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Portland State University Portland State University Friday, Nov. 30, 2012 | vol. 67 no. 26
Students and staff reTHINK PSU
PSU musicians come together
Campaign looks to overhaul education experience Katie Quick Vanguard staff
Students, faculty and administration at Portland State now have the opportunity to think of the institution’s academics as a blank canvas. It’s a chance to question the status quo. A campus-wide initiative was recently launched, titled reTHINK PSU, bringing a challenge from the provost of Academic Affairs to bring pioneering change to PSU. “The idea of the challenge is to deliver education in different, more innovative ways. We’re encouraging each department on campus to think creatively,” said Sona Andrews, provost and vice president for Academic Affairs. Schools often experience incremental change over time—meaning they’ll make one change and adjust to it before moving on to the next. Incremental changes are more accessible, but they don’t necessarily allow for continuous improvement. The aim of reTHINK is to allow departments to explore new options and focus on how to keep the innovation flowing. See Rethink on page 3
Miles sanguinetti/VANGUARD STAFf
carl halvorson, applied vocal instructor, performs his choreographed vocal presentation at Tuesday’s rehersal. Halvorson is one of the nearly 30 faculty to be featured at Friday’s event.
Music Forward! concert first of its kind at PSU Kaela O’Brien Vanguard Staff
Tonight, you have the chance to hear from every music ensemble Portland State has to offer in the first ever Music Forward! concert event. “This is like the smorgasbord of all PSU music departments,” said Sydney Carlson, a professor of music at PSU and director of the flute choir performing at the concert. She will also be performing in the Museau Trio.
Music Forward! is the first concert of its kind at PSU, and will feature nearly 30 professors and 200 students. At a time when more students are enrolling in the music program with fewer scholarship opportunities to go around, the department will put all funds raised by the concert toward scholarships for music students. With more than 20 ensembles scheduled to perform, the audience will sample a wide variety of music—from Japanese taiko drums to classical pieces, from holiday tunes to opera.
Darrel Grant, a jazz pianist, composer and professor of music at PSU, chaired the committee that organized the event. Carlson revealed that the flute choir is performing the holiday favorite “Deck the Halls,” Santa hats and all. “It’s like an all-you-can-eat buffet of music!” Grant joked. The music will be performed continuously and in several locations throughout Lincoln Hall, rather than in just one spot. The audience can also expect an array of solos, duets and larger ensembles. But the most unusual
aspect of the concert, as Carlson put it, is the sheer number of faculty and students performing. “It’s exciting that students and faculty are creating something so artistic and collaborative,” PSU senior Andy Sharma said. Sharma will play the clarinet in a clarinetflute duet. With so many participants involved in the concert, planning began in early summer. Grant and the eight other board members met frequently to plan and prepare all the pieces for the concert. See MUSIC FORWARD on page 2
Waves of research Sediment sampling reveals tsunami evidence Erik Mutzke Vanguard staff
Courtesty of brian atwater
Sarah Sterling (right), a PSU archaeologist, and Ian Hutchison, a professor at Simon Fraser University, examine possible tsunami deposits near the mouth of Salt Creek in Clallum County, Wash.
Eight years ago, Portland State archaeologist Sarah Sterling came across an unusual find in the ancient tribal village site of Tse-whit-zen, near Port Angeles, Wash. The village appeared to have been abandoned every few hundred years, according to gaps in her radiocarbon sequencing. The curious find led her to develop a hypothesis that caused a surge of research to follow it. Her explanation: more than one tsunami, spaced hundreds of years apart. Since then, the area has been the major focus for researchers from across various disciplines inter-
ested in the region’s earthquake and tsunami history. In May 2012, Sterling went back to Salt Creek Marsh, 17 miles west of Port Angeles along the Strait of Juan de Fuca shoreline, to look for more evidence in the layers of sand tsunamis left behind. “They show up very clearly in organic, rich marsh sediment,” Sterling said. With her was geologist Ian Hutchinson of Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, British Columbia. The research was made possible by a PSU Faculty Enhancement Grant. “When it comes to finding evidence for tsunamis, you need a geologist,” Sterling explained. The method for examining ancient tsunami evidence involves a process See tsunami on page 2