UCSC Review Summer 1997 – Campus Update
School will focus on the high-tech needs of the region and the state
With its distinctive new School of Engineering, finalized on May 15 before the UC Board of Regents, UCSC is poised to assume a critical role in training the skilled engineering workforce that will drive the economies of Silicon Valley, the Monterey Bay region, and the state in the 21st century.
Instruction will begin in September for freshmen in electrical engineering, the first of several new degree programs that will join existing strong departments in computer engineering and computer science to comprise UCSC's first professional school. Studies have shown that California will need increasing numbers of proficient engineers in these fields to remain at the vanguard of the high- technology global marketplace.
Faculty hiring is also under way in the key discipline of applied and engineering mathematics, the second of the new programs. The school's planners envision future programs in at least three other areas of growing importance: software engineering, engineering management, and molecular biotechnology engineering.
Ultimately, plans call for the School of Engineering to grow to about 90 faculty, 500 graduate students, and 1,200 undergraduates-- significant expansions from the current totals of 24 faculty, 160 graduate students, and 320 undergraduates.
"The new School of Engineering at UC Santa Cruz is both timely and advantageous to the state," said UC President Richard C. Atkinson. "The campus has carefully planned the school and its programs to place UCSC on the cutting edge of intellectual developments and the application of new knowledge, as well as to address clear societal needs."
UCSC's expansion of its engineering programs also received a huge boost in May with the announcement of a $5 million gift from Santa Cruz philanthropist and retired developer and engineer Jack Baskin.
Chancellor Greenwood presented UCSC's plans to the Board of Regents on May 15 and accepted Baskin's gift at a news conference a day later in San Jose.
"The Jack Baskin School of Engineering will foster innovative and entrepreneurial research, both by the faculty members we will recruit and by the students we will educate," Greenwood said.
Added Patrick Mantey, dean designate of the School of Engineering: "We are fulfilling our dream that UCSC can become a much more important player in the regional economy."
Prominent Santa Cruz community philanthropist Jack Baskin, a retired developer and engineer, announced on May 16 that he will support UCSC's new School of Engineering with a gift of $5 million-- by far the largest private donation in the 32-year history of the campus.
In recognition of Baskin's gift, UCSC will name its first professional school the Jack Baskin School of Engineering.
Baskin's donation will help UCSC attract topflight faculty members, offer scholarships, purchase equipment, and establish a permanent endowment to provide future income for the School of Engineering.
"Jack Baskin's generous gift establishes a new benchmark for philanthropic contributions to UC Santa Cruz and in the Central Coast area," said Chancellor Greenwood. "It speaks to a wonderful partnership between an institution and an individual who has dreamed of making new futures possible for the young people of this region, the state, and beyond."
Baskin, founder of the construction and housing company Jack Baskin, Inc., said his gift reflects his conviction that engineering is a critical discipline for the future well-being of the region and the state.
On a more personal level, Baskin noted, "Engineering was a stepping- stone for me. By funding the School of Engineering, I am paying back to the university, the community, and the country the great opportunities that were given to me. As young engineers graduate from UCSC, I will be delighted to know that they are on the road to success, just as I was."
David S. Lee, chairman of CMC Industries of Santa Clara and a member of the Board of Regents, has pledged $100,000 to establish an endowed scholarship fund for the new Jack Baskin School of Engineering.
Annual income from the Regent David S. Lee Scholarship Fund will support one or more undergraduate students in the School of Engineering starting in fall 1998. "
As the closest UC campus to Silicon Valley, Santa Cruz can play a key role in helping us fill the shortage of trained engineers from institutions in the Bay Area," Lee said.
Lee said he will augment the fund with future donations. He also plans to contribute digital communications equipment to the campus.
"I greatly appreciate Regent Lee's generosity," said Chancellor Greenwood. "His wonderful gift sets an example of the kind of community partnership that UC Santa Cruz needs now to realize the full promise of the Jack Baskin School of Engineering."
Two of Lee's three children are alumni of UCSC: Eric Chih-Yen Lee, B.A. in psychology in 1988; and Gloria Chih-Ping Lee, B.A. in economics in 1990.
In a comprehensive new analysis of more than 200 top universities, UCSC ranks 15th in the nation among public campuses in the quality of its research productivity. The study and rankings are detailed in a just-published book that chronicles the rise of a new generation of postwar research universities in the United States.
The book, The Rise of American Research Universities: Elites and Challengers in the Postwar Era (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996), makes the case that some of this country's newer research campuses are challenging many of the so-called "elite" universities in the quality of their research activities.
The authors, historians Hugh Davis Graham of Vanderbilt University and Nancy Diamond of the University of Maryland, assessed the performance of 203 research universities from 1945 to 1990. For the study, they measured per capita faculty research productivity-- the creation of new knowledge--in everything from medical science to the classics. "
Although there are fewer surprises among the private universities, in the public system some dramatic rising stars are found," Graham says. UCSC is one such campus.
The campus's overall ranking of 15th in the nation among public campuses includes a No. 1 ranking in the survey's Social Science Index and No. 8 in the Arts and Humanities Index.
Other accolades
UCSC has scored well in several other recent surveys:
* In a survey published by Yahoo! Internet Life that assessed the computer environment of 300 campuses, UCSC was ranked No. 56 in the country.
* In Hispanic Outlook in Higher Education, UCSC finished 53rd nationally in the number of undergraduate degrees it confers on Hispanic students.
UCSC graduate wins a Pulitzer Prize for rescue photo
For the second consecutive year, a UCSC alumna has snared a Pulitzer Prize, journalism's most prestigious honor. This year's recipient is Santa Rosa Press Democrat photographer Annie Wells (College Eight '81), who won the prize for spot news photography. The Pulitzer Prize Board at Columbia University lauded Wells for her "dramatic photograph of a local firefighter rescuing a teenager from raging floodwaters." Newspapers across the country printed the photo in February 1996 as seasonal floods swept through California's Sonoma County. Wells's interest in photography began at UCSC in 1979 when she designed her own major in science news writing and photojournalism. Last year, alumna Laurie Garrett, a reporter for Newsday, received a Pulitzer for explanatory journalism in recognition of her series of articles about the 1995 ebola outbreak in Africa.
In honor of its 20-year reunion, UCSC's class of '77 has donated $35,055 toward a scholarship program for students with financial need. It is the largest gift ever made by a UCSC alumni class. Steve Jung, president-elect of the Alumni Association, presented the check to Chancellor Greenwood at the class's 20-year reunion dinner in April, during the annual Banana Slug Spring Fair.
"We wanted to honor our time at UCSC by helping to ensure that others have the chance to benefit from a similar experience," said Jung. "We're proud that the class of '77 has earned its place in UCSC history as having done more for student scholarships than any class to date."
"This donation sets a new standard for alumni and demonstrates the level of their commitment to UC Santa Cruz," Chancellor Greenwood said. "I'm hopeful that other classes will be inspired to give so generously, because the need has never been greater."
The $35,000 gift adds to the UCSC Alumni Association Scholarship Fund, which provides support to students who have financial need, said Daniel G. Aldrich III, assistant chancellor for University Advancement. The fund awarded eight $2,500 scholarships this past academic year.
The gift brings the scholarship fund to more than $265,000. The association's goal is to build the fund to a permanent endowment of $1 million, added Aldrich.
Class gifts to provide current scholarships or build endowments have been a tradition since UCSC began hosting 20-year reunions five years ago.
A February mission to upgrade the Hubble Space Telescope had a distinctly blue-and-gold flair: UCSC alumnus Steven Hawley (Ph.D., 1977) was one of seven astronauts aboard the space shuttle Discovery, while professor of astronomy and astrophysics Harland Epps helped design one of the telescope's sophisticated new instruments.
Discovery lifted off for mission STS-82 from Cape Canaveral, Florida, in the predawn hours of February 11. During five space walks, astronauts replaced two of Hubble's observing instruments and upgraded its sensors and electronics.
For Hawley, it was his fourth shuttle mission and his first since April 1990, when he and fellow UCSC graduate Kathryn Sullivan deployed the Hubble Space Telescope in orbit. Hawley earned his Ph.D. in astronomy and astrophysics from UCSC in 1977.
Epps is one of 18 astronomers on the science team for the Near Infrared Camera and Multi-Object Spectrometer (NICMOS), a powerful new observing tool that promises unprecedented views of the universe. Sensitive to infrared ("heat") radiation rather than visible light, NICMOS searches for newborn solar systems around relatively nearby stars, peers into the dust-shrouded cores of galaxies, and looks back in time to the primeval stages of galaxy formation.
Epps joined the UCSC faculty in 1989 after 24 years on the astronomy faculty at UCLA.
In conjunction with the dedication of UCSC's new Music Center in May, Chancellor Greenwood announced the launching of the UCSC Music Campaign--a fund-raising program to broaden the scope and outreach of the campus's Music Department. The campaign will support efforts to recruit top high school seniors through four-year merit-based scholarships, as well as fund instrument and equipment purchases and other program needs. The campaign has raised $545,000--just over half its goal of $1 million, which is expected to be reached by June 30, 1998.
To date, the lead supporters of the campaign are Ernest T. "Bud" Kretschmer and Jean Kretschmer, Harold "Hal" Hyde and Persis "Perky" Hyde, the late Siegfried Puknat, alumna Lisa Eltinge, and E- mu Systems.
The UC Board of Regents voted in March to approve the initial stages of the master plan for the UC Monterey Bay Education, Science, and Technology (MBEST) Center, a regional economic development initiative based at the former Fort Ord military reservation.
UCSC, lead campus for the center, will now begin working on development activities that will create a community of forward- thinking researchers and educators on site.
The Regents ratified phases one through three of the master plan, which calls for new construction on 127 acres of UC-owned land within the city of Marina. Projections indicate that this development could create between 3,000 and 4,000 jobs. The property will provide room for about 1.3 million square feet of space for research and development, light industry, and commercial and mixed uses. Development is expected to last for 15 years.
Future phases of development would occur on 357 acres of adjacent UC-owned land. The MBEST site also encompasses 605 acres of unique maritime chaparral--called the Fort Ord Natural Reserve and protected as part of UC's Natural Reserve System.
On the developable land, MBEST planners envision a research and technology park that will draw upon the strengths of nearly two dozen Monterey Bay research and educational institutions (see map, above).
Planners envision four areas of activity that would form the core of development: environmental science, technology, and instrumentation, especially coastal applications; biotechnology, emphasizing agricultural and marine applications; information science and technology; and multimedia education and entertainment.
Shakespeare Santa Cruz's 16th season is scheduled to take place on campus from July 17 through August 31. This summer's festival will feature Shakespeare's As You Like It and Richard III. Also scheduled is The Forest, written by Alexander Ostrovsky. Tickets are available through BASS's South Bay Arts Line at (408) 998-8885, or from the UCSC Ticket Office, (408) 459-2159 (v/tdd). For a free festival brochure, call (408) 459-2159.
As one of Europe's most important powers, Germany has the economic, military, and political influence to be a major player on the world scene, yet the country's "burdened history" limits its ability to act. Unification in 1989 removed the physical scars of the Cold War, but the question remains: Can Germany reconcile its past with its future?
Fascinated by Germany's postwar emergence as a powerful nation and the tension generated by collective memory, Andrei S. Markovits and Simon Reich examine the ways in which history's shadow haunts Germany's future, in their new book The German Predicament: Memory and Power in the New Europe.
The authors consider the dilemma facing Germany and weigh contrasting views of its fate: that Germany has been tamed by the Holocaust and has no drive to expand; or that Germans have suppressed rather than obliterated their predatory ways and that its democracy, which was imposed by the Allies, is fragile.
"Both views are real, and that's where the tension lies," Markovits, a UCSC politics professor, said. "For the Germans, they're damned if they do and damned if they don't. If they're going to live up to their role as a major power, they will be called on to act, but then they are subjected to greater scrutiny than any other nation because of their history. And if they do nothing, they'll be accused of not pulling their weight as the wealthiest, most powerful nation in Europe."
By a two-to-one margin, members of UCSC's Academic Senate have approved a committee proposal that will permit new students-- beginning this coming fall--to request letter grades for all classes and accumulate a grade-point average.
Continuing students will be eligible to request letter grades for all classes beginning this fall, but will not be eligible to acquire a GPA, says registrar Cecilia Rodriguez.
Paleobiologist Richard Norris, who earned his B.S. with honors from UCSC's Earth Sciences Department in 1982, made a big splash in the news in February by leading a team that investigated the biggest splash of all: the purported impact of a large meteorite in the Caribbean 65 million years ago.
Norris, now an associate scientist at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, was co-chief scientist of an Ocean Drilling Program expedition that probed into the seafloor off the South Carolina coast. The team found bands of sediment that, in Norris's words, provide "proof positive of the impact." The layers included what appear to be vaporized remains of the meteorite itself, in addition to evidence that most life in the ocean was wiped out.
Kenneth V. Thimann, whose career as one of the world's leading botanists spanned more than 50 years at Harvard University and UCSC, where he served as founding provost of Crown College, died in January at the age of 92. Thimann died peacefully at his home at The Quadrangle, Haverford, PA.
A pioneering researcher in the field of plant physiology, Thimann was best known for describing the functions of hormones in the control and development of plants. He also was highly regarded for his research on the biosynthesis of pigments responsible for the colors of flowers and fruits and the action of various zones of the light spectrum on photosynthesis.
Thimann received the prestigious Balzan Prize in 1982, and his honors included membership in the National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the American Philosophical Society.
Thimann joined the faculty of Harvard University in 1935. In 1965 he came to UCSC at the urging of founding chancellor Dean McHenry to become professor of biology and the first provost of Crown.
Among Thimann's most noteworthy contributions to the campus was his nurturing of the UCSC Arboretum into a world-class collection of plants.
John L. Halverson, a founding faculty member of Stevenson College and a professor of literature, died in Santa Cruz in March after several months of illness. He was 69.
Halverson taught at Princeton University and was twice a Fulbright lecturer in Sri Lanka. He came to UCSC in 1966 and remained until his retirement in 1993.
Halverson was a principal architect of Stevenson's core course. His academic interests were wide-ranging and covered such areas as the literature of ancient Greek, medieval, and modern English eras; Buddhism; Christianity; linguistics; psychology; and Paleolithic art.
Siegfried B. Puknat, professor emeritus of German and comparative literature, died in March in San Francisco at age 83.
Puknat came to UCSC in 1964 as the first full-time faculty member hired--and only the third academic employee after Dean McHenry and Page Smith. He helped shape the campus in its formative years as author of the original preliminary bylaws for the Santa Cruz Division of the Academic Senate, founding chair of the Literature Department, an early provost of Cowell College, and chair of the building committee for College 4 (Merrill College).