09-27-2021

For students, faculty and staff accessing Franz River Campus: With daylight hours shifting, we’re seeing darker mornings on the construction site. Our general contractor primarily uses North Van Houten for construction access, so with safety in mind the Planning and Construction team requests that the campus community use Bluff Road instead of North Van Houten for any walking and other activities.

Click here to view a minute and a half video contemplation of the illumination “I Am My Beloved’s” from The Song Of Solomon in UP’s great treasure, The Saint John’s Bible. Music is provided by Susan McDaniel, PFA. These Moments of Beauty require nothing but your presence, allowing you simply to breathe, behold and BE. For the complete—and growing—archive, explore the portal on the Garaventa Center’s website.

Based on a nomination from Interim Dean Norah Martin, the unanimous recommendation of the Provost’s Council, and with Acting President Herbert Medina’s full support, Dr. Jim Baillie, Professor of Philosophy, and Dr. Katie O’Reilly, Professor of Biology, have been appointed as Tyson Distinguished Professors effective July 1, 2021 – June 30, 2024. The appointments are made in recognition of Jim and Katie’s many contributions as faculty and excellent leadership on the faculty for many years. Please join us in congratulating Jim and Katie on this well-deserved recognition.

This week, all first-year students will be poking around these Big Questions: Who or what is God? What roles can religious or secular faith play is shaping one’s sense of purpose in the world? What ethical obligations do we owe ourselves and others? Aiding those conversations and reflections will be Naomi Shihab Nye’s poem “Famous,” portions of Terrence Tilley’s Faith: What It Is and What It Isn’t and Jeannine M. Pitas’s “Vocation: An Ongoing Journey,” as well as videos “Mending Trauma: Theology of Making,” “The Danger of A Single Story,” and “Why The World Is Going Crazy and How To Win Back Our Minds.” These weekly glimpses of our initial foray into the brand-new Anchor Seminar come with a heartfelt invitation to make connections to what and how and who you are teaching in the Core, majors, minors and professional schools.

The English Department announces its lineup of Fall 2021 visiting writers: join us this semester for in-person, hour-long evening encounters with these creative thinkers:

-Portland poet Dr. Ösel Jessica Plante reading from her new book Waveland, 7 p.m. Wed. Oct 27, UP Bookstore (co-hosted by the Garaventa Center).

-Minnesota poet Anders Carlson-Wee reading from his collection The Low Passions, 7:30 p.m. Tues Nov. 9, UP Bookstore.

-Pulitzer-winning essayist, novelist, and memoirist Mitchell S. Jackson (UP’s Fall Schoenfeldt Distinguished Writer), Wed. Nov. 10, 7:30 p.m., BC Aud.

For details contact English Chair Dr. Lars Larson, larson@up.edu.

Wednesday, November 3rd 3:00 p.m.-4:30 p.m. 

Zoom link here 

We can’t wait to come together this fall for our Community Conversation! We will learn and share about disability justice and disability as an identity that intersects with other core identities.  

For this Community Conversation, we hope you will choose two or three options from the list below. To fully engage in the conversation, please read or watch at least one before attending. 

When we meet virtually on November 3, we will start the conversation by each sharing what pieces we chose and why, and we will offer one takeaway from each.  

·         The Smithsonian exhibit on disability history: Everybody: An Artifact History of Disability in America. 

·         Finding Dory, Disability Access, and Collective Access by Alice Wong 

·         30 year anniversary of ADA conversation: ADA in Color Panel Discussion 

·         Does Dis/ability Now Sit at the Table(s) of Social Justice and Multicultural Education? A Descriptive Survey of Three Recent Anthologies 

·         “Sometimes You Feel Invisible”: Performing Queer/Disabled in the University Classroom, Ryan A Miller 

If you haven’t yet had a chance, we also still highly recommend this short video from Kimberlé Crenshaw on the Urgency of Intersectionality as a complement to any of these other pieces we are discussing. Note: there is potentially traumatic information shared in this video pertaining to police brutality.  

Thank you for your good work at UP and for joining us in these dialogues. Please email oiedi@up.edu with questions, accommodation requests, or other feedback. 

Join Us! Employees at the University of Portland are forming an affinity group for LGBTQIA+ staff, faculty, adjunct, and administrators. All who self-identify as part of this community are invited to join this informal group by contacting Mary Markham (they/them & she/her) at markham@up.edu. Mary will collect names, pronouns, and emails from interested employees so a listsery can be created, and the group can begin to gather, to plan and organize events, to support one another, to provide training and resources, and to network. Overall, the purpose of this group is to create a supportive community for LGBTQIA+ folks here at UP.

To join this group, or to communicate any questions or ADA accommodations, please contact Mary Markham (markham@up.edu).