State Fair booth needs volunteers
University Relations is inviting faculty and staff members to volunteer for the University’s booth at the Iowa State Fair Aug. 11-21 in Des Moines.
Volunteers are needed for a variety of tasks—from answering general questions, to distributing posters and other items, to applying temporary Hawkeye tattoos to visitors. The UI booth is located in the air-conditioned Varied Indus-tries Building on the fairgrounds. Shifts are four hours each: 9 a.m.-1 p.m., 1-5 p.m., and 5-9 p.m. Fair admission, parking passes, and a black-and-gold T-shirt will be provided.
For more information or to sign up for a shift, see the UI State Fair web site at www.uiowa.edu/statefair/volunteers or contact George McCrory at (38)4-0012 or george-mccrory@uiowa.edu.
Pilot program to reward P&S
A one-year pilot program will permit departments to reward nonorganized P&S staff with a lump sum financial award throughout the year for exceptional performance. Under the new program, eligible employees may receive up to 10 percent of their base salary in a flexible pay reward during a 12-month period. All regular, nonorganized P&S employees who have been in a regular position for six months and have a current above-average performance evaluation on file would be eligible. Central Human Resources is now working with each college and division to develop specific guidelines on how the program will be implemented at the local level.
Corrections
The spine illustrations on page 1 of the May 6, 2005, issue of fyi were incorrectly credited to Nancy Zear; they are by Shirley Taylor, Creative Media Group graphics specialist. The videographer shown in the page 1 photo is Susan McClellen; the photo was taken by Vicki Martin. fyi regrets the errors.
National award recognizes power plant’s oat hulls project
The University of Iowa Power Plant has won a national award for its innovative use of oat hulls to replace coal in generating power.
The Association of Higher Education Facilities Officers selected Iowa to receive an Effective and Innovative Practices Award for the University’s Biomass Fuel Project. The project, which uses waste oat hulls from the Quaker Oats plant in Cedar Rapids, will save the University roughly a half million dollars in fuel costs each year. Oat hulls, a biomass fuel, are recognized as “green energy” because there is no net increase of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.
Ferman Milster, UI associate director for utilities and energy management, says, “The power plant team believed that this would work and refused to give up.”
The team devised a way to modify one of Iowa’s coal-burning boilers to burn oat hulls, thereby allowing a savings of more than 17,000 tons of coal annually.
The project reduces greenhouse gas emissions, uses a renewable waste product, and helps the University reduce energy costs at a time of serious budget reductions.
The UI Biomass Fuel Project also has received two Iowa Governor’s Awards.
Summer program helps kids with speech, language, reading
Children with speech, language, and reading problems can get one-on-one help this summer in the University of Iowa Wendell Johnson Speech and Hearing Center. Parents may enroll their children for a six-week Summer Speech and Reading Program, held June 13-July 21.
Children must be enrolled for a minimum of one 60-minute session per week or two 30-minute sessions per week. However, parents may sign their children up for more therapy.
Some health insurance benefits may be applicable, and scholarships are available for eligible children.
For more information, contact the Wendell Johnson center at (33)5-8736 or contact Betty Merrifield by e-mail at elizabeth-merrifield@uiowa.edu. An online brochure is available at www.shc.uiowa.edu/wjshc/ritecare.pdf.
Capote Award goes to Fletcher
A New Theory for American Poetry: Democracy, the Environment, and the Future of Imagination, by Angus Fletcher, a distinguished professor emeritus at the City University of New York Graduate School, is the recipient of the 2005 Truman Capote Award for Literary Criticism in Memory of Newton Arvin.
The $30,000 Capote Award, the largest annual cash prize for literary criticism in the English language, is administered for the Truman Capote Estate by the Iowa Writers’ Workshop.
The book, published in 2004 by the Harvard University Press, was selected for the Capote Award by an international panel of prominent critics and writers. Books of general literary criticism in English, published during the last four years, are eligible for nomination.
In addition to the administration of the literary criticism award, the Iowa Writers’ Workshop involvement with the trust includes the awarding of Truman Capote Fellowships to UI students in creative writing.
The establishment of the Truman Capote Literary Trust was stipulated in the author’s will, and the Annual Truman Capote Award for Literary Criticism in Memory of Newton Arvin reflects Capote’s frequently expressed concern for the health of literary criticism in the English language.
Press publishes wetlands guide
Coming on the heels of American Wetlands Month in May, the UI Press has published Wetlands in Your Pocket: A Guide to Common Plants and Animals of Midwestern Wetlands as its latest Burr Oak guide.
The laminated pocket guide celebrates the plants and animals that call the Midwest’s wetlands home. From blue flag and horsetail to leopard frog and western ribbon snake, Wetlands in Your Pocket identifies 100 of the most common plants and animals that inhabit the world of the wetands. The guide was written by Mark Müller, who has sketched and photographed the world from Alaska to Antarctica.
Wetlands in Your Pocket is available with the UI Press’s other Burr Oak Guides at bookstores or directly from the University of Iowa Press by phone at 800-621-2736 or online at www.uiowapress.org.
Construction closes S. Grand
A campus construction project will close the northbound lane of a portion of South Grand Avenue between the Field House and Melrose Avenue through mid-August. Southbound traffic will not be affected.
The street will reopen for traffic before the start of fall semester classes. During construction, traffic for the UIHC Emergency Room, Pharmacy Building, west campus residence halls, and the Field House will be detoured east to Byington Road and then north on Grand Avenue.
The project will provide turning lanes into the new Melrose Parking Facility and onto Melrose Avenue. |
