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Campus Almanac
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Board Names New President
USD's board of trustees announced in March that Mary
E. Lyons, current president of the College of Saint Benedict,
a Catholic liberal arts college in
Minnesota, will on July 1 become USD's next president.
Lyons
has been president of the College of Saint Benedict since
1996. Prior to that, the native Californian, a retired U.S.
Naval Reserve captain, was president of the California Maritime
Academy for six years.
"With her experience in both Catholic undergraduate
education and the professional training programs at the
academy, Dr. Lyons understands and embraces USD's mission
of academic excellence and values-centered learning,"
says Liam McGee, chair of the board. "We are confident
she is the right person to lead USD to even greater success
as a nationally ranked institution of higher learning."
USD President Alice B. Hayes will retire June 30 after
eight years at USD.
"I am confident and pleased to be leaving the university
in such capable hands," Hayes says. "In addition
to her excellent leadership skills, Dr. Lyons' energy and
enthusiasm will serve USD well in the years ahead."
Under Lyons' leadership, the College of Saint Benedict,
a women's college of 2,000 students, rose from the fourth
to the second tier of liberal arts colleges, according to
U.S. News & World Report.
In addition to her administrative positions, Lyons, 55,
was a professor of rhetoric and homiletics at the Graduate
Theological Union in Berkeley, Calif. She also taught at
the University of California, Berkeley, and San Jose State
University, and has been a community college, middle school
and elementary school teacher.
Major Gifts Provide
New Opportunities
The university recently received two major donations, one
to endow a lecture series that will bring international leaders
to speak at the Joan B. Kroc Institute for Peace and Justice,
and another that will strengthen athletics scholarships.
Philanthropist Joan B. Kroc, who funded the
institute that bears her name, recently donated $5 million
for an endowed lecture series that will bring top-level policymakers
to campus to discuss issues of global concern such as war
and peace, justice and human rights.
"This year is presenting global challenges
to our government, our citizens and our families," says
USD President Alice B. Hayes. "We are immensely grateful
to Mrs. Kroc for making it possible for the institute to bring
in speakers who will allow us to hold meaningful dialog about
these events, and to advance our nation's democratic tradition
of dialog and discussion."
Joyce Neu, IPJ executive director, says she
hopes to attract speakers such as U.S. Secretary of State
Colin Powell and Nobel Peace Prize nominee Helen Caldicott,
who founded Physicians for Social Responsibility, which educates
the public about the dangers of nuclear power, nuclear weapons
and nuclear war.
Douglas and Elizabeth Manchester recently made
a $6-million commitment to USD, which will be directed to
athletics scholarships and ensure that the university always
will be able to fund the maximum allowable NCAA scholarships
for basketball and golf.
To honor the donation, the Tecolote Village
residence hall, which opened in Fall 2002, was renamed Douglas
and Elizabeth Manchester Village, and the adjacent athletics
and intramurals field was christened the Manchester Athletic
Field.Manchester, chairman of Manchester Resorts, has served
on USD's Board of Trustees since 1978.
Top Students Work with
Laureates
Senior biology major Craig Weinkauf got the chance to rub
elbows with one of the heroes in his field when the Kyoto
Laureates came to USD in March.
Weinkauf, who with biology Professor Lisa Baird
has researched the purpose and function of hemoglobin in plants,
was selected to act as an assistant to laureate Leroy Edward
Hood, an American biologist who created a way to map the human
genome - the genetic blueprint for human beings.
Hood is one of three world-renowned leaders
honored at USD's second annual Kyoto Laureate Symposium for
their contributions to the world's scientific, cultural and
spiritual development. Students assisted the laureates with
their presentations, in which they discussed their work in
front of hundreds of visitors and scholars.
"Just the opportunity to be around bright,
intelligent, successful
people is invaluable," Weinkauf says. "It gives
students a sense of
what the possibilities are for us."
The event, held March 5-7, also honored French
mathematician Mikhael Leonidovich Gromov, who introduced a
metric structure for families of
geometric objects, and Tadao Ando, a self-taught Japanese
architect
whose work has been critically acclaimed throughout the world.
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