Carbondale Calendars and Events
Edwardsville Calendars and Events
East St. Louis Calendars and Events

A delegation from Henan University of Science and Technology — located in Luoyang, Henan Province, the People’s Republic of China — has signed a preliminary agreement with the SIUE School of Engineering to explore cooperation in the areas of joint research, faculty exchange and student exchange.  The delegation was on campus recently to meet with Professor Keqin Gu, chair of the SIUE Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, Engineering Dean Hasan Sevim and SIUE Provost Paul Ferguson.  Henan’s President Wang Jianji also met with SIUE Chancellor Vaughn Vandegrift to sign a preliminary memorandum of understanding.

The AT&T Foundation - the corporate philanthropy organization of AT&T Inc. - has awarded $20,000 to support SIU and Connect SI through the AT&T Excelerator competitive technology grant program.  The $20,000 grant will support Connect SI, which is a collective strategy to increase broadband Internet availability to connect the region's assets, build an economic development strategy around connectivity and to improve the quality of life in Southern Illinois.  The goal of the project is to produce measurable, transformative and sustainable results by promoting infrastructure investments, educating Southern Illinoisans about the need for high speed broadband access and teaching residents how to use broadband to expand the economy.  The initiative will affect a variety of areas, including health care delivery, business and industry, education and training, government, and agriculture, as well as household connectivity.  Greater access to broadband Internet services can mean more profitability for those who productively use the increased availability of greater bandwidth.

Bradley Noble, associate professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering and associate dean of the School of Engineering at SIUE, recently won an Emerson Excellence in Teaching Award.  The Emerson Excellence in Teaching Award Program annually recognizes 100 pre-school through higher education teachers in the St. Louis region.  Recipients are chosen for outstanding contributions to the teaching profession and to the students they teach.

With a little help from SIUC, 24 community college students are going to the dogs — and the cattle and the hogs.  SIUC is playing a key role in providing the hands-on experience with animals crucial to a new associate degree in veterinary technology being offered at five community colleges through the Southern Illinois Collegiate Common Market, with cooperation from SIUC, a Common Market member.  After a $100,000 grant from the USDA allowed the group to buy some essential equipment, representatives from SIUC, John A. Logan, Kaskaskia, Rend Lake, Shawnee Community and Southeastern Illinois colleges began hammering out the details.  Students will take their general education classes at their home campuses.  They will take the vet tech classes at both the Common Market facility in Herrin and at the SIUC farms, with the cooperation of the College of Agricultural Sciences and its animal science faculty.  The first students enrolled in August.  For more information on the program, e-mail Henry at nhenry@siccm.com, call her at (618)942-6902 or write to her at 3213 S. Park Ave., Herrin, Ill., 69248.

Imagine a space shuttle arriving in orbit, its bay doors opening, and a collection of thousands of individual robots, each with a piece of the reflector attached to them, float out into space.  These robots then navigate themselves to form a large parabolic structure, which is then used to harvest solar energy.  If you can imagine it, welcome to the mind of Ross Mead, graduate student in the SIUE School of Engineering.  Mead, the recipient of numerous state and national awards and author of several published works, not only imagines this for the future; he wants to make it a reality.  Mead, who recently was awarded an SIUE Research Grant for Graduate Students, introduced a project titled, Cellular Automata for Control and Interactions of Large Formations of Robots.  The project, which is his thesis, involves using large groups of robots that autonomously coordinate into a grid to form a solar panel or reflector.  Mead plans to submit the results of his research to the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence Conference in summer 2008.

Three Metro East high school students were honored Nov. 28 for excelling at this fall's annual Paul Simon Leadership Conference at SIUC.  Thomas Butler of Cahokia, Kevin Bland, from the East St. Louis SIU Charter School, and Keith Burton of O'Fallon were finalists for the Paul Simon Leadership and Character Award, presented at the close of the weekend conference in late September.  Close to 40 high school students from the Metro East area attended the Sept. 22-23 conference, featuring former Saluki and NBA standout Mike Glenn.  The conference, in its fifth year, focused on enhancing the leadership qualities of African-American young men through reinforcing positive qualities, building skills and increasing career awareness education.  The conference is named in honor of Paul Simon, the founder of SIUC's Public Policy Institute, who died in December 2003.

It has been said that home is where the heart is.  One SIUE graduate student is testing that adage.  Research conducted by Sharon Bean, an MFA student through the graduate school in the SIUE Department of Art and Design, shows that in the 60 years since the end of World War II the average footage of a single family home in the United States has increased by roughly 250 percent, while the average family size has decreased by nearly one-third.  Bean, who was awarded an SIUE Research Grant for Graduate Students for a proposal based on this information, is creating at least 20 copper etchings, measuring one square foot each, four large woodcuts and a large sculptural work in Habotai silk.  One of the reasons she is producing and exhibiting her work is to "provide a catalyst for viewers to consider and discuss their own approaches to home and the resulting impact on lives."  Bean also plans to examine the implications of increased square footage on a global scale — resulting in greater energy consumption and contributing to global warming and the depletion of natural resources.

Two art history students share the Tony Fehm Memorial Achievement Award in Art History this year.  The competitive award annually goes to a SIUC advanced undergraduate art history student who submits a paper demonstrating excellence in critical analysis and research.  This year, the art history faculty judged two students worthy of the recognition and cash prize that goes with the $1,000 award.  This year's winners are Amanda Cook from Metropolis and Alison Dunleavy from Chicago.  The students, both senior art majors, divide the cash prize between them, each receiving $500 awards for their winning art history papers.  Study of art history at SIUC can be a major or minor for undergraduates, and a graduate certificate program is also available.  Successful applicants for this undergraduate award must have at least 86 credit hours.  The faculty prefers applicants from students with a 3.0 overall grade point average and a 3.5 grade point average in art history.

Two professors at SIUE — one retired — recently were named Fulbright Scholars and will travel overseas to offer their expertise.  Bijoy Bordoloi, professor of computer management and information systems in the SIUE School of Business, is lecturing about Information System, Technology, Management and E-business at Birla Institute of Technology and Science in Pilani, India, through February.  Richard Millet, professor emeritus of Historical Studies at SIUE and distinguished chair in American studies, will lecture and conduct research on Experience of the Past: Dilemmas of the Present at the Copenhagen Business School in Copenhagen, Denmark, through next month.  Fulbright award recipients are chosen based on academic or professional achievement, as well as demonstrated leadership potential in their fields.  More than 30,000 Fulbright recipients participate in U.S. Department of State exchange programs each year.  The Fulbright U.S. Scholar Program is administered by the Council for International Exchange of Scholars.  For more than 60 years the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs has supported programs that promote mutual understanding and respect between the people of the United States and other countries.

The SIUC School of Music presents an evening of classical guitar performed by students devoted to the guitar as their primary instrument of study.  The SIUC Guitar Ensemble performs at 7:30 p.m. on Dec. 4 at the Old Baptist Foundation Recital Hall.  General admission is $7.50 and students get in for $3.  The program includes guitar trios and quartets with music by Beethoven, Chopin, Almeida, Barrios and contemporary composers Patrick Roux and Ian Gammie.  SIUC Professor of Classical Guitar Joseph Breznikar conducts the ensemble.

Colleen Casey, a former SIUE athlete who set the indoor school record at 1,000 meters, has qualified for the U.S. Olympic Trials in the marathon.  Casey has the 29th fastest qualifying time in the nation in the marathon and will compete in the 2008 U.S. Olympic Trials on April 20 in Boston.

Ian Michael Pendergast-White is the newest winner of the Dream Team Employee of the Month honors for Recreational Sports and Services at SIUC.  Pendergast-White, of Charleston, earned the award for October.  A four-year employee of Recreational Sports and Services, he's a graduate assistant in the outdoor adventure program and works with the base camp and climbing wall.  Pendergast-White is pursuing his master's degree in forestry.  Earlier this fall, he led the rescue of three teenage Boy Scouts stranded on a large freestanding rock formation in the Shawnee National Forest.  It was just the latest rescue effort for the man who has spent three summers on the wilderness field staff for a youth-at-risk program in Wyoming.

The SIUE Gamma Delta Chapter recently received the national Eta Sigma Gamma 2007 Chapter Service Activity of the Year award.  Members of the local chapter organized a Mid-West Regional conference for local Eta Sigma Gamma chapters.  SIUE’s Gamma Delta Chapter was given the award because of its commitment to “elevate the standards, ideals, ethics and competence of the profession,” according to a statement.  Eta Sigma Gamma, the National Health Education Honorary, was established in 1967 to enrich the profession of health education and health promotion.

The SimmonsCooper Cancer Institute at SIU has raised a record amount for its seventh "Denim and Diamonds" fundraising event held in September.  The $223,000 raised will help the SIU School of Medicine develop facilities in the Institute's permanent building which opens in the summer of 2008, especially for the five state-of-the-art research laboratories and amenities in the chemotherapy infusion area.  With a Hollywood theme, guests dressed in denim or formal attire were greeted by friendly paparazzi and red carpet reviewers at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Springfield.  In addition to 600 guests, the event had 30 sponsors and numerous donors for various auctions.  The SimmonsCooper Cancer Institute at SIU is focusing the medical school's efforts in cancer research, physician and public education, and treatment for patients from across central and southern Illinois.  The new three-story building will consolidate SIU's multi-disciplinary cancer clinics along with research and outreach service programs.  The Institute's Web site is www.siumed.edu/cancer.

SIUE Softball Coach Sandy Montgomery has signed five new recruits to National Letters of Intent.  The group that first plays for the Cougars in the 2009 season includes Whitney Davis (Cayuga, Ind.), Lindsey Barron (Urbana), Kay Hagelberg (Ankeny, Iowa), Ellese Lawrence (Clyde, N.C.), and Paige Sheeder (Davenport, Iowa).

Saturday, Dec 1, will be a historic day for SIUC athletics.  The day kicks off at McAndrew Stadium with the No. 4 Salukis hosting No. 7 Massachusetts in the NCAA Division I football quarterfinals at 2:20 p.m.  The football Salukis are 11-1 following last week's first round playoff win over Eastern Illinois.  Later that night, the No. 22 Saluki men's basketball team plays host to No. 15 Indiana in a sold out matchup at 8:30 p.m.  The basketball Salukis are 3-1 following a loss to Southern California in the championship game of the Anaheim Classic.  The football game will be televised live on ESPN Gameplan, while the basketball game is on ESPNU.  Gates at McAndrew open an hour-and-a-half before game time.  Doors at SIU Arena open two hours before game time for Dawg Pound members only and one hour before tip-off for the general public.

The SIUE Women's Basketball Team started the 2007-2008 Season with wins over Central Missouri and Harris-Stowe State.  Elyse Morris (Prophetstown) and Amber Shelton (Edwardsville) were named to the All-Tournament team.