David PesciMention “records and documents of a large bureaucracy” and images of stacks of dense paperwork, rows of beige filing cabinets, and perhaps even a slight sensation of suffocation comes to mind. But mention the same phrase to Laura Stark and her pulse steps up a beat as she sees something quite different: buried treasure. “I am interested in the power of bureaucracies and the discretion people within them have to interpret rules,” says Stark, assistant professor of science and society, assistant professor of sociology. “How people who work in big organizations, including government agencies, apply general rules to specific cases…
Olivia Drake[youtube width="640" height="400"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GGlPlEEmZlE[/youtube] This issue, we ask "5 Questions" of Eric Aaron, assistant professor of computer science. His article, "Action Selection and Task Sequence Learning for Hybrid Dynamical Cognitive Agents," was recently published in Robotics and Autonomous Systems. Aaron has a bachelor of arts in math from Princeton University; a master of science and Ph.D in computer science from Cornell University. Q: How did you become interested in computer science, and specifically artificial intelligence? A: I’ve always been interested in logical problem solving and how people think. As an undergraduate, I majored in mathematics and took courses in psychology and philosophy, but each…
Brian KattenWesleyan's varsity four entry Elliot Skopin '11, Terrence Word '11, Trevor Michelson '13 and Spencer Hattendorf '12 with coxwain Peter Chu '14 turned in an outstanding performance during the Collegiate Four event at the prestigious Head of the Charles Regatta in Boston Sat., Oct. 23. With a time of 17:41.27 over the three-mile course, the Cardinals quartet of rowers bested 39 other crews in the 41-boat affair, trailing just WPI by a seven-second gap. Wesleyan made up more than two minutes in moving past the University of Massachusetts team. (more…)
The Wesleyan Media Project has received a $100,000 grant from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. The Wesleyan Media Project is a non-partisan initiative designed to perform comprehensive tracking and analysis of federal and gubernatorial political advertisements by candidates, parties and special interest groups. It also provides experiential learning for graduate and undergraduate students in the review, coding and analysis of political advertisements. Since its launch in late September 2010, The Wesleyan Media Project (more…)
On Nov. 1, Jessica Posner ’09 met with Wesleyan President Michael Roth and Rob Rosenthal, interim provost and vice president for academic affairs, and the John E. Andrus Professor of Sociology, to share her “Do Something Award.” On July 19, Posner was declared the top world-changer among all Americans under 25 by VH1. She received a trophy and a $100,000 award for Shining Hope for Communities, an organization she co-founded in August 2009 with Kennedy Odede ’12. Shining Hope created the first free school for girls in Kibera, Africa’s largest slum. The award ceremony is featured online here.
To view photos of Homecoming / Family Weekend 2010, visit one of our online galleries: http://www.wesleyan.edu/hcfw/2010/ http://www.facebook.com/wesleyan.university http://www.flickr.com/groups/wesleyan/ More photos will be posted in the November Wesleyan Connection.
A WESeminar will be held at 1:30 p.m. Sat., Oct. 23 in Memorial Chapel titled "Journalism and Social Change: A Conversation with Koeppel Journalism Fellows William Finnegan and Jane Eisner." The presentation will be moderated by Anne Greene, director of Writing Programs. William Finnegan, staff writer for The New Yorker, is the author of award-winning works of international journalism. He has written about immigration issues and politics in Europe and Mexico; racism and conflict in Southern Africa; and poverty among youth in the U.S. Jane Eisner '77, editor of the Forward, a weekly Jewish newspaper of major influence nationally and internationally. She…
Knight Foundation President and CEO, Chairman of the Board of The Newseum, and former publisher of The Miami Herald, Alberto Ibargüen '66, is the featured speaker for the 18th annual Dwight L. Greene Symposium in Memorial Chapel on Oct. 23 at 4 p.m. Ibargüen will explore the opportunities and challenges in today's shifting information landscape. He will discuss an information paradox we are experiencing; specifically: We have more information available to us on any given day than most humans had in their lifetime during all of recorded history. Yet, for now, there is less information being produced that is local,…
Bill HolderWesleyan has received gifts totaling $5 million from Terry Huffington, her family and the Huffington Foundation to fund an endowed faculty chair in the College of the Environment and endowed scholarships. The Huffington Foundation Endowed Chair in the College of the Environment, created with a $3 million gift from the Foundation, will benefit the nascent College, devoted to the development of environmental knowledge and the exploration of innovative approaches to environmental problems. A separate $2 million gift establishes endowed scholarships that will support Wesleyan’s need-blind financial aid program. “Through these very generous gifts, Terry Huffington, her family and the Huffington…
President Michael S. Roth, tri-chair of the 75th anniversary Middlesex County United Way campaign, recalled the university's first campaign on behalf of United Way (then the Community Chest) in his Oct. 11 letter to the Wesleyan community. Noting that times were tough as the Great Depression lingered, he said, "The response at Wesleyan was remarkable. Every member of the Wesleyan faculty and staff stepped in and donated funds to help less fortunate neighbors meet their basic needs. "As then, our neighbors today are struggling in tough times. And as then, through the United Way, we can help." Through the campaign,…
Elie Wiesel, Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, acclaimed author and speaker, Andrew W. Mellon Professor in the Humanities and University Professor at Boston University, will deliver a University Lecture titled "Building an Ethical Society: The Death Penalty and Human Dignity" on Tuesday, Oct. 26 at 7 p.m. in Memorial Chapel. Wiesel received an honorary doctor of humane letters from Wesleyan in 1979. Wiesel's efforts have earned him the United States Congressional Gold Medal (1985) and the Medal of Liberty Award (1986); the Presidential Medal of Freedom (1992); the rank of Grand-Croix in the French Legion of Honor (2001); an honorary Knighthood…
Last fall, Stephen Devoto, associate professor of biology, associate professor of neuroscience and behavior, took on an unusual teaching engagement — to work with Peter Gottschalk, chair and professor of religion, in order to bring the science of evolution and animal development into Gottschalk’s course, "Religion, Science and Empire: Crucible of a Globalized World." “It was liberating to teach science in a different context than a typical science course with its attendant responsibility to cover a vast knowledge base, and to have students’ learning be driven by their interest in the intersection of science and religion,” Devoto says. “Students felt…