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Former Lawrence University Scientist Assumes Leadership of National Physics Association

Former Lawrence University Professor of Physics David Cook has assumed the role of president of the American Association of Physics Teachers, the country’s premier national organization and authority on physics and physical science education with more than 10,000 members in 30 countries.

David-Cook_webCook, who retired as Philetus E. Sawyer Professor of Science in 2008 after 43 years of teaching in the Lawrence physics department, will serve as AAPT’s president in 2010 and past president in 2011. First elected to the association’s executive board in 2007, Cook is the first Lawrence faculty member ever to serve as AAPT president and the first from any Wisconsin college or university since 1955.

The AAPT, says Cook, faces challenges in keeping the United States competitive in an increasingly global marketplace.

“Both the future of the United States as a leader in science and technology and the strength of the U.S. economy are at risk because too few of our most able young people are preparing for careers in science and engineering,” said Cook.  “The AAPT is already playing an important role in addressing this growing crisis.  The current efforts, however, need to be expanded in both intensity and scope.

“We need to assess whether the current AAPT structure and content of our offerings for prospective scientists are as strong as they can be in preparing students for productive 50-year careers in the 21st century and whether they are as appealing as they must be to compete successfully with the students’ alternatives.”

During his four-plus-decades career at Lawrence, Cook has taught nearly every undergraduate physics course while leading the development and incorporation of computers into the physics curriculum.  Beginning in 1985, he built Lawrence’s computational physics laboratory with the support of more than $1 million in grants from the National Science Foundation, Research Corporation, the W. M. Keck Foundation and other sources.

Cook is the author of two textbooks, “The Theory of the Electromagnetic Field,” one of the first to introduce computer-based numerical approaches alongside traditional approaches and “Computation and Problem Solving in Undergraduate Physics.”  He was the recipient of Lawrence’s Excellence in Teaching Award in 1990.

Founded in 1930, the AAPT is headquartered in the American Center for Physics in College Park, Md.

Lawrence University Tickling Top 10 in National Recycling Competition

Lawrence University students, faculty and staff are among the best recyclers in the country based on the early returns of the 2010 RecycleMania competition.

In the competition’s Per Capita Classic category, which tracks the amount of acceptable recyclables per person, Lawrence ranked 11th nationally among 315 colleges and universities through the first two weeks of the contest, which began Jan. 17.

Lawrence had recycled 8.67 pounds per person, just a few soda cans behind no. 10 Stanford University’s average of 8.73 pounds. Colorado College was leading the category at 18.73 pounds per person. Lawrence was the top recycler among 10 Wisconsin colleges participating in the per capita category, which includes St. Norbert College, UW-Madison and UW-Oshkosh.

“This is an opportunity to see how much recycling and waste reduction we can do if we come together as a community and focus our energy,” said Jeff Clark, faculty associate to the president for Green Roots: the sustainable Lawrence initiative. “The data we get from this also helps us identify areas that we need to improve upon, so it will have lasting effects even after the competition is over.”

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.

Sponsored by the College and University Recycling Council, a technical council of the National Recycling Coalition, RecycleMania has several goals, among them increase on-campus recycling participation by students and staff, heighten awareness of a schools’ waste management and recycling programs, lower waste generated on-campus and expand economic opportunities while addressing environmental issues in a positive way.

First conducted in 2001 between Miami University and Ohio University, the RecycleMania competition has grown steadily every year since. In 2009, all 50 states were represented for the first time and in 2010, a record 607 colleges and universities across the United States, Canada and as far away as Qatar are participating. This year’s competition runs through March 27.

RecycleMania 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.

British Comedy “The Storm or ‘The Howler'” Performed in Lawrence University’s Cloak Theatre

British playwright Peter Oswald’s “The Storm or ‘The Howler,'” an appalling mistranslation of Plautus’ Roman comedy “The Rope,” will be performed Feb. 18-20 by the Lawrence University department of theatre arts.

Show times will be Thursday, Feb. 18 and Friday, Feb. 19 at 8 p.m. with two shows on Saturday, Feb. 20 at 3 and 8 p.m. in Lawrence’s Cloak Theatre. Tickets, at $10 for adults and $5 for senior citizens and students, are available through the Lawrence Box Office, 920-832-6749. Due to suggestive content, this production may not be appropriate for anyone 16 years or younger.

While Oswald’s translation draws from the main plot of Plautus’ original comedy, he takes great liberties in retelling the story. First produced in 2005, “The Storm or ‘The Howler'” deals comically with freedom and loss and employs physical comedy, audience interaction and various anachronisms.

Kathy Privatt, associate professor of theatre arts and James G. and Ethel M. Barber Professor of Theatre and Drama, is directing the production. She says Oswald was having fun in giving his translation a double title.

“All the action of the play is set in motion by a storm and then the romp that follows will hopefully make the audience ‘howl’ with laughter,” said Privatt.

Plautus’ original comedy, written around 211 B.C., revolves around Palaestra, a young girl kidnapped by pirates at the age of three and sold into prostitution. When a storm causes a shipwreck, washing Palaestra ashore, she seeks shelter in a temple of Venus, where she is found by a slave. Comedic confrontations between slaves and masters, masters and pimps and pimps and slaves ensue.

Social Justice Series Features LU Seniors Discussing Role of Education in Rebuilding Haiti

Lawrence University seniors Oliver and Rebecca Zornow, who founded a school in Haiti, will discuss how education and poverty eradication can lessen the impact of natural disasters in the third installment of Lawrence’s 2009-10 Social Justice Lecture Series.

The Zornows present “Natural Disaster, Poverty and Rebuilding Haiti Through Education” Thursday, Feb. 18 at 6:30 p.m. in the Warch Campus Center cinema. The event is free and open to the public.

After visiting Caneille, Haiti in February 2006 as a senior at Appleton’s Valley New School, a charter school that emphasizes project-based learning, Oliver Zornow was inspired to start a school for the children he met there. Through arts and crafts sales, car washes, rummage sales, recycling cell phones and numerous other fundraisers, he was able to raise more than $5,000 for the Caneille Regional Development Fund (CDRF). In September 2006,Zornow was able to open the School of Grace of Caneille with 130 students. Since then, the school has added a grade each year and currently covers grades 1-6. For the past two years, the school has provided a daily meal program for students as well.

Since embarking on the project, the Zornows have raised approximately $25,000 to keep the school operating. They visit the school at least once a year to visit with teachers and students and lead groups on visits. The recent earthquake in Haiti, however, has temporarily closed the School of Grace of Caneille.

The Social Justice Lecture Series is sponsored by the Lawrence University Volunteer and Community Center and supports campus speakers who discuss contemporary social justice issues.

Author Presentation Looks at Surviving as an Outsider

Author, playwright and performance artist Kate Bornstein addresses the factors that makes one an outsider — race, religion, weight, sexual preference — and offers way to avoid suffering as one in the presentation “Hello Cruel World: Survival Tips for Outsiders” Wednesday, Feb. 17 at 8:15 p.m. in the Lawrence University Wriston Art Center auditorium. The program is free and open to the public.

A transsexual who was born male and underwent gender reassignment surgery, Bornstein is the author of the book “Hello, Cruel World: 101 Alternatives to Suicide for Teens, Freaks and Other Outlaws,” an unconventional approach to teenage suicide prevention for marginalized youth.

In her other books — “Gender Outlaw,” “Nearly Roadkill” and “My Gender Workbook” — Bornstein deconstructs all ideas about gender and challenges the “inherent oppression of a binary gender system.”

Bornstein’s appearance is sponsored by the Gender Studies department and the Lawrence University Campus Suicide Prevention Project, which is supported by a U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration grant.

Counseling Services Director Discusses Community Suicide Prevention Efforts in Live Webcast

Kathleen Fuchs, Lawrence University’s director of counseling services and adjunct associate professor of psychology, will be the featured guest Thursday, Feb. 11 at 11:30 a.m. in a live webcast interview with members of the editorial board of The Post-Crescent.

Fuchs will discuss Lawrence-led initiatives to engage the campus and Fox Valley communities in suicide prevention efforts. To watch the interview or join the conversation, visit www.postcrescent.com.

Lawrence recently was awarded a $25,130 grant from the J.J. Keller Foundation, Inc. to coordinate free suicide prevention training by mental health experts for Fox Valley area educators and youth-serving nonprofit organizations.

Last fall, Lawrence received a three-year $300,000 grant Lawrence from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) to implement a comprehensive initiative designed to lower suicide risk and enhance protective factors among Lawrence students.

Read excerpts from the interview here.

Lawrence University Awarded $25,000 Grant by J.J. Keller Foundation for Community-Wide Suicide Prevention Training

Lawrence University has been awarded a $25,130 grant from the Neenah-based J.J. Keller Foundation, Inc. to coordinate free suicide prevention training by mental health experts for Fox Valley area school districts and youth-serving nonprofit organizations.

Under the direction of Kathleen Fuchs, director of counseling services at Lawrence and adjunct associate professor of psychology, the grant will provide advanced clinical skills training and evidence-based gatekeeper instructor training for area clinicians, student services staff and staff from youth-serving non-profit agencies. The goal is to train key personnel to better recognize early warning signs of suicide risk and connect young people to existing mental health services for earlier and more effective intervention and treatment.

The Keller grant comes on the heels of a three-year $300,000 grant Lawrence was awarded last October by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) to implement a comprehensive initiative designed to lower suicide risk and enhance protective factors among Lawrence students.

“The SAMHSA grant was terrific news for the Lawrence community, but the college strongly wanted to ensure that the broader Fox Cities community also benefited,” said Fuchs. “The terms of the SAMSHA grant limited what we could spend on activities that won’t directly benefit a college audience. Through the generosity of the Keller Foundation, this grant will enable us to reach beyond the campus borders and extend some benefits of that federal grant throughout the Fox Valley.

“Given the recent tragedies in the community, we felt it imperative that we accelerate our timetable for carrying out the planned training and make every effort to extend its community impact,” Fuchs added. “With the help of the Keller grant, we’ll be able to begin that training as soon as this March.”

David Mays, a forensic psychiatrist at the University of Wisconsin and former director of the forensic program at the Mendota Mental Health Institute in Madison, will lead two day-long training workshops in mid-March on mental health and suicide assessment skills for invited participants from the Lawrence and Fox Valley communities. The workshops will include a day of in-depth core competency training specifically for higher-ed, K-12 and community practitioners that will enhance skills in effectively guiding persons at high suicide risk through critical moments in their lives.

Workshop participants will include representatives from local public and private K-12 school districts, Fox Valley Technical College, UW-Fox as well as Affinity and ThedaCare Behavioral Health units. Other key area nonprofit organizations such as NAMI, the YMCA, Goodwill-Harmony Cafe, Boys & Girls Club and others will be invited to participate.

Additional training this summer will utilize QPR — Question, Persuade, Refer — an evidence-based program that empowers ordinary individuals to recognize early warning signs of an individual in distress, open a supportive dialogue that persuades the individual to accept help and connect them to mental health services.

“The QPR model is based on a ‘chain of survival’ approach much like CPR,” Fuchs explained. “With just a 90-minute training session, participants can learn to be ‘gatekeepers’ who know how to recognize early suicide warning signs and reach out to people in distress.”

Fuchs said the QPR gatekeeper instructor training sessions made possible by the Keller grant will involve 62 community members. Those trained instructors will then conduct QPR gatekeeper training for their organization’s internal and external audiences over the course of the ensuing 18 months.

“Through the QPR instructor training, we’ll be able to provide organizations with a self-sustaining resource, allowing us to create a tremendous impact with a relatively small up-front investment,” said Fuchs. “Our first 62 trained instructors will subsequently train at least 1,550 new gatekeepers. If each gatekeeper reaches at least 50 students, colleagues, friends and neighbors, we will have put 77,500 members of our community within reach of early intervention.”

The Keller Foundation’s primary mission is to support organizations, projects and programs that address the causes and consequences of poverty. The focus population is homeless and disadvantaged individuals, the elderly, and children and youth. The Foundation was formed by John J. “Jack” and Ethel D. Keller in 1991 and their family has continued the Keller legacy of giving since their passing. Nearly $25 million has been given to more than 300 community organizations over the past two decades.

Relationship of Human Rights and Literature Examined in Lawrence Main Hall Forum

The relationship between literature and human rights will be examined Monday, Feb. 8 in the Lawrence University Main Hall Forum “War Crimes and Representation.” The presentation, at 4:30 p.m. in Main Hall 201, is free and open to the public.

James Dawes, associate professor of English and American literature at Macalester College, discusses his work with Japanese war criminals, who participated in the 1937-38 rape of Nanking, China, in which invading Japanese troops slaughtered more than 369,000 Chinese civilians and prisoners of war and raped an estimated 80,000 women and girls.

Dawes interviewed the war criminals, who offered their confessions both as a warning and a desire to spread them in the western world before they die. His presentation will explore the importance of the confessions as part of the collective moral archive of the 20th century to create an accurate account of our time for future generations as well as how these confessions represent an impossibility in language.

The founder and director of the Program in Human Rights and Humanitarianism at Macalester, Dawes is the author of “The Language of War,” which examines the relationship between language and violence and “That the World May Know: Bearing Witness to Atrocity,” a finalist in the 2008 Independent Publisher Book Awards, which chronicles the successes and failures of the modern human rights movement.

Grammy Winner Bobby McFerrin to Perform “Migrations” at Lawrence Feb. 19

Ten-time Grammy winner Bobby McFerrin joins the Lawrence University Jazz Ensemble, Studio Orchestra and Hybrid Ensemble at 8 p.m., February 19, for the sold-out U.S. premiere of “Migrations: One World, Many Musics.”

Composed by Lawrence’s own Fred Sturm, Kimberly Clark Professor of Music and director of jazz studies, “Migrations” was commissioned in 2007 by McFerrin and the NDR Big Band in Hamburg, Germany. The work is a “musical plea for world unity” that illustrates both the distinct and shared characteristics of indigenous music from 18 countries on six continents.

Collaborating with a former Lawrence student, Brian Pertl ’86, an ethnomusicologist and, at the time, the manager of Microsoft’s Media Acquisitions Group, Sturm researched more than 2,000 recordings from around the globe. Sturm transcribed, arranged, orchestrated and “recomposed” about two-dozen indigenous recordings to create the magical two-hour concert showcasing McFerrin.

“The music we selected for ‘Migrations’ is centuries old,” Sturm said. “It’s pure, innocent, beautiful and powerful. Though the character and styles are as varied as the world’s people who created this music, there is a prevalent common linkage between the selections. Bobby’s improvisations and interpretations of the material I’ve scored are intended to illustrate the musical unity of the world’s people.”

With a four-octave vocal range and a wide array of vocal techniques, McFerrin is one of the natural wonders of the world. Famous for his 1989 hit “Don’t Worry, Be Happy,” he is an ardent spokesman for music education. His collaborations with other artists such as Yo-Yo Ma, Chick Corea, and Herbie Hancock have established him as an ambassador of both the jazz and classical music worlds.

The concert will also feature Pertl, now the dean of the Lawrence University Conservatory of Music, playing the didjeridu and jaw harp, and Dane Richeson, professor of music at Lawrence, on drums and percussion.

Sturm will host a pre-concert lecture at 7 p.m. in Stansbury Theatre, Music Drama Center, 420 E. College Ave, west of Lawrence Memorial Chapel. The concert is sold out, however, the public is invited to enter a contest to win one of 10 pairs of tickets for this special performance beginning Wednesday, February 10.

Haitian Musicians to Perform at “Friends of Haiti Chamber Music Concert” Feb. 6

Lawrence University students, faculty, alumni and friends — including volunteers from music camps and Haitian musicians — will come together for the “Friends of Haiti Chamber Orchestra Benefit Concert”, Saturday, February 6, at 6:30 p.m. in the Lawrence Memorial Chapel. The public is welcome and tickets are not required.

It will be the third concert at Lawrence in as many weeks to benefit Holy Trinity Music School in Port-au-Prince, where Lawrence students and faculty have taught music for more than 10 years. The school and church complex were destroyed in the earthquake January 12. The Lawrence concerts have, to date, raised nearly $10,000 for Holy Trinity.

The concert on February 6 will begin with a silent auction at 6 p.m. featuring Haitian artwork and art produced especially for the event by members of a studio art class at Lawrence. The concert will highlight the music of Haitian composers and, in addition to numerous Lawrence students and faculty, will feature performances by musicians from across the United States, nearly all with connections to Haiti and the Holy Trinity Music School. Visiting Lawrence to participate will be John Jost, Bradley University; Steven Huang, Ohio University; Donna Lively Clark, Indianapolis; Keith Johnston, Sacred Heart University; Mary Procopio, Mott Community College, Flint, Michigan; Rob Wessler, UW-LaCrosse; and Lawrence alumni Sarah Davies ’09 and Paul Karner ’08.

Joining them will be Haitian musicians Benjamin Pierre Louis, University of Memphis; Canes Nicolas, Ohio University; Jethro Celestin, Loyola University; Tercy Hethkenly, New Wilmington, Penn.; Yonel François, Appleton; Fabienne Fanord, Port-au-Prince; and several musicians from the Mott Community College Educational and Cultural Residency Program in Flint, Michigan, including Fred Clovis, Carlot Dorve, Deborah Etienne, Ralph Stanley Jean Baptiste and Mackelder Saintilus.

“The outpouring of generosity has been overwhelming,” said Janet Anthony, Lawrence professor of cello and the leader of many music camps in Haiti. “I am in contact with many of our friends in Port-au-Prince, and they are so very grateful for our support. Whether it comes in the form of immediate, life saving gifts, or longer term support for a cultural gem such as Holy Trinity Music School, we know we are making a difference in their lives.”

Holy Trinity Music School, Port-au-Prince

Holy Trinity Church was founded in 1863 by the Episcopal Church and, as part of the church’s mission, several primary schools were established. Holy Trinity Music School began in 1970. Now serving over 1200 students, there are five orchestras, including Haiti’s only philharmonic orchestra, a boy choir, and three symphonic bands. Instruction is offered in all instrumental and vocal areas. The Holy Trinity Philharmonic Orchestra and the Petit Chanteurs have a very active performance schedule across Haiti. The Petits Chanteurs and a small instrumental ensemble have toured the United States five times in the past seven years to great acclaim. Those wishing to help the school may contribute online at www.cffoxvalley.org/donate. Select the Haiti Music School Rebuilding Fund from the drop down list of fund options.