FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact:
Bill Calhoun, UNI vice president for advancement, (319) 273-6078
Vicki Grimes, University Marketing & Public Relations, (319) 273-2761
Note editors/news directors: A 200 dpi JPEG photo of Joy Corning is available via the Internet at:
http://www.uni.edu/pubrel/newsroom/photos/corning.jpeg. If you need higher resolution or have other photo needs please call the UNI Office of University Marketing and Public Relations contact listed above.
CEDAR FALLS, Iowa — A desire to give students the opportunity to hear and interact with leaders in their respective fields from all over the world prompted University of Northern Iowa alumna and former Iowa Lt. Gov. Joy Corning, to make a $1 million gift to the UNI Foundation's “Students First” campaign.
The Joy Cole Corning Distinguished Leadership Lecture Series will bring to campus national and internationally renowned leaders in such areas as the arts, business, education, government and the judiciary.
Corning said her 25 years in elective offices gave her a myriad of experiences in interacting with leaders in various disciplines. She believes it is important for students to understand what makes a leader and how people become leaders. She said that interaction with the speakers will be a part of the lecture series.
Corning's gift is part the Northern Iowa Foundation's $75 million “Students' First” campaign, that includes a $16 million goal for program support endowments. “Private support will play a vital role in the university's ability to make excellent programs even better,” said Bill Calhoun, UNI vice president for advancement.
“I greatly appreciate the education I received here and am happy to have the opportunity to give back to the university,” said Corning. “I hope my gift might inspire others to think about a gift to the university.”
Now living in Des Moines, Corning taught school in Greenfield and Waterloo, following her graduation from UNI with a bachelor of arts in elementary education. She left the teaching profession to raise her family in Cedar Falls. She said she feels a “great affinity” for the Cedar Falls community, where she spent nearly 35 years of her life, and in which she began her career in elective office.
She was first elected to the Cedar Falls school board in 1973, serving 11 years, nine of them as its president. After serving six years in the Iowa Senate, in the middle of her second term, she was elected lieutenant governor, serving for eight years.
Now heavily involved in the volunteer arena, Corning serves on nearly a dozen boards, including the UNI Foundation Board of Trustees; UNI's Performing Arts Center Advisory Board; the boards of the Des Moines Symphony, the National Conference on Community and Justice, and the Institute for Character Development; and she is chairing a drive to raise money to build a chapel at the women's prison.
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact:
Douglas Shaw, assistant professor, Dept. of Mathematics, (319) 273-6805
Gwenne Culpepper, University Marketing and Public Relations, (319) 273-2761
CEDAR FALLS, Iowa -- Iowa high school students and University of Northern Iowa students may participate in The Wright Challenge, a Web-accessible mathematics contest now entering its second year.
Between now and April 27, the "mysterious Doctor E" will present six puzzles, roughly one every other week, on the World Wide Web at www.math.uni.edu. The puzzles will be printed in the UNI student newspaper and posted on campus, as well. The first problem is now posted, with solutions due Feb. 9 to: doctore@math.uni.edu; or Doctor E, c/o the University of Northern Iowa Mathematics Department, 320 Wright Hall, Cedar Falls, IA 50614-0506.
Prizes will include certificates suitable for framing; more than $100 in cash; and games donated by Kadon Enterprises, a premium-quality puzzle merchant.
"The University of Northern Iowa math department sponsors this contest to encourage Iowa students' enthusiasm for mathematics and to share their love of the subject with the community at large," said Douglas Shaw, assistant professor in the department of mathematics and creator of The Wright Challenge.
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact:
Martha Reineke, project director and professor of religion (319) 273-6233
Vicki Grimes, University Marketing & Public Relations, (319) 273-2761
CEDAR FALLS, Iowa —A three-month-long lecture and art series, “Picturing Faith: American Religious Life Yesterday and Today,” begins with an exhibit opening and gallery walk Thursday, Jan. 25 at the University of Northern Iowa.
The opening exhibit, “Picturing Faith: Religious Life in Government Photography, 1935-1943,” focuses on religious life in Depression-era America and features photos from the Farm Security Administration (FSA) archives. The exhibit, at the UNI Museum, 3219 Hudson Rd., opens with a 4 to 6:30 p.m. viewing Thursday. It will include a 5 p.m. guided walk through the works with Richard Colburn, UNI professor of art. The exhibition and opening event are free and open to the public.
Colburn, who himself has done research in the FSA archives in Washington, D.C., will interpret the works for their artistry, touching on their context within the archives and the careers of the photographers, such as Walker Evans, Dorothea Lange and Gordon Parks. A reception will be hosted by the Friends of the University Museum.
Colleen McDannell, whose Feb. 15 Hearst Lecture title serves as the exhibition title, was the “Picturing Faith” series catalyst, as well as the exhibit curator. She will discuss the role of religion in the lives of the poor during the 1930s, answering questions about how FSA photographers interpreted the role of religion in uniting America around shared democratic ideals, how they portrayed religious architecture and the techniques they used to express the religious spirit of the time.
McDannell is the Sterling M. McMurrin Professor of Religious Studies and Professor of History at the University of Utah. She will speak about the exhibition from an historian's perspective, during a 2 p.m. gallery lecture at the UNI Museum Feb. 17. Feb. 18, McDannell will address “Religious Kitsch” during a 2 p.m. lecture at the Hearst Center for the Arts, 304 W. Seerley Blvd., focusing on ways people expressed their religious beliefs with items of clothing, jewelry or bumper stickers.
Other events in the “Picturing Faith” series include a Feb. 23 lecture on “Popular Religious Images and the Modern American Home,” by David Morgan, professor of art at Valparaiso University; a photo exhibition of diverse religious and cultural traditions represented in homes in the Waterloo/ Cedar Falls community, by photographer Sheri Huber-Otting, opening Feb. 24 at the Hearst Center.
Also, an April 20 address on “Teaching About Religious Architecture” by Peter W. Williams, Distinguished Professor of Comparative Religion and American Studies at Miami University of Ohio; and a tour of religious architecture in Waterloo, April 21, also led by Williams. This tour will begin at the Grout Museum, 503 South St., in Waterloo.
The series is made possible through a grant from Humanities Iowa, with additional funding from the Grout Museum, the Hearst Center for the Arts, and, at UNI, the Meryl Norton Hearst Chair in the College of Humanities and Fine Arts, the Department of Philosophy and Religion and the University Museum. Martha Reineke, UNI professor of religion, is the project director.
For more information, contact Reineke at (319) 273-6233.
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