Top News

PROTHRO CENTER RECEIVES LEED CERTIFICATION

The Prothro Center for Lifelong Learning has been awarded Silver level certification under the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED®) Green Building Rating System™.

Platinum is the highest level of LEED certification, followed by Gold, Silver and Certified. Southwestern was awarded “high” Silver certification by scoring 37 out of a possible 69 LEED credits for the building. A Gold rating requires between 39 and 51 credits. 

The Prothro Center is Southwestern’s second building to receive LEED certification. The Wilhelmina Cullen Admission Center has Gold LEED certification. Bob Mathis, associate vice president for facilities and campus services, said the Prothro Center would have received GOLD certification if it had been built at the same time as the Admission Center, but the USGBC has changed the requirements for LEED certification since then.

“They continue to set the bar higher,” Mathis said.

Read more here.

GARDENERS AIM TO DONATE 1,000 BAGS OF FRESH PRODUCE TO NEEDY CHILDREN AND SENIORS THIS FALL

Growing up, Zoe Martin always had plenty of healthy food available. Her father, a Whole Foods employee, raised his family on natural and organic fare. But Martin knows that other people aren’t as fortunate. That’s why she is involved with a new project on campus that is designed to provide 1,000 bags of fresh produce to local residents this fall.

Martin, a junior anthropology major, is participating in the Community Garden project called SU Shares 1000. Every Monday, she can be seen filling bins full of the eggplants, peppers and potatoes that were harvested over the weekend by community garden volunteers. She loads them into her SUV and heads for the local Meals on Wheels office in Georgetown.

Vanessa Toro, a junior biology and environmental studies major, came up with the idea to partner with Meals on Wheels. She also has established a partnership with the Head Start program in Georgetown.

Read more here.

Events

‘THE MAN WHO CAME TO DINNER’ RUNS THROUGH SUNDAY

The Southwestern University Theatre Department is presenting “The Man Who Came to Dinner” Oct. 21-24 in the Alma Thomas Theater.

The play tells the story of an unassuming Ohio family whose home is taken over by a visiting critic who only came to dinner. He is injured by a slip and fall, so must stay until he is mended. As the situation spins hilariously out of control, a parade of characters takes over the house, from the forgetful country doctor and the frazzled nurse, to the starry-eyed young lovers, famous Hollywood actors, a cockroach farm, an Egyptian mummy case, and a crate of penguins that are gift of Admiral Richard E. Byrd.

The play features a large cast of actors from Southwestern and the Georgetown community. The lead role of Sheridan Whiteside will be played by 1992 Southwestern graduate Brian Coughlin.

Performances will be held on Thursday, Friday and Saturday at 7 p.m. and on Sunday at 3 p.m. Tickets for the Thursday and Sunday performances are $18 for adults and $14 for seniors, students and youth age 16 and under. Tickets for the Friday & Saturday performances are $20 for adults and $16 for seniors, students and youth age 16 and under. Tickets may be purchased by calling the Box Office at 512-863-1378 from 1-5 p.m. Monday-Friday or by going to   http://www.southwestern.edu/boxoffice

PHI BETA KAPPA VISITING SCHOLAR TO SPEAK AT SOUTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY OCT. 28

Jack A. Goldstone, a noted scholar of social movements, revolutions and international politics, will give a lecture at Southwestern University on Thursday, Oct. 28, as part of the 2010 Phi Beta Kappa Visiting Scholar Program.

Goldstone will give a lecture titled “Global Trends in the Quality of Governance and Democracy” at 6 p.m. in Room 105 of the F.W. Olin Building.

Goldstone is the Virginia E. and John T. Hazel Professor of Public Policy at George Mason University. His current research focuses on conditions for building democracy and stability in developing nations, the impact of population change on the global economy and international security, and the cultural origins of modern economic growth.

Goldstone has written more than 100 research articles and is the author of 10 books, including Revolution and Rebellion in the Early Modern World; Why Europe? The Rise of the West in World History; and States, Parties, and Social Movements. His essay, “The New Population Bomb: Four Mega-Trends That Will Change the World,” led off the January/February 2010 issue of Foreign Affairs.

Goldstone has been a consultant for the U.S. State Department, the FBI and the U.S. Agency for International Development, helping devise measures and strategies to cope with failing and failed states. He also led a National Academy of Sciences study of USAID’s democracy assistance programs and ways to evaluate their impact.

“Jack Goldstone is one of the most influential social scientists, not just in academia but in government circles as well,” said Eric Selbin, professor of political science and University Scholar at Southwestern. Selbin references Goldstone’s work several times in his latest book about revolutions.

Read more here.

JAMESON 5K TO BE HELD AT SOUTHWESTERN NOV. 6

The 10th annual Jameson 5K run will be held at Southwestern on Saturday, Nov. 6. The race starts and finishes in front of the Mundy Building on Southwestern Boulevard. Race time is 8 a.m.

All proceeds from the event benefit the Jaysn Jameson Memorial Scholarship Fund at Southwestern.

For more information, or to register, visit   http://jameson5k.com.

Media Coverage

Fox7, Community Impact newspaper and the Williamson County Sun covered the forum for District 52 candidates that Southwestern sponsored. Watch the Fox7 story here. Read the Community Impact story here.

The Austin American-Statesman, the Austin Business Journal, Community Impact newspaper and the Williamson County Sun covered the successful completion of the Priddy Challenge. Read the Business Journal story here. Read the Statesman story here. Read the Community Impact story here.

The Williamson County Sun ran a story about the $127,000 grant Southwestern received from the Associated Colleges of the South to hire a postdoctoral fellow for the Environmental Studies Program.

The Williamson County Sun covered the visit to Southwestern of the two candidates running for Texas Land Commissioner.

Southwestern student Lily Connor was featured in a blog that appeared in The Washington Post. Read the story here.

Austin American-Statesman fitness columnist Pamela LeBlanc did a feature story on cross-country coach Francie Larrieu-Smith. Read the story here.

Notables

Students Lilly Connor and Derrick Dolezal were selected to attend the Interfaith Leadership Institute in Washington, D.C., this weekend. The institute is sponsored by the Interfaith Youth Core.

Michael Cooper, professor of music and holder of the Margarett Root Brown Chair in Fine Arts, published a critical edition of Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy’s secular cantata “Die erste Walpurgisnacht” (the first Walpurgis night), Op. 60, with Baerenreiter-Verlag (Kassel). The work is based on a poem by Goethe and deals with Charlemagne’s forcible conversion to Christianity of the Saxon heathens in the 9th century C.E. – sympathizing with the pagans and portraying their Christian guards as superstitious cowards. Cooper’s edition restores the musical and verbal texts to what the composer intended.

Davi Johnson Thornton, assistant professor of communication studies, has the lead article in the October issue of the journal Critical Studies in Media Communication. Her article is titled: “Race, Risk, and Pathology in Psychiatric Culture: Disease Awareness Campaigns as Governmental Rhetoric.”

A work by Kate Nelson, studio technician in the Art Department, received an Honorable Mention Award in an exhibit titled “Red Heat Contemporary Work in Clay” at the University of Tulsa.

Elisabeth Piedmont-Marton, associate professor of English, spoke at the plenary session of the North Texas Writing Centers Association conference held in Fort Worth last week.

Mary Visser, professor of art, is giving a presentation at the INTERSCULPT 2010 symposium to be held in Paris Oct. 23-31. The conference selected one of Visser’s works to incorporate into the logo for the conference.