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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Dennison Receives Climate Leadership Award
When George M. Dennison retired Oct. 15 after 20 years as president of UM, he left a legacy as a recognized champion for commitment to sustainability and for the University's position now as a model campus in the nation for its climate change efforts.
Dennison was honored last week with a Second Nature Climate Leadership Award, presented at the Climate Leadership Summit of the American College and University Presidents Climate Commitment, held Oct. 12-13 in Denver. He received the award in the Individual President/Chancellor category.
Dennison signed the Talloires Declaration in 2002, rededicating UM to promoting sustainable development, self-determination and social justice on local, state, national and global levels. In 2007 he was a charter signatory of the American College and University Presidents Climate Commitment, officially committing UM to reduce its carbon emissions to zero.
During his tenure, Dennison's leadership led to UM's first Climate Action Plan that details strategies to make the University carbon neutral by 2020. Several of the strategies already have been implemented. He also supported the creation of the Office of Sustainability and the student-driven Sustainability Center, as well as the Forum for Living with Appropriate Technology, a University-owned home that students are retrofitting as an example of energy-efficient and sustainable living.
Last year UM announced the new minor in climate change studies, one of the first in the nation. The hard work of Dennison and others throughout the campus, community and state also led to the dedication this spring of the University's first building that will achieve LEED Gold status, The Payne Family Native American Center.
For more information about UM sustainability programs and Dennison's many accomplishments throughout his presidency, visit the Greening UM website.
Greening UM
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Renowned Paleontologist, Author at UM Oct. 28
Neil Shubin, author of UM's 2010 First-Year Reading Experience book selection, "Your Inner Fish," will give the next installment of the President's Lecture Series at UM on Thursday, Oct. 28.
He will present "Finding Your Inner Fish" at 8 p.m. in the University Theatre. Earlier that day from 3:40 to 5 p.m., he also will give a seminar titled "Fossils, Genes and the Evolution of Limbs" in Gallagher Business Building Room 123. The lecture series events, held in conjunction with UM's First-Year Reading Experience and the Office of the Provost, are free and open to the public.
Shubin is the Robert R. Bensley Professor and associate dean of the University of Chicago's Department of Organismal Biology and Anatomy and serves as provost of Chicago's Field Museum. He will talk about his 2008 book, "Your Inner Fish," which tells the story of evolution by tracing the organs of the human body back millions of years, long before the first creatures walked the earth.
Shubin is best known as one of the discoverers of the 375 million-year-old fossil fish Tiktaalik roseae in the Canadian Arctic. The 2004 discovery revealed a missing link in evolution between fish and land animals. He has conducted field work in Greenland, China, Canada, North America and Africa and has published multiple articles, including 18 in the prestigious journals Science and Nature.
Shubin also will hold a book discussion for UM first-year students and answer their questions at 11 a.m. Friday, Oct. 29, in Gallagher Business Building Room 123.
President's Lecture Series
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Regents Professor Speaks About Human Rights
UM Regents Professor of History Paul Lauren will give the next installment of the Provost's Distinguished Faculty Lecture Series on Wednesday, Oct. 27.
Lauren will present "Human Rights in Words, Images and Sounds" at 7 p.m. in the University Center Theater. The lecture, held in conjunction with UM's annual Day of Dialogue, will explore how determined and courageous men and women in history and in our contemporary world have struggled to uphold human rights. It is free and open to the public. A reception will follow.
Lauren, who has been nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, was the first faculty member at UM to be named a Regents Professor. He earned a doctorate at Stanford University and has received numerous awards for his teaching, advising and mentoring, research, administrative leadership and public service. His published books, chapters and articles are widely acclaimed, and his works have been translated into seven languages.
Lauren was selected by The Teaching Company to teach one of their Great Courses on the subject of human rights. He has lectured to audiences around the world and has delivered invited addresses at the Smithsonian Institution, the Nobel Institute and the United Nations, where he has been described as the world's leading authority on the history of human rights.
More information about the lecture series is on the Office of the Provost website.
Office of the Provost
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Day of Dialogue Offers Staff Education
This year's Day of Dialogue will provide staff education sessions from 8:10 to 9 a.m. Thursday, Oct. 28, in the University Center. All UM staff members are encouraged to attend a session, and supervisors are asked, if possible, to make allowances so that their staff can attend these sessions and other Day of Dialogue events.
Staff education sessions offered are:
- "Under the Rainbow: Alphabet Soup and the Complexity of Queer Identity" by Beth Howard, UM Undergraduate Advising Center. UC Room 326.
- "What are 'Reasonable Accommodations' in Postsecondary Education: A Consideration Through Their International Differences Between Japan and the United States" by Takeo Kondo, visiting scholar, computer and science engineering. UC Room 329.
- "Providing Access to Audio Material for Deaf and Hard of Hearing Students" by Brandy Reinhardt and Ami Davis, UM Disability Services for Students. UC Room 330.
- "HIV/AIDS: Myths & Realities -- How Close Can We Get?" by Laurie Kops, supervisor, STD/HIV Prevention Section, Montana Department of Public Health and Human Services; Mary Jane Nealon, ancillary services director, Partnership Health Center; Annie Sondag, professor, UM Department of Health and Human Performance; Jason Paranto, prevention coordinator, Missoula AIDS Council; and Lucy France, director, UM Equal Opportunity and Affirmative Action. UC Room 331.
- "Success in a Cross-Cultural Workplace -- How Important Are Cultural and Global Competence Skills?" by Udo Fluck, director, UM Multicultural Learning Services. UC Room 333.
Other Day of Dialogue sessions begin at 9:40 and 11:10 a.m. and at 1:10 and 2:40 p.m. on the third floor of the UC. Sessions also will be held at 12:10, 1:10 and 2:10 p.m. at the College of Technology.
A complete schedule of events is on the Day of Dialogue website. For more information, call 243-5622 or e-mail dayofdialogue@mso.umt.edu.
Day of Dialogue
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Business School Hosts Top Executives
Two of the most vibrant and leading advocates for improving the nation's education, Barbara Barrett and Craig Barrett, will speak at UM on Thursday, Oct. 28.
During their campus visit, Barbara Barrett, former U.S. ambassador to Finland and president and CEO of Triple Creek Guest Ranch in Darby, and Craig Barrett, retired CEO and chairman of the board of Intel Corp., will receive the 2010 Montana Academy of Distinguished Entrepreneurs Pioneer in Industry Award.
The award, which recognizes the achievements of outstanding entrepreneurs, will be presented to the Barretts at a VIP reception at 7 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 28, in the Gallagher Business Building second-floor piazza. To purchase tickets for the reception or for more information, call Larae Hackney at 243-4830 or e-mail larae.hackney@business.umt.edu.
The Barretts will hold open forums on campus earlier that day that are free and open to the public. They will speak about the ever-changing, high-velocity business landscape. The forum for the UM campus community will take place at 2 p.m. in Gallagher Business Building Room 106. An open forum to address the Missoula community will be held at 5 p.m. in the University Theatre.
Montana Academy of Distinguished Entrepreneurs
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Plans in the Works for Biomass Boiler at UM
UM officials hope to shrink the carbon footprint of campus by nearly a quarter by building a $16 million, wood-fired, biomass boiler onto the existing heating plant.
UM recently was awarded a $180,000 grant from the state Department of Natural Resources and Conservation in partnership with the U.S. Forest Service to complete plans for the project, which would reduce the University's natural gas usage by 70 percent and provide year-round steam to campus.
Robert Duringer, UM vice president for administration and finance, said the University will seek state Board of Regents approval for the project during a Nov. 18-19 meeting in Missoula. If that happens, plans for the plant would be completed this winter and construction likely would begin next spring.
Duringer said the industrial-sized biomass boiler would burn an estimated 17,000 to 20,000 tons of wood a year instead of using natural gas. Most would be logging residue such as treetops and limbs. It also might use beetle-killed trees and some trees from thinning projects.
UM intends to protect air quality in the Missoula Valley by using a biomass gasification provider called Nexterra from Vancouver, British Columbia. Duringer said the company uses cutting-edge technology that reduces emissions to at or below those of natural gas.
Read the Full News Release
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Researchers Discover Ancient Fossils
An international team of scientists from China, the U.S. and Japan have discovered tiny, tentaculated anemone fossils from the Lower Cambrian strata of South China that may change our whole understanding of how modern corals evolved and their relationships with sea anemones.
The rare fossils were named Eolympia pediculata, and their discovery in 535 million-year-old phosphorite deposits of Shaanxi, China, makes them the oldest fossils of their kind.
"The quality of the preservation of this ancient soft-bodied fossil and its tiny size is pretty unusual, but what is even more amazing is what the morphological features are telling us about evolution," said UM geosciences Professor George Stanley, a member of the research team that made the discovery. "They are telling us that it is a possible stem group to all later corals and soft anemones -- a group we collective refer to as Hexacorallians."
The fossils are only half a millimeter in diameter, but researchers were able to peer deeply into these once soft bodies using a new computer-aided technology called microtomographic analysis. It revealed three-dimensional details of the fossils, allowing researchers to better understand their anatomy and relationships with living counterparts.
The discovery was reported Oct. 13 in the science and medical journal PLoS ONE.
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Submissions must reach University Relations, 317 Brantly Hall, by noon Tuesday for inclusion in the following week's newsletter. Be sure to note that the submissions are for ForUM. E-mail submissions may be sent to campnews@mso.umt.edu. Items will be included as space permits. For more information, e-mail Brenda Day, ForUM editor.
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