May 2012 News Archive

Alan Horn '64 was named chairman of the Walt Disney Studios. Horn returned to campus in 2010 to speak at Commencement.

The announcement by Disney appeared in hundreds of news outlets, including the New York Times, Wall Street Journal and Forbes.

To read about Disney's announcement on Forbes.com, click here.

Kathleen Portillo ’14 is the Kenney Community Center’s Volunteer of the Week.

A leader for a local Girl Scout’s Brownie Troop as well as a volunteer for the America Reads Program, Portillo often donates her time to community service in the local area.

She is the secretary and philanthropy chair for Latinas Promoviendo Comunidad/Lambda Pi Chi Sorority, Inc. Portillo is also a Posse Scholar.

LGBTQ Ally training will take place on Monday, June 4 from 4:30 p.m. to 6 p.m.

The program is an educationally based program providing a safe space for members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transsexual and queer/questioning community at Union through identification of allies who can offer support and information.

Roman Yukilevich, assistant professor of biology, was a first co-author on “Incompatibility and Competitive Exclusion of Genomic Segments Between Sibling Drosophila Species," accepted for publication in Plos Genetics. His research investigated the extent to which recently diverged species show genetic incompatibilities, such that genomic regions of one species are unable to be incorporated into the genome of the second species. 

When the College needed to hire a new sustainability coordinator, a search committee sorted through more than 100 resumes. In the end, though, the group simply recycled a familiar name from the past.

Valedictorian: Mark B. Chaskes

Hometown: Williamsville, N.Y.

Major: Biology and Economics major in the Leadership in Medicine program

Physics and astronomy majors Halley Darling '13, Lucas Viani '14 and Rachel Almovodar '15, observed at the Arecibo Telescope in Puerto Rico with Associate Professor of Physics Rebecca Koopmann '89.

The observations carried out by the Union team are in conjunction with the ongoing ALFALFA, or Arecibo Legacy Fast ALFA, survey, which is a seven-year project headed by Cornell University to census hydrogen-bearing galaxies in the local universe.

On May 24, third-, fourth- and fifth-grade students from Lincoln Elementary School visited the College as part of their career exploration after-school program. 

Student volunteers from Sigma Delta Tau and Sigma Chi hosted the students and led tours, speaking about the academics and activities on campus. 

Jon Boroshok - Diversity/Careers in Engineering and Information Technology

Valerie Barr, chair of the Computer Science Department and director of Interdisciplinary Programs, was quoted in the recent issue of Diversity/Careers in Engineering and Information Technology.

To read the article, click here.

A blogger for Wired recently reviewed the new book by Chad Orzel, an associate professor of physics, How to Teach Relativity to Your Dog, in which he again tries to simplify a difficult subject matter so even Emmy, Orzel’s German shepherd mix, can understand. The book is a follow-up to Orzel’s well-received How to Teach Physics to Your Dog, which introduced the world to the brainy 10-year-old mutt.