NIU sets sights on Ohio administrator
who aims to expand university research mission NIU appears to have landed its top candidate – an accomplished scholar, award-winning teacher and experienced administrator – to lead the Graduate School and shape the university’s research mission for years to come.
The Academic Affairs, Student Affairs and Personnel Committee of the NIU Board of Trustees on Thursday recommended approval of the appointment of Rathindra N. Bose as vice president for research and dean of the Graduate School, effective July 1. The chemistry professor currently holds the identical title at Kent State University in Ohio.
The full NIU Board of Trustees is expected to confirm the appointment at its June 19 meeting.
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Second annual Latino education conference
scheduled June 20 at NIU-Naperville
 When Manny Sanchez came to NIU as a freshman in 1967, he was the first member of his family to attend college. At that time, Sanchez was also one of just a handful of Latino students at NIU, and he quickly looked for ways to “fit in” with the Caucasian majority here.
Now serving his second term as chair of the NIU Board of Trustees, Sanchez has made a personal crusade of changing the statistics that still reveal a disproportionately small number of successful Latino college graduates.
“Everything I am, and everything I’ve been able to accomplish, I attribute to my college education,” says Sanchez, owner and founder of the nation’s largest minority-owned law firm. “I want that potential to be available to all students.”
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Summer enrollment nears 10,000
 A weak summer job market and fewer internship opportunities for students, combined with greater competition for classes during the regular school year, are nudging summer school enrollment higher.
According to Director of Admissions Bob Burk, summer school enrollment is about 350 students ahead of this same time last year, putting NIU on track for a summer enrollment of about 9,800 students.
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NIU scientists help refine genetic map of rice
 Two Northern Illinois University researchers are part of a team of scientists announcing that they have completed detailed gene mapping of a rice chromosome.
Long Mao and Mitrick Johns, both professors in the NIU Department of Biological Sciences, participated in the sequencing of chromosome 10. With 23 million base pairs of DNA, it is believed to be the smallest of the dozen chromosomes that make up the rice genome.
“This is the first completed map of this chromosome,” Mao said. “Its sequencing is another key step toward unraveling the genetic makeup of the world’s most important food crop.”
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Vohra recommended for acting dean of CEET
 Promod Vohra has been recommended for the position of acting dean in the Northern Illinois University College of Engineering and Engineering Technology.
The recommendation was made Thursday by the Academic Affairs, Student Affairs and Personnel Committee of the NIU Board of Trustees. The full board will consider the recommendation at its meeting June 19.
Vohra came to NIU as a student and was the first graduate student ever in the electrical engineering program.
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NIU Art Gallery in Chicago
announces annual MFA exhibit
The NIU Art Gallery in Chicago is pleased to announced the Annual NIU School of Art Master of Fine Arts Exhibition to be held Friday, June 13, through Saturday, July 12.
Two public receptions for the artists will be held, the first from 5 to 8 p.m. Friday, June 13, with an awards presentation at 6:30 p.m., and the second from 5 to 8 p.m. Friday, July 18, to coincide with Absolut Vision, the annual art event in the River North District.
The work of Yongkook Byun, Andrew J. Chobot, Jo-An Vincer Clay, McCauley Hart, Moon Ja Kim, Ben Kohli and Patrick Teramoto Moreland will be exhibited, offering a unique opportunity for graduating MFA candidates to exhibit their work in Chicago and providing exposure for these students beginning their fine art careers.
Highlighting the diversity of the MFA program – it offers specialization in drawing, painting, printmaking, sculpture, ceramics, media studies, electronic media design, fiber/fabric, photography, metalwork and jewelry – the Annual NIU MFA Exhibition offers a broad sampling of materials and processes, styles and concerns affecting these emerging artists.
The NIU Art Gallery is located at 215 W. Superior, 3rd floor. Gallery hours are 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Wednesday through Saturday. Admission is free and open to the public. Please visit the Web site at http://www.vpa.niu.edu/museum or call (312) 642-6010 for more information.
University Libraries announces
summer building, service hours
Founders Memorial Library building hours are 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. through Friday of this week. The library is closed Saturday and open from 1 to 5 p.m. Sunday.
Beginning Monday, June 16, and continuing through Friday, Aug. 8, the hours are 7:30 a.m. to 10 p.m. Monday through Thursday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Fridays and 1 to 5 p.m. Sundays. The library is closed Saturdays as well as the Fourth of July. It will close at 5 p.m. Thursday, July 3.
Hours for the interim session from Saturday, Aug. 10, through Sunday, Aug. 24, are 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday and 1 to 5 p.m. Saturday and Sunday.
Call 753-1670 for the most current building and service hours.
NIU School of Music sponsors
summer Brown Bag concert series
The NIU School of Music is delighted to release the following schedule for the ever-popular Wednesday Brown Bag Summer Concert series.
All free, open-to-the-public concerts are held at noon in various NIU Music Building areas. Performance room locations will be posted in the Concert Hall lobby on the day of the concert.
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General Accounting Office issues
FY2003 schedule for accounts payable, reports
Please note the following deadlines and information with regard to the FY 2003 closing. Please make sure this information is distributed to everyone in your area who processes items for payment. -- MORE
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Theater students study in Russia
A shiver seems to dance along Chris Hibbard’s spine when he speaks of Konstantin Stanislavsky, the legendary Russian trainer of actors, or of studying in the master’s home.
Hibbard’s lack of breath is easily explained: He and 14 other students in the NIU School of Theatre and Dance are indeed taking some acting classes this month in Stanislavsky’s Moscow home, now part of the century-old Moscow Art Theatre School that Stanislavsky helped to found.
“It’s a pilgrimage for an actor,” says Hibbard, a graduate student on the month-long trip that began June 1. “It’s the Mecca of our craft.”
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New NICADD equipment
scintillating for scientists
 The Northern Illinois Center for Accelerator and Detector Development (NICADD) has a new tool that will help scientists capture data on the basic building blocks of the universe.
The extruder, which stretches 70 feet in length in assembly-line fashion, is up and running at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory near Batavia. The cutting-edge, custom-built extruder line will produce scintillating detectors – plastic devices injected with dye so they glow when struck by high-energy particles or photons.
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Historian takes top prize with book
on all that jazz in Japan
 NIU History Professor E. Taylor Atkins has won a major award for his book on the history of a uniquely American art form as it developed and took hold in an unlikely setting: Japan.
“Blue Nippon: Authenticating Jazz in Japan” won the annual John Whitney Hall Book Prize for best book on Japan or Korea. The Association for Asian Studies Northeast Asia Council presented the prize, which includes a $1,000 stipend, at its spring conference in New York.
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College of Health and Human Sciences
lauds FCNS academic adviser
 Sharon Louis, academic adviser in the School of Family, Consumer and Nutrition Sciences at NIU, is the winner of the 2003-04 Excellence in Academic Advising Award.
The award was established in the fall of 1998 by the College of Health and Human Sciences. Members of the Student Advisory Committee review the nominations and select the winner. Selection is based on an individual’s interpersonal skills and caring attitude toward students as well as their mastery of institutional requirements and procedures.
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Student Affairs departments honor
achievements during spring convocation
Employees from the nine Student Affairs departments came together May 8 to celebrate the annual Student Affairs spring convocation, highlighting department and staff achievements from the 2002-2003 academic year.
About 140 of the 440 Student Affairs employees convened in the Regency Room of the Holmes Student Center for a celebratory afternoon. Several special awards were given out at the convocation ceremony.
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