UBC This Week | Oct. 5, 2006

Oct 5, 2006

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UBC United Way Campaign:

www.unitedway.ubc.ca

UBC This Week is a weekly summary of UBC people in the news, recent media releases and upcoming event hightlights. 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

Three Engineers Recognized for Excellence

The Association of Professional Engineers and Geoscientists of B.C. have announced this year’s 11 President’s Awards recipients. UBC electrical and computer engineering professor and ICICS director Rabab Ward is this year’s recipient of the association’s highest award, the R.A. McLachlan Memorial Award, for her solid and continuing professional career and her outstanding service to the community; UBC civil engineering professor Carlos Ventura is recipient of the Meritorious Achievement Award for his distinctive and outstanding achievements in the field of earthquake engineering; and UBC mechanical engineering professor Sheldon Green is recipient of the Award for Teaching Excellence for his innovative and dedicated contributions to engineering undergraduate education.

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PhD Student Elected Chair of African HIV/AIDS Organization

The AIDS Support Organization (TASO), Africa’s largest HIV/AIDS support group, has elected UBC PhD student Julie Tembe as Chair of its Board of Trustees. At TASO’s Annual General Meeting held in Kampala, Uganda, on September 23, Tembe won a landslide victory against four competitors.

Tembe is completing her PhD in language and literacy education, focusing
on language policy and minority education in Uganda. Her research forms part of a large SSHRC-sponsored project on literacy and sustainable development, led by Education professors Bonny Norton and Maureen Kendrick.

TASO was founded in 1987 by Dr. Noerine Kaleeba and 15 colleagues most of whom have now passed away due to AIDS. The founding of The AIDS Support Organisation (TASO) was based on people that were unified by common experiences faced when encountering HIV/AIDS at a time of high stigma, ignorance and discrimination.

For more information: www.tasouganda.org or juliet_tembe@yahoo.co.uk.

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Prof. Earns 2006 Yasuo Sakakibara Prize for Best Paper

English Assoc. Prof. Mary Chapman has been awarded the 2006 Yasuo Sakakibara prize for best paper by an international member of the American Studies Association.

The essay, a part of Chapman’s book-in-progress about American suffrage literature, examines the journalism and fiction of Asian-American author Sui Sin Far, which has been read as "anti-progressive" and "conservative."  Chapman argues that Sui Sin Far’s version of feminism, which includes critical portrayals of American suffragists in her work, is inspired less by an American "New Woman" model of feminism and more by revolutionary Chinese feminist discourse which revised but did not reject outright many traditional Chinese gender norms.

The award includes a $500 cash prize which will be presented at the annual American Studies Association meeting in Oakland in October.

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UBC Prof. Clarence de Silva receives international accolades

UBC Mechanical Engineering Prof. Clarence de Silva is being honoured with the international Henry M. Paynter Outstanding Investigator Award for his sustained, outstanding research contributions in the field of intelligent control of robots and industrial processes.  The award is given once every two years by the Dynamic Systems and Control Division of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers.

De Silva is also Director of the international NUS/UBC Applied Science Research Centre, which facilitates collaborative research between faculty members and researchers in the Faculty of Applied Science at UBC and the Faculties of Engineering and Science of the National University of Singapore.

For more information: www.researchcentre.apsc.ubc.ca.

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UBC Kicks Off 2006 United Way Campaign

Look for a package in your mail this fall from the 2006 UBC United Way Campaign to kick off another ambitious community effort.

This year’s campaign committee has set an aggressive target this year, seeking to improve campus-wide participation with at least 100 new donors and increasing UBC’s United Way dollars by seven per cent over last year.

The committee is pleased to welcome Andrew Parr, Director of UBC Food Services, as the 2006 campaign chair. Parr, along with dozens of other volunteers, will be putting in many extra hours this fall to help UBC reach its campaign targets through increased campus participation and awareness.

For more information about the UBC United Way campaign, contact Kate Petrusa, Campaign Coordinator, at 604.822.8929 or united.way@ubc.ca or visit www.unitedway.ubc.ca.