Minkee Sohn – The Stanford Daily https://stanforddaily.com Breaking news from the Farm since 1892 Wed, 12 Feb 2014 11:40:32 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.4.3 https://stanforddaily.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/cropped-DailyIcon-CardinalRed.png?w=32 Minkee Sohn – The Stanford Daily https://stanforddaily.com 32 32 204779320 The Board of Trustees discusses tuition increase and new construction https://stanforddaily.com/2014/02/12/the-board-of-trustees-discusses-tuition-increase-and-new-construction/ https://stanforddaily.com/2014/02/12/the-board-of-trustees-discusses-tuition-increase-and-new-construction/#respond Wed, 12 Feb 2014 08:30:33 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1082286 The Stanford University Board of Trustees met on Monday and Tuesday of this week to discuss issues ranging from an increase in tuition to the construction of new facilities and housing.

The post The Board of Trustees discusses tuition increase and new construction appeared first on The Stanford Daily.

]]>
NEW.021214.trustees
AVI BAGLA/The Stanford Daily

The Stanford University Board of Trustees met on Monday and Tuesday of this week to discuss issues ranging from an increase in tuition to the construction of new facilities and housing.

The Board approved a 3.5 percent increase in undergraduate tuition for the 2014-15 academic year. Board Chair Steven Denning MBA ’78, emphasized, however, that nominal increases in the cost of tuition in recent years have largely been offset by the University’s financial aid commitments.

“Stanford’s one of the few institutions where we’ve had no real increase in net dollars over the past decade,” Denning said. “The net cost of attending Stanford, including room and board, has actually gone down five percent in real dollars over the last decade.”

The Board also heard an update on residential education from Senior Associate Vice Provost for Residential Affairs Nadeem Hussain ’90.

“[Hussain] is a ball of fire,” Denning said. “The Board was very enthusiastic about his presentation.”

Although Denning declined to discuss the exact content of Hussain’s presentation, he described a sustained commitment to the residential experience as an essential part of a Stanford education even as online learning gains traction.

“That residential element is not just where you live and eat…it’s a part of your education,” Denning said.

Last Sunday afternoon, current and former members of the Board participated in a naming ceremony for the new Donald Kennedy Graduate Residences in Escondido Village. Each of the four houses within the residence, which is named after the former president, is named for a different Stanford provost.

“We thought it was a very appropriate time to recognize those five leaders in terms of their contribution to what Stanford is today,” Denning said.

The Board also heard a presentation from Lloyd Minor, dean of the School of Medicine, on the future of Stanford medicine. According to Denning, Minor focused on discussing ways of capitalizing on the School of Medicine’s current position and means of leading the biomedical revolution.

Denning subsequently reviewed several approved construction plans, including the replacement of the current Stanford Stadium locker room facilities by a two-story field house (scheduled for completion by the 2015 season) and the addition of a parking complex by Roble (scheduled for completion by early 2016).

Denning also described new faculty housing as one of the more important construction plans for the near future. The Board approved building 180 new faculty-housing units on California Avenue, including 68 single-family units and 108 condominium flats, at this month’s meeting. All units will be available for sale.

“There’s been a lot of thought and effort put into designing the character of the adjacent college terrace area…it’s going to offer some other amenities regarding clubhouses and pools,” Denning said. “It’s an attempt to provide our faculty with appropriate housing.”

Construction is scheduled to be completed by the 2017-18 academic year, pending final approval from the City of Palo Alto later this year.

 

Contact Minkee Sohn at minkees ‘at’ stanford ‘dot’ edu.

The post The Board of Trustees discusses tuition increase and new construction appeared first on The Stanford Daily.

]]>
https://stanforddaily.com/2014/02/12/the-board-of-trustees-discusses-tuition-increase-and-new-construction/feed/ 0 1082286
46th Faculty Senate discusses BOSP offerings, MOOC courses https://stanforddaily.com/2014/01/27/46th-faculty-senate-discusses-bosp-offerings-mooc-courses/ https://stanforddaily.com/2014/01/27/46th-faculty-senate-discusses-bosp-offerings-mooc-courses/#respond Mon, 27 Jan 2014 09:22:16 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1081789 The first winter quarter meeting of the 46th Faculty Senate took place last Thursday, focusing both on future plans for the Bing Overseas Studies Program (BOSP) and on Stanford’s role in online learning.

The post 46th Faculty Senate discusses BOSP offerings, MOOC courses appeared first on The Stanford Daily.

]]>
Courtesy of Linda A. Cicero
Courtesy of Linda A. Cicero

The first winter quarter meeting of the 46th Faculty Senate took place last Thursday, focusing both on future plans for the Bing Overseas Studies Program (BOSP) and on Stanford’s role in online learning.

Bing Overseas Studies Program offerings

Ramon Saldivar, professor of English and comparative literature and director of BOSP, presented a report on the state of the program. In his report, Saldivar emphasized the importance of attracting more students to study abroad programs and discussed a focus on expanding BOSP’s offerings.

One new opportunity will be a BOSP program in Istanbul, Turkey, during winter quarter 2014-15. Unlike other quarter-length programs, Salvidar explained, the Istanbul program will not involve Stanford building its own site. Instead, Stanford will partner with the local Koç University to create a more flexible program in the Middle East.

Citing an example of BOSP’s attempts to create programs appealing to different kinds of students, Saldivar described BOSP’s four-week program on community health in Oaxaca, Mexico, which goes beyond the scope of medicine.

“The focus of this program is community health,” Salvidar said. “But really the question the seminar asks is this: What does it take to create a community that can be called healthy?”

Seventy students applied for the 15-slot Oaxaca program, and BOSP responded to the high demand by adding a preparatory course in spring quarter in order to enrich the seminar experience. Saldivar described plans to experiment with running two parallel Oaxaca courses in the future.

Saldivar also discussed the value of internships, which offer additional opportunities to students studying abroad.

“Internship programs also represent for us a pathway to the future,” Saldivar said. “This is something that I think we can develop further.”

Other future plans for BOSP that Saldivar discussed included expansion of the Cape Town program to three quarters and collaborative efforts with the School of Engineering for programs in China and India.

In answer to a question from Debra Satz, senior associate dean for the Humanities and Arts, Salvidar stated that BOSP has been working with faculty to blend the curricular experience on campus with overseas experiences as seamlessly as possible. However, the connection between curriculum and experience would benefit from continued improvement and a formal structure.

“[We want] a sequence there, rather than just a randomness,” Salvidar said. “It’s tricky, it’s hard to do, and it doesn’t always work.”

Stanford’s role in online learning

After the discussion on BOSP, President John Hennessy introduced an online learning panel held by Associate Professor of Education Mitchell Stevens, Director of the Open Learning Initiative Candace Thille and Vice Provost for Online Learning John Mitchell. This panel focused on massive open online courses (MOOCs), which could potentially offer higher education to anyone with Internet access.

In introducing the panel, Hennessy discussed the role of MOOC development at Stanford, prioritizing the importance of using online learning technologies to improve the experiences of Stanford students on campus.

“One area I’m particularly excited about is…using technology to study the effects of our pedagogy,” Hennessy said. “Online technology could be a significant enhancement in terms of figuring out how our students are mastering courses, and improving our pedagogy at a much more rapid rate.”

He added that MOOCs could extend Stanford’s reach to students overseas and facilitate access to high education for a wider range of people in terms of affordability and accessibility.

Stevens discussed the rising cost of higher education and its increasing burden on students and their families.

“There’s a reason people are thinking about college educations as consumer products,” Stevens said. “They’re literally mortgaging their own futures to pay for college.”

Stevens described continuing advances in digital media as allowing MOOCs to dramatically increase access to higher education.

“I am convinced we are at an epochal, pivotal moment in the history of higher education,” Stevens said. “This is a different kind of change.”

Mitchell discussed implications of MOOCs for teachers spreading their knowledge.

“We’ve all taught to classrooms full of students and enjoyed the rock star feeling of being in front of a crowd,” Mitchell said. “But that’s nothing compared to reaching tens of thousands of people with your vision of the field.”

Mitchell discussed Stanford’s MOOC program as a method of creating more courses in electrical engineering, English and core biology subjects. Future strategic directions for the MOOC program include partnering with other institutions and becoming a hub of experimentation in the field.

However, Raymond Levitt M.S. ‘73 Ph.D. ‘75, professor of civil and environmental engineering, pointed out that some institutions of higher learning could be threatened or even eliminated if materials made by top-tier universities dominated the market.

“Our hope is that…we’re humble and recognize the organizational diversity of American education in and of itself,” Stevens said in response. “[Our] goal isn’t to close other universities, but to add value to that ecosystem.”

Andrea Goldsmith, professor in the School of Engineering, asked the panel to predict what the greatest successes and failures of the MOOC experiment would be 10 years in the future.

Stevens responded that there is no future alternative to MOOCs.

“It’s not an experiment,” Stevens said. “It’s a new reality…there’s no turning back.”

Contact Minkee Sohn at minkees ‘at’ stanford ‘dot’ edu.

The post 46th Faculty Senate discusses BOSP offerings, MOOC courses appeared first on The Stanford Daily.

]]>
https://stanforddaily.com/2014/01/27/46th-faculty-senate-discusses-bosp-offerings-mooc-courses/feed/ 0 1081789
US-China summit returns after year-long hiatus https://stanforddaily.com/2013/11/12/us-china-summit-returns-after-year-long-hiatus/ https://stanforddaily.com/2013/11/12/us-china-summit-returns-after-year-long-hiatus/#respond Tue, 12 Nov 2013 10:32:13 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1080407 The annual Forum for American-Chinese Exchange at Stanford (FACES) summit returned this past weekend after a year of inactivity due to many group members graduating.

The post US-China summit returns after year-long hiatus appeared first on The Stanford Daily.

]]>
The annual Forum for American-Chinese Exchange at Stanford (FACES) summit returned this past weekend after a year of inactivity due to many group members graduating.

The “On Common Ground” (OCG) summit-held on campus from Nov. 7 to 10-brought together 50 students from the United States and Chinese universities to promote trust and understanding between the two countries.

Isabella Fu ’15, co-president of FACES, discussed the value of person-to-person interaction in human relationships, and described the summit as a dynamic environment to facilitate this interaction.

Courtesy of Isabella Yunfei Fu
Courtesy of Isabella Yunfei .

“We are aiming to cultivate future leaders in the U.S. and China,” Fu said. “[OCG is] inspiring young people and helping them understand different perspectives from the other side of the ocean.”

Fu went on to describe the importance of mutual understanding in the bilateral relations between the U.S. and China.

“The people of these countries have a very disheartening misunderstanding of each other,” Fu said. “I think most people would agree that it’s very important for these countries to come together.”

Hao Yi Ong ’14, co-president of FACES, described the summit as a way to form long-term cooperative networks between future U.S. and Chinese leaders, and emphasized that the responsibility to create and maintain those relationships lay in the hands of conference delegates.

“Whatever they get out of [the conference] is really how much they want to put it in terms of networking,” Ong said. “Networking at the level where they’re at and where they’re likely to become future leaders…that’s where the real added value is going to take place.”

Henness Leung, a student from the University of Hong Kong attending the conference, also saw the importance of the face-to-face communication facilitated by the conference.

“The media may be biased, especially in the case of China,” Leung said. “Communication between delegates is the most direct channel to clarify misconceptions.”

This year’s summit speakers included keynote speaker John L. Holden, former president of the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations, and Hans Tung, a Chinese venture capitalist ranked No. 100 on the 2013 Forbes Midas list.

After attending OCG, delegates shared their conference experiences.

Will Yale, a graduate student from the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies, described networking as the most important part of the conference.

“[I enjoyed] the socializing-getting to know a lot of well-informed and committed people,” Yale said. “The people and the interaction between students was the most important part of the conference.”

Yi Tao Zhang ’14 M.S. ’14 also shared what he learned in the conference.

“My biggest takeaway…was the role of innovation in elevating China into a First World country,” Zhang said.

Ong described several changes to this year’s OCG conference, the most visible being scheduling.

In order to accommodate schedule conflicts with events like graduations, the Stanford portion of the conference took place during fall instead of spring. The closing summit will be in China in April 2014.

Another major change to OCG this year was an increased involvement of FACES student officers in the conference.

“We’re trying to get our officers to do a lot more,” Ong said. “For example, we have a liaison officer program where we personally attach one officer to one speaker, so they have that personal connection.”

Fu said that the summit did not take place last year due to logistical reasons, since a significant portion of FACES graduated in the Class of 2012.

“We didn’t have a conference last year because all our officers happened to be very young-they were freshmen, sophomores,” Fu said. “It would be hard for us to start a conference only with people who have not gone through it.”

However, Ong said that the yearlong gap between conferences helped FACES to regroup and rethink its strategy, eventually hosting a one-day symposium event last year instead of a conference.

“[The gap year] gave us time to think, look at certain priorities and boost our campus programming,” Ong said. “Having a stronger on-campus presence, partly through our symposium, should continue this year.”

Moving forward, Fu and Ong said that they expect the summit to continue regularly on an annual basis.

“This year we really placed an emphasis on recruiting…Now we have a lot of freshmen,” Fu said. “When we graduate, there will be people who can keep running the conference.”

Fu and Ong said goals for future summits include strengthening the accessibility of the event on campus. Ong discussed efforts to increase the number of Stanford delegates participating in the conference and to reach out to a broader audience.

“My idea is that undergraduates need to know about this [experience] from the very start,” Ong said. “It’s important for undergrads to get on board.”

Ong added that he is confident in the ability of future summits to create greater understanding between the U.S. and China.

“It’s basically the milestone effort of FACES every year,” Ong said. “It may change a little in character, but not in its mission.”

Contact Minkee Kim Sohn at minkees ‘at’ stanford.edu.

The post US-China summit returns after year-long hiatus appeared first on The Stanford Daily.

]]>
https://stanforddaily.com/2013/11/12/us-china-summit-returns-after-year-long-hiatus/feed/ 0 1080407
Q&A: William Newsome, director of interdisciplinary neuroscience institute https://stanforddaily.com/2013/10/17/qa-william-newsome-director-of-new-interdisciplinary-neuroscience-institute/ https://stanforddaily.com/2013/10/17/qa-william-newsome-director-of-new-interdisciplinary-neuroscience-institute/#respond Thu, 17 Oct 2013 09:41:39 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1079487 William Newsome, a professor of neurobiology and director of Bio-X NeuroVentures, began directing a new interdisciplinary neuroscience institute last spring. The Daily sat down with Newsome to discuss his experience as director thus far and his new fundraising and expansion goals for the institute.

The post Q&A: William Newsome, director of interdisciplinary neuroscience institute appeared first on The Stanford Daily.

]]>
            William Newsome, a professor of neurobiology and director of Bio-X NeuroVentures, began directing a new interdisciplinary neuroscience institute last spring. The Daily sat down with Newsome to discuss his experience as director thus far and his new fundraising and expansion goals for the institute. 

The Stanford Daily (TSD): Can you describe the overarching purpose of the institute?

William Newsome (WN): The overarching purpose is to create a campus-wide community of scholarship in the neurosciences. We want to further basic discovery about the brain and how the brain makes our mental lives possible. We want to use that basic discovery to enhance human health in medicine and also to enhance human education and to apply knowledge in law and business and the social sciences. We feel the social sciences and the professional schools have much to offer for neuroscience, and that any science that deals with human behavior sets out phenomena that we want to understand from the point of view of the brain.

Courtesy
Courtesy of William Newsome

TSD: What are your duties as director of the institute?

WN: As the director, I have a duty to sort of increase the neuroscience activity on three strategic interfaces. One interface is with engineering, mathematics, physics and quantitative sciences. Another big strategic interface is for chemical biology and with molecular and cell biology and with chemistry. A third key strategic interface is the social sciences and the school of law, the school of education and the school of business.

So what I, as director, am doing is trying to create new relationships and new collaborative research projects across these interfaces. We’re trying to engage in fundraising so that we can have seed grants for collaborative research projects that involve both neuroscientists and collaborators in one of these three strategic interfaces, and try to start interdisciplinary research projects between people that might not normally ever work together. And we believe that by doing that, we’ll bring people together who will ask questions about the brain and behavior that have never been asked before. And so I’m all about catalyzing those relationships.

So I’ve got a big job here to do. I’ve got fundraising to do, I’ve got community building to do, and I’ve got leadership in trying to start all of these programs that we’d like to start.

 

TSD: How have you seen the collaborative nature of the institute panning out? Can you give a specific example of collaboration in the institute between members of different departments?

WN: One example I can give you is a collaboration between Professor Krishna Shenoy, who is in the department of electrical engineering, and Professor Jaimie Henderson, who is in the department of neurosurgery. Henderson and Shenoy have started major collaboration that seeks to take new discoveries out of engineering and basic neuroscience and use those new discoveries to treat people with motor disease more effectively.

They have recently implanted their first electro-chip in a human patient who is paralyzed. This electro-chip grabs signals out of the human motor cortex and sends those signals to an external computer. This external computer decodes the movement that the patient has been thinking about and then uses that decoded signal to guide the cursor on a screen. So the person, even though they’re mostly paralyzed, can use that cursor to open e-mail, answer e-mail, compose messages and draw little things, just by thinking about what they want to do. And this is a really dramatic example of the novel kinds of things that can happen when Stanford faculty reaches across disciplines and really work creatively to use basic neuroscience to address real-world, practical problems.

 

TSD: How do you see the future of the institute? What are the next steps you believe should be taken?

WN: We have quite a few specific plans. The University president and provost have established as a goal that we will raise $175 million to start new campus-wide programs in neuroscience. We will hire 10 faculty [members] over the next seven years, and we will build a new building that will house the new neuroscience institute and the new chemical biology institute.

What we want to do at the institute level is simply set some general guidelines and some general directions. But what we really want to do is enable the faculty and students to pursue their greatest and most creative dreams. We all want to do things that will teach us really deep things about where the human mind comes from, where thought comes from, where creativity comes from. Everywhere you look there are mysteries about the brain. We want to catalyze really excellent research that addresses these mysteries. The institute is motivated by fundamental research and curiosity, but with the conviction that it’s going to have broad impact all over the University and throughout society.

 

This interview has been condensed and edited.

 Contact Minkee Sohn at minkees@stanford.edu.

The post Q&A: William Newsome, director of interdisciplinary neuroscience institute appeared first on The Stanford Daily.

]]>
https://stanforddaily.com/2013/10/17/qa-william-newsome-director-of-new-interdisciplinary-neuroscience-institute/feed/ 0 1079487
EPASA tutoring goes beyond the classroom https://stanforddaily.com/2013/10/14/epasa-tutoring-goes-beyond-the-classroom/ https://stanforddaily.com/2013/10/14/epasa-tutoring-goes-beyond-the-classroom/#respond Mon, 14 Oct 2013 09:53:18 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1079392 The East Palo Alto Stanford Academy (EPASA), a long-standing organization of the Haas Center’s Education Partnerships program, has undergone significant changes since its inception in 1986 with new offerings in store.

The post EPASA tutoring goes beyond the classroom appeared first on The Stanford Daily.

]]>
The East Palo Alto Stanford Academy (EPASA), a long-standing organization of the Haas Center’s Education Partnerships program, has undergone significant changes since its inception in 1986 with new offerings in store.

Courtesy of Dominique Mikell.
Courtesy of Dominique Mikell.

Over the past 27 years, EPASA has been pairing Stanford tutors with seventh and eighth-grade students from the Ravenswood City School District to provide weekly tutoring in topics such as math and writing for one to two years.

EPASA Director Theresa Metz said that beyond the academic tutoring, the program fosters more personal relationships with the middle-schoolers and their families. Aiming to maximize the students’ education, the program has also established working relationships with the principals and teachers of the schools the children attend.

These key relationships build the strong “sense of connectedness and community” that Metz sees as a unique quality for the program.
Amika Guillaume, principal of Cesar Chavez & Green Oaks Academy appreciates Stanford’s dedication to the local schools.

“[Workers at EPASA] invest in our students over time,” she said. “We value their partnership.”

During a tutor orientation on Oct. 6, administrators from the Haas Center discussed the objectives of EPASA with tutors volunteering for the program.

EPASA aims to strengthen its focus on community connectedness by developing a greater degree of commitment on the part of Stanford tutors and better communicate what the program’s needs are to those involved.

Co Tran ’17, a freshman tutor for EPASA, said that she was involved because seventh grade was rather a pivotal year for her, especially because she felt people took interest in her academic career. She added that EPASA middle-schoolers are at a time in their lives during which they decide the kind of person they are going to be.

Improvement in EPASA revolves around a core question, according to Metz: How can EPASA provide this opportunity to more people?
EPASA plans to launch a concerted effort to involve Stanford students in activities other than tutoring and mentoring, such as organizing lunch and teaching electives. EPASA will also invite previous tutors to continue building relationships with the EPASA alumni.
The changes in EPASA reflect a wider pattern as the Haas Center’s Education Partnerships programs collectively adjust to changing needs in education.

As STEM fields play increasing roles in society, Metz discussed a growing interest in fields such as computer science, which EPASA now offers electives for.

According to Kelly Beck, director for education partnerships, the staff is very excited about this year’s launch of Preschool Counts, a math literacy program designed for students in early childhood. The Haas Center also offers the Science in Service program, providing youth with what Beck called “hands-on discovery in science.”

According to Metz, the Haas Center’s Education Partnerships’ early programs aim to create a sturdy basis for children on their paths to higher education, and participation in EPASA enables teenager to make smarter choices later on about their academics in high school.
“All our programs are the puzzle pieces that fit together for our efforts in education,” Metz said.

Contact Minkee Sohn at minkees ‘at’ stanford.edu.

The post EPASA tutoring goes beyond the classroom appeared first on The Stanford Daily.

]]>
https://stanforddaily.com/2013/10/14/epasa-tutoring-goes-beyond-the-classroom/feed/ 0 1079392