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The Regents of the University of California
 

February 11 , 2002 (Vol. 23, No. 9)

NEWS

BUREAU BRIEFS
Student Affairs – Janina Montero, vice president of campus life and student services at Brown University, has been appointed UCLA’s vice chancellor for student affairs effective July 1, Chancellor Albert Carnesale announced Jan. 29… Communication Policy Center – The more than 70% of Americans who use the Internet now consider online technology to be their most important source of information, outranking all other media, according to findings in the latest UCLA Internet Report… The College – Dean Pauline Yu of the Humanities Division in the College of Letters and Science will be leaving UCLA this summer to become president of the American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS), the preeminent organization advancing humanities scholarship in America.

UCLA MEETS INS DEADLINE
The federal government has set up a new computerized system for maintaining information about international students at universities around the country, and UCLA was ready to participate in the new program by the government’s January deadline.

INSTITUTE MELDS MOLECULAR WORLD WITH TECHNOLOGY
UCLA and NASA have partnered to combine the highest advances in biology and engineering at the Institute for Cell Mimetic Space Exploration (CMISE).

WINTER PROGNOSTICATOR PREFERS SLEEPING ON THE JOB
A hirsute animal captures the attentive adoration of some 35,000 marmotophiles who congregate at Punxsutawney, Pa., every year to witness Punxsutawney Phil’s prediction of how long winter will last.

NEWS 2

CAMPUS BRIEFS
On the Rise — Gov. Gray Davis will be among the dignitaries participating in a historic groundbreaking for the California NanoSystems Institute (CNSI) building Feb. 14 in the Court of Sciences ... Space Shuttle Tribute — Tributes to the space shuttle Columbia astronauts will be presented at the UCLA Planetarium Feb. 12, 19 and 26 … Higher Grades, But Less Work — Freshmen surveyed nationwide by UCLA’s Higher Education Research Institute indicated they spent less time studying or doing homework in the year prior to entering college, but their high school grade average continued to climb … Paris Connection — Pharmaceutical economics students at the School of Public Health and at the Ecole de Science Economique et de Commerce, a French business school in Paris, will share a virtual classroom via videoconferencing today to learn about each nation’s health-care systems.

DID YOU KNOW?
Applicants for UCLA’s fall 2003 freshman class — totaling 44,864 as of Feb. 1 — topped last year’s numbers, 43,440. Transfer applications also went up this year; as of Feb. 1, 13,027 have applied to transfer to UCLA in the fall, compared to 12,040 last year. Notification of acceptance will be sent out beginning March 13.

LATINAS’ UNEQUAL ACCESS
Latina students in California do not have equal access to accelerated K-12 programs, accounting in part for the low percentage of Latina undergraduate students in the University of California system, according to a recent report partially funded by the UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center.

EXPERTS ANALYZE DILEMMAS POSED BY GENETICS
International leaders in the field of genetic research convened Jan. 26 at a symposium on “The Storefront Genome” to discuss the rapidly changing field of genetics and the future moral and ethical dilemmas that will come with it.

YESTERDAY, TODAY & TOMORROW — Sundance Spotlight: Crowds attending the 2003 Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah, last month had a chance to see 10 films featuring the talents of students, alumni and faculty from the School of Theater, Film and Television; Armenian Studies: The UCLA Armenian Graduate Students Association, in collaboration with departments and other campus organizations, is hosting the first-ever Graduate Student Colloquium in Armenian Studies on Feb. 21 at Royce Hall 314 from 8:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m; Eyewitness to Apartheid: Peter Magubane, the renowned South African photographer who documented apartheid and its demise, shared his experiences and work with students as a University of California Regents’ Lecturer here last month.

PEOPLE

HOMAGE TO DICTIONARY IS SHEER POETRY
The idea for Harryette Mullen’s latest book of poetry came to her in her sleep — literally. “I woke up in the morning and something was poking me in the back,” recalled Mullen, an associate professor of English and African-American studies.

WORK-STUDY JOB CHANGED HIS LIFE
“I thought, ‘I’ll just see how it goes,’ ” recalled Moises Roman of the work-study job that was to change his life. It was 1992, his second year at UCLA as a premed student, when Roman took a job for a few hours a week as a teaching assistant at UCLA’s Bellagio Center, which provides child care for the preschool children of students, faculty and staff.

NAMES AND FACES
Congrats: Neal Halfon, Marvin E. Ament, Gerald S. Levey
Kudos: UCLA Medical Center, Desmond J. Smith, Maida Hastings
In Memoriam: Harold B. Gerard, Daniel Kivelson, Mia Slavenska

15 SECONDS
Suzanne L. Seplow, Director, Office of Residential Life

CAMPUS

'ROUND AND ABOUT
A Newborn Majority: The majority of babies being born now in California are Latino, according to a UCLA study; Heartfelt Help: Jack and Florence Ferman were on hand Jan. 22 to help UCLA Medical Center officials unveil a newly dedicated cardio- thoracic surgery research laboratory that was named for the couple in honor of their $1-million gift to support the lab; Genetics and the Press: In conjunction with the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education (CASE), UCLA will host a fellowship program to inform journalists about leading experts’ positions on the sweeping medical and societal changes brought by the genetics field to society and individuals; Night Moves: Effective Feb. 16, Santa Monica’s Big Blue Bus lines will no longer stop at the Hilgard Avenue bus terminal (below Murphy Hall) between 10 p.m. and 7 a.m., seven days a week.

WEB WATCH
Listen to a heart beating. The Auscultation Assistant Web site
provides heart sounds, heart murmurs and breath sounds in order to help
medical students and others improve their physical diagnosis skills. The site was developed by a fourth-year medical student to help his fellow students. To hear the heart, go to: www.wilkes.med.ucla.edu/intro.html

STRATEGIES TO CUSHION BUDGET'S IMPACT
In the wake of mid-year budget cuts authorized by Gov. Gray Davis, UCLA’s head of Campus Human Resources (CHR) said that her department, campus leaders and the UC Office of the President are looking at ways to cushion the impact on employees.

NON-SCIENTISTS SAMPLE WONDERS OF NANOWORLD
Nanotechnology has inspired both dreams and nightmares — the promise of new biomedical, manufacturing and information technologies that will dominate the 21st century juxtaposed against the fear of imagined dangers and science-fiction hype epitomized by micro-robots gone wild.

COMMUNITY BULLETINS
Building Sold: The majority of babies being born now in California are Latino, according to a UCLA study; Advocate for UCLA: Jack and Florence Ferman were on hand Jan. 22 to help UCLA Medical Center officials unveil a newly dedicated cardio- thoracic surgery research laboratory that was named for the couple in honor of their $1-million gift to support the lab.

VOICES

CLOSEUP:
GRAD STUDENTS LEARN TO BUST BARRIERS
Today, these are fertile grounds that are being mined for scientific riches — more effective therapies to fight disease, answers to the mysteries surrounding the circuitry of the human brain, retinal implants for the blind, low-energy sources of light. To make these new discoveries requires a wholly new kind of scientist.