UGA Columns September 15, 2014

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Head of UGA grounds department prepares to hang up his tools CAMPUS NEWS

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The University of Georgia University Theatre to open 2014-15 season with ‘Clybourne Park’

September 15, 2014

Vol. 42, No. 8

www.columns.uga.edu

kygilmor@uga.edu

UGA researchers have been awarded a three-year, $1.1 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to determine how two commonly administered drug combinations work to remove larvae from the bloodstream of people infected with lymphatic filariasis, also known as elephantiasis.

A serious human tropical disease caused by several species of parasitic roundworm, elephantiasis is transmitted to humans by infected mosquitos. More than 120 million people are infected with elephantiasis, and 1.3 billion people in 73 countries are at risk of getting the disease.

Often, elephantiasis is contracted during childhood. A

From left, Victoria Prevatt, executive director of development and alumni relations, Cal Powell, director of communications, and Vicky Dorsey, director of alumni and corporate engagement, all employees in the College of Family and Consumer Sciences, take part in a reception honoring faculty, staff and retiree donors.

All about UGA Reception held to honor, thank faculty, staff, retiree donors

jt88@uga.edu

On Sept. 4, UGA recognized faculty, staff and retiree donors who gave in fiscal year 2014 with a dessert reception in Grand Hall of the Tate Student Center. A total of 1,871 faculty, staff and retirees donated $2.8 million to help UGA achieve a record-breaking fundraising year.

UGA President Jere W. Morehead and Vice President for Development and Alumni Relations Kelly Kerner thanked the more than 200 faculty, staff and retirees in attendance for their generosity.

“As a longtime university

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$1.1M NIH grant to study effectiveness of elephantiasis drugs

By Kat Yancey Gilmore

By Tyler Daniels

UGA GUIDE

administrator and faculty member, I simply want to say thank you,” Morehead said. “All of us are fortunate to be part of the UGA family, and on behalf of the University of Georgia, I thank all of you for your support.”

Kerner also expressed his appreciation.

“In the very short time that I have been here, it has become clear to me that the UGA team is all about you,” Kerner said. “You’ve demonstrated your commitment by contributing more than just your wisdom, your time and your passion—you’ve contributed your personal resources. And on behalf of a grateful university, please

allow me to say thank you for all that you do.”

Several scholarship recipients as well as students from the Arch Society and Student Alumni Council were in attendance to thank donors who have impacted their university experience.

“These students are among the best and brightest in America, and they are fine examples of the outstanding students that all of us cherish having at the University of Georgia. And they are here, in part, because of your generous support,” Morehead said.

The Office of Donor Relations and Stewardship, a unit of the Office See RECEPTION on page 8

person’s lymphatic system, kidneys and immune system may be permanently damaged long before he or she begins to show physical Adrian symptoms. As Wolstenholme the disease progresses, it can cause extreme swelling in the extremities and other body parts, resulting in severe pain and, often, permanent disability.

In addition to the physical pain, the victims can suffer social and financial losses. Worldwide, roughly 40 million people have been disfigured or incapacitated by this disease.

See GRANT on page 8

‘us news & world report’ UGA in top 20 public universities; Terry College moves up six places

By Stephanie Schupska schupska@uga.edu

UGA continues to rank among the nation’s elite public research universities, according to U.S. News & World Report, which placed the institution at No. 20 on the list contained in its Best Colleges 2015 edition, released Sept. 8.

The university’s Terry College of Business increased its standing, moving six places to No. 21 for best undergraduate business schools.

“While specific numerical ­rankings will vary from year to year, I am pleased that the U ­ niversity of Georgia continues to be ­recognized

among the leading public universities in the nation,” said UGA President Jere W. Morehead.

“Our high standing overall, and in specific programs, provides more evidence of the outstanding academic experience offered at this institution.”

UGA has landed among the top 20 public universities six out of the last 10 years. This year, it was one of two SEC schools to make the list—along with the University of Florida.

The Terry College continues to rank top in the nation for its insurance and risk management

See RANKINGS on page 8

college of public health, georgia department of public health

University System summit leading up to tobacco-free campuses to be held Sept. 19

By Rebecca Ayer and Matt Yancey alea@uga.edu

The Georgia Department of Public Health and the College of Public Health invite the UGA community to attend the Tobacco-Free Colleges and Universities Summit Sept. 19 on the Health Sciences Campus.

This one-day event, which is open to faculty, staff and student representatives from all of Georgia’s public and private colleges and universities, will feature practical information and resources to help with the adoption, implementation

and enforcement of the new University System of Georgia tobacco-free campus policy.

“This policy is a major step ­towards improving the cardiovascular and respiratory health for UGA’s 44,000 students and employees,” said Phillip Williams, dean of the College of Public Health, which is cohosting the event. “And given the breadth of the University System of Georgia, the health and economic impacts for the state will be even greater.”

Last March, the board of ­regents, the body governing the 31 colleges and universities in the University System of Georgia,

unanimously approved a tobacco ban on all campuses effective Oct. 1. The policy prohibits the use of all tobacco products, including e-cigarettes and smokeless tobacco, on any property owned, leased or operated by the University System, including outdoor areas and parking lots.

“Tobacco-free environments are one of the best ways to help smokers quit and protect everyone from the dangers of tobacco,” said Jean O’Connor, director of health promotion and disease prevention for the Department of Public Health.

“We are honored to serve as a See SUMMIT on page 8

UGA set to ‘clear the air’ on its campuses UGA is launching a “Let’s Clear the Air” campaign to promote the University System of Georgia’s ban on tobacco products on all system campuses.

The campaign, which begins Sept. 22, advises faculty, staff, students and campus visitors that “UGA is a tobacco- and smoke-free campus,” in accordance with a policy adopted in March by the Board of Regents of the University System of Georgia.

The policy, which is effective Oct. 1, reinforces the USG’s commitment to provide a safe and amicable workplace for all employees as outlined in the Georgia Smoke Free Air Act of 2005 and to preserve and improve the health, comfort and environment of students, employees and visitors on all system campuses.

New signage around campus and messaging on the UGA website and via social media will promote the tobacco- and smoke-free campus policy, which applies to people in indoor or outdoor areas, including all buildings, recreational areas, lawns, university sidewalks, university vehicles and parking lots.

Banned products include cigarettes, cigars, pipes, all forms of smokeless tobacco, clove cigarettes and any smoking device that uses tobacco such as hookahs or simulate the use of tobacco such as electronic cigarettes.

For more information on the policy and resources to promote the policy as well as resources available for tobacco cessation, see uga.edu/tobacco-free or contact UGA Human Resources at 706-542-2621.

2 Sept. 15, 2014 columns.uga.edu

Around academe

U. of Oregon offers running tours

Earlier this month, the University of Oregon began offering campus running tours as a supplement to its existing walking tour.

According to a news release from the university, student tour guides lead groups through the trails surrounding the campus and complete the course with a victory lap around Hayward Field, a track and field stadium. The 3.7-mile tour is set at the pace of a 10-minute mile with frequent stops to point out landmarks.

The inaugural tour was co-hosted by Olympian and University of Oregon alumnus Andrew Wheating and student ambassador Ray Grant.

Eugene, where the university is located, often is referred to as “TrackTown USA.”

Gym time boosts GPA at Purdue

Purdue University found that first-year students who visited its recreational center 15 or more times a semester held a higher grade point average than those who did not.

The university tracked which first-year students often visited its France A. Cordova Recreational Sports Center and used their student ID numbers to generate a report based on their first-semester GPA. Those who frequently went to the center had an average GPA of 3.08. The average GPA for students who did not regularly use the gym was a 2.81.

News to Use

Prepare emergency plan in advance

National Preparedness Month is a good time to devise an emergency plan. To accomplish this, the UGA Office of Emergency Preparedness suggests that you: • Have a kit. Keep an emergency preparedness kit at your home and in your car. The kit at home should include enough food and water for three days. The kit in your car should include basic first aid supplies, water and a space blanket, which keeps in body heat and preserves body temperature.

• Make a plan. Have an emergency plan for both your office and home. You should know where the shelter and evacuation locations are for your office building. It is important to know more than one way out of your building in case your normal exit is blocked. Also prepare for what you would do at home in case of a fire or tornado. UGA staff can request an Emergency Preparedness Guidebook by emailing prepare@uga.edu or visiting www. prepare.uga.edu.

• Stay informed. Pay attention to your surroundings so you know when an emergency is likely to occur. Verify your contact information at ugaalert.uga.edu so you can receive an emergency message if necessary. To receive a scrolling message on your computer when a UGAAlert message is issued, ask your area’s information technology professional to install the UGAAlert Desktop application.

Source: Office of Emergency Preparedness

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Office of Institutional Diversity, Training and Career Development

Employees receive diversity certificate

By Matt Chambers mattdc@uga.edu

More than 130 UGA employees were recognized for making the university a more welcoming and inclusive place during the Sept. 4 Embracing Diversity program.

The program, which took place in the Chapel, honored 137 recipients of the UGA Diversity and Inclusion Certificate, a partnership between the Office of Institutional Diversity, Training and Career Development and other diversityrelated offices and programs at UGA. Three scholarship recipients also were recognized during the program.

Charles Orgbon III received the Black Alumni Scholarship, which is sponsored by the Alumni Association and is given to a first-year student who exhibits dedication to racial equality through previous experience, initiative and creativity in improving race relations in the community. Genesis Castro and Omar Frances received the Diversity Scholarship, which is a needs-based scholarship sponsored by the UGA Athletic Association. Castro and Frances were selected based on their demonstrated dedication to diversity in their community.

Michelle Cook, associate provost for institutional diversity, said it is important for the campus community to recognize and appreciate the richness of diversity at UGA. “We are strengthened daily by the different experiences, backgrounds and perspectives that we each contribute to the intellectual and educational enterprise here at UGA,” she said. “We all should be proud of our diverse community of students, staff and faculty and of our own contributions to that rich diversity.”

Paul Efland

More than 130 UGA employees were recognized Sept. 4 for earning the UGA Diversity and Inclusion Certificate.

J. Marshall Shepherd, the Athletic Association Professor of Geography in the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences, congratulated the certificate recipients during his keynote address.

Shepherd, immediate past president of the American Meteorological Society, veered into geometry as he discussed how everyone has a “radius of influence” that comes from their background, experiences and beliefs.

“Diversity expands your radius of influence,” Shepherd said. “And the larger our radius, the larger our circle of influence.”

Shepherd said that growing up in the rural town of Canton, a place where his family knew every other African-American person in town, his radius of influence was “just a dot.” After participating in 4-H, Model UN, science fairs, student government and a fraternity, Shepherd said his radius, and thus circle, grew.

“It continues to grow today,” he said.

Shepherd also pointed out that cultural expectations and lack of exposure can limit a person’s circle of influence. He said that growing up, it was assumed smart African-American men would be doctors, lawyers or business owners. Those expectations were part of the reason he agreed to run to be AMS president, despite originally declining the offer.

“I thought ‘what if some kid who’s doing his or her sixth-grade science project sees me and gets inspired?’ ” Shepherd said. “And that’s what made me call back and agree to it.”

Shepherd also called for more mentorship and told certificate recipients they were improving their world.

“With your certificate today, no matter what color you are or your gender, you’re blazing pathways,” he said.“You’re broadening your circle. And it’s not just about expanding your radius; now that you’ve gotten this certificate, you can now expand someone else’s radius.”

ACADEMIC AFFAIRS

OVPR

University announces plans to stop summer Commencement

Willson Center to host inaugural research seminar

By Tom Jackson

tjackson@uga.edu

UGA is returning to a traditional graduation schedule. The decision was made after a thorough assessment of the summer semester Commencement ceremony, which included attendance and cost analyses.

The executive committee of the University Council was notified of the administration’s decision to discontinue summer Commencement at its meeting Sept. 10. Separate ceremonies for graduates and undergraduates will continue to be held at the end of each fall and spring semester.

For many years, UGA held Commencement once a year—with separate undergraduate and graduate ceremonies on the same date at the close of spring semester. Additional ceremonies at the close of fall and summer semesters are a relatively recent addition. Separate fall ceremonies were added in 1998 and a combined graduate/undergraduate summer event began in 2000.

Beginning in 2015, undergraduates who are eligible to complete their degrees in spring or summer semesters will be allowed to attend the spring ceremony. Master’s and doctoral candidates who complete degrees in the summer will walk at the fall ceremony.

“A review showed participation in summer Commencement ceremonies has declined over the past several years, and we want to be fiscally responsible in our operations,” said Pamela Whitten, senior vice president for academic affairs and provost.

The action is in line with national

trends, she added.

“UGA is the only research university in Georgia still holding a summer ceremony, and only a few of our 24 designated peer and aspirational institutions hold ceremonies in the summer,” she said.

At UGA, only 16 percent of eligible undergraduates attended this summer’s event, with a total attendance of 372 graduates and undergraduates.

Graduate students desiring to be eligible for May 2015 graduation should be aware of the following deadlines: • Jan. 16, 2015: Final date for submitting applications for admission to candidacy to the Graduate School for doctoral candidates who plan to graduate in May 2015. Jan. 16 is also the final date for graduate students to submit an application for graduation for May 2015 graduation.

• April 6, 2015: Final date for submitting one complete copy of a thesis or dissertation for a format check for May 2015 graduation.

• April 27, 2015: Final date for the receipt of the following by the Graduate School: Final Defense Approval Form (all doctoral, M.S., M.A., M.H.P., M.L.A.) and corrected copy of thesis/ dissertation for May 2015 graduation.

• May 1, 2015: Final date for completing all requirements except submission of theses/dissertations (see earlier deadlines).

The Graduate School must receive notification concerning removal of incompletes, final examinations, etc., for spring 2015 graduation (this does not include grades for courses in which students are currently enrolled).

By Dave Marr

davemarr@uga.edu

The Jane and Harry Willson Center for Humanities and Arts will present its inaugural Research Seminar at Cortona, Italy Sept. 18-19. Open free to the public, “The Legacy of Classical Antiquity: ­Re-visioning the Past” will be held at the UGA Cortona Residential Center and the Museo dell’Accademia Etrusca e della Città di Cortona.

Mario Erasmo, a professor of classics in the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences, is among the featured speakers. Also presenting are Andrew Wallace-Hadrill, director of research in the Faculty of Classics at the University of Cambridge; Nigel Llewellyn, head of research at Tate; and Penelope Davies, division chair in art history at the University of Texas at Austin.

The seminar explores the legacy of classical antiquity as the nexus of the visual and cultural history of Italy and its modern interpretations. The conference offers a unique opportunity to examine material culture and artifacts in MAEC, whose collection represents a cross-fertilization of Etruscan and Roman civilizations.

“UGA is a global public research university with excellent academic resources,” said Nicholas Allen, Franklin Professor of English and director of the Willson Center. “This seminar brings top international scholars to our residential program in Cortona as a means to share ideas with our students, faculty and friends.”

A complete schedule and more information are at willson.uga.edu.

RESEARCH news

columns.uga.edu Sept. 15, 2014

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Digest Finalists for Graduate School deanship named; campus visits to begin Sept. 18

Peter Frey

Mary Ann Moran, Distinguished Professor of Marine Sciences at UGA, worked with other researchers who took samples from the plume 300 miles off shore from the Amazon River mouth, then isolated the genes of organisms using the nutrients, nitrogen, phosphorus and carbon being carried into the ocean by the river plume.

Model behavior

Franklin College marine scientists detail Amazon River Plume and its effects on global carbon budget

By Alan Flurry

aflurry@uga.edu

The Amazon River, the largest in the world in terms of discharge of water, transfers a plume of nutrients and organisms into the ocean. This plume creates a hot spot of microbial activity affecting many global processes, including the storage of atmospheric carbon.

In a new study, UGA scientists have revealed in greater detail the microbial activity in the Amazon River Plume as part of a broad project to understand the global carbon budget and its possible impacts in a changing ocean.

The study, “Microspatial gene expression patterns in the Amazon River Plume,” was published in the online edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

“By collecting data from genes and gene transcripts in the water samples, taking billions of sequences of DNA and RNA from organisms at various places in the plume, we were able to construct the most detailed look that’s ever been put together of the microbial processes

in a drop of seawater,” said Mary Ann Moran, Distinguished Research Professor of Marine Sciences at UGA. UGA researchers from the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences marine sciences and microbiology departments took samples from the plume 300 miles off shore from the Amazon River mouth, then isolated the genes of organisms using the nutrients, nitrogen, phosphorus and carbon being carried into the ocean by the river plume.

Discharge from the plume, more than 200,000 cubic meters of fresh water per second, delivers nitrogen and phosphorus to microscopic phytoplankton that live in the upper sunlit layers of the ocean. Via photosynthesis, phytoplankton capture carbon dioxide that dissolves into the ocean from the atmosphere, a mechanism that captures a larger proportion of CO2 than is consumed by the world’s rain forests.

Until now, quantitative data about the microbial activity underlying this mechanism has been elusive.

Data in the paper will used be as part of a larger model of the Amazon and will be

available to researchers around the world.

“The scientific community as a whole can draw new conclusions or study different aspects from the data sets,” said Brandon Satinsky, a doctoral student in microbiology at UGA and lead author on the study. “It’s such a large amount of water and material, and the location of the plume moves over the course of the year, from the Caribbean virtually over to Africa.”

“It’s the first time we’ve had this kind of data, at this level of detail, and so now we can share with teams of modelers to help them make better predictions about the future of the system,” Moran said.

The project is part of two major UGA research initiatives: ROCA, the River Continuum of the Amazon; and ANACONDAS, Amazon iNfluence on the Atlantic: CarbOn export from Nitrogen fixation by DiAtom Symbioses, both of which are led by associate professor of marine sciences Patricia Yager. The initiatives are supported by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation through grant GBMF2293 and the National Science Foundation.

Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources Researchers find invasive grass causing spiders to feast on toads

By Sandi Martin

smartin@warnell.uga.edu

An invasive grass species frequently found in forests has created a thriving habitat for wolf spiders, which then feed on American toads, a new UGA study has found.

Japanese stiltgrass, which accidentally was introduced to the U.S. in the early 1900s, is one of the most pervasive invasive species, particularly in the Southeast, in the past century. Typically found along roads and in forests, it can survive in widely diverse ecosystems and has been found to impact native plant species, invertebrate populations and soil nutrients.

In a new study recently published in the journal Ecology, UGA researchers found that Japanese stiltgrass also is affecting arachnid predators. Lycosid spiders, commonly known as wolf spiders, thrive in the grass. As their numbers grow, more spiders then feed on young American toads,ultimately reducing the amphibian’s

survival wherever this grass grows.

John Maerz, an associate professor in UGA’s Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources and one of the paper’s authors, said they found the grass had the greatest negative impact on toad survival in forests where toad survival was naturally high.

“In other words, the grass is degrading the best forests for young toad survival,” Maerz said. “Another important finding was that the invasive grass affects toads by changing interactions among native species rather than the grass having a direct effect on the native toads.”

Jayna DeVore, who led the project while earning her doctorate in the Warnell School, said people often don’t fully realize how much structural changes in an environment can affect how animals interact.

When DeVore and Maerz originally found lower survival of American toads at eight locations in Georgia where stiltgrass is actively invading, they initially

speculated that the grass was reducing the toads’ food supply by reducing insect populations—few native insects eat the Asian grass. However, after noticing the wolf spiders routinely preying upon toads in invaded habitats, it began to click, Maerz said.

Spiders typically keep spider populations in check, Maerz said, but Japanese stiltgrass is “kind of like a tall shag carpet,” and it provides the cannibalistic spiders refuge from one another. The accumulation of large, predatory spiders in these invaded habitats then results in higher mortality for small toads that have recently emerged from wetlands.

To test their hypothesis, DeVore and Maerz created cages where they could control the presence of stiltgrass and spiders. They found that spider densities were 33 percent higher and toad survival decreased by 65 percent in cages with the presence of stiltgrass. The presence of stiltgrass alone, in the absence of spiders, did not affect toad survival.

Four finalists for the position of dean of the UGA Graduate School will visit campus in the coming weeks to meet with members of the university community.

A committee chaired by Craig H. Kennedy, dean of the College of Education, conducted a national search to identify the finalists. The committee was assisted by the UGA Search Group in Human Resources.

Each finalist will make a public presentation in the Tate Student Center Reception Hall (Room 135). The finalists and the dates and times of their presentations are: • Brian S. Mitchell, a professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering and former associate provost for graduate studies and research at Tulane University, Sept. 18, 9:30-10:30 a.m.; • Milagros Peña, a professor of sociology and women’s studies and associate dean for social and behavioral sciences at the University of Florida College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, Sept. 26, 9:30-10:30 a.m.; • Victoria Greene, Stevenson Professor of Physics and senior associate dean for graduate education at the Vanderbilt University College of Arts and Science, Sept. 29, 9:30-10:30 a.m.; and • Jeffrey Engler, a professor of biochemistry and molecular genetics, associate dean for academic affairs and assistant vice president for research at the University of Alabama at Birmingham Graduate School, Oct. 1, 10-11 a.m.

The Graduate School coordinates and administers graduate programs at UGA. It offers the master of arts degree in 35 disciplines, the master of science in 51 disciplines and the doctor of philosophy in 79 disciplines. Professional master’s degrees are available in 32 areas, and professional doctoral degrees are offered in education, music and public health. The Graduate School also awards the master of education degree in 19 areas, the specialist in education in 19 areas and the doctor of education in 12 areas.

Institute for African American Studies to present discussion with authors

As part of its fall 2014 lecture series, the Institute for African American Studies will host a discussion with the authors of Harlem’s Rattlers and the Great War: The Undaunted 369th Regiment and the African American Quest for Equality.

Open free to the public, the lecture will be held Sept. 18 at 4 p.m. in the Richard B. Russell Library for Political Research and Studies at the special collections libraries.

Harlem’s Rattlers and the Great War is written

by John H. Morrow Jr., UGA’s Franklin Professor of History in the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences, and Jeffrey T. Sammons, professor of history at New York University. The book details the origins, evolution, combat exploits and post-war struggles of the African-American combat unit that grew out of the 15th New York National Guard to fight in World War I. The talk will include a screening of a documentary on the 369th. Copies of the book will be available for purchase and signing by the authors at a reception to follow the lecture.

Georgia Museum of Art to host talk with technology-focused artist Sept. 18

The Georgia Museum of Art will host a c­ onversation with artist Tristan Perich Sept. 18 at 5:30 p.m. The question-and-answer session, which will take place via Skype, will focus on Perich’s installation at the museum, Machine Wall Drawings, as well as his larger body of visual art and musical compositions. Topics also will include his background in math, programming, art and music.

Athens filmmaker Russell Oliver also will premiere his documentary on Machine Wall Drawings.

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4 Sept. 15, 2014 columns.uga.edu Public Service and Outreach

Nine faculty named Service-Learning Fellows for 2014-15

By Julia Wilson Mills jwmills@uga.edu

The Office of Service-Learning, a unit of the UGA Office of the Vice President for Public Service and Outreach and the Office of the Vice President for Instruction, has selected nine faculty members to serve as 2014-15 Service-Learning Fellows. They will spend the academic year exploring ways to integrate experiential learning into their teaching and research.

The Fellows, from a broad range of disciplines, will meet regularly throughout the academic year and receive an award of up to $2,500 to develop a service-learning project.

Academic service-learning integrates organized service activities that meet communityidentified needs into academic courses as a way to enhance understanding of academic content, teach civic responsibility and provide mutual benefit to the community.

The 2014-15 Service-Learning Fellows are: • Robert Christensen, an associate professor of public administration and policy in the School of Public and International Affairs, who plans to examine undergraduate students’ public service motivation and its relationship to participation in service-learning activities, with particular attention to the influences of student gender and ethnicity and longer term impacts on career choices that may be public service related.

• Caree Cotwright, an assistant professor of foods and nutrition in the College of Family and Consumer Sciences, who will create service-learning experiences for students in a foods and nutrition education course through the development of a mobile food market at local childcare centers to increase availability and consumption of fresh produce.

• Jolie Daigle, an associate professor of counseling and human development services in the College of Education, who will prepare future school counselors to implement service-learning in their schools to enhance the academic curriculum, engage students meaningfully in the community and contribute to school improvement and success.

• April Galyardt, an assistant professor of educational psychology in the College of Education, who intends to involve graduate students in applying statistical analyses to projects that benefit university offices and departments.

• Natasha Ganem, a sociology lecturer in the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences, who will continue to develop the service-learning components of her course on juvenile delinquency, focusing on preparing UGA students to become more effective youth mentors.

• Mary Hondalus, an associate professor of infectious diseases in the College of Veterinary Medicine, who plans to incorporate vaccination clinics and animal health education into a course partnering with underserved Athens communities.

• Peter Jutras, an associate professor of piano in the Hugh Hodgson School of Music, who plans to establish additional undergraduate and graduate service-learning courses in music teaching, connected with the Community Music School, which offers music instruction to individuals and groups of all ages and income levels.

•Catherine Teare Ketter, an academic professional in marine sciences in the Franklin College, who plans to bring additional community partners into her marine science educational outreach course and to research the short- and long-term impacts of prior courses on student outcomes; and •Tiffany Washington, an assistant professor in the School of Social Work, who plans to develop a Maymester gerontology course in which her students will interact with Alzheimer’s caregivers in the local community and provide respite care for their loved ones.

research news

Genetic ‘love triangle’

UGA scientists part of team that sequences complex canola genome

By James E. Hataway jhataway@uga.edu

An international team of scientists including researchers from UGA recently published the genome of Brassica napus—commonly known as canola—in the journal Science.

Their discovery paves the way for improved versions of the plant, which is used widely in farming and industry.

Canola is grown across much of Canada and its native Europe, but the winter crop increasingly is cultivated in Georgia. Canola oil used for cooking is prized for its naturally low levels of saturated fat and rich supply of omega-3 fatty acids, but the plant also is used to produce feed for farm animals and as an efficient source for biodiesel.

“This genome sequence opens new doors to accelerating the improvement of canola,” said Andrew Paterson, Regents Professor and director of UGA’s Plant Genome Mapping Laboratory. “We can use this knowledge to tailor the plant’s flowering time, make it more resistant to disease and improve a myriad of other traits that will make it more profitable for production in Georgia and across the country.”

Canola has one of the most complex genomes among flowering plants, forming thousands of years ago during the Neolithic Era when two plant species—Brassica rapa and Brassica oleracea—combined in the wild.

Plants in the B. rapa family include turnips and cabbages, while B. oleracea encompasses cauliflower, cabbage, collards, broccoli, kale and other common vegetables.

The Plant Genome Mapping Laboratory played prominent roles in sequencing both B. rapa and B. oleracea in 2011 and 2014, respectively.

“Understanding the genomes of B. rapa and B. oleracea was key to piecing together

Andrew Davis Tucker

Andrew Paterson, Regents Professor and director of the Plant Genome Mapping Laboratory, and other UGA researchers worked with a team of scientists to sequence the complex canola genome.

the canola genome,” said Paterson, cocorresponding author for the study. “It’s like a genetic love triangle between the three species, with canola sometimes favoring genes from B. rapa or B. oleracea or sometimes both.”

While much the world’s canola is used to make cooking oil and protein-rich animal feed, it also is used in the production of lipstick, lip gloss, soap, lotion, printing ink and de-icing agents.

The growing interest in carbon reduction and more environmentally friendly fuel alternatives also is good news for canola growers, as this genome sequence ultimately may help researchers develop feedstocks that are suited to more sustainable biofuel production.

Global canola production has grown

rapidly over the past 40 years, rising from the sixth largest oil crop to the second largest, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Much of the production in the U.S. is concentrated along the northern Plains, but the recent construction of a canola processing plant near the South Carolina-Georgia border has spurred interest for growers in the Southeast.

Additional UGA researchers for the project include Xiyin Wang, assistant research scientist and co-first author for the paper; Tae-ho Lee and Yupeng Wang, former postdoctoral researchers; and current and former graduate students Hui Guo, Huizhe Jin, Jingping Li, Xu Tan, Haibao Tang and Yupeng Wang.

Odum School of Ecology, College of Veterinary Medicine

Network-based vaccinations may control disease outbreaks in endangered chimps

By Kat Yancey Gilmore kygilmor@uga.edu

Vaccines are available for many infectious diseases that threaten endangered great ape populations, but immunizing enough animals to prevent outbreaks can be logistically challenging.

According to a study led by UGA student Julie Rushmore, focusing vaccination efforts on chimpanzees with the highest numbers of social contacts can reduce the number of animals that must be vaccinated to prevent an epidemic. This ultimately could make vaccination a more useful tool for the conservation of endangered great apes.

The research was published online in the Journal of the Royal Society Interface and focuses on the continuing research of Rushmore and her colleagues.

Rushmore, a student in the College of Veterinary Medicine’s DVM/PhD program who completed her doctorate in the Odum School of Ecology in 2013, spent nearly a year observing the wild Kanyawara chimpanzee community in Uganda’s Kibale National Park. She recorded the behavior of 37 chimpanzees in the community—including adults and juveniles of both sexes—and, along with her colleagues, used social network analysis to quantify which members of the community were more likely to contract and spread diseases based on how frequently

they interacted with each other.

The most connected animals in the network tended to be high-ranking mothers and juveniles from large families; the highranking males were second in their centrality to the community.

The research team used mathematical models to simulate the spread and control of close-contact pathogens that have threatened wild apes in the recent past—like Ebola, measles and influenza—on the chimpanzee social networks derived from field behavioral data. The computer simulations showed that targeting the most connected chimpanzees could prevent large outbreaks with considerably fewer vaccines than would be required if vaccinations were distributed randomly.

Because it is often easier to record traits like gender and family size for a chimpanzee than to determine the animal’s connectivity in the social network, the research team also evaluated the effectiveness of targeting risk groups, such as high-ranking moms, for disease control. Vaccinating individuals with high-risk traits also proved to be more effective than randomly vaccinating individuals in the community.

Beyond the logistical challenges of administering vaccines, immunizing wildlife can be expensive and stressful to the animals, thus underscoring the need to reduce coverage when mobilizing vaccines for deadly pathogens.

“This work is important because it indicates that we can use what we know about animal behavior to design more efficient disease control strategies,” Rushmore said. “In addition to wild chimpanzees, the methods we used to evaluate targeted vaccinations could aid in conservation efforts for other endangered wildlife species that are vulnerable to infectious disease.”

Rushmore’s approach to disease control and prevention also could be applied to controlling disease in human populations.

“Julie’s work on chimpanzees is indicative of a new strategy for studying disease that combines field observation, infectious diseases information and computer modeling,” said John Gittleman, dean of the Odum School. “It is compelling because her approach will allow preventive measures against disease outbreak and likely apply to human emerging diseases.”

“Dr. Rushmore’s findings will influence the strategies used to control infectious disease transmission among vulnerable populations of animals and humans where vaccination of all susceptible individuals is simply not practical,” said Sheila W. Allen, dean of the College of Veterinary Medicine. “This is an excellent example of One Health—where findings in animal disease investigations inform the approach to be used in human disease control.”

For a complete listing of events I 7 8 5 at the University of Georgia, check the Master Calendar on the Web (calendar.uga.edu/­).

The following events are open to the public, unless otherwise specified.

Dates, times and locations may change without advance notice.

GUIDE UGA

An Archaeologist’s Eye: The Parthenon Drawings of Katherine A. Schwab.

Through Dec. 7. Georgia Museum of Art. 706-542-4662, hazbrown@uga.edu.

Vince Dooley: A Retrospective, 1954-1988. Through Dec. 15. Special ­collections libraries. 706-542-7123, hasty@uga.edu.

Terra Verte. Through May 31. Jane and Harry Willson Sculpture Garden, Georgia Museum of Art. 706-542-4662, hazbrown@uga.edu.

TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 16 Adron Farris

From left, students Elle Oetter, Alexander Garrett and Jasmine Thomas rehearse a scene for the University Theatre performance of “Clybourne Park.”

University Theatre to open 2014-15 season with ‘Clybourne Park’ Sept. 25

By Aaron Kelly

aaronlk@uga.edu

University Theatre will present Tony- and Pulitzer-award-winning Clybourne Park by Bruce Norris, a spinoff of Lorraine Hansberry’s classic A Raisin in the Sun. Performances will be held Sept. 25-26 and 30 and Oct. 1-3 at 8 p.m. with matinees Sept. 28 and Oct. 5 at 2:30 p.m. in the Fine Arts Building’s Cellar Theatre.

Ticketsare$16,$12forstudents.

They can be purchased at www. drama.uga.edu/box-office, by phone at 706-542-4400 or in person at the Performing Arts Center box office or Tate Student Center ticket window.

A panel discussion featuring local real estate agents, representatives from the Athens Heritage Foundation and UGA’s Office of Institutional Diversity will follow the Sept. 28 matinee.

Directed by Paul Pierce, a UGA alumnus, this satiric comedy about race and real estate follows one house over 50 years—from the era of segregation to gentrification.

Winner of the 2012 Tony

EXHIBITIONS Bernd Oppl: Inhabited Interiors. Through Sept. 16. Alonzo and Vallye Dudley Gallery, Georgia Museum of Art. 706-542-4662, hazbrown@uga.edu.

Archway Partnership/CED Summer Internship Exhibit. Through Sept. 26.

Jackson Street Building.

Introducing Hubert Bond Owens: Pioneer of American Landscape Education.

Through Oct. 1. Jackson Street Building.

Works by Ginny McLaren. Through

Award for best play, an Olivier Award and the Pulitzer Prize, the play begins in 1958 with homeowners learning that a black family has bought a house in their all-white neighborhood in Chicago, depicting events immediately following those in the classic play. Act two takes the audience to the same house in 2008 as a white family is buying and renovating the house, now in a predominantly black neighborhood, and the roles are reversed. This reversal provides humor while raising the racial issues associated with historical redlining, fair housing policies and contemporary gentrification. The same actors play the characters in both act one and act two, emphasizing the connection between events half a century apart. Costumes and the décor of the home change drastically while the people and situations remain reminiscent despite the reversal of roles.

“Bruce Norris has created a comedy that sizzles with danger and meaning,” Pierce said.“It’s very rare that a modern playwright can do something that is both socially profound and funny.”

Oct. 5. State Botanical Garden.

706-542-6156, ckeber@uga.edu.

The Prints of Mary Wallace Kirk.

Through Oct. 12. Georgia Museum of Art. 706-542-4662, hazbrown@uga.edu.

Shapes That Talk to Me. Through Oct. 19. Georgia Museum of Art. 706-542-4662, hazbrown@uga.edu.

XL. Through Nov. 16. Georgia Museum of Art. 706-542-4662, hazbrown@uga.edu.

Calendar items are taken from Columns files and from the university’s Master Calendar, maintained by University Public Affairs. Notices are published here as space permits, with priority given to items of multidisciplinary interest. The Master Calendar is available on the Web at calendar.uga.edu/.

Tuesday Tour at Two 2 p.m. Richard B. Russell Building Special Collections Libraries.

706-542-8079, jclevela@uga.edu.

Workshop “Reacting to the Past: Flipping Your Course to Inspire Engaged Student Learning.” 2 p.m. Instructional Plaza.

706-583-0067, tchagood@uga.edu.

Ecology Seminar “Unexpected Responses of Disease to Global Change,” Erin Mordecai, NSF Mathematical Biology Postdoctoral Fellow, UNC-Chapel Hill and North Carolina State University. Hosted by Alan Covich.

4 p.m. Ecology building auditorium.

706-542-7247, bethgav@uga.edu.

Hugh Hodgson Faculty Series Recital Viola professor Maggie Snyder will perform with faculty accompanists Anatoly Sheludyakov and Damon Denton. $10; $5 with a UGA student ID. Ramsey Concert Hall.

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 17 Ecology/ICON Conservation Seminar “How Dreams, Death, Drugs and America’s Unskilled Labor Shortage Turned 70,000 Children into Refugees,”John Chamblee, anthropology. 1:25 p.m.

Ecology building auditorium.

706-542-7247, bethgav@uga.edu.

Tour at Two A tour of the museum highlighting Tristan Perich’s Machine Wall Drawing.

2 p.m. Georgia Museum of Art. 706-542-4662, hazbrown@uga.edu.

Guest Lecture Charles Lewis will discuss topics from his book 935 Lies: The Future of Truth and the Decline of America’s Moral Integrity. 2:30 p.m. Special collections libraries. 706-201-5373, freemans@uga.edu.

Movie in the Field Finding Nemo. 8 p.m. Legion Field.

706-542-9713, afionda@uga.edu.

THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 18 Conference “State of Education in Georgia.” Topics will include partnerships focused on

columns.uga.edu Sept. 15, 2014

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student achievement; teacher induction; strategies for retaining highly effective teachers; performance-based measures of teacher effectiveness; teacher evaluation; and more. $95.

8 a.m. Georgia Center. 706-542-8799, bmassey@uga.edu.

Workshop “Introduction to Service-Learning Course Design.” This workshop is free and open to faculty and graduate students interested in exploring the nuts and bolts of designing and implementing service-learning enhanced coursework; preregistration is required.

9:30 a.m. PSO Annex Conference Room, Office of Service-Learning Building.

706-542-0892, pmatthew@uga.edu.

Graduate School Dean Finalist Presentation Presentation by Brian S. Mitchell, candidate for dean of the UGA Graduate School. Mitchell is a professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering and former associate provost for graduate studies and research at Tulane University. 9:30 a.m. 135 Tate Student Center. (See Digest, page 3).

Lecture Co-authors Jeff Sammons of New York University and John Morrow of UGA will discuss their new book, Harlem’s Rattlers and the Great War. To be followed by a documentary on the 369th Regiment and book signing. 4 p.m.

271 special collections libraries.

706-542-5197, vbabb@uga.edu. (See Digest, page 3).

Drawing in the Galleries No instruction provided. Pencils only.

5 p.m. Georgia Museum of Art. 706-542-4662, hazbrown@uga.edu.

Conversation with the Artist Filmmaker Russell Oliver will premiere his documentary on Tristan Perich’s Machine Wall Drawings, followed by a video question-and-answer session with Perich. 5:30 p.m. Georgia Museum of Art. 706-542-4662, ­hazbrown@uga.edu. (See Digest, page 3).

Third Thursday The Georgia Museum of Art, the Lamar Dodd School of Art, the Lyndon House Arts Center, the Glass Cube & Gallery@ Hotel Indigo-Athens and ATHICA showcase their visual-arts programming.

6 p.m. Georgia Museum of Art. 706-542-4662, hazbrown@uga.edu.

Concert Cynthia Johnston-Turner, new director of bands, will lead the UGA Hodgson Wind Ensemble in its inaugural concert of the season. $10; $5 with a UGA student ID. 8 p.m. Hugh Hodgson Concert Hall. 706-542-4752, musicpr@uga.edu.

Film Schindler’s List. $2; $1 for UGA students who pay activity fees. 8 p.m. Tate Theatre, Tate Student Center.

706-542-6396.

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FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 19 Film X-Men: Days of Future Past will be shown Sept. 19 and 21 at 3, 6 and 9 p.m. $2; $1 for UGA students who pay activity fees. 8 p.m. Tate Theatre, Tate Student Center. 706-542-6396.

Exhibit Tour For Vince Dooley: A Retrospective, 1954-1988. 2 p.m. Special collections libraries. 706-542-8079, jclevela@uga.edu.

UGA Geography Colloquium Tentative title: “Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS) Wildlife Project,” Matthew Burgess, UAS program coordinator, Florida Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit, University of Florida.

3:15 p.m. 200C Geography and Geology. 706-542-2856.

SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 20 Fall Bird Ramble Oconee Rivers Audubon Society members will help participants spot and identify birds. 8 a.m. State Botanical Garden. 706-542-6156, ckeber@uga.edu.

South Campus Tailgate Hosted by College of Family and Consumer Sciences and the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences. $10-$30. 9 a.m. Legion Field.

706-542-6402, jenngrif@uga.edu.

Football vs. Troy. To be televised on the SEC Network. Noon. Sanford Stadium.

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 21 Soccer vs. Vanderbilt. 3 p.m. Turner Soccer Complex. 706-542-1621.

108 Sun Salutation Festival A donation of $10 is suggested. Participants should bring a yoga mat, water and towel. 4:30 p.m. State Botanical Garden. 706-542-6156, ckeber@uga. edu.

MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 22 Blood Drive 2 p.m. Reed Hall.

Coming Up University Council meeting Sept. 24. 3:30 p.m. Tate Theatre, Tate Student Center. 706-542-6020.

University Theatre Sept. 25. Clybourne Park. Also to be performed Sept. 26, 30 and Oct. 1-3 at 8 p.m., Sept. 28 and Oct. 5 at 2:30 p.m. This comedy spins off of Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun to follow one house over 50 years. $16; $12 for students. 8 p.m. Cellar Theatre, Fine Arts Building.

706-542-2836, wclay87@uga.edu.

(See story, above left).

To submit a listing for the master calendar and columns: Post the information about the event to the Master Calendar website (calendar.uga.edu/) first. Listings for Columns are gathered from the Master Calendar 12 days before the publication date. Events not posted by then may not be printed.

Any additional information about the event may be sent directly to Columns. Email is preferred (columns@uga.edu), but materials can be mailed to Columns, News Service, 286 Oconee Street, Suite 200 North, Campus Mail 1999.

Next Columns copy deadlines: Sept. 17 (for Sept. 29 issue), Sept. 24 (for Oct. 6 issue), Oct. 1 (for Oct. 13 issue).

6 Sept. 15, 2014 columns.uga.edu

CAMPUS CLOSEUP

Talking right

In discussing elections across Europe, Cas Mudde, an associate professor in the School of Public and International Affairs, told the Associated Press that the popular perception of far-right influence in the region is mistaken.

“When you put it in a historical context, there isn’t actually that much change,” he said, adding that the far-right has declined in many countries just as it has gained during the past decade. “Parties come and go.

The Greater Romania party had been a major party through the 1990s and then completely disappeared.”

The rise and fall of issues like local corruption, immigration and multiculturalism all impact far-right support, said Mudde, who is a faculty member in SPIA’s international affairs department.

Business boosts

In a Marketplace article discussing the South’s habit of providing tax incentives to businesses, UGA historian James Cobb said the practice started “after the agricultural economy was pretty much rend asunder by the Civil War.” The Spalding Distinguished Research Professor in the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences, Cobb said Southern states then began providing incentives as a way to attract outside capital. The freebies were meant to be temporary, according to Cobb, but then northern regions started doing the same thing.

“And then, in the last generation, the global labor market has become so competitive that it’s been very hard to sort of ditch the subsidy approach,” said Cobb, a faculty member in the history department.

Cobb also said that there is a point in which governments become so business-friendly that there are no incentives left for everybody else.

“You throw over so much in public expenditures in various things, including education, to keep taxes down, that you reach a point of it being self-defeating,” he said.

Making myths

In a Boston Globe article about the legend of Slender Man—an invented character whose origin can be traced back to an online forum—Shira Chess said she is unsurprised that people frequently buy into the tale.

“We tell ourselves stories because we (humans) are storytelling animals,” said Chess, an assistant professor of mass media arts in the Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication. “And, to that end, horror stories take on a specific significance and importance because they function metaphorically—the horror stories that are the best are often metaphors for other issues that affect our lives on both cultural and personal levels.”

A member of Grady’s telecommunications department, Chess said Slender Man is a metaphor for “helplessness, power differentials and anonymous forces.”

Slender Man came back to the spotlight in June when two 12-year-old girls in Wisconsin lured a friend into the woods and stabbed her 19 times in a kind of tribute to the character.

E-promotion

W. Keith Campbell, a professor and head of the department of psychology in the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences, was quoted in a New York Times article about the growth of self-promotion.

Campbell, who co-authored a 2007 paper on narcissism and Facebook, told the newspaper that online self-promotion is a result of do-it-yourself capitalism.

“Adam Smith wrote in The Wealth of Nations that people who seem more confident sell more products,” Campbell said. “Now that everybody’s in their own branding business, you have to become your own agent and marketing department. What you get on Facebook is a lot of people building their own brand and esteem, and it becomes normal.”

Campbell also said that while narcissism is “really good at the initial stage of relationship— for being hired or getting promoted, for getting a boyfriend or girlfriend—it damages you over time.”

Paul Efland

Deb Carter, a research professional in the College of Veterinary Medicine, performs in the group Scarlet Stitch. In June, she won Best Rock Female Vocals at the Georgia Music Awards.

Her own beat: Veterinary medicine staff member lives life of science, music

By Matt Chambers mattdc@uga.edu

Music has been a part of Deb Carter’s life since she can remember. Growing up in New York, her parents would take her brother and sister around to churches, homes and festivals to sing while her mother played the guitar.

Even in the car, her mother would belt out Bob Dylan tunes, much to Carter’s embarrassment.

Music still permeates Carter’s life outside of her work at UGA as a research professional in the College of Veterinary Medicine’s pathology department.

Carter sings in the Athens-based band Scarlet Stitch. In June, she won Best Rock Female Vocals at the Georgia Music Awards. “(Winning) was the most exciting experience ever,” Carter said. “We weren’t thinking at all it would happen.

The other artists were a lot younger or more popular, so when they called out my name, our row erupted in cheers.

It was shocking.”

Carter started in Scarlet Stitch after she went looking for firewood on Craigslist five years ago. There, she stumbled onto an ad placed for a vocalist, and the rest is history. Carter said while the group’s roots are in rock ’n’ roll, it also has some blues, country and acoustic aspects as well.

The band writes its own songs and does all of its own promotion. Members also have organized a few shows and played in some festivals, despite not having a manager.

“When you’re doing it on your own, it’s a bit difficult,” Carter said.

“But doing it on our own is best for us since we all have 9-to-5 jobs.”

While at work, Carter assists Elizabeth Howerth, a professor in the pathology department, with research.

The two do a lot with immunohistochemistry, which involves detecting proteins in animal cells. Carter said she does whatever Howerth needs for the day, which often varies widely.

“It can range from keeping cells alive to putting viruses into eggs or doing necropsies with (Howerth),” Carter said. “There’s not a general set thing that I come in and do. I never know what the day’s going to be like.”

The Ithaca, New York, native also works with anywhere from one to four students to provide assistance with their projects.

“The job title is research professional, but I often feel that I’m more like research support,” Carter said. “I’m kind of a jack-of-all-trades in the lab.”

Carter also travels with researchers to places such as Texas, Louisiana and Minnesota to collect samples for avian influenza research.

Carter started her lab career at Cornell University, where she was trying to get a job as a teacher. Instead, she landed a position conducting stem cell research, something she found enjoyable.

“Though I’m not a teacher, with all the students I’m working with in labs, it’s still like teaching,” Carter said. “It’s just in a much more personal setting outside of a classroom.”

Facts

Deb Carter Research Professional Pathology Department College of Veterinary Medicine B.S., Health Education and Physical Education K-12, Ithaca College, 1996 A.A.S., Criminal Justice, Tompkins Cortland Community College, 1991 A.A.S., Early Childhood Education, Tompkins Cortland Community College, 1988 At UGA: Seven years

Between the stage and lab, Carter also spends time hiking, camping and mountain biking. Carter raced mountain bikes professionally for Cannondale when she lived in New York, but now she only rides recreationally.

When time allows, Carter performs in musicals with the Town & Gown Players in Athens. She has been in past shows such as Godspell, Jesus Christ Super Star and Little Shop of Horrors.

Carter said her co-workers are so supportive of all her ventures.

“The people I work with are the best part of all of this,” she said. “Their support of everything has been so kind and wonderful.”

ON THE WEB

www.scarlet-stitch.com Web music video: http://www.youtube. com/watch?v=4Aewc-MMvXY

Retirees

September

Fourteen UGA employees retired Sept. 1. Retirees, their job classification, department and length of employment are: Elizabeth J. Bailey, building services worker II, Building Services-South Campus, 11 years, 11 months; David Austin Bryant, public service representative, Sea Grant Program, 27 years, 7 months; Anthony C. Capomacchia, associate professor, pharmaceutical and biomedical sciences, 38 years; Carey B. Cobb, farm supervisor III, Southeast Research and Education Center, Coastal

Plain Station, 28 years, 11 months; Michelle E. Davis, instructional technical development professional associate, Georgia Center Sales and Marketing, 25 years, 2 months; Michael R. Dillon, associate director, Athletic Association, 27 years; James M. Floyd, associate vice president, Auxiliary Services, 34 years, 9 months; Marjorie Joyce Floyd, administrative associate II, anthropology, 12 years, 5 months; Thomas A. Hoover, program coordinator II, College of Journalism and Mass Communication, 20 years, 7 months; Jack Houston Jr.,

professor, agricultural and applied economics, 31 years, Betty J. Jordan, program specialist I, Athletic Association, 13 years, 1 month; Suzanne Malloy, administrative associate I, Small Business Development Center, 9 years, 11 months; Stacey M. McQuaig, county extension program assistant, UGA Extension-College of Family and Consumer Sciences, 24 years, 3 months; and William Gray Potter, associate provost, librariesgeneral operations, 25 years, 1 month.

Source: Human Resources

Facilities Management Division

columns.uga.edu Sept. 15, 2014

Changing landscape

7

Head of university’s grounds department prepares to hang up his tools after 31 years

By Melissa Tufts mtufts@uga.edu

Students arriving on UGA’s campus in the 1970s found a somewhat beleaguered landscape: bare, eroding clay banks along Lumpkin Street, old chairs and beer coolers strewn in Tanyard Branch, poorly defined walkways and little sense of a pedestrian connection between North and South campuses. The landscape needed someone who understood that this is a campus for people in a naturally beautiful Piedmont setting.

Gordon Chappell, former director of the grounds department, set the stage for a more healthy and invigorated campus in the 1980s, and, along with design manager David Hale, inspired DexterAdams in his work.Current director of the grounds department,Adams will retire Sept. 30 after 31 years on campus.

A “Double Dawg,” Adams received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in landscape architecture from the College of Environment and Design in 1976 and 2004, respectively. An avid gardener, Adams has seen the campus flourish. In addition to his work in the Facilities Management Division, Adams has served his alma mater by helping student designers with projects and serving in class critiques. He also has a personal interest in the Founders Memorial Garden,which was conceived and created by the college’s founder, Hubert Bond Owens. Adams talked with Columns about his time at UGA: Columns: What are some of your favorite places on campus?

Adams: The town spring (just down the hill from the Tanner building), Founders Memorial Garden and Herty Field on North Campus. The remnant spring is such a quirky reminder of our beginnings, the intersection of historic preservation and ecology. The Founders Garden represents my own beginning in landscape architecture and the wonderful partnerships we’ve been able to sustain with academic departments across campus.

I’m fond of Herty Field because it was designed and built entirely in-house, thanks to staff alumni David Hale and Kimo Polster.

Columns: Is there an aspect of managing a campus landscape that you find particularly challenging?

Adams: Is there any land use quite like a large university campus? It’s a fascinating combination of history, beauty and heavyduty infrastructure that is in a constant state of construction, replacement and repair. This

weekly reader

The Village and Beyond: Memoirs of a Cotton mill Boy

By William Hale iUniverse $26.26

Paul Efland

Dexter Adams, director of the grounds department, will retire at the end of the month after 31 years of work on UGA’s campus.

puts tremendous pressure on the campus landscape and requires steady vigilance to protect trees, minimize damage to plantings and not violate the integrity of historic spaces.

Columns: How do you feel about prescriptions for sustainability?

Adams: The landscape as a thing of visual pleasure, of beauty, can be an end in itself.

But a landscape that does a job for you as well is especially worthwhile. I hope we’re showing that they need not be mutually exclusive. Landscapes should require less water, less “chemical” management and not create collateral damage to the surrounding environment. If, in the process they can clean the water and air, then you’ve given your customer the complete package. At least that’s what satisfies me professionally.

Columns: Are there any aspects of your career here of which you are especially proud?

Adams: I fell backwards into landscape architecture and had actually never heard of it before entering the program in 1973. I’m proud of the fact that I found a

Retired staffer pens autobiography

A former associate director at the Georgia Center for Continuing Education for 27 years,William Hale grew up during the Great Depression. In a neighborhood jammed with look-alike clapboard houses in a South Carolina cotton mill village, Hale was an inquisitive boy who climbed trees, played sandlot baseball and learned his greatest life lessons from unexpected places.

Now 88, he recounts those lessons in The Village and Beyond: Memoirs of a Cotton mill Boy. Hale details how he grew from a boy into a man and realized the impact of his choices that eventually led him in a different direction.

The Village and Beyond offers one man’s reflections on life as he revels in the powerful world of the human spirit and discovers that he will never be without questions.

field—environmental design—that I could believe in. Specifically, by assembling a great staff and thanks primarily to them, I’m proud of the entire campus, its composition and its management. And don’t get me started on composting…all that “stuff” was being landfilled when I got here. Now, if you don’t show signs of life within a few minutes we compost you into a wonderful soil amendment. People come from all around to check out our Bioconversion Center.

Columns: Are there any other beneficial campus landscape changes that you have witnessed?

Adams: The campus is more collegial, more democratic. It was managed in a very heavily top-down fashion in the past. There is improved accountability and costs are much more carefully monitored. At one time we could smother a problem with resources; no more. We now plan better, execute better and allocate restricted resources better.

We now actually operate under a master planning process, and our offices have developed extensive standards for building

and site construction. Some awful development occurred here and elsewhere between World War II and the 1980s. It is a much better process now governed, mostly, by solid guiding principles. Kudos to Danny Sniff and his staff here (in the Office of University Architects). I’ve tried to ensure that our organization is a good soldier in the implementation of the plan.

Columns: What do you plan to do with your time once you retire?

Adams: I’ve had a job since I was 14 so this is all a little weird. I have no big plans, just lots of little plans. My son Sam, who has special needs and is one of the best people I know, volunteers in the Founders Garden.

I look forward to spending more time with him and the rest of the family. We live on a nice chunk of old family farmland, and I have unfinished projects everywhere.

Columns: Do you have any recommendations for students of landscape design that you’d like to share?

Adams: Get dirty and do a sketch every day.

ABOUT COLUMNS

Cybersights

Columns is available to the campus community by ­subscription for an annual fee of $20 (second-class delivery) or $40 (first-class delivery). Faculty and staff members with a disability may call 706-542-8017 for assistance in obtaining this publication in an alternate format.

Columns staff can be reached at 706-542-8017 or columns@uga.edu

Editor Juliett Dinkins Art Director Kris Barratt Photo Editor Paul Efland

Consulting group updates Web presence

Senior Reporter Aaron Hale

http://qbcg.uga.edu/

Reporter Matt Chambers

The Quantitative Biology Consulting Group, which brings the combined expertise of multiple UGA quantitative biology consultants to bear on a single problem, has a new website that includes tutorials, software downloads

and more.

The website also includes material on Galaxy, a Web-based platform that performs dataintensive bioinformatics as well as information on the group’s Galaxy workshops.

The University of Georgia is committed to principles of equal opportunity and affirmative action.

The University of Georgia is a unit of the University System of Georgia.

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8 Sept. 15, 2014 columns.uga.edu

reception from page 1

Auxiliary Services

Dedication held for UGA’s newest dining facility

By Stephanie Schupska schupska@uga.edu

The ribbon was cut for Bolton Dining Commons Sept. 4 in a ceremony that included UGA students, administrators and members of John Dixon Bolton’s family.

“I can’t tell you how lucky I am to be a student here at the University of Georgia,” said senior political science major Drew ­Jacoby, who is president of the UGA Student Government Association. “We have top-tier academics, a highly competitive athletic program and, of course, incredible food.”

Bolton Dining Commons, located on the corner of Baxter and Lumpkin streets, is across from the Tate Student Center and Miller Learning Center and centrally located near student housing. The two-story, 56,000-square-foot building also sits near the site of what will be the Terry College of Business’ Correll Hall, which is under construction.

Bolton Dining Commons is the largest meal plan facility on the UGA campus and can seat up to 1,000 people. Open seven days a week, it is also the first to offer dinner on Sunday.

“On the day of its opening, the first day of class, we served nearly 10,000 meals at this facility,” said UGA President Jere W. Morehead. “We are keeping value foremost in our thoughts by providing this new facility and these expanded hours while holding the cost for the meal plan on campus at last year’s rates.”

Unlike many other universities that require their students living on campus to sign up for their meal plans, UGA’s is voluntary.

“Students at the University of Georgia know a good thing when they see it, and participation in our meal plan has increased by about 400 students over last year, which represents about a 5 percent increase in meal plan participation,” said Ryan Nesbit, vice president for finance and administration.“And we believe it is because our students and their parents fully recognize and appreciate the quality and the value the UGA team provides.”

Students Tisha Josephs and Reagan Gresham agree.

“It has just been great,” said Josephs, a senior mathematics major and student m ­ anager

at Bolton. “So many students from across campus are eating here. My friends who are seniors are staying on the meal plan because of the new Bolton.”

Gresham, a third-year political science major and student supervisor at Bolton, said watching the excitement has been “delightfully overwhelming.”

“It’s definitely been a learning experience, and I’ve enjoyed taking part in a historic moment at UGA,” Gresham said.

UGA Food Services has 1,350 employees.

More than 1,000 of them are students.

Jacoby, in his remarks to the crowd, listed a few of the many food options available in the dining commons—adding that the macaroni and cheese was arguably the best he’s ever eaten—before praising the university for its service to students.

“This place is truly amazing,” he said.

“I’ve realized how much the staff, faculty and administration do for students at the University of Georgia. They work day in and day out to better the student experience, and this new Bolton is merely one example of the work you all have done for us.”

Bolton Dining Commons is named after longtime UGA treasurer and comptroller John Dixon Bolton. The facility replaces the original Bolton Dining Commons, which was completed in 1963 as part of a 1,000-student housing complex, and was called Creswell Cafeteria. It was renamed soon after Bolton’s death in 1965 in honor of his 32 years of service to the university.

Bolton’s daughter Kitty Culpepper attended the ceremony along with her children and grandchildren—daughter and son-in-law Evelyn and David Dukes and son and daughter-in-law John and Katherine Culpepper and their children Hamilton and Mimi Culpepper.

“I want to thank our students for the privilege it is to serve you day in and day out and play a small but—what we hope—a very significant role in your overall student life experience here at UGA,” Nesbit said.

Bolton Dining Commons, used primarily by UGA students, is open to the public.

Breakfast costs $9; lunch is $11.25; and dinner is $15.50. More information is at ­ http://t.uga.edu/U8.

A video of the Bolton Dining Commons ceremony is at http://vimeo.com/105279992.

Bulletin Board BFSO luncheon tickets

The Black Faculty and Staff Organization’s 12th annual Founders Award Scholarship Luncheon will be held Sept. 30 from noon until 1:30 p.m. in Mahler Hall at the Georgia Center for Continuing Education. Ceasar C. Mitchell, president of the Atlanta City Council and UGA alumnus, will deliver the keynote address.

Tickets are available for purchase until Sept. 26. Prices are $35 per ticket or $280 for a table of eight.

Proceeds from the luncheon benefit BFSO’s scholarship program, which awards a $750 scholarship to a current undergraduate, graduate and professional student at UGA. Contact Mark Dawkins at mdawkins@uga.edu or 706-542-3632 to purchase tickets.

Award nominations

The Office of Service-Learning currently is accepting nominations for the 2015 Service-Learning Teaching Excellence and Service-Learning Research Excellence Awards.

All full-time, permanent UGA faculty members in any career track are eligible

for nomination. Awards recognize faculty for innovative service-learning course design as well as scholarship that stems from academic service-learning work.

Applications are due to the Office of Service-Learning by Nov. 3. Nominations by deans and department heads, faculty colleagues or self-nominations will be accepted. Nomination packets should follow award nomination guidelines available at http://t.uga.edu/Uh. Academic service-learning is an experiential learning approach that integrates structured service activities addressing community-identified needs into academic courses as a way to enhance understanding of course content, teach civic responsibility and provide mutual benefit to the c­ ommunity.

For more information, contact Shannon O. Wilder, director of the Office of Service-Learning, at 706-542-0535 or swilder@uga.edu.

The Office of Service-Learning is jointly supported by the Office of the Vice President for Instruction and the Office of the Vice President for Public Service and Outreach.

of Development, hosted the reception as part of the ThankU initiative, which seeks to promote an “attitude of gratitude at UGA.” “The goal of the dessert reception is to help faculty, staff and retirees who made a gift of any size during FY14 feel appreciated,” said Tony Stringer, director of donor relations and stewardship. “It takes every member of the UGA family to help ensure and sustain the student experience today and into the future.”

Each guest was given a nametag with an option to write out a reason why they give

to UGA. The reception included a dessert bar, a slideshow with quotes from student scholarship recipients and a photo booth for donors who wanted to have their photo taken with UGA mascot Hairy Dawg.

“Faculty and staff donors send a strong message to our alumni and friends, on whose philanthropic support we depend, that we believe in UGA enough to give our own valuable resources,” Stringer said. “Our example is a very powerful argument for them to give as well.”

grant from page 1 In parts of the world where the disease is common, it is controlled by giving a single dose of two drug combinations— albendazole with diethylcarbamazine citrate if just elephantiasis is present, and lbendazole with ivermectin if “river blindness,” which is caused by a different parasite, is also present—to the entire at-risk population every year. This is part of an ambitious project, led by the World Health Organization, to eliminate the disease by 2020.

“Billions of doses of these drugs have been distributed, yet we do not know how diethylcarbamazine citrate works against the parasites, and it is likely that our previous ideas of how ivermectin works against these parasites may be wrong,” said Adrian Wolstenholme, the principal investigator on the project.

Wolstenholme is a professor of infectious diseases in the UGA College of Veterinary Medicine and a faculty member within the UGA Center for Tropical and Emerging Global Diseases.

The drug combinations eliminate larvae from the patient’s bloodstream, which prevents the larvae from being transmitted to mosquitos and thus to other people. However, the drugs have a limited impact on the adult worms, which can live up to eight years inside

the infected patient. This means that at least five consecutive years of annual treatments are required to prevent new infections before the existing adult parasites die, which can be difficult to achieve in some areas of the world.

“Understanding how our current drugs work, especially if they allow the infected person’s own immune system to eliminate the parasite, will help us to use them in the most effective way possible,” Wolstenholme said. “It also may help us think of new ways in which to kill the adult parasites and to ensure that this horrible disease is removed from the face of the earth as early as possible.”

The other UGA infectious diseases department researchers working on the elephantiasis project are Ray Kaplan, a parasitologist and professor of infectious diseases; Balazs Rada, an immunologist and assistant professor of infectious diseases; Barbara Reaves, a cell biologist and associate research scientist; and Andrew Moorhead, a parasitologist and assistant research scientist. Walter Lorenz, an assistant research scientist in the UGA Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources and a member of the Institute of Bioinformatics’ Quantitative Biology Consulting Group, will help the researchers analyze the large amount of data generated by the project.

SUMMIT from page 1 resource for colleges and universities throughout the state, and the country, as they move to protect the health of our best and brightest.”

To assist Georgia’s colleges and universities in putting a tobacco-free policy in place, DPH published a tool kit to guide campus leaders through adopting, implementing and enforcing tobacco bans. That tool kit now is being offered as a key national resource on the Tobacco-free College Campus Initiative website. TFCCI was created by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in 2011 to encourage the voluntary adoption of

tobacco-free policies at institutions of higher learning across the nation.

“By offering a step-by-step approach to putting the policy in place, schools can get the support they need for their tobacco bans to succeed,” said Kenneth Ray, program manager for the Georgia Tobacco Use Prevention Program at DPH. Attendance to the summit is free for all sessions and a healthy lunch and snacks will be provided.

To learn more about the summit or to register, visit http://tinyurl.com/q58kz94.

RANKINGS from page 1

Emergency assistance form

To be effective in the event of an emergency, university officials want to be able to identify and support those students, faculty, staff and visitors with a disability who would need ­assistance.

Those with a disability, even if they have not otherwise self-identified or asked for an accommodation, are asked to complete an Emergency Assistance Referral Form if they feel they would need assistance during an emergency.

Completed forms will be kept on file by the Office of Emergency Preparedness and will be used only to develop an emergency plan for individuals who want one.

The university’s emergency procedures for students, faculty, staff and visitors with disabilities and Emergency Assistance Referral Forms may be found at http://t.uga.edu/Uu. For more information, email ­prepare@uga.edu or call 706-542-5845.

Bulletin Board is limited to information that may pertain to a majority of faculty and staff members.

program, placing first again this year among the best business specialties. Its real estate program was fourth.

“While we never want to put too much stock into rankings, I am pleased that the Terry College is becoming recognized for the top flight education and career opportunities we provide to students,” said Terry College Dean Benjamin C. Ayers. “I am proud to see that our ambition to create a true culture of success is being recognized nationally.”

U.S. News & World Report surveyed 1,365 colleges and universities in 2013. To decide its top national universities, it measured an institution’s assessment by peers and counselors, retention rates, faculty resources, student selectivity, financial resources, graduation rate performance (the difference between actual and predicted graduation rates) and the alumni giving rate. To be considered a national university, an institution must offer a full range of undergraduate majors, plus master’s and doctoral programs, and emphasize faculty research.

Helping UGA in its national ranking was its average freshman retention rate of 94 percent in 2013, the year selected for the 2015 edition’s survey.

The university’s graduation rate was predicted to be 81 percent but was actually higher at 83 percent. In the same year, 40 percent of UGA classes had fewer than 20 students while only 11 percent had more than 50.