News

STEM talk gives overview of Project Lead the Way

Carolyn Malstrom of Project Lead the Way (PLTW) will discuss her program in a STEM talk on Tuesday, April 30 at 4 p.m. in 138 Hasbrouck Lab.
 
PLTW program are among seven programs endorsed by the Massachusetts Governor's STEM Council as an @scale STEM program. Malstrom will provide a one-hour overview information session about the three PLTW programs: Gateway To Technology, Pathway To Engineering, and Biomedical Sciences.
 
The Gateway To Technology program is for middle schools and consists of eight separate units that introduce students to the engineering design process, automation,

Open Source Software Innovation competition announced by ICB3

The Institute for Computational Biology, Biostatistics, and Bioinformatics (ICB3) is accepting letters of intent and submissions for its Open Source Software Innovation competition.
 
Open to all UMass Amherst faculty, postdoctoral fellows and graduate students, the program is designed to support and stimulate software development and trans-disciplinary collaborations among computational, statistical and life sciences researchers, showcase campus strengths in these disciplines, and provide a novel mechanism for the dissemination of new knowledge, tools and research.
 
The tentative prize

Two alumnae recovering from injuries sustained in Boston Marathon attack

Two alumnae are recovering from injuries sustained during the April 15 terrorist bombing in Boston.
 
Brittany A. Loring of Ayer, a 2006 graduate, remains hospitalized but her condition has been upgraded from critical to serious, according to the Ayer News. Longmeadow native Ryan C. McMahon, 33, of Boston, a 2002 graduate, received a fractured vertebra and two broken arms when she fell as the crowd in the viewing stand fled the scene after the blasts, according to the Republican.
 
A recovery fund has been established for Loring.

STEM Diversity Forum scheduled for May 1

The STEM Diversity Institute (SDI) will present a forum on best practices governing advancement of women faculty in STEM fields on Wednesday, May 1 from 5-6:30 p.m. in 145 Integrated Sciences Building. 

Anyone with an interest in the topic is welcome.

The institute’s forum series is aimed at identifying best practices for increasing diversity in STEM fields on campus. The inaugural forum on March 28 drew more than a dozen members of faculty from STEM fields as well as faculty from Social and Behavioral Sciences and campus administrators.

Daffodil Fun Run to benefit Big Brothers Big Sisters

The Daffodil Fun Run, a 5K road race (run/walk) to benefit Big Brothers Big Sisters of Hampshire County, is being held Sunday, April 28 beginning at 11:30 a.m. at Kendrick Park in Amherst.
 
Learn more

 

Doctoral oral exams for April 29 to May 3

The graduate dean invites all graduate faculty to attend the final oral examinations for the doctoral candidates scheduled as follows:

Susan Balaban, Ph.D., Psychology. Monday, April 29, 4 p.m., 131 Tobin. Dissertation: “Trauma and Secure Based Behaviors in Dating Relationships.” Sally Powers, chr.

Zhaochang Peng, Ph.D., Economics. Wednesday, May 1, 9 a.m., 1028 Thompson Reading Room. Dissertation: “Decollectivization and Rural Poverty in Post-Mao China: A Critique of the Conventional Wisdom.” David Kotz and James Boyce, co-chrs.

Xuan Che, Ph.D., Management.

‘Sustainable Since 1863’ T-shirts available from Libraries

The Libraries are offering “Sustainable Since 1863” T-shirts made from recycled bottles for a $20 donation.

The shirts feature an archival photo of the campus’s early days as an agricultural college and were created from post-consumer waste yarns made in the United States from an average 14 bottles per shirt, and each is stamped with a bottle count. Energy and resource savings from the 1,000 shirts ordered include 12,400 bottles diverted from landfills, 199,648 lbs. of greenhouse gases avoided, 137,586 gallons of water and 1,701 kWh hours of electricity saved.
 
The T-shirts will be

Students organize run to raise money for marathon bombing victims fund

Just days after the Boston Marathon bombings, students are organizing a fundraiser to assist victims of the attack and demonstrate the campus community’s support for the people of Boston.
 
Christopher J. Weyant, a first-year Sport Management major from Wilbraham, is the lead organizer of a 2.62-mile campus run tonight. The runners are to gather at 6 p.m. on the plaza between the Mullins Center and the practice skating rink with the run starting off at 6:30 p.m.
 
Weyant says the event is designed to show the people of Boston that the UMass Amherst community supports them and “to show the

Beemyn keynotes Rutgers conference on LGBTQ inclusion

Stonewall Center director Genny Beemyn was a keynote speaker April 18 at “Trans Politics: Scholarship and Strategies for Social Change,” the first conference sponsored by the new Tyler Clementi Center at Rutgers University.
 
Beemyn’s address, which he gave with Sue Rankin of Pennsylvania State University, focused on “Creating a Gender-Inclusive Campus.” 
 
Beemyn and Rankin co-wrote “The Lives of Transgender People” and serve as lead researchers for the LGBT-Friendly Campus Climate Index, which aims to set forth a national standard of LGBT and ally-inclusive policies, program and practices.

Ambitious ‘greening the campus’ goals announced

Chancellor Kumble Subbaswamy recently accepted from his environmental advisory committee an updated Climate Action Plan that outlines ambitious goals for the campus, focused not only on energy efficiency and reduced emissions, but on raising sustainability literacy, student participation and integrating green principles into all of campus life, notably academic courses.
 
The 60-page report updates the campus’s first action plan released in 2010, which identified strategies for reaching carbon neutrality over the next 37 years, by 2050. That is the goal that former President Jack Wilson

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