April 10, 2009

Appointments, honors and activities

— James R. Mintert, Extension state leader and livestock marketing economist at Kansas State University, has been named assistant director of the Purdue University Cooperative Extension Service. As assistant director, Mintert will lead Purdue Extension's agricultural and natural resources programming. Purdue Extension provides educational programs and production and marketing information for crop and livestock producers in Indiana's 92 counties. Mintert earned bachelor's and master's degrees in agricultural economics at Purdue in 1978 and 1982, respectively. He received a doctoral degree in agricultural economics from the University of Missouri in 1986 and joined the faculty of Kansas State's Department of Agricultural Economics in 1986, where he specialized in livestock marketing. In 2004 he was named Kansas State's Extension state leader for agricultural economics.

• Campus activities:

— Purdue's Interfraternity Council will receive the 2009 Council Award of Distinction by the North-American Interfraternity Conference (NIC) at the organization's annual meeting this month. The Council Award of Distinction is given to the Interfraternity Council that operates in full compliance with NIC standards and works to maintain an environment on its respective campus that is conducive to the success of member chapters.

— NEXTRANS, a transportation research center in Purdue's Discovery Park, is sponsoring an essay contest for high school students who live in Indiana. A top prize of $500 will go to the best essay of 1,500 words or less. Submission deadline is May 1. No entry form or fee is required. Suggested themes are why transportation is important to the future of Indiana, what challenges does Indiana transportation face and what are possible solutions. The contest is designed to encourage students to consider the importance of transportation to the future of the state and nation and to see what potential career paths may be possible for them. No electronic submissions will be accepted. Entries should be mailed to: NEXTRANS 2009 High School Essay Competition, 2700 Kent Ave., B100, West Lafayette, IN 47906. For information, call 765-496-9729, e-mail nextrans@purdue.edu or visit https://www.purdue.edu/dp/nextrans/contest.php

— Purdue's Greek Week Team is sponsoring a Faculty & Staff Appreciation Brunch from 9:30-11:30 a.m. Tuesday (April 14) in the Purdue Armory. The event will offer an all-you-can-eat meal of pancakes, sausage links, orange juice and coffee catered by Chris Cakes, which was recently featured on the Food Network. The brunch is free and open to the first 500 faculty and staff members to arrive.

— The Purdue Student Government Supreme Court is sponsoring Know Your Rights Week April 13-17 on campus. The week, which focuses on promoting the knowledge of student rights, will feature a variety of lecture and activities including:

* April 13. 6:30 p.m. Fowler Hall. "Intellectual Property, Informatics and the Internet" with Sara Anne Hook, associate dean for Academic Affairs and Undergraduate Studies and professor and director of Informatics.

* April 14. 5 p.m. Fowler Hall. Oral argument about Muncie mayoral election featuring Melissa S. May, Indiana Court of Appeals judge, and Steve Carter, former attorney general of the state of Indiana. Following the argument, May and Carter will speak about how to become a lawyer, public service law and consumer protection issues.

* April 15. 6:30 p.m. Rawls Hall, Room 1086. Criminal law and the consequences students face featuring Hunter Reese and Stephen Akers, Purdue's executive associate dean of students.

* April 16. 6:30 p.m. Rawls Hall, Room 1062. "The Landlord vs. The Tenant" with James Gothard, professor in the department of Management at Purdue.

* April 17. 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Stewart Center, Room 190. Free Talk to a Lawyer Day. The Purdue Student Government Supreme Court is pairing with Indiana District 4 Pro Bono Corp. to bring free legal consultations to campus. Approximately 35 lawyers will be on duty with a variety of specialties. Students seeking information about pending legal issues, advice or law school are welcome to speak to the lawyers free of charge.

• Faculty and staff honors:

— Kamyar Haghighi, head of the School of Engineering Education in Purdue University's College of Engineering, will receive the 2009 Chester F. Carlson Award from the American Society for Engineering Education. Haghighi is being honored for providing national leadership in the development of engineering education as an academic discipline and for leading the creation of Purdue's Department (now School) of Engineering Education, the world's first such academic department. The award, sponsored by Xerox Corp., is named for the inventor of the process that led to the first copier. It is presented annually to an individual who, by motivation and ability to extend beyond the accepted tradition, has made a significant contribution to engineering education.

— Alexandra Boltasseva, a Purdue assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering, has received a young researcher award in advanced optical technologies from the Erlangen Graduate School in Advanced Optical Technologies at the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg in Erlangen, Germany. The honor, which carries a prize of 100,000 Euros - or $132,000 - recognizes her "pioneering contributions" in advanced "metamaterials" that could make possible future innovations such as new types of sensors and optoelectronic technologies. Boltasseva has published nearly 40 research papers and is taking a leave of absence from the Technical University of Denmark's Department of Photonic Engineering, where she is an associate professor. The award will be issued during a ceremony on May 12 in Germany.

— Laurence B. Leonard, the Rachel E. Stark Distinguished Professor of Speech, Language and Hearing Sciences, will serve as a member of the National Institutes of Health's Center for Scientific Review on the Language and Communication Study Section. The study sections review grant applications, make recommendations on these applications and survey the status of research in their fields. Leonard's appointment is from July 1, 2009, to June 30, 2013.

— Ned Howell, managing director of the e-Enterprise Center, and Mary Schultz, administrative assistant for the Regenstrief Center for Healthcare Engineering, are the inaugural winners of Discovery Park's Sunrise Award. Howell and Schultz each received a small monetary award and a plaque "to recognize those individuals who go above and beyond the stated responsibilities of their positions to advance the mission and vision of Discovery Park and Purdue University." Their names also will be listed on a plaque that will be displayed in the Burton D. Morgan Center for Entrepreneurship. The awards were announced April 7 in conjunction with Discovery Park's External Advisory Council meeting.

— The video unit within Purdue's Marketing and Media's Creative Services has received two awards. A two-minute student recruitment video called "Closing the Deal" won a gold award from the EMPixx Awards. A gold award also was granted by The Aurora Awards for "Purdue Pride - Episode 3," a half-hour news magazine produced for the Big Ten Network. Ray Cubberley produced both programs. The "Closing the Deal" video can be viewed at https://www.admissions.purdue.edu/youreaboilermaker/  and the Purdue Pride episode can be viewed at https://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=10ACA8092A1A88F6

Purdue News Service: (765) 494-2096; purduenews@purdue.edu

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