Union in the Media

Chad Orzel, associate professor of physics and chair of the Department of Physics and Astronomy, experimentally tested the physics of "deflate-gate."

Read what he found here on The Conversation, an international academic blog.

The members of the College’s chapter of the Society of Physics Students are this week’s Volunteers of the Week from the Kenney Community Center.

The students provide hands-on workshops to middle and high school students to help popularize physics and show its applications in everyday life, including liquid nitrogen ice cream and other fun science demonstrations. Recently, the group did a workshop for students on campus for the Kenney Community Center’s Martin Luther King Day program. They shared several science demonstrations and talked about what its like to be a physics major.

The students are: Shauna LeFebvre ’16; Stephen DiIorio ’15; Harry Hausner ’16; Andrew McCalmont ’16; Andrew Laugharn ’16; and Caleb Novins ’17.

The Environmental Science, Policy and Engineering (ESPE) Winter Seminar

Series continues on Wednesday, Jan. 28 with a talk by Anthony Leiserowitz, director of the Yale Project on Climate Change Communication, at 7:30 p.m. in the Nott Memorial.

The Yale Project on Climate Change Communication works to empower educators with more knowledge and tools to better engage audiences, conduct research and design and test new strategies to educate the public.

Leiserowitz and his project have led some of the most careful studies of public opinion related to climate change science and policy. Their reports on the "Global Warming's Six Americas" have fascinating implications for effective environmental communication.

Considered an expert on American and international public opinion on global warming, Dr. Leiserowitz will report on recent trends in Americans' climate change knowledge, attitudes, policy support, and behavior and discuss strategies for more effective public engagement.

The final speaker in the series includes:

Wednesday, Feb. 18: Cheryl Charles (co-founder, president and CEO Emerita of the Children & Nature Network (C&NN). Charles has been instrumental in developing the worldwide movement to reconnect children and nature. She is also the former founding national director of Project Learning Tree and Project WILD.

Past speakers in the series have included leading voices in environmental issues such as Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Lonnie Thompson and Bill McKibben.

Christopher Chabris. associate professor of psychology, co-authored an op-ed for the New York Times Sunday Review on collective intelligence, and why some groups are smarter than others.

The piece was one of the most popular on the Times website, and was picked up by a number of other media outlets, including The Atlantic.

Read the Times piece.

Read The Atlantic's take

In celebration of Martin Luther King Jr. Day, the campus community prepares to honor the memory of Dr. King with the annual Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Unity @ Union March.

On Monday at 12:45 p.m., students, faculty and staff will gather outside Schaffer Library, where signs and song lyrics will be distributed before the march begins. The march will be followed by a program inside Nott Memorial, where the campus community will be able to reflect on the significance of MLK Day with remarks by Melinda Lawson, senior lecturer of history. The event will conclude with a performance by the Heavenly Voices Gospel Choir.

The annual event is presented by the offices of Multicultural Affairs, Campus Diversity and Inclusion, the History Department and the Heavenly Voices Gospel Choir. All are welcome and encouraged to participate.

David Cotter, professor and chair of the Sociology Department, was recently featured on WAMC's Academic Minute.

The daily program features professors from colleges and universities around the world sharing their research. It airs on public radio stations across the country.

Cotter was the lead author on a research brief published for the Council on Contemporary Families chronicling the restarting of the "stalled revolution" in gender attitudes.

Listen Cotter's discussion

Chad Orzel, associate professor of physics and chair of the Department of Physics and Astronomy, recently appeared on WAMC's The Roundtable.

Orzel discussed his latest book, Eureka: Discovering Your Inner Scientist.

Northeast Public Radio is a member of National Public Radio, serving parts of New York, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Vermont, New Jersey, New Hampshire and Pennsylvania

Ashley Tolento ’16 is the Kenney Community Center’s Volunteer of the Week.

After participating in the Community Experience pre-orientation program prior to her first year, Tolento served as a student leader for incoming first-years this past summer. Additionally, she is active in the U-ReBloom Club, which delivers flowers from Union to local nursing homes, as well as in Habitat for Humanity.

Off campus, she has volunteered with Things of My Very Own, a local organization that provides crisis intervention for children in need.

“Ashley has been a real asset to our campus community as a Community Experience leader, as well as volunteering throughout the year,” Janet Sweeney said.

A sociology and psychology interdepartmental major, Tolento is a Queens, N.Y. native and a member of Delta Delta Delta Sorority.

The College was recently named one of the 20 most beautiful campuses in the country by the Princeton Review.

To read an item in the Albany Business Review, click here.

Greg Hallenbeck, visiting assistant professor of physics and astronomy, Will Harney '15 and Michael Warrener '16 presented at the Fall Astronomical Society of New York meeting at RPI. Hallenbeck’s talk described his research on gas-rich galaxies: "Looking Closely at the High Mass Galaxies: High HI Mass, HI-Rich Galaxies in the Local Universe." Harney presented a poster on the results of his senior thesis, , “The Quenching of Star Formation in the Group Environment: HI Observations of Star-Forming Group Galaxies.” Harney’s thesis advisor was Professor Rebecca Koopmann. Warrener presented a poster, "Measuring Ram Pressure Induced Asymmetries in Virgo Cluster Spiral Galaxies," describing his summer research project as a Dorrit Hoffleit Undergraduate Astronomy Research Fellow at Yale University. Warrener was one of three undergraduates chosen from across the world to be the inaugural scholars in Yale program.

Maggie Tongue, director of the Scholars Program, served on the selection panel for the Gilman Scholarship, which awards funds for study abroad students with financial need.

Hans-Friedrich Mueller, professor and chair of the Classics Department, was the keynote speaker at the annual meeting of the Texas Classical Association in San Antonio. He delivered two lectures: “Nocturnal Rome: General Considerations and Further Clues” and “Pontifex Maximus: The Priestly Career of Julius Caesar.”

Helen Hanson, associate professor of electrical and computer engineering, gave a talk at the Acoustical Society of America meeting in Indianapolis. She discussed evidence that characteristics of the trachea and lungs have acoustic effects that have shaped the inventory of vowels in the world’s languages.

Christine Henseler, professor of Spanish and chair of the Modern Languages Department, was a keynote speaker at Albion College in Michigan. Her talk, “Share Everything, Pursue Brilliance, Dare to Dream: When Labs and the Humanities Meet,” was part of Albion College’s Mellon grant initiative to develop humanities labs to connect courses and communities in collaborative settings.

An exhibit featuring the work of Charles Steckler, professor of theater and designer-in-residence, is currently on display at the Schenectady Jewish Community Center in Niskayuna. “Concerning the Art of Drawings” is on display through Jan. 30.

Peter Heinegg, professor of English, led a discussion of the film “Orchestra of Exile” as part of the Schenectady Jewish Community Center’s film festival. The film chronicles how a world-renowned violinist helped save Europe’s Jewish musicians from the Nazis during World War II.

Jeffrey Corbin, associate professor of biology, was recently featured in a Times Union story about the proposed ban of plastic bags in Saratoga Springs. Corbin talked about the environmental problems that plastic bags pose, such as potential contamination to local wildlife.