All faculty, staff, and students are invited to join multicultural programs and the Moreau Center on Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Monday, January 20, from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m., in the Bauccio Commons. There will be opportunities to sign up for community service projects throughout spring 2014, plus a DJ, free t-shirts for individuals interested in community service, and other giveaways. Those who don’t have time to stop by can go to http://tinyurl.com/lmpjavc for service opportunities. For more information, contact Bethany Sills, student activities, at 7470 and mulitculturalprograms@up.edu, or Lindie Burgess, Moreau Center, at 7132 or moreaucenter@up.edu.
Student Activities
Annual Christmas Tree Lighting, Dec. 2
All University community members, including alumni, families, and friends, are invited to gather in Bauccio Commons on Monday, December 2, at 7 p.m., for the 15th annual University of Portland Christmas Tree Lighting Ceremony. Refreshments will be provided by ASUP. Contact Student Activities at 7470 or stuact@up.edu for more information.
Faculty and Staff: Join the Luau!
The University’s Hawaii Club will host its 38th annual Luau on March 22, 2014, and organizers would like to invite UP faculty and staff members to be a part of the night’s entertainment. Hawaiian dance practices will begin the week of January 19, 2014. Faculty and staff whose schedules don’t match times or dates can contact the Hawaii Club and they will do their best to accomodate them. All those interested are asked to e-mail Tiffany Harada at harada15@up.edu. Mahalo!
Day of the Dead Celebration
Día de los Muertos (“Day of the Dead”), Mexico’s colorful and festive holiday to honor departed loved ones, will be recreated on campus on Friday, November 1, 6-8 p.m., in St. Mary’s Student Center lounge, according to Bethany Sills, student activities. The celebration will include music, dance, arts and crafts, and snacks. All University community members (as well as neighbors) are invited to attend and participate in craft tables. Family members, including children are welcome. For more information contact Sills at 8198 or multiculturalprograms@up.edu.
Beacon Makes National Finals
The Beacon, the University’s weekly student-produced newspaper, is a finalist for the Associated Collegiate Press Pacemaker Award, a national award considered for the past 86 years to be the most prestigious award in college media, according to Nancy Copic, student activities. The Beacon is among 22 colleges and universities whose newspaper are finalists, including Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Boston College, George Washington University, University of Oregon, Johns Hopkins, and more. The Associated Collegiate Press will announce this year’s Pacemaker winners at their convention in New Orleans on October 26. For more information contact Copic at 7470 or copic@up.edu.
Beacon Awards Keep Rolling In
The University’s student-run weekly newspaper, The Beacon, won 27 awards—including first place for General Excellence— at the statewide collegiate awards ceremony of the Oregon Newspaper Publishers Association on May 11, according to Nancy Copic, student activities. The citation for first place reads: “The Beacon is an excellent student newspaper. It has a strong mix of stories and columns, extraordinarily good design, and a quality of journalism that is very high. One issue covered thoroughly a campus discussion of the university’s nondiscrimination policy and did so ably. Even though the paper’s position was clear, it was not a rant. In fact, it was professionally handled. Students are shown everywhere in the paper, as a good student newspaper should. There is clearly no fear in taking on issues that could be controversial on campus. The Beacon is impressive.”
For more information contact Copic at 7470 or copic@up.edu.
National Win For The Beacon
Caitlin Yilek, who served as the 2011-2012 Beacon opinions editor, has won a national First Place Award for Editorial Writing in the Society of Professional Journalists’ Mark of Excellence Awards, for editorials she wrote for The Beacon. Two current Beacon staffers, Kate Stringer and Jackie Jeffers, are national finalists for Feature Writing and Sports Photography, respectively. The Beacon journalists competed in the “Small School” category, meaning colleges and universities with 5,000 or fewer students. Yilek, who graduated in 2012, won for her editorials titled “Where are all the women?,” “University disregards student media,” and “What has ASUP done for you?” She is now a copy editor at the 
in her home state of Minnesota. She will receive the award at the SPJ Excellence in Journalism convention in Anaheim, Calif.,in August. For more information contact Nancy Copic, student activities, at 7470 or copic@up.edu.
“Beacon” Shines Again
The Beacon made an impressive showing at the regional Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ) conference at held at Gonzaga University, winning first place in five categories in the Mark of Excellence awards, according to Nancy Copic, student activities. The Beacon also won second place for best all-around weekly college newspaper (5,000 students and fewer). First place winners will advance to the national SPJ competition and winners will be announced at the national SPJ conference in Anaheim, Calif., in late August.
First Place winners include:
- General News Reporting: Philip Ellefson, “Access Denied”
- Feature Writing: Kate Stringer, “Molly’s Legacy: Hope for Haiti”
- Column Writing: Amanda Munro, Sarah Hansell, Lydia Laythe
- Sports Photography: Jackie Jeffers, “Round Two!”
- Editorial Writing: Caitlin Yilek, Opinions editor
Second place winners include:
- Best All-Around Non-Daily Student Newspaper (schools with 5,000 or fewer students)
- General News Reporting: Kelsey Thomas, “Students cooperate but still can’t party”
- Feature Photography: Joey Solano, “The story behind the ink”
- In-depth Reporting: Rosemary Peters (last year’s editor in chief), “What’s in our Air?”
Third place winners included Jackie Jeffers, who won in Breaking News Photography for “He said yes!”
Region 10 includes collegiate newspapers in Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana and Alaska. For more information contact Copic at 7470 or copic@up.edu.
Rock The Bluff Tickets
Faculty and staff are invited to attend the Campus Program Board (CPB) Rock the Bluff concert on Saturday, April 13, at 8:30 p.m. A pop rock band, Boys like Girls, will be the headline act, with support from UP student band The Harm as the opening act. Doors to the Chiles Center open at 8 p.m. There will be a beer garden in the south mezzanine area from 8-9:30 p.m. for guests of legal age. There is a limit of 2 complimentary tickets per person. Please pickup your ticket(s) in the Office of Student Activities, Monday-Friday from 8:30 a.m.-5 p.m. starting April 8. For more information contact Sean Ducey, CPB director, at ducey13@up.edu. TIckets will be given away first-come, first-served.
Pamela Olson Lecture
Author Pamela Olson will present her experiences working and living in Palestine in a lecture/slide show in St. Mary’s on Monday March 25, from 6 to 7:15 p.m. Olson wrote Fast Times in Palestine after living in Ramallah for two years. She found herself attending Yasser Arafat’s funeral, guiding Israeli friends around the West Bank, being held at gunpoint and injured by a stun grenade, and witnessing the 2005 Disengagement from inside the Gaza Strip. Check her website at www.pamolson.org/index.html for more information. Her book will be available for sale at the lecture.