Posted on Sep 24, 2004

Neil
Lewis '68, a Washington correspondent for The New York Times, will speak on “Civil Liberties
in an Age of Terrorism” on Wednesday, Sept. 29, at 7:30 p.m. in the Nott Memorial.

His talk, part of the Perspectives at the Nott series, is free and open to the
public. The talk is sponsored by the Minerva Committee and Yellow House.

Lewis has covered
presidential campaigns, lobbying, terrorism, and Supreme Court confirmation
proceedings. Previously he was Reuters White House correspondent and senior
correspondent in South
Africa.

His work has appeared in The New
Republic, Washington Monthly, Rolling Stone, and The New York Times Book Review. He co-authored Betrayal,
a book about Aldrich Ames, a CIA officer who spied for the Soviet Union.

A reception
will follow in Yellow House at South College.

Posted on Sep 24, 2004

Dean
of Faculty Christina Sorum called on her colleagues to enhance
interdepartmental programs through better coordination and focused hiring, and
to reach a timely resolution for the reshaping of the General Education program.

Speaking
at a general faculty meeting on Tuesday, Sept. 21, Sorum cited the 2000 Middle
States review, which said, “With four divisions and a 200-year tradition of
'union' learning, the potential for cross-disciplinary work at this College is
considerable.”

Sorum
said the College has a belief in the value of a broad education, as
demonstrated by programs such as Latin American and Caribbean Studies,
Bioengineering, East Asian Studies and GenEd. The prominence of Converging
Technology (also known as Converging Thought) is an important step, she said.

“[Deans Charlotte Borst and Robert Balmer] and I
will be working this year with departments and with the Academic Affairs Council to ensure that our
various programs are taken into account in the hiring process and in curriculum
development,” she said. “The fact that we have 195 ID majors and 258 students
doing minors indicates that a considerable number of our students are
interested in a broad education.”

On GenEd, Sorum asked her colleagues to rise above
issues with departments, staffing and intellectual politics to “think of the
students and what is essential to their education.”

GenEd, she said, “is a curricular statement of what
we think a liberal arts education must include. All types of schools have
majors. We as a liberal arts college define ourselves not by our majors but by
the broad learning we wish our students to gain.”

Sorum also asked senior faculty to work closely with
newer members to include them in the intellectual community, a recommendation
from the Middle States report. The Minerva Houses and a nascent faculty lounge
will provide venues, but they are not sufficient, she said. “We who have been
here many years are the ones who must step forward and nurture the
redevelopment of an inclusive community,” she said. “We have much to offer the
newer members, and they have much to offer us.”

Admissions report
Ann Fleming Brown, associate dean of admissions,
invited faculty to meet with prospective students during fall open houses on
Oct. 11 and Nov. 11. “It is so special to these visiting students and it is
what we do so well.”

She reported that the College this fall welcomed 579
new students, including 25 transfers, after targeting 580. Applications were
down 2 percent to 4,060 with an admit rate of 49 percent.

Academic indicators increased slightly with a
typical student having a 90 GPA in rigorous secondary school programs.
Fifty-nine percent were ranked in the top 10 percent of their class, and SATs
average 1250.

The most frustrating result, she said, was a drop in
students of color, from 16 to 14 percent of the class, with numbers dropped
from 90 to 78.

Interviews and surveys show an increased overlap
with esteemed competitor colleges has declined the yield. “We have worked hard
to position ourselves in the premier liberal arts college cohort and … we find
that the [blue chip schools] eventually win out in the majority of cases.
Before one can compete and win, one must compete and lose, alas.”

On Financial Aid, Brown reported that despite an
unpredictable year, projections for the Class of 2008 were on target with just
under $6.1 million supporting the enrollment of 625 students. Upperclass awards
were nearly complete and projected slightly under budget, she said.

FEC business
Cliff Brown, chair of the Faculty Executive
Committee, introduced the FEC and its mission to new faculty. He thanked
colleagues who have agreed to serve on two committees, one on academic
reputation chaired by Tom Werner, the other a compensation
committee chaired by Dave Hayes. Prof. Brown said that the agenda for fall
meetings will include the fundraising campaign, to be introduced by Tom
Gutenberger, vice president for College Relations, at the Sept. 28 meeting;
long-term budget issues; a discussion of the merit system; recommendations from
the Spinelli committee on trimesters; and the Minerva House program.

Posted on Sep 23, 2004

With publication of her new book — a dual biography of Gertrude and Leo Stein — due next month, Brenda Wineapple will give her colleagues a glimpse of what it was like to research and write about the brother-sister team that collaborated on many of the great art and literary adventures of the early 20th century.

Wineapple, the Washington Irving Professor of Modern Literary and Historical Studies will discuss her upcoming Sister Brother Gertrude and Leo Stein in a faculty colloquium on Tuesday, April 2, at 4:30 p.m. in the Reamer Campus Center auditorium. Coffee and tea will begin at 4 p.m.

During her more than six years of research, Wineapple discovered a wealth of new and rare material — an early Gertrude Stein manuscript, reports of her medical career, and never-before-examined papers of Leo's. Also along the way, Wineapple discovered a few of the eccentric Leo's paintings with an art dealer who "didn't know what he had," and she urged a reprinting of his 1947 Appreciation, for which she wrote an introduction.

Wineapple's book is the first completely researched biography of Gertrude Stein in two decades, and the first book ever written about Leo. In 1989, Wineapple wrote an acclaimed biography, Genêt: A Biography of Janet Flanner about the Paris correspondent to the New Yorker. It has been reprinted twice.

A member of the College's faculty since 1976, she earned her B.A. from Brandeis University, and her master's and Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin, Madison.

She has authored a number of articles on 19th and 20th century American and British literature and authors.

Among her fellowships and awards, she received a John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship and was named a Donald C. Gallup Senior Fellow in American Literature at Yale's Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, which holds many of the Stein manuscripts.

Posted on Sep 23, 2004

Albany, NY (Sept. 23, 2004) – The ECAC Hockey League
has announced the results of both the coaches and media preseason men's hockey
polls.  Cornell leads the coaches' poll,
while Dartmouth was given the top spot
by the media. The results of this year's voting were announced at the League's
annual media day event held at the Pepsi Arena.

Cornell led the coaches' poll with 108 points and received four first-place
votes. Colgate and Dartmouth tied for second place
with 102 points and two first-place votes each, while Harvard was picked fourth
with 98 points and matched the Big Red with four No. 1 votes. Clarkson and Rensselaer round out the top half
of the poll in fifth (82 pts.) and sixth (68) place, respectively.

On the media side, Dartmouth was the top choice
taking 13 first-place votes and 304 points. Cornell earned the No. 2 spot by
the media with 285 points and 11 first-place nods. Colgate, with three
first-place votes and 269 points and Harvard with 247 points were tabbed third
and fourth, respectively. The media tabbed Clarkson and Rensselaer in the same way as the
coaches, ranking the schools fifth and sixth.

Union was selected to finish
tied for tenth with Vermont in the coaches poll and ninth in the media poll.  Head coach Nate Leaman isn't too concerned
with Union's low rank considering the competition in the
league.  “Preseason polls haven't meant a
lot in past years because the league is so tight,” said Leaman.  “We have been picked low in previous years
and have had home ice.  The league is
extremely competitive and there is not much difference between No. 1 and 12.” 

The
Dutchmen open their season on the road against Colorado College on October 15th.   

First-place votes in parenthesis

Posted on Sep 23, 2004

Albany, NY (Sept. 23, 2004) – The ECAC Hockey
League's women's coaches have cast their preseason ballots and they are
predicting a tight race again this season. Dartmouth earned the top spot in
the preseason poll with 94 votes, but has Harvard and Brown close on its heels.  Union was picked to finish
last, giving first year head coach Tim Gerrish and his team some motivation
heading into the season.

“We are hoping to do better than what the poll indicates,” stated
Gerrish.  “This is perhaps the best
league in hockey so we have a hard job ahead of us.  But we want to be in this league so we are
going to have to show people we can be better than what the polls say.” 

Dartmouth picked up five
first-place votes by the coaches and finished the voting with 94 total points.
Harvard claimed two No. 1 picks to earn the second-place spot with 88 points
and St. Lawrence is one point back with 87 and two first-place nods. Brown (76
points) and Princeton (63 points) round out the top five in fourth
and fifth place, respectively.  

Union finished behind Vermont who finished eight
points in back of Clarkson.  The
Dutchwomen will open their season on October 16th at Clarkson.

2004-05 ECACHL Preseason Coaches Poll

1. Dartmouth (5)
— 94

2. Harvard (4) — 88

3. SLU (2) — 87

4. Brown — 76

5. Princeton —
63

6. Yale — 55

7. Colgate — 46

8. Cornell — 33

9. Clarkson — 30

10. Vermont —
22

11.
Union – 11