UBC This Week | Jul. 31, 2008

Jul 31, 2008

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UBC This Week is a weekly summary of UBC people in the news, recent media releases and upcoming event highlights. UBC This Week past issues are also available on-line.

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Recent UBC Media Releases

Upcoming Event Highlights

Find out what else is happening at UBC this week. For sports events, visit the UBC Athletics site at www.gothunderbirds.ca/schedule.asp.

UBC People

UBC People

New leadership for mineral exploration

Dr. Craig Hart, a UBC alumnus and currently a senior research fellow at the Centre for Exploration Targeting at the University of Western Australia in Perth, will assume the position of director of UBC’s Mineral Deposit Research Unit (MDRU) in January 2009.  

Established in 1989, MDRU is an industry-UBC partnership in the Department of Earth and Ocean Sciences, Faculty of Science. The Unit works to increase knowledge about mineral deposits, aids in their discovery, and assists industry in developing new resources.

For more information, visit http://www.mdru.ubc.ca.

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Prof. David E. DowallNew director for Liu Institute

Prof. David E. Dowall has accepted the position of Director and Professor of the Liu Institute for Global Issues, effective January 1, 2009, for a five-year term. Dowall’s research background encompasses domestic and international land management, housing policy, economic development strategy, and infrastructure planning and finance. He has been Director of the Institute of Urban and Regional Development (IURD) at the University of California, Berkeley, since 2004. He is also former chair of the University’s Academic Senate.

The Liu Institute, one of sixteen research units within the College for Interdisciplinary Studies (CFIS), pursues interdisciplinary and policy-relevant research on global issues. For more information, visit http://www.ligi.ubc.ca and http://www.cfis.ubc.ca.

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Statistics welcomes new head

Prof. Nancy Heckman, with UBC’s Department of Statistics since 1984, has been named the new head of the Department of Statistics. Her work is in non-parametric, or smoothing, regression, and has been involved in the Faculty of Science’s working climate initiatives and in transforming the department’s largest introductory course as part of the Carl Wieman Science Education Initiative.

For more information, visit http://www.science.ubc.ca/news/190.

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School of Music student wins vocal competition

UBC School of Music student Simone Osborne is the co-winner of the Marilyn Horne Foundation Vocal Competition at the Music Academy of the West (MAW) in Santa Barbara, California. Osborne, who just completed third year in the Voice and Opera Bachelor of Music program at UBC, shares the competition win with baritone Edward Parks, from Pennsylvania. As part of their prize, both Osborne and Parks will be presented in a solo recital on the Marilyn Horne Foundation vocal recital series “On Wings of Song” in New York City.

The Music Academy of the West was founded in 1947 by a group of Southern California arts patrons and musicians. For more information, visit http://www.thedailysound.com/2008/07/two-winners-is-first-for-vocal.html.

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Federal funding boosts digitization project

UBC Library recently received more than $53,000 from Canadian Heritage’s Canadian Culture Online Program to support a digitization project entitled The Chinese Experience in British Columbia, 1850-1950. The project is a collaboration between UBC Library’s Rare Books and Special Collections, UBC Archives and the City of Vancouver Archives. The Library and Vancouver Archives are matching the federal funding.
 
The project will explore Chinese immigration, work and social and cultural life in B.C. through the digitization of items from the Chung Collection at UBC (http://www.library.ubc.ca/chung) and the Yip Sang fonds at the City of Vancouver Archives. Excerpts from the books of Wayson Choy, a Vancouver-born author, will be used to provide context for the digitized items. The project should be viewable by the summer of 2009.

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Chapbooks on display at UBC Library

UBC Library’s Rare Books and Special Collections (RBSC) will present a display of 19th-century English chapbooks from now until the end of September.
 
Chapbooks are booklets that were popular in rural areas and towns from the 16th to the 19th centuries, and ranged from jestbooks to histories of depraved criminals, and medieval romances to song verses. Chapbooks are extremely delicate, and many are illustrated with luridly coloured woodcuts.
 
This exhibition was created by UBC English Master’s student Catherine Whitehead. RBSC holds more than 300 chapbooks, many of which are part of the Arkley Collection of Early & Historical Children’s Literature.
 
RBSC is located on the first level of the Irving K. Barber Learning Centre, 1961 East Mall.

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GEERing UP!GEERing UP! in motion

GEERing UP!, a non-profit organization that promotes science, engineering and technology to youth across the Greater Vancouver Area, is on campus this summer with hands-on activities designed, organized and operated by UBC students.

This week, activities include visiting the wind tunnel to test campers’ sail cars, a fog machine demo with Airzookas and laser show, and a rocket bottle launch. Next week (Aug 5-8), GEERing Up! will be holding UBC’s first ever Engineering-based Aboriginal program. 

For more information, visit http://www.geeringup.apsc.ubc.ca.

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GEERing UP!Engineering students send “Mountie-bots” head to head

Thirteen teams of UBC engineering students pitted prototype police robots against each other for prizes and bragging rights in the 8th annual UBC Engineering Physics Robot Competition. This year’s competition theme, proposed by Dr. Andrew Irvine, is intended to raise awareness and interest in safe alternatives to Tasers as a means to detain suspects. Students were challenged to invent and build robots that demonstrate non-hazardous methods to track, apprehend, and “detain” suspects.

The competition is the final exam of a 13-week course in practical engineering design, similar to courses offered at MIT, Stanford and other engineering schools. For more information, visit http://www.engphys.ubc.ca/phys253/content/newsandevents.html.

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Reaction and cooperation in Japan’s economic policy

Prof. Hidetake Yoshimats will give a lecture entitled Strategic Reaction and Benign Cooperation in Japan’s Economic Policy towards East Asia. Yoshimats is a visiting scholar to the Institute of Asian Research from the College of Asia Pacific Studies, Ristumeikan Asian Pacific University, Beppu, Oita, Japan.

Date: Aug. 6
Time: 2 – 3:30 p.m.
Place: Institute of Asian Research, C.K. Choi Building Conference Room, 1855 West Mall
Info: http://www.iar.ubc.ca/home/tabid/36/ctl/detail/mid/575/xmid/381/xmfid/2/default.aspx

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Charity concert to support education programs

The AMS club Love Your Neighbour of UBC and the Department of Earth and Ocean Sciences is sponsoring a charity concert in connection with the Light and Love Home non-profit organization. Proceeds from the concert will go to support education programs in the developing countries such as in Philippines, El Salvador and Madagascar.

Date: Aug. 3
Time: 2 – 4:30 p.m.
Place: Room 2, Woodward Instructional Resource Centre, 2194 Health Sciences Mall
Info: http://www.lightandlovehome.org/our-services/events/2008/my-story/lang/en/

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Registration deadline for university administrators to gather at UBC

UBC is the official sponsor of the International Meeting of University Administrators (IMUA) 2008 conference in Vancouver this summer. The IMUA is a forum for the discussion of management and administration issues in higher education. This year’s theme is globalization.

Speakers include Prof. Bryan Gould, an international authority on higher education; Prof. Carl Wieman, Nobel Laureate and Director of the Carl Wieman Science Education Initiative at UBC; Prof. David Dolphin, Professor Emeritus in Chemistry at UBC and lead creator of Visudyne™.; Dr. Ron Dembo, founder of Zerofootprint; Prof. Rachel Gumbi, Rector and Vice Chancellor of the University of Zululand; and Dr. Dan Muzyka, Dean of the Sauder School of Business at UBC.

Date: Aug. 17-21
Time: 8:30 – 3:45
Place: Fairmont Hotel, 900 W. Georgia St.
Info: http://www.imua2008.ca/