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Transforming Africa: Navigating the AI Revolution in the African Landscape
7:30 PM – Lee Liu Auditorium, Howe Hall - Anicia Peters is the CEO of the National Commission of Research, Science and Technology (NCRST), an adjunct Research Professor at the University of Namibia, and the Presidential Task Force Chairperson on 4IR (2021-2022). She founded the Africa Human Computer Interaction Conference (AfriCHI), serves on the Steering Committee of ACM CHI, and was the Technical Programme Co-Chair for the ACM CHI2023 conference.From 2019 to 2023, she also served as an Editor for the African Scientific Journal in collaboration with Elsevier and the Next Einstein Forum. Anicia received the prestigious 2020 Google Inclusion Award and a research grant from Google AI in 2021. She was a Google scholar in 2012 while at Iowa State University.Anicia completed her PhD in Human Computer Interaction from Iowa State University in 2014 and a MSc degree in 2011, under a Fulbright International Science and Technology PhD Award, a Schlumberger Faculty for the Future Award, and a Google Scholar award. Furthermore, she holds a National Diploma and a B.Tech degree in Information Technology (Bus. Comp.), both with honors (cum laude), from the Namibia University of Science and Technology. She completed a Post-Doc at Oregon State University and worked in Silicon Valley complementing her industry experience in Namibia. With over 30 years of academic, industry, and managerial experience both in Namibia and internationally, she has developed a diverse range of expertise.This lecture is available to view on the Available Recordings page.

The Musical Legacies of Phenomenal Women of Color
7:00 PM – Martha-Ellen Tye Recital Hall - Enjoy works by phenomenal women of color such as Florence Price, Margaret Bonds, and many more; learn about their journeys and the legacies they left behind. About the artist: "A compelling, sparkling virtuoso" (Boston Music Intelligencer), Michelle Cann is in great demand as soloist, chamber musician, pedagogue, and scholar. Last season included concerto performances with the Los Angeles Philharmonic among other major symphony orchestras, and this year brings her to the Des Moines Symphony in March. Ms. Cann is Chair of Piano Studies at the Curtis Institute and winner of the 2022 Sphinx Medal of Excellence.Pianist Michelle Cann will also be giving a solo Town & Gown recital on Friday, April 12 at 7:30pm. Tickets and program information for this solo recital are available at www.amestownandgown.org Please note: This event will not be recorded.

An Evening with Hertz Farm Management- Emerging Issues in Agriculture
7:00 PM – 127 Curtiss - The Carl and Marjory Hertz Lecture on Emerging Issues in Agriculture was created in memory of the founders of Hertz Farm Management Inc. to inspire generations of industry leaders, research scientists, and young professionals to reach their full potential. Join a panel of Hertz Farm Management leadership for a Q&A style discussion about emerging issues in agriculture, preserving agricultural legacies, developments in agriculture, and questions from you! The panel will include:Chad Hertz, COO Hertz Farm ManagementRandy Hertz, CEO Hertz Farm ManagementJeff Troendle, President Hertz Farm ManagementDoug Hensley, President Hertz Real Estate ServicesThis lecture was recorded and can be viewed on the Available Recordings page.

Optimism Matters
6:00 PM – South Ballroom, Memorial Union - Barbara Hansen Lecture in Early Childhood DevelopmentSteve Gross, MSW, is a clinical social worker and pioneer in the field of using playful engagement and relationships to overcome the devastating impacts of early childhood trauma. Steve founded Project Joy, a nonprofit organization that used the power of joyful play to heal and strengthen homeless and impoverished children throughout Greater Boston, in 1989. In 2011, Life is Good invited Project Joy, now The Playmaker Project, to be the sole social mission of the brand.Through an outpouring of love, optimism, experience, and expertise, Steve and a trusted team of researchers and colleagues, have spent 30+ years developing the Life is Good Playmaker Project program.Please note: this will be a 60-minute lecture followed by audience Q&A.This lecture is available to watch on the Available Recordings page.

Lifting for the Health of It: Beyond Chalk Dust and Weight Belts
7:00 PM – Gerdin 1148 - Pease Family Scholar in KinesiologyDr. Stuart Phillips is a Distinguished University Professor in the Department of Kinesiology and a member of the School of Medicine at McMaster University in Canada. He is a Tier 1 Canada Research Chair in Skeletal Muscle Health. Dr. Phillips' work centers on the interaction of exercise/physical activity, aging, and nutrition in skeletal muscle and body composition. Dr. Phillips is a fellow of the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) and the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences (CAHS). He has 488 research publications, and his Web of Science h-index is 96 (Google Scholar h-index 136). He has been in the top 1% of cross-field (nutrition and physiology) highly-cited scholars globally for six straight years 2018-2023.This lecture was recorded and is available to view on the Available Recordings page. 

Beyond Ecocriticism: Environmental Humanities in the Age of Climate Crisis
6:00 PM – Curtiss Hall, Room 0127 - The 2024 Donald R. Benson Memorial Lecture, “Beyond Ecocriticism: Environmental Humanities in the Age of Climate Crisis,” will be delivered by Hunter Vaughan, senior research associate and associate professor, from 6–7:30 p.m. Thursday, April, 4, in Curtiss Hall. Light refreshments will be served.Vaughan is an environmental media scholar and a cultural historian at the University of Cambridge. He has done innovative work on the environmental impacts of film production and is the author of Hollywood’s Dirtiest Secret: The Hidden Environmental Costs of the Movies (Columbia University Press, 2019) and the co-editor of Film and Television Production in the Age of Climate Crisis (Palgrave, 2022). He was a 2017 Rachel Carson Center Fellow and is a co-founding editor (with Meryl Shriver-Rice) of the Journal of Environmental Media ​(Intellect Press). He is the co-director of the AHRC-funded Global Green Media Network, co-principal investigator on the Sustainable Subsea Networks project funded by the Internet Society Foundation, and a member of the Convening Team for the UNFCCC’s Entertainment and Culture for Climate Action initiative.This lecture was recorded and is available to view on the Available Recordings page. 

Flipping the Table on Christian Nationalism
6:00 PM – Sun Room, Memorial Union - John Pavlovitz is a writer, pastor, activist, and storyteller from Wake Forest, North Carolina. Over the past decade, his thought-provoking blog, Stuff That Needs to Be Said, has reached a diverse worldwide audience with over one hundred million views. A twenty-five-year veteran in the trenches of local church ministry, Pavlovitz is committed to equality, diversity, and justice—both inside and outside faith communities.John's books include A Bigger Table, and If God Is Love, Don't Be a Jerk.  His new book Worth Fighting For, arrived on April 2nd. He currently directs Empathetic People Network, a vibrant online community that connects people from all over the world who want to create a more compassionate planet.The ISU Book Store will be at the event selling copies of the speaker's book.This lecture available to view on the Available Recordings page for two weeks following the date of the lecture.

Socially Responsible Innovation
7:00 PM – Great Hall, Memorial Union - 2023-2024 Manatt-Phelps Lecture in Political Science Two-term former Ohio Governor John Kasich is a politician, a New York Times best-selling author, and a contributor for MSNBC and NBC News who believes that unity is the answer to our most common problems. He is known as a leading voice in promoting bipartisan solutions to health care reform, immigration and international trade, and has been one of the few Republicans to advocate for Medicaid’s expansion.Kasich served as a member of Congress from central Ohio for 18 years. He was elected to the U.S. House at just 30 years old, after having become the youngest state senator in Ohio history. He went on to become the chairman of the House Budget Committee and balanced the Federal Budget four times — a feat not accomplished since. After leaving Congress in 2000, Kasich worked as a managing director in the Investment Banking Division of Lehman Brothers, where he helped companies secure the resources they needed to succeed and create jobs. He undertook a high-profile run for President in 2016, ultimately earning 154 delegates and shifting the tenor of debate from negative personal attacks to one of "light and hope." He was the final major challenger to Donald Trump for the Republican nomination. Drawing on his decades of experience in the Statehouse and the halls of Congress, Governor Kasich examines the key issues that will define the next decade of American public policy. From fiscal policy and healthcare to foreign affairs, Gov. Kasich explains how the inability of America’s leaders to confront these mounting problems with legitimate solutions has disillusioned voters who see no progress from either party. Through it all, Governor Kasich reminds  audiences that, at the end of the day, change comes from the bottom up.Arrangements for the appearance of John Kasich made through UTA Speakers, New York, New York.This lecture will be delivered as a fireside chat format with Dr. Karen Kedrowski. Dr. Karen M. Kedrowski is Director of the Carrie Chapman Catt Center for Women and Politics and Professor of Political Science at Iowa State University. The Catt Center conducts research on women and politics, with a focus on Iowa; and promotes civic engagement. In addition to her duties at the Catt Center, Dr. Kedrowski teaches courses in American Politics and conducts research on women in American politics and civic engagement. She joined the Iowa State faculty in January 2019.Dr. Kedrowski is a graduate of the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities and the University of Oklahoma, Norman. Prior to coming to Iowa State, she spent 24 years at Winthrop University in Rock Hill, South Carolina, where she served in many roles, including Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences. She also received Winthrop’s highest faculty honor, Distinguished Professor, in 2011.This lecture was recorded and is available to view on the Available Recordings page. 

Protecting Plant Surfaces in a Changing Climate: Understanding Synthesis, Form and Function of the Plant Cuticle Using Corn Silks as a Model System
11:00 AM – 2630 Memorial Union - The Rossmann-Manatt Faculty SeminarTo develop solutions for the agricultural sector to maintain or increase crop yields amidst extreme weather conditions often seen with climate change, it is important to understand mechanisms by which plants combat stresses in the environment. One such mechanism is the plant cuticle, which is a hydrophobic barrier that provides a first line of defense by which plants protect themselves from stresses, including extremes of temperature, drought, frost, and solar irradiation.  Our team takes systems’ biology, classical and quantitative genetic, synthetic biology, and biochemistry approaches to decipher the genetic networks that underlie the deposition of the protective cuticle on the aerial surfaces of plants. We focus our work on the silks of corn, which serve as conduits for pollination and subsequent fertilization of the ovule for kernel production, thereby being critical for crop yield. In fact, we estimate that silks annually facilitate 7 quadrillion successful fertilization events as part of global corn grain production! By understanding the genetic networks responsible for cuticle synthesis and the protective qualities of the cuticle, we lay an important foundation for efforts to develop plants with “designer” cuticles that can protect silks and other plant organs from environmental stress and enable sustained or enhanced production under extreme environmental pressures. This seminar will provide an overview of our efforts to dissect the genetic networks associated with cuticle synthesis using diverse approaches, including 1) systems’ biology strategies, 2) building these pathways from scratch in tissues or organisms that do not naturally make a cuticle,  and 3) as facilitated by the Rossman-Mannatt award, exploring the role of “orphan” genes, which are only present in the genome of a single species, on cuticle biosynthesis and deposition.Dr. Yandeau-Nelson received a PhD in Genetics from Iowa State University in 2005, and she studied the genetics of starch biosynthesis in maize as a postdoctoral scholar at Penn State University from 2005-2008. As faculty in the Department of Genetics, Development & Cell Biology at Iowa State University, her work focuses on the biosynthetic and regulatory genetic networks of metabolic traits, to increase both the fundamental knowledge of cellular metabolism and to use that knowledge for downstream practical applications (i.e. plant breeding for resistance to stresses and the development of biorenewable chemicals and fuels).  She recently received the M. Rhoades Early-Career Maize Genetics Award from the Maize Genetics Cooperation.This lecture has been recorded and is available for viewing on the Lectures Available Recordings page.

Despite Advanced Technology, We Are Still Very Disaster-Prone!
9:00 AM – 2055 Hoover Hall - This presentation uses a variety of examples of different types of disasters to point out how vulnerable American society is despite our advances in prediction, warning, and communications technologies. Much of our vulnerability arises from population growth, urban sprawl, urbanization, and expansion into disaster-prone areas. Unfortunately, some lessons that could have been learned from disasters in one part of the country have not been assimilated in all regions.Dr. Greg Forbes received his B.S. from The Pennsylvania State University and his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago. He is presently retired, but worked as an Associate Professor at The Pennsylvania State University and later served as the Severe Weather Expert at The Weather Channel.This lecture has been recorded and is available for viewing on the Lectures Available Recordings page.