, are research assistant Paul Elsen B.A. ’06, and grad students Tim Bean and Cole Burton.
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Rembrandt van Rijn: Clement de
Jonghe, Bookseller, 1651; etching;
6-1/4 x 8-1/2 in.; transferred from
the Graphic Arts Loan Collection, the
General Library, University of California,
Berkeley.
Through August 3
The UC Berkeley Library celebrates the fiftieth anniversary of its renowned Graphic Arts Loan Collection with this exhibition in the Berkeley Art Museum’s Theater Gallery. The works on view, now held at BAM, were once part of a unique collection of original lithographs, etchings, engravings, and other works of art loaned to students from the Morrison Library on campus, distinguishing Berkeley as the only university library with an art-lending program.
The collection began in 1958 under the direction of Professor Herwin Schaefer, who believed that the best way to foster an appreciation of art is for students to live with original prints for a semester. He declared that the University could assemble a collection of works touched by the hand of the artist and make them available to students, providing a meaningful extension of the University’s art teaching program. The program proved highly popular. Students willingly queued up outside the library overnight for a shot at favored pieces.
More than 500 works have been added to the Graphic Arts Loan Collection through the generosity of individual donors, include prints by Chagall, Matisse, and Kandinsky, some of which are now too valuable to circulate.
Dormant for nearly a decade, the program will resume this fall, assisted by an online database to browse (which should reduce the likelihood of long lines).
Trevor Paglen: KEYHOLE/IMPROVED
CRYSTAL Optical Reconnaissance
Satellite (USA 129) near Scorpio, 2007;
C-print; courtesy of the artist and
Bellwether Gallery, New York.
Through September 14
The satellites are small, sometimes a mere streak, but fortunately the prints are large. Trevor Paglen, who recently completed his Ph.D. here in geography, photographically (and with computer animation) reveals the “black world’ of top-secret satellites. Because this realm is meant to remain unseen, Peglen has deployed an array of tactics — from data analysis and on-the-ground exploration to long-distance photography and astronomy — to map it. His large-scale astro-photographs capture barely-perceptible traces of surveillance vessels in familiar fields of stars. The exhibition centerpiece is an installation of a globe with an animated projection tracing the orbits of 189 satellites in real time. Paglen’s first book, Torture Taxi, with A.C. Thompson, was the first book to systematically describe the CIA’s “extraordinary rendition” program. His second was an examination of the visual culture of “black” military programs, as revealed on the totemic patches worn on uniforms of obscure military units, with mottoes in English and Latin, or something resembling it. That book was called I Could Tell You But Then You Would Have to be Destroyed by Me: Emblems from the Black World.
Patches from mysterious units of the kind in Paglen's second book. “Gustatus Similis Pullus” is apparently an in-joke, translating approximately to “Tastes Like Chicken.” NOYFB is either self-evident or beyond your Need To Know.
United Artists: 90 Years
Hecho por México: The Films of Gabriel Figueroa
The Long View: A Celebration of WidescreenThe Pacific Film Archive Theater is located at 2575 Bancroft Way (between Telegraph and Bowditch) in Berkeley. Advance tickets are available by calling (510) 642-5249 or online. More information is available online.
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27th Annual Review of the Presidency: Bush 2008
July 16, 6 p.m.
UC Berkeley's 27th Annual Review of the Presidency features journalists and scholars discussing the performance of the Bush Administration during its two terms in office and how it will be viewed by historians in the years
ahead. Also viewable on YouTube.
The War on Terror and the Rule of Law
July 18, 5 p.m.
The Honorable A. Wallace Tashima examines the U.S. government's War on Terror detention policies and procedures and concludes that their ad hoc and
shifting nature have eroded both the perception and the reality of the U.S.
commitment to the Rule of Law. This was a September 2007 Jefferson Memorial Lecture. It also may be viewed on YouTube.
The Challenges of Inequality and Global Capitalism to U.S. Democracy
July 25, 5 p.m.
Harvard labor economist Richard Freeman explores how social inequality and globalization are threatening the foundation of democracy in the United States in this October 2007 Jefferson Memorial Lecture. Freeman also talks with Berkeley’s Harry Kreisler in this “Conversations with History” episode on YouTube.
Conversations With History: The Power of Words and the Power over Words
Host Harry Kreisler welcomes Annabel Patterson, a professor emeritus of English from Yale University, for a discussion of her career as a literary scholar. The discussion focuses on the challenges of understanding literature in its historical and social context. Her work on censorship, Shakespeare, and her current research on the use of words in the American political dialogue are some of the topics addressed in the conversation. This conversation may be viewed on YouTube.
Conversations with History: Addressing National Security Challenges in the Post 911 World
(http://www.uctv.tv/ondemand/) (#14865)
UCSD professors Herbert York (whose 1949 Ph.D. is from Berkeley) and Susan Shirk (who earned her Asian Studies M.A. here in 1968). York, a nuclear physicist, was the first director of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, the first chancellor of UC San Diego, and the founding director of UC’s system-wide Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation. Shirk is a successor of York’s as director of the IGCC and is a political science professor at UCSD. York and Shirk compare the Cold War and the Post 911 world. Highlighting the importance of regional contexts and the need for well informed diplomacy, they evaluate the U.S. response in managing these threats, and offer recommendations for the future.
Graduate-student-produced programs
“On Demand” and worth watching: California News Service (CNS), produced by students at the University of California Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism. Programs include news shows with stories from around the Bay Area and magazine-format shows that feature stories from around the country and around the world.
(Photo: Martin Sundberg)
You may have noticed that UC Berkeley’s gateway website got a facelift for both appearance and functionality. The new look debuted in mid-June, with many requests to take it for a spin and make comments. An addition to the mix is a featured photo of the day, one example of which features chemistry grad student Laura Miller with assistant professor Richmond Sarpong in his Latimer Hall lab. Miller joined Sarpong’s research group in 2005; she’s a winner of the GSI Center’s 2007-2008 Outstanding Graduate Student Instructor Award. Sarpong, who was born in Ghana and raised in several African countries, is especially interested in parasitic diseases such as malaria, Chagas disease, and sleeping sickness. Two awards from the biotech company Amgen and Abbott Laboratories partially fund his group’s research in synthesizing of complex natural products as a starting point for developing pharmaceuticals. Sarpong says, “Most of the compounds we are interested in making will either help the alleviation of pain or further aid the development of anti-cancer therapeutics.”
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Elizabeth Warren
UCTV’s communications manager Alison Gang was reviewing their May web statistics and was “blown away” by what she saw. A Jefferson Lecture presented at Berkeley in March of 2007 — “The Coming Collapse of the Middle Class: Higher Risks, Lower Rewards, and a Shrinking Safety Net,” by Harvard law professor Elizabeth Warren — was downloaded a whopping 46,522 times in May alone. Since it first went online in February 2008, she told Ellen Gobler, who runs the Graduate Division’s lectures program, including the Jefferson, “it has received over 70,000 views,” making it “by far our most-viewed program this year.” Interested, or just like to join throngs? You can watch the lecture on YouTube. And if you want to know more about Warren, you can see her interviewed by Berkeley’s Harry Kreisler for his “Conversations with History” series. And you can read an extensive interview with her about credit, part of which appeared on a 2004 Frontline program “The Secret History of the Credit Card,” that was co-written by Lowell Bergman of Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism. It appears on a special website supporting the program. The site’s reporting and research, in significant portion by grad students, came from a project of the J-school’s Investigative Journalism for Print and Television seminar, which Bergman co-teaches. The Berkeley-Frontline connection has garnered numerous awards (most recently the co-production “News War,” which picked up two national honors in the last two months).
(Photo: Dick Cortén)
Poets emplaqued on the eclectic Berkeley Poetry Walk on Addison Street between Shattuck and Milvia include Ohlone and Yana Indians, Bishop George Berkeley (“Westward the course of empire…”, Jack London, Robinson Jeffers, Kenneth Rexroth, William Everson, Allen Ginsberg, Gary Snyder, Alice Walker, Joe McDonald (“I Feel Like I’m Fixin’ To Die Rag”), Lennie Lipton (“Puff the Magic Dragon), Malvina Reynolds, Percy Montrose (“My Darling Clementine”), Susan Griffin, Al Young, Julia Vinograd, Sharon Olds, Gertrude Stein, and Berkeley faculty members (past and present), Josephine Miles, Tom Parkinson, Leonard Nathan, Maxine Hong Kingston, Thom Gunn, Ishmael Reed, Louis Simpson, Gary Soto, Alfred Arteaga, and Czeslaw Milosz.
One pioneer California poet quoted in metal is Gelett Burgess, who is most famous (although not necessarily by name) for writing the poem "Purple Cow: Reflections on a Mythic Beast Who's Quite Remarkable, at Least," first printed in 1895:
I never saw a purple cow
I never hope to see one;
But I can tell you anyhow,
I'd rather see than be one!
Associated (and perhaps typecast) with that work, he subsequently wrote "Confession: and a Portrait Too, Upon a Background that I Rue":
Ah, yes, I wrote the "Purple Cow"—
I'm sorry, now, I wrote it;
But I can tell you anyhow
I'll kill you if you quote it!
Bishop Berkeley’s quoted verse is one of the most famous:
Westward the course of empire takes its way;
The first four acts already past,
A fifth shall close the drama of the day;
Time’s noblest offspring is the last.
It’s the final stanza of his Verses on the Prospect of Planting Arts and Learning in America. (His name, just to keep things confusing, was pronounced “Barkeley.”)
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.
