The University of Kansas

Seminars to address retirement planning
The Department of Human Resources is sponsoring several free pre-retirement and financial planning awareness seminars for KU employees and their families.
The seminar schedule is:
• March 13, Big 12 Room at the Kansas Union. “Health insurance after retirement,” 10 to 11:30 a.m., and “Social Security,” 2 to 4 p.m.
• March 14, Sunflower Room at the Burge Union. “Wills, trusts and estate planning,” 9 a.m. to noon, and “Advanced concepts in investment planning,” 1 to 4 p.m.
• March 15, Daisy Hill Room at the Burge Union. “Tax-deferred annuities in your retirement,” 8:30 to 10:30 a.m., and “KPERS benefits in retirement,” 1:30 to 3 p.m.
For more information, call (785) 864-4946.

CTE Faculty Fellows will share research
Four Faculty Fellows will present the results of their work at the Center for Teaching Excellence Dinner and Dialogue from 5 to 7 p.m. March 15 in 135 Budig Hall.
The featured speakers are:
• Marjorie Swann, English: Transforming a small class to a large class setting.
• Dietrich Earnhart, economics and environmental studies: Integrating research projects into an interdisciplinary course on environmental economics.
• Alice Lieberman, social welfare: Developing a course on alcohol and drug addiction.
• Byron Caminero-Santangelo, English: Establishing a department process for obtaining mid-term student feedback.
Faculty, staff and GTAs should register with CTE by March 12 at (785) 864-4199 or cte@ku.edu.

KC series examines 20th century ideas
A new lecture series will examine important ideas and events of the last century.
The “Whatever Happened to … ?” series, co-sponsored by the KU Hall Center for the Humanities and the Kansas City, Mo., Public Library, will be presented at Unity Temple on the Country Club Plaza, 707 W. 47th St., Kansas City, Mo.
Speakers will address Freudianism, liberalism in America, classical music, and the concept of good and evil.
“These ideas held enormous sway over the course of the last century, and they aren’t going away,” said Victor Bailey, Hall Center director. “But our perceptions of them, our definitions of them, have changed markedly over time. What these ideas will mean to the world over the next hundred years may be very different from the last hundred.”
The familiarity of the topics provides a common starting point for discussion.
“Everyone knows something about these topics, and that gives us a point from which to measure how much these ideas have changed,” Bailey said. “We want to share this end-of-century reassessment of these important ideas with the public because it’s such an interesting way to understand change.”
All presentations will begin at 7:30 p.m. and are free and open to the public.
The symposiums and speakers are:
• March 15: “Whatever Happened to Freudianism?” Toril Moi, Duke University;
• March 29: “Whatever Happened to Liberalism in America?” Bill Tuttle, KU professor of American studies;
• April 12: “Whatever Happened to Classical Music?” Walter Clark, KU associate professor of music history;
• May 3: “Whatever Happened to Good and Evil?” Russ Shafer-Landau, KU associate professor of philosophy.

Garden project wins national award
The GROW: Community Garden Project at the KU Center for Community Outreach was recently selected by the National Gardening Association as a 2001 Youth Garden Grant winner.
GROW was also recognized as a 2001 Kidsgardening Community Spirit Award winner, which honors the top 100 youth garden grant applicants in the United States.
The GROW volunteer program involves youth at the Lawrence Boys and Girls Club who tend a small organic garden. GROW received the gardening awards after applying for a grant for its Discovery Garden project.
The project’s goal is to give young people an opportunity to directly experience living things and develop a love for the natural world.
GROW will receive an assortment of tools, seeds, plants and garden products. The program has been part of the KU center since March 2000.

Contest to reward unique book collections
Faculty are urged to announce the upcoming Snyder Book Collecting Contest to their students.
The contest, in its 45th year, rewards KU students for their interest in books and collecting. This year the prizes are $850 and $350 in both graduate and undergraduate divisions.
Students are encouraged to look at the books they own and uncover an organizing principle. Past entries have included collections of children’s books, books purchased for a dollar or less, comic books and subject-based collections.
Entries are due by 5 p.m. April 2. For more information, see www.lib.ukans.edu or contact Jeff Bullington at (785) 864-8994 or jbullington@ukans.edu.

Steeples Awards accepting nominations
Nominations are open for the 2001-02 Wally and Marie Steeples Faculty Awards in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.
Don Steeples, Dean A. McGee distinguished professor of geology, and his wife, Tammy, established the Steeples award fund in 1997 to honor Don Steeples’ parents.
The fund provides for two annual $1,000 awards to recognize excellence in service to the state of Kansas by CLAS faculty members.
Nominees must have a full-time university appointment and be a tenured or tenure-track CLAS faculty member. Applications should be sent to Erin Spiridigliozzi, 213 Bailey, by 5 p.m. March 30.
Last year’s winners were Norman Saul, professor of history, and Robert Shelton, associate professor of religious studies.

KU Card Center will close for upgrade
The KU Card Center will be closed March 12 to 16 due to a scheduled system upgrade. No ID cards, departmental copy cards or badges will be made during this time.
The center is on level four of the Kansas Union.

KU Symphonic Band performs at convention
The KU Symphonic Band presented the finale concert at the Kansas Music Educators Association state convention Feb. 23 in Wichita.
The group, conducted by Robert E. Foster, was selected from all Kansas school bands. The Wichita State University Symphony also performed at the concert.
The program featured the KU faculty brass quintet — Chris Moore and Mark Boren, trumpets; Paul Stevens, horn, Mike Hall, trombone, and Scott Watson, tuba — and John Parks, professor of percussion, performing “Quintessence” for brass quintet, solo percussion and wind ensemble.

Awards honor African and African-American students
The Eighth Annual Black Faculty and Staff Council Student Awards Banquet will be at 6 p.m. April 7 in the Kansas Ballroom.
The event honors African and African-American KU students for their academic achievements.
This year’s speaker is Cordell Meeks Jr., a 1967 graduate of the KU Law School, who is district court judge for the 29th Judicial District of Kansas. He has served as senior partner in the law firm of Meeks, Sutherland and McIntosh, and as presiding judge of the Municipal Court of Kansas City, Kan.
Banquet tickets may be purchased by contacting Susan King at (785) 864-0780 or king@ukans.edu. The reservation deadline is March 28.

Seminar to help small-business owners
The KU Small Business Development Center will present a seminar for prospective small-business owners from 6 to 9 p.m. March 7 at the center, 734 Vermont St.
Rebecca Gubbles of the Center for Business Innovation in Kansas City, Mo., will discuss “How to get a microloan: Small-business loans from $500 to $25,000.” There is a $25 registration fee.
For more information or to register, contact the center at (785) 843-8844.

Class rosters will be available online
The Office of the University Registrar will soon provide online access to class rosters.
After the Spring 2001 semester, the office will no longer distribute fifth-week paper rosters or weekly add/drop reports to academic departments. The office will continue to distribute first-day paper rosters.
Faculty and staff members who wish to print class rosters will need to obtain a password. Staff members must attend a training session to set up an account for this purpose. Training sessions will be from 10:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. March 6 and 9 a.m. to 10 a.m. March 9 in 45b Strong Hall.
Faculty members can access class rosters at: www.ukans.edu/academics/roster.
To gain access, the faculty member must be listed as the instructor of the class, have an Exchange e-mail account and be listed in the KU human resources database.
For more information, contact Annette Bergman at (785) 864-5426 or nettieb@ku.edu.

Advertising campaign honored in national contest
An ad campaign produced by the Office of University Relations was recently honored in the 16th annual Admissions Advertising Awards, a national competition.
In the newspaper advertising/series category for schools with 10,000 or more students, KU received a bronze award for its student recruitment ad campaign.
The campaign was designed by Jeannine Counard, graphic designer, and featured photos by R. Steve Dick, photographer, and Doug Koch, photo coordinator.
Winners are highlighted in the February issue of the Admissions Marketing Report.