KALAMAZOO–A fund-raising event that allows area residents to find out what their old books are worth will be held at 7 p.m. Thursday, March 13, in the Meader Rare Book Room of Western Michigan University’s Waldo Library.

The “Antique Book Road Show” program will include a talk and book appraisal by Dr. James Best, a noted book dealer and appraiser. The event is being sponsored by the Friends of the University Libraries, which strengthens and supports the activities of WMU’s libraries.

Best’s talk on “How Much Are Old Books Worth?” will address topics such as what determines the value of books and where to buy and sell books.

Admission to the event is free for Friends of the University Libraries members. The admission fee of $5 for students and $10 for adults will count as an annual membership in the organization. Registration by Monday, March 10, and an additional fee are required for book appraisals. The appraisal fee is $5, and individuals may not have more than two titles appraised.

Best is a professor emeritus of political science at Kent State University who became a book dealer in 1978 and retired from teaching in 2001. His business primarily deals in illustrated works and those related to 19th-century travel and exploration, handwritten manuscript materials, and old and rare books from the 19th century and earlier.

During his academic career, Best wrote a bibliography and guide to the history of American Illustration as well as many articles on local government, Congress, the American presidency and American illustration. He has conducted numerous insurance-related appraisals, most recently completing one involving more than 3,000 manuscript items donated to the Oberlin University Library.

Go to www.wmich.edu/library/friends for registration information. Those with questions should contact Kathy Gerow at lib-friends@wmich.edu or 387-5202.

Media contact: Jeanne Baron, (269) 387-8400, jeanne.baron@wmich.edu

KALAMAZOO–A chemistry professor who won a $1 million prize for discovering a simple and inexpensive means of filtering potentially deadly arsenic from well water is coming to Western Michigan University.

Dr. Abul Hussam, a George Mason University chemistry professor and winner of the 2007 Grainger Challenge Prize for Sustainability, will speak from 11 a.m. to noon Thursday, March 13, in Room 1120 of Schneider Hall, home of the Haworth College of Business. His talk, part of the business college’s Global Lecture Series, is titled “Appropriate Technology: Making a Difference in People’s Lives.”

Hussam’s finding is credited with preventing serious health problems in hundreds of thousands of people in his native Bangladesh and could help millions of others around the world. He came to the United States in 1978 as a college teaching assistant and earned his citizenship and a doctoral degree in analytical chemistry.

Hassam has devoted much of his career to finding a simple solution to a very large problem accidentally caused when international aid agencies funded widespread well digging in Bangladesh and eastern India. The wells brought fresh groundwater to the surface for millions of subsistence farmers, who for many years had been drinking from unsanitary ponds and mudholes. But the agencies didn’t realize that groundwater in the region has some of the highest concentrations of naturally occurring arsenic in the world.

The wells sharply reduced the spread of infectious diseases, but also brought about an epidemic of arsenic-related skin ailments and even fatal cancers of the lungs, bladder and kidneys over time. Hassam’s family had two of the now infamous shallow wells, but did not become ill.

The Grainger Prize is administered by the National Academy of Engineering.

Media contact: Mark Schwerin, (269) 387-8400, mark.schwerin@wmich.edu

KALAMAZOO–Environmentalist Majora Carter will speak on sustainable energy solutions at an event sponsored by Western Michigan University at 7 p.m. Thursday, March 13, at the Kalamazoo Radisson Plaza Hotel and Suites.

The event, dubbed the Green Gala, is free and open to the public and will feature Carter’s address, live music, snacks and posters of environmental initiatives in Kalamazoo.

Hailing from the South Bronx in New York City, Carter travels the world in pursuit of resources to improve the quality of life in her environmentally challenged community. She founded Sustainable South Bronx in 2001, and her efforts helped secure more than $20 million for the South Bronx Greenway project, which will begin construction this year.

She also has created riverfront parks and green roofs, dramatically increased the number of trees in the South Bronx, worked to remove an underused expressway in favor of positive economic development and successfully implemented one of the nation’s first urban green collar job training efforts–the Bronx Environmental Stewardship Training program.

She earned the prestigious John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Fellowship, New York University’s Martin Luther King, Jr. Award for Humanitarian Service, and the National Audubon Society’s Rachel Carson Award. She sits on New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer’s Energy and Environment Transition Team as well as the Clinton Global Initiative’s Poverty Alleviation Panel.

Her speech is sponsored by Campus Concerns Committee, Honors Student Association, Students for a Sustainable Earth and the Western Student Association. For more information, contact Travis Meier at t3meier@wmich.edu or (248) 895-8771.

Media contact: Deanne Molinari, (269) 387-8400, deanne.molinari@wmich.edu

KALAMAZOO–Western Michigan University student organization Merchandising Opportunities Design Association will hold model auditions Friday, March 14, from 4 to 7 p.m. in 3303 Kohrman Hall.

Women age 18 or older are welcome to audition, there is no application fee, and all applicants should bring high heels. MODA filled its need for male models at an earlier audition. Models should be prepared to stay for the entire audition, 4 to 7 p.m. Upon arrival, applicants will have their measurements and photos taken.

Chosen models will participate in a two-day fashion event April 11-12 sponsored by MODA. All modeling positions are unpaid volunteer opportunities.

Models must be available at these dates and times

Thursday, March 20, 7 to 9 p.m.
Monday, March 24, 7 to 9 p.m.
Thursday, April 10, 7 p.m. to TBA
Friday, April 11, All day
Saturday, April 12, All day

Questions may be sent to Brittney Dudeck at brittneymodapr@aol.com.

Media contact: Thom Myers, (269) 387-8400, thom.myers@wmich.edu

KALAMAZOO–The Young Concert Artists Series at Western Michigan University concludes its spring season with a performance by award-winning Chinese pianist Chu-Fang Huang. The program begins at 3 p.m. Sunday, March 9, in the Dalton Center Recital Hall, and will feature works by Scarlatti, Schumann, Ravel and Chinese composer Chu Wang-Hua.

All seating is general admission. Tickets are $10 and $5 for students and senior citizens. They may be purchased at the door or in advance through the Miller Auditorium Ticket Office at (269) 387-2300 or toll free (800) 228-9858.

Huang also will give a briefer performance at 1 p.m. Monday, March 10, in the Dalton Center Recital Hall as part of the School of Music’s Convocation Series. Intended primarily for the WMU campus community, the Convocation Series is open to the public free of charge.

Huang’s extensive orchestral and recital appearances throughout the U.S. and abroad have elicited enthusiastic responses from audiences and critics alike. The Birmingham News declared of one of her recent performances: “Clarity, poise, lucid phrasing and dead-on technique were in abundance at the electrically charged recital.”

In addition to winning the 2006 Young Concert Artists International Auditions, Huang claimed the Paul A. Fish Memorial Prize, Slomovic Orchestra Soloist Prize, Embassy Series Prize, Lied Center of Kansas Prize, Mortimer Levitt Piano Chair of YCA, and Mortimer Levitt Career Development Award for Women Artists.

The young musician made her Lincoln Center debut at Alice Tully Hall in November 2005 and recently took the stage at Carnegie’s Weill Recital Hall in New York. She’s performed internationally at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, the Klavier Festival in Germany, the Sydney Opera House in Australia, and the Beijing Zhong-shang Concert Hall and Liao-ning Grand Opera House in China.

Huang began playing the piano when she was just 7 years old, and received a full scholarship to the Shenyang Music Conservatory’s pre-college division at the age of 12. She made her U.S. debut in the La Jolla Music Society’s Prodigy Series when she was 15. She received a bachelor’s degree in music from the Curtis Institute of Music and a master’s degree from the Juilliard School, where she is currently pursuing postgraduate studies.

The Young Concert Artists Series is sponsored by the Donald P. Bullock Music Performance Institute in collaboration with the Irving S. Gilmore Foundation. For the past two decades, the series has introduced the Kalamazoo community to young classical musicians on their way to achieving international prominence.

Media contact: Kevin West, (269) 387-4678, kevin.west@wmich.edu

KALAMAZOO–Western Michigan University dance students present their annual Winter Concert of Dance Friday and Saturday, Feb. 8-9, in Chenery Auditorium. Performances begin at 8 p.m. Friday and 2 and 8 p.m. Saturday.

The program features Antony Tudor’s “Dark Elegies,” staged by Willy Shives, assistant ballet master and lead dancer with the Joffrey Ballet, and “Strict Love,” choreographed by Doug Varone and staged by Eddie Taketa, both of Doug Varone and Dancers. The repertoire also includes works choreographed by WMU Department of Dance faculty members Carolyn Pavlik, Tony Calucci and Rhonda Cinotto; undergraduate dance students Marissa Staniec and Jessie Cosentino; and WMU alumna Kristen Legg.

Admission to the Winter Concert of Dance is $16; $12 for senior citizens, WMU faculty and staff, and Partners in Dance members; and $8 for students. All seating is reserved. Tickets are available in advance by calling the Miller Auditorium Ticket Office at (269) 387-2300 or (800) 228-9858, or at the door before each performance.

Chenery Auditorium is located at the corner of Westnedge Avenue and Vine Street in Kalamazoo.

KALAMAZOO–Deborah Amos, foreign correspondent for National Public Radio and ABC News, will give a public lecture at 6 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 5, in Shaw Theatre at Western Michigan University.

Admission is $5 for the general public and free to students and faculty of WMU and Davenport and Kalamazoo colleges. A valid ID from one of the three schools is required.

An award-winning correspondent who covers Iraq for NPR News, Amos will speak on the U.S. conflict in Iraq in her presentation, “Iraq: No Exit in Sight.”

Her visit to Kalamazoo is part of the World Affairs Council of Western Michigan’s Great Decisions Foreign Policy Lecture Series and is sponsored by the World Affairs Council, WMU’s Haenicke Institute for Global Education and Kalamazoo College.

Deborah Amos

Amos covers Iraq for NPR News, and her reports can be heard on NPR’s award-winning “Morning Edition,” “All Things Considered” and “Weekend Edition.” She has returned to work with NPR after a decade in television news, including ABC’s “Nightline” and “World News Tonight” and the PBS programs “NOW with Bill Moyers” and “Frontline.”

Prior to her work with ABC News, Amos spent 16 years with NPR, where she was most recently the London bureau chief. Previously she was based in Amman, Jordan, as an NPR foreign correspondent.

She has won several awards, including an Alfred I. duPont-Columbia Award and a Breakthru Award, and widespread recognition for her coverage of the Gulf War in 1991. She spent 1991-92 as a Nieman Fellow at Harvard University, and she is the author of “Lines in the Sand: Desert Storm and the Remaking of the Arab World,” published in 1992.

She is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

Amos joined NPR in 1977, where she was first a director and then a producer for “Weekend All Things Considered” until 1979, after which she worked on documentaries until 1985. In 1982, she received the Prix Italia, the Ohio State Award, and a duPont-Columbia Award for “Father Cares: The Last of Jonestown;” and in 1984 she received a Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award for “Refugees.”

Amos began her career after receiving a degree in broadcasting from the University of Florida at Gainesville.

Great Decisions Foreign Policy Lecture Series

Amos’ visit is the first of three programs in Kalamazoo sponsored by the World Affairs Council. Later this month there will be panel discussions on Russia’s future and global philanthropy.

Feb. 19–”Putin’s Long Shadow: Russia’s Future,” a panel discussion in the Fetzer Center’s Kirsch Auditorium

Feb. 26–”Philanthropy: Does This New Global Player have the Power to Make a Global Difference?” a panel discussion in Stetson Chapel at Kalamazoo College

For more information, contact the World Affairs Council’s Dixie Anderson at world@iserv.net or (616) 776-1721.

KALAMAZOO–The classic western “High Noon” opens the new Ethics Film Series at Western Michigan University with a screening and discussion beginning at 6:30 p.m. on Thursday, Jan. 24, in Room 213 of the Bernhard Center. Admission is free.

Dr. Michael Pritchard, co-director of WMU’s Center for the Study of Ethics in Society, will lead the post-film discussion on the relationship between love and ethics portrayed in the film, which was released in 1952. Gary Cooper won the Oscar for Best Actor for his portrayal of a lawman who stands alone to defend a town of righteous cowards in the greatest showdown in the history of cinema. Lloyd Bridges and Grace Kelly also star in the suspenseful story that unfolds in approximate real-time, from 10:40 a.m. to high noon in an 84-minute film.

The Ethics Films Series is sponsored by WMU’s Center for the Study of Ethics in Society. Other films in the series will be shown on Feb. 21, March 20 and April 3. All will begin at 6:30 p.m. in Room 213 Bernhard. The titles and discussion leaders will be announced.

For more information, contact Dr. Sandra Borden, co-director of the Ethics Center, at sandra.borden@wmich.edu or (269) 387-0362.

KALAMAZOO–Members of Western Michigan University’s gymnastics team are encouraging others to “think pink” in the fight against breast cancer with an auction Sunday, Jan. 20, to raise money for cancer awareness.

The team will compete at 1 p.m. in WMU’s University Arena against the University of Illinois-Chicago. WMU and UIC will put school colors aside and wear pink leotards for the competition. The Bronco’s will be auctioning off their competition pink leotards in a silent auction during the competition. Areas also will be set up for the audience to make donations with the first 100 donors receiving a “think pink” t-shirt. Admission is free, and participants are encouraged to come to the event wearing pink.

Terry Karwoski, WMU gymnastics head coach, said a similar event started in 2004 with the University of Alabama, and it has caught on with other gymnastics teams in the NCAA.

“In both our gymnastics team and our families, we know breast cancer survivors. It is something that is close to us,” says Terry Karwoski, head gymnastics coach. “We saw this as something we can do as a team.”

“The Think Pink meet is excellent opportunity to increase awareness of breast cancer and raise funds for programs to educate and treat patients throughout southwest Michigan,” adds Jessica Hermann-Wilmarth, director of development for the West Michigan Cancer Center that is partnering with the WMU gymnastics team for the event.

KALAMAZOO–Dr. Martin Luther King and social justice movements, civility in politics, torture and ethical questions in science are just some of the topics to be tackled in programs sponsored by the Western Michigan University Center for the Study of Ethics in Society during the spring semester.

The series begins with a panel discussion at 4 p.m. Friday, Jan. 18, in Room 210 of the Bernhard Center. Titled “Religion, Activism and Politics: From MLK to Now,” the discussion will be led by WMU graduate students David Charlton, who is studying comparative religion, and Ryan Pflum and Jeremy Green, who are both studying philosophy.

Those attending will be invited to explore the history and nature of the relationship between religion and social justice movements. Panelists will explore what is the proper place for religion in social justice, whether such movements require religious ties and what boundaries, if any, are there regarding the interaction between religion and movements for justice. These and other questions will be examined as community members look back at King’s work and at contemporary justice movements.

The WMU Center for the Study in Ethics in Society encourages and supports research, teaching and service to the University and community in areas of applied and professional ethics. Those areas include, but are not restricted to: business, education, engineering, government, health and human services, law, media, medicine, science and technology.

All ethics center programs are free and open to the public. Other dates for this semester’s programs, along with the speakers, their topics, and times and locations of their presentations are:

Jan. 30, WMU President Dr. John M. Dunn, “Ethical Challenges Confronting Higher Education” 7:30 p.m., Putney Auditorium of the Fetzer Center.

Feb. 7, Dr. Sandra Borden, WMU associate professor of communication and ethics center co-director, “The Moral Justification for Journalism,” 4 p.m., Room 105 of the Bernhard Center.

Feb. 13, Dr. Fritz Allhoff, WMU assistant professor of philosophy, “Torture and Ticking Time-Bombs: Empirical Research on Moral Judgments,” 7:30 p.m., Room 105 of the Bernhard Center.

March 19, panel discussion, “Civility in the Political Arena,” Gordon Bolar, WMUK-FM development director, moderator, 7:30 p.m., Room 105 of the Bernhard Center.

March 27, Dr. Adrienne Asch, director, Center for Ethics, Yeshiva University, “Ethics and Science: Some Lessons from Bioethics,” 5 p.m., Putney Auditorium, Fetzer Center.

April 2, panel discussion, “Science, Ethics and Politics: Are They Compatible?” Shirley Bach, associate director, WMU Ethics Center, moderator; Dr. Paul Pancella, chair, WMU Department of Physics, Bill Krasean, former science editor, Kalamazoo Gazette, Dr. Stephen Malcolm, WMU professor of biological sciences, panelists, 7 p.m., Room 210 of the Bernhard Center.