Posted on Jan 7, 2000

With the completion of five more renovated homes in the
College Park neighborhood this week, another 36 Union students are calling
the neighborhood home.

That brings to about 120 the number of students living
in renovated homes in the Union-Schenectady Initiative area.

The newly-completed homes are at 704 and 710 Huron
Street, and 219, 301 and 311 Seward Place.

Announced in October 1998, USI includes a number of
incentives for both homeowners and College employees. These include the
Kenney Community Center, up to $1 million annually in tuition scholarships
for children of eligible homeowners, special mortgage programs, and the
establishment of a neighborhood association and satellite security office
in the neighborhood.

Union has acquired more than 35 homes in the US
Initiative area, which are being renovated and used for student and
faculty residences. Renovations are scheduled for completion by fall 2000.
The US Initiative area is defined by Seward Place, Union Street, Nott
Street and Erie Boulevard.

Posted on Jan 7, 2000

Don't head to Silliman Hall after next week to
adjust your retirement distribution.

Human Resources will be moving to the first-floor of 17
South Lane (the former home of the Office of Communications) on Thursday
and Friday, Jan. 13 and 14.

The office will be closed those days to allow for the
move.

Posted on Jan 7, 2000

Kenneth G. DeBono, the Gilbert
R. Livingston Professor of the Behavioral Sciences, has published a
chapter titled “Attitude Functions and Consumer Psychology:
Understanding Perceptions of Product Quality” in a book titled Why
We Evaluate: Functions of Attitudes edited by Gregory R. Maio and
James M. Olson. DeBono's chapter summarizes the work he has done with
Union students looking at the strategies that differing personalities
adopt to evaluate consumer products.

Thomas C. Werner, the Florence
B. Sherwood Professor of Physical Sciences, is publishing a paper,
“Spectral Comparison of the Binding of Pyrene to beta-Cyclodextrin
and beta-Cyclodextrin Derivatives” in the April issue of Applied
Spectroscopy. His co-authors are Kellie Forrestall '99, Sara
McIntosh '97 and Dr. Josef Pitha, formerly with the National Institutes
of Health.

Gary Reich, professor of
physics conducted a day-long workshop on “Video Capture in
Introductory Physics” recently for 15 physics faculty and two
students from seven institutions. The workshop was supported by a grant
from the Pew Charitable Trust.

Carl George, professor
emeritus of biology, recently received the Alexander Glen Award from the
Village of Scotia in recognition of his years of research and support of
Collins Lake. George has studied the biological features of the lake since
the early 1970s, including monitoring dredging operations on the lake and
an extensive on-going survey of bird populations at the lake. He also
served as chair of the village's park board.

Posted on Jan 7, 2000

The calendar changed to Y2K on the Union campus without
incident following a year of work by staff from the Office of Computer
Services and members of a campus task force.

OCS staffers visited every administrative computer and
most faculty machines over the past year, installing “Y2K
patches” where necessary, said David Cossey, executive director of
OCS. They also checked machines in various labs.

Even as late as December, the College was receiving
patches from software vendors who still were rewriting code, Cossey said.

“We were most concerned about a power outage,”
Cossey said, adding that OCS disabled servers to protect them from hackers
who would use the Y2K as an excuse to do damage. But the power stayed on
and the hackers stayed away.

Rod Bossert, chair of the campus Y2K Task Force, said he
had received no reports of problems this week. Well, only one, he quipped,
referring to a glitch in a Pentagon satellite ground station: “We
lost some of our security surveillance when those spy satellites went
out.”

Posted on Jan 7, 2000

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