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Appleton Downtown Inc. Honors Lawrence University for Warch Campus Center, College Ave. Median Project

Downtown Appleton, Inc. recognized Lawrence University March 18 with its 2010 Dreamers and Doers Award for the opening of the Warch Campus Center and the completion of the College Avenue median project.

The annual Dreamers and Doers Award, presented at ADI’s annual dinner at the Radisson Paper Valley Hotel, recognizes a business, group or individual “who has significantly enhanced, for years to come, the physical and/or economic landscape of the downtown.”

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Warch Campus Center

Nearly 20 years in the making, the $35 million, 107,000-square-foot Warch Campus Center opened last September to rave reviews. In November, U.S. Green Building Council awarded the environmentally friendly building LEED-certified Gold status, the second highest designation on the green building four-level certification system.

The Dreamers and Doers Award is just the latest accolade for the Warch Campus Center. It previously was named one of Wisconsin Builder magazine’s 2009 Top Projects, earned a Concrete Design Award from the Wisconsin Ready Mixed Concrete Association and was named winner in the “Best New Construction” category in FOX CITIES Magazine’s annual “Great Spaces Great Places” contest.

The College Ave. median project between Drew and Lawe streets, was a joint undertaking between Lawrence, the City of Appleton and private donors in the historic neighborhood who funded the project.

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College Ave. Median Garden

The revamped median was turned into a natural garden with shrubs, trees and flowers, providing a beautiful entrance to downtown Appleton. Lighted Lawrence University signs on each end of the median remind motorists they are driving through the campus. The median also features two well-defined crosswalks to enhance safety for students crossing the busy boulevard.

$25,000 Watson Fellowship Sending Alex Winter to Asia for Video Game Culture Study

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Alex Winter

Alex Winter got his first taste of video gaming as a five-year old, playing “Sim City” at home in his father’s attic office with his dad. He’s been hooked ever since.

“Video games have been a part of my life my entire life,” said the Lawrence University senior, who soon will turn his life-long affection for gaming into a year-long study of the social phenomenon of the video game culture in East Asia.

Winter was one of 40 undergraduates nationally awarded a $25,000 fellowship from the Rhode Island-based Thomas J. Watson Foundation for a year of independent travel and exploration outside the United States on a topic of the student’s choosing. Winter, whose proposal —“Video Game Culture Studies in East Asia, Korea, China, Japan” — was selected from among 150 finalists representing 40 of the nation’s premier private liberal arts colleges and universities. More than 820 students applied for this year’s Watson Fellowship.

Interactive entertainment — gaming — has grown exponentially since the primitive days of “Pong.” According to Price Waterhouse Coopers, interactive entertainment earned $41.9 billion in 2007 and is anticipated to surpass music revenue by 2011.

As it has evolved, interactive entertainment has moved away from the one game/one player model toward entire communities of players who are brought together through the game itself, creating an international digital community with a unique subculture.

“Video gaming is creating its own, unique traditions every day,” said Winter, a biology major from Seattle, Wash. “Chief among them is a social, cultural network that circles the globe without regard for national boundaries or languages. The interactive entertainment industry is poised to change the world as profoundly as the Internet. We’re standing on the brink of a cultural revolution and now is the perfect time to study this infant culture.”

Winter will use his fellowship to visit China, Japan and South Korea, where the video game community holds mainstream positions much the same way Americans treat sports.

“I intend to spend time studying cyber athleticism, performance, economics and addiction in places where they are exceptionally visible, such as Internet cafes, gaming centers, arenas and conventions,” said Winter. “I want to immerse myself in the culture, performing observational studies and interviews whenever possible.”

Starting in mid-July, Winter will travel first to Hong Kong, the center of a unique economy in which real money is exchanged for goods that exist only inside the video game world. The next five months will be spent in Japan, home to three of the largest interactive entertainment publishers: Nintendo, Sony and Sega.

“The most accomplished players in Japan draw crowds of admirers, which is a fundamentally different style of video gaming than what is practiced here in the states,” said Winter. “Players compete against both the computer and the previous player in what might be called ‘video game performance art.’ I want to explore the motivations of those who perform and those who come to watch this unique style of entertainment.”

In January, Winter will travel to Beijing, home to the only state-sponsored video game addiction recovery center in the world. He plans to meet the doctors who treat the patients whose attachment to video games is near dependence levels and the video gamers themselves to explore how their addiction grew, how it affected their life and what led them to counseling.

During an ensuing five-month stay in South Korea, where competitions with prizes as high as $500,000 are nationally televised events, Winter will explore the country’s specialized Internet cafes and the phenomenon of cyber athletes.

“The possibilities for learning about and embracing my gamer self in a country that lauds its players are exciting and endless,” said Winter.

He will return to China in July 2011 to close his study in Shanghai, which boasts an exceptionally high number of gamers.

“I’m looking forward to seeing the interplay of traditional Chinese culture and interactive gaming in Shanghai,” said Winter.” “Of the three Chinese cities on my itinerary, Shanghai is the most traditional. Its collision and merger with state-of-the-art interactive entertainment will be a telling testament to the phenomenon of merging cultures.”

Brian Pertl, dean of the conservatory of music, served as Lawrence’s campus liaison to the Watson program this year. He said Winter will break “new ground” with his fellowship.

“His project is different. It’s exploring areas that haven’t been tackled by any previous Watson fellows,” said Pertl, a 1986 Watson Fellowship recipient himself as a student at Lawrence. “Alex’s passion for this topic as a scholar and as a participant in social gaming gives him the perfect background for this award. I’m confident he’ll come back with some deep insights and fantastic experiences.”

Winter sees his project not as a departure from his study of biology, but rather an extension of it.

“A background in biological science is fundamentally an education in methodical parsing of cause and effect,” said Winter. “Human culture can be examined as a complex system with confounding factors. My background in science gives me a scaffold on which to build this study and dig into the new sociological frontier presented by East Asian gaming.”

Winter is the 67th Lawrence student awarded a Watson Fellowship since the program’s inception in 1969. It was established by the children of Thomas J. Watson, Sr., the founder of International Business Machines Corp., and his wife, Jeannette, to honor their parents’ long-standing interest in education and world affairs.

Watson Fellows are selected on the basis of the nominee’s character, academic record, leadership potential, willingness to delve into another culture and the personal significance of the project proposal. Since its founding, nearly 2,600 fellowships have been awarded.

Lawrence University Jumps to No. 6 in National Recycling Competition

With less than three weeks remaining in the 2010 national RecycleMania competition, Lawrence University has moved up from 11th to 6th place in the per capita classic category according to the most recent standings. The category tracks the amount of acceptable materials recycled per person.

Lawrence had recycled an average of 21.99 pounds per person, up from 8.67 pounds at the beginning of the competition, which features 315 colleges and universities across the nation. Colorado College continues to lead the category at 34.58 pounds per person. Lawrence is first among 12 other Wisconsin schools in the per capita classic category.

RecycleMania is a friendly, 10-week-long competition and benchmarking tool for college and university recycling programs to promote waste reduction activities to their campus communities. The challenge, which ends March 27, includes four primary competition categories:

• Grand Champion, which combines trash and core recyclable materials to determine a school’s recycling rate as a percentage of its overall waste generation.

• Per Capita Classic, in which schools compete to see which can collect the largest combined amount of paper, cardboard and bottles and cans per person.

• Waste Minimization, in which schools compete to see which produces the least amount of municipal solid waste (recyclables and trash) per person.

• Gorilla Prize, which recognizes schools that recycle the highest gross tonnage of combined paper, cardboard, bottles and cans during the 10-week competition, regardless of campus population.

First conducted in 2001 between Miami University and Ohio University, the 2010 RecycleMania competition features a record 607 colleges and universities across the United States, Canada and as far away as Qatar.

Lawrence University Delegation Recognized at Model United Nations Conference

Lawrence University students Angela Ting and Angela Wang earned the “Best Delegation” award as members of Lawrence’s Model United Nations team at the recent 50th annual Midwest Model United Nations Conference in St. Louis, Mo.

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Angela Wang (l.) and Angela Ting

Lawrence’s eight-member delegation represented El Salvador in the General Assembly and the Economic and Social Council. Ting, a junior from Malaysia, and Wang, a sophomore from Forest Hills, N.Y., represented the General Assembly Third Committee. They were awarded Best Delegation honors for their work debating the provision of humanitarian assistance to refugees and internally-displaced persons in conflict situations.

During the four-day conference, the Lawrence delegation also participated in debates regarding the role of the United Nations in promoting development in the context of globalization and interdependence, the impact of drugs on development and the U.N.’s role in combating transnational organized crime. The regional conference drew more than 900 students from nearly 80 colleges and universities throughout the Midwest.

Also representing Lawrence were sophomore Carrie Brown, Chicago, Ill., sophomore Gi’selle Jones, Kingston, Jamaica, sophomore Amanda Popp, Palmyra, junior Tasmia Rahman, Dhaka, Bangladesh, sophomore Ranga Wimalasuriya, Nugegoda, Sri Lanka, and freshman Mingxia Zhu, Guangzhou, China.

Founded in 1960, the Midwest Model United Nations is a collegiate organization devoted to broadening students’ awareness of world politics by promoting an interest and understanding of other nations in the world. At the conference, student delegations representing various nations work on pressing international issues to gain perspective on the world and the United Nations’ role in world politics.

Service Learning Efforts Earn Lawrence University National Honor Roll Recognition

For the fourth consecutive year, Lawrence University has been named to the President’s Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll, the highest federal recognition a college or university can receive for its commitment to volunteering, service-learning and civic engagement.

Lawrence is one of only four Wisconsin institutions named to the Community Service Honor Roll every year since the program was launched in 2006. This year’s honor roll, announced by the Corporation for National and Community Service, recognized more than 700 colleges and universities for their impact on issues from poverty and homelessness to environmental justice in 2009.

“Preparing students for lives of responsible citizenship is a tenet of a Lawrence education and I am gratified that the dedicated efforts of our students here in our community and elsewhere once again have earned national recognition,” said Lawrence President Jill Beck. “I commend the students on their efforts to impact the greater community in a positive manner during their time here, as well as our Pieper Professor of Servant Leadership and the other faculty and staff members who assist them in those efforts.”

Honorees for the 2010 President’s Community Service Honor Roll were chosen on a series of factors, including scope and innovativeness of service projects, percentage of student participation in service activities, incentives for service, and the extent to which the school offers academic service-learning courses.

In the past year, more than 600 Lawrence students contributed more than 12,000 service hours to service-learning and volunteer programs. Among the initiatives for which Lawrence was recognized was the establishment of a partnership with the Pragati Foundation in Bangalore, India, for summer teaching opportunities with underprivileged middle school students; the Confidence and Determination in Youth (CADY) student organization which provides younger students an inspirational, college-like experience in learning; and the Lawrence Assistance Reaching Youth (LARY) Buddies, a mentoring program for at-risk elementary students.

“Our students are contributing literally thousands of hours of volunteer service on behalf of others in both our own Fox Valley community as well on the global stage, all within the confines of a rigorous academic program,” said Alan Parks, Lawrence’s Pieper Family Professor of Servant Leadership and director of the college’s Office for Engaged Learning. “We’re seeing annual increases in service hours by our students which makes it all the more gratifying that those efforts are being recognized nationally through the President’s Community Service Honor Roll.”

According to the Corporation for National and Community Service, a federal agency, 3.16 million students performed more than 300 million hours of service in 2009. The Corporation’s Learn and Serve America program supports service-learning in schools, institutions of higher education and community-based organizations.

The President’s Community Service Honor Roll is compiled by the Corporation for National and Community Service in collaboration with the Department of Education, Department of Housing and Urban Development, Campus Compact, and the American Council on Education.

Bernstein Classic “Candide” Makes Lawrence University Debut

Leonard’s Bernstein’s popular operetta “Candide” will be performed March 4-7 at Lawrence University for the first time.

Based on Voltaire’s 1759 satirical novel of the same name, “Candide” will be staged March 4-6 at 8 p.m. and March 7 at 3 p.m. in Stansbury Theatre, 420 E. College Ave. Tickets, at $10 for adults and $5 for senior citizens and students, are available through the Lawrence University Box Office, 920-832-6749.

Like Voltaire’s novella, Bernstein’s operetta is a bitter critique of optimism and the idea that “all is for the best in this best of all possible worlds.” The story follows Candide, the young illegitimate cousin of a noble family who grows up in a castle. He learns from his mentor, Pangloss, that everything in life happens for a reason and all is for the best.

But Candide’s ideas of optimism are painfully tempered by life’s hardships: his love, Cunegonde, is killed in an attack by the Bulgarian army; he sees the population of Lisbon wiped out by an earthquake; and Pangloss is hanged for heresy. Ultimately, Candide realizes “we must cultivate our garden” and make the best of what we are given in life.

“‘Candide’ is a show that has perennial appeal,” said Bonnie Koestner, associate professor of music and vocal coach for the production. “Leonard Bernstein has created a happy marriage between Broadway and opera. His score bubbles with fun and frivolity, yet the piece deals with some of life’s most serious questions, all wrapped up in a non-stop adventure story.”

Ben Krywosz, artistic director of Nautilus Music-Theater in St. Paul, Minn., is serving as guest stage director for the production. He is confident audiences will be surprised at how both funny and moving “Candide” can be.

“For all his musical sophistication, Bernstein was a populist at heart,” said Krywosz. “Both those qualities are evident in ‘Candide,’ wonderful toe-tapping tunes combined with a sumptuous operatic sweep.

“We’re taking a slightly unusual approach with this production, which is already a wild and crazy story,” Krywocz added. “The student performers have all been enthusiastic partners in bringing this score to life.”

First performed in 1956, Bernstein’s “Candide” presents a challenge to directors and performers, because it has been published in so many different forms, including a one-act Broadway revival and later a two-act “opera house version” first performed in New York City in 1982. Lawrence’s production will be an updated version by Krywosz in which the main characters address the audience directly, explaining Voltaire’s intentions and relating his ideas to modern life and current events as the plot unfolds.

The production features a double cast of 40 performers. Seniors Alex Gmeinder (Thursday-Saturday) and Justin Berkowitz (Friday-Sunday) portray the title role while seniors Lara Wasserman (Thursday-Saturday) and Taylor Jacobson (Friday-Sunday) play Candide’s love interest, Cunegonde. Pangloss is portrayed by senior Derrell Acon (Thursday-Saturday) and sophomore Brian Acker (Friday-Sunday).

Professor of Music David Becker will conduct the Lawrence Symphony Orchestra for the performances. Associate Professor of Theatre Arts Richmond Frielund served as set designer for the production.

Award-winning Author Jill McCorkle Conducts Fiction Reading

Fiction writer Jill McCorkle shares short stories from her 2009 collection “Going Away Shoes” Thursday, March 4 at 4:30 p.m. in the Warch Campus Center. The reading is free and open to the public.

Jill-McCorkle_webHer first short story collection in eight years, “Going Away Shoes” features stories of “women looking love in the face without flinching.” A member of the Fellowship of Southern Writers, McCorkle’s Southern heritage often influences her story ideas.

The Lee Smith Professor in Creative Writing at North Carolina State University, McCorkle has written five novels and four collections of short stories. Five of her works have been selected as New York Times Notable Books. Her stories have appeared in numerous publications, including two in the “Best American Short Stories.” Her story “Intervention” is included in latest edition of the “Norton Anthology of Short Fiction.”

She has been recognized with the New England Book Award, the John Dos Passos Prize for Excellence in Literature and the North Carolina Award for Literature. In 1984, at the age of 26, McCorkle made literary history by having her first two novels, “The Cheer Leader” and “July 7th,” published simultaneously.

McCorkle’s characters have come to life with the recent production of “Good ‘Ol Girls,” a musical based on her work and the writing of Lee Smith, McCorkle’s former teacher. The musical was originally staged in 2000, premiered on television in 2009 and came to New York City in February of this year for its off-Broadway premiere.

Underground Comix Examined in Visiting Artist Series Lecture

The evolution of underground comix into a popular art form will be the focus of the latest Lawrence University visiting artists series lecture.

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James Danky, who teaches in the University of Wisconsin School of Journalism and Mass Communication, presents “Underground Classics: The Transformation of Comics into Comix” Thursday, March 4 at 4:30 p.m. in the Wriston Art Center auditorium. The event is free and open to the public.

The presentation is based on Danky’s 2009 book of the same name. The book, co-written with Denis Kitchen, explores the work of generations of cartoonists, the impact of American underground comix on the economics of mainstream comic book publishing and their influence on modern culture.

Underground comix — small press or self-published, socially relevant or satirical comic books — gained popularity in the late 1960s and early ’70s in the United States and Great Britain. They often include content forbidden by the Comics Code Authority. Danky’s new book is the first serious survey of this often overlooked art form.

Danky is the founder and director of the Center for the History of Print Culture in Modern America at UW-Madison. He spent 35 years as newspapers and periodicals librarian for the Wisconsin Historical Society, developing a nationally recognized collection in the field of American History, before retiring in 2007. He has written or edited dozens of books on topics ranging from African American newspapers to women’s publications to the Native American press.

His appearance is supported by the department of art and art history.

LSO Concert Features World Premiere of Asha Srinivasan’s “Doubt”

The world premiere of composer Asha Srinivasan’s “Doubt” highlights the Lawrence University Symphony Orchestra concert Saturday, Feb. 27 at 8 p.m. in the Lawrence Memorial Chapel, 520 E. College Ave., Appleton. The concert is free and open to the public.

Under the direction of conductor David Becker, the Lawrence Symphony Orchestra also will perform Prokofiev’s “Symphony No. 1 in D Major, op. 25” and Beethoven’s famous “Eroica” symphony.

Provost and Dean of the Faculty David Burrows will serve as guest narrator for “Doubt,” which was originally written as Srinivasan’s doctoral dissertation at the University of Maryland. The text and the music reflect Srinivasan’s deeply personal thoughts on capital punishment.

An assistant professor of music at Lawrence, Srinivasan draws from both her Western musical training and her Indian heritage in creating her compositions. Raised with Carnatic music, the classical music of Southern India, Srinivasan integrates aspects of the Carnatic style into the Western music idiom.

The concert also will feature Seong-Kyung Graham as guest conductor. Graham currently serves as director of the Green Bay Civic Symphony. She was appointed conductor and artistic director of the symphony in 2005

The concert will be webcast beginning at 7:30 p.m. with a pre-concert program.

LU Alum Discusses Pediatric Respiratory Diseases in Two Presentations

Lawrence University graduate Kurt Albertine ’75 returns to campus to discusses his work with pediatric respiratory diseases in a pair of science hall presentations.

Kurt-Albertine_web Albertine professor of pediatrics and adjunct professor of medicine, neurobiology & anatomy at the University of Utah, delivers the Science Hall Colloquium “From Here to There:  An Alumnus’ Trip from Plants to Pediatrics” Wednesday, Feb. 24 at 4:30 p.m. in Thomas Steitz Science Hall 102.

Albertine will trace his academic training and the professional journey he took from his student days at Lawrence to a research career focused on acute respiratory distress syndrome and neonatal chronic lung disease.

Beginning with World War II, Albertine will discuss some of the medical advances made in regards to acute respiratory distress syndrome and neonatal chronic lung disease, including inventions and discoveries that provided opportunities and tools to better understand respiratory support of humans, both adult and preterm infants.

In a Recent Advances in Biology series address on Friday, Feb. 26 at 3:10 p.m. in Thomas Steitz Science Hall 102, Albertine presents “A New View about the Pathogenesis of the Second Most Common Pediatric Health Problem in the U.S.”

The address will examine the growing problem of neonatal chronic lung disease, which occurs in preterm infants who require assisted conventional mechanical ventilation.  Approximately 10,000 new cases of neonatal CLD are reported each year in the United States.

Albertine will discuss his research using a large-animal model (lambs) to investigate fundamental questions regarding the underlying molecular changes that contribute to neonatal CLD.

After graduating from Lawrence with a major in biology, Albertine earned his Ph.D. in anatomy at Loyola University’s Stritch School of Medicine. Prior to joining the University of Utah School of Medicine in 1993, he held research and teaching positions at the University of California, San Francisco, the University of South Florida, the University of Pennsylvania and Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia.