![[Currents header graphic]](/homeart/currents_header.gif)
October 13, 1997
Thirtieth birthdays are always a big deal, and the media coverage of the 30th anniversary of the UCSC Farm & Garden was no exception. The San Francisco Chronicle featured the accomplishments of the Farm & Garden on the front of its Bay Area section, and the San Jose Mercury News also gave the event prime space on the cover of its Garden section. Santa Cruz Metro pulled out all the stops and splashed the story on its cover. KION-TV and KSBW-TV sent crews to campus, and the Associated Press, Santa Cruz County Sentinel, and Good Times weighed in, too.
A team of researchers at Long Marine Lab led by psychobiologist Ron Schusterman is having its day in the media spotlight, thanks to innovative studies on the "perceptual worlds" of sea lions and their kin. The research, unique in the world, is shedding light on how pinnipeds see, hear, and think about their environment. USA Today devoted its full-page science section to the work, while United Press International sent out an article on its worldwide wire. The San Diego Union-Tribune also ran a report on page 1.
Social psychologist Anthony Pratkanis appeared on a special edition of Dateline NBC that was devoted to the subject of conformity. Pratkanis, who spent several days with a crew on campus, re-created for the camera a famous 1950 conformity experiment first perfomed by Solomon Ash. Three UCSC students who participated in the study were interviewed about their experiences with peer pressure. . . . Pratkanis also did a recent live, call-in session about the failings of school desegregation efforts in St. Louis for the local CBS Radio affiliate.
Grainger Hunt, Brian Walton, and their colleagues at the Santa Cruz Predatory Bird Research Group are earning attention for successfully tracking the dramatic northward migration of a juvenile bald eagle into Canada. A tiny satellite tag attached to the eagle has revealed that it flew nearly 1,000 miles from its Lake Shasta nest on its first flight away from home. The national Environmental News Network filed a report, as did Reuters News Service and, locally, KSBW-TV.
Freshman tennis player Danny Kim was chosen Athlete of the Week and profiled in the Santa Cruz County Sentinel for winning the singles in the Rolex Intercollegiate Division III Western Regionals in Claremont. Coach Bob Hansen was quoted in the article praising Kim's phenomenal potential.
Dream expert extraordinaire Veronica Tonay, who has just published a new journal and workbook for dreamers, appeared recently on a Portland radio show called Anything Goes.
Manuel Pastor of Latin American and Latino studies continues to get press, most recently in the Los Angeles Times, which quoted him in a story on "welfare commuters"--former welfare recipients who've found jobs but face onerous commutes that could deter them from keeping their jobs.