Today, (Thursday, Aug. 23), as part of Welcome Week,
students will flock to the annual Calapalooza Residence Hall Fair on the Campanile Esplanade from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. There, they can find information about a wide array of campus services and meet with more than 150 campus groups.

A prominent message being delivered to all students this year is to be fire safe in both on- and off-campus housing. Every student this year will receive a detailed guide to fire safety and information on ways to secure safe living quarters. Last year, in separate but equally tragic fires in rental housing, two UC Berkeley students lost their lives.

The Student Safe Housing Task Force was formed by UC Berkeley Chancellor Robert M. Berdahl in the wake of a fire safety summit he convened with representatives from the campus and the cities of Berkeley and Oakland. The task force has marshaled efforts to inform all students about their rights as tenants, to alert them to safety risks in rental housing and to urge them to make sure - one way or another - that they do not move into houses and apartments until a working smoke detector is in place.

The Berkeley Fire Department is offering free smoke detectors to students living in the city and is offering free window bar inspections as well. UC Berkeley's fire safety Web site provides students with information about the best locations to install smoke detectors and how to test and maintain them, as well as a general fire and life self-inspection checklist. (The Web addresses are at end of release).

This fall's Freshman Seminar Program, which offers small classes of no more than 15 students taught by some of the campus's most distinguished faculty members, is expected to fill up quickly. Offerings include a dramatic arts class on the school integration movement taught by professor emeritus Dunbar Ogden. His father, a Presbyterian minister, participated in the famous Sept. 4, 1957, "Little Rock Nine" incident in Arkansas by escorting nine African American students into segregated Central High School.

Other seminars include a College of Natural Resources class in which students go on suppertime outings with faculty members; a behind-the-scenes tour of the nearly 19,000 Egyptian artifacts stored at the Phoebe Apperson Hearst Museum of Anthropology; and "Automobility," a course on America's love affair with the car, including the sport utility vehicle.

Meet the incoming class

For a second year in a row, a record number of UC Berkeley's incoming students are women. The proportion of women in the new fall freshmen and transfer classes - 55 percent and 55.1 percent, respectively - continues to set records. Last year, a record was set when women comprised 54.1 percent of the freshman class. Only during the years when huge numbers of young men served in World War II has there been a larger percentage of women on campus.

Other new student facts:

* Of the 3,955 new freshmen who stated their intent to register, 44.6 percent are Asian American, 29.9 percent are white, 10.5 percent Chicano/Latino, 0.6 percent American Indian, 3.8 percent African American, and 1.5 percent listed "other." Another 9 percent did not indicate their ethnicity.

* Of the transfer students who said they intend to register, 41.1 percent are white, 30.9 percent Asian American, 3.9 percent African American, .9 percent American Indian, 9.1 percent Chicano/Latino, and 3.1 percent listed "other." Eleven percent did not give their ethnicity.

* Most of the incoming freshmen - 91.2 percent - are from California. Of the transfer students, 92 percent are from California schools - 5 percent of this group are international students transferring from California community colleges. An additional 5 percent are international students from abroad; and 3 percent are from out of state.

* The youngest freshman is 15 years old, the oldest new students are a 69-year-old female transfer student and a 68-year-old male transfer student.

* New students come from 53 of California's 58 counties, and nearly 80 percent of both new freshmen and transfers come from nine counties - Los Angeles, Santa Clara, Alameda, Orange, San Diego, Contra Costa, San Francisco, Sacramento and San Mateo.

* The freshmen hail from 671 different California public high schools and 186 California private schools. About 82 percent of transfer students are coming from about 100 California community colleges. However, one in four transfer from just three campuses - Diablo Valley College in Pleasant Hill, City College of San Francisco and De Anza College in Cupertino.

* Among Bay Area high schools, Oakland High and Mission San Jose in Fremont are providing the highest number of UC Berkeley freshmen. Both schools are sending 34 students to the campus. Lynbrook in San Jose is next, sending 33 students. Of the 34 students coming from Oakland High, more than half of them report their parents had no high school education and have a median parental income of $15,000.

Student fees hold steady

Fees paid by California residents have remained steady compared to last year, but overall expenses for UC Berkeley undergraduates have edged up slightly for the 2001-02 school year, reflecting the Bay Area housing market and higher energy costs.

For in-state undergraduates living in residence halls, the cost of two semesters at UC Berkeley - including educational fees, mandatory health insurance fees, room and board, books and supplies, personal expenses and transportation - is estimated at $16,926, an increase of $1, 284 over last year.

Fees are higher for the professional schools of law and business; non-resident undergraduates pay an additional $5,352 in tuition fees.

Campus housing supply holds, more units under construction

All the freshmen who requested on-campus housing have been offered spaces in the campus residence halls. In all this year, 5,183 students are housed in residence halls. Meanwhile, the campus is busy constructing apartment-style housing at College and Durant avenues to provide another 120 beds for upper division students. This is expected to be ready for occupancy for the fall 2002 semester. UC Berkeley also is developing plans to build residence hall and apartment-style housing on the south side of campus for more than 800 additional students during the next five years.

The campus also is constructing a central dining facility on the corner of Channing Way and Bowditch Street to replace two seismically deficient dining halls. The dining center, scheduled to open in early 2003, will serve students in two residence halls and also act as a community shelter in a disaster. The new dining hall will feature fresh, individually prepared meals and longer hours.

Library hours extended into evening

Students and faculty members will be able to study longer hours on Friday and Saturday nights this fall in the Doe/Moffitt library complex. Instead of closing at 5 p.m. as in past years, the two libraries - including the microcomputer lab in Moffitt - will stay open until 10 p.m.

The extended hours grew out of requests from the Associated Students of the University of California (the student government body) and faculty members. Last spring, Doe successfully experimented with keeping the library doors open past 5 p.m.

Construction continues, residence hall gets a name

In addition to constructing more places for students to live and eat, the campus continues this fall with a series of seismic safety and other improvement projects.

Major capital projects in progress include Barrows Hall, where classrooms are to be completed in spring 2002. Seismic work continues at Hildebrand and Latimer halls, Barker Hall, the Hearst Memorial Mining Building and Wurster Hall, where Ramona's Café is scheduled to reopen this fall. Construction also is underway to replace an insectary on Oxford Tract and add onto the Richard and Rhoda Goldman School of Public Policy.

Occupants of the Archaeological Research Facility have moved to a temporary location at Shorb House on the corner of Channing Way and Bowditch Street. The archaeology facility is on the site of the Zeta Psi fraternity house, built in 1876.

The retrofit of the Berkeley Art Museum will finish just in time for its reopening on Wednesday, Sept. 12. Featured will be African American sculptor Martin Puryear, nominated recently by TIME magazine as "America's best artist" and the first-ever retrospective of Korean-American conceptual artist and UC Berkeley alumna Theresa Hak Kyung Cha.

On UC Berkeley's Clark Kerr campus, an Aug. 30 ceremony will revive a tradition of naming campus residence halls after people who have made contributions to student welfare. Chancellor Berdahl will join campus dignitaries and students to formally name Maslach Hall after George and Doris Cuneo Maslach, both UC Berkeley graduates.

George Maslach, a retired dean of the College of Engineering, is known for fostering student interests in engineering. Doris Cuneo Maslach is a tireless community activist for housing and education. She helped negotiate the city/university/neighborhood agreement that led to university acquisition of the Kerr campus, and its use for student housing. Her interest in student housing issues dates back to the 1930s, when she was involved in student government and co-ops.

The Maslachs are the parents of Christina Maslach, UC Berkeley professor of psychology and the campus's vice provost for undergraduate education.

New deans, new faces

Two new deans are in place for the new school year, and a third has been named to assume a deanship next July.

P. David Pearson, a leading scholar in reading and reading assessment, is taking over the helm at the Graduate School of Education. Former dean Eugene Garcia returns to teaching. At the School of Optometry, Dennis Levi, a vision scientist comes to UC Berkeley from the University of Houston. He will be teaching and conducting research. He takes over as dean from Anthony Adams, who returns to the faculty and his research.

On July 1, 2002, in the College of Letters & Science, Mark Richards will become dean of the Division of Physical Sciences. Richards, a UC Berkeley professor and former chair of earth and planetary science, will replace Buford Price, professor of physics, who will return to the laboratory. Peter Bickel, professor of statistics, is interim dean until July.

In addition to Pearson and Levi, other new faces on campus this fall include Davitt Moroney, a renowned harpsichordist, organist and musicologist who left Paris to join the music department as a professor and university organist. Moroney earned his PhD at UC Berkeley in 1980 and as a solo concert performer recorded 50 CDs, many devoted to the music of J.S. Bach and the French musicians in the court of Louis XIV. He is the winner of three British Gramophone awards.

Moroney will teaching an introduction to Bach this fall. "The course will be very hands-on, since in class I'll be performing many works live on the harpsichord," Moroney said. "One of my aims is to communicate how modern, exciting and joyful Bach's music can be. We'll also look at why he liked coffee so much that he first performed some of his compositions in a coffee house."