Only one stop for students -- really

The "UC Shuffle" officially halted with the December opening of the $32 million University Pavilion. To keep students from shuffling back and forth across campus to conduct business in six different buildings, more than a dozen student-service offices moved into the new six-story building on a site formerly occupied by Beecher Hall.

"What we have created is leading edge in all of the country," says Mitchel Livingston, vice president of Student Affairs and Services. "We want our students," adds Stan Henderson, associate vice president for Enrollment Management, "to be challenged in the classroom by their academics rather than challenged by the harassment of bureaucracy."

In one location, students can now register, check grades, drop and add classes, pay tuition, apply for financial aid, obtain student health insurance, discuss disability services, obtain academic counseling, seek career guidance and more. Better yet, most services can be obtained by talking to a single cross-trained professional in a mini-living-room "pod" at One Stop Student Services, which extends hours to 7 p.m. on Mondays through Thursdays.

Operating as the university's front door, the Pavilion also contains the new University Visitors Center and executive offices for the president, the Board of Trustees and most of the vice presidents. A bridge connects the building to the College-Conservatory of Music and its garage.

The building was constructed without student fees or private money by using state capital projects dollars, which remain separate from academic funding.

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Offices and centers in University Pavilion

Mending Fences

Fences usually keep people apart, but the opposite occurred on UC's campus last October. Hundreds from the university and surrounding neighborhoods rallied to McMicken Commons to write their messages of peace, social justice and reconciliation on poster boards mounted on campus construction fencing.

The "Mending Fences" event, which also honored victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, was the largest "posters for peace" effort at an institution of higher education in the U.S., according to co-organizer Steve Sunderland, UC professor of social work. He said that he hoped this activity would "infuse the campus" with questions about peace and war issues.

About 120 posters were created by UC's international students. Afterwards, posters were exhibited in campus buildings and at the Northside branch of the Cincinnati Public Library.

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President Steger to retire

In November, UCi President Joseph Steger announced that he would retire at the end of June.

Steger became UC’s 20th president in July ’84, after serving for two years as provost. The only UC president to serve longer was Raymond Walters, who held the post from 1932-55. Average tenure for a university president ranges from four to five years.

The Board of Trustees has formed a committee that is conducting a national search for Steger’s replacement. If his successor is not in place by July 1, Steger agreed to remain as an interim. Afterward, he plans to return to the College of Business Administration faculty.

“I have been privileged to serve a great institution for 20 years,” he says, “to serve with excellent people, who have shared my vision that the University of Cincinnati is a world-class institution. It is time for me to move aside and watch the university continue to prosper.”

During Steger’s term, the university increased annual fund raising from $15 million to $73 million, expanded its endowment from $150 million to nearly $1 billion, became a global player with international co-op and affiliations with 50 overseas universities, transformed its campus environment with buildings and green spaces designed by world-renowned architects and incorporated the Internet into academic programs.

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The mummy’s scroll

The mummy kept mum about the papyrus scroll hidden inside his chest for more than 2,000 years. But the well-preserved text spoke eloquently to 60 international scholars assembled at UC in November, both its poetic epigrams and its revelations about Alexandrian Egypt in the third century B.C.

Kathryn Gutzwiller, UC classics professor and expert on Greek poetry, invited specialists in papyrology, Hellenistic and Roman literature, art history and Egyptian history to evaluate what is being called the oldest surviving Greek poetry book. The conference was the first such public gathering in the U.S. since the artifact’s rediscovery by tomb robbers about 10 years ago.

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Standing room only for Bono

The lead singer of U2 used the celebrity surrounding his four-letter name to attract attention to another four-letter word, AIDS, when he came to the College of Law in December. A standing-room-only crowd filled the lecture hall to hear Bono and actor Chris Tucker discuss the fact that 2.5 million Africans will die next year if they cannot get the drugs they need to fight the disease.

Hosted by UC’s Urban Justice Institute, their appearance was part of the DATA organization’s Heart of America tour. “It is great to be on campus (even though) I don’t have any letters after my name,” Bono joked. “In fact, I don’t even have any names after my name.”

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Artistic impressions

The smell of rancid beer wafts down Goose Alley, one street over from Vine Street in Over-the-Rhine. Between them is Findlay Playground, a sort of grassy oasis in an otherwise paved neighborhood -- one of the poorest in the city.

On this particular dank morning, the rainwater pools in the desolate ballfield. Still the view is pleasant and uplifting as two youngsters cartwheel their way along the 3-foot retaining wall that skirts the west end of the playground. Along the same wall, an older couple sits quietly holding hands. The scene never changes.

It never changes and its lifelike subjects stay put because they are part of a 140-foot mosaic artwork installed last year as part of UC’s Art in the Market program -- a six-year-old collaboration between DAAP students and young people in the community to install public works of art near Findlay Market. University of Cincinnati undergrad Terri Brandon coordinated the mosaic, titled “Growth.”

“I’m completely proud of what I did,” she says of the project that took several months and hundreds of volunteers. “The people in the community were excited about us being there. We couldn’t walk around without being thanked.”

More photos and related projects

In national headlines

• Newsweek -- interviewed industrial design alumnus Brian Smith, chief designer for the new concept car Cadillac Sixteen, in the Jan. 13 issue.
• The Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, CBS news, Newsweek, the Associated Press -- quoted medical professors Stephen Liggett and Lynne Wagoner regarding their discovery of two genes thought to cause heart failure, as reported in the New England Journal of Medicine.
• CNN, the Washington Post, Reuters and NBC -- itemized the dietary results of nursing professor Bonnie Brehm’s study comparing the Atkins low-carb, high-protein diet to the more balanced American Heart Association’s low-fat diet, which found Atkins dieters lose more weight and improve their cholesterol levels.
• U.S. Surgeon General -- invited medical professor Nelson Watts to speak in Washington, D.C., as a panelist at the Workshop on Osteoporosis and Bone Health in December.
• The New York Times -- quoted family medicine professor Susan Montauk about the dangers of giving children over-the-counter medications for colds.
• Time magazine -- quoted psychiatry professor Paul Keck in an article, “Young and Bipolar,” which appeared on the cover.
• ESPN -- featured 24 outstanding students in a TV spot aired nationally during four Bearcat football games.
• Carnegie Hall -- welcomed the CCM Concert Orchestra’s music director Xian Zhang in winning the inaugural Maazel-Vilar Competition, founded to nurture new artistic leadership. Competition lasted 20 months and featured 362 contenders from five continents.
• The New York Times -- claimed the performance by Michele Pawk, CCM ’85, “may well be the best on Broadway now,” in reviewing “Hollywood Arms,” a play by Carol Burnett and her daughter.
• Landscape Architecture magazine -- featured 12 pages, including a cover shot, on UC’s master plan.
• Science magazine -- published research findings by medical professor Lique Coolen, recent recipient of the American Association of Anatomists’ Charles Judson Herrick Award, recognizing important contributions from young investigators in comparative neuroanatomy.

Lights, camera ... answer!

Without 10 million people watching, it’s easy to “take American History for $400” and remember to answer with a question. It’s equally easy to put an “X” on Whoopi Goldberg to block John Ritter’s “O.” But two UC students know how it feels to be on the hot seat with cameras, lights and live studio audiences.

Accounting junior Allison Hurley and psychology senior Denise Hite earned college-tournament spots on Jeopardy and Hollywood Squares, respectively, when the game shows conducted auditions on campus last fall.

Hite’s half-hour of stardom, taped in Hollywood, aired in late February, and Hurley’s episode, taped at Ohio State University, aired in November. Both returned home richer in memories than in winnings.

That winning look

Sheer beauty, bold originality or funky fun, the designs of University of Cincinnati fashion students continue to win applause. For example, honors received in the National Competition of Young Fashion Designers in 2002 resulted in four students traveling to Paris in December to show their work to an international audience.

Junior Maren Hartman’s pink-and-cream dress with a skirt like crinkled rose petals won a special Award of Distinction at the national level. Laura Dawson, Jennifer Dusold and Akrasun Seanglai were UC’s other three finalists from among 40 students representing 18 of the country’s best fashion programs.

Meanwhile, five students in Phyllis Borcherding’s design class at the College of Design, Architecture, Art, and Planning were inventing ways to make pressure garments more acceptable for young patients at Shriners Hospital for Children. Burn victims wear the form-fitting, nylon-spandex garments to reduce skin swelling and disfigurement.

One of the young designers’ solutions is a washable “sleeve” that fits over a pressure garment. Patients can use colorful markers and cartoon decals to decorate this outer sleeve, then wash their artwork away when they want a change. Temporarily attaching ribbons or character patches would give children additional ways to personalize the sleeves.

Check out a few more fashions

Dressed for global success

Not a single student showed up for the final exam wearing a backward ballcap, an untucked shirt or even tennis shoes. And that’s a good thing.

Linda Ginter Brown’s advice to the 22 students in her Global Civility class had translated perfectly. For their final exam in December, the College of Applied Science students ate at the new Jean-Robert at Pigall’s, a fine French restaurant on Cincinnati’s Fourth Street, where they were graded on dining etiquette.

“I told them, ‘If you show up in Reeboks, I will kill you on the spot,’” Ginter Brown joked. Her students arrived in appropriately impressive attire.

The 10-week course, which goes far beyond learning which fork to use, is designed to give students an edge in the business world by requiring them to research business etiquette and international protocol as it relates to professionalism. “We’re a strong technical college, and while students have confidence in themselves in terms of doing the actual work, they don’t necessarily have the social background for the global market,” Ginter Brown said.

Leading the list

Recently ranked among the tops in the nation are the following:

• DAAP’s interior design program -- selected as the nation’s best by the “Almanac of Architecture and Design 2003,” based upon national surveys of professional design firms
• DAAP’s architecture program -- selected as the country’s third best by the “Almanac of Architecture and Design 2003,” a definitive design reference resource
• UC Medical Center’s health professionals -- according to U.S. News and World Report’s “America’s Best Hospitals” guide. University Hospital ranked 20th in otolaryngology, 36th in respiratory disorders and 48th in the hormonal category.
• UC’s Economics Center for Education and Research -- singled out from among 250 centers to receive the first outstanding performance award from the National Council on Economic Education, based upon excellence of programs, work with teachers and effective outreach to the community
• UC’s Career Development Center -- according to the 2003 edition of Kaplan’s “The Unofficial, Unbiased Insider’s Guide to the 320 Most Interesting Colleges,” based on a national survey of guidance counselors
• UC Libraries -- placed in the country’s top 50, as ranked by the Association of Research Libraries

$32.7 million boosts research efforts

UC medical researchers’ work on Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s disease, stroke and the genetics of human cell activity attracted nearly $33 million in grants and gifts last summer.

The largest amount -- $30 million -- was earmarked for the UC Neuroscience Institute to manage several stroke studies, including the identification of genes that cause brain aneurysms, the likeliness that a family member of a stroke victim also will suffer a stroke, an ongoing study of environmental risk factors for stroke, and a five-year National Institutes of Health study of a new drug for stroke treatment.

A $1 million gift will advance neuroscience research on Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s disease, thanks to James and Anne Bever of Oxford, Ohio, who established the Helen Stemen Ruder Fund in memory of her mother.

The UC Genome Research Institute is using a $1.7 million grant from the Ohio Board of Regents for capital equipment to enhance its medical programs. The former site of Aventis Pharmaceuticals laboratories underwent extensive renovation before GRI could become fully operational.

In honor of Turner and Schneider

Given the legacy of two UC pioneers, it is a fitting honor that their names be permanently etched into the campus landscape in the form of Darwin T. Turner Hall and Herman Schneider Hall.

The new buildings make up the $39 million Jefferson Residence Hall complex dedicated in October 2002, a 580-bed suite-style facility on the site of the former tennis courts along Jefferson Avenue.

Turner, UC’s youngest graduate, earned his bachelor’s degree in 1947 at age 16 and went on to become a leading writer, editor and critic of African American literature. The Minority Scholars program at UC was changed in 1989 to reflect his name. Today, there are nearly 200 Darwin T. Turner Scholars enrolled at UC. Turner’s widow, Jean Turner, flew in from Iowa City to attend the ceremony.

Schneider is a former UC president, dean of the College of Engineering and founder of the nation’s first cooperative education program, a 1906 endeavor to combine a student’s academics with paid professional experience. Today, UC averages 4,100 co-op placements every year.

More on the new residence hall complex

An attractive addition

When you say the word magnet, most think of the variety used to hold their kid’s art on the refrigerator. Now think of a magnet that is roughly the weight of 150 refrigerators.

The UC Medical Center installed this 12-foot, 19-ton magnet inside its Center for Imaging Research in October as the core to its magnetic resonance imaging system -- one of only a dozen 4 Tesla MRI scanners in the country. Traditional scanners used to detect and diagnose disease are 1.5 Tesla. The far stronger magnet is expected to produce clearer pictures of brain function that could lead to breakthroughs in Alzheimer’s disease, autism, bipolar disorder, stroke and more.

“With this new technology, we can directly visualize the activity of the human brain as it goes about its business -- thinking, remembering and feeling,” says Dr. Stephen Strakowski, director of the imaging research center.

The enormous donut-shaped device took five months to build, then traveled from England by ship and from New York by truck. Both the hallway and the elevator shaft inside the Medical Sciences Building had to be reinforced to allow it to safely travel to the imaging center.

Contributions to counter terrorism

In the search for Osama bin Laden, UC researcher Richard Beck identified a possible Al-Queda stronghold in Afghanistan by using satellite imagery and remote sensing.

For more than a year, he has forwarded information to the U.S. government, which has asked him to continue. Last fall, he presented his techniques to the Geological Society of America. Because Beck’s PhD dissertation in the ’90s focused on geological maps of the Afghan-Pakistan border, field experience had made him aware of the region’s cultural geography and its military history. To create a map identifying suspected terrorist training camps, he compared video images to his own photographs and to images supplied by the U.S. government and by satellite.

He began forwarding his geographic coordinates for targets to the government following 9/11. One month later, the U.S. bombed a site he had listed. “It could be total coincidence,” he says, “but I was thrilled that they were able to find good targets.”

When snacks attack

In what appears to be a fatal mission, a cunning fly guides itself directly into the silky trappings of a spider’s web and begins struggling to draw attention to itself. Suicidal behavior? Not exactly.

In a fascinating reversal of the predator-prey relationship, the insect waits for the mother spider to leave her clutch to investigate, then zips over and lays a stealth grub on the arachnid’s egg sac. Within about 15 minutes, the fly larva will have chewed its way through the sac to feast on its contents.

At least that is how the ploy is scripted by the fly, a species scientifically known as Arachnidomyia lindae. Research published by UC biologist George Uetz reports, however, that the spider, a Mexican species known as Metepeira incrassata, will wise up to the winged impersonator.

Uetz and his colleagues found, over years of experiments, that the fly’s wing-beat puts the spider on alert to defend her eggs and even sever her web to protect them. By mimicking the sounds of different flies, the scientists proved that the Mexican spider can actually distinguish a threat from a meal.

Cold, war protesters

Heated slogans against a war with Iraq were the only things left unfrozen as these protesters rallied near the main campus entrance on an icy day last January. Patrick Dyer, A&S graduate student (left), was one of about 25 people from UC and the broader community who took part.

Getting charged up about technology

Technology developed by UC researchers is changing high school and college chemistry labs across the country. Robert Voorhees, Estel Sprague and Paul McKenzie hit the market with MeasureNet in 1998, an electronic network that uses a single PC to support a dozen laboratory workstations. As a result, students are able to electronically collect, analyze and share data such as voltage, temperature, pressure and pH without each student needing a separate computer.

MeasureNet returned to the limelight in November when it won the Ohio Governor's Award for Energy Efficiency.

"PCs take up plenty of lab space and use a lot of electricity, plus you have to replace them every three to five years," says Voorhees. "The cost savings is significant, and the reduction of electricity over the life span is huge."