You Are Invited to Attend the All Extension Conference
All CAHNRS faculty are invited to attend the All-Extension Conference on March 11, 2009. This year, the conference features several speakers who may be of interest to CAHNRS faculty, staff, and students. These include:
9:30 – 10:30 a.m. – Dr. Cheryl Scott, Senior Advisor to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Global Health Division
Dr. Scott will discuss global health challenges and the impacts on both developed and developing societies and how public universities can effectively address these critical issues.
Bill Gates has said that “humanity’s greatest advances are not in its discoveries – but in how those discoveries are applied to reduce inequity.” In response the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation supports research and application leading to creation of vaccines, controlling insect vectors, improving nutrition, curing infection, and measuring health status.
10:45 – 12 a.m. – David Brewster, Founding Publisher, Crosscut.com
Mr. Brewster will address strategic thinking related to media, learning and communication. This information becomes of paramount importance for leaders in outreach communication and information for the residents of the state of Washington. Brewster will discuss how people choose information and make decisions from that information, now and in the future. Crosscut is an online venture seeking to “reinvigorate local journalism in the Pacific Northwest. Brewster is Crosscut’s publisher. He also founded the Seattle Weekly in 1976 and ran it for 21 years. After selling the Seattle Weekly in 2005, he engaged in creating a civic and cultural center in a restored old building on Seattle’s First Hill. Brewster was also responsible for creating the Northwest Best Places, a guidebook series, and was a columnist for the Seattle Times.
1:30 – 3 p.m. – Paul Roberts, Journalist and Author
Mr. Roberts will address critical problems within the worldwide food system. He argues that the consolidation and institutionalization of the modern food system is unsustainable and is a root cause of diet-related disease, compromised human health associated with overuse of antibiotics and other drugs, and many recent food safety challenges. Roberts published his first book, the critically acclaimed The End of Oil in 2005. He has also written for the Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, and has appeared in Slate, USA Today, Newsweek, and many other print media. His latest book is entitled The End of Food and is the basis for his presentation on March 11.
3:30 p.m. – Dr. Elson S. Floyd, President, Washington State University
Dr. Floyd will discuss his vision for outreach and engagement in a contemporary land-grant university.
Online registration for the All Extension Conference is open at http://ext.wsu.edu/aec.
Academic Programs Offers Professional Development Workshops for Grad Students
Academic Programs continually strives to provide opportunities for improving teaching and learning experiences in CAHNRS. In the spirit of inclusion, we are delighted to announce our first professional development workshops for CAHNRS graduate students. Corey Johnson of WSU libraries is partnering with us to organize and offer two workshops for graduate students to support them with their research efforts. Below are the descriptions of both workshops. We would greatly appreciate it if you would distribute this information to all CAHNRS graduate students.
To potential attendees:
Are you in your second year of graduate school and still have not stepped foot in the library?
Does the library feel foreign and a bit intimidating to you?
Are you still trying to figure out how to find that one article that seems to be just out of reach?
Are you almost done with your lit review but just can’t quite find those few pieces of literature needed to tie it all together?
If you answered “yes” to any of these questions, these library workshops are for you! At these workshops you will:
- Gain a solid understanding of how to use the WSU Library resources
- Be provided with guided instruction specific to your research area
- Learn how to make your searching more efficient
- Learn about tools to assess the quality of scholarly work
Workshop 1: Research Basics (24 participant maximum)
Wed, 2/18, 2-4 pm, Terrell Library 105
This hands-on workshop will provide you with a solid understanding of the WSU Libraries’ resources and services. There will be guided opportunities to learn how to effectively use Griffin (our online catalog), Summit (our Pacific Northwest catalog) and WorldCat (one of the planet’s most comprehensive research tools). In addition, you will learn about key library databases for CAHNRS discipline areas and how to use article retrieving tools such as Find It @ WSU, Article Reach and ILLiad. Along the way you will be exposed to key vocabulary and methods needed to construct effective search queries. We know from past experience that spending two hours in this workshop will save you hours in the future!
Participants in Workshop 1 will understand:
- the complete set of library research services and the best ways to take advantage of them.
- how to effectively use Griffin, Summit and WorldCat.
- advanced ways to structure search queries.
- how to efficiently retrieve journal articles from CAHNRS specific databases.
Workshop 2: Advanced Research Topics (24 participant maximum)
Wed, 3/4, 2-4 pm, Terrell Library 105
This hands-on workshop will feature instruction about reference management tools including EndNote and Zotero. In addition, librarians will teach you about tools to assess the top journals and researchers in your fields and conduct basic citation counting. Finally, you will become better acquainted with scholarly communications and WSU’s own institutional repository for scholarly materials, Research Exchange. Advanced issues on the topics of plagiarism and copyright also will be discussed. This workshop will help equip you to excel as a researcher and instructor at WSU.
Participants in Workshop 2 will understand:
- how to effectively use proprietary and free reference management tools to make in-text citing and bibliography creation more efficient.
- citation counting and ways to locate the best researchers and journals in their fields.
- the various facets of scholarly communication including copyright issues for graduate students and how to access and use WSU’s institutional repository, Research Exchange.
As you can see, there is a limit to the number of participants for each workshop. To sign up for either or both workshops, please email Anna Whitehall at awhitehall@wsu.edu. If you have any questions about the workshops please feel free to contact Anna Whitehall or Corey Johnson at coreyj@wsu.edu.
WSU Internal Communications Moves to Electronic Only
Internal communications at WSU will be delivered electronically only, according to a policy announced Jan. 14 by President Elson S. Floyd as part of an effort to reduce operating costs and save resources.
As a result, WSU Today – the university’s newspaper for faculty, staff and graduate students – will cease to be offered in print format. WSU Today will provide internal news and information via its website and other electronic formats.
Floyd urged departments to convert their internal communications to electronic delivery as promptly as possible. By July 1, all internal communication must be electronic.
This decision comes out of efforts by the administration and the University Budget Committee to cut operating costs. Printing and paper costs for WSU Today were $20,531 for the 2007-2008 academic year.
Floyd said internal communication is important for the university. This change to electronic delivery will open up opportunities to use innovative communication technologies and increase access to news and information across all WSU locations, he said.
Study Design in London, Como, Florence and Paris
Please let your students know that the Department of Apparel, Merchandising, Design and Textiles invites all students, faculty and others to come along on their Summer 2009 study tour of Europe. All majors welcome! Contact Joan Ellis (joana@wsu.edu or 509-335-8399) for more info on how you can customize the trip to meet your educational needs. Learn more @ http://academic.cahnrs.wsu.edu/images/fashion-tour-su09.pdf.
New on Dean Bernardo’s Blog
Dan Bernardo has been posting updates on the WSU CAHNRS budget situation on his blog: https://sharepoint.cahnrs.wsu.edu/dan-blog/default.aspx. He welcomes your comments. In his latest posting, the fourth in an ongoing series on the budget, he writes in part, “Our best defense against budget reductions is to expand our funding base through extramural grants, contracts, gifts, and other non-governmental sources. Faculty and staff continue to make progress in this area, and we should continue to channel our energies in this direction.”
In another recent post on interior design national ranking and the ongoing transformation of the human sciences in CAHNRS, he writes, “the Big H programs in CAHNRS are transforming themselves in order to make significant impacts in research, graduate education and outreach, as well as continuing to excel in their traditional roles of providing world-class undergraduate instruction.”
Darwin Week
CAHNRS has joined several other WSU Colleges and units in supporting a series of evening outreach events on the Pullman campus, part of the worldwide celebration of Darwin’s birth (200th anniversary) and publication of On the Origins of Species (150th anniversary). Highlights include:
Feb 17: “Evolution, Science and Society” Misunderstandings about evolution addressed by two WSU scientists, Dr. Mike Webster (School of Biological Sciences), and Dr. Dan Rodgers (Department of Animal Sciences).
Feb 18: Evening Keynote address, “Talk Radio Evolution,” by Pulitzer Prize winning author Edward Humes,
Feb 19: Documentary: “Judgment Day: Intelligent Design
Feb 20: Friday Night Flick: “One Million Years B.C.” starring Raquel Welch
For more information, visit http://ipem.anth.wsu.edu/darwinweek/index.html.
Nature Launches Online Collaborative Space
It’s sort of like MySpace for undergrad scientists. With Nature‘s new Sciatable site (http://www.nature.com/scitable), students and researchers can collaborate, discuss and join groups to study and find jobs. Nature is one of the world’s premiere science journals and, in the words of Boing Boing’s David Weinberger (http://www.boingboing.net/2009/01/15/nature-magazine-laun.html), they’ve shown an “admirable willingness to experiment.” Learn more at http://www.nature.com/scitable.
Update from Marketing, News, and Educational Communications – Brian Clark Has Moved
Brian Clark has moved to Hulbert 217 and has a new phone number: 509-335-6967. His email address, bcclark@wsu.edu, remains the same.
Kudos
Ash Sial, a Ph.D. candidate being mentored by Jay Brunner at the Tree Fruit Research and Extension Center in Wenatchee, was selected as one of two campus-wide outstanding Research Associates by the Graduate and Professional Student Association.