Chicago Journal
For the Record
Genius takes charge
Classics and political-science professor Danielle Allen will become
Humanities Division dean July 1. Allen, who joined the University
in 1997, is Chicago’s first MacArthur “genius award”
dean. She succeeds Janel Mueller, in the post since 1999.
A gain for the SSA...
Bank One has donated $1 million to the School of Social Service
Administration to create the Bank One Program for Leadership in
Community Schools. The program will provide fellowships, field education,
and career services for students working in “community schools,”
which link academics with neighborhood services.
... And a loss
Edward Lawlor has stepped down after six years as SSA’s dean,
effective June 30. Lawlor, a professor at the SSA and the Harris
Graduate School of Public Policy, is moving to Washington University
to become dean and chaired professor at the George Warren Brown
School of Social Work.
Cosmo grant
Fred Kavli’s California-based foundation has donated $7.5
million to Chicago, making the Center for Cosmological Physics now
the Kavli Institute for Cosmological Physics. It’s one of
seven U.S. and European centers Kavli has funded to study brain
science, nanoscience, and cosmology.
Found in translation
After creating the first online Pashto dictionary, the University’s
congressionally funded South Asia Language Resource Center is developing
the first standard proficiency test in that Afghan language. The
center, which studies parlance in places including Afghanistan and
Pakistan, hopes to improve Americans’ foreign-language knowledge
for government intelligence purposes.
Good with money
Global Derivatives magazine ranked the University’s
financial mathematics master’s program fourth in North America.
The program is one of the math department’s most popular offerings.
Its place in the math department rather than the business school
makes Chicago’s program stand apart from other universities’.
Young and clever
Two junior faculty members in the Graduate School of Business, associate
professor of accounting Daniel Bens and assistant professor of accounting
Franco Wong, received this year’s Ernest R. Wish Accounting
Research Award, given by Wish, MBA’71, and his former firm,
PricewaterhouseCoopers. Bens and Wong were honored for their 2003
paper “Employee stock options, EPS dilution and stock repurchases.”
Reveler skips town
Husband-and-wife team Edward “Ned” Rosenheim, AB’39,
AM’46, PhD‘53, and his wife Margaret (“Peggy”),
JD’49, have retired to San Francisco after six decades at
Chicago. Ned Rosenheim, the David B. and Clara E. Stern professor
emeritus in English Language & Literature, helped write some
25 Quadrangle Club Revels, faculty and staff revues satirizing the
University. Peggy Rosenheim, the Helen Ross professor emerita in
the SSA, served as the school’s dean from 1978 to 1983.
Colorful particles lead
to prize
Yoichiro Nambu, the Harry Pratt Judson professor emeritus in Physics,
received the annual Bogoliubov Prize from the Joint Institute for
Nuclear Research of Dubna, Russia, this summer for his contribution
to the theory of colored quarks. Nambu’s work is also discussed
in a new book, Martinus Veltman’s Facts and Mysteries
in Elementary Particle Physics.
Cacioppo to advise on
aging
John Cacioppo, the Tiffany and Margaret Blake distinguished service
professor in Psychology, will serve on the National Institutes of
Health’s National Advisory Council on Aging. A social neuroscientist,
Cacioppo studies societal influences and personal relationships’
effects on cognition and emotions.
V.P. gets the word out
University vice president and dean of College enrollment Michael
Behnke is also, as of this winter, vice president for University
relations. Behnke will oversee the University’s news and publications
offices and will work with the development & alumni affairs
and community & government affairs offices, helping to publicize
Chicago’s achievements and its unique nature.
My fellow Chicagoans
Five University scientists—physicists Young-Kee Kim and Pavel
Wiegmann, astronomy & astrophysics professor Stephan Meyer,
chemistry professor Norbert Scherer, and James Franck Institute
senior scientist P. James Viccaro—have been elected American
Physical Society fellows.
Speaking role
This winter classical languages & literature professor Nicholas
Rudall, a fixture on Chicago’s dramatic stages, narrated Gertrude
Stein’s comic, farcical ballet, “A Wedding Bouquet,”
for the city’s Joffrey Ballet.
Heaven and Earth
The Religion and Environment Initiative, a partnership between University
environmental and religious groups formed last year—and led
by biochemistry & molecular biology professor Ted Steck—held
its first workshop in February. Ron Engel, emeritus professor of
social and environmental ethics at the Meadville/Lombard Theological
School, discussed the Earth Charter, a treatise on the ethics of
environmental sustainability.
Send in the experts
Goldman Philanthropic Partnerships, an Illinois-based
foundation that funds disease research, has paired with the University,
allowing Goldman to consult Chicago experts when choosing which
studies to sponsor.
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