August 2004

Bear Briefs
Greet the Griz—This year’s Great Griz Encounter has been combined with the Missoula Downtown Association’s Downtown ToNight. The event will be held from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 26, in Caras Park. Attendees can meet the Grizzly football players and UM’s new Monte mascot, as well as enjoy live music, a beverage garden and many food vendors. Head football coach Bobby Hauck also will say a few words, and Griz cheerleaders will present raffle tickets for prizes from the Bookstore at UM.

Education Attorney—A lawyer with a broad background in public education has been hired to serve as chief legal counsel for the Montana University System. Catherine M. Swift, a partner in the Helena law firm of Gough, Shanahan, Johnson & Waterman, will begin her new position Sept. 1. It’s a job with which Swift is somewhat familiar: She worked as a staff attorney and served as acting chief counsel for the university system in her first years as a practicing attorney during 1975-1978. Since 1988, Swift has been a public school attorney, first with the Montana School Boards Association from September 1988 to December 1989, and since then, in private practice. She replaces LeRoy Schramm, who has held the position since 1981. Schramm retired Dec. 30, 2003, but has continued to serve in post-retirement status.

Get Some Ice Cream—The third annual community ice cream social, which welcomes new and returning UM students to campus and the surrounding neighborhoods, will be held from 3 to 5 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 12, in the 400 block of University Avenue. The street party will feature live music, introduction of special guests and much mingling. There will be free ice cream for all, as well as bubble dispensers and chalk for sidewalk art for children. Baskin-Robbins, Big Dipper and other Missoula retailers are donating the ice cream and other supplies. Begun in 2002, the event was created by a group calling itself Thoughtful Neighbors to celebrate the diversity UM students bring to the community. The group is a mix of University neighborhood homeowners and residents, UM students and staff, and members of area charitable and service organizations.

Washington Testimony—Dave Forbes, dean of the UM School of Pharmacy and Allied Health Sciences, was invited to testify about financing higher education during a U.S. Senate finance committee hearing on Capitol Hill July 22. He was invited by Iowa Republican Sen. Charles E. Grassley, chair of the Senate Committee on Finance. The hearing was titled “The Role of Higher Education Financing in Strengthening U.S. Competitiveness in a Global Economy. Forbes highlighted how UM and the school he leads have benefitted from federal support, allowing programs to expand and providing greater access to students. “Improved access,” he says, “leads to a healthier community, which is more competitive.”

College With A Conscience—UM will be one of 81 schools nationally featured in an upcoming book titled “Colleges With a Conscience: An Engaged Student’s Guide to College.” The book will be written and edited by Campus Compact and the Princeton Review. Dean McGovern, executive director of Montana Campus Compact at UM, said 100 institutions were selected as finalists for possible inclusion in the book. Each university completed an application and survey, and more than 4,600 students completed surveys at the various institutions. UM will receive a two-page profile in “Colleges With a Conscience,” which will be published by Random House in winter 2005.

For information, contact:
Rita.Munzenrider@mso.umt.edu
University Relations
(406) 243-2522

© 2003 The University of Montana
Web design by Cary Shimek
and Patia Stephens