Humanities & Society

The Online College Database has named Washington University in St. Louis one of “50 Colleges Committed to Saving the Planet” in recognition of its new environmental policy major. The College Database called the major “a rigorous journey through the tangled web of politics, bureaucracies, public opinion, regulation, the global political economy, sustainability, global oil battles, climate change, genetically altered foods, air and water quality, and biochemistry.”

The Center for the Interdisciplinary Study of Work and Social Capital at Washington University School of Law is sponsoring the “Black Sexual Economies: Transforming Black Sexualities Research”conference Sept. 27-28 in the Bryan Cave Moot Courtroom in Anheuser-Busch Hall.

Deeply concerned about an “innovation deficit” that is threatening the nation’s economic growth, Chancellor Mark S. Wrighton and Timothy M. Wolfe, president of the University of Missouri System, sent a joint letter last month to Missouri’s U.S. congressional delegation urging their support in helping close this innovation gap. Wrighton and Wolfe also  joined more than 160 university presidents and chancellors in signing an open letter July 31 to President Obama and the U.S. Congress asking them to restore federal investments in higher education and research.

Students captured life on campus and abroad for WUSTL’s first summer photo contest. Winning images will be displayed in January Hall next month.

The Brown School is launching a new Public Health speaker series titled “Innovative Solutions in State and Local Agencies,” designed to help policy makers grapple with tough public health problems. All lectures are free and open to the public and will take place from noon-1 p.m. in Brown Lounge, Brown Hall. The series kicks off Wednesday, Sept. 11, with “The ‘Long Tail’ and Public Health: New Thinking For Addressing Health Disparities.”

To read the joint letter that WUSTL Chancellor Mark S. Wrighton and Timothy M. Wolfe, president of the University of Missouri System, sent last month to the 10 members of Missouri’s congressional delegation, including U.S. Rep. William L. Clay, urging their support in helping close the innovation gap, visit here.

A panel discussion, titled “Conversations on Gender and Blackness in the Age of Trayvon Martin,” will open WUSTL’s African and African-American Studies fall colloquium series at 10:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m. Friday, Sept. 6, in the Women’s Building Formal Lounge. WUSTL faculty will lead the discussion, which includes a coffee reception at 10 a.m.

Washington University media specialist Brian Cohen loved music festivals so much that he created one here in St. Louis. Loufest features indie rock’s top acts including Wilco, the Killers, Alabama Shakes and the National. This year’s event runs Sept. 7-8 in Forest Park.

Faculty and graduate students from St. Louis-area universities with an interest in labor, households, health care, law and social welfare are invited to take part in the continuing series of Monday brown-bag luncheon seminars held biweekly on the Danforth Campus beginning Monday, Sept. 9, and running through Dec. 2. All lectures take place at noon in Seigle Hall, Room 348. The series begins with a lecture by Derek Neal, PhD, professor in economics at the University of Chicago titled “Designing Accountability Systems and Incentives Schemes for Educators.”

Rob Reich, PhD, associate professor of political science at Stanford University, has been named the 2013-14 Wells Fargo Advisors Visiting Professor in Entrepreneurship by the Skandalaris Center for Entrepreneurial Studies at Washington University in St. Louis. An expert on political theory, he will make four visits to WUSTL over the course of the 2013-14 academic year.