August 17, 2015Vol. 43, No. 4 www.columns.uga.edu

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3INSTRUCTIONAL NEWS 5UGA GUIDE

Works by emeritus professor of art to open Circle Gallery season

FYO Seminar Program has proven track record of student engagement

The University of Georgia®

By Sam Fahmysfahmy@uga.edu

Some of the world’s leading scholars are joining the faculty of UGA this fall, and nearly 65 more faculty members in newly created positions are on the way as the result of a series of hiring initiatives.

“Investing in the academic core continues to be the highest priority at the University of Georgia,” said President Jere W. Morehead. “The faculty members hired through these initiatives will positively im-pact student learning and student success. They also will enhance

the institution’s ability to serve the state and to conduct world-changing research in a number of critical fields.”

Last fall, Morehead and Provost Pamela Whitten launched an ex-traordinary research faculty hiring initiative to recruit internationally recognized scholars to UGA. The ongoing initiative has created four new faculty positions to date. Esther van der Knapp, a pioneer in understanding the molecular genetics of commercially important crops, joins the horticulture de-partment and UGA’s Plant Center

At its Aug. 12 meeting, the Board of Regents of the University System of Georgia approved the 2016 health care plan changes and premiums for active employees and retirees younger than 65. The board also approved USG funding for the new supplemental coverage for Medicare-eligible retirees and dependents age 65 and older. The 2016 plan year will begin Jan. 1.

There will be very few cover-age changes for active employees. Premium increases will depend upon the specific health care plan in which employees are enrolled. Health care plan information will

be sent to active employees in early October; open enrollment will be held Nov. 2-13.

Retirees and dependents who are younger than 65 will remain on the same plans as active employees. Separate pre-65 retiree premium rate charts will go into effect for the 2016 plan year.

Medicare-eligible retirees and Medicare-eligible dependents age 65 and older will enroll for supple-mental health care coverage and receive the USG health care benefit in a new way in 2016. Medicare Parts A and B will provide primary

By Sam Fahmysfahmy@uga.edu

Suzanne Barbour views the students she has mentored as part of her legacy; a contribution to changing the lives of individuals and advancing the frontiers of research and scholarship. As the new dean of UGA’s Graduate School, her legacy now extends to the university’s more than 8,000 graduate and professional students and to the thousands more

who will enroll in the coming years.Barbour said she first became

interested in administration when she was tapped to direct the gradu-ate program in the biochemistry and molecular biology department at the Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine.

“I came to realize that as much as I enjoy working with students one-on-one in the laboratory, I also really enjoy developing programs and thinking more globally about

graduate education,” Barbour said.Barbour directed the graduate

program in biochemistry and molec-ular biology for a decade and for four years was the principal investigator or co-principal investigator on four training grants from the National Institutes of Health to maximize student diversity. Her six years of service on the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology’s education and professional

By Sam Fahmysfahmy@uga.edu

Three of the four finalists for the position of assistant provost and campus director at UGA’s Griffin campus will visit UGA-Griffin in the coming weeks to meet with members of the uni-versity community.

A committee chaired by Rus-sell Mumper, vice provost for academic affairs, conducted a national search to identify the finalists. The committee was as-sisted by the UGA Search Group in Human Resources.

The finalists will give a presen-tation on their vision for the campus

from 9:30-10:30 a.m. in Room 104 of the UGA-Griffin Student Learning Center. The finalists and the dates of their presenta-tions are:• William “Bill” Randle, a pro-fessor of natural resources and environmental design and former dean of the North Carolina Agri-cultural and Technical State Uni-versity School of Agriculture and Environmental Sciences, Aug. 20.• Jeffrey L. Jordan, a professor of agricultural and applied econom-ics and director of the Southern Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program at UGA-Griffin, Aug. 24.• Luanne Lohr, national program

lead for economics at the USDA Forest Service, Sept. 3.• Lew Hunnicutt, vice president of extended services at Frank Phillips College, visited Aug. 11.

The CVs of the finalists, along with their full campus visit itin-eraries and candidate feedback forms, are available at http://t.uga.edu/1wC.

The assistant provost and campus director of UGA-Griffin will oversee all research, exten-sion and instructional programs at UGA-Griffin. This new position will be the senior administrator at UGA-Griffin. The assistant provost and campus director will

By Tracy Coleytcoley@uga.edu

Incoming UGA students have set a record for academic quality, with the highest GPA and SAT scores in the university’s 230-year history.

The approximately 5,300 first-year students will begin fall semes-ter with an average GPA of 3.91 and an average SAT score of 1301. Just five years ago, those figures were 3.83 and 1264, respectively.

“We are pleased that the Uni-versity of Georgia once again has enrolled a record-setting class of first-year students,” said UGA Pres-ident Jere W. Morehead. “These students are attracted to UGA’s

world-class learning environment with bold new initiatives to expand experiential learning and to reduce class sizes. This year’s incoming class is another sign that UGA is reaching new heights of academic excellence.”

UGA received more than 22,000 applications (a 4 percent increase over last year) for fall 2015 admission, with an admittance rate of 52 percent of all applicants. Since 2010, the number of fresh-man applications has increased by 25 percent. Around 1,550 transfer students also will begin classes today.

A breakdown of the numbers indicates that the mid-50 percentile GPA range for the class of 2019 is

A broader legacyNew Graduate School dean ready to take UGA’s programs to an even higher level

Suzanne Barbour, dean of the Graduate School, said that graduate education has historically trained students to be “clones of their mentors” but that less than 20 percent of today’s graduate students will become academicians. She said she’s most excited about broadening training opportunities for students so they can explore careers outside of academia.

New faculty, leading scholars join UGA as result of initiatives

UNDERGRADUATE ADMISSIONS

BOARD OF REGENTSACADEMIC AFFAIRS

Incoming class of students sets record for academic quality

UGA-Griffin campus director finalists to visit Regents approve health care plans, premiums for 2016

See STUDENTS on page 2

See REGENTS on page 8See GRIFFIN on page 8

See FACULTY on page 8

See DEAN on page 8

Dorothy Kozlowski

By Tracy Coleytcoley@uga.edu

The Center for Teaching and Learning kicks off the fall semester with a series of workshops for new and current faculty, a slate of nationally renowned speakers and a film night for the university community.

In August and September the CTL offers a Faculty Development Series for any faculty interested in or cur-rently teaching a First-Year Odyssey Seminar course. First-Year Odyssey Seminars are required one-hour credit courses that allow first-year students to get to know UGA and a faculty member in a small class setting (See story, page 3).

The Pedagogy and Practice Se-ries—workshops and lectures that run throughout the semester—focuses on engaging students through technology and high-impact teaching practices.

Topics include improving student success through ePortfolios and blogs, open educational resources, learning activities for flipped and SCALE-UP classrooms, and experiential learning.

The CTL fall schedule also includes a National Speaker Series that begins

Aug. 31 with Todd Zakrajsek, who is a nationally rec-ognized expert in student learning. An associate pro-fessor in the family medicine depart-ment at the Uni-versity of North Carolina at Chapel

Hill, Zakrajsek will present two faculty lectures. The first, “Motivating and Engaging Your Students: Strategies for Teaching From the Psychology of Learning,” will start at 10:30 a.m. in the special collections libraries.

The second lecture, “Learning-Centered Teaching: Coordinat-ing Evidence-based Teaching With Evidence-based Learning,” will start at 2 p.m. in Room 201 of the Pharmacy South building. Zakrajsek also will present a lecture to students based on his book The New Science of Learn-ing: How to Learn in Harmony with Your Brain. The lecture will begin at 6:30 p.m. in Grand Hall of the Tate Student Center.

Other award-winning and national speakers will focus on high-impact

strategies for teaching and engag-ing students. Speakers include Bret Eynon from LaGuardia Community College; Dr. Cynthia Ward, a profes-sor of internal medicine and chief medical officer for UGA’s College of Veterinary Medicine; Terry Rhodes of the American Association of Colleges and Universities; Andrew Owsiak, an assistant professor of international affairs in UGA’s School of Public and International Affairs; and Jill C. Sible of Virginia Tech.

CTL is sponsoring a campus-wide Fall Film Night. Most Likely to Succeed will be screened Oct. 6 at 7:30 p.m. at Cine in downtown Athens. The feature-length documentary explores new approaches aimed at revolution-izing teaching. Immediately follow-ing the screening, a panel of UGA researchers will discuss the film’s portrayal of education in America and field questions from the audience.

2 Aug. 17, 2015 columns.uga.edu

By Allison Brannenaharper1@uga.edu

UGA Food Services has new meal plan options for the 2015-16 academic year. Block plans with 65-80 meals per semester in the dining commons and Paw Points redeemable at any UGA Food Services location, including re-tail cafes, eateries and vending, will be available for $1,796 to $2,802 for the academic year.

Customers also can enjoy food faster at UGA Food Services retail locations by placing mobile orders through the Tapingo app. Available from the App Store and Google Play, Tapingo accepts mobile payments as well as Paw Points.

The app easily guides customers through menu selections of participat-ing locations. Once an order is placed, Tapingo alerts the customer when the order is ready to be picked up.

The decision to create new options came from a growing need to provide more meal plan choices for commuter students, faculty and staff.

“The University of Georgia’s dining program is nationally renowned for its exceptional quality and innovation,” said UGA President Jere W. Morehead. “I am pleased that commuter students, faculty and staff will now be able to enjoy a variety of dining options on campus through meal plans that are tailored to their needs.”

A campus-wide survey of students, faculty and staff showed customers were seeking more variety and a plan geared toward commuters.

“Many off-campus students came to us asking for a lunch-only plan,” said Bryan Varin, interim director of UGA Food Services. “The block plan gives even more flexibility by providing them with meals to use throughout the semester. They are not limited to lunch only. If they find themselves on campus during other meal periods, they are still able to eat in our dining commons or retail locations.”

AUXILIARY SERVICES

Food Services offers new meal plan options

National search underway to find next CAES dean

ACADEMIC AFFAIRS

OFFICE OF THE VICE PRESIDENT FOR INSTRUCTION

Center for Teaching and Learning kicks off workshops, speaker series

Lindsay Bland Robinson

FOR MORE INFOFor a full calendar and to register for events sponsored by the CTL, go to http://ctl.uga.edu/events.

Todd Zakrajsek

3.81-4.06. Additionally, this class has a combined mean critical reading and math score of 1301 plus an average writing score of 626, for a total of 1927 on the 2400 scale, 14 points higher than last year’s incoming class. This year’s mean score for students who took the ACT was 29, match-ing last year’s record.

The Honors Program will enroll 525 new students in the first-year class who have earned an average high school GPA of 4.07, a strong indication of their rigorous Advanced Placement or International Baccalaureate curriculum. Incoming Honors students have an average SAT score of 1469 and an average ACT score of 33.

The rigor of students’ high school curriculum continues to be a key factor in admissions decisions, with some 94 percent of the students having enrolled in College Board Advanced Placement or International Baccalaureate classes while in high school. Many students earned enough credits to be classified as sophomores and several as juniors during their first term of enrollment. The average number of AP and IB courses taken by students was six. Sixteen percent of students were dually enrolled in college while attending high school, up 3 percent from 2014. The top preferred majors are biology, business, finance, marketing, psychology, biological science, biochemistry/molecular biology and computer science.

“UGA’s future is bright,” said Patrick Winter, associate vice president for admissions and enrollment management. “The incoming class represents some of the top scholars, leaders, innovators and artists from across Georgia, the nation and the world. They have achieved at an incredibly high level already. I can’t wait to see what they are going to accomplish at UGA.”

In addition to being the most academically qualified, the 2015 freshman class also is one of the most diverse in UGA history, with more than 30 percent of the entering freshmen self-identifying as other than Caucasian. Eight percent have self-identified as African-American and 6 percent as Hispanic.

Approximately 86 percent of the first-year class hails from 443 high schools and 133 counties across Georgia. Almost 13 percent of the class comes from other states and countries. Of the 43 states represented, the largest number of students outside of Georgia are from North Carolina, Texas, Florida, Virginia, Maryland, Tennessee, New Jersey, South Carolina, New York and Pennsylvania.

More than 200 of this year’s incoming students are ranked as first or second in their high school graduating class.

STUDENTS from page 1

By Sam Fahmy sfahmy@uga.edu

UGA Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs and Provost Pamela Whitten has appointed a committee to begin a national search to fill the position of dean and director of the College of Agricultural and Environ-mental Sciences.

Josef M. Broder, who has served as associate dean for academic affairs for the past decade, has agreed to serve as interim dean beginning Sept. 19.

Sheila Allen, dean of the College of Veterinary Medicine, will chair the 23-member search committee, which includes faculty from UGA’s campuses in Athens, Griffin and Tifton, staff, students and alumni as well as govern-ment and agribusiness representatives.

Additional search committee members are Gary Black, UGA alumnus and commissioner of the Georgia Department of Agriculture; Cader Cox III, UGA alumnus, CEO of Riverview Plantation and UGA Research Foundation board member; Griffin Doyle, vice president for gov-ernment relations at UGA; Michael Doyle, Regents Professor in the food science and technology department and director of the Center for Food Safety at UGA-Griffin; Zippy Duvall, president of the Georgia Farm Bureau and a member of the Georgia 4-H Foundation board of trustees; Haley Gilleland, a graduate student pursing a master’s degree in animal science who recently earned her bachelor’s degree from UGA and served as Collegiate 4-H vice president and lead camp counselor at Rock Eagle 4-H Center; Stefani Hilley, administrative associ-ate in the CAES Office of the Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and a UGA Staff Council representative; Scott Jackson, Georgia Research Alliance Eminent Scholar in the crop and soil sciences department and director of UGA’s Center for Applied Genetic Technologies; Laura Perry Johnson, associate dean for UGA Extension,

who most recently served as South-west District extension director in Tifton; Jeffrey L. Jordan, a professor of agricultural and applied econom-ics at UGA-Griffin and director of the Southern Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program; Kay Kelsey, a professor and head of the agricultural leadership, education and communication department; Zenglu Li, an associate professor of crop and soil sciences and principal investigator in UGA’s Soybean Breeding and Mo-lecular Genetics Laboratory; Francis “Abit” Massey, former president of the UGA Alumni Association, emeritus trustee of the UGA Foundation, presi-dent emeritus of the Georgia Poultry Federation and member of the UGA Research Foundation and UGA Real Estate Foundation; Laura Meadows, director of UGA’s Carl Vinson Institute of Government; Kristen Navara, as-sociate professor of endocrinology in the poultry science department; Maria Navarro, an associate professor of agricultural leadership, education and communication; Peggy Ozias-Akins, a professor of horticulture at the Tif-ton Coastal Plain Experiment Station and director of the Institute of Plant Breeding, Genetics and Genomics; Anne Sapp, UGA alumna and chair of the Georgia 4-H Foundation board of trustees; Steven Stice, GRA Eminent Scholar in the animal and dairy science department and director of UGA’s Regenerative Bioscience Center; Michael Strand, Regents Professor in the entomology department; Ron Walcott, a professor of plant pathol-ogy; and Franklin West, an assistant professor of animal and dairy science.

The committee will be assisted by the UGA Search Group in Human Resources.

J. Scott Angle, who has served as dean of the college since 2005, recently announced that he will step down from his position to lead the International Fertilizer Development Center, a global organization that works to al-leviate hunger.

UGA ranks among top 100 universities worldwide for number of US patents

UGA is ranked among the top 100 universities worldwide for the number of U.S. utility patents granted in 2014, according to a list released by the National Academy of Inventors and the Intellectual Property Owners Association.

Based on data obtained from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, the list recognizes the im-portant role patents play in facilitating the move-ment of university research discoveries into the marketplace.

The UGA patents issued in 2014 included those covering antimicrobial coatings for textiles, a candidate HIV treatment, a biomarker that may enhance early detection of breast cancer, two poultry vaccines and a method for neutralizing munitions residue. UGA has more than 500 active patents protecting its inventions.

More than 500 products based on UGA tech-nologies have reached the marketplace.

Top U.S. universities listed include the Univer-sity of California’s 10-campus system, the Mas-sachusetts Institute of Technology and Stanford University as well as the Georgia Institute of Technology and Emory University.

University partners with Georgia Tech, Georgia State U. for poetry competition

UGA, under the auspices of the University of Georgia Press, has partnered with the Georgia In-stitute of Technology and Georgia State University to establish the Georgia Poetry Prize.

A national competition that celebrates excel-lence in poetry, the Georgia Poetry Prize is sup-ported by the Bruce and Georgia McEver Fund for the Arts and Environment. It will be open to unpublished, original collections of poems written in English by residents of North America. Judging will rotate annually among the poetry faculty at the three participating institutions, beginning in 2016 with Thomas Lux at Georgia Tech.

The authors of the winning manuscripts will receive a cash award of $1,000, their collection will be published by the University of Georgia Press under a standard book contract and they will be invited to read their work at UGA, Georgia Tech and Georgia State University. Interested parties may consult the guidelines and submit their manu-scripts online through Submittable between Oct. 1 and Nov. 30.

Support for the McEver Fund comes from Bruce McEver, founder of Berkshire Capital Securities LLC and a member of the University of Georgia Press Advisory Council. A board member of the Poets House in New York, McEver also is a member of the Dean’s Council at the Harvard Divinity School. He has published three books of poetry and is a professor of practice at Georgia Tech, where he is a founding supporter of the Poetry at Tech program.

WUGA-FM wins statewide awardWUGA-FM 91.7/97.9 FM, the university’s

public radio station, was awarded the GABBY Award for Excellence Aug. 1 in the best locally produced program (non-news/sports) category at the Georgia Association of Broadcasters annual convention.

WUGA’s program, “The Guest List,” won in competition with both commercial and public major market radio stations in Georgia. “The Guest List” is hosted and produced by Chris Shupe, WUGA program director, along with a panel of music com-mentators including Katie Maifeld, Gabe Vodicka and Andre Gallant. Broadcast on Saturdays at 10 p.m., the program is part of WUGA’s The Rota-tion series of locally produced music programs, which include “Under the Influence” and “The Sound of Athens.”

WUGA-FM 91.7/ 97.9 FM is operated by UGA through a partnership with the Georgia Public Tele-communications Commission.

Digest

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INSTRUCTIONAL NEWS

An engaged student is a success-ful student. That’s the premise behind UGA’s First-Year Odys-

sey Seminar Program now entering its fifth year.

“If you get students engaged, they are more likely to be successful, to be active learners and participate in lifelong learning,” said Fiona Liken, assistant vice president for instruction and associate director of the First-Year Odyssey Semi-nar Program. Decades worth of research backs up that idea.

The goals of FYO seminars, which are required for every first-year student, are to get undergraduates to engage with the academic culture at UGA, build relationships with faculty and learn about the university’s teaching, research, outreach and international mission. The program is housed in the Office of the Vice President for Instruction.

What makes the First-Year Odys-sey Program unique is not necessarily its goals, but how they are achieved. Ronald Cervero, associate vice president for instruction and director of the FYO Seminar Program, said many colleges and universities offer first-year seminars to introduce students to college life, but few connect top faculty with first-year students.

What distinguishes UGA from a lot of other colleges is its status as a Research I institution, he said. In FYO seminars, faculty lead a conversation with students about their research areas.

“Often first-year seminars are about teaching students study skills and show-ing them around campus,” Cervero said. “Our focus is on faculty research. There is real academic content.”

With the diversity of research at UGA comes an array of topics to study in these seminars. From the science of animal forensics to brain health, from literature by Homer to Harper Lee, and from the analysis of the hot dog to zombie plagues—the hundreds of FYO seminar titles offer something interesting for every student. And students don’t have to choose a seminar based on their major.

Emily McLanahan, now a fourth-year Grady College student from El-berton, said she loved the variety and ability to pick what interested her. As a first-year student, McLanahan chose an FYO seminar about the Holocaust, taught by Jerry Legge, associate provost for academic planning.

“We were able to really dive in and go deeper than I had been taught in high school,” McLanahan said.

Digging deep and engaging in

discussion is a highlight of the collegiate experience, and the FYOS Program gives students a healthy dose of that.

In Janet Frick’s FYO seminar, Hu-mans and Animals in Modern Society, students read about and then discuss emotional topics about animal treat-ment, like factory farms and animal testing. Students can bring strongly held views about these issues.

“We have some great discussions,” said Frick, an associate professor and associate department head of psychol-ogy. “It’s teaching students that, more broadly in a university, you are going to be asked to grapple with ideas that you either agree with or don’t. They learn to abide in that discomfort.”

But it’s not just class time that’s im-portant to the curriculum of the FYO seminars. The program also promotes experiences across campus. The program requires students to attend three on-campus events to engage in the university community. Those events, including cultural programs and special lectures, are tied with the mission of the university.

In its first four years, the FYO Semi-nar Program has been a clear success. According to student surveys, 58 percent of students said their seminar helped them make plans for future learning, 59 percent learned about an opportunity to participate in UGA research and 81 percent said they were introduced to faculty members’ roles at UGA.

And getting to know faculty is one of the most important goals, Cervero said.

By design, the seminars are small classes of no more than 15 students. That creates an environment for build-ing relationships.

“This is one of our attempts to shrink the university to a manageable size,” Cervero said.

In large classes, it’s difficult to build one-on-one relationships between students and faculty, said Mark Farmer, a professor and director of biological sciences in the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences.

Farmer’s FYO seminar, The Anthro-pocene—Earth’s Sixth Mass Extinction, allows him more flexibility to interact with students than his Introduction to Biology class, which seats 300. Engage-ment in the small class settings is the key to student success. Based on interactions in FYO seminars, Farmer has written letters of recommendation for students going to graduate and medical school.

“It’s really important at a place as big as UGA to find ways to make it smaller and more intimate,” Farmer said.

3 columns.uga.edu Aug. 17, 2015

10 intriguing FYO seminars

The odyssey continuesFive years after its launch, FYO Seminar Program

has proven track record of engagementBy Aaron Hale / aahale@uga.edu

Dr. Cynthia Ward, chief medical officer of the Small Animal Hospital and professor of internal medicine in the College of Veterinary Medicine, escorts First-Year Odyssey students through the college’s Large and Small Animal Hospital.

A few of the fun ones

There are more than 300 seminars on amazing and diverse topics.

Here are some of the most intrigu-ing First-Year Odyssey seminars for this fall.

Animal Forensic CSIStudents learn about animal forensic medicine and animal crime scene in-vestigations. Instructor: Doris Miller, a professor of pathology in the College of Veterinary Medicine.

Chickenology: Everything You Need to Know About Chickens This class provides hands-on experience on the use of chickens in the food industry, biomedical sciences and in people’s backyards. Instruc-tor: Robert Beckstead, an associate professor of poultry science in the College of Agricultural and Environ-mental Sciences.

Electric Guitar Building 101By building an electric guitar, students can begin to understand how they learn and how to take advantage of that learning at UGA. Instructor: Jay Rojewski, a career and information studies professor in the College of Education.

Are You Smarter Than a Smartphone? Aimed at improving the way students organize and conduct their personal, academic and professional lives by better understanding how to produce and consume information on mobile technology. Instructor: Theodore J. Kopcha, an associate professor of career and information studies in the College of Education.

File photo

4 Aug. 17, 2015 columns.uga.edu

FRANKLIN COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES

Andrew Davis Tucker

University Housing administrator earns international award of recognition

University Housing’s M. Keener Scott recently received the Parthenon Award from the Associa-tion of College and University Housing Officers-International.

The honor recognizes outstanding collegiate housing professionals for their service, leadership, achievement and contributions to the housing field.

Scott is associate director for staff development and student conduct in University Housing as well as an adjunct professor in the College of Educa-tion’s counseling and human development services department.

The Parthenon Award is the ACUHO-I Foun-dation’s most prestigious award. Nominees are sub-mitted by their colleagues and must have at least 10 years of service in housing, residence life or an affiliated field, have at least five years of service at the regional or international level with ACUHO-I, and have demonstrated an impact on the campus housing profession.

Scott’s 23 years of service to UGA have been characterized by her passionate and socially con-scious advocacy for the students and staff as adult learners and by an organized and collaborative spirit.

In addition to Scott’s award, University Hous-ing was recognized for its outstanding leadership within the profession and commitment to students in the field of student affairs. Tom Ellett, ACUHO-I executive director, presented the orga-nization’s President’s Award to University Housing at a recent ceremony in Orlando.

University Housing was honored for its involvement in the college student affairs and ad-ministration program in the College of Education as well as its commitment to the National Housing Training Institute, which has been hosted at UGA for the past five years.

Ruth Bartlett begins two-year term as UGA Alumni Association president

Ruth Bartlett, an audit partner at Frazier & Deeter in Atlanta, has been named the 74th president of the University of Georgia Alumni Association. Her two-year term began on July 1.

A 1976 graduate of UGA, Bartlett has been in public accounting for more than 35 years, joining Frazier & Deeter in 1990. She became the first fe-male partner and served as the head of the firm’s audit department for more than 15 years. She was the first female president of the Georgia Society of CPAs and the first woman to receive the organization’s Meri-torious Service Award. She has been on the Georgia chapter of the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society’s board of trustees for more than 20 years.

As part of her responsibilities as president, Bartlett also joins the UGA Foundation Board of Trustees and the UGA Athletic Association Board of Advisors.

Recent UGA graduate wins national weather forecasting competition

UGA graduate Jordan McLeod recently took home top prize in the 2014-2015 WxChallenge, a yearly national collegiate weather forecasting competition.

McLeod, who was earning his master’s degree at UGA when the forecasting competition began in fall 2014, beat out nearly 2,000 participants ranging from undergraduates to tenured professors from over 100 colleges and universities.

To compete, participants forecasted the weather conditions—daily maximum and minimum tem-perature, daily maximum sustained wind speed, daily precipitation total—for 10 selected cities across the U.S. Participants forecasted each city for two weeks and then submitted each city’s forecast to the WxChallenge website.

The competitors with the top 64 cumulative scores at the end of the fall and spring semesters were then placed in a four-week forecasting tour-nament structured similarly to the NCAA basket-ball finals. McLeod began this year’s tournament as a No. 7 seed and won every round to win the entire tournament.

UGA had a total of 13 team members who participated. This included six graduate students, five undergraduates and two alumni.

Digest INSTRUCTIONAL NEWS

By Camie Williamscamiew@uga.edu

Kip Lacy knew before he began his freshman year at UGA that he wanted to be a scientist. But finding a more specific field of study proved to be tough when there are so many options.

Casey Grippando had a career in mind that doesn’t involve a lab coat, but she wasn’t sure how to get there.

Both found their niche through UGA’s Center for Undergraduate Research Opportunities.

“It’s super interesting,” Grippando, a rising third-year student majoring in political science and international affairs, said of her days examining con-gressional voting records as a CURO Summer Fellow. “All this infighting we see on the news, it isn’t what it appears. This research definitely made me love politics even more.”

CURO has enabled more than 2,000 UGA undergraduate students to delve into thousands of topics since

it was founded 15 years ago. Last year alone, 500 students received more than 700 credit hours for CURO courses, and a record-setting number presented their findings at the annual CURO Symposium, which offers cash prizes.

In addition to paid summer fel-lowships, the program expanded in 2014 to offer research assistantships of $1,000 per semester to 250 students.

Grippando heard about CURO from a professor and was intrigued to find that undergraduate students have the ability to conduct research as early as their first semester on campus. While the program is administered through the Honors Program, it is open to all undergraduates, and Grippando jumped at the chance.

“Research looks great on a resume or a grad school application,” she said. “Plus, I’m having a great time doing it.”

Lacy is one of those science students who arrived on campus and immediately wanted to find his way into a lab. He soon learned that he could take a CURO

course and get class credit while doing what he loved.

At the same time, CURO let him explore the vast offerings in sciences at UGA, which brought him to a surpris-ing choice for favorite study subject: fire ants.

“CURO has opened a door for me in the sense that I’ve gotten to explore some fields that I didn’t know about. It’s been really nice to have the opportunity to pop around and try them,” said Lacy, a fourth-year student majoring in ecol-ogy and biology who has his sights set on earning a doctorate in evolutionary biology.

Through a CURO Summer Fel-lowship, Lacy delved into a project on a lesser-known species of fire ant, making discoveries that could leave a major mark in entomology.

“Through CURO, I was able to get class credit and funding, so I was able to invest a lot of time and energy into it,” he said. “It made my work all the more fulfilling.”

Opening doorsUndergraduate research opportunities

unleashed at UGA

Kip Lacy, a fourth-year student majoring in ecology and biology, worked with fire ant colonies as part of his summer research in entomology professor Ken Ross’ lab at the Riverbend Research Lab North.

By Alan Flurryaflurry@uga.edu

Coughing and sneezing that often indicates the flu could be traced to a rare genetic disorder related to cilia, the small hairs that protrude from cells throughout the human body.

Though it only affects a small number of people annually, ciliary dyskinesia can mimic the symptoms of less serious diseases. New research published in the journal Science Translational Medicine identifies a new technique to help clini-cians make more accurate early diagnoses.

“The disorder causes the cilia to not move properly,” said the study’s lead author, Shannon Quinn, an assistant professor of computer science in UGA’s Franklin College of Arts and Sciences. “Without the proper motion, they can’t clear out mucus and with that you get anything from flu-like symptoms, all the way up to lung scarring necessitating lung transplants.”

The study was part of Quinn’s

doctoral research at the University of Pittsburgh.

Clinicians go through a series of steps to diagnose ciliary dyskinesia, and no single method produces a certain diagnosis. Electron microscopy detects structural abnormalities, measuring the frequency at which the cilia beat. Nasal cultures are plated for biopsy and grown in the lab. Then, their motions are analyzed. From the videos, clinicians or researchers make a determination about whether the motion is normal.

“It’s that last step that we’re focusing on,” Quinn said. “Researchers or clini-cians making this determination based on their own training and experience is the current state of the art, but it is subjec-tive, laborious and error prone. There is no cross-institutional commonality for making the diagnoses. So our goal was to provide a quantitative baseline for that particular step in the diagnostic process.”

By providing a baseline for this one step in the diagnostic process for ciliary dyskinesia, the researchers have

established a pipeline to take some of the guesswork out of the process.

“To be able to attach numbers to the motion introduces a higher degree of cer-tainty in diagnosing the abnormalities,” Quinn said. “It provides a quantitative definition that is relevant across clinics, across research institutions, and it’s all automated so that we have a direct com-parison between motion types.”

The faster, more accurate diagnosis is applicable across the class of disorders that involve cilia dyskinesia. A growing body of research on cilia suggests a litany of other conditions could be implicated by the disorder, from congenital heart disease to early embryonic development in which cilia play a large role in establish-ing signaling pathways.

Senior investigators on the study are Chakra Chennubhotla and Cecilia Lo of the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. Additional study co-authors are Maliha Zahid, Richard Francis and John Durkin of the University of Pitts-burgh School of Medicine.

Researchers identify new techniques for diagnosing breathing abnormalities

5 columns.uga.edu Aug. 17, 2015

NEXT COLUMNS DEADLINES Aug. 19 (for Aug. 31 issue)Aug. 26 (for Sept. 8 issue)Sept. 2 (for Sept. 14 issue)

Calendar items are taken from Columns files and from the university’s Master Calendar, maintained by Public Affairs. Notices are published here as space permits, with priority given to items of multidisciplinary interest. The Master Calendar is available on the Web at calendar.uga.edu/.

TO SUBMIT A LISTING FOR THE MASTER CALENDAR AND COLUMNSPost event information first to the Master Calendar website (calendar.uga.edu/). Listings for Columns are taken from the Master Calendar 12 days before the publication date. Events not posted by then may not be printed in Columns.

Any additional information about the event may be sent directly to Columns. Email is preferred (columns@uga.edu), but materials can be mailed to Columns, News Service, 286 Oconee Street, Suite 200 North, Campus Mail 1999.

The following events are open to the public, unless otherwise specified. Dates, times and locations may change without advance notice.

For a complete listing of events, check the Master Calendar on the Web (calendar.uga.edu/ ).

EXHIBITIONSCooking the Books. Through Aug. 31. An exhibit from the private press collection of the Hargrett Rare Book and Manu-script Library. Hargrett Gallery, special collections libraries. 706-542-0674, acme@uga.edu.

El Taller de Grafica Popular: Vida y Arte. Through Sept. 13. Georgia Museum of Art. 706-542-1817, hazbrown@uga.edu.

Art Hazelwood and Ronnie Goodman. Through Sept. 13. The two artists confront and tackle such present-day realities as homelessness, poverty, war, corruption and violence in their art. Georgia Museum of Art. 706-542-1817, hazbrown@uga.edu.

Afloat. Aug. 20 through Oct. 2. Circle Gallery. (See story, above right).

Ralph Chesse. Through Oct. 4. Georgia Museum of Art. 706-542-1817, hazbrown@uga.edu.

MONDAY, AUGUST 17FALL SEMESTER CLASSES BEGIN

DROP/ADD FOR FALL SEMESTERFor undergraduate-level (1000-5999) and graduate-level courses (6000-9999). Through Aug. 21.

BLOOD DRIVENoon. Ramsey Student Center.

TUESDAY, AUGUST 18BLOOD DRIVE10 a.m. Memorial Hall ballroom.

COOKING SERIES: GINNY McCORMACKParticipants will meet cookbook author Ginny McCormack over coffee and treats before her talk and cooking demonstration. Her recently published cookbook, Seasons of the South, in-cludes over 400 beautiful photographs, recipes, complete menus, stories and quotes that reflect life in the South. Purchase tickets at botgarden.uga.edu or by calling 706-542-9353. This event is limited to 60 people. $5. 10 a.m. Visitor Center’s Gardenside Room, State Botanical Garden. 706-542-6014, connicot@uga.edu.

SUMMER TUESDAY TOURLed by a docent. 2 p.m. Special collec-tions libraries. 706-542-8079, jclevela@uga.edu.

CLASSChris McDowell will teach participants how to make Adirondack chairs and herb boxes to decorate an outdoor space. Participants, who should be prepared to use power tools, will make their own chair and box to take home. The materials are provided by the UGA Material Reuse Program. $45. 5:30 p.m. Greenhouse Maintenance Center, State Botanical Garden. 706-542-6156, ckeber@uga.edu.

WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 19BLOOD DRIVE10 a.m. Georgia Center.

TOUR AT TWOFeaturing a dialogue between museum director William Underwood Eiland and artist Art Hazelwood. 2 p.m. Georgia Museum of Art. 706-542-4662, hazbrown@uga.edu.

THURSDAY, AUGUST 20UGA-GRIFFIN CAMPUS DIRECTOR FINALIST VISIT William “Bill” Randle, a professor of natural resources and environmental design and former dean of the North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University School of Agriculture and Environmental Sciences. 9:30 a.m. 104 UGA-Griffin Student Learning Center. (See story, page 1).

BLOOD DRIVENoon. Poultry Science.

THURSDAY TWILIGHT TOURHighlights from the permanent collec-tion. Led by docents during Third Thurs-day. 6 p.m. Georgia Museum of Art. 706-542-4662, hazbrown@uga.edu.

PANEL DISCUSSIONJoin artists Arturo Garcia Bustos and Rina Lazo, members of El Taller de Grafica Popular, scholars on the print workshop for a discussion of the work-shop and prints in the exhibition El Taller de Grafica Popular: Vida y Arte. Partially

in Spanish, with live translation. 7 p.m. Georgia Museum of Art. 706-542-4662, hazbrown@uga.edu.

FRIDAY, AUGUST 21INTERNATIONAL COFFEE HOURThis event is for those who enjoy good food, coffee, conversations with people and exploring and learning new cul-tures. 11 a.m. Memorial Hall ballroom. 706-542-7911, cheeia@uga.edu.

CONFERENCEIDD@UGA: Conference for Instructional Designers and Learning Professionals. Through Aug. 22. A conference show-casing innovative eLearning design strategies and projects. $164; $129 for instructional design and development alumni; $49 for UGA faculty, staff and students. Georgia Center. 706-542-4556, mbaer@uga.edu.

SATURDAY, AUGUST 22BARTRAM CONFERENCE OPENING EVENTOpening event for “Set Off for Georgia. ...,” a series of events celebrat-ing the 250th anniversary of John and William Bartram’s Natural History Expedi-tion in Colonial Georgia. 7 p.m. Special collections libraries. 706-542-8079, jclevela@uga.edu. (See story, above left).

SUNDAY, AUGUST 23OPENING RECEPTIONA reception for Chuck Murphy’s new

series of photographs titled Nature, Illustrated. 2 p.m. Visitor Center, State Botanical Garden. wtonks@uga.edu.

MONDAY, AUGUST 24UGA-GRIFFIN CAMPUS DIRECTOR FINALIST VISIT Jeffrey L. Jordan, professor of agri-cultural and applied economics and director of the Southern Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program at UGA-Griffin. 9:30 a.m. 104 UGA-Griffin Student Learning Center. (See story, page 1).

BLOOD DRIVE2:30 p.m. Creswell Hall.

COMING UPSCHOOL OF SOCIAL WORK OPEN HOUSEAug. 28. The School of Social Work will host an open house at its new location, 279 Williams St. Visitors can learn more about the school’s various programs, speak with faculty, students and staff, take short guided tours of the 157-year-old building, view art and more. 4 p.m. School of Social Work Building. 706-542-5461, kfarlowe@uga.edu.

UGA-GRIFFIN CAMPUS DIRECTOR FINALIST VISIT Sept. 3. Luanne Lohr, national program lead for economics at the USDA Forest Service. 9:30 a.m. 104 UGA-Griffin Student Learning Center. (See story, page 1).

By Melissa Tuftsmtufts@uga.edu

The Circle Gallery in the College of Environment and Design will open its fall schedule with works by RG Brown III, artist and UGA emeritus professor of art. An alumnus of the Harvard Graduate School of Design in Landscape Architecture, Brown chose to dedicate his life to creating art rather than conventional landscapes. But like a landscape architect, his interpretation of place is often foremost in his mind.

Afloat, which will be on display from Aug. 20 to Oct. 2, is a compendium of works that explores the notion of journey and the memories of newfound places and experiences.

For Brown, boats hold a primary place in human and societal development; they are archetypal vessels used to

gather and transport personal experiences that shape how people live in the world. During his career Brown traveled to Africa, South America, Europe and Southeast Asia to learn boat building from indigenous people in various cultures.

“Boats can represent many things: transportation, opportunity, livelihood, hardship, leisure, status, freedom, enslavement, transitions and transformation,” Brown said. “One of mankind’s greatest inventions, the boat form has existed in myth and reality since the dawn of civilization. For me, what you bring back from a journey is what is most important, so the boat represents much more than just a ves-sel; it represents the process and collection of experiences.”

The exhibit’s opening reception will be held Aug. 20 at 4:30 p.m. It is open free to the public.

The Circle Gallery is located in the Jackson Street Building.

By Jean Clevelandjclevela@uga.edu

A series of presentations, including a dramatic perfor-mance, a plant walk and sale, and lectures at UGA will mark the 250th anniversary of the natural history expedition of John and William Bartram in Colonial Georgia.

Based on John Bartram’s journal account of their travels, this celebration marks their sojourn in Georgia between Sept. 3 and Oct. 8, 1765.

Dorinda Dallmeyer, president of the Bartram Trail Conference, is coordinating the UGA events. She directs the UGA Environmental Ethics Certificate Program and her edited anthology, Bartram’s Living Legacy: the Travels and the Nature of the South, was published in 2010.

John Bartram was a third-generation Pennsylvania Quaker with a curiosity and reverence for nature as well as a passion for scientific inquiry. In 1765, Bartram was ap-pointed the “Royal Botanist” by King George III and, with his son William, set out for South Carolina, Georgia and Florida on a collecting trip that would last two years.

A complete schedule of events is at http://t.uga.edu/1Hk.

UGA libraries to observe anniversary of Bartrams’ natural history expedition

Works by emeritus professor of art to open Circle Gallery season

UGAGUIDE

The focal piece in the Afloat exhibit is a dug-out canoe RG Brown III (second from left) built from a single tree in Africa using traditional boat-building methods he learned from artisans in Prampram, Ghana. The boat, which weighs over 2,000 pounds, was set up for the Circle Gallery exhibit by (from left) Nelson Harris, Garrell Mattox, Rico Smith, Lynwood Jameson and Curtis Dempsey of the support services department.

6 Aug. 17, 2015 columns.uga.edu

Kudos recognizes special contributions of staff, faculty and administrators in teaching, research and service. News items are limited to election into office of state, regional, national and international societies; major awards and prizes; and similarly notable accomplishments.

Chris Haack, head golf coach since the 1996-1997 season, was chosen for induction into the Georgia Golf Hall of Fame. The induction banquet will take place Jan. 16 at the Atlanta Athletic Club.

Joining Haack in the Class of 2016 will be Stew-art Maiden, James Mason, C. Layne Williams and UGA alumna Nanci Bowen, an All-American and LPGA major winner.

A two-time National Coach of the Year, Haack will be the first collegiate coach inducted into the Georgia Golf Hall of Fame. He has led UGA golf teams to a school-record 56 tournament victories, including the 1999 and 2005 national champion-ships and seven SEC titles.

In 2012, Haack also became UGA’s director of golf. He serves as the liaison between the Athletic Association and the UGA Golf Course, and he oversees the Boyd Center and the adjacent practice facilities.

Haack was inducted into the Golf Coaches As-sociation of America Hall of Fame in 2012.

Laura Katz, a faculty mem-ber with the Athens office of UGA’s Small Business Develop-ment Center, was named the 2015 SBDC statewide Consul-tant of the Year.

The annual award is based on a consultant’s work with the business community, program development, publications, presentations and professional

development. Katz has worked with the SBDC as a business consultant since 2011.

A public service and outreach unit, UGA SBDC provides business consulting and continuing educa-tion services at 17 locations throughout the state.

Craig H. Kennedy, dean of the College of Edu-cation, was recognized by Mometrix Media as No. 3 on a list of the 30 most influential deans of education in the U.S. Researchers with the organi-zation combed through countless ranking systems, honors, awards and commendations in search of the top deans in the country. That data then was compiled, organized and ranked.

The write-up on Kennedy stated, “Under his guidance, UGA has watched as StartClass ranked both its early childhood education and middle school education degrees in the top 10 in the coun-try (10th and third, respectively). Dr. Kennedy’s program has also been recognized by America.edu as having the ninth best elementary education pro-gram in the country, while AC Online recognized UGA as being home to the third best online educa-tion degree, and Campus Explorer ranked it as the fifth best school for education majors. Dr. Kennedy has also been the recipient of multiple prestigious awards, has published hundreds of articles, book chapters and books, and has given over 300 national and international presentations.”

Craig Osenberg, a professor in the Odum School of Ecol-ogy, was elected a Fellow of the Ecological Society of America. He is the fifth current or former UGA ecology faculty member so honored since the program began in 2012.

The ESA Fellows program recognizes outstanding contribu-tions to the advancement or appli-

cation of ecological knowledge; Fellows are elected for life. This year’s class of 24 ESA Fellows also includes UGA alumni Peter Groffman and John Blair as well as Liza Comita, who was named as one of nine Early Career Fellows for a five-year term.

FACULTY PROFILE

RETIREES

Laura Katz

Craig Osenberg

By Mike Wootenmwooten@uga.edu

It’s easy to trace the beginnings of Zion Tse’s career as a biomedical engi-neer. Tse’s father, an electronics techni-cian in Hong Kong, often would bring his work home and allow young Zion to disassemble and reassemble fans, air conditioning systems and other devices.

“I even stripped down part of my dad’s car at one point. I think now they call that experiential learning,” Tse said jokingly.

This hands-on approach to learn-ing still resonates in Tse’s teaching and research at UGA, where he’s an assistant professor in the College of Engineer-ing and a member of the university’s multidisciplinary Regenerative Biosci-ence Center.

“Hands-on experience is essential for students studying interdisciplinary fields such as biomedical engineering because it involves the mechanical, elec-trical, physical, biological and chemical functions of organisms,” Tse said.

Tse’s Medical Robotics Laboratory in the Driftmier Engineering Center is nothing if not hands-on. At one end of the lab, a graduate research assistant is outfitting a quadricopter drone with ultrasound sensing technology so it can map the inside of large power plants. At the other end, Tse’s team has erected a bright blue metal scaffold and two large coils of copper tubing to study wireless charging of electric vehicles. In

between, Tse and his student researchers are creating an enhanced imaging system for heart catheterization procedures.

“When I first started my research at UGA I focused entirely on medical robotics but as time went by, I realized there was a need for research in other areas to help meet the needs of the state,” Tse said.

Tse joined the fledgling UGA Col-lege of Engineering in 2012 following a post-doctoral research fellowship at Harvard Medical School and its teaching affiliate, Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston.

Tse said his proudest accomplish-ment since joining UGA is an ongoing collaboration with researchers and phy-sicians at Emory University Hospital.

“In the last three years we have been involved in some promising research on a new treatment for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis or Lou Gehrig’s disease,” he said. “We’re designing a robotic system that allows the injection of stem cells into the ventral horns of a patient’s spinal cord with a high degree of precision.”

Previous research in small animal models has shown stem cell therapy may halt the degeneration and death of motor neurons associated with ALS. But the current procedure to deliver stem cells involves invasive surgery, including the removal of part of the vertebra covering the spinal canal. Tse said a robotic posi-tioner created by the team, SpinoBot, is designed to deliver stem cells with a needle under MRI guidance.

Tse also is collaborating with the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland, on the devel-opment of a robotic system to treat prostate cancer.

“Medical robotics is a field that’s very translational,” Tse said. “What you have designed today can be used relatively quickly in patients and you can see the results quickly.”

Tse, who teaches courses in engineer-ing physiology, electronics and mecha-tronics systems engineering, believes his research is a powerful teaching tool.

“As a researcher, I can be in touch with state-of-the-art knowledge, and I can apply that knowledge to my class-room teaching,” he said. “I can show students how robotics is being used in medicine today. The students get excited. They can learn from not only their textbooks but also from the real-life examples of cutting-edge diagnostic and surgical techniques that I introduce in the classroom.”

Experiential engineering: Researcher shows how robotics aid medicine

FACTSZion TseAssistant ProfessorCollege of Engineering Ph.D., Imperial College, London, Medical Robotics 2009B.E., Mechanical Engineering, University of Hong Kong, 2006At UGA: 3 years

JulyTwenty-seven UGA employees retired

July 1. Retirees, their job classification, department and length of employment are:

Dewey H. Alford, county ex-tension program assistant, UGA Extension-Northwest District, 12 years, 7 months; Charles Patrick Allen, director, community relations, 12 years, 5 months; Charles A. Bartlett, network administrator spe-cialist, EITS network infrastructure/services, 14 years, 2 months; Wanda Delores Beard, administrative man-ager II, IREHD, 25 years, 10 months; Warren Stephen Bell, assistant direc-tor, Public Affairs, 32 years, 11 months; Christine Q. Betts, regional director, Office of Development, 29 years, 1 month; Nancy R. Bridges, public service assistant, UGA Extension-Northeast District, 30 years; Martha

M. Cagle, veterinary assistant, Vet-erinary Teaching Hospital, 35 years; James J. Dowd, professor, sociology, 37 years, 10 months; Donald L. Evans, professor, infectious diseases, 33 years; Marcus Fechheimer, professor, cellu-lar biology, 30 years, 9 months; Joseph F. Frank, professor, food science and technology, 36 years, 8 months; Anne P. Glass, associate professor, geron-tology, 10 years, 6 months; Dorothy Hausman, senior research scientist, food and nutrition, 30 years; Libby Johnson, administrative associate II, Graduate School, 39 years, 10 months; Peter B. Konenkamp, broadcast news coordinator, Public Affairs, 20 years, 10 months; Andrew G. Landers, wom-en’s basketball coach, Athletic Associa-tion, 36 years, 2 months; John H. Leary III, research professional II, infectious diseases, 26 years, 7 months; Nancy G. McDuff, associate vice president,

Office of Undergraduate Admissions, 20 years, 1 month; Barbara Joanne Miller, county extension associate, UGA Extension-Southeast District, 15 years, 1 month; Gary L. Mills, associate research scientist, Savannah River Ecology Lab, 31 years, 9 months; R. Douglas Moore, academic profes-sional, Hugh Hodgson School of Music, 33 years, 10 months; Joseph J. Powell, project architect, Facilities Planning Office, 17 years, 3 months; Melinda F. Thomas, regional director, Office of Development, 13 years; Janet S. Valente, public service associate, Col-lege of Family and Consumer Sciences, 9 years, 10 months; Louise Wicker, professor, food science and technol-ogy, 26 years, 10 months; and Janet Allison Wilkie, county secretary, UGA Extension-Northeast District, 10 years.

Peter Frey

Source: Human Resources

Zion Tse, an assistant professor in the College of Engineering, said his proudest accomplishment since joining UGA is an ongoing collaboration with researchers and physicians at Emory University Hospital.

By Sara Freelandfreeland@uga.edu

With the start of the fall semester, there have been some changes around campus. Here’s an update on some projects on campus:

Correll Hall, the new Terry College of Business building near the intersection of Lumpkin and Baldwin streets, is open for fall semester. Named in honor of Ada Lee and A.D. “Pete” Correll, chairman emeritus of Georgia-Pacific Corp., the 74,000-square-foot structure houses 10 classrooms, a business in-novation lab, a graduate commons and multiple project team rooms.

Construction continues on the $44.7 million, 122,500-square-foot Science Learning Center, located on the southwest corner of D.W. Brooks Mall, bounded by Carl-ton Street, Pharmacy South and the McPhaul Center parking lot. The facility will encompass 33 instructional labs, two 280-seat lecture halls and two 72-seat classrooms and is expected to be completed in July 2016.

Baldwin Hall is being renovated and adding a 10,800-square-foot annex. The addition will provide the School of Public and International Affairs with technology-enabled active learn-ing classrooms; space for graduate teaching as-sistants to hold office hours with undergraduate students; and common areas for faculty, staff, students and alumni to convene for academic discussions, presentations and events.

Work on the addition began in June and will run through May 2016. Renovations are expected to be complete in September 2016.

New turfgrass research and education facilities on UGA’s campuses in Griffin, Tifton and Athens are under construction. Outdated facilities on UGA’s campuses will be replaced with labs, greenhouses, classrooms and office spaces designed to keep the university at the forefront of turf breeding programs around the nation.

The UGA Veterinary Medical Center opened March 25. Located at 2200 College Station Road, the facilities encompass roughly 300,000 square feet and include an education building and a teaching hospital for large and small animals. The center houses a Veterinary Education Center, which includes a 160-seat auditorium and three classrooms. Expanded teaching and collaboration spaces also are lo-cated in the new Veterinary Teaching Hospital.

The new hospital will care for large and small animals and is more than double the size of the old facility and is outfitted with top-of-the-line equipment and improved functionality. Third- and fourth-year students will take classes and work at the new center. All learning spaces will be available to students

for studying during non-class hours and can be reserved for seminars and special events.

The Ramsey Student Center is in the first stage of a renovation, which has included new paint, flooring and signage in the main lobby, spectator lobby, Gym Central, central offices and strength and conditioning rooms.

The customer service desk in the main lobby has been re-oriented toward the center. There also will be digital signage and televi-sions added in the main lobby and several other spaces in the building.

Delta Hall, UGA’s new permanent resi-dential facility located in Washington, D.C., was dedicated in February. Once a commercial office building, the 20,000-square-foot space is now capable of housing 32 students and additional faculty and staff. The three-story building includes classroom and study space, common living areas, conference rooms, kitchens and suite-style rooms.

There also were changes to spaces. Here are a few of the new locations:• The Graduate School moved to Terrell Hall from its building on Williams Street in November 2014.• The School of Social Work began a phased move into the former Graduate School Building on Williams Street. The move from Tucker Hall was completed in May, and the building been renamed the School of Social Work Building.• Several departments from the Office of the Vice President for Research are moving into Tucker Hall from offices in Boyd Graduate Studies, Riverbend North and the E-shop. De-partments include research communications, Grant Smart, units from research compliance and units from OVPR Support Services.• Contracts & Grants and the Office of Spon-sored Programs also moved into Tucker Hall earlier this year.• The Willson Center for Humanities and Arts moved from Psychology Building/Instruc-tional Plaza to 1260 S. Lumpkin in January.• A group of Franklin College advisors moved from Memorial Hall into the space vacated by the Willson Center.

The UGA Police Department set up a large metal drop box last year to safely collect un-needed or unwanted prescription medications.

Installed next to police headquarters at the Hodgson Oil Building (286 Oconee St.), the box is available 24/7. It offers a secure loca-tion for anyone who wants to get rid of both legal and illegal substances. Individuals can leave the substances with no questions asked and no potential for criminal prosecution or other sanctions.

The Police Department also offers an “E-Commerce Safety Zone.” The clearly

marked, well-lit place in the parking lot at the Hodgson Oil Building is for people making transactions with others they’ve met on popular Internet sites such as eBay, Craigslist and more. This space also has video surveillance.

Campus Transit has added a new bus route that goes out to the new Veterinary Medical Center on College Station Road. The Veteri-nary Medical Center Route has buses leaving every 15 minutes from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. dur-ing the fall and spring semesters. Buses leave the Riverbend/South Milledge route every 20 minutes from 7 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. and will stop at the State Botanical Garden on request. Both of these routes replace the former River’s Crossing route, which no longer operates.

The bus stop at Four Towers (on the Visi-tors Center side of the street) is closed due to safety concerns. All buses now will stop at the Ramsey Student Center stop (the bus bay on the Ramsey side of the street). This change affects Orbit, East Campus Express, Night Family Housing and Night East-West routes.

There also have been changes made to the bus stop on Baldwin Street in front of the Fine Arts Building. Those changes and future ones include: cutting back tree limbs to improve sight lines to the flashing lights; replacing the bulbs in the flashing lights with higher intensity bulbs to increase visibility; the future installation of pedestrian-activated lights; improved signage that will accompany the new light standards; the bus stop (the painted curb) will be moved 30 feet up the street, away from the crosswalk, to improve sight lines for pedestrians who have previously had to look around stopped buses to see oncoming traffic; and future considerations include raising the crossing tables or relocating the bus stops to a completely different location altogether.

There also have been some changes to parking around campus.

UGA Parking Services converted the former small animal emergency clinic lot on Carlton Street into a new UGA permitted lot, S25.

A new parking lot in the previous location of Bolton Dining Commons is scheduled to open in September.

Lot W03 will close for parking in October/November for construction of the new Terry Business Learning Center.

Construction of the Baldwin Hall addition will mean fewer spaces in lot N07.

The East Campus parking deck will un-dergo structural maintenance in the next year, and parking will be impacted.

The E01 and Intramural Fields parking lots are now “plate only” spaces. Stickers and hang tags won’t be needed for registered parking customers.

DIVISION OF FINANCE AND ADMINISTRATION 7 columns.uga.edu Aug. 17, 2015

Change of placeAn update on campus construction, projects, parking and transit

CYBERSIGHTSWEEKLY READER

To kick off fall semester, the Division of Public Affairs, along with other campus units, has pro-duced a website to give the campus community a welcome to the new academic year.

The Welcome UGA site features a stream of campus social media posts as well as feature articles about

UGA programs such as First-Year Odyssey seminars. There also are UGA-related lists that include top-ics like hidden gems of campus and ways to get cultured at UGA.

Campus community members can use #WelcomeUGA on social media to share their excitement about the new year.

Site welcomes campus communitywelcome.uga.edu

ABOUT COLUMNS

I 7 8 5

The University of Georgia is a unit of the University System of Georgia.

Columns is available to the campus community by subscription for an annual fee of $20 (second-class delivery) or $40 (first-class delivery). Faculty and

staff members with a disability may call 706-542-8017 for assistance in obtaining this

publication in an alternate format.

Columns staff can be reached at 706-542-8017 or columns@uga.edu

EditorJuliett Dinkins

Art DirectorJanet Beckley

Photo EditorDorothy Kozlowski

Senior ReporterAaron Hale

ReporterMatt Chambers

Copy EditorDavid Bill

The University of Georgia is committed to principles of equal opportunity and

affirmative action.

As new digital forms of learning proliferate, there is an increasing need to better understand how people in different regions of the world are implementing massive open online courses, or MOOCs, and other forms of open education.

Ongoing e-learning develop-ments related to both technol-ogy and pedagogy have pushed institutions and organizations to grapple with issues of accreditation, credentialing, quality standards, innovative assessment and learner motivation and attrition, among other areas of concern.

MOOCs and Open Education Around the World—co-edited by Thomas C. Reeves, professor emeritus in UGA’s College of Education—explores and illumi-nates unique implementations of MOOCs and open education across regions and nations.

Book examines open education learning

MOOCs and Open Education Around the WorldEdited by Curtis J. Bonk, Mimi M. Lee, Thomas C. Reeves, Thomas H. ReynoldsRoutledgeHardback: $155Paperback: $39.95

Correll Hall

Science Learning Center

Willson Center for Humanities and Arts

ON THE WEB

Visit http://welcome.uga.edu/ UGAconstruction_roundup.html for an in-depth construction roundup.

Aug. 17, 2015 columns.uga.edu8

GRIFFIN from page 1

REGENTS from page 1

FACULTY from page 1

Tobacco cessation classes College of Pharmacy students will

offer their “Beat the Pack” program to help those who want to stop using tobacco.

The program is free, but space is limited to 10 participants. The regis-tration deadline is Aug. 21.

Open to UGA employees and students as well as the Athens com-munity, the six-week program will be held Aug. 25, Sept. 1, 8, 15, 22 and 29 from 5:45-6:45 p.m. at the UGA Training and Development Center, located at 315 S. Thomas St. Parking in the center’s lot is free after 5 p.m.

Based on Pfizer’s “Beat the Pack” smoking cessation program, the UGA sessions will focus on tobacco-use issues. The classes also can be adapted to help those who want to stop chewing tobacco.

Register by faxing a completed registration form to 706-542-6022; emailing a completed registration form to monicaw@uga.edu or calling Monica Williams at 706-542-3893. A PDF of the registration form and program fliers can be downloaded at http://t.uga.edu/1Du.

USG service awardsThe deadline to submit nomina-

tions for the University System of Georgia’s 2015 Chancellor’s Service Excellence Awards is midnight Aug. 31. Nominations should be made online at http://www.usg.edu/service_excellence/recognition_programs.

The Chancellor’s Service Excel-lence Program was created to honor University System employees who

have gone “above and beyond” their normal job responsibilities in helping their internal and external customers and consistently promoting customer service excellence.

Email Catherine K. Shircliff, cks@uga.edu, for additional information.

Gerontology open house The Institute of Gerontology,

which is part of the UGA College of Public Health, is hosting an open house Sept. 10 from 4-6 p.m. in Hud-son Hall (102 Spear Road) on the Health Sciences Campus. Refresh-ments will be provided.

RSVP to Josie Pough at 706-542-2539 or jopough@uga.edu.

Kaltura video serviceThe video service platform Kal-

tura is now available for instructors to use within UGA’s learning manage-ment system, eLearning Commons.

A media tool, Kaltura allows users to create, upload and publish videos such as webcam recordings and screencasts. Kaltura is integrated in eLC as a resource for course-related instruction.

Learn how to use Kaltura in eLC are at http://ctl.uga.edu/kaltura.

The Center for Teaching and Learning is offering drop-in work-shops for instructors who need as-sistance with eLC, including Kaltura. The dates, times and location of the workshops are at http://ctl.uga.edu/events/category/elc-workshops.

Kaltura is an optional resource as a replacement for the recently decommissioned podcasting service.

For assistance with Kaltura for

course-related content in eLC, email Carrie Bishop, CTL coordinator of emerging learning technologies, at cnbishop@uga.edu, or James Castle, OOL instructional designer, at jcastle@uga.edu.

Units interested in using Kaltura for noncourse content should email EITS’ Robert Ethier at rethier@uga.edu.

Basketball season ticketsSeason tickets for the men’s

basketball team are now on sale. The team will open its 2015-2016 season Nov. 13 against Chattanooga in Stegeman Coliseum.

The men’s team will play 18 home games this winter: nine nonconfer-ence games and nine games against SEC opponents. The team’s non-league slate includes home games against Georgia Tech, Clemson, Kansas State and Murray State.

Season ticket packages are $135 for UGA faculty and staff and $270 for everyone else. Faculty and staff as well as contributors to the Basketball Enhancement Fund will be able to order season tickets until Sept. 1 on-line at http://ev11.evenue.net/cgi-bin/ncommerce3/SEGetGroupList?groupCode=UGA&linkID=uga&shopperContext=&caller=&appCode or by calling the UGA ticket office at 1-877-542-1231 weekdays from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

Bulletin Board is limited to informa-tion that may pertain to a majority of faculty and staff members.

Bulletin Board

DEAN from page 1

development committee broadened her perspec-tives on the challenges and opportunities facing graduate education, and a yearlong leadership development program at Drexel University forti-fied her skill set through coaching, networking and mentoring.

She has served on scores of research and train-ing grant review committees over the course of her career. In 2013, she was asked to serve as a program director in the National Science Foundation’s Di-vision of Molecular and Cellular Biosciences. But when the opportunity to lead the graduate school at a university that has its ambitions set on raising the quality of its graduate programs and the impact of its research enterprise, she couldn’t say no.

Barbour comes to her role as dean of the Gradu-ate School knowing that graduate education is in transition. She said that graduate education has historically trained students to be “clones of their mentors” but that less than 20 percent of today’s graduate students will become academicians. The new normal of constrained budgets at the state and federal levels combined with a greater focus on accountability and student outcomes means that resources must be allocated carefully and with an eye toward data-driven best practices, she added.

“Because resources are so limited now, we’re forced to do our homework before we take steps forward,” she said, “and I think that’s going to be very informative and that it’s going to make us much more efficient as we explore and implement new strategies.”

Barbour said one of the things she’s most ex-cited about is broadening training opportunities for students so they can explore careers outside of academia and develop professional skills in areas such as communication and project management that will serve them regardless of the career path they choose. She added that she’s fortunate to lead a graduate school that already has strong programs and partnerships across campus.

“Graduate students are working at the cut-ting edge of their fields and asking questions no one is asking; they’re answering questions and getting answers that no one had ever dreamed would be found.” Barbour said. “At my core I’m an intellectual, so the idea of being able to have a window into the cutting edge of a variety of fields is really unique and something I find to be really exciting about being a graduate dean.”

coverage as they currently do. Supple-mental coverage will be provided through the Aon Retiree Health Ex-change, and USG will deposit money into a health reimbursement account for retirees and/or their dependents to use towards premiums and other eligible out-of-pocket health care expenses.

The regents approved the USG HRA funding of $2,736 per year or $228 per month for each Medicare-eligible retiree and any Medicare-eligible covered dependent(s) age 65 or older.

To receive the USG HRA funding, the retiree and/or dependent must be enrolled in coverage through the USG plan in 2015 and must purchase cover-age through the Aon Retiree Health Exchange in 2016. The enrollment period is Oct. 1-Dec. 31 for coverage

that will begin Jan. 1.Enrollment informational meet-

ings for Medicare-eligible retirees will be held at each USG campus in August and September. Medicare-eligible re-tirees have received invitations to the Athens meetings, which will be held Aug. 18 and 19. Retirees will receive an enrollment packet by mail from the Aon Retiree Health Exchange in September.

Information about the Medicare-eligible retiree supplemental coverage for 2016 is at http://www.usg.edu/hr/benefits/retiree_benefits.

The board of regents meeting notes can be found at http://www.usg.edu/regents/meetings/date/2015.

The UGA Human Resources Office is ready to assist anyone with questions. Email them to benefits@uga.edu or call 706-542-2222.

report dually to the Office of the Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs and Provost to support in-structional missions and to the dean of the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences to support the research and extension missions of the college. The assistant provost and campus director also will coordi-nate UGA-Griffin’s interaction and partnerships with community and business leaders.

Located 40 miles south of At-lanta, the UGA-Griffin campus was established in 1888 as the Georgia Experiment Station. It houses exten-sion services for the people of Georgia as well as internationally recognized research programs.

In 2005, it launched academic programs to offer both undergraduate

and graduate degrees. Undergraduate degree-completion programs as well as graduate degrees at UGA-Griffin are offered through UGA’s College of Agricultural and Environmental Sci-ences, College of Education, College of Family and Consumer Sciences, Franklin College of Arts and Sciences and Terry College of Business.

UGA-Griffin is internationally known for its research in agriculture, food processing and food safety, among several other fields.

Notable research centers at UGA-Griffin include the Center for Food Safety, the Food Product Innovation and Commercialization Center, the Center for Urban Agriculture and a Turfgrass Research and Education Facility.

this fall. Pejman Rohani, an expert in the use of com-

putational modeling to predict infectious disease dynamics, has joined the Odum School of Ecology as well as the infectious diseases department in the College of Veterinary Medicine. Eric Harvill, a microbiologist who is one of the world’s fore-most experts on the bacteria that cause whooping cough, will join the infectious diseases department in December.

Stephen Trent, who develops next-generation therapeutics and vaccines against a range of bacterial diseases, joined the infectious diseases department last spring as a UGA Foundation Distinguished Professor.

The support of the Georgia Research Alli-ance has helped bring three new GRA Eminent Scholars—Arthur Edison, Robert Haltiwanger and Ted Ross—to campus, and an interdisciplinary hiring initiative launched in fall 2013 has brought 14 faculty members to campus.

Morehead and Whitten recently announced two new hiring initiatives for the 2015-2016 aca-demic year. An initiative to reduce class sizes by creating more than 300 new course sections will bring a total of 56 new faculty members to campus this year, and up to eight new faculty members with expertise in informatics will be hired to build upon the university’s strengths in this emerging and interdisciplinary field.

Whitten said the continuing focus on hiring helps the university achieve three interrelated goals: enhancing the undergraduate learning experience, elevating the quality of graduate education and strengthening the university’s research enterprise.

She noted that the new faculty members will enable smaller class sizes that, along with the experiential learning requirement approved last academic year, give students the type of person-alized and hands-on learning experiences that position them for success after graduation.

In addition, the advances in research and schol-arship that new faculty members bring strengthens the university’s contributions to the economic and cultural vitality of Georgia and the world while also attracting graduate students whose skills are in high demand in today’s knowledge economy.

“We have a beautiful campus with state-of-the-art facilities, but our real strength is in our people,” Whitten said. “By investing in world-class faculty, we lay the foundation for impactful research, scholarship and outreach while creating an unmatched learning environment for students.”

Lindsay Bland Robinson