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Volume 5, Issue 3: September 2, 2008
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Fire It Up!
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Students, faculty, and staff across the university are making plans for ISU’s Homecoming celebration, scheduled for October 13-19. This year’s theme is “Fire It Up!” and the campus is already abuzz as plans are taking shape. On Friday, as a part of the Alumni Day tradition, each department in the College of Arts and Sciences will invite one or more prominent alumni back to campus to address student groups, give lectures, and participate in various functions. “This is a wonderful opportunity to strengthen relationships with our distinguished alumni,” said Dean Olson. “I’m looking forward to meeting them when they come to campus.”
Saturday offers a number of Homecoming activities. The day kicks off at 7 a.m. with the Town & Gown 5k Run, sponsored by ISU and the Town of Normal. The Homecoming parade steps off at 9:30 a.m., followed by tailgating at 11:00 a.m., and at 2 p.m. Redbird football takes on Missouri State. The day will conclude with a Red Carpet Event at 7:00 p.m. with the Unveiling of the new Alumni Center. For more information about Homecoming and a list of all scheduled events visit http://www.alumni.ilstu.edu/homecoming/
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Volume 5, Issue 3: September 2, 2008
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William E. Shields
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William E. Shields, lecturer in geology and general education coordinator in the Department of Geography-Geology, has been working with the Center for Teaching and Learning Technologies (CTLT) on campus to incorporate Virtual Interactive Classroom Environments (VICE) into the department’s repertoire of teaching tools. During the spring 2008 semester, the department purchased a virtual island in the online virtual world simulator Second Life http://secondlife.com/ “Keeping current with technology and innovative teaching techniques has always been a high priority for the Geography-Geology Department,” said David Malone, Chair of the department. “Bill has been invaluable in helping us achieve this goal.”
Second Life, which opened in 2003, is a 3-D virtual world that its residents create. Since commencement, its population has grown to over 6,000,000 and adds some 20,000 new residents each day. There are more than 200 educational institutions with a presence in this world, including Bradley University, the University of Illinois, and Northern Illinois University.
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Volume 5, Issue 3: September 2, 2008
Touré Reed, Associate Professor of History, is the author of Not Alms but Opportunity: The Urban League & the Politics of Racial Uplift, 1910-1950 (University of North Carolina Press). The book explores the ideology and policies of the National, New York and Chicago Urban Leagues during the first half of the twentieth century and illuminates the class issues that shaped the racial uplift movement. Reed argues that the racial uplift in the Urban League reflected many of the class biases pervading contemporaneous social reform movements, resulting in an emphasis on behavioral, rather than structural, remedies to the disadvantages faced by Afro-Americans. “Not Alms but Opportunity is at once a solid institutional history of the early decades of the National Urban League as well as a nuanced exploration of the very complicated politics of racial uplift,” said Jonathan Holloway, Professor of History, African American Studies, and American Studies at Yale University. “It is refreshing to see the ways that Reed gives the organization flesh and blood. In his hands the Urban League is seen as a totally human invention—altruistic in its determination to make a better way for black Americans while simultaneously riven by class distinctions and confining notions of ‘proper behavior’.”
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Volume 5, Issue 3: September 2, 2008
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Dan Coad
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TV-10 marches into a new semester with not only a new set, but also a brand new theme song. The theme song for the local program was composed by Dan Coad, a senior majoring in mass communication-television production, and performed by ISU’s own Big Red Marching Machine. Coad and University of Illinois music education major Glenn Eikenberry worked together to enhance the theme song and make it a success. Coad also supervised the live recording session of the song last Sunday as the band performed at Hancock Stadium. “At the beginning of July, I began thinking of ways to enhance TV-10 News from a student’s perspective. It is not just about the visuals; the source music must support and compliment the visuals. Glenn and I listened to TV-10's music from the previous year for inspiration and guidance,” Coad said. Click Read More for More Photos.
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Volume 5, Issue 3: September 2, 2008
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| George Skadron |
Professor Emeritus George Skadron, former chair of Illinois State's Physics department, retired from the University in 1998 and moved to Albuquerque, NM, where he joined the Physics and Astronomy Department as adjunct professor at the University of New Mexico. He had visited Albuquerque twice before, and found the city, the climate, the scenic beauty, and the university appealing. In 1999, he began work on an application for a Fulbright Scholarship to India. The application was successful and in 2000, he accepted the position of Fulbright Visiting Professor at the Indian Institute of Science. “Life at the Institute was demanding but thrilling,” Skadron said. “The students taking my graduate course in classical electrodynamics were excellent and kept me up long hours to stay ahead of them. Life in Bangalore was equally thrilling, but that's another story.”
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