NIU President John Peters has been elected by his colleagues in the Mid-American Conference to chair the Council of Presidents. His 13 fellow university presidents elected him to the post
at a meeting in March.

MAC commissioner Rick Chryst welcomed Peters aboard, saying, “We’re thrilled to have someone with both the broad experience and personal commitment to athletics of President Peters serve as the next chair. His prior experiences at Tennessee and Nebraska have been a great asset in helping both Northern Illinois University and the MAC address the many challenges of Division I athletics.” President Peters answered a few questions about his new role for Northern Now.

MAC Commissioner Rick Chryst hands off to NIU President John Peters

Q. What one priority will you focus on during your term?
A. I want to increase the visibility of the MAC in the Chicagoland area. The MAC is an exciting, competitive conference that draws many of its star players from the area, so there is a natural connection.

Q. The MAC is up against stiff competition for attention in the Chicago market.What are its selling points?
A. MAC football teams have a record of 8-0 against Conference USA teams.We play competitively every year against the Big Ten. The MAC has more than a million alumni and a lot of them live and work in the greater Chicago area. You have a good product and a built-in audience. Now we need to find ways to deliver the product to the audience.

Q. Any plans underway for raising the profile of the MAC in Chicago?
A. I am already working with Rick Chryst to schedule upcoming MAC media events in Chicago. The conference will need to invest some time in cultivating the Chicago media and the great Chicagoarea
sports fans, but I believe it will pay off.

Q. And does your new leadership position mean you can guarantee some MAC Championships for the Huskies next season?
A. Our players and coaches are doing a pretty good job of that on their own. I think one of the reasons my fellow presidents considered me is due to the respect NIU has gained in the MAC on the
field and court.

The January/February issue of BizEd featured an article titled “Smarter, Faster, Better” about the best new colleges of business in the U.S. NIU’s new Barsema Hall was featured along with the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, Case Western University, and the University of Arizona. The article states, “…it’s important to reach for the stars…This mindset made Barsema Hall that much easier when they found a donor who could support all their projects, including an interactive sales training suite, an emerging technologies lab, and a business information transfer center where students use a variety of technologies to work on projects for actual companies.”

Most people can picture the image of an English king or lord, lavishly dressed and dripping with jewels and ornaments. But what about the English poor? The destitute? What was life like for them?

Northern Illinois University Professor of English Sean Shesgreen published a book which visually examines the lives of these widely overlooked members of society. Images of the Outcast: The urban poor in the Cries of London, complete with over 130 illustrations, sheds some light on how the “other half ” lived.

“I really wrote the book to let people know what life was like for the poor, the weird, the bad, the marginal, and the dispossessed,” Shesgreen said. “We have enough on kings and queens and rich people, who are boring anyway. I’m interested in rogues, scoundrels, thieves, and women of no virtue. People like that.”

The book highlights prints, drawings, lithographs, oil paintings, and photographs focusing on the poor and unsavory members of London life, known as the London Cries. It includes illustrations by such
artists as William Hogarth, Paul Sandby, Francis Wheatley, Thomas Rowlandson and Theodore Gericault.

Recently, the book was selected by the Chronicle of Higher Education as a notable work by a university press, and received a double column notice. The Chronicle has a circulation of about 450,000.

To see and read more about the underclass of England from the 16th to 19th centuries, go to: www.engl.niu.edu/sshesgreen/outcast/.

A team of NIU graduate students in engineering won a national competition sponsored by the Institute of Industrial Engineers. The NIU team had to develop a staffing and customer support model for a fictional company that manufactured solar-powered devices. Iowa State University took second place, and Texas A&M University placed third. Other universities with notable engineering programs that competed were Stanford, Georgia Tech and the University of Texas.

NIU received the gold award for advertising in the annual national competition sponsored by “Admissions Marketing Report.” The first-place ad (left) was featured in the college ranking issue of U.S. News and World Report. Lipman Hearne produced the ad on behalf of
NIU through funding for marketing initiatives supplied by the NIU Foundation.

In the annual survey of top undergraduate accounting programs released by Public Accounting Report, NIU’s well-regarded program landed among some very select company.

In the 2003 rankings, NIU placed ahead of four Big Ten programs (Indiana, Ohio State,Michigan State, and Wisconsin) and other major business schools such as the University of Pennsylvania, Virginia, and
Florida. Joining Northern in the top seven were Texas, Illinois, Brigham Young, Notre Dame,Michigan, and USC.

Seven distinguished NIU faculty were honored at the Convocation for Academic Excellence held on campus this spring.

History Professor Christine Worobec and Professor William Baker, who holds a joint appointment with University Libraries and the Department of English, have been named Presidential Research Professors for 2003.Worobec has pioneered the study of women in Russia and the Ukraine and Baker is recognized as one of the most important forces in Victorian scholarship.

Political scientist Gerald Gabris and music professor Robert Chappell have been named Presidential Teaching Professors for 2003. Gabris is a mainstay of NIU’s famed Master of Public Administration (M.P.A.) program that produces about one-third of the city managers in the state. Chappell is the head of percussion studies, a performer, and a composer, whose steel band composition “Wood-N-Steel” earned top honors in two rounds at the World Steelband Festival 2000.

In addition, three professors have been honored for their excellence in undergraduate teaching for 2003. The teaching awards are especially coveted because the nominations must be initiated and supported by the students themselves. The top teaching trio includes: Jenny Parker (Department of Kinesiology and Physical Education); Joseph Scudder (Department of Communication); and David Sinason (Department of Accountancy).

Northern’s students have a reputation for taking full advantage of every opportunity. And recent experience shows that when presented with an opportunity they will work hard to make the most of it. Northern Illinois University’s exclusive contract with the Pepsi Company has provided $50,000 in grants for 33 motivated undergrads to reach new heights in advanced studies.

These students are being funded through grants provided by the Undergraduate Special Opportunities in Artistry and Research (USOAR) program. The USOAR program has been active at Northern for four years, but Professor Robert Wheeler, vice provost and member of the selection committee, said that this year saw the most student interest ever.

“Over the time we’ve had this program here, we’ve seen the biggest interest this year, and also a marked improvement in the quality of the proposals,”Wheeler said. The committee received 35 proposals, some of which included groups. Twenty-five of those proposals, and a total of 33 students, were funded.

Students interested in the USOAR program were invited to attend two workshops this fall,
which helped them learn the skills they needed to develop a competitive proposal, including budget development. For many students, this was the first opportunity they had to be exposed to the procedure of formally constructing a proposal and obtaining a grant. “They can request up to $2,500, and they are required to have a detailed budget in their proposal, where they outline what they
think they’ll need,” explained Sue Saari, business manager for the Provost’s Office, and one of the staff overseeing the USOAR program.

One NIU student who received her second award this year is Jennifer Camp. Camp, who is pursuing a mathematical sciences major with a political science minor, first learned about the USOAR program through a professor.With her grant money, Camp will be traveling to the Alhambra in Granada and the Real Alcazar in Sevilla, Spain, to study wallpaper patterns–designs which have a repeated pattern that reflect mathematical principles.

“I will be delving into the history behind these places and the art, to round out the information that I bring to students,” she said. “I will also be looking for these patterns everywhere, then I am going to classify the patterns I find with the help of Professor Harald Ellers in the math department. This project will give me firsthand experience with a mathematical topic that is interesting and interdisciplinary in nature. In math, it is sometimes difficult to make the material interesting to students who are passionate about other subjects.When you can tie math to art and history and so forth, it makes it real to those students.”

Camp, a rare two-time USOAR grant recipient, said that she feels the opportunities she gained through the USOAR program have made the difference between a good education and a great
education. “I absolutely love this program,” Camp enthused. “It is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for
me. It allows students to pursue something of their own design which will change their lives. I never
would have done all this without the help of USOAR.

I think that any university that does not have this sort of program is doing a disservice to its students.”
Wheeler stated his involvement with the USOAR program is something he’s especially proud of. “If
someone asked me what I was proudest of in my three years in this position, this program would be right at the top,” he said. Saari seconded Wheeler’s feeling. “It’s got a special place in my heart,” she said, smiling.

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