University President Richard Levin, who underwent surgery for prostate cancer in April, will be on hand for this weekend’s Commencement festivities.
Levin has stayed out of his Woodbridge Hall office for most of the past three weeks so that he could focus on recuperating. But, while he will miss a few events this weekend, he will give the Baccalaureate Address and lead Monday’s Commencement ceremony as usual.
“I will be back in action and I will give all of my speeches,” Levin said Wednesday.
A $5 million gift has given Divinity School Dean Harold Attridge a new title: the Henry L. Slack Dean of Yale Divinity School.
The new endowed deanship was created by Robert McNeil Jr. ’36 in honor of his grandfather, a leader of the Congregational Church in Connecticut who graduated from the Divinity School in 1877.
The donation comes at a time when the Divinity School has been struggling to meet its fundraising targets and expand its financial aid offerings. As of March, contributions to the school’s annual fund, which is earmarked directly for financial aid, were down nearly 20 percent compared to the 2008 fiscal year.
At a meeting of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences earlier this month, faculty members formally discussed the possibility of instituting minors for the first time but did not vote on the issue.
Pericles Lewis, co-chair of the Committee on Majors, said many faculty members spoke in favor of minors at the well-attended meeting.
“The discussion was incredibly rich and fruitful,” Yale College Dean Mary Miller said. “It’s the kind of conversation one hopes for in a meeting in which people will learn from one another.”
Commencement should not be affected by the swine flu outbreak, Vice President and Secretary Linda Lorimer said today in an e-mail to the community.
No cases of the novel H1N1 virus have been confirmed at Yale and there are currently no more cases of probable or even suspected swine flu under investigation, Lorimer said.
“We can all be pleased that the swine flu ‘situation’ has abated and no serious problem materialized here,” she said. “I hope there will be no further need to hear from me on this subject!”
The University advised those with flu-like symptoms to stay home and to contact their primary care providers rather than Urgent Care at Yale University Health Services as health officials had previously advised. However, individuals returning from Mexico were instructed to contact either Student Medicine or Employee Health before resuming their normal activities.
In other news, Connecticut Gov. M. Jodi Rell announced today that five more cases of swine flu had been confirmed in the state, bringing the total thus far to 38 — four of which were from New Haven County.
The Senate Committee on Foreign Relations voted Tuesday to send Harold Hongju Koh’s nomination as legal adviser to the Department of State to the full Senate. But in a reflection of the recent debate of Koh’s nomination, the vote was split 12-to-5, almost exactly along party lines.
Sen. Richard Lugar of Indiana, the senior Republican on the committee, was the only GOP member to vote with the Democrats in favor of Koh’s nomination.
As we reported last week, the Foreign Relations Committee originally scheduled a vote on Koh’s nomination last Tuesday, but Sen. Jim DeMint, Republican of South Carolina, delayed the vote until this week. The full Senate has yet to schedule a date to vote on Koh’s nomination.
As the economy worsens, so are the relationships between many universities and their communities, a front-page article in The New York Times reported today.
But in a post on his Facebook page about the Times article, Associate Vice President for New Haven and State Affairs Michael Morand ’87 DIV ’93 begged to differ — at least in the Elm City.
“NOT in New Haven, though!” Morand wrote in his Twitter-like response to the article, which carried the headline “Slump Revives Town-Gown Divide Across U.S.”
“Hometown & Yale University working as closely & cooperatively as ever,” Morand added.
Students will likely not be able to use University funds for summer work or travel in Mexico due to an outbreak of swine flu, University Provost Peter Salovey announced Friday. The U.S. State Department issued a standing travel advisory last week urging U.S. citizens to avoid non-essential travel to Mexico, and the University is adhering to those guidelines, Salovey said.
In the unlikely event that the advisory is lifted, undergraduates would be able to use University funds for travel.
It was not immediately clear Friday how many students the decision will affect. Only undergraduates are subject to the restrictions, Salovey’s e-mail said, while graduate and professional school students are urged to use “good judgment” in deciding whether to travel to Mexico this summer.
Today’s New York Times features a heartbreaking story about the struggles faced by Assistant Dean of Yale College Edgar Letriz, the point person in the Dean’s Office for working with student organizations.
Letriz has been on disability leave this semester because of a degenerative disc disorder. To make matters worse, Letriz, who lives with his sister and her two children in a second-floor New Haven apartment, is now facing eviction after the owner of the three-family home where he lives defaulted on its mortgage.
The Times article focuses on Letriz and Chauntay Barnes, a Hamden resident who also lives in an apartment that has gone through foreclosure. But there is one key difference. The mortgage on Barnes’ unit is controlled by Fannie Mae, which has stopped evicting renters from foreclosed homes. On the other hand, HSBC, the bank that holds the mortgage on Letriz’s property, is still evicting renters. So Letriz, who needs surgery on his back, may soon lose his home.
“I’ve had sleepless nights and psychiatric counseling because of the pain, and now this causes more stress,” Letriz told The Times. “I’m not capable of moving. I can’t pick up even a gallon of milk.”
A committee voted to grant tenure to two science professors Thursday afternoon, bringing the total number of tenure appointments this year to nine. Eight of these have been in the sciences or social sciences.
Richard Yang (left), an associate professor of computer science, and Jun Korenaga (right), an associate professor of geology and geophysics, received tenure at a meeting of the Board of Permanent Officers, a body composed of the full professors in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. Korenaga became a full professor, while Yang will retain his title of associate professor.
Students gathered on Cross Campus yesterday to show support for a chemistry lecturer who is about to lose her job.
Above, Blessing Aghaulor ’12 signs a petition asking that the lecturer, Iona Black, remain employed by the University. Meanwhile, Leon Noel ’10 pours baking soda into a homemade-volcano, while Travis Long ’10 looks on.
Long said Black told him several weeks ago that she would be let go as of June 30, because, as Long recalled her saying, her impact on campus was not sufficient.
“Yale without her would be a darker place,” Noel said.
No sooner did U.S. Supreme Court Justice David Souter announce his plans to retire from the nation’s highest court at the end of the term next month than did speculation on his replacement sweep Washington. Both Yale and Harvard make appearances on the short list published by The Washington Post today.
The Post named Harold Hongju Koh, the Yale Law School dean who was nominated earlier this spring to be the legal advisor to the State Department, but cautioned that since that nomination has come under fire by conservatives who oppose his views on international influence on U.S. law, a Supreem Court bid would be similarly embattled. Meanwhile, Elena Kagan, the former dean of Harvard Law School who was confirmed as solicitor general in March, was already considered a top choice for Obama’s first Supreme Court nomination when the President picked her for solicitor general.
Also on the list was Judge Sonia Sotomayor LAW ’79 of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit, who would be the first Hispanic on the Court and who sided with the city of New Haven in the firefighter’s discrimination case now facing the Supreme Court.
