THE GRADUATE SCHOOL NEWSLETTER

DECEMBER 2009

THE GRADUATE SCHOOL NEWSLETTER

Greetings from Dave Francko, Dean of the Graduate School at The University of Alabama.

Another autumn season at the Capstone is swiftly drawing to a close, and what a semester it has been! Once again, UA set a record for total graduate student enrollment (4292, up 315 from last year and more than 500 above Fall 2006), and we remain on course to reach our goal of 4250 by fall 2010 and 5250 by Fall 2013. Minority graduate student enrollments are also at record levels, including 549 African-American students. This is the 7th year in a row that African-American graduate student enrollment has set a record. Despite severe budget cuts at the state level, a record 1627 graduate students this fall are funded on a 0.5-FTE assistantship or fellowship, including a record 125 Graduate School fellows. We rolled out two groundbreaking graduate student mentoring and support programs - Tide Together and Graduate Parent Support – that are proving highly successful.

All of this added support takes money, and once again, my thanks to those of you who have made recent donations to our new Graduate Student Enrichment Fund! I know that times are tough, but even a modest gift can help close the gap in funding graduate student travel to present papers, graduate student research and other professional development needs. As I indicated in the last Newsletter, we’ve seen a 400% increase in Travel and Research Fund spending (over $295,000) and number of students funded (470) in just the past 3 years, and we anticipate another quantum jump in 2009-10 to over 500 students supported and $325,000 expended. You can always learn more about Graduate School goals and giving options at http://graduate.ua.edu/giving.html

Graduate Parent Support (GPS) Making a Difference in the Lives of Graduate Students. Kevin Johnson, a law student, along with his wife and three children, ages 2 months to 4 years, were among the many fans cheering the UA Men’s Basketball game to victory against Providence on Friday, November 20th. Kevin was able to attend thanks to a new program in the Graduate School – Graduate Parent Support – and the UA Athletic Office who donated 120 basketball tickets to GPS. Kevin explained the importance of attending the event as a family: “Attending university functions is a great way to keep the family involved with the place that is taking up so much of my time. We ate popcorn and watched the Tide Roll. Oh, and the kids love Big Al!” Research shows that graduate students with children are often an invisible minority on university campuses and often have difficulty juggling the demands of academic life and family life. The GPS program is designed to help graduate students with this balancing act by providing a centralized virtual location (http://www.gps.ua.edu/) for graduate students to find out about university, community, and state resources, network and socialize with other graduate students with children, and discuss relevant academic and personal issues.

University Scholars Program Allows Students to Earn a Baccalaureate and Master’s Degree Simultaneously. The University of Alabama has been a pioneer in offering innovative programs to facilitate gifted and highly motivated students in earning simultaneously a master’s and bachelor’s degree. Approved in 1994, The University Scholars Program allows undergraduate students with 91 or more hours and a GPA of at least a 3.3. to begin graduate study while completing their bachelor’s degree. Approximately 100 students are currently participating in one of 24 University Scholars approved programs. 

Chemistry Doctoral Students Garner National Attention. Melody Kelley and Whitney Hough brought national attention to the Capstone with their impressive work in chemistry. Melody Kelley, third-year graduate student in Chemistry, recently won two prestigious research fellowships: a UNCK-Merck and an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship. The NSF-GRF is the premier national graduate fellowship in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics) areas. Read more.

Whitney Hough, who will earn her PhD in Chemistry in 2010, not only won 2nd place and $500 in the UA’s Capstone Elevator Pitch Competition but also was featured in an article entitled “Seeking Angels” in Chemical and Engineering News (http://pubs.acs.org/cen/email/html/8735bus1.html). The article also mentioned the Alabama Institute for Manufacturing Excellence which is helping Hough’s company, PDH Technologies, raise the seed money needed to bring their product (bandages made from shrimp shells and algae) to market. See more at http://www.tuscaloosanews.com/article/20091011/news/910109934?Title=UA-scientists-146-idea-could-result-in-a-better-bandage .

UA Joins Other Alabama Universities in Sending Their Message about the Economic Impact of Graduate Education to the Rest of the Nation. Dean Francko and UAB Associate Graduate Dean Jeff Engler were invited presenters at the December 2009 Council of Graduate Deans’ annual meeting in San Francisco. They highlighted the Alabama Council of Graduate Deans’ (ACGD) effort to publicize the links between Alabama graduate education outcomes and our state’s economic development potential. Dean Francko, who chaired the ACGD this past year, showed UA’s video “How Graduate Education Builds the Knowledge Economy in Alabama” to this national audience. You can view this video at:
http://graduate.ua.edu/publications/econimpact.wmv  (Windows Media Player) of
http://graduate.ua.edu/publications/econimpact.mov  (Quicktime) .