Newsroom Stories

Currently the associate dean for students in the School of Law, he’ll begin his new position Jan. 1.

Photo by Joe AngelesHundreds gathered Dec. 3 at the Renaissance Grand Hotel to mark the success of the Campaign for Washington University.

Pratim Biswas has found a method for removing MTBE, which been detected at low levels in municipal water sources around the nation.

Researchers Rosie Koch and Stan H. Braude won an award from the Animal Behavior Society of America for their documentary, All the Trappings.

Executive pay is sometimes appropriate, often not.In a perfect business world, corporate governance and decision-making would follow sound and rational processes. And, indeed, Professor Todd Milbourn has discovered that, at times, executives are compensated appropriately and appropriate decisions are taken. This finding is from what he calls the “bright side” of his research. But, the real world can also serve up Disneys, Enrons, and WorldComs. Not all mismanagement, however, makes the front pages or drives companies into bankruptcy. More commonly it goes on unnoticed or as accepted practice, says Milbourn, associate professor of finance at the Olin School of Business at Washington University in St. Louis. His collaborative research also reveals a “dark side,” where companies reward chief executive officers simply for being lucky and where “yes men” often rule.

Salmonella entericaEvery year in developing nations, typhoid fever infects more than 16 million people and kills more than half a million. Researchers hoping to reduce this heavy toll have an important new tool: completed genomes for the two bacteria that are the leading causes of typhoid fever.

Hannah Wilke, “Intra-Venus #4, February 19, 1992,” (1992-93)Women’s bodies — nude, adorned, eroticized, abstracted — figure prominently in the history of art. Yet the art of women’s health is shockingly new. In January, the Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum at Washington University in St. Louis will present Inside Out Loud: Visualizing Women’s Health in Contemporary Art, the first major museum-level exhibition dedicated to the topic. The show tracks the emergence of women’s health in American art from the early 1980s to the present, and includes approximately 50 artworks in a variety of traditional and cutting-edge media by more than 30 internationally known artists and artists’ groups.

Alcohol and drug abuse remain the biggest problems among homeless individuals.The homeless population is changing. In the days of the Great Depression, many homeless people were victims of bad luck and a worse economy. But after studying St. Louis’ homeless population since the 1980’s, experts at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis say the problem has become more complex in recent times.

VeechTylenol, Bridgestone Firestone, Columbine High School, Exxon, McDonald’s, United Airlines, American Airlines — all of these organizations have been hit by a major crisis. Companies never know when they might be struck by a terrorist attack, a major product recall as a result of deaths or injury, workplace violence, a fire or explosion, a nasty scandal or sudden death of the company’s leader. In today’s media climate, any small or large organization can land on the front page of the daily newspaper or the six o’clock TV news before the dust has hit the ground. Business managers need to be prepared for such an eventuality with a detailed crises communication plan, says Annette Veech, senior lecturer of business communications at the Olin School of Business at Washington University.

Promoting healthy marriages in African-American communities.The Bush Administration has introduced proposals to renew Temporary Assistance for Needy Families that include spending $1.5 billion over five years to create programs with the goal of promoting marriage, reducing divorce and creating incentives for fathers to be involved in their children’s lives. “Although controversial, President Bush’s plan to make marriage promotion an explicit element of the government’s anti-poverty policy sends an urgent call to African-American faith communities to increase and expand marriage promotion and building activities within their congregations,” says Stephanie Boddie, Ph.D., a noted community development expert and assistant professor in the George Warren Brown School of Social Work at Washington University in St. Louis. “Faith leaders in the African-American community need to be aware of the current vigorous debate about the definition, purpose, jurisdiction and future of marriage under way in the United States that is influencing federal welfare policy.”