March 13, 2007, Northern Today Abridged

Governor’s budget plan includes
$19 million for Stevens Building renovation

The budget plan for the coming year proposed by Gov. Rod Blagojevich includes more than $19 million for renovation and expansion of NIU's Stevens Building.

The governor’s fiscal 2008 budget recommendation announced last week also includes an increase of nearly $2 million in operating funds for NIU.

“We’re pleased with Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s budget proposal,” NIU President John Peters said. “We’re encouraged to see the governor recognizes the need for necessary capital improvements at NIU and universities across the state. Renovation of the Stevens Building has long been a top priority for NIU, and we’ve worked diligently to make it a top priority in Springfield as well.

“I look forward to working with members of the Illinois General Assembly as they further consider the governor’s budget request,” Peters added.

Long in need of major repairs, the Stevens Building houses facilities and classrooms for the Department of Anthropology and the School of Theatre and Dance, including the O’Connell, Players and Corner theaters.

The governor’s budget request for an increase to the university’s general fund calls for an increase of 1.9 percent, to $105.9 million. “We’re also glad to see that the governor increased the Illinois Board of Higher Education’s general fund recommendation for NIU from a base budget increase of 1.5 percent to 1.9 percent,” Peters said. “The extra funding is needed.”

International Reading Association honors
NIU Literacy Education professor Carger

Chris Carger lives in a world of vivid colors, familiar characters, rich stories and, of course, endings.

Some are happy. Some are sad. Almost all, however, resonate with her in a way that touches her soul and moistens her eyes. Her anecdotes are tied to her favorite children’s books, and she’s quick to name their titles, their authors and their plots.

“The books themselves are just so beautiful,” says Carger, an associate professor in the Department of Literacy Education at Northern Illinois University. “I’d take the books home, sit on the couch and read them, and sometimes I’d just be in tears. My daughters used to tease me about it.”

But it’s the way that children relate with books that moves her, and sometimes surprises her, the most.

That’s why her car’s trunk and back seat are packed with wonderful children’s books, many of which she bought and some of which she gives away. It’s why she’s challenged some school administrators who’ve locked away the literature in favor of more time spent on skill sheets and workbooks. It’s why she’s prodded teachers who, in some school districts, are almost afraid to admit they’ve read fiction aloud in class.

“If you can get children to connect to a book … that’s what’s going to make them lifelong readers,” Carger says. “We’ve got to get books into children’s hands – into all children’s hands.”

Her passion and mission have the world’s attention.

Carger has won the International Reading Association’s prestigious Arbuthnot Award as the year’s outstanding teacher of children’s and young adults’ literature. It recognizes knowledgeable professionals who are innovative teachers, leaders in the field, role models, mentors and disseminators.

The honor comes May 17 in Toronto at the IRA’s annual conference.

“This means a lot to me. It affirms my life’s work,” she says. “For years, I carried books to teachers and children across northern Illinois and talked about their many values.”

Norm Stahl, chair of the NIU Department of Literacy Education, calls Carger a “beacon for our students, our faculty and the greater Chicagoland community by advocating for the many ways children’s literature can be used.”

“Across 35 years of service in our field, I have yet to meet an individual who has more commitment to, or love of, children’s literature than Dr. Carger,” Stahl says. “Chris is tireless in writing proposals and gaining grants so as to put children’s literature and art materials in the hands of children and teacher candidates.”

* * *

Carger came to the NIU College of Education in 1994 with a background in reading and bilingual education. She was asked to prepare a course in multicultural children’s literature, an assignment that changed her life.

The granddaughter of immigrants discovered one glorious book after another, all full of tales of young children living in their native countries or in the “New World” of the United States.

She discovered that children of any culture can find themselves in the stories; book characters often can break apart stereotypes. She also discovered some teachers don’t know about these books, or don’t have the funds to buy them.

There was “The Circuit,” Francisco Jimenez’s story of a migrant farm boy in the Mexico and California of the 1940s. There was Lois Lowry’s “Number the Stars,” about a 10-year-old girl living in Denmark during World War II. There was “Nory Ryan’s Song,” by Patricia Reilly Giff, about the Irish famine’s effect on a 12-year-old girl and her family.

But there was also “Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes,” Eleanor Coerr’s book about a real Japanese girl in the 1950s suffering from leukemia brought on by the atom bomb that struck Hiroshima.

Sadako believed a legend that folding 1,000 tiny paper cranes would grant her any wish – she would wish for her disease to go away – but died before she could complete her task. Her classmates finished it for her.

That book inspired one NIU student to fold 1,000 paper cranes and suspend them from a mobile that now hangs in the Children’s Literature Teaching Collection inside Gabel Hall. The mobile, in turn, inspires Carger.

“I remember seeing it when I first came to NIU 13 years ago,” she says, sitting next to the mobile just outside her office, “and wishing I could be a teacher of children’s literature in one of the nearby offices.”

And there was also “My Very Own Room,” linked to an experience that demonstrated to Carger the profound potential that reading can unlock in children.

Amada Irma Pérez’s book is about a Mexican girl living in the United States who is forced to share a bedroom with her younger brothers. When she decides to claim a closet as her own, there is not enough paint of one color to cover the walls. She decides to use all three leftover colors she has, painting in swirls.

Carger read the book aloud to Latino children at a school in Chicago where the principal had locked away all the children’s literature. When she reached the page of swirls, one child chirped, “That looks like a painting by Vincent van Gogh!” Another added: “It’s like ‘Starry Night!’ ”

She later learned their teacher had read a story about van Gogh, and showed his famous painting, during a recent lesson in social studies. The students drew the connection on their own, Carger says, and even searched their local library that weekend for more books illustrated by Maya Christina Gonzalez.

“This is what they’re capable of,” Carger says. “Don’t keep these books from them and think that English language learners can’t handle literature discussions. We have got to get these books out to the people who can get the most out of them.”

* * *

Although Carger worries about the distractions children face – television, computers, cell phones, video games, iPods – she has plenty of ideas to keep students involved.

She points students to a Web site on César Chávez when teaching “The Circuit.” She visited Denmark to take pictures of WWII sites, tour a museum and interview a member of the resistance to create a PowerPoint presentation about “Number the Stars.” She downloaded museum pictures of the Irish famine to discuss “Nory Ryan’s Song.”

Literacy Education students who take her Techniques of Tutoring course serve as reading tutors for Latino children in several DeKalb and Aurora schools. The “Reaching Out through Art and Reading” program pairs books with art projects that bring the literature to life.

Some of her students in the early childhood studies program put on puppet shows connected to books at the DeKalb Public Library.

“It’s more than just holding up a book and saying, ‘You should read this,’ ” she says. “Nothing replaces your own enthusiasm for the books.”

And nothing dampens her fervor.

Carger keeps busy writing grants to find funding that would pay for books and art supplies, and also is applying for money that would support her new idea to tap NIU’s international students to read aloud books from their native lands to DeKalb school children.

She’s also the chair of this year’s annual Children’s Literature Conference, scheduled for March 16 and 17 at NIU. Guests include Giff and Pam Muñoz Ryan, author of “Esperanza Rising.”

Meanwhile, Carger is nearly finished with the sequel to her 1996 book, “Of Borders and Dreams: A Mexican-American Experience of Urban Education.” The first book related her case study of a Latino boy who dropped out of school; a decade later, she follows up to illustrate what happens to a dropout.

She served on and chaired the review committee for the Américas Award for Children’s and Young Adult Literature and served on the selection committee for the Monarch Award: Illinois’ K-3 Children’s Book Choice Award.

“Chris is not just somebody who likes children’s books. She really does her homework to stay up on new books. She brings a wealth of information to me, her students and, finally, to the children,” says Pam Nelson, a colleague in the Department of Literacy Education. “Nobody knows where that ends. You just don’t know which of these kids will become teachers of children’s literature someday.”

Carger, who’s grateful to Nelson, retired NIU professor Carl Tomlinson and all her associates, students and mentors, says she wishes they all could share the Arbuthnot Award.

The professor also hopes her family can join her in Toronto for the ceremony. She and husband Jim, who live in suburban Chicago, have been married 28 years. They are parents to Elizabeth, 26, who graduated from the University of Chicago, and Mary, 22, a math major at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

NIU’s C.T. Lin develops sensor
to detect poisons, chemical warfare agents

NIU’s invention man is at it again.

Chemistry Professor C.T. Lin, who has eight patents to his name, unveiled his latest creation recently in San Francisco.

Lin has developed a sensor that selectively changes color immediately upon detection of a toxic chemical agent, including chemical warfare agents, such as nerve and mustard gas.

“The sensor is fast, very sensitive, agent selective and specific, durable and low cost,” Lin said. “As an added benefit, a decontamination catalyst can be encapsulated in the sensor.”

Lin’s device was one of 16 technologies featured in this past weekend’s Innovation Showcase at the 2007 International Meeting of the Association of University Technology Managers.

The technology takes advantage of the unique charge-transfer characteristics exhibited by various toxic agents. Mustard gas, for example, has a lone pair of electrons on the sulfur atom. This makes the toxin a good “electron donor,” Lin said.

The sensor contains an ideal reactive material that acts as an electron acceptor. When the sensor comes in contact with a toxin, it generates a color change through the flow of electrons from the donor to the acceptor by forming a charge-transfer complex. 

The sensor can be produced as a solid strip, array, film or coating. Lin said it could actually be spray-coated onto a uniform or piece of military equipment. In spray form, the sensor’s encapsulated catalysts could decontaminate an area, cleansing the air or surface area by speeding up the chemical reactions without creating toxic byproducts.

Lin has tested the sensor using non-toxic analogues, groups of chemical compounds similar in chemical structure but slightly different than their toxic cousins. The sensor was developed using sol-gel technology, converting nanocatalysts suspended in a liquid solution into a solid array that works as the sensor.

Sol-gel chemistry works at room temperature to produce optically transparent powders, array structures and ultra-thin coatings with a wide range of properties.

In addition to being useful for identifying chemical warfare agents, Lin’s technology can be adapted to detect other toxic agents, including heavy metals and agricultural pesticides and insecticides. Lin said it could potentially be used by Homeland Security, environmental agencies and waste management companies.

A professor who has won every top teaching and research award at NIU, Lin is never short on ideas for new technologies using the sol-gel process.

Among his creations:

• A thin film coating of specialized nanoparticles that act as “molecular fans” to cool nanodevices, such as the components found in advanced computers, high powered LEDs and cell phones.
• A conductive coating that acts as a shield to electromagnetic radiation generated by cell phones, high-tension wires and other electrical devices.
• An environmentally friendly metal-surface coating technology that eliminates the health, safety and waste disposal concerns of standard coatings for metals. The technology led to the creation of ChemNova Technologies, Inc., a university spin-off company that is marketing the process.

College of Ed joins national initiative
on strengthening educational doctorates

Physicians serve internships and residencies and must pass the medical boards. Lawyers must pass the bar exam, and some work as judicial clerks, before arguing cases.

But what sort of universal capstone experience is or should be provided to, or required of, those educators who earn doctoral degrees in preparation for professional roles in the field?

The Carnegie Foundation aims to answer that question with the help of the NIU College of Education and 19 other U.S. universities.

Dean Christine Sorensen joined Jon Crawford and Teresa Wasonga, professors in the Department of Leadership, Educational Psychology and Foundations, at a Carnegie-sponsored “orientation meeting” held Feb. 23 in New York City.

“In education, we don’t have a signature pedagogy. The question was, ‘Can we establish our own signature pedagogy, and what should it look like?’ ” Wasonga said. “We believe that this group is going to set the tone, and we want to be among those setting the tone.”

“We were excited we were selected,” Sorensen said. “The group has decided to focus on two areas: laboratories of practice and the scholarship of teaching. Our folks are going to focus on laboratories of practice, and given our strong partnerships with local school districts, that would make sense for us.”

The Carnegie Foundation’s efforts, coming on the heels of its five-year study of professional preparation programs, arrive at a critical and tenuous period in U.S. education.

Federal “No Child Left Behind” legislation demands accountability and achievement from schools, and fingers often are pointed at principals and superintendents when adequate progress toward those benchmarks fails to meet expectations.

Meanwhile, regional accrediting associations are paying attention to doctoral education, particularly the preparation of professional practitioners.

“A degree of concern exists, and that may be an understatement, over the progress being made toward closing the achievement gap and improving student performance on standardized achievement tests: We’re not making as much progress with that as the society as a whole expects,” Crawford said.

“Why is progress toward closing the achievement gap lagging? Does the fault lie with leadership in the schools? If the problem lies with the leadership in the schools, the whole process of training and preparing school leaders is going to be under the microscope.”

Organizers of the Feb. 23 event created three subgroups to focus on teacher education, higher education and school leadership respectively. NIU’s delegates joined the school leadership group.

They’ll spend the next four or five months looking at the traditional capstone experience for doctoral students in education: the dissertation – or, as one Carnegie official posited, a potentially soon-to-be fossil.

Abandoning or even altering the dissertation poses a great hurdle, Crawford said.

“One of the things prevalent in a university environment is paranoia. University programs tend to be afraid to do too much tinkering or changing of a program for fear of what our colleagues at other universities might think,” he said.

“The Carnegie Foundation is creating is a community of learners with these 20 universities and has granted this cadre of learners license to push the envelope. The comfort of being among a group of 20 other universities is heightened by the blessing of the Carnegie Foundation. The Carnegie Foundation’s reputation lends credibility to the project.”

Another mission is to define both a standard skill set and knowledge base needed for people earning the doctorate degree in educational leadership to be successful in providing effective leadership to schools, Crawford said.

“If you went to law school at USC, the University of Texas, Harvard or East Snowshoe University, you’re not going to recognize much difference in the first-year program of study, regardless of the law school you visit. There may be a slight variance, but generally a first-year law student is going to take a contracts course, a torts course, a property course,” he added.

“Contrast this level of conformity with education. If you went to these same four or five universities and compared their educational leadership programs, it is likely you would see considerable variance.”

Higher education also must ease its fear that change will send students away.

Wasonga said the University of Southern California revamped some programs, scaring some that students would flee to other institutions. Yet the university’s communication of the tweaks, the more-rigorous requirements and the excellence of its graduates made employers more interested in the school and added value to the degree.

“We should not hide from quality. Let’s be proud of quality. Let’s distinguish ourselves as people providing quality students with skills, and let the employers know that. People will come to you,” Wasonga said.

“We can be proud of producing people of quality and not worry about competition. We will still get our share of students as long as people understand what we are doing and that what we are doing impacts practice.”

A key part of the Carnegie project is sharing information and ideas among the participating universities, Crawford said, and NIU already is engaged in several exciting programs that will be deposited in the collective knowledge bank.

Partnerships with local school districts, such as Crystal Lake and Rockford, use cohort models to train potential future school leaders. Internships begin immediately rather than serving as a culminating experience. Internship portfolios are presented not just to university professors but to school district leaders as well.

Innovations such as these caught Carnegie’s eye when NIU was asked to participate in the project, he said.

“The Carnegie initiative fit so nicely with where our educational leadership team has been over the past three or four years, examining and reflecting on where our program is and where it could be going,” Crawford said. “This is a chance to catapult NIU’s educational leadership program onto a national stage.”

Internationally renowned educator Michael Apple
to speak March 19 at NIU graduate colloquium

Michael W. Apple, an internationally renowned professor and author of books on educational reform, will speak Monday, March 19, at Northern Illinois University for the spring graduate colloquium.

Apple, the John Bascom Professor of Curriculum and Instruction and Educational Policy Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, speaks from 7 to 8:30 p.m. in the Clara Sperling Sky Room of the Holmes Student Center.

The event is free and open to all faculty, students and the general public. Apple’s presentation is co-sponsored by the Graduate Colloquium Committee, the Department of Teaching and Learning and the Division of Art Education.

Call (815) 753-8458 for more information.

“Our faculty and our students are going to get such a great opportunity through this,” said Elizabeth Wilkins, an associate professor in Teaching and Learning. “His message is powerful, and his work stands on its own.”

Apple’s books include “Educating the ‘Right’ Way: Markets, Standards, God, and Inequality,” a recent work and the title of his NIU presentation. His most recent title, “The State and the Politics of Knowledge,” joins others such as “Ideology and Curriculum,” “Education and Power,” “Teachers and Texts” and “Power, Meaning and Identity.”

His lecture at NIU will examine his beliefs that the social, political, economic and cultural movements of the right have succeeded in forming a “hegemonic alliance” to influence and shape educational policies in the United States.

Wilkins said Apple’s message “makes us stop and think about why we do what we do in the education profession.”

Apple, who has served as vice president of the American Educational Research Association, is widely regarded as one of the 50 most important educational scholars of the 20th century.

He recently was honored with a Lifetime Achievement Award by the American Educational Research Association and with the UCLA Medal for outstanding academic achievements in research in education.

On the faculty at UW-Madison since 1970, he holds degrees from Columbia University and Glassboro State College.

NIU departments lend heat, light,
command center for Sycamore fire battle

Firefighters and local law enforcement got a hand from NIU while battling a recent Sycamore blaze and investigating its suspicious origins.

Shortly after arriving in the 300 block of South Avenue during the early hours of Sunday, March 4, officials began to suspect that the fire scene likely was also a crime scene. The bodies of two people believed to be the victims of a murder-suicide eventually were recovered.

Anticipating a complicated and lengthy investigation, they called upon an unlikely source for help: the NIU Convocation Center.

Wanting to keep firefighters as comfortable as possible in the bitter cold, Sycamore fire officials asked to borrow the large diesel-powered heaters used to warm the loading docks of the facility during winter events.

John Gordon, director of the Convo, took the call around 5 a.m. By 6 a.m., the machinery was on site and set up. Later in the day, the Convocation Center provided portable light towers to illuminate and secure the scene overnight.

“We have to coordinate with the fire and police departments on many, many events, and we have developed a terrific relationship with them,” Gordon said. “They are always helping us out, so when we had the opportunity to return the favor, we didn’t hesitate at all.”

The attitude was similar at the NIU Department of Public Safety, which received a call a short time later asking for use of its Mobile Command Center. Once again, within an hour of the call, the requested equipment was on the scene and soon was up and running.

The 31-foot command center is a second-hand mobile home that has been extensively remodeled to incorporate extensive communications capabilities, several computer work stations and an area where commanders can meet to coordinate activities. Put into service last fall, the vehicle has been used at football games, concerts and other major events on campus.

“We were able to park right next to the scene, and people could observe the site while coordinating efforts,” NIU Police Lt. Todd Hennert said. “At a typical fire, they can usually command operations from the front seat of a car. But because of the suspicious nature of the fire and the damage of the building, they knew this would take two or three days. They needed something better, and we were glad to be of service.”

The vehicle was a perfect solution, Sycamore Fire Chief Bill Riddle said.

“We had 13 different fire departments, the state fire marshal, police, public works and the utility companies working on this scene, and having a place where we could all meet – out of the weather – to coordinate activities was a godsend,” Riddle said.

“These incidents get very complicated and very large in a hurry, and this kind of cooperation is what is required to bring them to a safe and successful conclusion,” Riddle added. “To know that we can count on this type of cooperation from other agencies and the university gives us great confidence that we can handle just about any situation.”

Student film festival at NIU attracting
entries from across the country

Entries have streamed in from top film schools across the country for the 7th annual Reality Bytes Student Documentary Film Festival at NIU.

The NIU Department of Communication will host the festival from Thursday, March 22, to Saturday, March 24. Admission is free, and all events are open to the public. Festival details and a video promotion are online at www.comm.niu.edu/realitybytes.

The festival will feature 21 documentary films. Entries have been received from students at numerous institutions, including NIU, Stanford University, New York University, Syracuse University and the universities of Michigan, North Texas, Florida, Oklahoma and North Carolina.

All films are shorts and range in length from seven to 30 minutes. Films included in the festival are as diverse as the schools they come from, with topics ranging from a documentary profiling a painter who is blind to an in-depth look at crystal methamphetamine addiction.

“We’re thrilled that the festival is attracting so much attention from student filmmakers nationwide,” said festival director Laura Vazquez, a professor of communication at NIU. “The event provides a great opportunity for the public to see excellent student work. The competition will be very heated.”

A special preview night will be held from 10 to 11:30 p.m. Thursday, March 22, at the House Café, 263 E. Lincoln Hwy., DeKalb. The preview is free and will give the community a sampling of the films that will be featured Friday and Saturday.

The main festival screenings will be held from 5 to 9 p.m. Friday, March 23, and Saturday, March 24, in Room 100 of the NIU Art Building. Free popcorn will be available.

The winning films will be announced following the March 24 screenings. The Best of Festival winner will receive a prize of $200 and Avid Video Editing Software, while second place will receive $150 and third place $100. In addition, a fan favorite will be chosen at both the Friday and Saturday screenings.

Judging of the films will be conducted before the screenings by NIU alumni with feedback provided to all contestants.

“This film festival is meant to be a learning experience for all who participate, but it also offers entertainment for members of the community seeking a different type of viewing experience,” Vazquez said. “Many of these students would like to pursue filmmaking careers. This is a nice opportunity for them to experience competitive screenings in a public venue.”

For additional information, e-mail Vazquez at lvazquez@niu.edu.

Northern Star inducts five into Hall of Fame

Membership in the Northern Star Hall of Fame grew to 58 last week with the induction of five new alums, including two from the NIU faculty.

Denise Schoenbachler, dean of the NIU College of Business, is considered a friend of the campus newspaper for conducting and delivering three market research studies in the last decade. Lois Self, retired chair of the NIU Department of Communication, is another friend who led the university’s journalism faculty and served as executive secretary for the Northern Illinois Newspaper Association.

Schoenbachler and Self are among a class that includes a former White House correspondent, a former White House adviser and, perhaps, a thorn in the current White House’s side: the author of one of the nation’s most influential – and left-wing – political blogs.

The induction ceremony was held Saturday, March 3, at a downtown DeKalb restaurant.

“The Star has launched so many great careers and so many great friendships,” Northern Star adviser Jim Killam said. “One of the best things about this event is that our current students get to see that, close-up. Someday they’ll be the ones telling stories about how this place helped shape their lives and careers.”

The Northern Star Hall of Fame honors former students, advisers and friends of the Northern Star who significantly affected the Northern Star, journalism or related fields, or who have otherwise received acclaim based in part on experience gained at the Northern Star.

Created in 2000, the Hall of Fame serves as a means to keep alumni actively involved in support of the Northern Star and to encourage Northern Star students toward excellence in their chosen career paths.

More information is available online at http://www.northernstar.info/alumni.

This year’s inductees are:

• Carol Jouzaitis, a 1975 alum who served as a national correspondent and White House correspondent for the Chicago Tribune. Jouzaitis, who began her career at the Geneva Chronicle and the now-defunct Suburban Tribune, eventually covered Bill Clinton’s 1992 presidential campaign and much of his presidency, traveling frequently on Air Force One. She later wrote for USA Today and now is senior vice president and director of public relations at Slack Barshinger in Chicago.
• Bruce Ladd, class of 1958, who edited newspapers in the suburbs and played key roles in the passage of the Illinois Open Meetings Act and the drafting of the federal Freedom of Information Act. Ladd was press secretary for Chuck Percy’s 1964 gubernatorial campaign, served on then-U.S. Rep. Donald Rumsfeld’s staff and later advised President Nixon’s communications director. The author of three books later was vice president for legislative affairs at Motorola and a legislative analyst for Winston & Strawn in Chicago. Retired since 1998, he and his wife now live in Chapel Hill, N.C.
• Markos Moulitsas, who graduated in 1996 and later earned a law degree from Boston University. Moulitsas is the founder and editor of the Daily Kos, a potent blend of news and commentary from a largely liberal perspective. An average of 500,000 readers visit the site each day to read postings by Moulitsas as well as dozens of other bloggers and politicians, including Sens. Ted Kennedy and John Kerry. A resident of San Francisco, Moulitsas also is the co-author of “Crashing the Gate: Netroots, Grassroots, and the Rise of People-Powered Politics.”
• Denise Schoenbachler, friend of the Star who became dean of the NIU College of Business in 2006. Schoenbachler, former chair of the Department of Marketing, contracted with the Star to conduct and deliver market research in 1996, 2000 and 2005. She obtained scientific results using NIU’s Public Opinion Laboratory to conduct telephone surveys of hundreds of students and faculty members. She then met with the Star’s advertising sales staff to discuss the results and subsequent sales strategies. Schoenbachler heads a faculty that, as a whole, has been heavily involved in training and supporting the Northern Star’s advertising sales staff.
• Lois Self, another friend of the Star who retired as chair of the NIU Department of Communication last year. When Self took the reins shortly after a contentious merger of her department and the Department of Journalism, her actions quelled fear and outrage that journalism at NIU would vanish. She met with worried leaders of the Northern Illinois Newspaper Association and soon became a NINA leader herself. Self “listened, asked questions, promised that things would be better and then tirelessly worked to make sure they were,” one newspaper editor said.

Matt Bute, automotive manager for the Chicago Tribune’s print and online editions as well as cars.com., received the Outstanding Young Alumni Award. Bute graduated in 1999 and also was a co-recipient of the BridgeBuilder Award in 2004.

Nobel Laureate Leon Lederman
to visit NIU for public lecture

Nobel Prize-winner Leon M. Lederman, director emeritus of Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, will visit NIU for a public lecture from 3:30 to 4:30 p.m. Friday, March 23, in the Altgeld Auditorium.

The lecture, titled “Sputnik, Frogs and the Future of Science Education,” is free and open to the public. The event is hosted by the President’s Office, the Office of the Provost and the Department of Physics.

An internationally renowned high-energy physicist, Lederman holds an appointment as Pritzker Professor of Science at the Illinois Institute of Technology. He served as chairman of the State of Illinois Governor’s Science Advisory Committee and is a founder and the inaugural Resident Scholar at the Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy, a 3-year residential public high school for the gifted.

Lederman was the director of Fermilab from 1979 to 1989. He is a founder and chairman emeritus of the Teachers Academy for Mathematics and Science, which was active in the professional development of primary school teachers in Chicago from 1990 to 2003.

Lederman was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1988. Other awards over his distinguished career have included the National Medal of Science (1965), the Elliot Cresson Medal of the Franklin Institute (1976), the Wolf Prize in Physics (1982) and the Enrico Fermi Prize given by President Clinton in 1993.

Lifelong Learning Institute hosts
NIU Notables ‘Brown Bag’ lectures

The Lifelong Learning Institute will host a NIU Notables “Brown Bag” Lecture from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. Wednesday, March 14, in Holmes Student Center Room 505.

NIU Law Professor Guadalupe Luna will present “Anti-Immigration Municipal Codes: A Fractured Legal Template.”

DeKalb County Clerk and Recorder Sharon Holmes is the guest Wednesday, March 21, in HSC 505. Holmes will speak on “Elections and Voting: Report from the Frontlines” from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m.

Bring a lunch, pick one up at the HSC Blackhawk Cafeteria or just come and listen. Both lectures are free and open to the public. For details, call (815) 753-5200.

Application deadline extended
until March 16 for spring MCTI

Tenure-track faculty, instructors and SPS are invited to apply by Friday, March 16, to participate in the Multi-Cultural Curriculum Transformation Institute the week of May 14.

Applications also are welcome from Institute graduates who participated before 2003.

During the Institute, participants receive information and advice on how to transform their courses to make them more inclusive. Workshops focus on race and ethnicity, gender, social class, religion and cultural diversity. Participants also hear from NIU students about their classroom experiences, and from Institute graduates who have successfully transformed their courses.

Professor Barbara Love, an internationally recognized authority on multi-cultural education, will present the plenary address and interact with the audience. Participants also will work together in small groups with task force members to discuss and to revise their individual courses.

Upon completion of their work, participants will receive a stipend of $1,000.

Application materials and more information about the Institute are available at http://www.niu.edu/mcti/institute.shtml, or by calling Kimberly Reuille at (815) 753-8557.

Kishwaukee Concert Band to play
familiar opera selections March 18

The Greater Kishwaukee Area Concert Band will present “Matinee at the Opera” at 3 p.m. Sunday, March 18, in the Boutell Memorial Concert Hall.

This concert will feature selections from several familiar operas, including “Phantom of the Opera,” complete with the scream. The concert is free, open to the public and accessible to all.

Commuter Appreciation Week takes off March 19 at NIU

All students, faculty and staff are invited to learn about and share in the NIU commuter experience during Commuter Appreciation Week, scheduled from March 19 to 22.

Events will take place in the Collegia at Holmes Student Center, located in the lower basement area.

Throughout the week commuters can express their identity by creating “vanity license plates” which will be used to form a collage display in the Collegia. Coffee Breaks featuring Gas Card Bingo will be held from 10 to 11:30 a.m. Tuesday, March 20, and from 3 to 4:30 p.m. Wednesday, March 21.

Commuters are invited to leave the brown bag at home Wednesday, March 21, and enjoy a free soup and sandwich lunch compliments of Commuter & Non-Traditional Student Services.

The week’s festivities will end Thursday, March 22, by celebrating famous commuters in books and movies. Commuters are invited to the Collegia to share movie clips, books or trivia featuring commuters. Complimentary popcorn will be served. Cards and envelopes also will be available that day to create notes to students, faculty or staff members to thank them for being commuter-friendly.

Commuter and Non-Traditional Student Services, located in the basement of the Holmes Student Center, Room 023, is a resource for commuter, non-traditional and off-campus students enrolled at NIU. A featured commuter service for students and faculty is the Commuter Car Pool Connections at www.niu.edu/comnontrad.

Christian prayer group to meet for monthly lunch

The NIU Christian Faculty and Staff Prayer Group meets from noon to 12:50 p.m. the third Tuesday of each month in the East Room of Blackhawk Cafeteria. Bring your own lunch or purchase one there.

March’s date is Tuesday, March 20.

‘Chicago Hand Bookbinders’ travels
to NIU Art Museum Hall Case Galleries

The NIU Art Museum will host “High and Low: Chicago Hand Bookbinders” in its Hall Case Galleries from March 20 through April 21. The public is invited to an opening reception from 5 to 7 p.m. Tuesday, March 20.

“High and Low” features original bindings and book works by 14 artists belonging to the Chicago Hand Bookbinders group. It offers strong, unique craftwork in both traditional binding techniques and in experimental formats classified as Artists Books. This exhibition is the second in the Museum’s series of artist made books.

Chicago Hand Bookbinders was founded in 1978 to promote awareness, understanding and appreciation of handmade books. Members are amateur, student and professional binders as well as anyone interested in the book arts. They aim to learn from one another through sharing skills and techniques, to educate the public through exhibitions and demonstrations and to encourage the highest standards in the craft of bookbinding.

Each year, members participate in a themed exhibition.

The NIU Art Museum’s Hall Case Galleries are located on the first floor, west end of Altgeld Hall. The Hall Case Galleries are open to the public from 8:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Monday through Friday and from noon to 4 p.m. Saturday. Exhibitions are always free. 

Exhibitions are funded in part by the Illinois Arts Council, a state agency, the Friends of the NIU Art Museum and the Arts Fund 21. For more information, visit our www.vpa.niu.edu/museum or call (815) 753-1936.

Nine national artists ‘Draw’ on uncertainty at Art Museum

The NIU Art Museum will host “The Uncertainty Principle: Drawing in the Golden Age of Worry” from March 20 through May 12. The public is invited to an opening reception from 5 to 7 p.m. Tuesday, March 20.

A drawing symposium featuring artists Charles LaBelle, Shona Macdonald, Judith Burns McCrea, Geoffrey Todd Smith, Deb Sokolow and Chris Uphues is scheduled for 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday, March 24, in Altgeld 315.

“The Uncertainty Principle” is composed of drawings by nine artists and is guest-curated by Karen Brown, a drawing professor in the NIU School of Art.

The NIU Art Museum’s South Galleries are located on the first floor, west end of Altgeld Hall. Gallery hours are 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday through Friday, from noon to 4 p.m. Saturday and by appointment for group tours. Exhibitions and artist talks are always free. 

Exhibitions are funded in part by the Illinois Arts Council, a state agency, the Friends of the NIU Art Museum and the Arts Fund 21. The drawing symposium is sponsored by the NIU School of Art Fine Arts Studio Division and the Visiting Artist/Scholar Fund.

For more information, visit www.vpa.niu.edu/museum or call (815) 753-1936.

Geography organizes presentations on global climate warming

The geography department has organized a series of public presentations and discussions revolving around the recent International Panel on Climate Change report on global climate warming.

The series of presentations by NIU scholars, with question-and-answer sessions and discussion, begins at 7 p.m. Thursday, March 22, in the Montgomery Hall Auditorium with an overview of the IPCC report. NIU Presidential Science Adviser Gerald Blazey and Geography professors David Goldblum and Jie Song will be presenters.

Symposiums on other climate-change related topics also will be held on March 29, April 5, April 12, April 19, April 26 and May 3. All of the events will be held from 7 to 8 p.m. in the Montgomery Hall Auditorium.

Mobile drivers’ facility coming March 26 to HSC

Illinois Secretary of State Jesse White’s mobile drivers’ facility will return to the NIU campus for its third consecutive year. Officials will set up a “mini facility” once a month outside Diversions Show Lounge.

The facility allows students, faculty and staff of NIU, along with the public, to get driver’s licenses or state IDs. This would include new, renewals and replacements. In addition, staff will renew license plate stickers, register applicants to vote and sign interested parties up for the new Organ Donor Registry.

March’s date is Monday, March 26. The hours of operation are 9:30 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Operating Staff banquet rescheduled for May 10

Schedule conflicts have changed the date for the 38th Annual Operating Staff Service Awards Banquet.

The event will be held at 6:30 p.m. Thursday, May 10, in the Holmes Student Center Duke Ellington Ballroom. A cash bar will open at 5:30 p.m.

Donate Life Illinois: Re-register for organ, tissue donation

April is National Donate Life Month, a time to remember the 4,700 Illinoisans and 95,000 people nationwide who are awaiting lifesaving transplants. Are you re-registered in Illinois’ new organ/tissue donor registry?

Illinois approved a new law Jan. 1, 2006, creating a new donor registry that eliminates the need for additional consent from family members or loved ones for you to be an organ/tissue donor when you die. The new registry ultimately will save many more lives, but people must re-register to make their donor status valid.

Donate Life Illinois makes it easy with a 30-second online process. Even if you’ve signed the back of your driver’s license, what counts is your registration in the new registry.

Donate Life Illinois (www.IAmAreYou.org) is a coalition of agencies across the state working toward registering 3.5 million Illinoisans in the state’s new registry by April. The campaign is part of a national effort to increase to 100 million the number of Americans who have taken action to become donors in their states.

It takes 30 seconds to re-register and possibly provide someone with a second chance at life.

3-13-07