In a pair of 30-second video spots, University mascot YoUDee dons Western duds to promote the Code of the Web, an educational initiative designed to raise awareness and ease the problems of bandwidth abuse and copyright infringement. Sheriff YoUDee urges students, faculty and staff to play by the rules of responsible computing. The spots are airing on UD's cable system and will be aired as part of weekend film showings on campus.

Kudos for Mentors' Circle

While officially dedicated to honor teaching excellence, Mentors' Circle has won professional recognition as well. The Delaware Nursery and Landscape Association (DNLA) named it as a winner of its 2002 Landscape Award in recognition of design excellence, plant selection and installation of an outstanding landscape. Tom Taylor, UD landscape engineer, designed and supervised construction of Mentors' Circle and accepted the award on behalf of the University.

Mentors' Circle, dedicated in the fall of 2001, has received rave reviews from faculty, staff, alumni and visitors to the UD campus. Located between Hullihen Hall, Morris Library and Memorial Hall, and formerly the site of a parking lot, Mentors' Circle honors the best faculty traditions at UD.

As members of the UD community and guests to campus traverse the area, they can view a series of engraved bricks that bear the names of individuals who have been honored with Excellence-in-Teaching and Excellence-in-Advising awards dating from 1960.

Dr. Francis Alison, founder of the institution that is now the University of Delaware, also is honored on a pair of bronze plaques placed at the entrance gates to the circle.

Three-day Beckett Festival planned for October

An English actress and a French director who are among the world's foremost interpreters of the works of Samuel Beckett will be featured at a three-day festival celebrating the Nobel Prize-winning author, scheduled Oct. 9-11, at the Newark campus.

UD's Samuel Beckett Festival will include performances by Billie Whitelaw, pre-eminent actress and acclaimed stage interpreter of Beckett's plays, and by actorand director Pierre Chabert.

Ruby Cohn, doyenne of Beckett scholars and professor emerita of English at the University of California at Davis, will present a keynote address, and panel discussions on criticism, translation and performance by noted Beckett scholars are scheduled.

In conjunction with the festival, an exhibit will highlight the University of Delaware Library's Sir Joseph Gold Samuel Beckett Collection, and filmed Beckett works will be screened. For details on all events, visit the web site at [www.English.udel.edu/beckett].

Widely regarded as one of the most important and influential writers of the 20th century, Beckett (1906-89) was born in Dublin and educated at Trinity College. In the 1930s, he emerged as a writer of note in Paris, where he met and was influenced by James Joyce. In 1953, his play En attendant Godot opened to acclaim in Paris. Productions in London and New York brought him international recognition and secured his reputation as a writer of significance. In 1969, he received the Nobel Prize in literature "for his writing, which in new forms for the novel and drama­in the destitution of modern man acquires its elevation."

The Samuel Beckett Festival is sponsored by the Delaware Division of the Arts, the Delaware Humanities Forum and the UD Library Associates, as well as the University.

Take a tour of marine studies labs

Anyone interested in the ocean or curious about the research being conducted at the College of Marine Studies can take
a free tour of the college's facilities at the Hugh R. Sharp Campus in Lewes this summer.

Tours are offered by trained guides every Friday morning beginning at 10:30 a.m. through August. To join a tour, call (302) 645-4346 no later than noon the preceding day to reserve a place. Group tours also can be scheduled.

Each tour begins with a 20-minute introductory video that highlights many research activities. Viewers are transported from the beaches of Delaware Bay, where scientists collect data to assess the status of the horseshoe crab population, to the remote sensing labs in Newark where satellite technology is used to monitor and predict El Niño. A one-hour walking tour follows, including visits to laboratories in Cannon and Smith laboratories where most of the oceanography and marine biology-biochemistry research is conducted.

Visitors can learn about research on blue crabs, oysters and fish, salt water plants and extreme marine environments, including the ice-covered seas of Antarctic and hydrothermal vent sites a mile deep within the ocean.

UD faculty honored for teaching, advising

Winners of the Excellence-in-Teaching Award are (front row) Lesa Griffiths, professor of animal and food sciences,
and Lawrence Nees Jr., professor of art history, and (back row) James Scarborough, associate professor of bioresources engineering, and Harris Ross, professor of English. The awards, presented during Honors Day, held throughout the campus on May 9, are sponsored by the Christian R. and Mary F. Lindback Foundation and the University Alumni Association and are based primarily on student evaluations.

The Excellence-in-Advising Award, presented to two faculty members, is given to emphasize the importance of Undergraduate academic advising, to recognize and reward excellent faculty advisers and to encourage faculty to devote more time and attention to becoming effective advisers. This year's recipients are Stephanie Wolbert, instructor in education, (left) and Connie Vickery, professor of nutrition and dietetics. Awardees are selected by the Faculty Senate Committee on Student and Faculty Honors.

New joint AA degree

Beginning in September 2004, an associate in arts (AA) degree will be offered by the University of Delaware in partnership with Delaware Technical & Community College.

The new, two-year degree program builds upon the success of the Parallel Program and will increase higher education opportunities statewide for Delaware residents.

Students entering the associate in arts program will be matriculated for a UD degree from the outset of their enrollment. The program will offer the first 60 credits of a UD bachelor of arts degree on Delaware Tech's Georgetown, Dover and Wilmington campuses. All students who complete these 60 credits will earn a UD associate in arts degree, and the earned degree will guarantee eligibility to continue study for a UD baccalaureate degree. All AA coursework will count fully toward a baccalaureate degree.

Associate in arts students may choose from more than 20 academic tracks leading to expedited and uninterrupted progress in pursuing particular majors for the baccalaureate degree on the Newark campus.

Inuit art and culture exhibit opens in fall

Land of Ice, Hearts of Fire: Inuit Art and Culture," will open Sept. 10, at the University of Delaware Gallery. On exhibit will be the University's collection of rare Canadian Inuit drawings from the Frederick and Lucy S. Herman Native American Art Collection, as well as related artifacts and archival materials from Alaskan Yup'ik villages from the Harley and Mabel McKeague Collection of Alaskan Inuit Art.

Until recently, Inuit were a semi-nomadic people who roamed from British Columbia to the Arctic Circle. Although known as carvers of whalebone and soapstone, it was not until the late 1940s and early 1950s that Canadian Inuit were introduced to the concept of drawing.

Drawing, as it is understood in a Western sense, did not exist in Inuit culture until it was introduced by Canadian Northern Services Officer James Houston in 1949 as a "make work" project of the Canadian government. This project encouraged the development of native art forms as a way to bring economic growth and financial stability to Inuit communities. In 1959, Houston and his first wife, Alma, helped establish the West Baffin Eskimo Co-op at Cape Dorset as a vehicle to help sell Inuit works of art.

The success of Inuit art and artists has influenced the evolution of the Inuit from a semi-nomadic culture to a political entity in contemporary Canadian society.

On April 1, 1999, the Canadian government officially recognized Nunavut, home of the Inuit, as a newly formed territory. Nunavut means "our land" and its birth represents the first time Canadian boundaries had been redrawn since 1949, demonstrating the respect and success the Inuit gained during the second half on the 20th century.

The UD exhibit, planned in observance of the concluding year of the United Nation's International Decade of the World's Indigenous People (1994-2004) and the 50th anniversary of the first Inuit art exhibition in the United States, will be on display through Dec. 14. It is sponsored by the University Gallery and the UD Center for American Material Culture Studies.

Webcast reviews curbs on high-risk drinking

The environmental or policy approach to high-risk drinking, where universities and communities join forces to deal with the problem, was the topic of a national webcast, originating June 11 from East Hall on the Newark campus.

A Matter of Degree (AMOD): The National Effort to Reduce High-Risk Drinking Among College Students, the webcast featured a panel of university representatives from AMOD institutions, who shared their experiences, successes and challenges in involving the community in partnerships to implement change. Approximately 500 persons and institutions tuned in to the live webcast.

Moderated by Ralph Begleiter, Rosenberg Professor of Communication at UD and former CNN world affairs correspondent, the panel included Tracy Bachman, program director of the UD-City of Newark's Building Responsibility Coalition; Lisa Erk, former national communications director of AMOD; Philip Jones, dean of students and vice president of student services at the University of Iowa in Iowa City; Linda Major, project director of NU Directions at the University of Nebraska/Lincoln; and Richard Yoast, director of the American Medical Association office that administers AMOD.

During the webcast, President David P. Roselle said that the University of Delaware was more highly regarded for taking responsibility and intervening in high-risk drinking and its possible consequences of illness, injury or even death. He said one result of the AMOD program is that there is a marked decrease in vandalism on campus and in the community.

Yoast pointed out that 44 percent of college students engage in binge drinking, putting themselves and others at risk, and that 1,400 student deaths per year are caused by alcohol.

Bachman spoke about making UD fraternities and sororities more accountable and working in the community where the problems exist--house parties and alcohol-licensed establishments. She spoke about student participation in the program and the importance of their input in planning nonalcoholic events and using grant money to sponsor them.

Mentors commended