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Feb. 16, 2009 | Vol. 37, No. 22

In this issue:

Former CIA Officer To Present Lecture
UM Named To Service Honor Roll
Mansfield Center Chosen As Confucius Institute
Album Recorded At UM Takes Grammy
Extended Learning Services Institute Offered
Professor Scores Second Award For Article
UMCUR Applications Due Feb. 27
Drama/Dance Production Opens Feb. 24
Participate In Strategic Planning
Lunch Series Begins This Week
Staff Senate Meeting Schedule
Faculty Senate Meeting Schedule
President Dennison's Office Hours
Faculty/Staff Socials
News About U
Publications

Campus Links

Recent UM Publications

Welcome to ForUM, the e-newsletter for University of Montana staff, faculty and administrators. ForUM is published weekly during the academic year except during scheduled academic breaks.

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Former CIA Officer To Present Lecture

Former CIA officer and author Michael Scheuer will give the next installment of the President's Lecture Series at UM on Monday, Feb. 23.

Scheuer will present "Marching Toward Hell: America and Islam after Iraq" at 8 p.m. in the University Center Ballroom. Earlier that day from 3:10 to 4:30 p.m., he will give a seminar titled "A Conversation with CIA Veteran Michael Scheuer" in Gallagher Business Building Room 123. Both events are free and open to the public.

During his 22-year career with the CIA, Scheuer served as the chief of the Bin Laden Issue Station and the Osama bin Laden tracking unit at the Counterterrorist Center. He also worked as special adviser to the chief of the bin Laden unit from 2001 to 2004.

Scheuer will talk about how America's political leaders and citizens have generally misunderstood the motivation of Osama bin Laden, al-Qaida and their steadily increasing number of Islamist allies. He argues that Islamist militants are attacking America because of what it does in the Islamic world and not because of the way America's people think, vote, behave and believe or not believe in God.

Scheuer is the author of several books, including "Through Our Enemies' Eyes: Osama bin Laden, Radical Islam and the Future of America," "Imperial Hubris: Why the West is Losing the War on Terror" and "Marching Toward Hell: America and Islam after Iraq."

President's Lecture Series

UM Named To Service Honor Roll

The Corporation for National and Community Service honored UM last week with a place on the President's Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll for exemplary service efforts and service to America's communities.

Launched in 2006, the Community Service Honor Roll is the highest federal recognition a school can achieve for its commitment to service learning and civic engagement. Honorees are chosen based on a series of selection 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.

UM students engaged in academic service learning provided more than 30,500 hours to the Missoula community during the 2007-08 academic year. The students also participated in nearly 5,000 hours of extracurricular volunteering and in more than 34,000 service hours through the AmeriCorps national service program.

"Taking into consideration the current dollar amount attached to a volunteer hour in Montana, UM student service to the Missoula community during the 2007-08 academic year equated to an economic impact of nearly $875,000," said Andrea Vernon, director of UM's Office for Civic Engagement. "We are honored to receive this distinction from the Corporation for National and Community Service."

"Given the current economic challenges, the value -- both monetary and social -- of the service students provide has escalated rapidly, making a critical difference for people in need," agreed UM President George Dennison. "But of even greater importance, the students involved have benefited immensely in terms of personal growth that comes with service to others and the development of those 'habits of the heart' that power the ethic of civic engagement."

Corporation for National and Community Service

Mansfield Center Chosen As Confucius Institute

China's Ministry of Education recently designated UM's Maureen and Mike Mansfield Center the 39th Confucius Institute in the United States. There are currently 269 Confucius Institutes worldwide, which are supported by the Chinese government to promote the teaching of Chinese language and culture. In the United States, they are awarded on a one-per-state basis.

"All across America there is a rapidly growing interest in China," said Mansfield Center Director Terry Weidner. "Over one-fifth of the world's population is Chinese, and educational opportunities to learn about China and its language are increasingly in demand in the United States and around the world."

UM's institute will receive at least five years of funding from the Office of Chinese Language Council International, part of China's Ministry of Education. Weidner said UM's Confucius Institute will meet an important educational need and its work will be appropriate for the Mansfield Center to honor its legendary namesake, Montana's late U.S. Sen. Mike Mansfield.

Album Recorded At UM Takes Grammy

A recording of a live performance by children's storyteller and songwriter Bill Harley won a Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word Album for Children at the awards presentation in Los Angeles on Feb. 8.

The album, "Yes to Running: Bill Harley Live," includes stories and songs that paint a vibrant and hilarious picture of school, growing up and family life. It is a collaboration between Montana PBS and Montana Public Radio and was recorded in June 2007 at UM's University Theatre. Harley is heard regularly on MTPR's long-running children's program "The Pea Green Boat." He will return to Montana for concerts in spring 2009.

Daniel Dauterive, operations director at KUFM-TV, originated the idea of recording the popular performer and co-produced the Grammy-winning CD with Harley. Michael Marsolek, MTPR program director, coordinated the audio for Harley's two live concerts at UM and was the engineer for the recording.

Extended Learning Services Institute Offered

Extended Learning Services will offer an institute on online teaching and learning at UM on Thursday and Friday, March 5-6.

The institute, which is slated to become an annual event, is free and open to all faculty, administrators, librarians, staff and technology personnel at UM and its affiliate campuses. The event will promote the exchange of knowledge, effective practices and research relative to online teaching and learning.

Rena Palloff and Keith Pratt will be the institute's keynote speakers in an interactive session titled "Best Practices in Online Teaching and Learning." They are the authors of five books on online teaching and learning, including the seminal work "Building Learning Communities in Cyberspace: Effective Strategies for the Online Classroom." Their most recent book, "Building Online Learning Communities," was published in 2007.

For details about registration, how to submit a proposal to make a presentation and other information, visit the institute's Web site. More information is available by calling Mary Engstrom at 243-6333 or e-mailing mary.engstrom@umontana.edu.

Extended Learning Institute

Professor Scores Second Award For Article

Dan Flores, UM's A.B. Hammond Professor of Western History, has won a second literary award for his article "Bringing Home All the Pretty Horses: The Horse Trade and the Early American West, 1775-1825."

The article, which was published in Montana The Magazine of Western History last year, was recently named Outstanding Magazine Article by the Western Heritage Center and National Cowboy Museum in Oklahoma City.

"Bringing Home All The Pretty Horses" also received the 2008 Vivian Paladin Best Article Prize. The prize is given annually by the editorial board of Montana The Magazine of Western History for the best article published in the magazine.

In 1998, Flores won the Western Heritage Center and National Cowboy Museum's Outstanding Magazine Article award for "When Bison Roamed," which was published in Wild West magazine.

UMCUR Applications Due Feb. 27

The ninth annual UM Conference on Undergraduate Research will be held in the University Center on Friday, April 17. The conference offers students opportunities to give poster and oral research presentations, musical and dance performances, and readings from creative works.

More than $700 in awards will be given to the top student poster and presentation in each subject area. Faculty and staff are asked to encourage UM undergraduates to submit applications. They are due by Friday, Feb. 27, and must be submitted online.

For more information, application forms, presentation templates, contact information and samples from last year's conference, students should go to the Undergraduate Research Web site.

Undergraduate Research

Drama/Dance Production Opens Feb. 24

UM's Department of Drama/Dance will present the Pulitzer Prize-winning play "Buried Child" at 7:30 p.m. Feb. 24-28 and March 3-7 in the Masquer Theatre, located in the PAR/TV Center.

To show appreciation for long-standing commitment and service to UM, President Dennison and the drama/dance department will provide faculty and staff one free ticket to the production. In addition, a second ticket may be purchased for only $7.

To get faculty/staff tickets, present your Griz Card at the Drama/Dance Box Office in the PAR/TV Center. For more information about "Buried Child," visit the Department of Drama/Dance Web site.

Department of Drama/Dance

Participate In Strategic Planning

The Academic Strategic Planning Committee will hold town hall meetings this month for faculty and staff to share ideas and opinions regarding strategic directions for academic affairs at UM. All meetings will be held in the University Center and each meeting will have a specific focus.

Following is the meeting schedule:

Noon-1:30 p.m. Wednesday, Feb. 18 -- Focus: graduate education. Location: UC Room 326.
2-3:30 p.m. Friday, Feb. 20 -- Focus: research, creativity and scholarship. Location: UC Theater.
Noon-1:30 p.m. Wednesday, Feb. 25 -- Focus: technology. Location: UC Room 330.
1:10-2:30 p.m. Friday, Feb. 27 -- Focus: international connections/engagement. Location: UC Room 326.

For more information, call Carol Brewer, associate dean, UM College of Arts and Sciences, at 243-2632 or e-mail carol.brewer@umontana.edu.

Academic Strategic Planning Committee

Lunch Series Begins This Week

The first spring semester event of the Clergy/Faculty/Staff Lunch Series will take place Wednesday, Feb. 18. The series, sponsored by Emmaus Campus Ministry, is held from noon to 1 p.m. at Emmaus House, located at 532 University Ave. Soup, bread, coffee and beverages are provided. RSVPs are not necessary.

Lectures in the series this semester are:

Wednesday, Feb. 18: "The Political Obligations of Christians" by UM Regents Professor of Philosophy Albert Borgmann.
Thursday, March 19: "Christianity and Human Rights" by UM Regents Professor of History Paul Lauren.
Thursday, April 23: "Sinners are Closer to God: Social Justice Perspectives within Literature" by Laure Pengelly Drake, director of advising, UM Davidson Honors College.

For more information, call Rev. John Lund at 396-4974.