Newsroom Stories

Alex A. Kane has been named the Dr. Joseph B. Kimbrough Chair for Pediatric Dentistry in the Washington University Department of Surgery, Division of Plastic Surgery for Use in the Cleft Palate/Craniofacial Deformities Institute for teaching and healing. Kane is associate professor of plastic and reconstructive surgery at the School of Medicine and director of the Cleft Palate and Craniofacial Institute at St. Louis Children’s Hospital.

“Financing University Education” is the focus of a free public conference to be held 6 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. April 14 in the Bryan Cave Moot Court Room. Anheuser-Busch Hall, Danforth Campus, Washington University in St. Louis.

Economic downturns test the skills of the most seasoned managers. In response to the challenges of managing during the current economic crisis, the Olin Business School at Washington University is shifting the focus of its executive education seminars. Faculty are fine-tuning their lectures and case studies to address the recession and its effect on many aspects of business.

Tutoring children in and after school isn’t new, but how much does it really help in critical areas like reading? Rigorous new research from Washington University in St. Louis shows significant gains from a national service program that trains experienced Americans to help low-income children one-on-one in urban public schools. The central finding: Over a single school year, students with Experience Corps tutors made over 60 percent more progress in learning two critical reading skills — sounding out new words and reading comprehension — than similar students not served by the program.

Chad Nackers and John Harris will take us “Inside the Onion,” — America’s Finest News Source, at 7 p.m., Thursday, April 9 in Graham Chapel. Their talk is the Neureuther Library Lecture and is co-sponsored by “WUnderground,” the University’s premiere (only) satirical newspaper. The event is part of the Assembly Series.

Two of Missouri’s top leaders in public health will speak at the George Warren Brown School of Social Work on April 10 and 13. Ronald J. Levy, director of the Mo. Department of Social Services, will close National Public Health Week with a lecture on “Building a Healthy Missouri” at noon on April 10 in Brown Hall Lounge. On April 13, Margaret Donnelly, director of the Mo. Department of Health and Senior Services, will speak about “Careers in Government” from noon to 1:30 p.m. in Brown Hall Lounge.

“‘Meetings on the Move’ is an inexpensive, easy way to improve health and productivity,” says Tim McBride, Ph.D., associate dean for public health at the George Warren Brown School of Social Work at Washington University in St. Louis. Meetings on the Move (MOTM) get employees on their feet and out of the office environment. “Forty percent of the population are absolute couch potatoes,” says Debra Haire-Joshu, Ph.D, and professor of social work at Washington University. “That’s almost a learned behavior. You learn to sit at school; you learn to sit at work. What ‘Meetings on the Move’ really does is get us active like we used to be when we were kids. We can learn then to bring activity back into our daily life, just like we learned to take it out.” Haire-Joshu also is the director of the Obesity Prevention and Policy Research Center at the Brown School. Video available.

The Kay Yow/Women’s Basketball Coaches Association Cancer Fund and The V Foundation announced that Michael Welch, Ph.D. and John-Stephen Tyler, Ph.D. received the first research grant awarded with money raised by the Kay Yow/WBCA Fund. Awarded during the NCAA Women’s Final Four weekend in St. Louis, Mo., the grant will fund a breast cancer research project at the Siteman Cancer Center at the School of Medicine and Barnes-Jewish Hospital.

Nonfiction writer and St. Louis native Nick Reding will read from his work at 8 p.m. Thursday, April 16, for Washington University’s Writing Program in Arts & Sciences. Reding is the author of The Last Cowboys at the End of the World: The Story of the Gauchos of Patagonia (2001), which explores a semi-nomadic culture that was once thought to have all put disappeared at the end of the 19th century.

Photo by Mary ButkusMarion G. Crain, J.D., was installed as the Wiley B. Rutledge Professor of Law March 30 in the Bryan Cave Moot Courtroom in Anheuser-Busch Hall.