The gifts, in the form of cash, payroll, equipment and in-kind services, support the firm’s core interests in music, multimedia, and computer science and technical training.

State-of-the-art Sony equipment valued at $25,000 will be installed in music classrooms and studios for use by current students and faculty members. Sony will provide about $2,500 of in-kind services to produce and distribute a Music CD-ROM for use in recruiting new student and faculty musicians.

Audiences at the just-concluded Oregon Bach Festival heard polished performances by the Youth Choral Academy, thanks to Sony’s sponsorship of the music education program. The firm will provide $2,500 of replication services for the academy’s CD and $7,500 of digital authoring services for the festival’s CD.

Library Media Services will receive a donation of Sony cameras, camcorders, projectors, monitors and production cameras.

Five $2,400 internships, split between UO and Sony work sites, will support the multimedia design program. Another $2,000 paid for sponsorship of this spring’s "Animation Explosion!" exposition of art and journalism student work.

In addition, the Computing Center will receive $7,500 of in-kind services to produce the annual DuckWare CD for distribution of software to UO faculty, staff and students this fall. Sony will provide the sleeve and 15,000 discs in Macintosh and PC formats.

The Erb Memorial Union will get $2,000 of technical assistance in designing a multi-use, high-tech meeting room.

"Sony Disc Manufacturing is proud to partner with the University of Oregon on so many levels. Working together, we can provide opportunities for students, teachers and graduates to apply their knowledge and talents and ensure a healthy local economy for the long term," says Thomas Costabile, senior vice president for operations in Springfield.

The firm’s generosity is the outcome of a new, coordinated approach to fund raising that UO officials hope will set a new course for campus units as they seek future support from Sony and other corporate and foundation donors.

"By combining requests from several campus programs into a single funding proposal, we’re able to streamline the process for all while addressing the needs of the recipients and aligning the mutual goals and priorities of the donor and the university," says Susan E. Plass, Development director of corporate and foundation relations.

She says consolidating requests means that campus programs are more likely to get the support they seek, and donors only have to deal with one proposal that targets their interests, furthers their objectives and fits with their philanthropic cycle.

Requests for 2001—2002 to Sony Disc Manufacturing are being processed, and recipients will be announced this fall, Plass says. Deadline to submit the 2002—2003 proposal will be next spring. For details and more information, call 6-2166.

Opened in 1995, Sony Disc Manufacturing in Springfield is Sony’s newest digital optical disc manufacturing facility. The state-of-the-art plant employs 400 people and operates 24-hours a day to produce up to 12 million discs per month. As the world’s largest producer of prerecorded optical discs, Sony offers high-quality products and services to serve education, entertainment and information industries.

•You get the most energy savings when you manually switch off lights every time you leave an area. Turn off lights when you leave a room. Flip off the light switch at night, or during lunch and when out of your work area. Turn lights off after business hours. Turn on only the lights in occupied work areas. If you get to work early or work after regular hours, use only the lights you need. Reduce work area lighting. The human eye is highly adaptable to reduced lighting levels. Lights near windows can often be completely off during the day.

As the final whispered prayer of the "Libera Me" from Verdi’s Requiem dispersed into silence in Silva Hall, the 2001 Oregon Bach Festival was delivered into history July 8. But not before producing wonderful music, near-record crowds and ticket sales, and some surprises.

Musically, this year’s festival was a success, says Helmuth Rilling, artistic director and conductor.

"The artistic level was very high," Rilling said, following the closing performance. "We were able to show opposite sides of a musical spectrum, from the Requiems of Brahms and Verdi to music by Bobby McFerrin."

Rilling also was pleased with the level of audience interest.

"At each concert it was clear to see their enthusiasm and appreciation," he said.

Moreover, audience support was visible at the box office. With ticket sales of nearly $400,000, the festival exceeded its sales goals for the fifth straight season. Paid concert admissions were 20,780, and total attendance, including free concerts and educational programs, numbered more than 33,500. Both figures were near the record highs set in 2000.

Ticket buyers came from 34 states and Canadian provinces as well as from Germany, Denmark and Japan. Out-of-town audience members represented 23 percent of ticket buyers.

On stage, participating artists came from across the United States and Canada, Germany, France, England, Paraguay, Japan, Korea, Russia, Finland and the Netherlands. They were part of the festival’s 34-concert lineup that spanned 17 days.

Among the artistic highlights:

• The opening night performance of the Messa per Rossini, the collaborative composition led by Verdi which served to compare what Rilling called "the good schoolwork" of Verdi’s colleagues with the genius of his own Requiem. Audience members, thrilled by the dynamic soprano Amanda Mace, were thanked with fragrant roses as they left the concert hall.

• The last-minute heroics of tenor Mark Beudert, Music, in the Verdi Requiem, called in at 11 a.m. for a 4 p.m. performance when Vinson Cole fell ill. Beudert was "adept, confident, and very appealing, equal to the demands of his part," according to James McQuillen of The Register-Guard. Beudert had first come to national attention when he assumed the role of Frederic in the New York Shakespeare Festival’s production of The Pirates of Penzance with 25-minutes notice and no rehearsal.

• Trumpeter Guy Few’s ease and polish in performing the solo in Brandenburg Concerto No. 2 and his encore performance requested by Rilling preceding the following day’s Discovery Series performance of Bach’s Magnificat.

• Bobby McFerrin’s energizing appearance with the Festival Youth Choral Academy, one of 10 sell-outs. The academy’s 80 high-school singers also performed under Rilling in the German Requiem.

• Debut concerts by the Festival Baroque Ensemble, a period instrument group led by Kenneth Slowik of the Smithsonian that promises to become an Intimate Evenings series fixture in Beall Hall.

• Three major requiems, which showcased the flexibility of Kathy Romey’s Festival Chorus in handling the subtleties of Fauré, the intensely personal convictions of Brahms and the theatricality of Verdi.

• Helmuth Rilling announcing his intent to continue as the festival’s artistic leader for "years to come" at various functions over the course of the event, including the public "Let’s Talk" session on July 6.

Rilling and Saltzman also announced preliminary programs for the 33rd festival, June 28—July 14, 2002. The schedule will include Bach’s Mass in B Minor, a new Mendelssohn recording project beginning with Symphony No. 1, Bach’s Christmas Oratorio as the focus of the Discovery Series of lecture-concerts, and an encore of the festival’s Grammy Award-winning premiere of Credo by Krzysztof Penderecki.

Now, University of Oregon violence prevention researchers are gearing up to manage the new Oregon Center for School Safety, which was established by HB 3429. The center will be housed permanently at the UO Institute on Violence and Destructive Behavior (IVDB).

"Schools and agencies that deal with school safety are looking for single points of contact in each state for data, analysis and technical training," says Jeff Sprague, IVDB co-director.

The Center for School Safety measure allows the UO institute to work with schools and communities in developing long-term plans to address school safety and student discipline. The center will serve as a point of information, data analysis, research and technical assistance for schools and communities.

A 15-member board, set to convene this fall, will govern the center and oversee development of its plan to assess school safety and discipline. The center will give annual reports on the status of school safety to the governor, attorney general, State Board of Education and state legislature.

One of the center’s key efforts will be to streamline the process schools go through to report incidents of violence or rule infractions by students. Such data is crucial in assessing school safety and addressing problem areas. Schools already must file reports with several federal agencies in a complex system that Sprague says can deter accurate reporting. The center will work to develop software and an online system for reporting to make the process more efficient for school personnel.

"We are interested in seeing whether we can get more accurate incident data with a more technologically sophisticated way for schools to report," says Sprague.

The new center also will work with individual districts to develop their school safety plans, which are required under HB 3429. For school districts, Sprague likens the process of developing a safety plan to ordering from an extensive but indecipherable menu at an ethnic restaurant.

"There is so much information available, and schools don’t always know what to do with it," he says. "This centralized resource will be a good development for Oregon’s schools."

Sprague was the key writer of "How Safe Are Oregon Schools? Status and Recommendations," a report released last March by the Attorney General’s School/Community Safety Coalition. Oregon Attorney General Hardy Meyers formed the coalition of more than 30 education, emergency services, mental health and other specialists after the 1998 shootings at Thurston High School in Springfield.

In the report, the coalition recommended a number of measures that schools can take to create safer environments for learning. Among its suggestions were improving school security and building design to discourage crime; implementing measures to discourage bullying and harassing behavior that often leads to violence; and establishing the state school safety center.

Oregon’s center is modeled after Kentucky’s, which, ironically, was being considered by lawmakers there in 1997 when a school shooting in West Paducah left three dead and five wounded.

"That is definitely not the way you want to get bills passed or funded," says Sprague, while acknowledging that tragedies such as those in Springfield and West Paducah tend to mobilize public sentiment and government resources toward finding solutions.

The Center for School Safety, officially established within the Department of Higher Education, will be funded through public and private contributions. It will build on $75,000 in seed money provided by the Hamilton Fish Institute on School and Community Violence, which has a goal of making Oregon’s center a national model.

"We plan to leverage that money fully and turn this into something bigger," says Sprague.

Along with the school safety center bill, Kitzhaber signed two other bills aimed at preventing school violence: HB 3403, which requires every Oregon school district to implement an anti-bullying policy; and HB 3647, which establishes a statewide hotline for reporting school-related crimes or suspicious activities. The hotline also will be managed through the Center for School Safety.

Placement of the Center for School Safety at the UO reflects the IVDB’s statewide and national reputation as a leader in violence prevention. Since its inception in 1995 as a research arm of Education, the IVDB has documented effective early intervention strategies. Professors of education, psychology, sociology, law, philosophy, architecture and planning, public policy and management bring broad expertise to the institute’s research efforts.

Mike Bellotti, Athletics, received the Blue Heron Destination Award during the Convention and Visitors Association of Lane County Oregon’s annual appreciation dinner in May. The head football coach was recognized for his efforts in promoting Lane County to recruits, as well as for leading a program that has been a catalyst for generating national awareness about Eugene and Lane County.

Peter Briggs, Admissions, has been elected to the European Council of International Schools Americas Committee. He will begin a three-year term in June on the panel that promotes global educational activities and advises the council’s Office of the Americas.

Monte Westerfield, Biology, has received a Humboldt Research Award for Senior U.S. Scientists in recognition of his past achievements in research. The award offers the opportunity for an extended research stay in Germany.

Bev Smith, Athletics, is the sole inductee this year into the Canadian Basketball Hall of Fame. The native of Salmon Arm, British Columbia, who became the Ducks’ fifth women’s basketball coach on July 2, will be inducted Oct. 13 at Almonte, Ontario, birthplace of basketball founder James Naismith. Smith, who played for the Ducks from 1978—82, holds eight school records and is the only UO woman to receive Kodak All-America honors (1981 and 1982).

Recipients of Humanities Center Research Fellowships for 2001—2002 are Barbara S. Andrew, Philosophy; Elizabeth A. Bohls, Gordon M. Sayre and Mary Elene Wood, all English; Alexandra Bonds, Theatre Arts; Steve Larson and Marian Smith, both Music; Carol Silverman, Anthropology; and Mónica Szurmuk, Romance Languages. Alternates are Jon McVey Erlandson, Anthropology, and Amalia Gladhart, Romance Languages.

Dean Rennard Strickland, Law, has announced his intention not to seek another five-year term as dean when his first term in that post ends in 2002. Following a one-year sabbatical leave, Strickland, 60, plans to return as a law faculty member, focusing on teaching and writing. A nationally known expert on American Indian law, he is of Osage and Cherokee heritage and was editor of The Federal Handbook of Indian Law, considered the leading authority on the subject. A national search to find a successor is underway, with a new dean expected to be hired by July 2002.

Alana Holmes of Austin (Travis County), Texas, began work June 25 as Human Resources’ employee relations manager, filling the post vacated by Mark Zunich. Holmes, who has a law degree from Santa Clara University, has many years of experience in employee relations and human resources management.

Hilary Gerdes has been appointed director of Academic Advising after service as interim director.

Sandra Koelle has joined the Arts and Sciences development staff as assistant director with responsibility for major gifts. A graduate of Penn State, she formerly worked in fund raising and alumni relations for the Penn State Annual Fund, Penn State Public Broadcasting and the Penn State College of Earth and Mineral Sciences.

Joining Admissions in March were Anne Michalsky as assistant director for processing and Az Carmen, previously in Academic Advising, as coordinator of Native American enrollment services.

Lawrence Crumb, Library emeritus, is the author of "Some American Bishops’ Letters to E.B. Pusey" in the December 2000 issue of Anglican and Episcopal History.

Dianne Dugaw, English, is the author of Deep Play–John Gay and the Invention of Modernity published by the University of Delaware Press.

Duncan McDonald, Journalism and Communication, spoke to the Association of American Medical Colleges on "Changing Societal Expectations of Medical Care" in Scottsdale, Ariz., on May 1. He serves as public director on the board of the Accrediting Council on Graduate Medical Education.

Raymond Birn, History, lectured on book censors and censorship in 18th-century France as an invited professor at the College de France in Paris during March and April.