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“UTSA
in the News” is a synopsis of items that have appeared in periodicals
mentioning UTSA, its faculty, staff, students and programs. March 2003 By the time the third round of layoffs
came around, software engineer Robert Ayoub knew he had to come up with
a plan for the next couple of years. He decided to seek his master's
degree in business administration at The University of Texas at San
Antonio. Ayoub chose UTSA because he also could gain training in computer
information security which would help him to eventually become a team
leader for the information security system of a corporation or start
his own business. At UTSA, where the faculty has been aggressively recruiting
students, enrollment in the MBA program has increased significantly
from 650 to 719 students this year. This year's recipient of the La Prensa
Foundation education award has numerous achievements, awards and accomplishments.
Ellen Riojas Clark, Ph.D. received her doctorate from the University
of Texas at Austin with her dissertation titled: Determination of Giftedness
in Lower Socio-economic Mexican American student. She serves as an associate
professor in the Division of Bicultural Bilingual Studies, College of
Education and Human Development, at The University of Texas at San Antonio.
She has been recognized with numerous awards including the Annual Award
for Contributions to the Field of Bilingual Education from the Texas
Association for Bilingual Education as well as a nomination for the
San Antonio Women's Hall of Fame. Nalin Ratnayeke wanted to be good enough
to get into a middle-school orchestral program, but the 10-year-old
had only a year to learn how to play the violin. So he decided to attend
the University of Texas at San Antonio String Project to get ahead of
his classmates and his potential competition. He is only in his second
semester of the after-school program, but already he is writing his
own music as well as playing it. The project is part of the American
String Teachers Association String Project Consortium, a program that
pairs third-through fifth-graders wanting to play a string instrument
like the violin, viola, cello and bass with university music professors
and university students wanting to teach music. Now in its second year,
the program has grown from 28 students to almost 70, said Gene Dowdy,
project director and chair of the music department. Armed with only a camera, they put
themselves in the middle of combat with hopes for cover photos and a
desire to show the gruesome reality of war. But before the Vietnam War
would end in 1975, 135 photojournalists from both sides would disappear
or die like the soldiers they photographed, most killed by land mines
and in helicopter crashes. An exhaustive collection of their work that
spans three decades went on display at the Institute of Texan Cultures.
The exhibit, "Requiem: By the Photographers Who Died in Vietnam
and Indochina," is both a memorial and a showcase for haunting,
compelling images taken by the likes of Larry Burrows, Robert Capa and
Henri Huet. Days after the shuttle Columbia explosion
killed seven astronauts Feb. 1, UTSA faculty members Stephen Brown,
Shannon Crum and Stuart Foote were called to the incident command center
in the East Texas town of Hemphill. They helped create maps that guided
the search of 54 square miles of land where much of the shuttle debris
was scattered. The team worked 19-hour days with a 4,000-member team,
searching a strip of land 27 miles long and two miles wide. Using advanced
Global Positioning System and Geographic Information System equipment,
they identified and mapped more than 2,300 pieces of the landing gear,
tires, communication equipment and a space suit. Former Texas Gov. Dolph Briscoe is
scheduled to give the keynote address at the Frost Bank Distinguished
Lecture Series on April 8 at the University of Texas at San Antonio
Business Building Auditorium. Briscoe is a Uvalde native who has enjoyed
a distinguished career as a politician, rancher and community leader.
His political career began in 1949 as a member of the Texas Legislature
and he served as governor from 1973-79. He is credited with passing
legislation to establish farm-to-market program that helped pull farmers
out of muddy roadways and eventually led to the development of rural
Texas. A chance conversation
with a university researcher moved a San Antonio data analyst from the
field to the strategy room for the debris recovery effort that followed
the deadly explosion of the Shuttle Columbia last month. It also set
the stage for an influx of technical assistance from San Antonio that
impressed those managing the initial debris-mapping activities in Northeast
Texas. P. R. Blackwell, an information scientist with the Forest Resources
Institute at Stephen F. Austin State University in Nacogdoches, said
several cities and agencies sent officials to help the institute crank
out the maps and analytical work that was needed to keep the recovery
effort focused, but San Antonio probably contributed more than any other
city. San Antonio's contribution included debris mapping work by three
UTSA researchers Stephen Brown, Shannon Crum and Stuart Foote. Comments
or questions to Kris Rodriguez
(krodriguez@utsa.edu)
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