News Briefs
12 February 2009
UCSF’s Lawrence Pitts named
interim UC provost
UC President Mark Yudof’s appointment of UCSF professor emeritus Lawrence H. Pitts as interim provost and executive vice president for academic affairs of the UC system was approved last week by the regents. Pitts fills the vacancy in the position resulting from the departure of interim Provost Robert Grey.
Pitts, 68, a physician and past chair of the UC Academic Senate, is a professor of neurosurgery at UC San Francisco, where he has served on the faculty since 1975. He has also served on a variety of Academic Senate committees at the divisional and systemwide levels.
A national search for a permanent provost is under way; Yudof hopes to conclude the search by Sept. 1.
A name change for Berkeley Law’s
energy-policy center
The California Center for Environmental Law & Policy, launched as a Berkeley School of Law think tank in 2006, has changed its name to The Center for Law, Energy and the Environment (CLEE).
The center is currently advising California policymakers on state efforts to develop renewable energy sources and reduce greenhouse-gas emissions through improved fuel standards, more efficient vehicles, and low carbon thresholds. The center also works with state leaders on revising transportation and land-use policy to lower reliance on fossil fuels.
Registration is open for Feb. 23
energy symposium
The third annual UC Berkeley Energy Symposium — “Bold Ideas for a New Energy Landscape” — will be held on Monday, Feb. 23, from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. in the Martin Luther King Jr. Student Union. The all-day event will explore the cutting-edge science and policy that will craft the nation’s future energy landscape.
This year’s keynote speakers will be Mary Nichols, chair of the California Air Resources Board, former secretary of California’s Resources Agency, and a professor at UCLA’s Institute of the Environment, and John Hofmeister, former president of Shell and CEO and founder of Citizens for Affordable Energy.
Registration ($15 student, $80 academic/government/nonprofit, $190 general) is now open. For information, visit www.berkeleyenergysymposium.com.
Terner Prize awarded to affordable-housing project in Boston
ICON Architecture’s Maverick Landing in Boston is the winner of the 2009 I. Donald Terner Prize, which recognizes successful and innovative affordable-housing projects and their leadership teams. The $50,000 prize is awarded every two years by the Center for Community Innovation at Berkeley (communityinnovation.berkeley.edu).
The winner and five finalists were honored Feb. 5 at the 2009 Housing Policy Forum at the Haas School of Business, sponsored by the campus’s Fisher Center for Real Estate and Urban Economics, the Urban Land Institute, and the BRIDGE Housing Corporation, which was founded in 1982 by I. Donald Terner, the prize’s namesake.
Feb. 17 registration deadline
for ‘Teaching With GSIs’ seminar
The 13th annual Faculty Seminar on Teaching With GSIs will take place on three successive Wednesdays (March 4, 11, and 18) from 2-5 p.m. This year’s seminar, sponsored by the Graduate Council and the GSI Teaching and Resource Center, will include specific strategies for working well with graduate-student instructors and connecting the work of a section to that of the larger course; for giving feedback to GSIs and conducting productive classroom observations; and for guiding GSIs in grading student work.
Faculty members may register online by Tuesday, Feb. 17, at newscenter.berkeley.edu/goto/GSIteach09. Questions may be directed to the GSI Teaching and Resource Center, gsi@berkeley.edu.
UC libraries, Springer agree on open-access journal publishing
The University of California libraries and Springer Science+Business Media have concluded an experimental agreement to support open-access publishing by UC authors. The arrangement, part of the journals’ license negotiated by the California Digital Library on behalf of the UC system’s 10 campuses, is the first large-scale open-access experiment of its type undertaken with a major commercial publisher in North America.
Beginning this year, articles by UC-affiliated authors accepted for publication in a Springer journal will be published using Springer Open Choice, with full and immediate open access. There will be no separate per-article charges. In addition to access via the Springer platform, final published articles will also be deposited in the California Digital Library’s eScholarship Repository (repositories.cdlib.org/escholarship).