Bear Briefs

Trust to Advance Value of Liberal Education— UM President George M. Dennison has joined the new Presidents’ Trust of the Association of American Colleges and Universities. Dennison and a group of 81 other college and university leaders from around the country formed the trust to make the strongest case for liberal education and its value in today’s world. The Presidents’ Trust will function as a leadership group within the Association of American Colleges and Universities national initiative, which is titled Liberal Education and America’s Promise (LEAP): Excellence for Everyone as a Nation Goes to College. The LEAP Presidents’ Trust believes that a liberal education empowers individuals with core knowledge and transferable skills and prepares graduates both for socially valued work and for civic leadership within their society. Its members represent all sectors of higher education. More information is online at http://www.aacu.org/leap.

Journalism School Launches New Grad Program—The UM School of Journalism now is accepting applications from candidates interested in earning degrees from its new master’s program in environmental science and natural resource journalism. The school will accept applications until Feb. 15, 2010. The new program will begin classes fall semester 2010. The school created the program to address the growing need for journalists who can better understand pressing science and natural resource issues, UM School of Journalism Dean Peggy Kuhr said. Associate Professor Henriette Lowisch is the program director. Students will receive practical training in print, photo, broadcast and online media and take courses in the hard sciences, ethics and law, among others. Almost half of the course work for the two-year program will consist of classes outside of journalism, such as wildlife biology and forestry. For more information about the new master’s program, visit http://www.jour.umt.edu/degree-programs/ma-journalism.

UM Students Attend Climate Conference—Three UM students were among the 10,000 or more people attending the United Nations Climate Change Conference Dec. 7-18 in Copenhagen, Denmark. The students from UM’s Environmental Studies Program are Melissa Hayes, a law and graduate student from Girard, Ohio; Yaicha Bookhout, a senior from Shorewood, Minn.; and Zachary Brown, a freshman from Bozeman. Hayes and Bookhout were selected by the Environmental Studies Program to receive grants from the Wiancko Family Foundation that will fully fund their travel to Copenhagen. With the support of the program, Brown raised his own funds from UM’s Office of the Provost and the Orfalea Foundation. The students will write about their experiences on blogs and Twitter, which can be accessed through the Environmental Studies Program Web site at http://www.cas.umt.edu/evst. They’ll also communicate with classes via live video conferencing and presentations after they return.