Lectures
Penn State Intercom......October 11 , 2001

e-Education leader to be next Forum speaker

Matthew Pittinsky, chairman and co-founder of Blackboard Inc., will deliver the Penn State Forum lecture at noon Friday, Oct. 19, at the Penn Stater Conference Center Hotel on the University Park campus.

The topic of his presentation is "Dot-com and Beyond."

As founding chief executive officer, Pittinsky has been instrumental in Blackboard's growth, including more than 1,800 client institutions, 450 staff, four acquisitions and more than $100 million in investment financing.

The Penn State Forum is a lunchtime speaker series offered by the Faculty Staff Club and is sponsored in part by the Penn State Bookstore. It is open to the public. Tickets are $10 for members and $12 for non-members and include lunch. Reservations can be made by mail or by stopping by the Faculty Staff Club office at 103 HUB-Robeson Center on the University Park campus. Tickets will be on sale at the door on a first-come, first-served basis. Lunch begins at 11:30 a.m. followed by the speech and a question-and-answer session at noon.

For information, call (814) 865-7590.

Ben Stein

Ben Stein wins attention as Distinguished Speaker

Ben Stein, host of the Comedy Central quiz show, "Win Ben Stein's Money," will speak at
8 p.m. Monday, Oct. 15, at Eisenhower Auditorium on the University Park campus.

Stein's appearance is part of the University's Distinguished Speakers Series. The event is free to the public, but tickets are required. Limited tickets may be available the night of the speech.

Stein is a longtime screenwriter, author and a well-known actor in movies, television and commercials. He also served as a speechwriter and lawyer for Presidents Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford.

For information, call (814) 863-3786.

Columnist Leonard Pitts to present lecture

Leonard Pitts Jr., syndicated Miami Herald columnist and author of Becoming Dad: Black Men and the Journey to Fatherhood, will deliver the African and African-American Studies Cyril Griffith distinguished lecture at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 25, at Heritage Hall in the HUB-Robeson Center on the University Park campus.

His topic is "Coming Together: Race, War and Being American," inspired by the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

Pitts joined the Miami Herald in 1991 as its pop music critic. Since 1994, he has penned a column of commentary on pop culture, social issues and family life.

The talk is free to the public, but seating is limited.

For information, call (814) 863-4243 or e-mail ard5@psu.edu.

Landscape architect's topic is 'cheap and green'

Landscape architect and artist Martha Schwartz, 2001-02 Bracken Fellow, will kick off this year's John R. Bracken Lecture Series with "Quik, Cheap and Green" at
8 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 18, in 26 Hosler Building on the University Park campus.

Schwartz is principal of Martha Schwartz Inc., in Cambridge, Mass., and is a registered landscape architect in California, Rhode Island and New Mexico. With a background in fine arts and landscape architecture, Schwartz's major interest lies in urban-scale projects and the exploration of new design expression in the landscape.

Schwartz is an adjunct professor of landscape architecture at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design.

The lecture series, sponsored by the College of Arts and Architecture's Department of Landscape Architecture, honors John R. Bracken, one of the first to graduate from Penn State with a major in landscape architecture and former head of the Department of Landscape Architecture.

The lecture is free to the public. For information, call (814) 865-9511.

Conference marks department's centennial

The Department of Germanic and Slavic Languages and Literatures will hold an international conference on "A Century of German-American Crosscurrents at Penn State (1901-2001)," Oct. 18 to 20 at the Palmer Museum of Art and in Pattee Library on the University Park campus.

The conference, which marks the centennial of the Department of German's foundation, will focus on "German Cultural and Literary Connections and the "Pennsylvania German Heritage."

Speakers include Ursula Hegi, with a reading from her recent book, Tearing the Silence; Charles Bierbauer, senior Washington correspondent, CNN; Roger Cohen, former Berlin correspondent of The New York Times; Donald Kraybill, Messiah College, on "The Amish Experience"; and Armin Franck, University of Göttingen, on "Literary Translation."

Concurrent with this conference, two photography exhibits will be shown at Zoller Gallery. "The New Berlin" documents the Berlin of the decade after German unification, while a photo essay by Gary Catchen, nuclear engineering, focuses on "Genres of German Architecture." Both exhibits are open to the public.

For information, a conference schedule and for online registration, check http://german.la.psu.edu/centennial01/centennial.html, call Gerhard F. Strasser at (814) 865-2263 or e-mail gfs1@psu.edu.

Non-conventional fertilizers to be discussed

Ephraim Govere, a doctoral candidate in soil science, will speak about "The Agronomic Effectiveness of Non-Conventional Phosphorus Fertilizers Derived From Dorowa Rock, Zimbabwe" from 3:35 to 4:25 p.m. Oct. 12 in 101 Agricultural Sciences and Industries Building on the University Park campus.

The Department of Crop and Soil Sciences is the host for the event. For information, call (814) 863-1601.

Researcher to discuss
stem cell prospects

John Gearhart, C. Michael Armstrong professor of medicine and professor of gynecology and obstetrics, physiology and comparative medicine in the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and professor of biochemistry and molecular biology in the Johns Hopkins University School of Public Health and Hygiene, will speak on "Human Pluripotential Stem Cells: Prospects for Cell-based Therapies" in the Life Sciences Consortium's Colloquium Oct. 16 on the University Park campus.

The colloquium will be videoconferenced at 4 p.m. from 101 Thomas Building to Lecture Room D at Hershey Medical Center.

At Hopkins, Gearhart serves as director of the Division of Developmental Genetics, director of research for gynecology and obstetrics and director of preimplantation genetic diagnosis.

Safer world will be the
topic at U.N. Day dinner

The United Nations Association of Centre County will hold a U.N. Day dinner and discussion from 6 to 8 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 24, in Dean's Hall at The Penn Stater Conference Center Hotel on the University Park campus.

The topic for discussion will be "Building a Safer and More Secure World."

Tickets are available until Oct. 17 by calling Helen Bell at (814) 238-6613.

Robin Becker to give
public poetry reading

Robin Becker, professor of English and women's studies at Penn State, will give a public reading at 8 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 18, in the HUB-Robeson Center auditorium on the University Park campus.

The reading is Becker's inaugural lecture upon promotion to professor and also is part of the Allegheny Mountains Reading series.

The reading is free to the public.

Prevention of behavior
problems will be topic

Jean Dumas, distinguished professor of psychology, will give a lecture from 4 to 5 p.m. Oct. 17 in 207 South Henderson Building on the University Park campus.

The lecture is titled "Parenting classes as prevention of child behavior problems: engaging and retaining parents who are not asking for help." The seminar is presented by the Prevention Research Center for Promotion of Human Development.

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