UPbeat

News for and about University of Portland faculty and staff.

02-18-2013

Elayne Shapiro Lecture

Elayne ShapiroElayne Shapiro, communication studies, will present “Conflict in the Bible: the Communication-Conflict Lens” as part of the Spring 2013 Communication Studies Colloquium Series on Wednesday, February 27, noon to 1 p.m., in Buckley Center room 163. Her talk is free and open to faculty, staff, students, and the public.

In addition to her teaching and administrative duties, Shapiro conducts research in computer-mediated communication and health communication. Her research appears in several book chapters, the Journal of the Northwest Communication Association, the Journal of American Academy of Nurse Practitioners, the Journal of College Teaching, and the Journal of Religious Education. Orbis Press recently published Reading the Bible: Transforming Conflict, coauthored with Sr. Carol Dempsey, theology.

Light snacks will be served, and all are welcome to bring their lunch. For more information contact C. Vail Fletcher, communication studies, at 7351 or fletcher@up.edu.

Ed.D. Degree Informational

For those who have already earned a master’s degree in education or a related field, the School of Education is hosting a pair of Doctor of Education in Learning and Leading (Ed.D.) informationals on Wednesday, February 20, and Wednesday, February 27, both at 6 p.m., in Franz Hall Siegfried Room (room 452). Both sessions will present the same information. The Ed.D. program in the nationally accredited School of Education combines innovative coursework and faculty expertise with applied research and best practices to prepare the next generation of leaders. If you would like to attend, please RSVP to the School of Education at 8535.

Seeking Submissions

The Campus Connector program is seeking original art and photos for the “Art of Diversity” exhibition and contest, according to Gwen Guderjohn, international student services. In coordination with Diversity Dialogues Week, students, staff, and faculty are encouraged to submit an original piece of art or photography that represents an aspect of human diversity. Art and photographs will be displayed in the international student lounge in Christie Hall 020 and three winners will be chosen by audience selection. Join the Campus Connector coffee hour on Friday, March 1 from 11:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m. for artwork viewing and discussion. Instructions and rules are available at http://tinyurl.com/bd9qqw6.

Flex-Plan Grace Period

Employees who participated in Flex-Plan for the 2012 calendar year have a grace period of January 1, 2013 to March 15, 2013 that will allow employees to maximize their 2012 benefit. Employees have until March 31, 2013 to submit claims for expenses incurred on March 15, 2013 or before. Claims can be submitted online at www.flex-plan.com or through a paper form available at up.edu/hr, Employee Benefits, Flexible Spending Account Information (http://tinyurl.com/b7xha33). Contact hr@up.edu with questions.

TIAA-CREF Representative Visits

Mark Gilgan from TIAA-CREF will be on campus on Tuesday, February 26 to give a brown bag presentation on the state of UP employees’ retirement accounts. The presentation will be held at noon in Buckley Center room 163. All are welcome to bring their lunches and join fellow employees and HR staff for an informative session on retirement.

A TIAA-CREF representative will host a brown bag lunch presentation on 2013 tax law changes and how they affect personal finances on Wednesday, March 6, at noon in Buckley Center room 163. Contact Andy Sherwood, human resources, at sherwood@up.edu for more information. Snacks will be provided.

Freedom Fighters Discussion

The Moreau Center will host a brown bag lunch session, “The Freedom Riders, Fighters, and Writers Project: Insights from a Service-Learning Collaboration,” on Wednesday, February 20, 12:30-1:30 p.m., in the Murphy conference room on the fourth floor of Franz Hall. Rich Christen, education, and Kate McPherson, Roosevelt High School, will discuss their journey to engage University of Portland education students and Roosevelt High School students in an inspiring and meaningful collaboration, which resulted in the Freedom Fighters exhibit which will be on campus on February 19 and 20. Please RSVP to Laura Goble, Moreau Center, at goble@up.edu.

Project Improv Portland

The University will host Project Improv Portland on Friday, February 22, from 6 to 9:30 p.m., in Buckley Center Auditorium. There is a recommended donation of $3 per person to offset costs of putting on the show and to benefit UP’s Bluffoons improv group. Patrons are welcome to come and go throughout the event, which will feature six improv teams, including the University of Portland Bluffoons, improv professionals from the Brody Theater, and the Dead Parrots Society, winners of the 2010-2011 National College Improv Tournament.

This project has been made possible by the Brian Doyle Scholarships for Gentle & Sidelong Humor, created by Patricia and John Beckman ’42 as a RISE Campaign gift. For more information, contact Ryan Belisle at belisle14@up.edu.

Portland Village Gardens Benefit

Village GardensAll faculty, staff, and students are invited to the first annual benefit dinner hosted by Village Gardens at the Bauccio Commons on Friday, March 15, according to Kim Nguyen, nursing. Village Gardens has been a UP partner agency in many important projects. The organization promotes community leadership, growing and sharing of healthy food, and youth empowerment, education, and skill building. The evening will include food and drink, community participant presentations, brief videos highlighting program successes, and a silent auction. Tickets are $40, with dinner included, and can be purchased at www.villagegardens.org. Table Sponsors can give $350 to invite or donate tickets to eight individuals. Students may use Pilots meal points to purchase tickets. The event goes from 6 to 9 p.m. with dinner served at 7. For more information, contact Nguyen at nguyekim@up.edu.

Diving Into “Mink River”

Mink River Brian Doyle and Rev. Charlie Gordon, C.S.C., will again join forces as they explore the braided spiritual journeys of defiant hope and faith in Doyle’s novel Mink River, and in the works of other spiritual writers including Annie Dillard, David James Duncan, Marilynne Robinson, and Ron Hansen. Please join them on Wednesday, February 20, at 7 p.m., in the Pilot House bookstore. Their spirited talk is free and open to the public.

Doyle’s Mink River, a finalist for the Oregon Book Award and winner of the Foreword Reviews’ Novel of the Year in 2011, is the story of a small town on the Oregon coast and its “fitfully graceful” denizens, among them a priest, a nun, and a remarkably wise and articulate crow. The book is now on the reading lists of students in high schools and colleges around America, and Fr. Gordon teaches it in his class on modern Catholic literature. Doyle, editor of the University of Portland’s Portland Magazine, is the author of many other books, among them the spiritual essay collections Grace Notes and Leaping. A new collection of his spiritual essays, The Thorny Grace of It, will be published in September by Loyola Press in Chicago.

For more on the Garaventa Center’s busy slate of events, all of them free and open to the public, see http://www.up.edu/garaventa/. For more information on this event contact Jamie Powell, Garaventa Center, at 7702 or powell@up.edu.

2013 Mazzocco Lecture

Debra SatzThe annual William James Mazzocco Lecture in Distributive Justice will take place on Wednesday, February 20, at 7:30 p.m., in Buckley Center room 163. Debra Satz (pictured left), the Marta Sutton Weeks Professor of Ethics in Society at Stanford University, will present “Should Everything Be For Sale?” The lecture is free and open to all. Satz will explore the controversies around diverse goods (human organs, votes, sex, credit derivatives, etc.) and whether they should be treated as marketable commodities. She will draw much of her argument from her 2010 book, Why Some Things Should Not Be For Sale: The Moral Limits of Markets. Other works by Satz include Toward A More Humanist Justice: The Political Philosophy of Susan Moller Okin (2009) and Occupy the Future (2013). Her areas of academic specialty include the place of equality in a just society and theories of rational choice, and she is currently leading a multi-year research project which aims to clarify plausible interpretations of equality of educational opportunity and their implications for public policy.

The William James Mazzocco Memorial Lecture in Distributive Justice was established in 2006; Mazzocco earned his economics degree on The Bluff in 1937. A lifelong world traveler, Mazzocco had a long, distinguished career which included military intelligence assignments during World War II, diplomatic posts in Paris, Rome, Rio de Janeiro, and Abidjan, and significant contributions to the Marshall Plan. He credited his years at the University of Portland with giving him a solid moral foundation that would guide his life and work for the remainder of his 89 years, most notably his steadfast belief in distributive justice—the principles of equitable and fair distribution of wealth.

For more information contact Gary Malecha, political science, at 7452 or malecha@up.edu.