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El-Baz receives Nevada Medal from Desert Research Institute
The 2005 Nevada Medal has been awarded to Farouk El-Baz, a CAS professor and director of BU’s Center for Remote Sensing. The Nevada Medal was established by the Desert Research Institute in 1988 to acknowledge outstanding achievement in science and engineering. The annual award includes an eight-ounce minted medallion of .999 pure Nevada silver and a $10,000 prize. As part of the award program, the medalist gives public lectures at Desert Research Institute campuses in Las Vegas and Reno. The award is presented by the governor of Nevada during ceremonies attended by Nevada’s business, educational, and governmental leaders.
CAS chemistry prof to deliver Lehman College’s Sweeny Lecture
The 24th annual Arthur Sweeny, Jr., Memorial Lecture, which is held at the City University of New York’s Lehman College, will be delivered by Morton Hoffman, a CAS professor of chemistry, on November 13. His talk is entitled General Chemistry: A High School Chemistry Clone or a Brave New World? It will focus on how to revive the image and content of general chemistry at the collegiate level, which is often seen as a “weed out” course for students. Hoffman will give examples of innovative curricular and teaching techniques, including the use of group activities in lectures, requiring journals for reading assignments, and peer-led teaching workshops.
Barth receives honorary degree from University of Aarhus
As part of its 75th anniversary celebration, Denmark’s University of Aarhus conferred an honorary degree upon Norway native Fredrik Barth, a CAS professor of anthropology. According to the University of Aarhus, “Since the 1960s, Fredrik Barth has been one of the most influential anthropological theorists in the world. He has developed generative models that seek to encompass the variations in human behavior based on Max Weber’s ideas on social actions. His work, which is based on intensive field research in many different societies, includes theories on ethnicity and identity, ecological and political anthropology, and transactional anthropology. His latest research, which focuses on knowledge and knowledge traditions, has refreshed and enriched the study of culture in complex societies.” Present at the ceremony were Her Majesty Queen Margrethe and His Royal Highness Crown Prince Frederik.
BU alums score big in the movies
Stephen Fromkin (COM’00), who earned his master of fine arts in
film production at COM and is a former adjunct production professor,
won, along with director Andrew Mudge, the 2003 Chrysler Million Dollar
Film Festival. It consists of a $1 million production and distribution
deal from Chrysler, Hypnotic, and Universal Pictures. Last year Fromkin
produced Mudge’s film short The Perfect Gooseys, which
was an Academy Award contender and earned Fromkin and Mudge summer office
space at Universal
as competition finalists so they could produce a sample scene from a
feature film being written by Mudge, entitled The P. T. Johansen
Field Guide to North American Monsters.
Zachary
Lee (COM’03) recently finished shooting his first feature
film, Shortness of Breath, after working in various indoor and outdoor
locations in Cambridge and Somerville. The movie, which was shot on 16mm
film, is a tribute to Jean-Luc Godard’s new wave classic Breathless and is slated for release next fall.
Waller’s award-winning film garners more recognition
Small Justice: Little Justice in America’s Family Courts, the first independent documentary by Garland Waller, a COM assistant professor in the department of film and television, has received the award for Excellence in Media from the Family Violence and Sexual Assault Institute, jointly with the Leadership Council for Mental Health, Justice, and the Media and Justice for Children. The film was cited for its “unflinching courage and honesty in dealing with the difficult issue of child abuse allegations that arise in the context of custody litigation.” Waller’s film also won Best Social Documentary at the New York International Film and Video Festival, received an award at the Key West Indie Film Fest, and has been screened at Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts and at the Boston Film and Video Foundation.
BMC’s annual We Care Walk set for October 5
On Sunday, October 5, Boston Medical Center will hold its annual five-mile
walk to raise funds in support of critical hospital programs. The course
winds through the neighborhoods BMC serves, including Boston’s
historic South End, lower Roxbury, and Dudley Square. Nonperishable foods
will be collected at a food drive to benefit BMC’s Preventive Food
Pantry and Demonstration Kitchen. “This year’s event takes
on added importance, as it honors the memory of Sister Claire Hayes,” says
Valerie Navy-Daniels, BMC’s director of community relations. The
late Sister Claire was a hospital chaplain dedicated to serving the hospital
and the BUMC community for more than 12 years. After the walk there will
be a free festival featuring live entertainment, refreshments, health
information, and children’s activities on the lawns near the Menino
Pavilion. To obtain a pledge form, arrange online giving, or volunteer
for the event, call 617-638-6910 or visit
http://www.bmc.org/walk.
26
September 2003
Boston University
Office of University Relations