After months of negotiations, and just hours before the current collective bargaining agreement expired, the University of Washington and UAW 4121, representing nearly 4,500 academic student employees (ASEs) including teaching assistants, research assistants, readers, graders and tutors, reached a tentative agreement Thursday for a new three-year contract. A ratification vote by union members on the contract will take place in the coming weeks. “We are very pleased that the negotiations concluded successfully and we were able to reach agreement with…
Keiko Torii, a UW professor of biology, this month was awarded the 35th annual Saruhashi Prize, given each year to a female researcher in the natural sciences. Each year, one woman scientist receives the award recognizing both exceptional research accomplishments and mentoring of other women scientists. “I am especially pleased that the selection committee recognized and highly valued my demonstrated mentoring of women postdocs balancing career and family,” Torii said. She has helped several researchers in her lab balance starting…
Faith Ramos, a junior studying sustainable urban development at UW Tacoma, was named one of 50 students nationally to receive the prestigious Udall Scholarship. Ramos worked for 15 years in arts and other nonprofits, including for National Parks programs that bring economically disadvantaged youth to the parks, before enrolling at UW Tacoma. She also has a strong background in filmmaking and singlehandedly produced, shot, edited, and narrated the documentary, “Heart & Sold,” which addresses gentrification in Seattle’s South Lake Union neighborhood. She is an…
Two University of Washington faculty members are among the leaders from academia, business, philanthropy, humanities and the arts elected as 2015 fellows of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences, one of the nation’s oldest and most prestigious honorary societies. Stanley Fields, a professor of genome sciences and medicine, and David B. Kaplan, a professor of physics and director of the UW-based Institute for Nuclear Theory, join 197 new academy members announced today. “We are honored to elect a new…
Tatiana Toro, a University of Washington professor and associate chair of mathematics, is among 175 new fellows from the U.S. and Canada recognized this year by the Guggenheim Foundation. Winners, chosen from more than 3,100 applicants, receive grants of varying amounts that allow them to pursue creative projects of six to 12 months in the fields of science, academic scholarship and the arts. Toro, who holds the Robert R. and Elaine F. Phelps endowed professorship, earned her doctorate at Stanford…
At the University of Washington’s first engineering open house, visitors marveled at early-1900s scientific advances: using electricity to cook and curl hair, sending wireless messages over a distance of five miles, experimenting with lightning. Engineering Discovery Days Fri., April 24, 9 a.m. – 2 p.m. (registration full) Sat., April 25, 9 a.m. – 2 p.m. Exhibit location map Fast forward a century, and this week’s on-campus activities for the 100th anniversary of Engineering Discovery Days include forming nanoparticles, extracting DNA…
The UW Stroum Center for Jewish Studies will host its third annual Spring Research Symposium 9:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. Friday, May 1, in room 214 of the HUB. The event is free but advance registration is recommended. This half-day event highlights research by the five members of the 2014-15 Jewish Studies Graduate Fellowship, with topics ranging from biblical interpretation to Jewish animated short films. The graduate students are Summer Satushek of comparative religion, Christina Sztajnkrycer of French and Italian studies, Katja Schatte…
Last summer, a team of University of Washington oceanographers successfully installed hardware deep underwater for an Internet-connected observatory off the Washington and Oregon coasts. Now scientists from around the country are meeting to discuss how this will change how people monitor and study seafloor geology. The Networked Observations and Visualizations of the Axial Environment, or NOVAE, workshop, titled “Axial volcano: Wired and restless,” will take place April 20 through 22 at the Talaris Conference Center near the UW. The program…
Craig Sheppard, professor of piano in the School of Music, will perform all of the 24 Preludes and Fugues, Opus 87, by Dmitri Shostakovich in a faculty recital at 7:30 p.m. on Saturday, April 25, in Meany Hall. He answered a few questions about the music and his approach to the performance. In a 1993 review of a performance of the Preludes and Fugues by well-known Russian pianist Tatyana Nikolayeva, for whom Shostakovich composed the music, the New York Times…
The University of Washington will be working with the Bainbridge Island-based Puget Sound Restoration Fund to see whether growing seaweed could help combat ocean acidification in Puget Sound waters. Like plants on land, kelps and other seaweeds naturally take up carbon dioxide. Puget Sound waters are already high in carbon dioxide and are projected to become more so in the future. Seaweeds, which are naturally abundant in Puget Sound, could help address this growing problem. The team proposes to cultivate…
Some people think Jonathan Bricker is a geek, and they mean it in the best way possible. Bricker, an affiliate professor of psychology at the UW and a psychologist at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, is among five finalists for the annual “Geek of the Year Award” from Seattle technology news site GeekWire. The award honors “someone who created a technological breakthrough that made the world a better place, or strengthened the community through their work or good deeds.” Bricker,…
UW Interim President Ana Mari Cauce will give remarks and lead a conversation about equity, racism and difference Thursday afternoon on campus at the Intellectual House. Updated 4/14: Transcript of Cauce’s remarks The roundtable event, which starts at 2 p.m., will encourage students to participate in a discussion about these issues. Space is limited and participants were asked to RSVP in advance. “As one of the world’s great public universities, we have a responsibility to live out our core values…
Katie Davis, assistant professor at the University of Washington Information School, has received a Faculty Early Career Development Award from the National Science Foundation. Davis, who studies the role of digital media technologies in the lives of teenagers, will receive $759,462 over five years for a project titled “Digital Badges for STEM Education.” The work aims to develop and implement a system to identify and reward science, technology, engineering and math skills and achievements in a science-based after-school program at…
A UW postdoctoral scientist is among six nationwide recipients of the 2015 Carl Sagan Exoplanet Postdoctoral Fellowships. The Sagan Fellowships support recent postdoctoral students in research related to the scientific goals of NASA’s Exoplanet Exploration Program — specifically, to discover and characterize planetary systems and Earth-like planets around stars. Daniel Foreman-Mackey , an incoming postdoctoral researcher in the UW Department of Astronomy, will focus on using statistical methods to research exoplanet discoveries, with the goal of developing a framework for…
The country of El Salvador was torn apart by a brutal civil war from 1980 to 1992 that took the lives of 75,000 civilians, many the victims of massacres that wiped out entire villages. Throughout that war, thousands of children were forcibly disappeared from their homes and communities by agents of the Salvadoran state as a tactic to instill terror in the population. Faculty and 10 students of the University of Washington Center for Human Rights in its Jackson School…
The United States imprisons a larger percentage of African Americans than South Africa did at the height of apartheid. In Washington, D.C., three out of every four young black men are likely to serve time in prison, according to projections. Those stark facts are found in Michelle Alexander’s 2012 book “The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness.” In a searing indictment of the U.S. criminal justice system, Alexander argues that mass incarceration is a system of…
Robots such as household helpers, driverless cars and personal drones are — or will soon be —available to consumers. But what protections guarantee they won’t spy on us or surreptitiously sell us things? Could a robot be used to verify an alibi in a criminal court case? Who is liable if a driverless car crashes into a person? We Robot 2015, a conference being held April 10 and 11 at the University of Washington School of Law, will explore these…
The UW Astronomy Department celebrates its 50th anniversary this school year. Julie Lutz, research professor emeritus of astronomy, will review that history in a free public talk at 4 p.m. Thursday, April 9, in the Physics/Astronomy Auditorium. The astronomy department was formed in 1965 by George Wallerstein, Paul Hodge and Theodor Jacobson, for whom a UW observatory is named. At the time, NASA’s Gemini program was underway, Sputnik 1 was seven years in the past and the moon landing lay…
Each year the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics recognizes individuals who have made outstanding contributions to the fields of applied mathematics and computational science. A University of Washington mathematician is among 31 new fellows honored this year from academic, industrial and government institutions around the world. Anne Greenbaum, a UW professor of applied mathematics, is being recognized for her contributions to theoretical and numerical linear algebra. Her research interests are in non-normal matrices, numerical linear algebra, iterative methods for…
The University of Washington has three programs in the top 10 on LinkedIn’s rankings of university graduate school programs based on job outcomes in some select fields. The UW’s graduate program for software developers (ranked third), designers (fourth) and accounting professionals (seventh) were in the top 10 in their fields. “By analyzing the employment patterns of over 347+ million LinkedIn members from around the world, we were able to determine which graduate schools are the most successful in launching their…
On the UW campus, most people’s focus at this time of year is on pink cherry blossoms. But this time of year in the northern Atlantic Ocean, a massive bloom soon to appear at the ocean’s surface is a major event in our planet’s carbon cycle. Now UW-developed robots have captured what happens to these ocean blooms as they dissipate. Swirling ocean eddies carry microscopic plants far beneath the surface, creating a surprising end to the bloom that could have…
We are attached to our devices nearly 24/7. As our number of activities and time spent outdoors shrinks, it’s perhaps no coincidence that the larger society faces higher occurrences of depression, child and adult obesity and attention deficit disorder. Getting more people outside and engaged with nature is the topic of this year’s School of Environmental and Forest Sciences annual Sustaining Our World Lecture, 6-7 p.m. Thursday, April 2, in Kane Hall 210. The talk is free and open to…
One would imagine a glacier’s melt to be fairly quiet. That would be wrong. Recordings by current and former University of Washington researchers in fjords shows that melting at glacier edges in the narrow rock-edged canyons are some of the noisiest places in the sea. The study, published in Geophysical Research Letters, recorded the sound near glacier tongues in narrow fjords in the Arctic and Antarctica. The sounds were louder than any natural or human-generated ocean noise, at least within…
More than 40 University of Washington students will compete in the Alaska Airlines Environmental Innovation Challenge 2015. It asks students from around the state to identify an environmental problem, develop a solution, build a prototype and sell their idea to judges. Twenty-two interdisciplinary student teams will pitch and demonstrate their solutions April 2 at an invitation-only daylong event. The competition challenges students to come up with “clean-tech innovations” that reduce waste, minimize energy consumption or contribute to a healthier planet….
The Labor Archives of Washington, part of UW Libraries Special Collections Department, is creating an online resource called the Minimum Wage History Project to document the 2013-2014 campaign that succeeded in mandating a $15 minimum hourly wage in the cities of Seattle and Sea-Tac. The effort kicks off with a public program, “Preserving Solidarity Forever: The Minimum Wage History Project,” 1 to 4 p.m. Saturday, April 11, in Kane Hall’s Walker-Ames Room. James Gregory, UW professor of history, will speak,…
No one would argue that exposing children to secondhand smoke is bad, but should it be considered child abuse? Taryn Lindhorst, a UW associate professor of social work, says no. In an opinion piece published online in the Annals of Family Medicine earlier this month, Lindhorst argues that treating children’s exposure to secondhand smoke as child abuse and reporting parents to authorities takes a punitive approach to addiction and harms both children and families. “Removing kids from their families, their…
Years ago, a fellow educator made a comment that stuck in Christine Stickler’s head. University students don’t need to travel to a foreign country for spring break to immerse themselves in another culture, she said — they can do that right here in Washington state. That observation led Stickler to launch the UW’s Alternative Spring Break program, which sends out teams of undergraduates to small rural and tribal communities throughout Washington to work with elementary and middle school students on…
The University of Washington’s Applied Physics Laboratory and Everett-based company OceanGate this month unveiled the first model of its joint project to build a new type of submarine for human research and exploration in the deep sea. Cyclops 1 was a developed over the past year and a half in the Applied Physics Lab’s co-laboratory space down by the Ship Canal. OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush introduced the vessel and gave tours of the inside March 11 on the dock of…
The University of Washington’s latest step toward its goal of carbon neutrality by 2050 came last week, with the release of its Climate Action Strategy for Transportation, or CAST. The CAST follows the UW Climate Action Plan, a set of broad strategies to guide the UW to the goal of carbon neutrality that was released in 2009. The CAST suggests specific actions for reducing emissions in the transportation sector. “This represents an important step toward strategically reducing a significant portion…
Norman J. Johnston will be remembered as a dedicated and community-minded architect, city planner, teacher and critic. He died Monday, March 16, 2015, in his Seattle home. He was 96. Memorial for Norman J. Johnston 2 p.m. Sunday, May 31, University of Washington Club. Johnston earned a bachelor’s degree in art from the University of Washington in 1942. He returned to the campus in 1960 as a faculty member in architecture and urban planning, and taught until his retirement in…
Members of the UW community are invited to a free daylong conference for technology professionals at the 2015 UW TechConnect Conference on March 24. Explore, learn and connect with other IT colleagues and choose from a dozen presentations about the future of information technology at the UW – from human resources and payroll modernization to accessibility and the latest in computer networking. Keynote speakers start the day with a presentation at 8:30 a.m. by UW Vice Provost for Innovation Vikram…
Attorney General Bob Ferguson has appointed Senior Counsel Karin Nyrop as the new chief of his office’s University of Washington Division. The division provides legal services to the university, including UW Bothell, UW Tacoma and the UW Medical Center. “The University of Washington will be well served by Karin’s impressive combination of legal expertise, leadership experience, personal achievements and demonstrated commitment to public service,” said Ferguson in a statement. Nyrop brings 30 years of legal experience to this position. She…
UW Libraries has opened up a new multimedia space on the third floor of Allen library for the use of students, faculty and staff. It’s called the mediArcade, and is open weekdays 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. to those with a Husky card. With iMacs, large televisions and DVDs, video game consoles, several media editing programs and even VHS playback, UW community members can use the room to watch videos and listen to music, or to create and edit their…
One of modern science’s grand challenges is understanding how the human brain actually works — from cataloging millions of individual cells to figuring out how the circuitry that underlies our thoughts and actions decodes information. By deconstructing these intricate processes, engineers can use the human brain to build everything from smarter computers to better speech recognition programs to artificial limbs that can “recognize” thoughts. Some of the University of Washington’s leading experts on this process — called “Reverse- Engineering the…
Blossom update: 100 percent in bloom as of March 14. Follow @uwcherryblossom for more info. The cherry trees in the Quad at the UW reached full bloom March 14. Exact timing always depends on the weather — if we have sunny, warm days, the trees reach full bloom faster, but colder weather stretches out the timing. Still, full bloom by mid-March is about a week earlier than most years, according to Sara Shores, the UW arborist. Depending on the weather, the blossoms will likely…
Online education has great potential to improve lives, but few people in developing countries have access to such classes. The UW Information School’s Technology & Social Change Group will conduct research as part of a $1.55 million multiagency initiative to study and address this need. The project will include research on online course enrollment in Colombia, the Philippines and South Africa, and is being conducted by the U.S. Agency for International Development together with Coursetalk.com, the largest source of online…
A document from the UW Sephardic Studies Program‘s Digital Library and Museum appears in a new PBS documentary called “The Jewish Journey: America.” The documentary will be broadcast at 7:30 p.m. Monday, March 16, on KBTC, Tacoma’s public broadcasting station, and is now available for viewing online as well. The hour-long film, directed by Emmy-winner Andrew Goldberg, traces Jewish immigration to America over five centuries, using the perspectives of immigrants, historians and Jewish-American writers. The film’s producers contacted Devin Naar,…
No matter what your business — from a nonprofit museum that wants to deepen visitor engagement to a chain store looking for new markets — it’s essential to be able to extract meaningful patterns and results from often massive reservoirs of data. Improving this “art and science” of data analysis, reporting and visualization is the focus of the DRIVE/conference developed by the University of Washington, which will draw more than 700 IT and data professionals to Seattle and Bellevue on…
New research from the UW College of Built Environments on the “spatial clustering of obesity” in urban areas has helped clarify and build upon work a 2007 study began. The takeaway, in brief: In King County, Washington, at least, low property values match with high body-mass indexes, or BMIs in less diverse, lower-income South King County, and higher property values match with low BMIs in more populous, prosperous North King County. Body-mass indexes are a measure of a person’s relative…
The power of social media in fueling movements such as Black Lives Matter, the racial justice campaign sprung from last year’s protests in Ferguson, Missouri, has become increasingly evident in recent years. Recognition of those grassroots efforts is the focus of the fifth annual Women Who Rock “unconference” event, to be held Saturday, March 7, at Rainier Valley Cultural Center in South Seattle. The event’s theme, Rocking Media Justice, celebrates the use of social media to document the realities of…