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Past Events
Monday, 7 Nov 2016
A Conversation on Safety, Justice and Students of Color
7:00 PM – Sun Room, Memorial Union - Join us for a proactive discussion designed to raise awareness and understanding about the issues people of color face, especially in their interactions with law enforcement. Students and others on campus are invited to share personal experiences, including how national events and media coverage have had an impact on their lives and community. Panelists include Department of Public Safety Interim Police Chief Aaron Delashmutt, Ames Police Commander Jason Tuttle, Vice President for Diversity and Inclusion Reginald Stewart, and Student Counseling Services psychologist Raghav Suri. Monic Behnken, assistant professor of sociology, will moderate.
Tuesday, 1 Nov 2016
Which Future? Fiction and the Everything Change - Margaret Atwood
8:00 PM – Great Hall, Memorial Union - "I think calling it climate change is rather limiting. I would rather call it the everything change." - Margaret Atwood
Margaret Atwood is an author, poet and environmental activist whose work is widely known for its commentary on the human condition and female experience. Her more than forty books include The Handmaid’s Tale, The Blind Assassin, and The Heart Goes Last. Her MaddAddam trilogy, which began with the Oryx and Crake, is currently being adapted into an HBO series. Her forthcoming book, Hag-Seed, is a modern retelling of Shakespeare’s The Tempest. Atwood's many international literary awards include the prestigious Booker Prize for contemporary fiction, Arthur C. Clarke Award in science fiction and the Governor General's Award for fiction in her native Canada. Atwood's critical acclaim is equally matched by her popularity among readers and following on Twitter.
Thursday, 27 Oct 2016
The Age of Trolls - Joel Stein
8:00 PM – Great Hall, Memorial Union - Joel Stein, author of the recent TIME magazine cover story "Why We're Losing the Internet to a Culture of Hate," will discuss how trolling on the Internet is infecting our real-life interactions, including politics. In addition to sharing the horrific messages he's received personally on Twitter and email, Stein, a longtime journalist, will share his perspective on how we can reverse the trend of a cyberculture that is growing meaner and more threatening. Joel Stein has written a weekly humor column for TIME since 1998, as well as fourteen other cover stories. He contributes frequently to national television and print media, including such publications as The New Yorker, GQ, Businessweek, Wired and the opinion section of the Los Angeles Times. National Affairs Series: When American Values Are in Conflict
Wednesday, 26 Oct 2016
Free Trade and Business at the Border - Tom Fullerton & Alberto Davila
7:00 PM – Richard and Joan Stark Lecture Hall, 1148 Gerdin Business Building - Tom Fullerton and Alberto Davila will discuss the North American Free Trade Agreement-NAFTA, including cross-border trade, the border economy, and its impact on labor markets and business. Both are graduates of the Iowa State Department of Economics. Tom Fullerton is a professor at the University of Texas at El Paso and holds the Endowed Trade in the Americas Chair in the UTEP College of Business Administration. His work focuses on border economics, econometrics and regional forecasting. Alberto Davila is Associate Dean and V.F. "Doc" and Gertrude Neuhaus Chair for Entrepreneurship in the Robert C. Vackar College of Business & Entrepreneurship at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley. He is a labor economist with a focus on the U.S.-Mexico border. Part of the Economics Forum and World Affairs Series
The Grandmother Hypothesis and Human Evolution - Kristen Hawkes
6:00 PM – Dolezal Auditorium, 127 Curtiss Hall - Kristen Hawkes is Distinguished Professor of Anthropology at the University of Utah, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, and a graduate of Iowa State. She will discuss her research on the Grandmother Hypothesis, the theory that the trait for human females having long post-menopausal lives has been selected because it allows grandmothers to help their offspring survive and assist in raising their grandchildren. The theory focuses on key differences in life history between humans and our closest living relatives, the great apes. Hawkes's research also focuses on the evolutionary advantages and consequences of grandmothering, which include more than just longevity.
Tuesday, 25 Oct 2016
Legislative Candidate Forum - Iowa House of Representatives District 45
6:00 PM – Sun Room, Memorial Union - Incumbent state representative Beth Wessel-Kroeschell, Republican candidate Sondra Childs-Smith and Libertarian candidate Eric Cooper are running in the Iowa House of Representatives District 45, an area that includes many Iowa State students. Benjamin Dirks, Student Government Senior Director of Government Affairs, will moderate.
Part of the Campaign 2016 Series, providing the university and community with opportunities to question candidates before the November election.
Monday, 24 Oct 2016
The Geology and Geography of Floods - Jim O'Connor
8:00 PM – Sun Room, Memorial Union - Jim O’Connor is a research geologist at the U.S. Geological Survey in Portland, Oregon, who studies landscape evolution related to rivers and floods. He is particularly interested in the the role of floods in shaping our historic and present-day physical and cultural landscapes. A fellow of the Geological Society of America, O'Connor has done extensive work on Ice Age floods that transformed the Pacific Northwest. O'Connor completed his undergraduate work in geological science at University of Washington and earned MS and PhD degrees at the University of Arizona. He has worked at the U.S. Geological Survey since 1991. Sigma Xi Lecture Series
Global Health and Sustainable Development - Ambassador John Lange
3:00 PM – Cardinal Room, Memorial Union - Ambassador John E. Lange (Ret.) is Senior Fellow for Global Health Diplomacy for the United Nations Foundation. Prior to joining the Foundation in 2013, Lange spent four years at the Gates Foundation working with African governments to improve public health. He has served as co-chair of the Global Polio Eradication Initiative’s Polio Partners Group as well as Deputy U.S. Global AIDS Coordinator at the inception of the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief. Ambassador Lange had a 28-year career in the Foreign Service at the U.S. Department of State, including service as Special Representative on Avian and Pandemic Influenza. He was Ambassador to Botswana from 1999 to 2002, where HIV/AID was his signature issue. Ambassador Lange co-chaired the U.S. Institute of Medicine committee that produced the 2014 report Investing in Global Health Systems: Sustaining Gains, Transforming Lives. World Affairs Series
Saturday, 22 Oct 2016
Planning for Success - Aurelio Curbelo
6:00 PM – Great Hall, Memorial Union - Aurelio Curbelo, born and raised in Puerto Rico, is the director of the Multicultural Center for Academic Excellence at the University of Minnesota. Previously, he worked as the multicultural liaison officer and administrator of the George Washington Carver summer research program for the College of Agriculture & Life Sciences at Iowa State. Curbelo earned an associate's degree in tropical crop production from the University of Puerto Rico and went on to complete undergraduate and graduate degrees at Iowa State, including a master's in agricultural education and PhD in Higher Education Administration.
This presentation is part of the Puerto Rican Student Association's Cultural Night, which runs 6-10pm and includes traditional food and dancing.
Thursday, 20 Oct 2016
Beyond Science Fiction: The Physics of Invisibility - Sir John Pendry
8:00 PM – Benton Auditorium, Scheman Building, Iowa State Center - Sir John Pendry, the physicist who proposed the idea of an "invisibility cloak," is a professor of theoretical solid state physics at Imperial College London. Pendry has made seminal contributions to surface science, disordered systems and photonics, but his work on cloaking and metamaterials is arguably his most famous and potentially transformative. His concept for an "invisibility cloak" uses metamaterials - whose properties are not defined by their chemical makeup but rather by their structure on the tiniest scales - to bend light in such a way that it can form a container around an object and effectively make it invisible. Pendry is a recipient of such distinguished awards as the Newton Medal, Descartes Prize, and the Kavli Prize in Nanoscience. The 2016 Zaffarano Lecture in Physics