News Bureau

The U. of I. astronomy department will host its first open house April 23, telling guests to stop by the campus Observatory, 901 S. Mathews Ave., anytime between 1- 5 p.m. and 8-10 p.m.

The Audiology Clinic at Illinois is offering free adult hearing screenings Jan. 23 through April 27. Appointments may be scheduled by calling 217-333-2230. No scheduling is available by email.

The Audiology Clinic at Illinois is offering free adult hearing screenings Jan. 25 through April 22. Screening appointments may be scheduled by calling 217-333-2230. No appointments are accepted via email. 

The Audiology Clinic at the U. of I. is offering free hearing screenings June 1 to July 22. Screenings appointments may be scheduled by calling 217-333-2230. The clinic does not schedule appointments by email.

The Audiology Clinic at Illinois is offering free hearing screenings through Nov. 18. Screenings appointments may be scheduled by calling 217-333-2230. The clinic does not schedule appointments via email.

The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign announced Dean’s List honorees and graduates for the fall semester 2023, and the graduates for August 2023.
 

Nicole Krauss, an award-winning and best-selling author, will talk about her latest novel, “Forest Dark,” and her other works at two campus events April 9.

Tracy Dace, the founder and chief executive officer of the Driven to Reach Excellence and Academic Achievement for Males Opportunity Center; Kevin Tan, a professor of social work; Sara Benson, a professor and copyright librarian at the University Library; and the Cline Center for Advanced Social Research are the recipients of the 2023 Campus Awards for Excellence in Public Engagement.

The recipients of the 2024 Campus Awards for Excellence in Public Engagement include faculty members Sheldon Jacobson and Emily Knox; graduate students Dusty Bacon and Imani Canton; the Champaign-Urbana Community Fab Lab community engagement team; and the University of Illinois Audiology and Speech-Language Pathology Clinic.

Patricia Hruby Powell, an award-winning young-adult author and Illinois alumna, will provide the third reading and discussion for the Illini Union Bookstore reading series marking the University of Illinois’ 150th year.

2017 was the sixth-warmest year on record in Illinois, with a statewide average temperature of 54.3 degrees, or 2 degrees above normal, in spite of the extremely cold ending to December.

Eight of the 12 months in 2017 brought above-normal temperatures, according to Illinois State Climatologist Jim Angel of the Illinois State Water Survey, part of the Prairie Research Institute at Illinois. The state experienced the warmest February on record with a statewide average of 41 degrees, 10.1 degrees above normal.

The Baroque Artists of Champaign-Urbana will offer the holiday music program "A German Baroque Christmas" at 7:30 p.m. Dec. 13 at Holy Cross Catholic Church, 405 W. Clark St., Champaign.

The Baroque Artists of Champaign Urbana will perform a Messiah sing-along at 4 p.m. Nov. 29 at the First Baptist Church at Savoy, 1602 S. Prospect Avenue, Savoy.

Milan Bagchi, the head of the department of molecular and integrative physiology, was named the next director of the School of Molecular and Cellular Biology, part of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at Illinois.

Southern blueswoman Marcia Ball will perform in a free outdoor concert in the University of Illinois Research Park on Friday, July 20 at 7:30 p.m.. The event is part of the Outside at the Research Park series. The opening act is Jive Bag, led by Jonny Beckett, playing New Orleans funk and jazz starting at 6:30 p.m. Ball is known for her keyboard skills that blend “rollicking, two-fisted New Orleans piano, Louisiana swamp rock and smoldering Texas blues,” according to The Boston Globe.

The Baroque Artists of Champaign-Urbana announces its 20th anniversary season. When holding its first concert, the group had no idea it would still be bringing baroque music to central Illinois in 2015.

The Carle Illinois College of Medicine has appointed a permanent executive associate dean: Rashid Bashir, a professor and the department head of bioengineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Zaida “Zan” Luthey-Schulten, a part-time faculty member in the Theoretical and Computational Biophysics Group at the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology, will present “Stochastic Simulations of Cellular Processes: From Single Cells to Colonies.” The lecture will begin at noon Nov. 5 in Room 1005 of the Beckman Institute as part of the Beckman Institute Director’s Seminar. Lunch will be provided.

John Erdman, a professor emeritus of food science and human nutrition and a part-time faculty member in the Bioacoustics Research Laboratory at the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology, will present the next Beckman Institute Director’s Seminar at noon Dec. 3. 

Dr. Richard Isaacson and Max Lugavere will discuss “The Role of Nutrition in the Management of Alzheimer’s Disease” at 6 p.m. Sept. 23 in the auditorium of the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology.

Applications are now being accepted for the 2016 Illinois Governor’s Sustainability Award, the nation’s longest-running state environmental awards program.

The last films have been added and the schedule is out for this year’s Roger Ebert’s Film Festival, coming April 19-23 to downtown Champaign.

University of Illinois entomology professor and department head May Berenbaum, a member of the National Academy of Sciences and longtime editorial contributor to the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and other journals, has been appointed editor-in-chief of PNAS, effective Jan. 1.

Author, educator and entrepreneur Wes Moore will present the One Book One Campus keynote lecture at the Illini Union at 7 p.m. Dec. 8. An informal reception and book signing will immediately follow the presentation.

The Big Ten Academic Alliance recently announced the 2024-25 fellows for its Academic Leadership Program and Department Executive Officers Seminar. Eleven University of Illinois faculty members have been selected to participate.

The Big Ten Academic Alliance recently announced the 2023-24 fellows for its Academic Leadership Program and Department Executive Officers Seminar. Eleven U. of I. faculty members have been selected to participate.

Bring your bike to the 11th annual Light the Night event on Thursday, Sept. 20 and get a free set of front and rear lights. Illinois law requires bicyclists riding at night to use lights.

Bill & Melinda Gates Agricultural Innovations has awarded a grant of $34 million to the Realizing Increased Photosynthetic Efficiency project, an international research effort led by scientists at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. In its 10-year history, RIPE has demonstrated large increases in crop productivity in replicated field trials on the university farm.

The fourth annual MRL Biological Conference will be Nov. 4 and 5 at the Materials Research Laboratory. The laboratory offers an array of characterization tools, which enable a wide range of structural research in biological and advanced materials systems. To further educate current and future facility users in the number of options available to them, this workshop is devoted to biological inquiry and applications.

Despite record cold air temperatures, soil temperatures averaged slightly warmer than normal in Illinois this winter. Consequently, the arctic conditions are expected to have little effect on overwintering field crop insect pest populations.

A wide range of air temperatures occurred in Illinois this winter with periods of warmer temperatures in the 60s and 70s and extreme cold with lows in the -30s. Overall, temperatures averaged 29.9 degrees, 0.8 degrees above normal for the season.

At its November 16 meeting, the University of Illinois Board of Trustees will consider a three-year extension for U. of I. athletics director Josh Whitman through June 30, 2031.

Germán Bollero will be the next dean of the College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, pending approval by the University of Illinois Board of Trustees. Bollero has served as the interim dean of ACES since September 2021.  

Illinois’ weather in October was a mixed bag of conditions with temperatures in the 90s, the first fall frost, the first snow of the season and widespread heavy rains, according to Illinois State Climatologist Jim Angel at the Illinois State Water Survey, part of the Prairie Research Institute at Illinois.

Registration is now open for the 11th annual Boneyard Creek Community Day. The event, to be held Saturday, April 23, encourages the public to help protect local waterways through cleanup and educational activities.

Elias Khoury, a Lebanese novelist and distinguished professor of Middle Eastern and Islamic studies at New York University, will visit campus March 7 to deliver a lecture and a reading from his most recent novel, “The Broken Mirror: Sinalcol.”

Passes for the 19th annual Roger Ebert’s Film Festival, or "Ebertfest," coming April 19-23, 2017, will go on sale Nov. 1. The passes cover all 12 or more screenings during the five-day event at the Virginia Theatre in Champaign.

The Brandon Seabrook String Trio will hold an improvisation workshop at 3 p.m. Friday, Oct. 5, with a performance following at 7:30 p.m., in the Music Building Auditorium, 1114 W. Nevada St., Urbana. The event is part of the Improvisers Exchange, a two-year initiative investigating the field of music improvisation. Both events are free and open to the public.

Brazilian music educator and scholar Juliana Cantarelli Vita presents a lecture and recital on Afro-Brazilian percussion genres, Saturday, March 30 at 7 p.m. at Spurlock Museum of World Cultures, 600 S. Gregory St., Urbana.

Bree Newsome, the community organizer and activist who removed the Confederate battle flag from the South Carolina Statehouse in 2015 after the Charleston shootings, will be the keynote speaker for this year’s iUnite Week.

Her talk, titled “Tearing Hatred from the Sky,” will be presented Tuesday, Sept. 20, at 7 p.m. in rooms A, B and C at the Illini Union, 1401 W. Green St., Urbana. The event is sponsored by the Office of Inclusion and Intercultural Relations, Inclusive Illinois and the Illini Union Board. The event is open to the public.

Newsome established herself as a touchstone of empowerment for disenfranchised people around the world when she tore down the Confederate flag  in the name of social justice and equality. A graduate of New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, Newsome blends her artistic talents with her activism, encouraging audiences to transform society into a world where the lives and contributions of all individuals are recognized equally.

A brown-bag session, “Still Too Slow: The Advancement of Women,” will be held Wednesday, Sept. 7 from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. in the Illini Union, 1401 W. Green St., Urbana, Room 314A.

Danita M. Brown Young will become the vice chancellor for student affairs at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign effective Aug. 7. She currently is the vice provost for student affairs and dean of students at the University of Minnesota.

“The New Normal,” a 30-minute documentary premiering May 23 at 1:30 p.m. CST/ 2:30 p.m. EST on the Big Ten Network, documents the journey of University of Illinois Urbana Champaign researchers to create a fast and inexpensive coronavirus test to ensure that U. of I. students, faculty and staff could remain safe and healthy during the pandemic

A seed grant, along with some hard work by U. of I. student volunteers and museum staff, has grown a butterfly garden at the Orpheum Children’s Science Museum in Champaign. The “Growing Prairies and Growing Minds” butterfly garden and an archaeology exhibit will open to the public on Saturday, July 30, from 1-5 p.m. at the museum, 346 N. Neil St., Champaign. Guest speakers at the beginning of the event include Illinois state Sen. Scott Bennett and Deb Frank Feinen, the mayor of Champaign. 

The Campus Faculty Association will award up to five $1,000 scholarships to undergraduate students at the University of Illinois’ Urbana campus who demonstrate a commitment to social justice in the community.

Campus Recreation at Illinois will hold a grand reopening of the newly renovated Ice Arena on Friday, Sept. 15 from 7:30 to 9:30 p.m. Remarks from Marcus Jackson, the director of Campus Recreation, will be at 7:30 p.m.

The U. of I.’s campuswide outcomes survey is now available for December 2015 graduates earning a bachelor’s degree. Faculty members are asked to encourage graduates to respond to the survey, which asks about employment, continued education and other next steps after graduation. Graduates can access their unique survey links online.

The Office of Volunteer Programs is sponsoring the eighth annual Cans Across the Quad food drive Sept. 29 in conjunction with National Hunger Action Month. Registered student organizations, campus units and people from the university and community are encouraged to participate.

More than $44 million in student funding will go toward modernizing teaching and learning environments that will benefit the Illinois campus, Facilities and Services announced. Capital improvement projects were selected and approved by the Academic Facilities Maintenance Fund Assessment Oversight Committee and are in development. 

The Carle Illinois College of Medicine has announced nearly 100 inaugural faculty members.

The Carle Illinois College of Medicine, the first engineering-based medical school, has received preliminary acreditation from the Liaison Committee on Medical Education and is recruiting students for its first class.