2015 – Page 33

Long Lane Farm will host its annual May Day Festival from noon to 5 p.m. on May 2. The rain date is May 3. The event is open to the community, and will feature food, live music, face painting, crafts and activities, a bake sale, and a small farmer's market. A yoga class will be offered at 2 p.m., and a contra dance held at 3 p.m. Long Lane Farm is located at 281 Long Lane in Middletown at the corner of Long Lane and Wadsworth Street.

Peter Rutland, the Colin and Nancy Campbell Professor in Global Issues and Democratic Thought, has won an $85,000 grant from the Leverhulme Trust to serve as a visiting professor at the University of Manchester in the United Kingdom in 2016. There, he will be working on a research project titled, "Visualizing the Nation" with Manchester professors Vera Tolz and Stephen Hutchings. The Centre for Russian and Eurasian Studies at Manchester is a leading institution in the study of Russian television and mass media. Rutland is also professor of government, professor of Russian and Eastern European studies, tutor in the College…

WESU 88.1 FM is holding its annual Spring Pledge Drive to support another season of community-driven radio. The station aims to raise $20,000 this spring to close out a capital campaign that started at the beginning of 2014, when the station kicked off its 75th anniversary year. Meeting its pledge goal this spring will allow WESU to complete some much-needed studio updates, including an audio mixing console in the air studio, as well as other technical improvements that will strengthen infrastructure and better accommodate live in-studio performances. These upgrades will also enable WESU to broadcast from remote locations. (more…)

Wesleyan’s Institute for Curatorial Practice in Performance (ICPP) has been awarded a four-year, $100,000 grant from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation to support the participation of low-income students and students of color in ICPP’s master’s and certificate programs through the ICPP Scholarship Fund. Founded in 2010 and housed at Wesleyan’s Center for the Arts, ICPP is a center for the academic study of the presentation and contextualization of contemporary performance, and offers an interdisciplinary, graduate-level education in innovative and relevant curatorial approaches to developing and presenting time-based art. Starting in July 2015, the institute will offer a master’s degree in performance…

Manju Hingorani, professor of molecular biology and biochemistry, was awarded a grant of $408,609 from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to study the structure and mechanisms of DNA repair proteins responsible for fixing errors in the genetic code and preventing carcinogenesis. The three-year grant will fund PhD and undergraduate students' research on DNA mismatch repair (MMR). MMR corrects base mismatches and loops in DNA, and is therefore a critical guardian of genetic and cellular integrity. Defects in this essential, evolutionarily conserved DNA repair process cause high levels of mutations in the genome, which in turn lead to cancer. In humans, MMR…

#THISISWHY On April 17, more than 30 alumni, parents and community members and 80 student-athletes participated in an Alumni Athletics Mentoring Workshop in Beckham Hall. As part of the program, mentors met with female student-athletes to speak about career options. Student-athlete Melissa Leung '16 has first-hand knowledge of the workshop's value. "At last year's event, I met my mentor, Clare Colton '12," says Leung, who attended the event for the second year in a row. "Clare provided resume and email etiquette advice and connected me with Jim Citrin (P'12 P'14), senior director of Spencer Stuart, who created an internship position for me with…

Wesleyan welcomed about 450 admitted students and their families to campus April 15-17 to experience life at Wesleyan first-hand. Visitors had an opportunity to explore all that Wes has to offer through tours of campus, film studies, science facilities, the Center for the Arts, and the theater department; parent-to-parent and student-to-student panels; departmental and center open houses; and a student activities fair, as well as lectures, performances and film screenings. (Photos by Dat Vu '15, Hannah Norman '16, Gabe Rosenberg '16, Dena Matthews and Lauren Rubenstein.) (more…)

#THISISWHY On April 17, 30 senior and BA/MA students in the Natural Sciences and Mathematics Division presented their research to the Wesleyan community. Nearly 100 people attended the annual Celebration of Science Theses poster session, which was held in the Exley Science Center lobby. The event was co-organized by Manju Hingorani, professor of molecular biology and biochemistry; Barbara Juhasz, associate professor of psychology, associate professor of neuroscience and behavior, director of the service learning center; and Seth Redfield, assistant professor of astronomy. (Photos by Dat Vu '15.) (more…)

Several Wesleyan students and faculty were recently awarded grants for research by NASA's Connecticut Space Grant Program. Seth Redfield, associate professor of astronomy and campus director of NASA's CT Space Grant Consortium, was excited about the number of winners. "I was thrilled to see how successful Wesleyan was this year in getting grants through NASA's CT Space Grant program," wrote Redfield. "It demonstrates the diversity and quality of work we do that is aligned with NASA’s mission." "The grants this year support undergraduate, graduate, and faculty research, as well as special events organized by faculty at Wesleyan to promote exposure and…

Vera Schwarcz, the Freeman Professor of History and East Asian Studies, professor of history, delivered the 40th Annual Mansfield Freeman Lecture on April 16. She spoke in Daniel Family Commons on "The Human Dot on Yellow Mountain: Re-thinking 45 Years of China Study." (Photos by Dat Vu '15.)

#THISISWHY On April 15, faculty and staff met to share their service- and project-based learning stories during an Academic (Technology) Roundtable lunch at the Allbritton Center for the Study of Public Life. A(T)R lunches are designed to promote conversation, cooperation and the sharing of information, ideas and resources among faculty members, librarians, graduate students and staff. Barbara Juhasz, director of service-learning, associate professor of psychology, associate professor of neuroscience and behavior, led the session, providing an overview of service-learning at Wesleyan as well as the variety of ways that service can be used as a pedagogical tool. Other speakers included Rob Rosenthal, director of…

Writing in The Daily Beast, President Michael Roth reviewed In Defense of a Liberal Education by Fareed Zakaria, a refreshing change from the scores of books published in recent years decrying the state of higher education. Roth writes: Into this atmosphere of cynicism and spleen, Fareed Zakaria offers a compact, effective essay on the importance of a broad, contextual education. Cheerfully out of step with the strident critics of higher ed, In Defense of a Liberal Education is a reminder that American colleges and universities are a powerful resource that has allowed so many young people to learn about themselves and their ability to have a positive impact…

Long Lane Farm to Host Annual May Day Festival

Rutland to Serve as Visiting Professor at University of Manchester With Grant

WESU Holding Spring Pledge Drive

ICPP Receives $100K Doris Duke Grant

Hingorani Awarded Major NIH Research Grant

Mentors Share Experience with Female Student-Athletes

WesFest Gives Admitted Students, Families a Taste of Campus Life

Students in Natural Sciences and Mathematics Present Research

Astronomy Department Awarded Grants for Research

Schwarcz Delivers 40th Annual Mansfield Freeman Lecture

Faculty, Staff Share Service- and Project-Based Learning Stories

Roth Reviews ‘In Defense of a Liberal Education’