:: UCLA TODAY Home

©2004
The Regents of the University of California
 

bureau briefs

OLYMPIC ATHLETES

In keeping with its impressive Olympic tradition, UCLA has sent 55 players and coaches to the 2004 Summer Games in Athens, Greece. Bruin athletes have struck gold in every Olympics since 1932, with the exception of the boycotted 1980 Games. Prior to 2004, 387 UCLA athletes, coaches and trainers have participated in the Summer Olympic Games, winning a total of 195 medals: 98 gold, 51 silver and 46 bronze. As of press time Aug. 13, gold-medal hopes rested with the U.S. women’s water polo team, of which seven members — Robin Beauregard, Natalie Golda, Thalia Munro, Nicolle Payne, Kelly Rulon, Amber Stachowski and alternate Gabrielle Domanic — are UCLA students and alumni, and with the U.S. softball team, whose roster includes five UCLA alumni.

ARTS AND ARCHITECTURE

The opening of the Edythe L. and Eli Broad Center is a year away, but already excitement is building because of news that internationally renowned sculptor Richard Serra has created a 42.5-ton, untitled, steel torqued ellipse to be installed in front of the new building. The Broads have donated $23.2 million toward the $50-million building, designed by Richard Meier & Partners Architects, to house the Department of Art, the Department of Design | Media Arts and the New Wight Gallery. The sculpture is an open, tilted, 14-foot-high cylindrical steel form that was fabricated in Germany, where it is currently being stored. “That UCLA will be home to Richard Serra’s first public art work in Southern California reflects the significance of our university not only as the flagship arts campus within the UC system, but as a major cultural center on the West Coast,” said Dean Christopher Waterman.

THE COLLEGE

Despite a nationwide drop in cultural exchange programs with Muslim countries, UCLA’s Language Resource Center last month welcomed 10 educators from the former Soviet republic of Uzbekistan, a secular country with a Muslim majority. At UCLA, these native Uzbek and Russian speakers, who teach English at the state-run University of World Languages, studied American slang, body language and intonation, thanks to a State Department grant. “Because it’s a place in the Muslim world that’s open to American values, and because it borders on Afghanistan, there is a lot of interest in keeping friends,” said Donna Brinton, the center’s director of special projects. “One way you do that is by giving aid and a peek into our way of life.”