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Assets for financial mathematics
Steve G. Stevanovich, AB’85, MBA’90, founder and CEO of asset-manage-ment firm Epsilon Investment Management, gave $7 million toward the University’s new Center for Financial Mathematics, which bears his name. Founded in August 2006 as a spin-off of the master’s program in financial mathematics, the Stevanovich Center is the only research center in the nation devoted to the discipline. Part of Stevanovich’s gift will go toward renovating the Mathematics/Statistics Building at 5727 S. University Avenue, the center’s home.

Law School wins suit
Six years after he was accused of murdering his mother and spent 17 months in Cook County Jail, Hyde Parker Corethian Bell received a $1 million settlement from the city after DNA evidence exonerated him. Craig Futterman, associate clinical professor in the Law School’s Mandel Legal Aid Clinic; Randolph Stone, clinical professor in the Law School and a former Mandel Clinic director; Hyde Park civil-rights attorney Tom Peters; and more than 20 Law School students worked on Bell’s suit. In 2000 Bell was interrogated for 50 hours by Chicago police, then confessed to the crime on videotape. Two years later the Mandel Clinic obtained a court order to test DNA found at the scene. The results matched the DNA of serial rapist DeShawn Boyd, who received a life sentence in 2004.

Jump-start for media literacy
The University’s Center for Urban School Improvement received a $1.6 million grant from the MacArthur Foundation to fund after-school programs on media literacy. With money from the grant, students at Woodlawn High School and at the North Kenwood/Oakland campus of the U of C Charter School will learn to produce video documentaries, podcasts, and music videos.

Campus buses frustrate students
Shoreland and Broadview residents expressed disappointment with the campus bus system at an October town-hall meeting with Housing and Facilities Services. This year the University substituted less costly Chicago Transit Authority buses for some daily bus routes, maintaining separate late-night routes. Students complained to Director of Campus Transportation and Parking Brian Shaw about overcrowding, missed buses, inadequate shelter, confusing stops, bad customer service, and inconvenient schedules. In response, Transit Operations Administrator Debbie Garfi promised to open a voice-mail line to report bus issues.

Doctor’s lifework recognized
Marshall Lindheimer, professor emeritus in medicine and obstetrics & gynecology, received the 2006 Lifetime of Advocacy Award from the Preeclampsia Foundation, recognizing his contributions to the study and prevention of high blood pressure during pregnancy. Lindheimer is a consultant to the World Health Organization’s Global Program to Conquer Preeclampsia and a founder of the International Society for the Study of Hypertension in Pregnancy. The author of more than 350 articles, he has written or edited seven books.

Banking on youth
Crain’s Chicago Business chose Jennifer Tescher, MPP’96, David Hoffman, JD’95, Tiffany Leadbetter, MBA’05, Kevin O’Connor, MBA’86, and GSB professor Austan Goolsbee as five of its 40 rising business leaders under 40. Director of the Center for Financial Services Innovation, Tescher suggests ways for banks to reach out to “under banked” immigrants and minorities. Hoffman fights corruption as City Hall’s Inspector General. An assistant vice president for Global Hyatt Corporation, Leadbetter scouts out new locations for the chain. O’Connor brokers deals with Chinese companies for Caterpillar Construction. Besides teaching at the GSB, Goolsbee writes columns for the New York Times and Slate and appears on NPR and PBS.

Court Theatre dominates Jeffs
Chicago’s Joseph Jefferson Awards Committee recognized Court Theatre’s 2005 productions of Fences and Man of La Mancha with ten Jeff Equity Awards, given to the city’s best productions. This was Court’s most successful year ever, with Fences winning for best play, play direction (Ron O. J. Parson), principal actor (A. C. Smith), and principal actress (Jacqueline Williams), and Man of La Mancha taking the musical, ensemble, musical director, scenic design, lighting design, and musical direction categories.

$20 million for cancer research
The Virginia & D. K. Ludwig Fund gave $20 million to each of six leading cancer-research institutions, including Chicago. At the University the gift will support metastasis research at the Ludwig Center, directed by Ralph Weichselbaum and Geoffrey Greene, to be housed in the Knapp Center for Biomedical Discovery when it opens in early 2008. Researchers in molecular biology, cell biology, genetics, bioinformatics, chemistry, imaging, and medicine will study why cancer cells tend to metastasize and how treatments can inhibit the process.

New developer, same plan
After Kenard Developers copresident Hal Lichterman died, the company, which bought the Shoreland from the University in 2004 for $6 million, resold it to R. D. Horner & Associates for $10 million in October. Horner & Associates was one of the property’s initial bidders and plans to carry out Kenard’s plans to convert the dorm into condominiums. After the University’s lease expires in 2009, Horner & Associates will take over, constructing 260 condos, a six-floor parking garage, a hair salon, and a restaurant in the original ballroom.

Art appreciation
Marilynn Alsdorf, president of hardware company Alsdorf International, received the Joseph R. Shapiro (X’34) Award, presented by the Smart Museum every two years to an art collector distinguished by vision and expertise. Alsdorf and her husband began collecting in the ‘50s. Their first purchase was a portrait by Amedeo Modigliani. Her collection includes works by 20th-century masters; Indian, Himalayan, and Southeast Asian sculpture; and ancient Egyptian, Greek, Roman, and Islamic art.