Top Stories
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We are family – Bucknell and you!
Please join us for Family Weekend 2007 (Oct. 26-28). It is a wonderful opportunity to enjoy three days of great activities with your student and get to know the whole Bucknell community. [full story]
Family Weekend features a full schedule of events, including music, children’s activities, academic talks, football vs. Holy Cross, department tours, college information for high-school siblings, special-interest receptions, golf and pool tournaments, a 5k run, and more.
President Brian C. Mitchell will speak on the future of the University at 10 a.m. Saturday at Trout Auditorium. Afterward, President and Mrs. Mitchell invite all first-year families to tour the President’s House.
Please visit the Family Weekend website for the latest schedule information or to register.
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16 athletics programs boast 100% graduation rate
Bucknell has again been named one of the best universities in the country in graduating student-athletes. [full story]
On Oct. 3, the NCAA announced preliminary Graduation Success Rate data, along with U.S. Department of Education graduation rate data. Once again, Bucknell fared extremely well in the findings of the two agencies.
Sixteen Bucknell varsity programs, including men’s basketball, boasted perfect 100 percent Graduation Success Rates (GSR), factoring student-athletes who entered school between the 1997-98 and 2000-01 academic years.Of Bucknell’s 23 varsity sports considered in the study (cross country, indoor and outdoor track and field are combined, for GSR purposes), 20 had a GSR of 90 percent or better.
Focusing on sports specifically emphasized by the NCAA, Bucknell’s men’s basketball, baseball, volleyball and women’s soccer programs maintained their 100 GSRs, while the football (91) and women’s basketball (94) programs were both over 90 percent. The national averages for those sports are 61 percent in men’s basketball, 66 percent in baseball, 65 percent for Championship Subdivision football, 81 percent for women’s basketball, 88 percent for volleyball, and 89 percent for women’s soccer.
Other Bison men’s programs with 100 percent GSR figures were golf, lacrosse, soccer, tennis, and water polo. Other women’s programs at 100 percent were rowing, golf, lacrosse, softball, swimming, tennis, and water polo.
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Civil engineers receive $230,000 in NSF grants
The National Science Foundation funded two proposals by Bucknell professors related to the study of soil-bentonite cutoff walls, commonly used as barriers against groundwater pollutants. [full story]
Proposals for the NSF grants, which total more than $230,000, were submitted by Jeffrey Evans, professor of civil and environmental engineering, and Michael Malusis, assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering.
One grant will fund a drill rig and accessories worth nearly $134,000. The drill rig, which should arrive in November, is the second Major Research Instrumentation grant obtained by the University this year, the first being an atomic force microscope acquired by the chemistry department.The cutoff wall grant is in conjunction with Louisiana State University professor Radhey Sharma, formerly a visiting professor at Bucknell.
The partnership with LSU, a Research I institution, allows both schools to accomplish a larger body of work, while encouraging students to engage in high-level research and to consider pursuing advanced degrees.
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Alumni cyclists raise over $1 million for scholarships
Three generations of Bucknell alumni exceeded their goal of raising $1 million for scholarships for Bucknell students by cycling from coast to coast. [full story]
Walter McConnell '53, Frank Arentowicz '69, Jay Kosa ’07, Pat O'Malley '07, and Kyle Rosendale '07 completed a 19-day, 3,050-mile trek Sept. 27. It is said to be the first such effort by alumni anywhere to raise scholarship money.
The five Bucknell cyclists - part of the Bucknell-Penn Alumni Bike Race Across America - were honored at Christy Mathewson-Memorial Stadium prior to the Sept. 29 Bucknell-Marist football game. Marking the generosity of those who supported their ride, they presented a check for $1,168,514 to Laura Denbow, executive director of Alumni Relations and Career Services at Bucknell.
Arentowicz, who turned 60 during the ride, and McConnell, who will turn 76 this month, completed at least two 100-plus mile rides during the course of the trip. All five Bucknellians pedaled the last 10 miles together.
"Not only had we done it, we were now three generations of Bucknellians bonded forever by what we had done together - three fantastic young graduates Jay, Pat and Kyle, 'middle age' Frank, and one old geezer. What a thrill that words can hardly describe," wrote McConnell in his blog. "We had covered over 3,000 miles and marveled daily at the expanse, beauty, and diversity of our country and friendliness of our people. We are truly blessed." -
President Mitchell issues statement on Burma crisis
President Brian C. Mitchell recently affirmed the University community’s concern about the political crisis in Burma. [full story]
In late September, non-violent demonstrations by Buddhist monks and nuns and common people throughout Burma were met with violent attacks by the military regime and police. After a week of increasingly large public demonstrations against the government’s fuel price increases, the regime instituted a repressive crack-down.
Bucknell has a long historic relationship with Burma, also known as Myanmar (as renamed by the military government in 1989).
In 2008, Bucknell will celebrate the 150th anniversary of the arrival of Maung Shaw Loo, Bucknell’s first international student and the first student from Burma to enroll in a U.S. university. In recent years, the creation of the Shaw Loo Memorial and Win scholarships have given more students from Burma the opportunity to study at Bucknell.
"On behalf of the University, I must declare our deep concern for the safety of our students’ families, and our many alumni and friends in Burma, and our hope that the international community, in keeping with its commitment to the principles of human rights, will do whatever is appropriate to press the military government to cease its attacks on and arrests of monks, nuns, demonstrators and democracy activists," Mitchell said in a statement. "We trust that this crisis might open the door for peaceful negotiation on the demonstrators’ demands for relief from extreme poverty, a more open society, and a genuinely humane future for Burma." -
Russert kicks off Bucknell Forum with election talk
Speaking to a full house at Bucknell's Weis Center for the Performing Arts, veteran NBC newsman and best-selling author Tim Russert kicked off the Bucknell Forum's national speakers series Sept. 18, saying the 2008 presidential election is wide open. [full story]
But Russert said the political situation is Washington is "poisonous" and that the next president of the United States must find common ground to bring the country together on a diverse array of significant issues.
"We are capable doing this if we are willing to accept a simple notion: That one party and one ideology does not have a monopoly on the truth," the moderator of NBC's "Meet the Press" said.
"The Bucknell Forum: The Citizen & Politics in America" is a national speakers series exploring major issues in the 2008 presidential election, notably those at the forefront of today's national discourse. The series features nationally renowned leaders, scholars, and commentators exploring these issues from multi-disciplinary perspectives and offers opportunities for campus and community conversations.
The Bucknell Forum will present a panel of national political correspondents representing such media as the Wall Street Journal, Time, NPR, Politico.com, and ABC-TV on Oct. 18 and, on Nov. 5, a talk by internationally renowned scholar Dr. Benjamin Barber titled, "The News as Commodity in an Interdependent World: Can Citizenship Survive?"
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President lauds database as alternative to rankings
In an Oct. 4 op-ed in The Philadelphia Inquirer, Bucknell University President Brian C. Mitchell, who is also chair of the Association of Independent Colleges and Universities in Pennsylvania, lauded a new national database that will help students and parents choose higher education institutions based on comprehensive and comparable information. [full story]
More than 60 independent colleges and universities in Pennsylvania have joined U-CAN, or the University & College Accountability Network.
"Students relying on the (magazine college) rankings to make a choice may not consider a number of schools that might be the best fit for them," President Mitchell wrote in the op-ed. "Now, students and families have available a source of broad information about higher education that will allow them to make choices based on their needs and educational goals," he added.
View Bucknell's U-CAN profile here.
