March 28, 2005, Northern Today Abridged

Web site on theater production
provides look ‘Behind the Curtain’

While NIU theater students gear up for the April production of “The Grapes of Wrath,” their counterparts in the Department of Communication are working diligently to capture the behind-the-scenes drama.

Student video and media crews are documenting the production’s progress in a project known as “Behind the Curtain.” And they hope you’ll tune in.

Vignettes are posted online regularly with more polished “episodes” appearing every two weeks at www.comm.niu.edu/curtain/. Eventually, a full-length documentary will be produced for local public access television and used by the School of Theatre and Dance as a recruiting and marketing tool.

The video documentary crew members are all students in an advanced media production course taught by Communication Professor Laura Vazquez. “We want to record the progression of the play, from rehearsals and stage construction to costume design and lighting,” Vazquez said.

“Our goal is to document how it goes from a cast of students who might not even know each other to a major theatrical production,” she said. “It’s a challenging, collaborative assignment for my students because they must learn how to find the best shots in a way that’s inconspicuous, how to edit down tons of video footage and how to assemble it all into an interesting story.”

“Behind the Curtain” is a twist on a Vazquez course taught last fall, when her students produced weekly Web segments documenting activities in the College of Business’s “Apprentice” class.

“Our students are learning that the wave of the future for dissemination of video is through the Internet,” Vazquez said. “These types of courses give them hands-on, pressure-on experience. You have to respond quickly and tell your story quickly. I tell the students, ‘If your final piece is more than three minutes, you blew it. It will take too long to download and your audience will go away.’ ”

“Behind the Curtain” relies on the advance skills of four graduate student directors: Marcus Leshock, Matt Holdren, Christopher McPherson and Brian Ekdale. Although the project has been little advertised, the Web site already is receiving about 2,000 hits weekly.

“As far as we know, we’re the first school to try this,” Ekdale said.

He hopes “Behind the Curtain” will whet the appetite of theatergoers.

“We think it’s exciting that people can see what’s going on with the production before they see the performance. We hope it will build audience interest in the play,” he said. “At the same time, we’re getting practical experience creating something that has to be in a finalized form under a limited time schedule.”

Cast and crew members for the “The Grapes of Wrath” are benefiting from the experience as well.

“This gives our students an opportunity to learn to be comfortable and less self-conscious in front of the camera,” said theater Professor Christopher Markle, who is directing the play. “It’s also wonderful to have other people validate all the work that goes into a production. Our students devote weeks of their lives preparing for a performance. It’s a lengthy, intense process.”

Colin Jones, who will be performing in the lead role of Tom Joad, said he wasn’t thrilled at first with the thought of having video crews on hand during rehearsals. But he said the process has gone smoothly.

“They have been quietly voyeuristic, and that’s been a joy,” Jones said. “They ask questions once in a while but very unobtrusively. I thought I would be hiding from (the camera crews) all the time, but since they haven’t over-approached the cast, it makes us want to go to them.

“I’m excited to see the end product,” he added.

An air date for the completed “Behind the Curtain” documentary hasn’t yet been established.

Students in the School of Theatre and Dance will perform “The Grapes of Wrath” from April 7-10 and from April 14-17 at the O’Connell Theatre inside the Stevens Building on the NIU campus. More information is available at http://www.niu.edu/theatre/season2004/grapes.htm.

Noted writer of books about books to speak
at library’s 2 millionth volume celebration

Acclaimed writer Nicholas A. Basbanes, famous for writing books about books, will present the keynote address at an upcoming celebration of University Libraries’ acquisition of its 2 millionth volume.

The public is invited to the celebration, which will be held at 2 p.m. Thursday, April 7, in the Altgeld Hall Auditorium.

The event will include a reception with music, door prizes, hors d’ oeuvres and refreshments. In addition to Basbanes’ address, University Libraries Dean Arthur Young will name a representative 2 millionth volume to mark the occasion.

“We’re very pleased to welcome Nicholas Basbanes to campus,” Young said. “He is the premier writer about the world of books, book collectors and libraries.”

Basbanes was an award-winning investigative reporter during the early 1970s. Later he wrote a nationally syndicated column on books and authors. The Washington Post calls him “our leading chronicler of the printed word and book culture.”

Basbanes’ first book, “A Gentle Madness: Bibliophiles, Bibliomanes, and the Eternal Passion for Books,” was a finalist for the 1995 National Book Critics Circle Award in nonfiction. It also was named a New York Times Notable Book of the Year. His most recent work, “A Splendor of Letters: The Permanence of Books in an Impermanent World,” focuses on efforts to preserve books and other printed matter from the ravages of time.

The acquisition of its 2 millionth book volume earlier this academic year places University Libraries in the top 3 percent of academic libraries nationwide.

The library has grown immensely since its origins in 1895, when barbed wire baron Jacob Haish provided a $10,000 gift for its creation. A major expansion occurred in December 1952, with the opening of the Swen Franklin Parson Library (now the law school). Founders Memorial Library opened in 1977 and celebrated the acquisition of its millionth volume four years later.

Today University Libraries supports all academic areas on campus and acquires about 26,000 new volumes annually. The library also holds a number of rare books (see related story below). In addition to Founders Memorial Library, University Libraries operates a number of branches, including the Faraday Science Library, Music Library in the Music Building, Map Library in Davis Hall and libraries at NIU campuses in Naperville, Rockford and Hoffman Estates.

Library holdings span continents, centuries

University Libraries boasts a number of unique collections and rare books, often amassed in efforts to bolster particular areas of academic strength at NIU.

The crown jewel is the Donn V. Hart Collection of Southeast Asian materials.

Founded in 1963 and later named in honor of the first director of the university’s Center for Southeast Asian Studies, the collection houses some 100,000 titles from Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia, the Philippines, Burma, Singapore and Vietnam. It’s among the top five Southeast Asian collections nationwide.

Other highlights among the University Libraries collections include:

• Palm-leaf manuscripts: Buddhist teachings or texts recorded on fragile palm leaves and dating as far back as the 16th century.
• Parabaiks: Books on paper, cloth or metal that are usually folded accordion fashion and often lack covers. They are common to Burma, Laos, Cambodia and Thailand.
• A collection of rare 16th, 17th, 18th and 19th century maps from across the world, with a special emphasis on maps from Southeast Asia.
• Seven leaves from medieval manuscripts, including a leaf from a portable Latin Bible produced in France in 1250.
• A 1493 edition of Martial’s “Epigrams,” the library’s oldest printed book.
• The Horatio Alger Collection with more than 4,000 volumes from the all-time, best-selling series writer. It is one of the world’s most comprehensive collections of Alger material.
• Collections of dime novels, science fiction and comic books.
• The Lord Byron Collection, with nearly 300 titles from the English Romantic poet.
• The William Blake collection, featuring books of poetry, drawings, paintings and bibliographies of the British poet.
• A collection of books and other materials in all subject areas by and about African Americans and other people of African descent throughout the world.
• A collection of autographed books by famous or noteworthy writers and artists.

NIU’s twelfth MCTI to include instructors

When the 20 participants in this year’s Multicultural Curriculum Transformation Institute gather this May, their ranks will – for the first time – include instructors.

Originally conceived 12 years ago as a program for faculty, the doors opened in 2003 to members of the Supportive Professional Staff with teaching responsibilities. That change prompted NIU’s instructors to seek entry.

“I’m especially excited. Many of our instructors teach large, lower-level general education courses, so we hope that we will be able to reach more students as they first come into the university,” said Amy Levin, director of Women’s Studies and chair of the MCTI task force.

Scheduled for May 16 to 20, MCTI brings together teachers from across campus to learn more about multiculturalism and discuss how to weave its ideals into their courses.

Paula Rothenberg, director of the New Jersey Project on Inclusive Scholarship, Curriculum, and Pedagogy at William Paterson University, is the keynote speaker. Rothenberg will lead a plenary workshop from 9 a.m. to noon Tuesday, May 17, that is open to non-participants.

Other sessions open to the public include a panel on disabilities (10:45 a.m. to noon Monday, May 16), a panel on race (9 a.m. to noon Wednesday, May 18), a panel on class (9 to 10:30 a.m. Thursday, May 19), a video titled “A Class Divided” (10:45 to 11:45 a.m. Thursday, May 19), a panel on sexual orientation (9 to 10:30 a.m. Friday, May 20) and a panel on religion (10:45 a.m. to noon Friday, May 20).

All sessions are held in the Heritage Room of the Holmes Student Center.

Levin, who also is a professor of English, said NIU students who enroll in transformed courses gain inclusive and diverse perspectives and experiences. The enhanced syllabi also help to attract a wider range of students.

More than 150 faculty and Supportive Professional Staff are MCTI alumni.

“We can teach our subjects more comprehensively by focusing on different cultures, classes and sexual orientations in our courses. We can teach better,” Levin said. “Being involved in Women’s Studies and being a scholar in African-American literature, I for a long time have had an interest in the intersection of race, class and gender in the classroom and in the curriculum.”

Multiculturalism is defined as the inclusion of scholarship, theory, concept and fact of cultures that historically have been under-represented in all educational arenas.

Task force leaders envision an enriched academic environment where faculty address multicultural perspectives in their teaching and curricula, accommodate the needs of a diverse student population and engage in activities that promote scholarship of multicultural curricula.

Rothenberg, whose most recent book is titled “Invisible Privilege: A Memoir about Race, Class, and Gender,” has spoken at colleges and universities across the country. Hundreds of NIU students have used Rothenberg’s edited collection “Race Class, Gender in the United States.”

A reception in her honor will take place from 4 to 6 p.m. Monday, May 16, in the Presidential Suite of the Holmes Student Center.

“We chose Rothenberg because she has a reputation for developing materials relating to multiculturalism in the classroom,” Levin said. “She will lead the participants to develop their awareness and understanding of multicultural issues.”

Sixteen of this year’s participants will receive awards of $1,000: Abu Bah, Sociology; Lisa Baumgartner, Counseling, Adult and Higher Education; Hans Beck, Biological Sciences; Edward Cancio, Teaching and Learning; Mayra Daniel, Literacy; Kenneth Elliott, Management; Eric Jones, History; Chang Liu, Operations Management and Information Systems; Christine Malecki, Psychology; Sherrill Morris, Communicative Disorders; Charles Peterson, OMIS; Lesley Rigg, Geography; Thomas Roberts, Leadership, Educational Psychology and Foundations; Maribel Valle, Allied Health Professions; and Angela Odoms-Young, Allied Health Professions.

Also participating are Margaret Cook, Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Resources; Donna Martin, LEPF; Deborah Pierce, Division of International Programs; and Mary Shelden, University Libraries. All participants will hold workshops this fall based on their MCTI projects.

For more information, contact Levin at (815) 753-1038 or via e-mail at alevin@niu.edu. More information also is available from Tara McDonald, task force assistant, at (815) 753-8557 or via e-mail at multicultural_institute@niu.edu.

Sondra King remembered for compassion, enthusiasm, teaching

Sondra King would do whatever was necessary.

To teach her dietetics students the principles of a good “diet recall” – an interview to determine what a patient has eaten – the longtime NIU professor from the School of Family, Consumer and Nutrition Sciences would become Miss Daisy.

Drawing inspiration from her elderly mother and aunt, King would enter the classroom dressed in a small cape, white gloves and a little veiled hat, chatting about the drive over in her old Packard.

“She played this to the hilt, all the way down to saying she had amaretto in her coffee. She had the students eating out of the palm of her hand,” said Lucy Robinson, a former graduate assistant for King who played the role of the dietitian in the Miss Daisy skits. “She did such wonderfully creative things in her classroom.”

Yet King, who died March 16 at the age of 63, also did whatever was necessary to combat hunger and malnutrition at home and in developing countries.

It was a devotion that carried her to nearly three dozen nations, including China, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Ghana, Nicaragua, Panama and Uzbekistan. There she spread lessons of good nutrition – and brought food and love – to impoverished mothers and their children.

“Sondra was a woman of great compassion. The thing that really made Sondra different from the rest of us is that she really acted on that compassion,” said Robinson, now the director of the dietetics internship program in the College of Health and Human Sciences.

“We all can feel compassionate, but she was out there collecting day-old bread from the bakery outlets and taking it to the pantries. She was collecting books and storing them in her garage for six months and then shipping them to Africa. She was collecting medical supplies in her basement that were donated and were going to Nicaragua. She took herself to all these different countries.”

“One of the seminal characteristics of Sondra was her enthusiasm,” said Ellen Parham, who retired in 2003 as coordinator of NIU’s nutrition, dietetics and hospitality administration program.

“Sondra felt strongly about so many things, and some of those were just fun things, like her enthusiasm for old cars, and others were deadly serious things, like her commitment to working against domestic and third-world hunger,” Parham added. “She was very unusual in that she was willing to work on all levels about things she cared about. By that, I mean she didn’t need to be the chief. She was perfectly willing to be the Indian.”

Mary Pritchard, associate dean of the College of Health and Human Sciences and former longtime chair of the School of Family, Consumer and Nutrition Sciences, calls King “the epitome of a professor” through her integration of teaching, research and service.

“She brightened every room she entered with just that contagious energy and enthusiasm,” Pritchard said. “She was a team player. She did what needed to be done, and we often wondered how she did so many things.”

King came to NIU in 1976 as an assistant professor in home economics.

Born in 1941 in Pampa, Texas, she earned her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in biology from West Texas State University and her Ph.D. in foods and nutrition from Kansas State University.

She specialized in maternal and child nutrition, and was respected as a specialist on global nutrition issues with a focus on malnutrition and its causes.

King won NIU’s highest annual honor for teaching – the prestigious Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching award – in 1992. From 1986 to 1988, she served as president of the Illinois Nutrition Association. In 2003, a year after she retired, she received the Outstanding Educator Award from the Illinois Dietetics Association.

She preferred teaching undergraduates, Parham said, but also worked closely with graduate students and directed 48 theses.

“Many, many, many students would say, ‘I went into dietetics because of Dr. King.’ Students felt that she wanted them to learn. If they weren’t doing well, that was a personal disappointment to her,” Parham said.

Over the years, King became as well-known for her globally minded activism as for her knowledge of food and her devotion to teaching.

In 1981, she was a trainer for a Peace Corps project to send nutrition educators to Niger, West Africa. From 1984 to 1986, she studied in Costa Rica in a faculty development program.

She participated in the 1986 Institute for Central American Studies tour to Nicaragua and, in 1989, took sabbatical leave for a research project at the National Center of Hygiene and Epidemiology through the Ministry of Health in Managua, Nicaragua. King analyzed the blood of pregnant women.

“Her scope of influence was international,” Robinson said. “She touched so many lives as she worked tirelessly, both locally and globally, to ameliorate hunger.”

NIU taps Governors State professor
with national visibility as English chair

Governors State University Professor Deborah Holdstein, editor of the country’s top journal in the field of rhetoric and composition, has been named chair of the NIU Department of English, effective July 1.

For the past two decades, Holdstein has served as a professor of English and rhetoric at Governors State. Since 2002, she also has been a faculty associate in the provost’s office at the far south suburban university, where she led and coordinated efforts to bring oversight and cooperation to all aspects of graduate study.

She now takes the helm of one of the largest departments in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at NIU. More than 500 students are majoring in English and another 100 are seeking minors. The department boasts 35 tenured faculty members and 30 instructors.

“I’m excited about the challenge,” Holdstein said. “I’ve been impressed with NIU’s Department of English, and I’m committed to building upon its already outstanding reputation.”

Holdstein, of Oak Park, has been active for many years in the Conference on College Composition and Communication, a national organization that supports and promotes teaching and scholarship in the study of writing. She is a member of the organization’s executive committee and, in 2004, was appointed editor of its flagship journal.

She also served a 4-year term on the publications committee of the Modern Language Association.

“As a professor who has gained national visibility and has top-flight credentials, Dr. Holdstein is an excellent fit for NIU,” said Frederick Kitterle, dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. “It was clear that she enjoyed the support of a wide range of constituencies here.”

“Dr. Holdstein is a fine scholar and also has extensive administrative experience and skills,” added English Professor Jeffrey Johnson, a member of the search committee. “She was part of an accreditation team that came to review the program here a few years ago, so she’s familiar with our department and is enthusiastic about its strengths.”

Holdstein holds a Ph.D. in comparative literature from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and an M.B.A. certificate from the Wharton College of Business at the University of Pennsylvania. She has published numerous research articles and several books in the areas of rhetoric, literary studies, film and technology in the humanities. At Governors State, she was the recipient of university-wide Faculty Excellence Awards and three times won the Student Choice Award for teaching.

“Throughout my career, I’ve been dedicated to providing students with high-quality, affordable public education,” Holdstein said. “I firmly believe that students come first. At Governors State, even after taking on administrative duties, I continued to work as an active faculty member, advising and teaching students. I have a lot to learn on the administrative side in my first year at NIU, but down the road I would like to do some teaching as well. I want to get to know Northern students.”

Holdstein’s appointment fills a vacancy left by former English chair Heather Hardy, who was named dean of the College of Liberal Arts at Colorado State University in 2003. Professor Doris McDonald has served as interim department chair.

Department of State bolsters NIU peace effort in Philippines

Outbursts of terrorism and ethnic-fueled civil war are an ordinary part of life on the Philippine island of Mindanao, where enmity between Christians and the Bangsamoro, a linguistically and culturally diverse group of native Muslim minorities, has simmered over the course of four centuries.

That is why it was so unusual last summer to see Christian, Muslim and tribal youth come together – more than 2,000 of them in all – for a children’s peace festival in the southern Philippines.

“The children of Muslim separatist fighters were among those who performed cultural dances, and even some of the rebels themselves attended,” says Susan Russell, director of NIU’s Center for Southeast Asian Studies. “It’s amazing.”

Lasting peace in Mindanao won’t be accomplished overnight, but NIU is helping to plant seeds of tolerance with hopes that they will blossom in the next generation. Some of the young people and adults who organized the peace festival were graduates of NIU’s “Bridging the Gap” program, an intensive one-month training institute held on campus last spring.

The institute was so successful that the U.S. State Department is providing $400,000 to continue the program this year and next. A new group of 34 Filipinos, most of them in their teens, will arrive on April 3 for a month-long stay at NIU.

The institute aims to teach conflict-resolution and inter-ethnic dialogue skills to teen-agers and young adults from Mindanao, the largest and least-developed island in the southern Philippines. Along with other islands in the southern Philippines, it is home to 13 different ethno-linguistic groups. Institute participants also will examine the important role of volunteerism in civil society and will be introduced to American institutions that promote tolerance and religious diversity.

“This is a small part of the United States’ huge and very expensive peace initiative in Mindanao,” says Russell, an anthropology professor specializing in the Philippines. “We’re creating a generation of future leaders with good values toward peace and tolerance.”

Russell and Lina Ong, director of the NIU International Training Office, head up NIU’s Bridging the Gap program, which brings together the talents of about 10 faculty members with expertise in Southeast Asia and/or racial and ethnic relations. The U.S. Embassy in Manila, Capitol University in Mindanao and the International Visitors Program-Philippines also are collaborating on the project.

While at NIU, the Filipino activists will participate in classes and workshops, learning about different strategies for conducting inter-faith dialogue, conflict resolution and mediation.

Visits are planned to area churches, mosques and synagogues, as well as to a homeless shelter and other local organizations. The young Filipinos will interact with NIU students and peers from DeKalb, Sycamore and Rochelle high schools. They also will meet with community activists and local government leaders in DeKalb, Chicago, Springfield and Indianapolis.

Institute leaders will conduct follow-up visits later this year to Mindanao, where participants’ action plans will be further refined and their successes documented. The institute format is modeled after last year’s program, which succeeded beyond the organizers’ expectations.

“The graduates of this program already are building and expanding the network of young peacemakers that this project has created,” Ong says. “They are starting diversity clubs in their schools and exposing others to conflict-resolution skills. They are committed to building a ‘community of communities’ in their home areas.”

Professor Nagasura Madale, an NIU alumnus who is on campus this semester as a visiting professor from Capitol University in the Philippines, says the NIU program is a first of its kind.

“One of the problems in Mindanao is we have a lot of groups and institutions doing their own kind of peace,” says Madale, who is among the NIU institute trainers. “This project is unique because we are able to bring all the groups together to support a larger effort.

“We’re happy the project will be allowed to continue over three years,” he adds. “By then, we will have developed about 100 students and adults who will change the playing field. It’s a big step toward peace.”

For more information on the Bridging the Gap program, visit www.niu.edu/cseas/outreach/PhilAccess/accessfs.htm.

NIU to host first international Thai conference on U.S. soil

More than 300 scholars from across the world are expected to visit NIU for the upcoming Ninth International Conference on Thai Studies.

The conference will be held from Sunday, April 3, through Wednesday, April 6. It will be the first international Thai studies conference held in the United States.

Kasit Piromya, the Thai ambassador to the United States, and Darryl Johnson, former U.S. ambassador to Thailand, are expected to be among the attendees. The conference also is expected to draw nearly two dozen NIU alumni who hold scholarly posts in Thai studies here and abroad.

“In a lot of ways, this will be a coming home for many of the conference participants,” said Arlene Neher, an NIU scholar of Thailand who is serving as director of the conference. Neher said $125,000 in funding was raised to bring scholars from abroad to DeKalb.

The conference focuses on a broad definition of Thai studies, including studies of all ethnic groups within the Kingdom of Thailand, as well as Thai/Tai peoples of Southeast Asia, India and China. About 185 papers have been submitted for the event. “This will be bigger than any of the Thai conferences that have been held previously,” Neher said.

“We’re honored to be hosting the first international Thai conference on U.S. soil,” added Susan Russell, director of the NIU Center for Southeast Asian Studies. “Scholarship on Thailand has long been of keen interest to our center, and it’s great to see so many scholars coming from Thailand and abroad to participate. Arlene has done a terrific job organizing the event.”

Russell’s center is sponsoring the conference, coordinated through the Office of External Programming in Liberal Arts and Sciences. Founded in 1963, the university’s Center for Southeast Asian Studies is the second oldest of its kind in the nation and one of seven National Resource Centers for Southeast Asian studies.

Students can work toward a minor or a graduate concentration in Southeast Asian studies; courses are offered in the region’s languages, literatures, anthropology, geography, history, religion, music, art history and government. NIU’s center has particular strengths in the study of Thailand, Burma (Myanmar), Cambodia, Indonesia and the Philippines.

Organizations providing funding and support to the Thai conference at NIU include the Rockefeller Foundation, Toyota Foundation, The Asia Foundation in Washington, D.C., the U.S. Department of Education, the Association for Asian Studies at the University of Michigan, the University of Wisconsin at Madison and the Royal Thai Consulate General in Chicago.

More information about the Ninth International Conference on Thai Studies is available online at www.niu.edu/thaiconf/.

Reality Bytes fest features student documentaries

The Northern Illinois University Department of Communication and Ruckus Network will host the student documentary film festival Reality Bytes from 1 to 4:30 p.m. Friday, April 1, in Diversions Lounge at the Holmes Student Center.

Admission is free and open to the public.

Student-produced short documentaries will be screened during the festival. Documentary festival winners will be selected from three genres: historical, biographical and social issue. The winning films, along with the Best of Festival winner, will be announced at 4 p.m. in Diversions Lounge.

Ruckus Network, a digital network that provides entertainment programming for college students at NIU, will provide snacks and a chance to win a $50 movie download giveaway.

In addition, NIU media studies alumni Bill Weinman will attend the festival. Weinman was a film editor on “Beyond the Glory,” “Nash Bridges” and “VH-1 Behind the Music,” and editor/producer on two feature-length music documentaries, “Pura Vida” and “Evolution.” Weinman also was a sound editor on more than 35 feature films including “Shawshank Redemption,” “The Fugitive” and “What’s Love Got to do With It.”

Visit the festival Web site at http://www3.niu.edu/~tm0lrv1/realitybytes/2005events.html for more information or contact Communication Professor Laura Vazquez at lvazquez@niu.edu.

SPS will recognize award winners

Recipients of the Supportive Professional Staff Presidential Awards for Excellence – Joanne Dempsey, J. Daniel House, Lori Marcellus and Judy Skorek – and of the SPS Council Service Award in memory of Gary Gray – Deborah Haliczer – will be honored at a reception from 2 to 4 p.m. Tuesday, March 29, in the Clara Sperling Sky Room of the Holmes Student Center.

The awards ceremony begins at 2:30 p.m.

ITS starts final phase to stop spam e-mail

Implementing enterprise spam controls for NIU has been a yearlong project for Information Technology Services. On Thursday, March 31, the final phase of stopping mail before it hits our enterprise mail servers is set to begin.

All GroupWise and student mailboxes will enter the Do Not Deliver Spam option. Any mail currently tagged in the subject line as [Spam:***Spam Score] will be rejected. Creating a permit list will assure mail delivery from specific senders.

Find out how to do this along with answers to other common concerns on the Web at www.its.niu.edu.

NIU librarian to talk on writer Philip K. Dick

The Friends of the NIU Libraries invite the public to attend the third program of the 2004-2005 academic year at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, March 31. Stephen Wright, associate dean of NIU’s University Libraries, will present “The Shadow of Philip K. Dick.”

Dick was an American science fiction writer and author of more than 30 novels and more than 100 short stories. His science fiction extended beyond the use of robots and space travel into memory implants and counterfeit worlds.

He lived in poverty while working for low-paying science fiction publishers until he sold the rights to “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?” – the basis for the film “Blade
Runner.” He died before the movie was released in 1982, but his popularity increased. Other movies produced from Dick’s writings include “Total Recall,” “Minority Report” and “Paycheck.” Dick’s work gained acceptance and respectability among serious literary circles, with just about all of his works currently in print.

Wright will talk about Dick’s personal life and religious experiences, his influence on
popular culture and film, and his own experiences collecting Dick’s work.

The program will be held in the Staff Lounge located on the lower level of Founders Memorial Library on the NIU campus in DeKalb. Free parking might be available after 7 p.m. in the Visitor’s Parking Lot on Carroll Avenue.

There will be an opportunity for discussion and light refreshments following the presentation. For more information, call (815) 753-9394 or e-mail cditzler@niu.edu.

LGBT co-sponsors Ally Awards reception

The university community is invited to the first Ally Awards reception, sponsored by the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender Resource Center and the Presidential Commission on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity.

The reception is scheduled from 2 to 4 p.m. Monday, April 4, in the Clara Sperling Sky Room of the Holmes Student Center. Individuals are welcome to stop by the reception at any time. A brief program will be held at 2:30 p.m. to present the awards.

The Ally Awards recognize individuals, departments or groups who have shown their support for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender (LGBT) people or the LGBT community during the 2004-2005 school year. All are welcome.

For more information about the Ally Awards, click here www.niu.edu/lgbt/allyawards.htm, call (815) 753-5428 or e-mail lgtb@niu.edu.

LGBT Awareness Month includes concerts, lectures

Concerts, workshops, panel discussions, multi-media presentations, lectures and more are on the calendar for April’s celebration of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender Awareness Month.

Featured speakers for the month include Columbia College’s Edna Johnston presenting “Identity of a Deaf Woman: Perceptions and Awareness,” Arizona State University’s Thomas Nakayama speaking on “The Problem of Asian-American Sexuality,” and the University of New Mexico’s Laurel Lampela presenting “Out Loud: Works and Words of Lesbian Visual Artists.”

Full details about these and all other events are available by calling (815) 753-5428, e-mailing lgbt@niu.edu or clicking here www.niu.edu/lgbt/april.htm.

Campus Child Care hosts open house

The NIU Campus Child Care Center is hosting an open house Friday, April 8, in celebration of the Week of the Young Child.

Tours, refreshments, a slide show and early childhood materials will be available from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. The facility is located in a white stone building between Annie Glidden Road and Gabel Hall.

The Center is now welcoming community families into its preschool program. Part-time and full-time enrollment options are available. Enrollment for NIU students, faculty, and staff includes care for children ages 2 months to 5 years, and ages 6 to 8 years during the summer.

For more information, please call (815) 753-0125, e-mail cherrmann@niu.edu or visit www.ccc.niu.edu.

Affirmative Action/Diversity Resources
concludes Spring Semester Series

The 2005 Spring Series featuring Collective Stories and Cultural Experiences concludes Tuesday, April 19, with "The Spectrum of Advancement." The session will be held in the AADR-178/166 training rooms from noon to 1 p.m. All are welcomed to attend.

In celebration of Asian/Pacific American National History Month (May), this discussion/dialogue will highlight implications of the advancement of Asian Americans in the higher education setting. Specifically, movements of attainment in learning and curriculum development, climate and retention of students/faculty and how persons of the Asian populations perceive the cultural environment for success will be addressed. Guest panelists are Sherri Fang, School of Family, Consumer and Nutrition Science, and Deborah Pierce, director of International programs.

For more information, contact Phinette Maszka, assistant director, Mediation and Diversity Awareness Programming, at 753-6030, TTY 753-2000 or at pmaszka@niu.edu. Please feel free to bring your lunch. Light refreshments will be provided.

University Bookstore urges ‘Rate Your Books’ survey

Faculty members are encouraged to participate in the “Rate Your Books” survey by ordering Scantron forms for students before the end of the semester. Please call (815) 753-1082 by Friday, April 22, with the number of questionnaires needed. A packet will be sent in time for the final class.

First-Year Connections seeks UNIV 101/201 instructors

The First-Year Connections program is recruiting UNIV 101/201 instructors for the fall.

UNIV 101 is a one-credit, 12-week course designed to assist freshmen in developing the necessary academic and social skills to be successful at NIU. UNIV 201 is the UNIV 101 equivalent designed specifically for transfer students.

Instructors must be current or retired members of the NIU faculty, staff or administration, have completed at minimum of a master’s degree or have prior experience teaching at the college level. Interested candidates who do not meet the last two criteria may have the opportunity to co-instruct.

This is a great way to impact new students as they transition to the university. Additionally, you have the opportunity to work with upper-class students who serve as peer instructors to assist with the planning and facilitation of the course.

Those interested must attend a one-day instructor development workshop in May. UNIV instructors typically receive a stipend of $1,000, with co-instructors sharing this amount.

Please e-mail firstconn@niu.edu to request an instructor application and for more information. All those interested are invited to attend a new instructor overview from 3 to 4:30 p.m. Friday, April 22, in Room 505 of the Holmes Student Center. Please RSVP via e-mail.

NIU seeks host families for brief international exchange

NIU is seeking families in DeKalb and Sycamore to host Muslim and Christian high school students and adult leaders from the Southern Philippines for two weeks in April.

The visitors will be participating in a training institute led by the university’s Center for Southeast Asian Studies and International Training Office. Funded by the U.S. Department of State, the institute is designed to promote conflict resolution and interethnic and interfaith dialogue. Participants were selected through a competitive application process, have outstanding academic credentials and are fluent in English.

The training institute will introduce participants to American institutions that promote tolerance and will expose them to the religious and ethnic diversity of the United States. NIU hopes to place the high school students with local families who have students of the same age if possible.

The Filipino students and adult leaders will stay with their host families from April 17 to May 1. Host families will provide the visitors with transportation to and from campus, where workshops will be held daily. Students will join their host families for breakfasts and most dinners. The students also will have at least one free day each week during the two-week host-family experience.

Host families will be required to attend an orientation session. During the orientation, past host families will share their experiences from a similar program that was held last year.

Interested families should contact Julie Lamb, outreach coordinator for the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at (815) 753-1595 or jlamb@niu.edu. More information is available online at www.niu.edu/cseas/outreach/PhilAccess/accessfs.htm.

3-28-05