GSC Leadership Earns Top National Award

The Graying of Graduate Studies

Diversity Advocate Opens Doors at Ole Miss

A Message from the Dean

Distinctions

Dateline: Oxford

Alumni Notes

Where Are You Going? Where Have You Been?

 

Dean Maurice Eftink

It seems like a short time since we prepared our last newsletter. We have been pretty busy at the Graduate School and I think some of this hard work is beginning to bear fruit.

I want to briefly tell you about some of our recent successes.

We were fortunate to have a couple of proposals funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) that will provide support for our graduate programs. One of these grants is called an NSF GK-12 Initiative. This proposal, which was written by Drs. John O'Haver in Chemical Engineering, Cliff Ochs in Biology, David Rock in Curriculum and Instruction, and myself as a bit player, has a very interesting goal. The NSF GK-12 grant is designed to provide stipends for graduate students from the science, mathematics and engineering disciplines to prepare instructional materials for presentation in the local Oxford and Lafayette school classrooms.

The theme of the grant is the Mississippi River, and the intent is to prepare grade-appropriate educational materials revolving around this topic, with much of these materials involving some type of electronic technology for their presentation to the students. We see this as a real win-win program, with the local schoolteachers and students benefiting from the materials and the graduate students benefiting from experiencing the joy of the teaching-learning process. And it should be fun. We will be beginning this program in fall 2000, and I will write more about it when the plans come into focus.

A second major grant is the NSF Minority Graduate Education grant that Associate Dean Don Cole and I prepared. We are very excited about this program. The University of Mississippi will be the leader of a statewide consortium that has the goal of enhancing opportunities for minority students to have access to (and to succeed in) graduate education. The NSF recognizes that certain ethnic minorities are highly underrepresented among recipients of doctoral degrees, particularly in the science, math, and engineering areas. Given the high population of African-American students in Mississippi, the success of some of our undergraduate minority access programs, and this University's history in diversity issues, we felt that it was very important for our University to take a leadership role. The program will involve a variety of support programs, including summer research internships for undergraduates and entering graduate students, a state-wide symposium on minority access, enhanced recruitment activities, mentoring programs, and special workshops. This overall program will be gearing up this next year and I will share more about it in later newsletters.

A third major, recent success was the receipt by our Graduate Student Council (GSC) of a national honor. As detailed in the first story, our GSC has been recognized as the Graduate/Professional Organization of the Year by the National Association of Graduate and Professional Students. We are extremely proud of our GSC for this achievement because it was based on much hard work and commitment.

What projects do we have on the front burner now? We are spending a lot of time trying to improve our electronic/Internet-based services for students and faculty, including such things as an on-line application process and improving features of our Graduate School web page. Recruitment of graduate students is a major effort, and we remain committed to providing a range of student services, such as our evening workshops. I think we have had a pretty successful year, and I must say that this has been due largely to the dedication of our staff and to the fact that many of our graduate students, such as our GSC leaders, have shown an interest in becoming involved in activities outside of their offices or labs.

Several of you have responded to our request to communicate with us about what you have done since leaving The University of Mississippi. If we have not heard from you yet, please drop us a letter or send us an e-mail at gsalumni@olemiss.edu.