Archive for the ‘BU Today Features’ Category

BU Today took a look at this year’s winners of the John S. Perkins Distinguished Service Awards. Among them is MET’s assistant Finance Director, Zhuyuan Zhang.

Zhang (MET’04) has worked at MET since 1998. Dean Jay Halfond praised her efforts to implement BUworks, the University’s massive software upgrade, during MET’s busiest season last summer, when the college was immersed in a marketing campaign and its summer term. In addition, Zhang launched a partnership with a Chinese university that has brought 20 full-time undergraduates to MET in the last two years through the college’s international study program.

Red the full article on BU Today.

Ask Jason Sobocinski about a cheese and he’ll tell you a story. Take Point Blue for example. He’ll tell a tale of salty Pacific breezes, coastal pastures, and a herd of Holsteins that ends with a blue cheese with a yummy saltiness.

The MET Alum is the host of The Big Cheese, a show dedicated to cheese that debuted last fall on the Cooking Channel. Find out more about Sobocinski’s show and his other projects in BU Today’s feature.

BU Today published an article today that looks at the rise of advisory boards at Boston University and the important role they play in shaping the future of different areas within the University. Currently, at President Brown’s request, all 16 colleges, the athletics department, and the Marsh Chapel have active advisory boards. Metropolitan College is presented in the article as an example where advice from an advisory board member lead to the implementation of successful new programs and educational opportunities for professionals in the health informatics field.

When MET Dean Jay Halfond was on the hunt for cutting-edge programs that would prepare the college’s students for new and burgeoning professions, he turned to his board of advisors. Board member Andrei Soran (MET’92), CEO of Metrowest Medical Center in Framingham, had two words—health informatics.

Metropolitan College has forty-five Advisory Board members, five of which have been added in just the past few months, with whom Dean Halfond meets as a group once or twice annually, individually throughout the year, and continuously in email communication.  It is an impressive and diverse group of accomplished and committed individuals—who believe in the mission of Metropolitan College and are continually impressed with its accomplishments.

To find out more about the impact of advisory boards on the BU community, read the full article on BU Today.

In BU Today Rachel speaks out about the importance of cooking and nutrition classes offered to students.

It’s important to have outlets like these courses, because they give young people independence and skills that will last a lifetime.

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Boston University will award Metropolitan College (MET) culinary instructor Jacques Pépin an honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters at commencement exercises on May 21, 2011. The acclaimed chef, author, and television personality is being recognized for his contributions to the University, including his role as co-founder (with Julia Child) of the MET master’s program in gastronomy and the certificate program in the culinary arts, which established the tradition of integrating hands-on culinary experience with the serious academic study of cuisine in society. Pépin, who has been a part-time faculty member at MET since 1983, has taught hundreds of Boston University students. He has additionally drawn over ten thousand residents of greater Boston to the University by hosting informal seminars, demonstrations, discussions, and special cooking events through MET’s Lifelong Learning programs. In 2005, MET honored Pépin with the Roger Deveau Memorial Outstanding Part-Time Faculty Award.

Rebecca Alssid, director of Lifelong Learning at MET, says longtime friend and colleague Pépin “epitomizes the best of what a teacher, an artist, and humanist ought to be. He is recognized throughout the world for his culinary skill, his warmth of spirit, and his generosity as an educator and a person.”

Pépin’s career began with his exposure to cooking as a child in his parents’ restaurant, Le Pélican, in Bourg-en-Bresse, France. His training includes a formal apprenticeship at the distinguished Grand Hôtel de l’Europe and training under Lucien Diat at the Hôtel Plaza Athénée in Paris. Pépin served as personal chef to three French heads of State; honors conferred by the government of France include Chevalier de L’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, Chevalier de L’Ordre du Mérite Agricole, and in 2004, the National Order of the Legion of Honour. He earned his master’s degree in eighteenth-century French literature from Columbia University.

Pépin’s involvement with MET and BU reflects his accomplished background and his enduring commitment to culinary education. In addition to his many contributions to newspapers and magazines, Pépin has published twenty-six books and hosted eleven public television series, including the recent Jacques Pépin: More Fast Food My Way, which is the companion piece to the book of the same title.

Pépin has established a teaching legacy at MET that approaches cuisine from a perspective in which creativity is enabled by skillfulness, and intellectual curiosity is enabled by practicality. Under his guidance, MET’s gastronomy degree and culinary arts certificate have developed into highly regarded academic and professional credentials.

In response to BU’s announcement of the award, Pépin remarked: “It is a great honor and I am humbled, gratified, and very happy. It validates the work of chefs and the importance of cooking, dining, and sharing food with family and friends. Julia would be very proud.”

Read more about Jacques Pépin’s honorary doctorate on BU Today. Find MET’s full interview with Pépin here.

Learn more about programs in Food, Wine & the Arts at MET.

Today’s BU Today features a MET Urban Affairs course that utilizes the show, “The Wire”. Though this series has been integrated into courses at many universities, we are among the few that has done so in a planning and urban affairs program. This course is innovative not only because of its use of this television series, but in learning how media shape mainstream opinion about cities, race, class, crime, and other urban issues. Several MET students and MET’s instructor, Don Gillis, are quoted in this piece.

Read the full story on BU Today.

Elizabeth Bouhmadouche (MET’99), registrar and director of enrollment services at the Henry M. Goldman School of Dental Medicine, is a 2011 recipient of the University’s John S. Perkins Distinguished Service Award. This honor is given to staff members at Boston University who go above and beyond and set a new standard for passion and professionalism in their positions. Bouhmadouche’s attention to detail and love of her job has made her an indispensable part of the School of Dental Medicine.

The Perkins Award was also given to Susan Tomassetti, assistant to Associate Provost Douglas Sears, and Kenneth Douglass, senior associate director of the Office of Residential Life.

Read more about all three of the 2011 Perkin Awards winners on BU Today.

BU Today is featuring an article on the important role of interpreters in our society. Highlighted in the article is the Center for Professional Education’s Community, Legal, and Medical Interpreting programs. These programs prepare the next generation of interpreters to increase the effectiveness of communications in the areas they work.

Read more on BU Today…

One year ago today, a 7.0 magnitude earthquake leveled much of Port-au-Prince, the capital city of Haiti. In a video featured on BU Today, Metropolitan College Professor Enrique Silva, who was part of the first BU group and has since returned to Haiti three times, talks about the work yet to be done.

See the video on BU Today…

Associate Professor Daniel Ranalli’s Cape Cod photographs are currently on display in an exhibit titled Traces at the Provincetown Art Association and Museum in Provincetown, Massachusetts.

Read more on BU Today…