Mike Sciola, standing, director of Wesleyan’s Career Resource Center, speaks during an Academic (Technology) Roundtable meeting Feb. 8. Posted 02/16/07 Intellectual property issues, using visual images in the classroom and rock and roll memories are all upcoming topics for the Academic (Technology) Roundtable. The weekly roundtable meetings aim to promote conversation, cooperation, and the sharing of information and resources among Wesleyan's faculty and staff. "This is an informal way for faculty, librarians and staff members to get together and talk about technologies, academic issues and student life," explains Andy Szegedy-Maszak, director of the Center for Faculty Career Development, the Jane…

Posted 02/16/07 Members of the Wesleyan Cluster Computing Committee have listed the impacts on research from the newly-installed computer cluster. The Cluster Computing Committee members are Eric Aaron, assistant professor of computer science; David Beveridge, the University Professor of the Science and Mathematics; Tsampikos Kottos, assistant professor pf physics; George Petersson, professor of chemistry; and Francis Starr, assistant professor of physics. The committee is supported by the Information Technology Services staff, who made commitments of space, personnel resources, and developed an upgrade program so that the facility does not become rapidly obsolete. ITS staff involved include Henk Meij, applications technology…

Andrew Moreno, a graduate student in chemistry, teaches a lesson on probability to his peers during a Molecular Biophysics Journal Club class Feb. 7. Posted 02/16/07 Alicia Every, a graduate student in chemistry, went to class last week not only to learn, but to teach. She and the other 20 students taking the course, Molecular Biophysics Journal Club II, are expected to prepare a lesson on relevant course material and present a micro-lecture to their peers. For 20 minutes she spoke, jotting equations on the chalkboard while explaining that heat is in random motion. She drew a gas molecule inside…

This image by Ben Rowland '08 will be on display at the Brooklyn Artists Gym Gallery. Posted 02/16/07 During winter break, Ben Rowland ’08 traveled to Istanbul for a vacation with his cousins. A hobbyist photographer, he took several photographs. One of these has found a place in a New York gallery. That image, titled, “The Man and the Mosque,” is now part of a group gallery show called: “Look See: Photographs on Reflection” at the Brooklyn Artists Gym (B.A.G) Gallery in Brooklyn. The opening is from 6 to 9 p.m. Feb. 24. In “Man and the Mosque” Rowland captured…

From left, Henk Meij, applications technology specialist; Francis Starr, assistant professor of physics; and James Taft, assistant director of technology support services, look over the newly-installed 10-terabyte computer cluster at Information Technology Services. Posted 02/16/07 It takes 10, 250-volt plugs to power up. It takes 9,000 BTUs to keep it cool. It can communicate 14 times faster than high-speed internet, and it has the potential to store more than 2.5 million MP3s. But most important, this state-of-the-art high-performance computer cluster will offer both education and research opportunities for the university on a level which has never before been available. The…

Posted 02/01/07 Jim Lehrer P’85, anchor of Public Broadcasting Service's “The Newshour with Jim Lehrer,” will be the featured speaker at Wesleyan's 175th Commencement ceremony, which will be held on May 27, 2007. Lehrer began his career at PBS in 1972 and partnered with Robert MacNeil in 1973 to cover the Watergate hearings. In 1975, the two men began anchoring “The MacNeil/Lehrer Report” In 1983 the show became the nations first 60-minute television evening news program and was re-titled “The MacNeil/Lehrer News Hour.” Lehrer has been honored with numerous journalism awards, including a Presidential National Humanities medal in 1999. During the…

  Civil rights activist Sonia Sanchez speaks during Wesleyan’s Celebration of the Life of Martin Luther King Jr. event Jan. 30 in Memorial Chapel. Posted 02/01/07 Poet, author and civil rights activist Sonia Sanchez delivered the keynote address during Wesleyan’s Celebration of the Life of Martin Luther King Jr. event Jan. 30. She met King in 1957 and shared excerpts of King’s speeches with an over-flowing audience in Memorial Chapel. Often in poetic rhythm, Sanchez spoke about her own life and the troubles she and her family faced as being poor, black Americans. She emphasized her years in New York…

Robert Boyd's Xanadu is on display in Zilhka Gallery through March 4. Posted 02/01/07 A new exhibit at the Ezra and Cecile Zilhka Gallery tweaks, condenses, and re-frames contemporary events into montages of quick cuts, representing a history of apocalyptic thought as a series of MTV-style music videos within a setting reminiscent of a discotheque. Robert Boyd's Xanadu is a synchronized four-channel video installation that probes society's self-destructive impulse and parodies avenues of popular culture such as documentaries, news media, cartoons, and pop music. Xanadu takes its title from the 1980 American pop musical starring Olivia Newton-John. “One of the…

Nikhil Melnechuk ’07 and Jessica Posner ’09 are co-producing a week-long theater event based on Suzan-Lori Parks’ “365 Days/365 Plays.” The plays will be shown throughout campus and the Middletown community this month. Posted 02/01/07 In November 2002, Pulitzer Prize winning playwright Suzan-Lori Parks committed to writing a play a day for 365 days. Since November 2006, this year of new plays has been debuting across the country as “365 Days/365 Plays.” Wesleyan is among 52 universities and more than 700 venues taking part in this project, and will perform eight of Parks’ plays Feb. 5-11. “Wesleyan is making history,”…

Posted 02/01/07 Howard Bernstein, a long-time visiting professor at Wesleyan, died Jan. 15, 2007 at the age of 63. Bernstein was a member of the Wesleyan faculty from 1979 to 2001, during which time he taught in the College of Letters, the History Department, the programs in Educational Studies and Science in Society, and in Wesleyan’s Graduate Liberal Studies Program. Bernstein also was a major contributor to the Masters of Arts in Teaching Program. In addition, he supervised a large number of senior honors theses. Bernstein earned a bachelor’s of arts from the City College of the City University of…

Maria Cruz-Saco, dean of the college, will leave Wesleyan to conduct a study at the Universidad del Pacifico's Research Center in Peru. Posted 02/01/07 Maria Cruz-Saco, dean of the college, will leave Wesleyan at the end of her contract in June 2007. At the invitation of a United Nations office and Universidad del Pacifico, Lima, Peru, Cruz-Saco will lead a study on aging, equity and income security in Peru. While leading this study in 2007-08, she will be a Fulbright Scholar at Universidad del Pacifico's Research Center. In 2008-09, Cruz-Saco will resume teaching as professor of economics at Connecticut College.…