Ag and Life Sciences ONLINE

COLLEGE NEWS



- More than 150 attend college retreat on scholarship



- New faculty to be introduced at convocation



- Destination Ukraine and Siberia for some in college



- Thanks to all State Fair volunteers



- Questions of all sorts heard at State Fair



- AgComm makes plans for fifth year in college



- CARD Fall Ag Policy Conference at two sites



- Fall field day at Southeast Farm



- Deadlines & Reminders



COMMUNICATIONS KIOSK



- E-mail virus scares often overblown



INFOGRAZING



- ISU ag alum maintains national farm safety Web site



- Another alum to study prayer power in farm safety



EXTERNAL VOICES



- University's values reflected in faculty evaluation



MARGINALIA



- We dairy you to come up with a butter title







C O L L E G E N E W S







MORE THAN 150 ATTEND COLLEGE RETREAT ON SCHOLARSHIP



More than 150 faculty and staff attended Thursday's College of

Agriculture's retreat on "Rethinking Scholarship." A

videotape of keynote speaker Conrad Weiser, dean emeritus at Oregon

State University, is available now, and a summary report of the

day's discussions on scholarship, tenure and promotion, characteristics

of the ideal reward system and barriers to innovation will soon

be available. For more information, contact Robert Martin, 4-0896

or drmartin@iastate.edu.



NEW FACULTY TO BE INTRODUCED AT CONVOCATION



The College of Agriculture's fall convocation will be held in

the Curtiss Auditorium, 127 Curtiss Hall, at 4 p.m., Monday, Aug.

26. New faculty members will be introduced. Refreshments will

be served.



DESTINATION UKRAINE AND SIBERIA FOR SOME IN COLLEGE



Several projects are taking college administrators and faculty

to Ukraine and beyond. An International Conference on Agriculture

on Sept. 2 at the National Agricultural University of Ukraine

will include several presenters from ISU. A three-day Ensminger-Iowa

State University Ag-Tech School follows, with college faculty

and administrators among the group of international presenters.

(Animal scientist and author M.E. Ensminger, who received an honorary

degree from ISU this year, is known for his work in international

agriculture.) Dean Topel also will visit Kharkov State University

in Ukraine. He and officials from ISU's International Institute

of Theoretical and Applied Physics will travel to the Siberian

Aerospace Academy to investigate potential exchanges.



THANKS TO ALL STATE FAIR VOLUNTEERS

Thanks to the 64 volunteers who helped staff "A Rumen With

a View," the dairy-themed College of Agriculture exhibit

at the Iowa State Fair (see "Marginalia.") Thousands

stopped to learn more about ISU dairy history, current ISU dairy

activities, how a rumen works and how milk is made. About 12,000

kids took home farm-scene sheets on which they'd placed rubber-stamp

images of cows. About 2,800 activity sheets for kids and 2,000

cards with recipes and phone numbers of ISU contacts were distributed.

Many visitors picked up brochures on college majors and off-campus

program offerings.



QUESTIONS OF ALL SORTS HEARD AT STATE FAIR



Besides the most common question ("Is that a REAL rumen?"),

visitors to the college's State Fair display always ask a lot

of questions. This year about 30 people wanted to know more about

attending Iowa State. Several teachers asked for more information

on materials used in the exhibit. Some wondered if the photo of

a milk-mustached Fred Hoiberg was available as a poster. Other

questions included how to design and build hog facilities and

what will kill plaintain without killing alfalfa. All requests

for information have been filled or forwarded to appropriate ISU

experts.



AGCOMM MAKES PLANS FOR FIFTH YEAR IN COLLEGE



1996-97 is the fifth year for AgComm, the College of Agriculture's

communication-across-the-curriculum program. This year AgComm

plans to offer faculty development workshops on teaching communication

in technical courses; consult with those who want to develop the

communication-intensive aspect of their courses; offer support

for developing and presenting class materials; and review, upon

request, an individual's or department's communication-intensive

courses. A Web page of communication-intensive assignments also

will be developed, with support from a two-year USDA Challenge

Grant. For more information or to schedule workshops or consultations:

Robert Martin, 4-0896, drmartin@iastat.edu.



CARD FALL AG POLICY CONFERENCE AT TWO SITES



"Market-Based Agriculture: Opportunities and Challenges"

is the theme of CARD's 1996 Fall Agricultural Policy Conference,

offered on two dates at two locations: Sept. 12, Iowa Lakes Community

College, Emmetsburg, and Sept. 13, Indian Hills Community College,

Ottumwa. For more information: 4-6257.



FALL FIELD DAY AT SOUTHEAST FARM



A fall field day will be held Sept. 11 at the ISU Southeast Research

and Demonstration Farm near Crawfordsville. For more information:

4-4620.



DEADLINES & REMINDERS



Aug. 26: College of Agriculture convocation, Curtiss Auditorium,

Curtiss Hall







C O M M U N I C A T I O N S K I O S K









E-MAIL VIRUS SCARES OFTEN OVERBLOWN



Experts say that fears of e-mail-borne viruses appear to be overblown,

and are urging network users to stop their misguided efforts to

warn others of the "non-existent" threat. Panic over

unfounded rumors causes another very real problem -- floods of

e-mail warnings that can slow Internet traffic to a crawl. Security

specialists say that plain electronic mail cannot carry a virus,

and that users can best protect themselves by not opening attachments

unless they have a good idea of what's inside. (Chronicle of

Higher Education, July 12)







I N F O G R A Z I N G







ISU AG ALUM MAINTAINS NATIONAL FARM SAFETY WEB SITE



Farm safety information from many different states, agencies and

organizations -- including ISU -- is available on the National

Ag Safety Database, a Web site at the University of Florida. Carol

Lehtola, an ISU ag and biosystems engineering alum and Florida's

Extension Safety Specialist, maintains the site. The Web site

is: http://www.agen.ufl.edu/~nasd/nasdhome.html



For more information: clehtola@agen.ufl.edu.



ANOTHER ALUM TO STUDY PRAYER POWER IN FARM SAFETY



LaMar Grafft, rural health and safety specialist at the University

of Iowa's Center for Ag Safety and Health, will study a northeast

Iowa pastor's efforts to organize mass prayer for the safety and

health of Iowa's farmers during the fall harvest. "We're

not trying to test God," said Grafft, who has bachelor's

and master's degrees in animal science from ISU. "What we're

trying to do is create a method for measuring the benefits of

social awareness." Researchers will monitor the prayer efforts,

compare data from year-to-year farm safety records and interview

farmers who feel they were affected by the prayer. (Des Moines

Register, Aug. 22)







E X T E R N A L V O I C E S







UNIVERSITY'S VALUES REFLECTED IN FACULTY EVALUATION



"A university's values are most clearly described by its

promotion and tenure policies, and by the criteria used to evaluate

faculty performance." Conrad Weiser, dean emeritus of the

College of Agricultural Sciences at Oregon State University, at

Thursday's College of Agriculture Faculty-Staff Retreat.







M A R G I N A L I A







WE DAIRY YOU TO COME UP WITH A BUTTER TITLE



In her Aug. 17 column in the Quad City Times, Kathie Obradovich

wrote: "In the over-the-top spirit of the (Iowa State Fair),

we offer this list of the most excessive offerings we could find

. . . Worst pun -- Leave it to those ag-heads at Iowa State University.

Their exhibit is a tribute to a cow's stomach, titled A Rumen

With A View. In case you didn't know, a rumen is the first of

the four stomach chambers in our bovine friends. The exhibit comes

complete with a shellacked-and-dried cow organ about the size

of the engine in the my '88 Mustang."