Wes in the News

This semester, Wesleyan has begun offering a linked major program for Environmental Studies. Barry Chernoff, the Robert Schumann Professor of Environmental Studies, Professor of Earth & Environmental Sciences, professor of biology and director of the Environmental Studies Certificate Program, explained the new major to interested students during a recent campus event.

The linked major program is the second major to a primary major. Students must complete all the requirements for graduation from their primary major in addition to those of ENVS as their second major. The basic information about the program can be found here.

In USA Today, Elvin Lim, assistant professor of government, discusses the dynamic between President Obama and Afghan forces commander General McChrystal regarding adjusting troop levels.

Wesleyan students involved in The Humanitarian Free and Open Source Software (HFOSS) project have teamed with students from other institutions to create disaster management software for several volunteer agencies, including The American Red Cross, The Salvation Army and Catholic Charities USA. The free software provides a virtual emergency response center that these organizations can use immediately after a disaster to help manage aid and logistics. The Wesleyan HFOSS group, along with analogous groups from Trinity College and Connecticut College, also received part of an $1.3 million grant to create more software of this type. Wesleyan’s HFOSS group is supervised by Norman Danner, associate professor of computer science, and Daniel Krizanc, professor of computer science.

The Wesleyan Sukkah, a structure created by the 15 students enrolled in Architecture II and working in the Wesleyan research-design-build studio, has won a 2009 “Faith and Form Award” from the American Institute of Architects (AIA). The students are supervised by Elijah Huge, assistant professor of art.

Wesleyan President Michael S. Roth has a piece in The Huffington Post on the 100th anniversary of Sigmund Freud’s only visit to the U.S. Freud came to New England 100 years ago this fall to deliver a series of lectures.

Suzanne O’Connell, associate professor of earth and environmental sciences, director, service learning center, has an opinion piece in The Hartford Courant that tells residents and law-makers about a proven, environmentally-friendly method for reducing carbon emissions and raising revenue that’s also incredibly cheap to implement.

Brian Stewart, associate professor of physics and director of Wesleyan’s Molecular Collisions Laboratory, settles once and for all exactly what the Heisenberg Principle means on NPR’s “The Colin McEnroe Show.”

Lisa Dombroski, associate professor of film studies, comments in USA Today on the new film Jennifer’s Body, a horror film with a snarky side that has the genre-inverting set-up of men as the victims and a woman who is the feared yet extremely attractive “monster.”

Gil Skillman, chair and professor of economics, was a featured guest on WNPR’s “Where We Live” discussion on the general state of the economy one year after the demise of Lehman Brothers and the onset of the recession. Skillman and two other economists discuss what led to the collapse and point out some of the danger points that have been under-reported in the newsmedia and have yet to be addressed by the Federal Government.

The Colin McEnroe Show on WNPR had a discussion about Vodou and Haitian culture featuring Elizabeth McAlister, associate professor of religion, associate professor of African American studies, and Gina Ulysse, associate professor of anthropology, associate professor of African American studies, associate professor of feminist gender and sexuality studies.