Bless honored with James E. Newcomb Award

Dr. Diane Bless

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Connor awarded fellowship from national association

Dr. Nadine Connor

Dr. Nadine Connor was recently granted a Fellowship of the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association.

This award recognizes professional or scientific achievement and is given to members who have made outstanding contributions to the professions.

The award is one of the highest honors that ASHA can bestow and is retained for life.  

Connor is an Associate Professor in Communicative Disorders and Surgery-Otolaryngology.

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Local educators travel to Arizona for an astronomical adventure

Wisconsin Teachers (left to right) Brandon Olszewski, Evan Gnam, Derek Engebretsen, and UW astronomer Eric Hooper inspect an image of the Owl Nebula, a dying star, they took with the WIYN 0.9-meter telescope. Photo: John Heasley.

Astronomy Department researchers expanded the scope of their ongoing program to involve K-12 educators in research observing runs at telescopes on Kitt Peak, Arizona. 

This past May, four Wisconsin teachers joined UW-Madison astronomers Eric Hooper and Marsha Wolf at the WIYN 0.9-meter and 3.5-meter telescopes. 

The Wisconsin teachers represented the first high school teachers, as well as the first pre-service teachers, to experience the WIYN in Arizona. 

The local teachers included:

• Evan Gnam, a former UW-Madison graduate student in astronomy, who now teaches math, physics, and astronomy at Madison East High School. 
• John Heasley, an English teacher at Richland Center High School, who teaches a course on literature involving Mars.  He is also an avid amateur astronomer and a NASA Solar System Ambassador.
• Derek Engebretsen and Brandon Olszewski, both UW-Madison undergraduate preservice teachers, who trained at Madison East.  Engebretsen just graduated and will begin teaching in the fall, and Olszewski will graduate next spring.  Both also taught in the UW-Madison Physics Learning Center.
  

Despite a tight schedule, the teachers had time to use the electronic detector on the 0.9-m telescope to make images of some of their favorite objects in the sky such as nebulae formed by dying stars, globular and open star clusters, distant galaxies like the Whirlpool Galaxy and even clusters of galaxies. 

The teachers noticed Bucky representing UW-Madison on one of the instruments attached to the WIYN 3.5-meter telescope. Photo: John Heasley.

The impact of the trip will spread far beyond this summer and the four teachers. 

Gnam and Heasley have already enthralled their students with tales of the trip. 

Gnam is processing data for all four to use and Heasley has talked to an amateur group about the experience.  Both are planning activities comparing true and false color using the data they took, plus Engebretsen and Olszewski are planning how to incorporate astronomy into their future physics teaching. 

Wisconsin Teachers Evan Gnam (left) and Derek Engebretsen (right) walk to the WIYN 0.9-meter telescope at sunset. Photo: Brandon Olszewski.

The trip was made possible by the support of Astronomy Department Board of Visitors, Professor Andy Sheinis and Madison East and Richland Center High Schools. 

UW-Madison will continue to use the 0.9-meter telescope for educational purposes this summer, as Hooper will lead its contribution to the Astronomy Camp program, which will be resident on Kitt Peak this June for only the second time in its more than two decade history. 

Category: Biological & Physical Sciences
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Geography honors students with awards

The Geography Department honored a number of outstanding students for their achievements this spring:

• Douglas Steeples – Clarence W. Olmstead Award for Excellence of Scholarship in Geography. (Recognizes growth in the Geography major within the Department)
• Kevin McGrath – Clarence W. Olmstead Award for Undergraduate Achievement in Cartography. (Recognizes growth in the Cartography major within the Department)
• ViolaDan Wandersee – Department of Geography GIS Certificate Program Achievement Award. (For outstanding achievement in academics and application by a GIS Certificate Program student)
• Jamie Foster – Clarence W. Olmstead Award for Outstanding Teaching Assistant. (Recognizes an outstanding teaching assistant based on student evaluations and length of service.)
• Jacquelyn Gill – Clarence W. Olmstead Award for Outstanding Publication by a Graduate Student. "Pleistocene Megafaunal Collapse, Novel Plant Communities, and Enhanced Fire Regimes in North America." Recently published in Science.
• Chris Muellerleile – Clarence W. Olmstead Award for Outstanding Grad Presentation at the 2010 Student Symposium. "Derivative Geographies: Chicago, Financial Derivatives and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission."
• Genevieve Schaad – Clarence W. Olmstead Award for Outstanding Undergrad Presentation at the 2010 Student Symposium. "The Geography of my Viola: How to enhance your interests, for Geographers."

• Bricknell MapMichael Bricknell – Barbara Petchenik Memorial Graduate Award in Cartography Design: First Place
• Wang MapPing Wang – Barbara Petchenik Memorial Graduate Award in Cartography Design: Second Place
• Forrest MapMatt Forrest – Barbara Petchenik Memorial Undergraduate Award in Cartography Design: First Place
• Ignatowski MapSimon Ignatowski – Barbara Petchenik Memorial Undergraduate Award in Cartography Design: Second Place
  

• Travis Tennessen – Whitbeck Graduate Dissertator Award. "Making the New Greenhouse Economy:  Science, Markets & Expertise in Climate Policy"
• Mark Cooper – Whitbeck Graduate Dissertator Award. "Making the New Greenhouse Economy:  Science, Markets & Expertise in Climate Policy"
  

Trewartha Research Grant Awardees:

• Andy Davey  
  
• Cathy Day
• Fei Ma
• Marigold Norman
• Nancy Parker
• Leslie Sinak
• Katie Wirka
• Emily Atkinson
• Leif Brottem
• Amanda Kolpin

Category: Biological & Physical Sciences
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Geography (Madison) to Geography (Beijing) linkages

UW Madison Professors Robert Kaiser, Matthew Turner and A-Xing Zhu were part of the delegation of UW-Madison faculty and staff to China that was led by University of Wisconsin-Madison Chancellor Biddy Martin in spring.

This action-packed trip laid the foundations for the ongoing development of collaborative plans between the geography programs of UW-Madison and Beijing Normal University.

For more on the Chancellor's trip, see:

http://www.chancellor.wisc.edu/china/

Category: Biological & Physical Sciences
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Geography undergraduate Miller honored with Leadership Trust Award

Undergraduate student Ally Miller

Undergraduate geography major Ally Miller has received the Leadership Trust Award through the Letters & Science Honors Program.

The honor also provides funding to be used by the students to help plan, develop, and implement projects designed to improve the UW-Madison, the community, and/or the university student body.

In promoting healthy relationships with food and community, the Slow Food Friends project seeks to meet the needs of four interrelated organizations: Slow Food-UW, the Boys and Girls Club of Dane County, Quaker Housing Inc for senior citizens and people with disabilities, and the South Madison Farmer’s Market. This campus-community partnership provides spaces for intergenerational and cross-cultural interaction while celebrating the many agricultural and environmental initiatives that exist within South Madison.

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Astronomy Board sees Space Shuttle Atlantis up close and personal

The Space Shuttle Atlantis taking off from Kennedy Space Flight Center on May 14.

Members of the Department of Astronomy Board of Visitors, accompanied, by several astronomy faculty and UW Foundation staff, traveled to the Kennedy Space Flight Center to see the final launch of the Space Shuttle Atlantis on May 14.

NASA chief-of-staff and Astronomy alumnus Dave Radzanowski (BS'88) provided VIP opportunities for the Board, including getting very up close and personal with Space Shuttle Endeavor in the Orbiter Processing Facility.

The Space Shuttle Endeavor Orbiter Processing Facility.

Wonderfully, after months of planning by NASA and the Board, the launch was on time and a complete success.

The sound was impressive as expected; more surprising was the brightness of the solid rocket booster exhaust — like a small bit of the Sun lifting the shuttle from the launchpad.

As Atlantis disappeared from view in its chase of the International Space Station, which had just passed overhead, all felt inspired by the launch, mixed with a bit of bittersweet feelings knowing that only a couple more Shuttle launches remain to inspire others younger than us.

Members of the Astronomy Board of Visitors enjoying some sun in Florida on their trip to see the Space Shuttle Atlantis.

As a postscript, Jere Fluno reported that twelve days later he left his dentist's chair in Florida and went outside to hear Atlantis' sonic boom as it came overhead for
its final landing.

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