Posted on Apr 8, 2008

Former Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee will speak Monday, April 14, at 6:30 p.m. in Memorial Chapel.

His talk, titled "The Pursuit of the Presidency and the Perfectly Insane American Process," is free and open to the public. Doors open at 6 p.m. Seating is limited and priority will be given to members of the campus community.

Huckabee surprised many by winning the Iowa caucuses and seven other presidential primary states, including West Virginia, Alabama and Tennessee. However, the former Arkansas governor struggled to expand his appeal beyond Southerners, conservative Christians and others and was forced to drop out of the race March 4. He remains a candidate to be Republican nominee Sen. John McCain’s running mate in the fall election.

“Mike Huckabee is politically and culturally foreign to many Union students,” said sophomore Abby Cable, president of Union’s College Republicans group. “His appearance will provoke controversy and encourage students to become more engaged and active during this historical election cycle.”

Huckabee, 53, became governor of Arkansas in 1996 after Jim Tucker resigned. He was elected to a full, four-year term in 1998 and re-elected in 2002.

An ordained Southern Baptist minister, Huckabee continues to lecture across the country on topics such as education reform and health care reform. He gained national attention for his own struggles with obesity, losing more than 100 pounds after he was diagnosed with Type II diabetes in 2003. He has competed in marathons and encourages others to adopt a healthier lifestyle and is the author of several books, including “Quit Digging Your Grave with a Knife and Fork.” He also plays bass guitar in his rock band, Capitol Offense.

“Despite being a registered Democrat, I feel like this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity,” said Will Friedman ’10, acting president of the Speakers Forum, sponsor of the lecture. “Throughout the campaign, Gov. Huckabee was one of the few presidential candidates who stayed true to his beliefs without making personal attacks on any of the other candidates. That is a key reason why we decided to invite him to Union.”

Posted on Apr 7, 2008

Faculty, staff and students hosted some 400 guests Monday during the first of two Union Acceptance Day Programs. The sun and blue skies made the day perfect for rolling out the welcome mat to prospective members of the Class of 2012.

“I knew I wanted a small liberal arts school on the East Coast, and I really liked the sense of community at Union,” said Sarah Rosenblum of Los Angles, a student at the Archer School for Girls who is looking forward to pursuing Art History and Psychology next fall. “This is my third visit to campus. This is where I want to be.”  

“I’m definitely choosing Union,” said Adam Burns of Rochester. “I like the small size and the variety of academics and extracurricular activities.”

Burns shared lunch in Memorial Fieldhouse with a number of students who live in the area, including Amelia Abba of Niskayuna and Melinda Rothman of Saratoga Springs – both of whom have also committed to Union – and Liz Carney of Niskyauna.

More than 2,000 students received acceptance letters from the Office of Admissions last month, culled from 5,264 applications.

The second Accepted Students Day is set for Monday, April 14. The program encourages students and their families to explore the campus, with a number of tours, class visits, campus life panels and academic presentations scheduled. 

Visitors started the day in Memorial Chapel with a welcome from President Stephen C. Ainlay, Interim Vice President for Admission and Financial Aid Ann Fleming Brown and the Dutch Pipers, Union’s a capella singing group.

Union expects a first-year class of 565 students.

In the meantime, the Admissions staff is hard at work recruiting the Class of 2013. 

Posted on Apr 4, 2008

Steve Schmidt, professor of Economics, and Therese McCarty, professor of Economics and dean of the Faculty, have authored a paper, “Estimating Permanent and Transitory Income Elasticities of Education Spending from Panel Data,” which has been accepted for publication in the Journal of Public Economics. The paper develops a methodology for correctly estimating the effect that household income has on education spending in states when several years of data are used. This methodology can be used for understanding the relationship between changes in income and changes in other types of government spending in states and localities.

Posted on Apr 4, 2008

Citing "moral panics" such as the public debate over physician-assisted death, Northwestern University Professor Tod Chambers challenged scholars and students to reconsider conventional boundaries of bioethics.  

Chambers' speech sparked a robust dialogue with audience members Friday at the opening event of the 11th annual National Undergraduate Bioethics Conference, a two-day event focused on the “The Human Use of Human Beings in Medicine and Science."

The speech, titled  "Witches, Punks and Bioethicists," dealt with moral panics such as the Terri Schiavo case, which Chambers described as a tool to “denounce and reaffirm” societal values.

“The nature of bioethics is taking issues that are causing social disease and putting them into categories,” Chambers said. “I don’t think the boundaries bioethicists have put forward are all that challenging.”

Chambers is president of the American Society for Bioethics and Humanties (ASBH), which helps organize the conference each year, and author of “Narrative Bioethics and Prozac as a Way of Life.” He described bioethics as a “concept that is still being defined” and pushed students and scholars at  the conference to rethink conventional ethical boundaries surrounding issues like euthanasia, gene therapy and gender reassignment surgery.

The conference, which concludes Saturday, is planned and organized by students and covers topics in the field of bioethics and discussions led by experts from across the country. Nearly 170 people are expected at this weekend's event.

For a complete schedule, click here

The theme reflects the ideal of "medical humanities" encompassed in the ASBH name by embracing art, drama, literature, film and the media, as well as the humanities and the social and natural sciences. It includes three specific sub-themes:

•  Portrayals of the Human Use of Human Beings in Medicine and Science in Art, Drama, Literature, Film, Mass Media and the Web (e.g., in paintings like Thomas Eakins' “The Gross Clinic” and “The Agnew Clinic”; in dramas like “Wit,” etc.)

•  Historical Reflections and Case Studies of the Human Use of Human Beings in Medicine and Science (e.g., the abuse of human subjects in medical research)

•  Controversies Over the Human Use of Human Beings in Medicine and Science (e.g., stem-cell research involving human embryos)

“This is a celebration of undergraduate research and an opportunity to introduce a new generation of students to the field of bioethics,” said Robert Baker, chair of the Rapaport Ethics Across the Curriculum Initiative and the William D. Williams Professor of Philosophy. He also directs the Union Graduate College-Mount Sinai School Medicine Bioethics Program.

Susan Lederer, chair of the Department of Medical History and Bioethics at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, and author of “Frankenstein: Penetrating the Secrets of Nature,” will discuss “The Myth and Metaphor of Frankenstein.”

Other speakers include award-winning journalist Harriet Washington, author of “Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present.”

The event also includes a series of panels, workshops and discussions. A Bioethics Bowl features teams from Dartmouth, the National Hispanic University, University of Miami and other schools for formal debates on numerous bioethical topics.

Union is the first liberal arts college chosen by ASBH to host the conference. Previous hosts were Princeton University, the University of Virginia, University of Notre Dame, Emory University, Boston University, Texas A&M, University of Michigan, University of Pennsylvania and Michigan State University.

For more information, go to http://ethics.union.edu/nubc.html

Posted on Apr 3, 2008

The Union College Bookstore is hosting a children's book drive for the Kenney Community Center Monday, April 7 through Friday, April 18 to collect new children's books that can be used for the Center's literacy programs, such as America Reads and SAIL (Studying Arithmetic in Literature). These programs are staffed by Union student volunteers, who help Schenectady schoolchildren expand their reading skills and improve their overall learning.

To participate, stop by the Bookstore and purchase a book from the Kenney Center Wish List. You will receive 20 percent off the book you choose to donate. Most titles on the list can be purchased for under $10. The Bookstore will collect all donated books. The goal: 250 new books.