Wildflower Book Reprinted
A reprint of the distinguished late botanist Earl L. Core’s Spring Wildflowers of West Virginia is now available from the WVU Press.
This third edition references nearly 250 species of West Virginia native wild flowers and includes detailed line drawings by William A. Lunk.
Initially published over 50 years ago, this comprehensive text includes both scientific and common names of a species, descriptions, uses, and habitats throughout West Virginia. In addition, there is an index suitable for rapid classification of a species.
The information presented in the book is not exclusively for the scientifically minded. The text is user-friendly and can be utilized by any reader as a quick reference during nature walks or various other wildflower identification endeavors.
Earl L. Core received both his bachelor’s and master’s degrees from WVU before earning his doctorate from Columbia. A distinguished botanist and WVU professor, WVU’s Core Arboretum bears his name.
WVU Unveils Forensic Garage
America is a society that moves on four wheels, and that includes people who travel outside of the law.
From Bonnie and Clyde to drug dealers in tricked-out dream machines, the car has opened up a whole new lane of investigation for authorities gearing up to bring criminals to justice.
That lane has routed itself to WVU, where a new forensic garage has been added so students enrolled in forensic science courses can learn the intricacies of lifting evidence from cars involved in everything from kidnapping to DUI cases.
“Cars are involved in a whole host of cases,” said Dr. Clifton Bishop, director of WVU’s Forensic and Investigative Sciences Program. “We’re talking about hit-and-run fatalities, bank robberies, abductions . . . there are a lot of clues to be found on four wheels.”
The garage is located next to the program’s two crime scene houses on WVU’s Evansdale campus, where the 400 students enrolled in forensic classes study the aftermath of violent acts.
Alumnus Charles Bayless Returns to Lead Alma Mater
Charles E. Bayless, a native West Virginian and business executive long recognized as one of the most respected leaders in the nation’s utility industry, is the ninth president of the WVU Institute of Technology.
A 1968 Tech graduate who has headed major utilities from New Hampshire to Arizona, Bayless replaces Dr. Galan “Lanny” Janeksela, who had served as interim president since the retirement of Dr. Karen LaRoe last year.
Bayless, 62, is a Kanawha County native who also earned a master’s degree in electrical engineering and a law degree—both from WVU—and an MBA in finance from the University of Michigan.
New Student Body President, Vice President Elected
D.J. Casto and Shannon Logan are WVU’s new Student Government Association president and vice president, respectively. More than 6,000 students cast their vote online during February elections.
Casto, a senior accounting major from Clarksburg, was the 2004–05 SGA vice president and is a former SGA Board of Governors member.
Logan, a first-year graduate student in journalism from Baden, Pennsylvania, has two years of BOG experience.
Fincham Is Mountaineer Mascot Again
Petersburg native Derek Fincham will don his coonskin cap for another year as the Mountaineer mascot. The selection committee made the announcement before a crowded Coliseum during Mountaineer Parents Club Winter Weekend.
“I have lived my whole life in this great state, and I have always been proud to be a Mountaineer,” Fincham wrote in his application. “I come from a family that has deep roots and love for this state, and this love runs as deep as the dark coal that has made West Virginia famous.”
The senior religious studies major made more than 150 appearances as the 2004–05 mascot.
Libraries Answering Online Inquiries
WVU Libraries are among 31 institutions across the nation participating in a pilot program to provide virtual reference services to people seeking government information.
The Government Information Online service allows researchers to go online and ask questions or seek information about state and federal government. Patrons access the service through a link on the WVU Libraries Web page (www.libraries.wvu.edu) or directly at http://govtinfo.org. From this site users can e-mail a question or engage in a real-time chat session with a librarian.
“More and more citizens are seeking information about government programs, services, and policies, and this virtual reference service makes it easy for Internet users to get that information quickly from qualified reference specialists all over America,” said Penny Pugh, head reference librarian at the Downtown Campus Library.
If the pilot program is successful, Pugh said the library will consider becoming part of a permanent virtual government information reference service.
New Honors Experience
High-achieving freshmen have swelled the roster of the WVU Honors Program. During fall 2004, a total of 354 entering first-year students were admitted, bringing the total number of Honors students to 1,162, up from 918 last year.
In response to the growing enrollment, the Honors Program has developed innovative, increasingly challenging curriculum tracks. Under the new guidelines, students may choose from one of two paths: the Professional Scholar track provides an enhanced experience in a professional curriculum while the 21st Century Scholar track offers integrated studies courses and a third-year research methods class.
“The goal is to go beyond the experience in the major,” Director and Eberly Family Professor Keith Garbutt said. “We are developing new, integrated courses of study that examine a whole range of a topic. Students would work primarily on a problem-based learning approach, taking a real-life problem and analyzing approaches to this issue.”
Honors students will also be required to complete a final-year thesis, similar to a graduate thesis, as part of the capstone experience.
Ag Sciences Expansion Under Way
A new two-story, 37,500-square-foot building will house the plant pathology and environmental microbiology programs in the Davis College of Agriculture, Forestry, and Consumer Sciences. The $9.5 million facility will contain research and teaching laboratories, a small greenhouse, a lecture hall, offices, and unfinished shell space for future expansion. It will be built on the south side of the Agricultural Sciences Building on the Evansdale campus.
“The purpose of this project is to relocate faculty and staff in our plant pathology and environmental microbiology program from Brooks Hall on the downtown campus to the Evansdale campus,” said Cameron Hackney, dean of the WVU Davis College.
Over 1,600 Attend Mountaineer Parents Club Winter Weekend
From exercising at the Student Recreation Center to sampling WVUp All Night activities in the Mountainlair, family members learned about the activities available on a typical weekend at WVU during the Mountaineer Parents Club Winter Weekend. More than 1,600—the most ever—participated in the annual event designed to encourage parents’ participation in WVU intellectual and extracurricular life.
Parents Club member Cheryl Costello of Weirton said the organization has allowed her to stay involved in her daughter’s education and interact with other parents sharing the same experience.
“I am thankful that the Parents Club provides us with information that allows me to stay involved with my child’s education, while not having to impose upon her,” Costello said.
The Mountaineer Parents Club is now in its tenth year. Since President David C. Hardesty Jr. and his wife, Susan, created the organization in July 1995, the club has grown to 13,000 members, with 62 local clubs and 18 state chairs coast-to-coast.
Continuing Ed Courses Are Now Online
Aiming to hit the right note with tech-savvy adults, WVU Extended Learning has added new online continuing education courses and makes enrollment in them as easy as the click of a mouse.
“Continuing and professional education is a relatively new component of Extended Learning,” said Sherry Kuehn, coordinator of the service. “These are noncredit courses that allow individuals to renew certification, prepare for exams, continue professional development, or pursue personal interests.”
The 12 online continuing and professional education courses include substitute teacher permit renewal training, basic engineering economics, community health education specialist review, paralegal certificate and certified legal assistant preparation, beginning and intermediate West Virginia genealogy, and Webmaster certificate.
Besides rock and blues guitar, other new offerings are personal finance management and original substitute teacher certification.
Courses are designed to be individually self-paced so individuals can register anytime.
Visit www.elearn.wvu.edu/contining to learn more about the courses or to register.
New Africana Studies Minor Bridges WVU, the World
From music to agriculture, history, and medicine, WVU’s new Africana Studies minor is bridging a campus—to bring understanding of people of African descent across the world.
History faculty will help teach the 15-credit course offerings, along with their Eberly College colleagues from geography, foreign languages, and English. Professors from the schools of medicine and law, the colleges of Creative Arts and Human Resources and Education, and the Davis College of Agriculture, Forestry, and Consumer Sciences will also be teaching required courses.
The broad offering of courses befit the mission of the minor, which is to engender an intellectual appreciation and understanding of Africana people and culture across the globe.
Executive MBA—WVU Comes to You!
Thanks to WVU’s Executive MBA Program, working professionals throughout West Virginia can pursue an MBA degree in their hometown while maintaining momentum in their careers.
The Executive MBA, or EMBA, reaches out to 11 cities in West Virginia. State-of-the-art technology delivers the program to Beckley, Bluefield, Charleston, Elkins, Lewisburg, Martinsburg, Moorefield, Morgantown, New Martinsville, and Wheeling.
Designed to meet the needs of working professionals, the 30-month, part-time program operates on a cohort system, with EMBA students beginning their program together as a group to maximize teamwork and collaboration. New cohorts begin every six months; the next cohort, starting in August, will serve Charleston, Morgantown, and Parkersburg.
New Management Information Systems Degree
Students at WVU have a new major to consider: management information systems, or MIS.
Students in the College of Business and Economics program gain skills to be managers and leaders who can build a corporate database, oversee installation of a new computer system, or design an interactive Web site.
Career opportunities for MIS graduates include systems analysis and design, database management, networking and telecommunications, Web page development, network security, programming, and technology management.
KUDOS
Alumnus Honored by Eberly College
Alvin L. “A.L.” Emch, a law executive who helped draft the nation’s first mediation program for the U.S. District Court, received the Eberly College of Arts and Sciences’ annual Certificate of Achievement.
In 1987, Emch, along with then-Chief U.S. District Court Judge Robert Maxwell, planned, organized, and implemented the first district-wide mediation program in a U.S. District Court—a program that continues to operate.
Emch, a 1969 WVU Eberly College graduate with degrees in English and history, is CEO of the West Virginia law firm Jackson Kelly, PLLC.
Creative Writing Professor Wins Honor
An award-winning author has won one of WVU’s premier teaching honors for nurturing the next generation of creative writers.
Gail Galloway Adams, an associate professor of English, is the recipient of the 2005 Harless Award for Exceptional Teaching.
She is the author of The Purchase of Order, a collection of short stories that won the Flannery O’Connor Award for Short Fiction in 1985. The title story was selected for the Prentice Hall Anthology of Women’s Literature.
Animal Scientist, Space Physicist Claim Research Honors
Robert Dailey, BS ’67, has spent almost 30 years on WVU’s farms studying how to produce hardier farm animals so more Americans can enjoy a fine steak or ham dinner.
Earl Scime creates and examines scorching gases in his Hodges Hall laboratories with the hope of making a better rocket engine.
For their efforts, the two WVU scientists have been awarded this year’s Benedum Distinguished Scholar awards, the University’s premier research honor.
Dailey has explored various methods for improving the reproductive efficiency of farm animals that reach the butcher’s shop and eventually the dinner table.
Scime is chair of the Department of Physics. His latest research involves a laser-based device he has developed to measure the flow of ions in a specific plasma source capable of spontaneously generating a strong electric field that accelerates the positively charged ions out of the source.
Marketing Professor Named to Endowed Professorship
A WVU marketing professor who has studied consumers’ understanding of dietary supplement claims has been named to an endowed research position in the College of Business and Economics.
Paula Fitzgerald Bone is the first Nathan Haddad Professor in Business Administration.
Dr. Bone specializes in consumer behavior, public policy, and marketing ethics. Her current work focuses on consumers’ use of dietary supplements and their interpretation of claims made on supplement labels. She and coauthor Karen Russo France presented their findings to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration last September.
Commencement
WVU celebrated its 138th commencement and graduated nearly 4,000 students on May 15. Governor Joe Manchin delivered this year’s commencement address. Manchin, who earned a bachelor’s degree in business administration from WVU in 1970, received an honorary doctor of law degree during the ceremony.
Gene A. Budig and Michele Vigneault McNeill also received honorary degrees. Budig, WVU president from 1977 until 1981, received a doctor of law. McNeill, a WVU alumna who funded Kern McNeill International and is known for her work on AIDS research, received a doctor of science.
David L. Dickirson and William R. Haden received the President’s Distinguished Service Awards, given for exceptional leadership in the state and nation.
