Hunter Headlines for 2006
Hunter Professor Awarded Grant for Smoking Study
End of Semester Brings Final and Fission
Professor Ender Wins MLA Award
Isabella Rossellini Speaks at Hunter
$800,000 Grant Will Help Hunter Train More Teachers Of Learners with Severe Disabilities
Hunter Gets $1.6 Million Grant to Study Factors Related to Drug Abuse
‘06 Alum Places High in NYC Marathon
Barron’s Names Hunter “Best Buy” in College Education
NYT’s Kristof and Student Journalist Come to Hunter to Discuss Darfur
Women's Tennis Claims Seventh Straight Conference Title
Hunter Hailed as Top School for Fulbright Scholars
Two Distinguished Alumnae Honored for Library Gifts
Nursing School Gets $300,000 Grant To Maintain Its Leading Edge in Technology
Manhattan/Hunter Science H.S. Seniors Come To Hunter
Hunter Alumnus Named to “Brilliant 10” List
Hunter Ranks Among the Best Northeastern Colleges, According to Princeton Review
Hunter Awarded $130,000 Grant
Professor Dennis Awarded Prestigious NIMH Award
Village Voice Publishes Special Issue Written by Hunter Students
Hunter to Co-Sponsor 12th Annual Avignon/New York Film Festival
Hunter Professor to Direct Human Rights Seminar
Screening Room Named in Honor of Cecile Insdorf
Class of 2006 Presents Legacy Gift
Hunter President Honored by A Better Chance
Newsweek’s Fareed Zakaria Delivers Keynote Address at Hunter Graduation; Activist Gloria Steinem Honored During Ceremony
Senator John Edwards Speaks at Hunter
Hunter Holds Dialogue on Diversity
Professor Eva Bellin Named Carnegie Scholar
Women’s Swim Team Earns National Honor
Spring 2006 Undergraduate Student Elections
Hunter’s Michael Gitlin Wins Guggenheim Fellowship
Did Your Mother Go To Hunter?
“Our New York” Neighborhood Project Screening in West Lobby
Anthony Lewis, Molly Ivins Receive Aronson Lifetime Achievement Awards
Hunter Named One of America's "Best Values" by Princeton Review
Actress Tyne Daly Brings Broadway to Hunter
Hunter’s Braun Wins National Jewish Book Award
CUNY Teacher Academy at Hunter
Bella Abzug Leadership Institute Launched at Hunter
Opera Star Angela Brown Gives Sneak Preview Before Hunter Concert
Science Students Recognized for their Research
Journalist Wayne Barrett Named Newfield Visiting Professor
HEO Award Winners Have Served Hunter a Total of 142 Years
Hunter Grads Urged to Make World Better Place
Hunter Junior Heads to DC for International Relations Internship
Hunter Nutrition Student Promotes Healthy Lifestyle
Hunter Senior Named Young Ambassador by German Academic Exchange Service
MoMA to Premiere Film Produced By Fulbright-Winning Hunter Student
Hunter Soccer Star Represents College in South Africa
Music Student Selected for Highly Competitive NPR Internship
Hunter Student Wins a Fulbright Grant to South Korea
Two Students Travel to Germany Via Prestigious Awards
Hunter Doctoral Student to Attend Meeting of Nobel Prize Winners
Hunter Student Wins Fulbright to Spain
Merage Institute Awards Fellowship to Hunter Student
Two Hunter Juniors Awarded HIA Fellowships
Hunter Student Wins APA Minority Scholarship
Hunter Wrestler Headed to NCAA Wrestling Championships
Hunter Professor Awarded Grant for Smoking Study
Dee Burton of Hunter’s Center for Community and Urban Health has been awarded a $378,000 research grant from the New York State Department of Health for an innovative program aimed at helping Chinese restaurant workers stop smoking.
The launch of the Chinese Restaurant Workers Project on Dec. 15 – which was reported in several major Chinese newspapers – involves incorporating Chinese cultural traditions into a unique counseling plan for smokers recruited from restaurants in Flushing, Queens.
“Smoking is more prevalent among Chinese –American men than any other group except Native-Americans,” said Dr. Burton, an adjunct associate professor in the School of Health Sciences. “Chinese restaurant workers tend to be recent immigrants who work long hours - and their smoking provides a bond to their homeland, where most men smoke.”
The Center’s three-year study will offer phone counseling to the workers in Mandarin, Cantonese, Fujianese and Wenzhounese dialects. There will also be other customized approaches provided such as Chinese meditation exercises and quit-smoking teas.
“At the end of the three years, we’d like to have a protocol for smoking cessation based on Chinese cultural traditions and then see that incorporated into the regular stop-smoking programs within the community by hospitals and volunteer groups,” Burton said.
Burton is a co-director of the Center, which is part of Hunter’s School of the Health Professions. Asian Americans for Equality, a community organization, is collaborating with Hunter College on the study.
End of Semester Brings Final and Fission
A Thomas Hunter Honors class takes an inside look at a nuclear power plant.
As a course comes to a close, nervous energy is generally expected, but one Hunter class ended with nothing short of nuclear power. Students enrolled in the Thomas Hunter Honors colloquium Our Energy Future, Hydrogen or Else?, taught by Hunter professors Steve Greenbaum (physics) and Haydee Salmun (geography), finished the term with a trip to Entergy's Indian Point Nuclear Power Plant in Buchanan, NY.
The plant provides about 20% of the electricity needs of New York City and the lower Hudson Valley. After touring the facility, Hunter student Steve Osit remarked, “It was truly an amazing once-in-a-lifetime experience.”
The class took a look at the “gargantuan” electricity-generating turbines, spent fuel rod pool, and control room simulator, which is a replica of the actual control room. They also saw the rotating safety screens that prevent Hudson River fish from being drawn into the massive pumps that feed the steam generators.
The students understood that, like a final exam at the end of a class, their experience will probably not be repeated. “I doubt I will be able to go to a nuclear power plant again,” said Lulu Zhong.
Professor Ender Wins MLA Award
Hunter Romance Languages Professor Evelyne Ender has been awarded the Aldo and Jeanne Scaglione Prize for Comparative Literary Studies by the Modern Language Association of America for her book, Architexts of Memory: Literature, Science, and Autobiography.
Awarded annually for an outstanding scholarly work that is written by a member of the association and involves at least two literatures, the prize includes a monetary award of $2,000 and a certificate. It is one of seventeen awards that will be presented on December 28 during the Association’s annual convention.
Hailed as “personal and provocative” by the selection committee, Architexts of Memory, published by the University of Michigan Press, is an interdisciplinary study that explores human remembrance by revisiting great works of literature. Through examining texts by Proust, Eliot, Freud, and others, she reveals that memory is grounded not only in the factual, but in the fictional and aesthetical.
Ender, who joined the Hunter faculty this fall, has a doctorate in comparative literature from the University of Geneva. A scholar in the fields of nineteenth- and twentieth-century English and French literatures, feminist criticism and gender, and memory studies, Ender has also published Sexing the Mind:Nineteenth-Century Fictions of Hysteria and multiple articles in such journals as Yale Journal of Criticism, Nineteenth-Century French Studies, Compar(a)ison, and Science in Context.
Isabella Rossellini Speaks at Hunter
Isabella Rossellini came to the Chanin Language Center at Hunter on November 21 to present “The Flowers of St. Francis,” a film directed by her late father, the renowned Roberto Rossellini. The celebrated actress, model, and writer was introduced to the audience by Cecile Insdorf, a longtime Hunter professor in the Romance Language Department and great supporter of the Foreign Language Film Festival.
Rossellini spoke warmly of her dad, saying, “His uniqueness and originality were his strengths.” She talked of his affinity for using non-actors in his films, as they have an “authenticity in their faces,” and said he cast real Franciscan monks in the featured film. “Papa said ‘If you make up Cary Grant to look like a fisherman, he will look like Cary Grant made up to look like a fisherman.’ ”
“The Flowers of St. Francis” was made in 1950, a time when Europe was in a state of unrest. “My dad looked at St. Francis, at the teachings of this saint, to see how they could be applied to Europe to reconstruct a peaceful society. He used cinema to create awareness or knowledge rather than as an instrument for fantasy or escape.”
Roberto Rossellini would have been 100 this year, and several screenings of his films will be featured in a retrospective at MoMA.
$800,000 Grant Will Help Hunter Train More Teachers Of Learners with Severe Disabilities
Hunter will be able to prepare more people to teach children who are severely/multiply disabled and have auditory and visual impairments, thanks to a four-year $800,000 grant brought in by Rosanne K. Silberman, professor of special education. The grant is from the U.S. Department of Education.
“There is a severe shortage of qualified teachers in this field, particularly in the area of deaf-blindness,” explains Silberman, “and this grant will help us increase the supply of these much-needed teachers.”
Hunter is one of only six colleges in the country—and the only college within CUNY and SUNY—that has a program to train teachers in the area of deaf-blindness.
The grant will provide tuition waivers and stipends to highly qualified candidates seeking to enter the Hunter master’s degree program. Students who complete the program earn an MSEd and are qualified to become special education teachers with a specialty in severe disabilities including deaf-blindness.
“I’m really excited about this grant,” says Silberman. “It will help students who might not have been able to afford a graduate education earn a degree and build a rewarding career in a much-needed field. In turn, these Hunter graduate students will be able to provide deaf-blind children and youth with severe disabilities, including deaf-blindness, with a superior education that will enhance their quality of life.”
Silberman estimates that the grant will aid more than 40 graduate students over four years.
Hunter Gets $1.6 Million Grant to Study Factors Related to Drug Abuse
Hunter was recently awarded a five-year $1.6 million grant to support three research projects that are examining aspects of drug abuse. The grant is from the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
Professor Gordon A. Barr is principal investigator for the new grant, which supports the research projects of Professors Rebecca Huselid, Shirzad Jenab, and Vanya Quinones-Jenab, with Professor Jeffrey Parsons acting as a consultant/advisor to the grant.
The five professors are all members of the Psychology Department faculty. “All of the projects,” explains Barr, “are seeking to determine how best to understand the factors, both social and biological, underlying drug abuse and how best to mitigate drug use.”
These are the research projects:
- Huselid is studying how perceptions of personal and group-level race discrimination are related to substance use, psychological distress, and academic achievement; she will also test the effects of racism on coping responses to stress.
- Jenab proposes to use molecular biological methods to determine novel mechanisms that mediate cocaine’s effects; he will also seek to devise new strategies to prevent cocaine addiction.
- Quinones-Jenab is testing the hypothesis that the rewarding effects of cocaine are modulated by the female hormones estrogen and progesterone, since women are more susceptible to the addictive properties of cocaine and other stimulant drugs than are men.
The new grant will also support a research seminar, to be given in the spring, featuring outside speakers who are experts in research on drug abuse. The specific program funded by the grant is Hunter’s MIDARP (Minority Institutions’ Drug Abuse Research Program), which is directed by Barr.
‘06 Alum Places High in NYC Marathon
Former Hunter cross-country star Omri Holzman was among the leading runners in the New York City Marathon on November 5.
The June 2006 Hunter graduate – participating in his first career marathon - placed 20th in his age group and 48th in the male category among nearly 38,000 finishers. Overall, Holzman’s time of 2:29.21 put him in 54th place.
During his four years at Hunter, Holzman – an Israeli native – was the top men’s cross-country runner in the CUNY Athletic Conference and the most successful long distance runner in Hunter history. He earned 17 championship medals and was the league’s cross-country champion all four years.
Barron’s Names Hunter “Best Buy” in College Education
Hunter College has been listed in the new edition of Barron’s “Best Buys in College Education” – the only CUNY school to receive such recognition
In recommending Hunter as one of a select group of colleges where it says the education dollar goes further, Barron’s praised it as a dynamic “working class college, with an energy that makes the campus sizzle.”
“Its curriculum is rich in traditional subjects like English and political science,” the Barron’s survey said, “as well as in programs such as women’s studies and Latin American and Caribbean studies that are targeted at the interests of its special populations, many of whom are the children of immigrants and the first in their families to attend college.
“The student body is highly stratified, starting with competitive honors undergraduates at the top and working down to remedial students at the bottom, with every ability level in between.”
The prestigious publication quoted one recent Hunter graduate as saying the school offered a rewarding educational experience that “culturally and politically is more different, more diverse, and more radical than what most mainstream or Ivy League Colleges provide.”
The final conclusion from the Barron’s Best Buys college survey: “Mature, self-reliant undergraduates who are culturally and politically active and who appreciate diversity in all areas, including their course of study, are happiest at Hunter.”
NYT’s Kristof and Student Journalist Come to Hunter to Discuss Darfur
Student journalist Casey Parks (in yellow sweater) discusses her recent trip to Africa at a dinner with Hunter journalism students.
Pulitzer-prize winning New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof and student journalist Casey Parks discussed their recent journey through central Africa at Hunter College on Tuesday, October 24, 2006. The discussion, titled “Africa, Genocide and the World,” was part of The New York Times “Times Talks” series.
Parks, a graduate student in journalism at the University of Missouri, was selected by Kristof out of about 4,000 entrants to accompany him through Ecuatorial Guinea, Cameroon, and the Central African Republic. The contest was, Kristof freely admits, “a gimmick” geared largely toward finding a way to communicate the problems in Africa to a younger audience.
Parks had never traveled abroad before and had thought of herself as poor before seeing poverty in Africa. “I can’t imagine talking about my family as being poor now,” Parks said, explaining that her family always had food and medical care.
The pair answered audience questions after the talk, tackling such issues as the value of journalistic distance and Darfur. “It’s ridiculous to think it would be a better story to watch people die,” Kristof said in reference to his donating his own blood to a sick woman in a hospital in Cameroon.
Kristof, whom Parks lauded as the journalistic authority on Darfur, answered questions about the region, where he says the genocide is “at rock bottom and getting worse, expanding into [neighboring countries] Chad and C.A.R.” He accused the international community and the White House of “dropping the ball” and placing economic interests before humanitarian values, drawing applause from the large audience in the Kaye Playhouse.
Pulitzer-prize winning Hunter Journalism Professor Bernard Stein and his opinion writing class dined with Casey Parks at Hunter following the talk. Professor Stein and his class had been in contact with Parks after reading her blog and Kristof’s column.
Women's Tennis Claims Seventh Straight Conference Title
Photo Credit: Lisa Tao Yen
Top-seeded Hunter Hawks (19-0) won their seventh straight CUNYAC Women’s Tennis Championships, defeating the No. 2 seeded Baruch Bearcats 8-1 at the U.S. National Tennis Center on Saturday, October 21.
The victory gives the Hawks the conference's first automatic bid to the NCAA Women’s Tennis Championships, which will be held this spring, as well as the first undefeated season in program history.
“I’m very proud of this team for finishing the season undefeated and accomplishing our goal of earning a bid to the NCAAs,” said Hunter head coach Mel Kerper. “It’s a very exciting step for our program, which will now be able to attract more top players and become more of a metropolitan power.”
Sophomore Monica Calungcagin was named the Tournament Most Valuable Player for the second consecutive season after avenging her only conference loss of the campaign to Baruch sophomore Kateryna Pylypyshyna, 6-4, 6-2. “We' re very evenly matched and it was a fight to the end,” said Calungcagin. "Losing to her earlier in the season definitely helped motivate me to defeat her today."
Hunter opened the match by taking all three doubles points to position Baruch into a quick hole. The Hawks then put the match away by winning five of the six singles matches.
“ I think that our team learned a valuable lesson today,” said Kerper. “We may have underestimated Baruch a bit, as we trailed early in several matches today. They were very competitive and fought very hard. It was good to see our team turn things around, but we will need to play harder when the NCAA Tournament comes around.
Hunter Hailed as Top School for Fulbright Scholars
Hunter College is highlighted in the October 20 edition of The Chronicle of Higher Education for the success of its students in winning highly sought-after Fulbright awards.
Hunter – with four Fulbright scholars for the 2006-07 academic year – appears on the “Top Producing” schools list of Master’s Institutions having the highest number of U.S. Fulbright students this year, according to The Chronicle.
The Hunter students who won Fulbrights include Alice Arnold, a graduate student in the MFA program in Integrated Media Arts who won a Fulbright Grant for a video project in Hong Kong; Sarah Osewalt, a June 2006 graduate, who is teaching English in South Korea; Erica Seppala, a graduate student in the School of Education’s Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages program who is teaching English in Spain; and Carla Minami, a June graduate who is teaching English as a foreign language to German students.
Begun in 1946, the Fulbright Program – founded by the late Arkansas Senator J. William Fulbright and sponsored by the U.S. State Department as well as governments in other countries – has provided the opportunity for top students to study aboard and exchange ideas with other cultures.
It now operates in more than 150 countries and is considered one of the most prestigious academic award programs in the world.
Two Distinguished Alumnae Honored for Library Gifts
Two Hunter College benefactors and alumnae were honored in a ceremony at the Jacqueline Grennan Wexler Library on October 4 for generous gifts they gave to renovate the library.
A donation by Helen Galland ‘45 was used to dramatically update and redesign the browsers’ lounge in order to make it a more inviting place for students to read, study and learn. She is a member of the Hunter College Hall of Fame and the Hunter College Foundation Board of Trustees.
Another contribution from Ada Peluso ’60 provided for a new and vastly improved circulation desk area. Dr. Peluso, a member of the Hunter College faculty for some 40 years, is the Chairman of the Mathematics and Statistics Department. She gave the gift along with her brother Romano in memory of their parents.
Hunter College President Jennifer J. Raab described Ms. Galland and Dr. Peluso as “two extraordinary Hunter women” and vowed that these were just the first of many positive changes to the East 68th Street library, which opened nearly a quarter century ago. “Today we celebrate a new circulation desk designed by the staff, a pleasant place for students to study and wireless access,” Raab said at the dedication ceremony.
In addition to aiding the library, Helen Galland’s gift to Hunter provides for a number of student scholarships and an innovative new program for summer interns. Known as the Galland Internships, the program offers grants to Hunter students to work in public service or non-profit jobs over the summer for organizations that otherwise couldn’t afford to pay them.
Nursing School Gets $300,000 Grant To Maintain Its Leading Edge in Technology
Hunter’s nursing students will soon be learning how to work with patient records through state-of-the-art technology, thanks to a $300,000 grant to the Hunter-Bellevue School of Nursing.
The three-year grant will enable the nursing school to modernize the curriculum for teaching students to work with high-tech information systems in hospitals and home-care settings. Students will learn the latest techniques in reading and updating patients’ electronic records and in using cutting-edge technology to communicate the information to other health-care workers.
The grant comes from the Jonas Center for Nursing Excellence, an arm of the Barbara and Donald Jonas Family Fund of the Jewish Communal Fund.
Dr. Kathleen Nokes is director of the program and Dr. Donna Nickitas is co-director. The two Hunter professors will work in partnership with the chief nursing executive at the New York Harbor Health Care System of the city’s Department of Veterans Affairs and the chief operating officer of the Visiting Nurse Service of New York. The aim of the three-way partnership is to increase the use of patient-record software systems at the Department of Veterans Affairs at the visiting nurse service and to teach nursing students to use this new technology.
Manhattan/Hunter Science H.S. Seniors Come To Hunter
A remarkable success story is taking place on the Hunter campus as seniors from the new Manhattan/Hunter Science High School began attending classes here this fall semester.
Seventy-seven members of the Class of 2007 – the first to graduate next June from the unique science-focused “early college” high school – will take college-level courses along with Hunter students during their entire senior year. The credits they earn count for both their high school and college records.
MHSHS Principal Susan Kreisman said her students were already enthusiastically settling in to college life – talking excitedly about freshman classes, their professors, things to do on campus and even telling her proudly how they now had Hunter College E-mail addresses.
Many said they planned to go to Hunter next year after they graduate. “The goal is to make the transition to college as seamless as possible,” Kreisman said of the “dual credit” concept which allows them to begin their college experience while still in high school. “We want to help these students become the self-reliant, independent learners they need to be in college.”
The Manhattan/Hunter Science High School opened in September 2003 as a partnership between Hunter College and the New York City Department of Education – funded in part by a grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. It is one of several schools located in the old Martin Luther King School building on the Upper West Side.
Despite its emphasis on science, the school does not seek out super-achievers with top grades – instead the goal is to recruit average students and make them academically successful. Admission is based on attendance records, interviews and letters of recommendation. Between 3000 and 4000 students applied last year – and 115 were accepted.
“I know of no other school quite like it,” Kreisman said proudly.
Hunter Alumnus Named to “Brilliant 10” List
Hunter graduate Erich Jarvis (’88) has been named one of Popular Science’s Brilliant 10, the magazine’s annual list of young scientists and researchers to watch. In the October issue of the magazine in which the list appears, editor-in-chief Mark Jannot calls the Brilliant 10 “some of the brightest, most promising minds in science,” adding, “their work will change our lives.”
While he was still an undergraduate at Hunter, Dr. Jarvis published six papers on bacterial molecular genetics. After earning his BA in biology and mathematics, he went on to receive a Ph.D. from Rockefeller University. In 1998, he joined the faculty of Duke University where he is now an associate professor of neurobiology.
Dr. Jarvis uses songbirds to study the neurobiology of vocal communication, and his research has changed the understanding of the role of genetics and molecular biology in learned vocal communication. He has also led an international consortium of neuroscientists that proposed a drastic renaming of the structures of the bird brain to correctly portray birds as more comparable to mammals in their cognitive ability.
This is not the first time Dr. Jarvis has been singled out for national attention. In 2002, the National Science Foundation awarded him its highest honor for a young researcher: the Alan T. Waterman Award. And in 2005, he received the National Institutes of Health Director's Pioneer Award, which provides unrestricted grant support of $500,000 per year for five years.
Hunter Ranks Among the Best Northeastern Colleges, According to Princeton Review
Hunter College’s growing academic stature has been confirmed by its inclusion in the Princeton Review’s Best 361 Colleges for 2007. Only about 15% of the four-year colleges in America are in the guidebook, and they are ones that offer students “an outstanding undergraduate education,” according to The Princeton Review. The rankings are based on a survey of 115,000 students (about 300 per campus on average) attending the 361 colleges in the book.
The Princeton Review ranked Hunter No. 5 in the nation in diversity of the student body and hailed its “stellar faculty.” Among the College’s “many tremendous assets,” The Review said, are its New York City location and its ability to provide “fantastic learning opportunities.”
The Princeton Review’s 80-question survey asks students to rate their schools on several topics and report on their campus experiences. Ranking lists report the top 20 schools in categories that range from best professors, administration and campus food to lists based on student body political leanings, interest in sports and other aspects of campus life.
There’s more: In America’s Best Value Colleges, a guidebook that profiles 150 schools named by The Princeton Review as the best deals in undergraduate education, Hunter was one of 103 public colleges that met the “best value” criteria, as judged by academic excellence, the generosity of financial aid and low costs.
Hunter Awarded $130,000 Grant
Hunter College has been awarded a $130,000 Environmental Protection Fund (EPF) grant for the restoration of Roosevelt House. The landmark is currently being restored as Hunter College’s Public Policy Center honoring the Roosevelt legacy.
Hunter’s EPF grant is one of 7 grants administered through the State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation. The awards support a variety of projects, including waterfront improvements, repairs and restoration work to historic properties, and enhancements to public recreation and playground facilities in city parks and community gardens.
Professor Dennis Awarded Prestigious NIMH Award
Assistant Professor of Psychology Tracy Dennis has been awarded the prestigious Mentored Research Scientist Development Award from the National Institute of Mental Health.
This highly-sought-after honor provides for a five-year grant that will allow Dennis to do intensive research, as well as receive advanced training and mentorship, in the field of child emotion regulation (ER) – how children learn to control their behavior and emotions when upset.
“In my research, I am attempting to identify child brain activity and behavior that predicts whether a child will go on to show effective emotion regulation or specific problems with ER and psychological adjustment,” she said. “Ultimately, this understanding will help us to screen children for problems with ER and to better prevent and treat mental illness.”
Dennis is a clinical psychologist who received her Ph.D. from Pennsylvania State University and a post-doctorate at the NYU School of Medicine.
“Hunter College has been immensely supportive of my research efforts,” Dennis said. “Without the resources and support of the college, and of my colleagues in the Psychology Department, I would not have been able to obtain this award.”
Village Voice Publishes Special Issue Written by Hunter Students
A class of dedicated student reporters at Hunter has carried on the work of legendary journalist and alumnus Jack Newfield (’60) by writing a special edition of his famed “10 Worst Landlords” feature for the Village Voice.
The Voice devoted its entire July 5th issue to the unique investigative project – which was supervised by Wayne Barrett, Hunter’s first Jack Newfield Visiting Professor of Journalism.
The 13,000-word article was the result of a semester long class in which the student journalists targeted, researched and wrote about the worst New York City landlords – in the same way that Newfield did for years as the Voice’s preeminent investigative reporter.
“They showed tremendous interest and energy, and some of the pieces they wrote were good enough to go into the paper almost unedited,” said Barrett, Newfield’s longtime colleague and later his successor at the Voice.
The Newfield Visiting Professorship – named in honor of the crusading journalist, who died in 2004 – was created by Hunter in partnership with Newfield’s wife and family to carry on his legacy. A continuing series of distinguished journalists will teach the spring term classes each year.
Hunter to Co-Sponsor 12th Annual Avignon/New York Film Festival
The Avignon/New York Film Festival, one of the most important and provocative film festivals in America, will be held on the Hunter campus from November 15-19. This is the 12th Avignon/New York Festival, and the second to be hosted by Hunter.
Avignon/New York is the American version of France’s 23-year-old Avignon Film Festival. The events at Hunter, which will be held in the Kaye Playhouse and the Lang Recital Hall, will include premieres of high-caliber new works, retrospectives, round-table discussions with film industry experts, interviews with filmmakers, and receptions.
The French and American events, note the festival’s sponsors, form the only transatlantic film celebration in the world today.
Hunter Professor to Direct Human Rights Seminar
Human rights experts and educators from all over the country will gather for a five-week seminar examining “Human Rights in Conflict: An Interdisciplinary Perspective” at the CUNY Graduate Center this summer. The seminar, the 2006 NEH Institute for College and University Teachers, will take place from June 26-July 28 and is being directed by John R. Wallach, associate professor of political science at Hunter and the Graduate Center.
The seminar “will focus particularly on conflicts involving relationships between human rights and power,” says Wallach, and it will address four aspects of human rights in conflict: philosophical and historical; legal; cultural; and political.
Speakers will include Professor Seyla Benhabib, Yale; Associate Professor Roxanne Euben, Wellesley; Professor Paul Kahn, Yale Law School; Professor Martha Minow, Harvard Law School; Kenneth Roth, executive director, Human Rights Watch; and Professor Michael Walzer, Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton.
Wallach, who will be assisted in organizing the institute by graduate students in political science and anthropology, has published in contemporary political theory, ancient Greek political theory, and the political theory of human rights.
For more information, visit http://web.gc.cuny.edu/nehhumanrights06.
Screening Room Named in Honor of Cecile Insdorf
Professor Cecile Insdorf (center) stands with her daughter Annette, son-in-law
Mark Ethan Toporek, and President Raab at a dedication ceremony in her honor.
Cecile Insdorf, a longtime professor and adviser in the Romance Languages Department, recently gave a gift of $100,000 to the College and was honored at a ceremony on June 5 dedicating a room in the Chanin Language Center as the Cecile Insdorf Foreign Language Screening Room.
Insdorf's gift will support the Foreign Language Film Festival and a variety of programs in the Romance Languages Department and the Chanin Center.
Insdorf created the Foreign Language Film Festival, which has screened many foreign-language masterpieces and hoste d such celebrated speakers as Pedro Almodovar, Paul Auster, Ben Kingsley, and Martin Scorsese. Insdorf has also brought Milos Forman, Liam Neeson, Meryl Streep, and other film luminaries to Hunter for her course on "Film and the French Novel."
At the dedication ceremony, Insdorf thanked the guests-faculty members, friends, and family members-"for the honor of keeping my name alive at my beloved Hunter College."
Class of 2006 Presents Legacy Gift
Launching a new tradition at Hunter, members of the Class of 2006 Legacy Gift Campaign presented a Legacy Gift to the College — a check for $620 — during the June 1 Commencement ceremony. The money, which was raised through a student-led campaign, will be used to purchase a clock and plaque to be displayed in a prominent area of the College as an emblem of the graduating class’s time at Hunter. The purpose of the gift is to symbolize the memories, education, and plans for the future of the Class of 2006.
The check was presented to President Jennifer J. Raab by two members of the Class of 2006 Legacy Gift Campaign Committee, Pierce Varous, president of the Student Government, and Alina Plotkina. Other members of the committee are Taina Borrero and Mohammad Saleem.
As of June 5, a total of $675 has been contributed toward the Legacy Gift.
Hunter President Honored by A Better Chance
A Better Chance, the national resource for identifying, recruiting and developing leaders among academically gifted students of color, is honoring Hunter College President Jennifer J. Raab with its Benjamin E. Mays Award. The award memorializes the late Dr. Mays, scholar, orator, writer, civil rights figure and president of Morehouse College.
“If Hunter is the heart of New York City’s public university system, then Jennifer Raab keeps it ticking,” said Sandra E. Timmons, president of A Better Chance. “Under her watch, Hunter’s reputation as an urban leader has soared and its innovative classes and programs enrich the city’s academic and cultural fabric. Like Dr. Mays, for whom Ms. Raab is receiving this namesake award, her efforts have a significant impact on the many students she serves.”
“The rich diversity of our student body – a vast community of different backgrounds, cultures and strengths – is something we are very proud of at Hunter College,” said President Raab. “That is why I am especially pleased to receive this award named for such a great civil rights figure as Benjamin E. Mays. It is a tremendous honor for me and for Hunter.”
A Better Chance was founded in 1963 by 23 private schools wishing to diversify their student populations. It has expanded its network to 250 affiliated college preparatory schools. Past recipients of the A Better Chance Benjamin E. Mays awards include: Dr. Shirley Tilghman, president, Princeton University; Lee Bollinger, president, Columbia University; Lloyd G. Trotter, president and CEO, GE Industrial Systems; Tim McChristian, general manager, IBM Global Computer Services Industry; and Steven Rogers, clinical professor of finance and management, Kellogg Graduate School of Management.
Newsweek’s Fareed Zakaria Delivers Keynote at Hunter Graduation; Activist Gloria Steinem Honored during Ceremony
Fareed Zakaria, editor of Newsweek International, addressed some 2,000 graduates and their friends and families and received a President’s Medal at Hunter’s 193rd Commencement on June 1, 2006. Zakaria , who is also an analyst for ABC News, is a frequent guest on Comedy Central’s “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart.” His most recent book, The Future of Freedom, was a New York Times bestseller. Zakaria has written for The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The New Yorker, The New Republic, and Slate. In 1999, he was named “one of the 21 most important people of the 21st century” by Esquire.
During the commencement exercises, President Jennifer J. Raab conferred an honorary degree on feminist activist Gloria Steinem. Steinem, a writer, lecturer and editor, is the cofounder of the National Women’s Political Caucus, the Women’s Action Alliance, and the Coalition of Labor Union Women. She is also the founder and original editor of Ms. magazine, and has authored five books, including the bestseller, Revolution from Within: A Book of Self-Esteem.
Senator John Edwards Speaks at Hunter
John Edwards – the 2004 Democratic vice presidential candidate – said in a speech at Hunter on May 11th that poverty in America was “the great moral issue of our time.”
The former senator from North Carolina was the keynote speaker and special guest at this year’s highly-acclaimed Presidential Public Leadership Program. Edwards spent the day on the Hunter campus, interacting with students and faculty and taking part in seminars on politics and media studies.
During his address at the Kaye Playhouse, Edwards talked about the 37 million people in this country “who wake up in poverty every day.
“It’s wrong,” said Edwards, currently the director of the Center for Poverty, Work and Opportunity at the University of North Carolina Law School. “We’re better than that. And we have a responsibility to do something about it.”
He urged Hunter students to make the battle against poverty their cause in the same way that young people in the ‘60s fought for civil rights and to end the Vietnam War. “I have seen young people change the country,” he said. “This country needs the passion and idealism of young people again.”
Widely mentioned as a potential candidate for President in 2008, Edwards was highly critical of the Bush White House on such issues as the war in Iraq, tax cuts for the rich and the federal response to Hurricane Katrina. “There is a hunger in America,” he said. “A hunger to be inspired again. People are looking for something that makes them proud to be Americans.”
Hunter Holds Dialogue on Diversity
A Hunter College Summit on Diversity was held on campus May 3 – the start of a long-term effort to focus on this crucial issue.
Pointing out that more one-third of the freshman class this year came from different countries, President Jennifer J. Raab described Hunter to the gathering of some 75 students, staff and faculty as “a school of immigrants.”
“It is our strength and our beauty,” Raab said, “but we all realize it is also our challenge.”
Laura Schachter, Dean for Diversity & Compliance, said the Hunter student body consisted of people from 150-200 countries at any one time, speaking nearly 100 different languages.
“I hear dozens of languages being spoken in the halls,” said Hunter student Taina Borrero, citing all the different cultures and ethnic backgrounds as her favorite thing about going to school here. “Every classroom, every hall is a testament to our rich diversity.”
After opening remarks, the participants all broke off into individual groups – led by facilitators from outside the Hunter community – to discuss different diversity issues facing the campus and the best ways to encourage an ongoing dialogue to solve them.
More discussions are planned in the future as a follow-up to the Summit.
“This really is a kickoff,” President Raab told the group. “As an administration we’re continually committed to free speech and respect. This is a long-term commitment to the discussion about the beauty of diversity and the challenge of diversity.”
Professor Eva Bellin Named Carnegie Scholar
Hunter Political Science Professor Eva Bellin has been named a 2006 Carnegie Scholar, one of 20 scholars chosen by the Carnegie Corporation to study issues relating to Islam and the modern world. Bellin will receive nearly $100,000 to study Islam-centered research themes over the next two years.
Bellin is regarded as one of the most outstanding U.S. scholars in the field of Middle Eastern politics, and has published scholarly papers in many prestigious academic journals. Her research project, “Arbitrating Identity: High Courts and the Politics of Islamic-Liberal Reconciliation in the Muslim World,” aims to explore the roles that high courts play in Muslim countries whose institutions are informed both by religious identity and by liberal democratic values. Bellin’s research will culminate in a book intended for academic, policymaking, and general audiences.
The goal of the Carnegie Corporation's new emphasis on Islam is to encourage the development and expansion of the study of Islam within the United States and to stimulate research on which to help build a body of thoughtful and original scholarship.
This year's scholars were selected from the largest number of nominations to date. They represent an array of U.S. universities and institutions, indicating that Islamic Studies is a growing area of interest in American academia.
Women’s Swim Team Earns National Honor
After winning their fifth consecutive City University of New York Athletic Conference (CUNYAC) Championship earlier this year, the Hunter Women’s Swim team has achieved yet another milestone.
The defending champions were named an Academic All-America team by the College Swim Coaches Association of America (CSCAA) for their tremendous efforts in the classroom.
To qualify for Academic All-America, an entire swimming and diving squad must average at least a 2.8 grade point average (GPA) on a 4.0 scale.
The Hunter Hawks, who boast a team GPA of 3.15, qualified for the “Excellent” award within the Academic All-America criteria. The “Excellent” category honors teams who average a 3.00 to 3.25 GPA.
This is the second time in three years that the Hawks have earned Academic All-America status.
Spring 2006 Undergraduate Student Elections
As the College did so successfully the last two years, we will once again use web-based voting for undergraduate student elections this spring.
This technology, used by colleges and universities throughout the country, enables students to vote while at school, work or home. In addition to a computer students may have at home or work, there are many computers throughout campus from which they can also vote. By bringing the “polls” to the students, making voting more convenient, we hope to see students taking part in the election process in even greater numbers. As you may know, when we used Web-based voting, participation increased significantly. In order to ensure the integrity of the election process, we have hired an outside company experienced with Web-based campus elections, and unaffiliated with Hunter College, to handle all aspects of the voting. The student's Hunter email, which must be set up per the instructions below, will not be used by this company for any purpose other than this election.
When to Vote:
Voting is scheduled to take place from Monday, May 1 (12:01 a.m.) Friday, May 5 (11:59 p.m.).
How to Vote:
In order to vote on the web, students must set up their Hunter e-mail account. If they received previous e-mails from Hunter, they are properly set up. Students should advise their friends that if they have not yet set up their Hunter e-mail, they should do so right away by going to the SNET Helpdesk in Room 109 North.
During the week of April 24, the company administering the election will send students an email (Subject: 2006 Hunter College Student Elections) with a voter registration code, which they will need in order to vote. The voter registration code, along with instructions, will allow them to view and submit their ballot on the company’s special Hunter elections website when the “polls” open on May 1. Election results will be posted on the election site immediately after the polls close. (Note: If others are able to access a student's e-mails, or if they think they have the ability to do so, they should make the necessary adjustments immediately).
What Positions are on the Ballot:
Students will have the opportunity to vote, via the web, for the following 36 positions:
A) Seven Undergraduate Student Government Executive Officers:
President
Vice President
Finance Commissioner
Evening Affairs Commissioner
External Affairs/Public Relations Commissioner
Student Welfare/Academic Affairs Commissioner
Cultural Affairs/Student Activities Commissioner
(Note:Brookdale Commissioner will only be voted on by residents of the Brookdale Residence Hall. This voting will take place at the residence hall on Friday, May 5, 2006 in the main lobby from 9:30 a.m. - 10:00 p.m. Hunter I.D. will be required).
B) Fourteen Undergraduate Students
Government Senators, including two freshmen, four sophomores, four juniors and four seniors.
C) College Association (4 positions available)
D) Auxiliary Enterprise Board (5 positions available)
E) Faculty Student Disciplinary Committee (6 positions available)
Please check the Office of Student Services website to view the responsibilities of the aforementioned positions and an overview of the funds for which the student government is responsible. This information is also currently posted in the glass-enclosed "Elections" bulletin board on three West.
Learn about the Candidates:
The following information and events will assist students in selecting their candidates:
- Each candidate was asked to submit a 100 word campaign statement which will be posted on the election website, which students will be able to access when they receive their elections email.
- All candidates were asked to participate in a “Candidate’s Forum/Debate” to introduce themselves and their platform to the electorate. This will be held on Wednesday, April 26, at 1:00 p.m. in room 615 West.
- The list of candidates and their party affiliation, if any, is now posted in the glass-enclosed “Elections” bulletin board on three West. This list will also be on the elections site when students receive their ballot and voting instructions.
For any questions about student elections or web-based voting, please contact Dean Michael Escott in the Office of Student Services, Room 1103 East.
Your vote counts……use it wisely to determine who represents you next year.
Hunter’s Michael Gitlin Wins Guggenheim Fellowship
Hunter Film and Media Studies Professor Michael Gitlin has been named a 2006 Guggenheim Fellow and is the only CUNY faculty member to win this year’s fellowship. One of the most prestigious fellowships in the arts and sciences, the Guggenheim will support Gitlin’s work on his current project, which Gitlin describes as “a kind of ethnographic film about Young Earth Creationists, dealing with philosophy-of-science issues.”
Gitlin is one of 187 artists, scholars, and scientists selected by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation for this year’s awards from a pool of almost 3,000 applicants. The fellowships are awarded to applicants who have exceptional records of past achievement and are taking their work in especially promising future directions.
Gitlin’s films have been shown at numerous film festivals and other venues, both nationally and abroad, including the Toronto International Film Festival, the London Film Festival, the New York Video Festival at Lincoln Center, the 1997 Whitney Biennial Exhibition, and on Independent Focus, a PBS television program. His latest film, The Birdpeople, premiered in January 2005 at the Museum of Modern Art in New York.
Gitlin, who has been at Hunter since 1995, teaches Experimental Film and Video, Film Production, Sound Production for Film and Video, and Editing Technique. He previously taught at Pratt Institute, the New School for Social Research, NYU, and the University of the Arts in Philadelphia.
Did Your Mother Go To Hunter?
Hunter College has a long, proud tradition of offering ambitious young people an exceptional education. Armed with a Hunter degree, Hunter alumnae have gone on not only to touch the lives of their own families, but also to shape the world around them. To honor these remarkable women, we have established the Mother’s Day Scholarship Program. The Mother’s Day Scholarship Program celebrates Hunter mothers (or other family members) in an extraordinary way by building a scholarship fund that provides a new generation of students access to the higher education they might not otherwise receive.
We invite you and your family to join us in building the Mother’s Day Scholarship Fund by giving a different kind of gift this Mother’s Day - the gift of education. Click here to make a gift. If you have any questions please contact, Katy McNabb at 212-650-3349 or email kmcnabb@hunter.cuny.edu.
See also: The New York Times Advertisement (PDF)
“Our New York” Neighborhood Project Screening in West Lobby
The School of Arts and Sciences ORSEM Program (First Year Orientation Seminar) is presenting “Our New York,” a digital slideshow screening in the lobby of the West Building on April 5-11 from 9:30am – 8pm. The 19-minute slideshow represents the work of 146 Hunter students, who recorded their impressions of neighborhoods in all five boroughs of New York City. The photographs are just a sample of those photos that were collected by first year Hunter students in the ORSEM program last fall. The images are part of a larger Hunter College project documenting the history and culture of New York neighborhoods.
Anthony Lewis, Molly Ivins Receive Aronson Lifetime Achievement Awards
Creators Syndicate columnist Molly Ivins and former New York Times columnist Anthony Lewis will receive lifetime achievement honors at an April 11 ceremony for winners of Hunter’s James Aronson Awards for Social Justice Journalism. The event will also feature a keynote introduction by Wayne Barrett, longtime Village Voice investigative reporter and the first Jack Newfield Visiting Professor of Journalism at Hunter.
Winners of this year's Aronson awards include Kirk Anderson for "Cartooning with a Conscience," Gary Fields of the Wall Street Journal for exposing problems in the system of "get-tough" prison sentencing, Kevin Fagan of the San Francisco Chronicle for his coverage of the homeless issue, and Tracie McMillan of City Limits magazine for reporting on low-income and working-class people in New York City. Also, the first Aronson Award for blogging is going to University of Michigan Professor Juan Cole for his Iraq War-related "Informed Comment" blog.
The awards have been administered since 1990 by the Hunter College Department of Film & Media Studies and a committee of journalists, media professionals, scholars and activists. James Aronson was a longtime distinguished Hunter professor of journalism and a founder and editor of the crusading news weekly, The National Guardian.
Hunter Named One of America’s “Best Values” by Princeton Review
Hunter College is one of the nation’s “Best Value” colleges, according to America’s Best Value Colleges, a guidebook that profiles 150 schools named by The Princeton Review as the best deals in undergraduate education this year.
In the 2007 edition, Hunter College is one of 103 public colleges that met The Princeton Review’s best value criteria of excellent academics, generous financial aid packages and relatively low costs. The colleges were evaluated in four major categories: academics, tuition; financial aid (how well colleges meet students’ financial needs) and student borrowing.
The Princeton Review selected the schools for the book from a field of 646 colleges that the organization considers academically excellent. In determining which colleges were the “best values,” The Princeton Review took into account institutional data from the schools and its own surveys of students attending them.
Actress Tyne Daly Brings Broadway to Hunter
Actress Tyne Daly with Hunter alumna Floria V. Lasky
Actress Tyne Daly and other cast members from the Broadway play “Rabbit Hole” came to Hunter College on March 15 to speak a class of more than 200 students.
Daly – known for her roles in TV shows such as “Cagney & Lacey” and “Judging Amy” – talked about the differences in performing before a live audience; how a single line of poetry in the script convinced her this was a play she wanted to do; and the way she prepares to go on stage.
“I love to listen to the audience filing into the theater,” she told the students, who had attended a performance of “Rabbit Hole” – which also stars Cynthia Nixon (Hunter High School ’84) - prior to the class. “That’s a great sound.”
Joining Daly at Hunter were cast members Mary Catherine Garrison and John Gallagher Jr. They were peppered with questions from the students – members of an introductory theater course - -about everything from forgetting your lines on stage to the best ways to eat food and speak at the same time in front of an audience when the role calls for it.
“Rabbit Hole,” presented by the Manhattan Theatre Club, tells the story of a suburban mother (Nixon) and her family whose life is turned upside down by the tragic death of their young son. Daly plays the role of Nixon’s mother.
Hunter alumna Floria V. Lasky (’42) is the head of the Frederick Loewe Foundation, which made possible the purchase of the tickets for the students to attend the play.
Hunter's Braun Wins National Jewish Book Award
Jewish Women and Their Salons: The Power of Conversation, by Emily Braun (Art) and Hunter College High School alumna Emily Bilski, has won a 2005 National Jewish Book Award. The illustrated book, published by Yale University Press, took the prize in the Visual Art Category. It is based on an exhibition co-curated by Braun and Bilski that premiered at the Jewish Museum in New York last spring and traveled from there to the McMullen Museum of Art at Boston College.
Jewish Women and Their Salons examines the role played by the salons of Jewish women in the development of art, literature, music, theater, philosophy, and politics in Europe and America from the late 18th century through the 1940s. The book includes chapters on such subjects as “The Romance of Emancipation,” “Expatriates and Avant-Gardes,” and “Music, Femininity, and Jewish Identity: The Tradition and Legacy of the Salon.”
CUNY Teacher Academy at Hunter
For over 135 years, teacher education has been the heart and soul of Hunter College. This is where it all began. For generations, Hunter College has played a crucial role in the preparation of thoroughly trained, highly skilled, enlightened teachers to answer the needs of New York City and beyond.
Today, Hunter continues this tradition with the new CUNY Teacher Academy at Hunter College. The Teacher Academy is an innovative program designed to train and prepare the next generation of science and mathematics teachers.
The Teacher Academy at Hunter is housed in the College's School of Education. Through its educational mission, the School creates equal opportunity for all members of the city's racially, ethnically and economically diverse population. Through classroom activities, laboratory experiences, paid internships and field placement, the program will deepen your understanding that learning and teaching are interwoven with the cultures and ethnic richness and diversity of the city's neighborhoods and schools.
You will be taught by a nationally recognized, doctorally-prepared faculty, many of whom began their careers as classroom teachers in the public schools.
The Teacher Academy instills deep and broad knowledge of theories and the scholarly literatures, but is firmly grounded in real world, field-based experience.
"We make what we teach useful in our students' own classrooms. Our students know that if they have a class at Hunter on Wednesday, they'll know something new and helpful when they teach on Thursday," said Frank Gardella, Associate Professor.
Bella Abzug Leadership Institute Launched at Hunter
Hunter President Jennifer J. Raab (center) announces the launch
of BALI with Eve Abzug (left) and Liz Abzug (right).
High school and college women will learn essential leadership skills at a newly launched institute housed at Hunter and named for one of the College’s most celebrated alumnae—legendary feminist leader Bella S. Abzug (1920-1998).
The launch of the Bella Abzug Leadership Institute (BALI) was announced at a news conference held at Hunter on February 8.
A lawyer when female attorneys were a rarity, a Congresswoman whose famous campaign slogan was “This woman’s place is in the house—the House of Representatives,” and an internationally renowned leader in environmental crusades, the peace movement, and, most notably, the women’s movement, Abzug was already recognized as a leader at Hunter, where she was head of the student government. She graduated in 1942 and went on to get a law degree from Columbia.
BALI, founded by the late Congresswoman’s daughters, Liz Abzug and Eve Abzug, will run training programs to help young women build the speaking, advocacy, business, and other skills they need to become effective leaders.
Speakers at the February 8 conference included Hunter President Jennifer J. Raab, the co-host; Gloria Steinem; and singer Lesley Gore.
Opera Star Angela Brown Gives Sneak Preview Before Hunter Concert
Opera star Angela M. Brown gave a sneak preview of her appearance with the Hunter College Symphony to a group of students and alumni on March 7, 2006.
Ms. Brown talked about growing up in Indiana, learning to sing gospel in churches and her meteoric rise to stardom with the Metropolitan Opera and other major houses during a discussion group in the Lang Recital Hall led by music professor Richard Burke.
“You have to be connected to something other than you - a higher power,” she said when asked about her critically-acclaimed successes in “Aida” and other famous roles. “The Lord literally pushed me to New York. He said: ‘I’m gonna be with you, girl. Go!’”
She sang arias from “Porgy and Bess” and selected American spirituals in her performance with the Hunter symphony on March 8, her only New York appearance of 2006.
Science Students Recognized for their Research
Undergraduate students from the Hunter MBRS/RISE and MARC Programs attended the 5th Annual Biomedical Research Conference for Minority Students in Atlanta from November 2-6, 2005. There were over 1200 students from 700 colleges and universities in the U.S., and more than 1100 presentations of biomedical research. Hunter students made 21 of these presentations, including 5 students who were invited to present their research as prestigious oral presentations. The oral presenters were Lawrence James (Chemistry major), An Chen (Chemistry major), Elizabeth Rodriguez (Psychology major), Bernadine Akukwe (Chemistry major), and Julius Arijeloye (Chemistry and Physics majors).
Six Hunter students garnered awards from scientific research societies for the quality of their research and presentations. Five poster presentations and an oral were chosen. The awardees were: Lawrence James (Chemistry major), Ingrid Tulloch (Psychology major), Joanna Ayoung (Biology major), Amy Colon (Physics major), Dalia Francis (Biology major), Mahendra Samaru (Chemistry major).
The director of the MARC Program is Dr. Peter Lipke, Dr. Derrick Brazill is the Coordinator and Susana Vargas is the Program Administrator. For MBRS/RISE, Dr. Victoria Luine is Director, Dr. Karen Philips is Coordinator and Janerie Rodriguez is Program Administrator. For more information about these programs and the conference, please see the MARC/MBRS web site http://marcmbrs.hunter.cuny.edu/
Journalist Wayne Barrett Named Newfield Visiting Professor
Wayne Barrett, a Senior Editor at the Village Voice, has been awarded the inaugural Jack Newfield Visiting Professorship in Journalism at Hunter College. The professorship, named in memory of journalist Jack Newfield, was created by Hunter in partnership with Newfield's wife and family to maintain his legacy through special classes, other programs and activities.
"As Jack Newfield's colleague at the Voice and an investigative journalist in his own right, Wayne Barrett brings a unique insight to Hunter students," said Hunter President Jennifer J. Raab. "They will learn from one of New York's best reporters how journalists can continually rediscover, and tell the story, of the drama of a great city remaking itself again and again. We look forward to his presence on campus and to his challenging our students."
Jack Newfield graduated from Hunter in 1960, with a BA in English, and began his distinguished journalism career as sports editor of the Hunter Arrow. It was as a reporter for the Village Voice that Newfield developed his reputation as a crusading journalist, and his annual lists of "Ten Worst Judges," and "Ten Worst Landlords" quickly became "must reads" among New Yorkers.
Barrett said he is honored by his selection as Hunter's first Jack Newfield professor, and that he will spent his semester as a professor offering his students "a window into the life of City Hall and the state capitol in Albany, offering insiders' views of city and state politics as seen through the eyes of guests from the mayor's office, the city council, and the journalists who cover them."
HEO Award Winners Have Served Hunter a Total of 142 Years
Six longtime Hunter employees have received this year’s Presidential HEO awards and were honored January 10th at a reception held in the President’s Conference Room. The annual awards, created last year, recognize staff members in Higher Education Officer titles “whose dedicated efforts,” said President Raab, “have led to a significant improvement in the way the College serves its students, faculty, and staff.”
The recipients each received an award of $1,500—“in addition,” said the president, “to our appreciation and gratitude.” Nominations for the awards were made earlier in the year by faculty and staff. The six award winners are:
Jim Barry (Instructional Computing and Information Technology) joined the Hunter staff in 1981 as a computer operator in the days when we had a computer mainframe. For the past seven years he has been in charge of the ICIT Help Desk, a job that has entailed managing 16,000 requests for help with computer and telecommunications issues. In addition, aware of the need to upgrade hardware on desktop computers, Jim refurbished some 600 computers, thus helping the entire network. And as a member of the HEO Forum, he has been of great help to his colleagues.
Ruth Brooks (Facilities Management and Planning), who earned an MS at Hunter, returned to her alma mater in 1978 as a member of the Facilities staff and was project manager of FM&P when she retired in July 2005. She had responsibilities related to scores of College renovations—as well as the construction of the East and West Buildings—and created the work order system used College-wide. A member of the HEO Forum, Ruth was captain of the CUNY Campaign for many years and chair of the Holiday Gala for 12 years. Two of her children and her daughter-in-law are Hunter graduates.
Robert Hassel (Welcome Center), whose many achievements include playing a major role in the design of the all-important Undergraduate View Book, became a Hunter staffer after getting his BA here in 1984. A veteran of both Admissions and the Registrar’s Office, he has been operations manager of the Welcome Center since it opened. Robbie also does considerable volunteer work: he was a volunteer at Ground Zero, for which he was awarded the 9/11Community Service Award; served as special events coordinator for the Police Athletic League; and has been a volunteer for the Make a Wish Foundation.
Janet Robertson (School of Arts and Sciences), assistant for personnel and budget to the dean of arts and sciences, has been at Hunter since 1987. In addition to carrying out numerous assignments at A & S—which have included participating actively in the discussions on restructuring the School—she has also been a member of the Sexual Harassment Panel, the HEO Forum, and a subcommittee of the Faculty Personnel and Budget Committee. A graduate of Wellesley College with an MA from Teachers College, Janet spends some of her leisure hours singing with the Canterbury Choral Society and hr church choir.
Ernie Tubb (Registrar’s Office), a supervisor in the OASIS, became a Hunter staff member in 1975, soon after earning his BA. He worked in the SEEK Department, Student Services, and Admissions before joining the Registrar’s Office, and he has been part of OASIS—which is part of the Registrar’s Office and has improved student life considerably—since it opened its doors in 1997. Ernie is a member of the HEO Steering Committee and has participated in a number of interdepartmental searches. He continues to keep up with current publications in anthropology and archaeology, the fields he studied at Hunter.
Barbara Wolin (Animal Facilities), who has been manager of Animal Facilities since coming to Hunter in 1986, began her Hunter career by refurbishing the facilities and continues to ensure that they are kept up-to-date. She also works to ensure that the Hunter community and the general public understand the appropriate use of animals in research, and she deals with federal, state, and local agencies concerned with animal research. A graduate of Penn State, Barbara is a member of the HEO Committee and she regularly does volunteer work involving animal welfare and other aspects of her professional field.
Hunter Grads Urged to Make World Better Place
Some 1,200 students celebrated their graduation at Hunter’s 192nd commencement ceremony on January 19 – and they were urged to use their degrees to make the world a better place to live.
Edward Lewis, founder of Essence – the preeminent lifestyle magazine for African-American women, cited Martin Luther King in his keynote speech as an inspiration for the Winter, 2006 graduates to go out and become “a force for peace, harmony and justice.”
“I believe if Dr. King were here today,” Lewis said,” he would look at all the progress we have made and say, ‘Well done, my brothers and sisters, but now is not the time to rest.”
Honorary Hunter degrees were awarded to former New York City mayor David Dinkins and acclaimed author Grace Paley, who both delivered the same message of hope to the graduates and their guests.
“You are the source of our nation’s moral wealth, and we are invested in you,” said Dinkins.
Paley, a longtime activist in the antiwar, civil rights and women’s movements, apologized that she and her generation had not done even more. “We worked hard, but never hard enough,” said Paley, who studied creative writing at Hunter more than a half century ago. “But you could. And you and your children will see a better world.”
Hunter Junior Heads to DC for International Relations Internship
Alexander Vaisman, a junior in the CUNY Honors College at Hunter, will soon find himself in Washington, D.C. tackling issues regarding international relations, human rights, and diplomacy. He was selected by the Washington Center as an Edward T. Rogowsky intern, and will participate in the highly competitive and intensive International Affairs Program this spring.
“I feel incredibly grateful and excited for the opportunity to experience the political environment in Washington,” said Vaisman. “I’m hoping that the experience will give me some sense of new potentials in the world and guide me towards career options and opportunities.”
Vaisman will receive a stipend and live in Washington from the end of January to early May. In addition to working full-time at his internship, he will maintain a journal of his experiences, submit written reports, attend weekly colloquia featuring prominent Washington D.C. figures, and work on reaction and research papers.
Vaisman is open-minded about the heavy workload. “Meaningful education requires experience and observation to augment formal instruction,” he said.
A Thomas Hunter Honors Scholar, and an English and political science major, Vaisman hopes to go on to law school after graduation.
Hunter Nutrition Student Promotes Healthy Lifestyle
Photo Credit: Julia Schneider
Jennifer Frémont, a nutrition and food science major at Hunter, brought Brooklynites a healthy dose of nutritional knowledge at the Red Hook Harvest Festival on October 21.
Working at the festival’s “Sugar Station,” Frémont opened visitors’ eyes to the high sugar content in popular beverages like soda, and encouraged families to opt for fresh, locally grown produce.
Frémont intends to promote nutritional education to help people maintain healthier diets and lifestyles. “I am interested in exploring and investigating the [food] traditions that people share, and to use that as a spring board, via writing and video documentary, to educate or, dare I hope, enlighten people to a better way of composing and conducting their lives.”
Growing up, Frémont was surrounded by family members who were great cooks and gardeners, so her interest in food stems naturally from her roots. “I grew up near apple orchards and the Macintosh happens to be a symbol of my devotion.”
Frémont is president of Hunter’s Nutrition Club and student committee co-chairperson of the Greater New York Dietetic Association. She currently freelances for CondeNet, Inc., helping to integrate nutrition and health information from NutritionData.com with CondeNet publications like Epicurious.
Frémont will graduate from Hunter in January and hopes to attend NYU to pursue an advanced degree in Food Studies.
Hunter Senior Named Young Ambassador by German Academic Exchange Service
Anastasiya Shapochkina has been singled out for an international honor. The Hunter senior has been named a Young Ambassador for the 2006-07 academic year by the German Academic Exchange Service (Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst—DAAD). She is one of 20 Young Ambassadors chosen nationwide from among students who studied or interned in Germany last year. The Young Ambassadors serve as liaisons for the DAAD in the U.S. and Germany.
Shapochkina, a history and political science major who emigrated from the Ukraine with her family in 2002, says she is eager to help promote DAAD, which she says “needs more publicity.” She believes its exchange program helps to clear up the “misperceptions Germany and the U.S. have about each other.” After graduation she plans to enroll in an international relations graduate program, focusing on European studies.
DAAD offers programs and funding for more than 50,000 students, faculty, researchers and others in higher education each year.
MoMA to Premiere Film Produced By Fulbright-Winning Hunter Student
Alice Arnold, a student in Hunter’s Integrated Media Arts Program, has just scored four major triumphs in a row: the Museum of Modern Art will host the big-screen premiere of her first film, Channel 13 aired the film this summer, she has won a Fulbright Grant to go to Hong Kong, and she has a university teaching position.
The Fulbright will run from February-December 2007, and the MoMA screening is tentatively scheduled for mid-October. This semester Arnold is teaching film production, video production, and cinema studies at Hollins University in Roanoke, Virginia.
Arnold was a professional photographer in her native Los Angeles and in New York before entering Hunter.
Her film, “To Be Seen,” is a documentary about street art that “explores ideas of class, what is considered art, and the use of public space,” says Arnold, who lauds Hunter for “the support the faculty gives to artists.”
The Fulbright grant will fund her work on “Electric Signs,” a video project that will examine video billboards in Hong Kong to analyze how these signs are changing communications and the use of public space in cities.
Arnold, who has a BA in history from UCLA, expects to get her MFA in Integrated Media Arts in 2007.
Hunter Soccer Star Represents College in South Africa
Hunter soccer star David Lovercheck represented the College this past summer as a member of the CUNY Athletic Conference’s Goodwill Trip team that toured South Africa.
A TV report about Lovercheck and the other 16 members of the men’s soccer group was shown on the Madison Square Garden Network recently.
The squad competed against local South African teams, toured the country and taught soccer to local children during what Lovercheck – a senior defender on the Hunter team - called an “amazing” 14-day experience.
“In each city, we held what were my favorite parts of the tour, soccer clinics for children,” Lovercheck says. “In Cape Town, the children were around 12 years old and under, while at the clinic in Johannesburg they were from 15-19. Each clinic was a great success with plenty of kids coming out to play. In Cape Town the kids made us sign autographs on the t-shirts and balls we handed out.”
On the roster for the visit to South Africa, which will host the 2010 World Cup, were players representing each of the CUNY conference’s senior and community colleges.
CUNYAC Commissioner Zak Ivkovic described it as an exciting opportunity for the student athletes to “learn about the South African culture, history and scores of languages while spreading good will from all New Yorkers.”
Music Student Selected for Highly Competitive NPR Internship
Michael Ehrie, an MA student in musicology at Hunter, was selected out of more than 1,000 applicants to be a summer intern at National Public Radio in Washington, D.C. A privately supported, non-profit membership organization, NPR attracts more than 26 million listeners each week and is in partnership with more than 815 public radio stations around the country.
Ehrie is interning for the classical music program, Performance Today, where he listens and logs new concert acquisitions, assesses the performance, and logs the timings of each movement or piece. He is also a reporter for the internal radio program, Intern Edition, a show produced, reported and edited by the summer interns. Ehrie will produce a piece on music critics and how bloggers and new technology are changing the critiquing profession. The show debuts online at the Intern Edition webpage on August 3.
To hear the show or learn more about the internship program, visit: http://www.npr.org/about/nextgen/internedition/sum06
Hunter Student Wins a Fulbright Grant to South Korea
Sarah Osewalt, a June 2006 Hunter graduate, has received a Fulbright Grant to teach English in South Korea. While at Hunter, Osewalt was a member of the Thomas Hunter Honors Program and majored in English. Her work in South Korea builds upon her long-standing interest in Asia and Asian culture and her desire to learn the Korean language.
Osewalt is also a Jeannette K. Watson Fellow and will spend her final summer with the program as an intern at the Peggy Guggenheim Museum in Venice before she heads to Korea. While in Korea, she will teach conversational English to middle and high school students and live with a Korean family.
Opportunities are available for study, research or teaching English in more than 140 countries through the Fulbright Grant, www.fulbrightonline.org/us. The Hunter College deadline to apply for the 2007-2008 academic year is September 15, 2006.
Two Students Travel to Germany Via Prestigious Awards
Two Hunter students will be spending next year in Germany, one under a Fulbright grant and the other through an exchange program sponsored jointly by the U.S. Congress and the German Bundestag. Both awards are designed to enhance the students’ professional skills and both are highly competitive.
Carla Minami, who graduated in June with a double major in English secondary education and German literature, has been awarded a Fulbright teaching assistantship which calls for her to aid a German instructor in teaching English as a foreign language to German students. She will also start an after-school program such as a theater or reading group and carry out a project, which she developed, concerned with German spelling reform.
“I hope to improve my German, as well as gain insight into international relations and cultural differences,” says Minami, adding: “I believe that this time in Germany will help me to become a better teacher here in the United States. Ultimately, my goal is to work for the U.S. State Department as part of the diplomatic community.”
The other student heading to Germany is Alex Rodriguez, a junior in the CUNY Honors College at Hunter, who has been selected as one of 75 participants in the 2006-2007 Congress-Bundestag Youth Exchange for Young Professionals. The program will begin in late July with an orientation seminar in Washington, and from there the participants will fly to Germany as a group. In the first phase of the program after arriving in Germany, Rodriguez will take courses in German and in business, and in the second phase he will work as an intern in a German company.
“I’m dedicated to mastering the German language,” says Rodriguez, who is majoring in German and economics, “and excited about the kinds of opportunities this program may open to me.”
Hunter Doctoral Student to Attend Meeting of Nobel Prize Winners
Hunter student Sonjae Wallace will be joining some of the world’s leading puzzle solvers later this month when he travels to Lindau, Germany, to attend an international meeting of Nobel laureates in chemistry and physics. Wallace, a doctoral student in physical chemistry, has been selected to be a member of the U.S. student delegation attending the meeting, which is sponsored by the National Center for Research Resources of the National Institutes of Health and will take place June 25-30.
“It will be a great exchange,” says Wallace. “I’ll get the chance to learn what’s going on scientifically throughout the world and I’ll be taking part in discussions with some of the world’s greatest scientists as well as other young, emerging researchers.”
A native of Jamaica who came to New York to go to college, Wallace got a BS in chemistry at York College and did research at the NASA-Goddard Institute of Space Studies before coming to Hunter, where he now does research in Professor Louis Massa’s lab. Describing his work in the lab, Wallace says, “We develop new theories and then test them. Our project now is to find a faster way of calculating the energies of very large molecules.”
Hunter Student Wins Fulbright to Spain
Erica Seppala, a graduate student in the Hunter School of Education’s Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) program, has won a Fulbright to teach English in Spain. Seppala will work as a teaching assistant at a Spanish high school or official language school and will also volunteer her services in a Spanish organization teaching English to victims of domestic violence. Of the 179 applicants for the Teaching Assistantship in Spain, Erica was one of nine candidates selected.
The Fulbright U.S. Student Program provides an unparalleled opportunity to study, conduct research and teach in other countries. Its goal is to increase mutual understanding among nations through educational and cultural exchange. Information on the Fulbright Grant is available at www.fulbrightonline.org. Hunter students must apply through the college. Contact Fulbright Representative Myrna Fader at mfader@hunter.cuny.edu before the September 15, 2006 deadline.
Two Hunter Juniors Awarded HIA Fellowships
Lindsey Toft, Merida Lang
Two Hunter College juniors, Lindsey Toft and Merida Lang, have been awarded Humanity in Action Fellowships. HIA sponsors summer fellowship programs in Denmark, France, Germany, The Netherlands, Poland and the United States, where students study the condition of minorities in the host country and seek innovative ways to address these issues. Following the summer program, fellows may proceed to internships at various governmental and non-governmental organizations in Europe and the United States.
Toft, an anthropology major, is also a member of the Thomas Hunter Honors Program. She will attend the American program in New York City and is one of six Americans who will participate in a three month internship in Berlin at a humanitarian think-tank organization, focusing on transatlantic issues in human and minority rights.
Lang is a member of the Thomas Hunter Honors Program, majoring in sociology with a minor in AFPRL. She is a volunteer intern with the Harlem Community Justice Center, where she works with juvenile offenders. Lang will participate in the French program in Paris.
Fellows are selected on the basis of academic achievement, leadership ability, and demonstrated commitment to protecting the rights of vulnerable minorities. Toft and Lang were among 66 American undergraduate students selected from a national pool of students from 147 colleges and universities. More information on the program is available at: http://www.humanityinaction.org.
Merage Institute Awards Fellowship to Hunter Student
Hunter senior Jane (Yevgeniya) Elkina has been awarded a 2006 Merage American Dream Fellowship, which recognizes students who have demonstrated academic excellence, leadership skills, creativity and initiative. Elkina is one of 14 students selected from colleges across the country.
Applicants, who must be immigrants, were asked to describe their goals, their American dream – with respect to achieving leadership positions in an area of business, culture and the arts, science or education, or public service. The award is a stipend of $10,000 per year for two years of post-graduate study, travel or research.
Elkina emigrated with her family from the former Soviet Union in 1990. While at Hunter, Elkina served as president of the Math Club and as student representative of the mathematics department in the Hunter Senate. During her sophomore year she was selected as a National Science Foundation Scholar and last year she was selected through a nationally competitive process to be an intern at Coach, Inc. After graduating from Hunter in June, Elkina plans to enter a doctoral program in math education at Teachers College, Columbia University.
Hunter Student Wins APA Minority Scholarship
Hunter student Chika Okoye has won the American Philological Association’s Minority Scholarship. Okoye, a fourth-year classics major, will use the award money this summer to fund her studies at the American School in Athens, where she will attend a six-week summer program. She will spend three weeks in and around Athens, visiting museums and archaeological sites and will also travel to other regions in Greece.
Okoye admits that she has loved Greek and Roman mythology since childhood, later becoming interested in classical history and philosophy as well. After taking a class in Greek and Roman Tragedy her first year at Hunter, she decided to major in the field, and plans to teach at the university level. Okoye is most excited to experience first-hand the places she has until now only read about in her archaeology classes.
The American Philological Association’s Minority Scholarship is awarded each year to one undergraduate minority classics major to further his/her preparation for graduate work within the field. The scholarship may be used for summer study abroad or language training. Further information about the scholarship is available at: http://www.apaclassics.org
Hunter Wrestler Headed to NCAA Wrestling Championships
Wrestler Terry Madden will represent Hunter College at this weekend’s 2006 NCAA Division III Wrestling Championships beginning Thursday, March 2nd at the College of New Jersey.
“Terry is one of the most focused wrestlers I have ever worked with,” said head coach Bob Gaudenzi. “He has a great chance of placing at nationals and coming home as an All-American.”
Madden, a junior at Hunter, was selected as a wild-card entry for the national tournament after a second place finish at the 2006 Metropolitan Conference Championships. He finished the year with an impressive 20-6 overall record, including an outstanding 10-1 mark in dual matches. Since January 12th, the New York native has been ranked in the top 10 nationally at 184 lb.
Hunter College Celebrates a Banner Year for Diversity with 26 New Faculty Appointments
Isabella Rossellini speaks with WNYC about getting her master’s at Hunter and her new theater production