A gala opening is planned for the center in Spring 2002 at which Tel Aviv University President and former Israeli ambassador to the U.S. Itamar Rabinovich is scheduled to attend and deliver a public address.

A Jewish Studies Advisory Board, made up of distinguished community leaders and nationally re-nowned scholars in Jewish studies, has been formed to provide input regarding both the creation of the center and the growth and expansion of UAlbany’s Department of Judaic Studies.

“We are very proud of this effort, which represents the University at Albany’s ongoing commitment to overall academic excellence and in particular to the field of Jewish studies,” said Hitchcock. “Our University is home to one of the oldest Jewish studies departments in the country, and the Jewish community in the Capital Region has a long and significant cultural history.

“We therefore look forward with confidence and enthusiasm to the creation of a vibrant Center for Jewish Studies based here at the University.”

Mark A. Raider, chair of the Department of Judaic Studies, said that the advisory board met in November 2000 and approved a major fund-raising campaign. It raised an initial $50,000, including a $25,000 challenge grant from Marty Silverman of New York, to launch the campaign. “The Center for Jewish Studies will significantly enhance the mission and reach of Judaic studies at UAlbany through new educational initiatives, community-wide programming, scholarly endeavors, and distance-learning technology,” said Raider.

The advisory board’s charge is to increase interaction among the University, the field of Jewish studies, the Capital Region community, and all residents of New York State.

“This is an important undertaking,” said Alan P. Goldberg, president and director of First Albany Corporation and a founding member of the board. “It is also a special opportunity for the community to support and shape Jewish studies at UAlbany.

“And with Albany being the capital of New York State and the headquarters for SUNY Central Administration, UAlbany is the ideal place to create a center for Jewish studies.”

The founding members of the board include such community leaders as Beth and Peter Elitzer of Albany; Malka Evan of Slingerlands; Francine Godgart of Troy; Alan P. Goldberg of Albany; Steven Hess of Rochester; Nahum Lewis of Albany; Anna Rosen of Albany; Haskell Rosenberg of Rochester; and Abraham Sherer of Albany.

The board also includes several prominent scholars: Pamela Nadell of American University; Frances Malino of Wellesley College; Arthur Brenner of Siena College; Mishael M. Caspi of Bates College; professors Daniel Levy and Mark A. Raider (ex officio) of UAlbany; Alvin H. Rosenfeld of Indiana University; Jonathan Rosen of Albany Medical College; Jonathan D. Sarna of Brandeis University; Susan Sherman of UAlbany; and Robert M. Seltzer of Hunter College, CUNY.

Honorary Degree to be Awarded to John Lewis
By Lisa James Goldsbeery
The Honorable John Lewis, United States Representative for the 5th Congressional District of Georgia and a major civil rights activist, will receive an honorary Doctor of Laws degree from the University at Albany on Thursday, Feb. 15. The honorary degree convocation will be at 2:30 p.m. in the Recital Hall of the Performing Arts Center (PAC). This is the highest honor bestowed by the State University of New York system.

“The Honorable John Lewis has dedicated his life and repeatedly risked his personal safety to champion the rights of his fellow citizens. The United States is a tangibly better country for his efforts and the University at Albany is proud to recognize his many accomplishments with this honorary degree,” said University President Karen R. Hitchcock.

Lewis will also serve as keynote speaker for UAlbany’s annual Martin Luther King, Jr. Luncheon, to be held the same day at noon in the Campus Center Ballroom. Both the convocation and the luncheon are free and open to the public.

“No other United States elected official embodies the grand legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr. more than U.S. Representative John Lewis,” said Carson Carr, assistant vice president for Academic Affairs and director of Albany’s Educational Opportunities Program. “He is a national treasure.”

Carr will present “Congressman John Lewis: A Video Workshop” on Wednesday, Feb. 14, at 7 p.m. in Lecture Center 19. The program will give an historical perspective on the contributions of Lewis. Carr and Virgil Hodges, former executive director of the Martin Luther King Institute for Non-Violence, will speak and answer questions. The workshop is free and open to the public.

Born the son of sharecroppers in 1940 in Alabama, Lewis organized sit-in demonstrations at segregated lunch counters in Tennessee and was chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, which he helped to found. In 1961, he volunteered to participate in the Freedom Rides, which were organized to challenge segregation at interstate bus terminals across the South.

At age 23, he was recognized as one of the six primary leaders of the Civil Rights Movement and was an organizer and keynote speaker at the 1963 March on Washington, D.C. Lewis coordinated voter registration drives during the “Mississippi Freedom Summer” in 1964. He was at the front of the line during both of the legendary marches from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama, where a clubbing by Alabama State Troopers fractured his skull. One major result of the “Mississippi Freedom Summer” was the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Lewis went on to become director of the Voter Education Project which, under his leadership, changed the country’s political climate by adding virtually four million minorities to voter rolls. In 1977, President Jimmy Carter appointed Lewis to direct more than 250,000 volunteers of ACTION, the federal volunteer agency.

Elected to Congress in 1986, Lewis co-chairs the Congressional Urban Caucus and is a member of both the Congressional Caucus on Anti-Semitism and the Congressional Committee to Support Writers and Journalists. In 1998, Lewis co-authored Walking with the Wind: A Memoir of the Movement, with writer Michael D’Orso. The book, a firsthand account of the Civil Rights movement, received the prestigious Robert F. Kennedy Book Award in 1999.

For more than thirty years, Lewis has taken on major leadership roles in the struggles for human and civil rights in the U.S., dedicating his life to securing personal dignity and building what Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., called “The Beloved Community.”

Immediately after the convocation, there will be a reception for Lewis in the Futterer Lounge of the PAC.

Center for Excellence
By Vinny Reda
UAlbany and its Institute for Materials (UAIM) will be big winners if Gov. George Pataki’s proposal to create a Center for Excellence in Nanotechnology becomes a reality.

Announced by the governor in his State of the State Address on Jan. 3 and then included in his Jan. 16 budget proposal, the nanotech center would be one of three university-based centers statewide that would leverage $283 million in state funds with more than $700 million in federal and private sector monies to support the growth of high-tech research and training centers. The other two centers, located in Buffalo and Rochester, would be devoted to bioinformatics and photonics, respectively.

The UAlbany center, meanwhile, would take advantage of UAIM’s national leadership in computer chip research - now conducted on the industry standard 200-millimeter platform - and its working relationships with more than 100 companies, but in particular IBM. The computer giant is now building a $2.5 billion microchip plant in East Fishkill that will employ the next generation industry standard silicon-wafer platform of 300 millimeters.

The 300-millimeter platform is also scheduled to be available at UAIM for pilot manufacturing research, for use by UAIM incubator firms, and as part of a state-of-the-art workforce training center, when its 35,000-square-foot addition is completed at the Center for Environmental Sciences and Technology Management (CESTM) in mid 2002 (the same time as IBM’s new facility). UAIM’s onsite workforce-training will take place in the latest hands-on clean-room instructional facilities for the corporate workforce, as well as command Internet-based instruction to support training programs at community colleges throughout the Hudson Valley.

The UAIM efforts will also build on another success story for this synergistic relationship: more than a dozen Albany doctoral graduates have been hired by IBM Microelectronics alone in the past two years.

Alain Kaloyeros of the College of Arts and Sciences’ Department of Physics and executive director of the Institute for Materials, called the governor’s proposal “a bold and visionary move. Nanotechnology is the next generation of circuitry - one one-thousandth of the size of existing microchips. The expansion of its uses into biotechnology, environmental technology, and several other fields is potentially enormous.”

UAIM also received good news from the governor’s office concerning the first round of New York State Office of Science, Technology and Academic Research (NYSTAR) grants, aimed at promoting new job creation in a variety of high-tech fields. Of the $1.5 million funded in 2001 for projects statewide, UAIM received nearly $600,000, covering three project collaborations: with Infrared Components Corp. on a thermal imaging camera to aid firefighters; with SUNY Buffalo and Praxair Inc. to develop a process for fabrication of advanced memory and logic devices; and with Starfire Systems Inc. to develop a chemical vapor deposition process to deposit and characterize silicon carbide films.

While the Centers for Excellence is being called the most significant initiative in the governor's 2001-02 proposals, the governor's proposed budget would also fully fund all current contractual obligations; maintain tuition levels and Tuition Assistance Program support; and, most significantly, provide an increase in funding from $41 million to $92 million to address an accumulated SUNY hospitals deficit. The funding would permit the SUNY system to avoid campus cutbacks in order to cover the deficits.

Butler Named Distinguished Librarian by SUNY Trustees; Alba and Logan Honored as Distinguished Professors
By Lisa James Goldsberry
Meredith Butler, director of the University Libraries and dean of the Library Faculty, has been appointed as the State University of New York’s first Distinguished Librarian by the SUNY Board of Trustees. In addition, UAlbany professors Richard Alba and John Logan have been appointed distinguished professors.

Distinguished Professor is the highest rank that can be achieved by a SUNY educator and is above that of full professor. Alba and Logan have joint appointments in the Department of Sociology of the College of Arts and Sciences and the Department of Public Administration and Policy. Butler’s rank parallels the Distinguished Professor rank. SUNY may be the first in the country to extend its “Distinguished” ranks to the library faculty.

In nominating Butler for the award, President Karen R. Hitchcock said, “While Dean Butler has served the majority of her professional career at the University at Albany, her contributions transcend the boundaries of the Albany campus. Through her professional service and research, she has had substantial impact on the theory, practice, and development of librarianship throughout New York State and the nation.”

Butler has been the principal leader in introducing automated technologies to the University Libraries, and provided critical direction for planning and construction of the new library. In addition, she provided leadership for the Campaign for the Libraries, which raised $3.5 million.

Butler joined UAlbany in 1981 as assistant director for planning and resource development. She has a joint appointment in the School of Information Science and Policy. UAlbany’s libraries are among the top 100 research libraries in the country.

Alba has played a critical role in the intellectual life of UAlbany as founding director of the Center for Social and Demographic Analysis. He is widely recognized as one of today’s top sociologists. His current research focuses on the assimilation of Italian Americans into the mainstream of American life.

This past year, Alba was awarded one of only two Guggenheim fellowships to study second generations in immigrant societies. As a result, he served as associate director of the Centre Nationale de la Recherche Scientifique in Paris.

In nominating Alba for the honor, Hitchcock said, “The institution’s current capacity for and international reputation in demographic analysis owes much to the foundation that Dr. Alba established during the ten years he provided leadership for this vitally important interdisciplinary research unit.”

Alba, who earned his Ph.D. from Columbia University, joined UAlbany’s sociology department in 1980.

Logan serves as director of the University’s Lewis Mumford Center for Comparative Urban and Regional Research. His work on ethnic and immigrant populations draws on his highly respected expertise and skill in the quantitative analysis of large, demographic datasets.

A recent study, which compiled a count of publications in the three leading sociology journals for 1975-84 and 1985-94, ranked Logan first in the field in the total count of publications. He was one of only three scholars to rank as a “top article publisher” for both time periods.

“Not surprisingly, the knowledge, imagination, and rigor that characterize Dr. Logan’s contributions in research are also features of his performance as a teacher and mentor,” said Hitchcock in nominating Logan for the honor. “He has been particularly gifted in involving students in his research, in initiating students into the culture of professional publication, and in placing students in academic and research positions at other research universities and institutions.”

Logan, who earned his Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley, joined UAlbany’s faculty in 1980.

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