A Sampling of Clips for September 8^th, 2009

* UCSD faculty and staff may obtain a copy of an article by e-mailing the University Communications Office

CA Family Mourns Pole Vaulter Who Died at Practice
Associated Press, Sept. 7 – The UCSD pole vaulter who died after hitting his head during practice followed family tradition by becoming a pole vaulter and died doing what he loved, his sister said Monday. Leon Roach, 19, fell and hit his head on a cement floor Thursday during a practice drill on a rope swing at the La Jolla campus. He died at a hospital Saturday afternoon. More

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Students Outsourcing Homework
CNN, Sept. 4 -- Cheating on homework is becoming a web business. Look at the word, "cheater." It's awful, but educators say many students would rather cheat than fail. (Video clip features interview with Tricia Bertram Gallant of the Academic Integrity Office at UCSD) More

UCSD Ranked High for Adding to Public Good
San Diego Union-Tribune, Sept. 7 -- UCSD has placed second among national universities in a ranking compiled by Washington Monthly magazine that attempts to rate schools based on their contributions to the public good.
The ranking considers criteria including the number of alumni serving in the Peace Corps, the number of science and engineering doctorates awarded, and percentage of students who are low-income and receive federal grants. More

No Smiley Faces in Term Papers, Please
San Diego Union-Tribune, Sept. 7 -- UCSD Provost Don Wayne was reading a student essay recently when he stumbled over the expression LOL.  “I can never remember what it stands for,” said Wayne, who began teaching composition to college students in 1969. He jotted a note in the margin about the inappropriateness of colloquialisms and abbreviations in academic prose and added it to his growing list of frustrations about student composition. (Also quotes Matthew Herbst, history professor at UCSD) More

UCSD Hospitals Make Cuts without Furloughs
KPBS, Sept. 7 -- The UCSD Medical Center has cut $24 million from its budget without resorting to furloughs.
State budget cuts created a deficit of more than $800 million at the University of California. Many of the cuts have come in the form of employee furloughs. But UC hospitals were given the option of not using furloughs, in order to ensure patient safety. DeAnn Marshall, with the UCSD Medical Center, said San Diego hospitals have found alternatives. More

George S. Murphy Jr.; former UCSD
Administrator, Health Care Innovator; 74
San Diego Union-Tribune, Sept. 5 — George S. Murphy Jr., the top administrator of student affairs at UCSD during its most tumultuous era and a founding member of an alliance that sought to expand health care to underserved populations, has died. He was 74. Also a former executive at Cubic Corp., Mr. Murphy died of colon cancer Aug. 29 at home in Prescott, Ariz., where he and his wife Beverly had been living since 2004. More

Scholarly Moves
San Diego Union-Tribune, Sept. 6 -- It’s like watching a sparkling river. Two dozen dancers flow into duets, trios — tribes. Responding to live violin music (jazzed up electronically), they tumble over each other like roly-poly bugs or connect with sudden urgency. The mood is playful; yet at times, magically, there’s a moment of hushed grace that takes your breath away. (Mentions UCSD) More

You Might Want to Pack a Mask in Your Carry-on
San Diego Union-Tribune, Sept. 5 -- After the usual cattle call of passengers, you start to settle into your airline seat only to find your seatmate coughing, sneezing and spewing huge air pockets of germs. Uh-oh, you've hit turbulence before takeoff. The last thing you want is to be sick with the flu or a cold on your vacation, business trip or anywhere away from home. (Quotes Dr. William Norcross, family physician and clinical professor of family medicine at the UCSD Medical Center) More

Drowning in Sound: Large Ships' Propellers
Creating Underwater Din for Whales, other Marine Animals
Silicon Valley Mercury News, Sept. 6 -- As the 45-foot-white catamaran "Kitty Kat" bobbed in the ocean near the Farallon Islands last month, Jackie Dragon dropped a hydrophone overboard to capture the underwater sounds of an oil tanker gliding by a mile to the south. To those watching it from the catamaran, the 900-foot, black-and-white tanker cruised in majestic silence out to sea through the marine sanctuary, due west of the Golden Gate Bridge. (Mentions Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UCSD) More

Twitter Policies Come to Workplace
San Diego Union-Tribune, Sept. 8 -- Twitter revolutionized small talk. Now it's rankling bigwigs. Although the popular social networking site limits each post to 140 characters, there appears to be no limit to the anxiety it's causing major players in sports, media, business, the courts, the military and other fields. (Quotes Becky Carroll, who teaches a new-media marketing class at UCSD) More

Way to Go, Human Race
Voice of San Diego, Sept. 8 -- If you've been following our coverage of the voyage by Scripps Institution of Oceanography researchers out to the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, you might (like me) have had a hard time contemplating how wasteful the human race must be on a daily basis to create such a thing. This artful presentation on The New York Times website gives you a sense. It depicts 2.4 million pieces of plastic, which is the estimated number of pounds of plastic that enter the world's oceans every hour. More

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