Giffords, Hileman Recovering After Tucson Shootings; A Year of Undergrad at Cornell Approaches $55K; Economist Alfred Kahn Dies; First Grads for India Program; 'Cornell Dots' Go into Human Trials in Melanoma Patients; Senior Arrested in $50K Heroin Bust; Engineering Offers Sustainability Minor; CAM's Jack Krieger '49 Dies; Faculty Memorials Online; Students Volunteer DNA for Genographic Project
Giffords, Hileman Recovering After Tucson Shootings
As the nation grappled with the aftermath of the January shootings in Tucson, Cornellians rooted for the recoveries of two of their own. Representative Gabrielle Giffords, the Arizona congresswoman who was the alleged gunman's main target, earned a master's in regional planning from Cornell in 1997. After surviving a gunshot to the brain, Giffords continues to recover at a Houston rehabilitation center.
Also on the mend after the shootings—which left six dead and thirteen wounded—is Susan Annis Hileman '73. A retired social worker who is married to Wilson Hileman '72, "Suzi" Hileman was shot three times but is expected to make a full recovery. In the weeks following the attack, both Hilemans spoke candidly to the media about their grief and horror at the murder of nine-year-old Christina Taylor Green, the gunman's youngest victim. Susan Hileman had invited her young neighbor, who had a nascent interest in politics, to accompany her to the event at which Giffords met with constituents at a Tucson shopping center.
Knowledge is power (and it's not cheap): Next year, tuition in the endowed colleges will rise 4.5 percent.
A Year of Undergrad at Cornell Approaches $55K
All Cornell undergraduates will see a $1,875 tuition increase next year under an across-the-board hike that the trustees approved in January. According to vice president for planning and budgeting Elmira Mangum, the increase was prompted by a variety of factors, including rising costs and a drop in state support. The increase brings tuition to $41,325 for students in the endowed colleges and for outof-staters in the statutory colleges; New York residents will pay statutory tuition of $25,185. With housing, dining, and mandatory fees, the cost of a year in the endowed colleges will rise 4.5 percent, to $54,645. Says Mangum: "We are making a concerted effort to streamline operations and reduce expenses, with marked success, and will continue to do so to hold down substantial tuition increases in the future."
Economist Alfred Kahn Dies
Alfred Kahn, the economist best known for overseeing the deregulation of the airlines during the Carter Administration, died December 27 at ninety-three. His decades on the Hill included terms as chair of the economics department, a member of the Board of Trustees, and dean of Arts and Sciences. Kahn graduated NYU at age eighteen—summa cum laude and first in his class—before earning a PhD from Yale. He joined the Cornell faculty in 1947, becoming known not only for his teaching, scholarship, and policy work, but his sense of humor and dedication to clear language. A lover of light opera, he performed numerous Gilbert and Sullivan character roles with the Cornell Savoyards. (As Kahn told the New York Times in an interview quoted in his obituary: "I was a ham.") Kahn is survived by his wife, Mary, GR '53-57, three children, eight grandchildren, two great-grandchildren, and a nephew for whom the couple were legal guardians. For a tribute by colleague Robert Frank, see page 8.
First Grads for India Program
A dual degree program offered by Cornell and India's Tamil Nadu Agricultural University celebrated its first commencement in January. The ceremony in Coimbatore, India, honoring the Master of Professional Studies graduates was attended by several CALS faculty and staff, including senior associate dean Max Pfeffer and director of international programs Ronnie Coffman, PhD '71. In his remarks, Pfeffer noted that both schools "strive to contribute to the development of knowledge that informs our understanding of global agriculture and food systems." The MPS students, who can concentrate in plant science or food science, split their time between the two campuses.
'Cornell Dots' Go into Human Trials in Melanoma Patients
"Cornell Dots," the glowing nanoparticles that show promise in diagnosing and treating cancer, are going into human trials. The FDA has approved an initial trial with five melanoma patients at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York City to ascertain that the "C-dots" are safe and effective. "This is the first product of its kind," says Michelle Bradbury, a radiologist at Sloan-Kettering and a professor at the Medical college. "We want to make sure it does what we expect it to do." The dots are silica spheres, less than eight nanometers in diameter, that contain dye molecules. Researchers can attach molecules to them that bind to tumor cells, so cancers are pinpointed by the dots' bright glow during diagnostic scans. Eventually, the dots—which have been tested on mice—could be used to deliver drugs directly to tumors.
Cold war: In February, a snowball fight on the Arts Quad drew dozens of students—and the Cornell Police, who broke it up.
Senior Arrested in $50K Heroin Bust
In December, an English major and former Daily Sun editor was arrested by Ithaca police for allegedly possessing more than five ounces of heroin, with a street value of more than $50,000. After being apprehended on Stewart Avenue, twenty-six-year-old Keri Blakinger '11 of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, was charged with second-degree criminal possession of a controlled substance, a Class A-II felony. On her Facebook page, Blakinger lists two quotes, one by Kurt Vonnegut '44 about his days at the Daily Sun, the other by Hunter S. Thompson from the movie Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. "I knew it was a crime," the latter says. "I did it anyway."
Engineering Offers Sustainability Minor
Starting this academic year, the Engineering college is offering a minor in sustainable energy systems. According to engineering professor Teresa Jordan, who helped develop it, the minor aims to view energy studies broadly, as interacting systems. Overseen by the School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, the minor will include courses in that discipline as well as in earth and atmospheric sciences and mechanical and aerospace engineering. Like most minors, it is open to all undergrads.
Modern family: An Old Fashioned Garden by Maurice Prendergast (in a Charles Prendergast frame) will be on display at the Johnson Museum in "Light and Shadow: American Modernist Paintings and Drawings" from April 2 to July 31.
CAM's Jack Krieger '49 Dies
Jack Krieger '49, an active Hotel school alumnus and former publisher of this magazine, passed away in Ithaca on January 14. He was eighty-six. A member of the Army Air Corps in World War II, Krieger piloted a B-26 Martin Marauder on forty missions. His career included work for golf course architect Robert Trent Jones, Sp Ag '28-30, the co-founding of Patient Care magazine, and partnership in a Connecticut real estate business. After retiring to Ithaca, Krieger lived in an apartment building next door to the CAM offices—often dropping in to say hello and reminisce—and became a daily fixture at the Ithaca Coffee Company, where CAM staff often found him holding court. He will be sorely missed. In addition to his wife, Susan, Krieger is survived by three adult children and their families.
Faculty Memorials Online
When civil engineering professor William Cleveland died in 1873, his fellow faculty members wrote a tribute to his life and career that was recorded in the faculty minutes. Ever since then, the death of every Cornell faculty member has been memorialized by his or her colleagues. In 1941, all of the memorials to date were collected by Cornelius Betten '31, PhD '36, dean of the faculty, in a book titled Necrology of the Faculty. Now the contents of that volume and all subsequent memorial statements—more than 1,400 in all—are available online at the University Library web-site, thanks to the efforts of the Internet-First University Press, led by J. Robert Cooke and Kenneth King. To access the memorials, go to: http://ecommons.cornell.edu/handle/1813/17811.
Students Volunteer DNA for Genographic Project
Two hundred undergrads—chosen from more than 600 volunteers—are having their DNA tested as part of a project launched in February. The students had cheek swabs taken, and the samples will be analyzed by National Geographic's Genographic Project, a global study of humanity's migration history. At an event on campus in April, anthropologist Spencer Wells will give a lecture on test results. Wells, National Geographic's Explorer-in-Residence, is a Frank H. T. Rhodes Class of '56 Professor.