News Bureau

The Baroque Artists of Champaign Urbana will perform a Messiah sing-along at 4 p.m. Nov. 29 at the First Baptist Church at Savoy, 1602 S. Prospect Avenue, Savoy.

Illinois Program for Research in the Humanities is accepting proposals for the 2016-17 IPRH fellowship year, which has announced the theme of “Publics.” The deadline for proposals is Dec. 4.

John Erdman, a professor emeritus of food science and human nutrition and a part-time faculty member in the Bioacoustics Research Laboratory at the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology, will present the next Beckman Institute Director’s Seminar at noon Dec. 3. 

Faculty and staff members, students and other stakeholders are invited to the Strategic Plan town hall meeting from 3-5 p.m. Nov. 18 in the auditorium of the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology.

Judith Adanma Johnson premiered her exhibition “Energy” last week in the Illini Union Art Gallery. The exhibition will be on display in the gallery through Nov. 29. Located in the northwest wing of the Illini Union, the exhibition is free and open to the public.

Brian A. Boyd, an expert on autism spectrum and related developmental disorders, will give the annual Goldstick Family Lecture in the Study of Communication Disorders at the University of Illinois.

The Jupiter String Quartet performs a series of three concerts this week that will feature the six string quartets by Hungarian composer Béla Bartók. The string quartets are among Bartók’s greatest works and among the greatest in the genre.

Mobility has long been associated with success, power and adaptability. However, relocation of families, neighborhoods or whole ethnic groups has often been a matter of necessity or hardship. The College of Fine and Applied Arts will address how the worlds of art, culture and commerce have been marked by recent or historical migrations at Uncorked and On Topic at 5:15 p.m. Nov. 12 in the Tryon Festival Theatre foyer at Krannert Center for the Performing Arts.

The Educational Technology Leadership Summit will be from 8 a.m.-4 p.m. Dec. 9 at the I Hotel and Conference Center. The summit will bring state educational leaders to the U. of I. to participate in a unique professional learning opportunity on educational technology.

Illinois International Programs invites faculty members to “Globalization at Illinois: A Faculty Dialogue,” a town-hall style conversation about globalization at Illinois at noon Nov. 10 in Room 104 of the Illini Union. 

The U. of I. ROTC units will host a Veterans Day ceremony at 5 p.m. Nov. 11 at the indoor track of the Armory Building. The event is designed to commemorate veterans of all branches of the United States military. The event is organized by the Naval, Army and Air Force ROTC units of the U. of I.

Zaida “Zan” Luthey-Schulten, a part-time faculty member in the Theoretical and Computational Biophysics Group at the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology, will present “Stochastic Simulations of Cellular Processes: From Single Cells to Colonies.” The lecture will begin at noon Nov. 5 in Room 1005 of the Beckman Institute as part of the Beckman Institute Director’s Seminar. Lunch will be provided.

Dr. Neil Vasdev will discuss “Cutting-edge Radiochemical Methods and Technologies for Human PET Imaging” at noon Nov. 13, in Room 1005 of the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology.

Richard Levin, CEO of Coursera and president emeritus of Yale University, will present two upcoming lectures on the U. of I. campus.

The University Library invites the campus community to a Library Research Showcase from 1 to 4 p.m. Nov. 10 at the Main Library. Library faculty members and academic professionals will present their research, which impacts a wide variety of library services as well as the global library and information science profession and other scholarly fields.

The Illini Union Office of Volunteer Programs is sponsoring its annual Thanksgiving Basket Drive to provide families with a basket of nonperishable food items and a $25 gift card, which can furnish a Thanksgiving meal. The entire Illinois campus is invited to participate. The drive will run through Nov. 16.

On Oct. 19, the Urbana-Champaign Senate approved a university policy on open access to research articles. This policy grants the university a nonexclusive, irrevocable, worldwide license to exercise all rights under copyright to the scholarly articles produced by faculty members.

The Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology and the Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology will sponsor two upcoming Chambana Science Café events.

The Advance Illinois Project is replacing the FACTS legacy system with a new customer relationship management database and related document management and business intelligence functionality.

The U. of I. main Quad is a next stop on a nationwide tour of HungerU – a mobile exhibit to raise awareness of nutrition and food security issues. HungerU will be on the north end of the Quad from 9 am. to 4 p.m. Nov. 4. Visitors can pedal tractors around the Quad and participate in events to win prizes. The interactive games and displays provide information about the significance of modern agriculture and how it affects the world’s food crisis and the state of food security in more than 100 countries.

Energizing the U. of I. since 1941, Abbott Power Plant provides safe, reliable, environmentally compliant and cost-effective energy to support the mission of the university.

The School of Literatures, Cultures and Linguistics will offer a unique learning opportunity in the form of its Intensive Foreign Language Instruction Program for winter 2016.

Technology Services will perform maintenance to the campus network on Friday morning, Oct. 23, beginning at 3 a.m. The work is expected to take 15 to 20 minutes, but maintenance could potentially continue until 5 a.m. 

On Friday, Oct. 23, several campus-area streets and intersections will be closed between 5:30 and 7 p.m. for the Homecoming parade.
 MTD routes through the parade area will be modified and delays may occur. Streets and intersections that are affected are listed below.


The University YMCA will present the “Behind Closed Doors No-More” exhibition series, displaying linocuts and quilts by Elzbieta (Elka) Kazmierczak. The exhibition opens at 5 p.m. Nov. 5 at the Y’s Murphy Gallery, followed by a gallery talk with Kazmierczak at 5:30 p.m. Light refreshments will be provided.

Japan House is auctioning more than two dozen handmade quilts. The online auction is live now and continues through Nov. 8. A portion of the proceeds from the auction will go to the Kimiko Gunji Legacy Fund to support visiting artists and teachers who will share Japanese culture.

Three faculty panelists will lead a discussion of the issues arising from the June censure of the U. of I. by the American Association of University Professors and the proposal by the U. of I. Board of Trustees this fall to require criminal background checks for all new faculty members. The event, sponsored by the Urbana campus AAUP Chapter, will be at 4 p.m. Oct. 20 in Room 314A Illini Union.

Technology Services recently implemented a new password system that will save faculty and staff members and students time by not having to maintain multiple passwords. It also will be easier to reset a password if the user forgets it.

The fourth annual MRL Biological Conference will be Nov. 4 and 5 at the Materials Research Laboratory. The laboratory offers an array of characterization tools, which enable a wide range of structural research in biological and advanced materials systems. To further educate current and future facility users in the number of options available to them, this workshop is devoted to biological inquiry and applications.

The Institute for Sustainability, Energy and Environment will host an array of events during Sustainability Week, Oct. 19-23.

Would you like to enhance your experience when attending performances at Krannert Center for the Performing Arts? Patrons may use monthly guides provided by the Music and Performing Arts Library to learn more about the performers and works being performed through materials in the library's collections. 

Omega Tau Sigma, the professional veterinary fraternity, will host the 5K Road Race for Animals on Oct 25. Participants may run or walk, with or without a dog.

Do you have a work-related question that doesn’t have a simple answer? Are you unsure of which office to contact? Representatives from campus, community and affiliated organizations will provide information about benefits, services, programs and other related topics at the All Employee Expo.

Who can see what we share? Does our email belong to us? How is technology changing the ways we communicate? Two faculty members from the College of Fine and Applied Arts will address such questions at the college’s Uncorked and On Topic event at 5:15 p.m. Oct. 15 in the Krannert Center for the Performing Arts Tryon Festival Theatre Foyer.

The U. of I. will again offer four-week online courses during winter break this year. Winter Session 2015-16 will run Dec. 21 through Jan. 15. The courses offer an opportunity for undergraduate degree-seeking students to take an active role in their education, learn time management, set goals and meet them as they work toward degree completion. Illinois faculty members teach the courses that are offered to U. of I. undergraduate students at the Urbana campus and nondegree students at other institutions.

The seasonal flu shot is now available 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Monday through Friday for free at McKinley Health Center to all U. of I. students who have paid the Health Service Fee and all benefits-eligible faculty and staff members, retirees and state employees. Check the McKinley website and its Flu Clinic Events Calendar for other locations on campus.

Stephen P. Long, the Center for Advanced Study Professor of Plant Biology will deliver the 25th Annual CAS Lecture at 7:30 p.m. Oct. 27 in the Knight Auditorium at Spurlock Museum. Long’s topic is “Feeding and Fueling the World from Crops: Will it be Possible by 2050?”

Nominations are being accepted for the Chancellor’s Academic Professional Excellence Award program, which is designed to recognize the important contributions made by academic professionals at the U. of I.

Six academic units came together to offer the new Sustainability, Energy and Environment Fellows Program, a campuswide undergraduate minor through the Institute for Sustainability, Energy and Environment to promote systems-level thinking about energy and sustainability, and to foster the development of an integrated view of the economy, society and the environment.

A Los Angeles-based artist will discuss how race is represented in art in a lecture this evening, Oct. 8, at Krannert Art Museum. Ken Gonzales-Day, a professor of art and humanities at Scripps College, will speak at 5:30 p.m. The title of his lecture is "Interruption and Absence: A History of Lynching (Latinos) and How It Changed What I Think About Contemporary Art."

From 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Oct. 4, more than 350 veterinary medicine students will give a behind-the-scenes look at the state’s only veterinary medicine college. From prospective veterinarians to anyone fascinated by animals, visitors will find something of interest at the U. of I. College of Veterinary Medicine Open House.

Three faculty members will join Krannert Art Museum curators at 5:30 p.m. Oct. 1 for a discussion of the current exhibition “Attachment.”

Emanuel Donchin, a professor of psychology at the University of South Florida, will present the U. of I. department of psychology's 2015 Lyle Lanier Lecture, “Typing With Your Brain Waves: A Communication Tool for Locked In Patients.” The lecture is at 4 p.m. Oct. 15 at the auditorium of the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology.

The Center for South Asian and Middle Eastern Studies will host a daylong symposium dedicated to exploring the Ganges River – its heritage, threats to its sustenance and planning initiatives to conserve it.

Bernard Hammes, a professor of medicine, will speak on advance care planning from noon-1 p.m. Oct. 14 at the Presence Covenant Medical Center auditorium, 1400 W. Park St., Urbana. The event is free and open to the public.

The U. of I. and Dow AgroSciences LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of The Dow Chemical Company, announced the Sept. 28 grand opening of the Dow AgroSciences Innovation Center in the Research Park on the Urbana campus.

Supporters of the U. of I. Wildlife Medical Clinic will host a fundraiser at the Harvest Moon Drive-In Oct. 3 for a viewing of “How to Train Your Dragon.”

University Primary School will host an open house Oct. 13 and 14. Prospective families, researchers and community members may observe the preschool in action from 9 a.m. to noon.

The Baroque Artists of Champaign-Urbana announces its 20th anniversary season. When holding its first concert, the group had no idea it would still be bringing baroque music to central Illinois in 2015.

Wesley Student Center and United Methodist Church at the U. of I. have been sponsoring a monthlong exploration of race and violence in America. The final event will be a panel discussion at 1:30 p.m. Oct. 4 featuring Travis Dixon, a U. of I. professor of communication, and Monica McDermott, a U. of I. professor of sociology, as well as Champaign Mayor Deb Frank Feinen and Champaign Police Chief Anthony Cobb.