Posted on Apr 15, 2010

U.S. Rep. Paul D. Tonko, a nationally recognized expert on energy issues, gave the keynote talk, “The Smart Grid: Who Should Control Our Energy Future?” at the third annual Alumni and Friends Symposium April 9 through 11 at the College.

A smart grid delivers electricity from producers to consumers using technology to optimize the use of less expensive power from alternative sources.

Congressman Tonko is a member of the House Committee on Education and Labor and serves on the subcommittees for Higher Education and Healthy Families and Communities. He is also a member of the Committee on Science and Technology. As a member of the New York State Assembly from 1983 to 2007, he served as chairman of a standing committee on energy; after leaving the Assembly, he was president and CEO of the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA).

Throughout the weekend, guests participated in a series of workshops to examine major issues surrounding America’s development and implementation of a smart electrical grid and propose solutions.

A panel discussion, “Implementing the Smart Grid,” featured David Pacyna ’83, senior vice president and general manager of Siemens Energy Inc.; Kannan Tinnium of General Electric Global Research; Martin Insogna, of the New York State Department of Public Service; Randy A. Bowers, New York Independent System Operator, Inc.; Mary E. Reidy, Smart Technology Center, National Grid; and Ron Ambrosio, IBM Global Research leader, Energy and Utilities Industry.

Richard H.K. Vietor ’67 presented a case study, “Cape Wind: Offshore Wind Energy in the U.S.A.” Vietor is the Paul Whiton Cherington Professor of Business Administration at the Harvard Graduate School of Business Administration and senior associate dean for the Asian Initiative.

Gary Cohen ’78, IBM general manager, Global Communications Sector, led a session, “Smart Grid Opportunities and Challenges.”

Last year’s symposium on health care reform featured Ezekiel Emanuel as keynote speaker. Now serving as a health care expert for the White House, he is the brother of  Rahm, President Obama’s chief of staff.

The first Alumni and Friends Symposium, held in June 2007, was modeled after the “Moral Dilemmas of Governing” class led for many years by Byron Nichols. Twenty former students of Nichols, a popular political science professor from 1968 to 2008, returned to Union for a spirited discussion on the moral and political issues surrounding illegal immigration.

The program is designed to re-engage alumni in the intellectual life they enjoyed at Union.

Posted on Apr 14, 2010

Mark Mahoney, the winner of the 2009 Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Writing, will discuss “Local Newspapers in a Changing Media Environment” Monday, April 19 from 3:05 to 4:45 p.m. in Social Sciences 016.

The talk by Mahoney, the editorial page editor of The Post Star (Glens Falls, N.Y.), is part of the Pizza and Politics series, which is sponsored by the Department of Political Science.

Mahoney was honored with journalism’s highest honor for “his relentless, down-to-earth editorials on the perils of local government secrecy, effectively admonishing citizens to uphold their right to know.”

To read his winning entries, click here.

Posted on Apr 14, 2010

More than 400 students and family members attended this week’s Admissions Open House, the first of two this month. The second program is set for Monday, April 19.

It’s a busy time for Admissions, which mailed decision letters to prospective members of the Class of 2014 last month.

The campus will host many visitors in the next several weeks as admitted students decide where they will enroll. 

Among other special outreach programs, a guidance counselor tour will be held Tuesday, April 27. Nearly 70 counselors from around the country are expected to attend.                                    

This year, Union received 4,940 applications for this fall’s freshman class, the second most ever.  

Posted on Apr 14, 2010

Posted on Apr 14, 2010

And speaking of art… If you haven’t had a chance to see the current faculty exhibition at the Mandeville Gallery Nott Memorial, do so before May 9.

“Chris Duncan: Recent Work” features the professor of sculpture’s latest sculpture and works on paper. The playful abstractions have a sense of immediacy, energy and emotion.

Duncan is a man of many talents who’s exhibited widely, including solo exhibitions throughout the Capital-Saratoga Region, the Bruno Marina Gallery in Brooklyn, Nanjing Normal University in China, and at numerous college galleries across the country.

His work also is included in private and public collections including the Hyde Collection in Glens Falls and the Munson-Williams-Proctor Institute Museum of Art in Utica.

And while you’re at the Nott, don’t miss “Nano Grande,” in the Wikoff Student Gallery through May 2, featuring digital prints made by students using scanning electron microscopy (SEM). This exciting collaboration was created by merging courses: Photography II, offered by the Visual Arts Department, and Frontiers of Nanotechnology, a joint offering of Biology, Chemistry and Electrical Engineering.

The classes worked together to arrange each composition using the SEM machine and various samples, everything from clay nanocomposites with embedded quantum dots to bees, electric circuits and metal shavings from the Peter Irving Wold Center construction site.

This project was organized by Palma Catravas, associate professor, Electrical and Computer Engineering Department, and Kevin Bubriski, visiting professor, Visual Arts, in collaboration with many other Union faculty and staff and the Capital District Microscopy and Microanalysis Society.

It was sponsored in part by the National Science Foundation, the Dean of Interdisciplinary Studies, and an Internal Education Fund grant.