Sophomores Nathan Presmyk and Emily Morgenstern can’t resist tossing some of the crisp leaves carpeting the campus near Furman Hall.

My first year out of the College of Arts and Science was an exciting, amazing and scary time in my life. It was 2000–2001. My personal play-by-play: First, with the NASDAQ at 5,000 and headed to 10,000, I moved back home to the Bay Area with the hope of joining an Internet company and becoming a participant in the “Technology Revolution.” There I joined a 20-person online payment start-up that—we thought—was destined to revolutionize commerce (this company was not PayPal). I began dating my now husband, Bryan Kelly, BA’00. The NASDAQ dropped below 2,000, my start-up cratered, and I found myself jobless. I was advised to seek employment with a real company. (I took this to mean a company entirely unrelated to the Internet.) I shied away from the advice and joined another young Internet company, one named Google.

When I joined Google as employee no. 230 in early 2001, the online search engine had great technology and highly talented people, but a nascent business strategy. Google had just launched AdWords, its advertising program that pairs an advertiser’s online ad next to appropriate search results, with me as the second employee in AdWords’ Online Sales and Operations (OSO) division. Initially my job entailed supporting and growing the program and advertiser base. Success meant trying, failing, learning, iterating, failing again and trying again. Oscar Wilde said, “Experience is the name everyone gives to their mistakes.” By that standard I was gaining experience rapidly, and I loved it. The lack of benchmarking and guideposts in Google’s new business was daunting, but I thrived in that environment. I found that I loved working with and leading others, and creating business strategies and practices. 

I was a fine arts major in the College of Arts and Science—not the first major most people think of when they think of Google—and it provided a great foundation for me. I have always been passionate about art, both creating my own work and appreciating the work of others. My liberal arts studies taught me how to think, analyze problems, brainstorm about solutions and articulate a perspective. They also taught me the importance of working hard to achieve good results. Finally, my experience as an art major rewarded and reinforced my instinct to pursue what I am passionate about.

The Vanderbilt campus, as seen from Google Earth™ mapping service. Image U.S. Geological Survey © 2008 Goggle

 Great professors such as Leonard Folgarait and Helmut Smith created a wonderful environment in which I learned to overlay attention to detail and an analytical approach to my natural creativity. Professor Folgarait brought a depth and vibrancy to his work and our conversations. Encouraging mental flexibility, he taught how art is usually the byproduct of several different influencing factors and often there is no right answer in determining the relative importance of these influences. 

Professor Smith demonstrated the importance of seeking out and being open to differing viewpoints and ideas. In one instance I recall he sought student critiques of his book, The Butcher’s Tale: Murder and Anti-Semitism in a German Town. I remember how impressed I was with his receptiveness to our critiques. Professor Smith also introduced me to Google in spring 1999 when, on the lawn outside the library, he walked our class through a handout detailing how to use Google for primary research.’

The past seven years at Google have been amazing for both the company and me personally. Google has become the worldwide leader in online advertising, and we now have 19,000 employees, with more than 3,000 in the Online Sales and Operations division alone. I have been fortunate to grow with Google, each year taking on more responsibility and enjoying my job more with every new challenge. 

I am currently a director of OSO, heading Google’s online sales and operations for the Asia, Pacific and Latin America regions. I find immense gratification working with others to build what I believe is a truly great organization of innovative people, from whom I learn every day. 

Four key things keep me motivated. First, I’m passionate about Google’s mission—to organize the world’s information—and this makes me eager to help out any way possible. Second, I have had, and I continue to have, wonderful mentors and colleagues, from whom I have learned so much and with whom it is a joy to work. Third, I really believe that our AdWords product is a great solution for our advertiser customers. Finally, I realized from my first start-up experience that having lots of customers is a very good sign.

I travel internationally a lot, which has provided an amazing opportunity not merely to read about but actually to participate in globalization. The jet lag is tough, but the experience of working with smart, hard-working, creative people from different cultures and countries, all dedicated to a common goal, is a wonderful opportunity. Without a doubt, being at the right place at the right time has been a huge factor in my career thus far. As they say, “Timing has a lot to do with the success of a rain dance.” Along with the luck has come a lot of hard work and determination. Just as I learned to work hard as a Vanderbilt student, I have worked hard, in particular, to become a domain expert in online advertising, a very exciting space in today’s business world. I have also learned much from my colleagues about being an effective leader, and I work very hard at that, trying to help bring out the very best that our talented, creative team has to offer. My time at Vanderbilt was critical to the success I’ve been fortunate to achieve up to this point.

As daunting as our world’s challenges are today, I am optimistic about the future because I truly believe that the more people from different backgrounds around the world work together, and the more inter-connected our economies become, the more we will find common solutions for the benefit of all.

It’s been a long time since that day on the lawn in Professor Smith’s class. I never imagined I would be where I am today. Since then I have traveled around the world, worked with extraordinary colleagues, interviewed thousands of people, and learned to relish forging my own path. My ability to do these things was buttressed by the foundation that the College of Arts and Science and amazing professors and classmates helped me build. For that, and the opportunities that I have experienced since then, I’m feeling very lucky.

His license plate proclaims “SAFTBOB.” That moniker conveys Bob Wheaton’s mission as Vanderbilt’s executive director of environmental health and safety, sustainability and environmental management. 

Is there a funny smell in Benson Hall? Wheaton and his staff of 34 want to know about it. Need a particular chemical for a physics experiment? Wheaton’s department has already catalogued and created a tracking system for 26,000 lab chemicals. What if the psychology department wants to up its commitment to going green? They’ve got it covered. Suppose a natural disaster happened during a football game? No worries—Wheaton’s team has helped create a safety plan. 

The native New Englander shrugs at the myriad, multiple moving parts of his domain and insists that focusing on the institution-wide picture while simultaneously dogging the details is just how it’s done. Safety Bob is on the job.

Where did Safety Bob get his start?

I was always interested in science. I had a professor in environmental toxicology at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. Every week he’d read to us the job ads and salaries in the field of industrial hygiene. I thought they sounded pretty good. After graduating I worked at Digital Equipment Corp. as an environmental chemist and then as an industrial hygienist.

After leaving Digital, I was assistant director of environmental health and safety at Harvard for six years before coming to Vanderbilt. That was 10 years ago, and Vanderbilt is the best thing that’s ever happened to me. 

Is there an initiative that you’re particularly proud of?

One of the things we do is help with clean-up in labs that are closing. These are important programs we’ve developed to assist researchers in moving, closing or relocating laboratories. In fact, we just helped move eight researchers from chemistry into new facilities at the Vanderbilt Institute for Chemical Biology in Medical Research Building IV.

Have you come across any surprises during those kinds of moves?

When Nobel Prize-winning professor Stanley Cohen was retiring, we found a plastic vial labeled “KCV.” We asked him about it and he said, “Oh, that’s king cobra venom.”

Once, early on a Sunday morning, we were removing some hazardous materials from the old Medical Center North dock. We roped off the area with yellow caution tape and had experts in to handle it properly and safely. We even had VUPD police officers there to help protect public safety. Then some guy walked up and tried to duck under the tape like nothing was going on. I guess he was going into his office to work. It’s always something.

After 10 years in Nashville, do you miss Boston?

Sure, I miss family and friends, but Vanderbilt’s a special place. It has a collegial atmosphere, and the people here really do want to do the right thing. I also miss going to Red Sox and Patriot games. So I go to Titans games instead.

So after the Super Bowl is over, what then?

I’m a golfer with a 13 handicap. My wife, Kathy, and I live on the 19th hole of a 27-hole course. We play every Saturday and Sunday and sometimes during the week. My friends say if there’s a golf infomercial [about a piece of equipment], I own it. That stuff helps my game. Sometimes.

And if you’re not on the golf course …?

I like photography and have a Nikon D300. I love that camera. It’s got the latest and greatest technology built in. I like to shoot environmental stuff—you know, whales breaching and celestial and weather events. My picture of a lightning strike is in the Vanderbilt calendar this year. I’m still waiting on a good tornado [shot]. During the last tornado I was in the closet with Kathy. I figured it wouldn’t look good for Vanderbilt if its safety director got killed while photographing a tornado.

Besides photography and golf, what else do you do?

I enjoy cooking and TiVo cooking shows such as Tyler’s Ultimate, Everyday Italian, America’s Test Kitchen and Down Home with the Neeleys.

My best dishes are pizza from scratch, spaghetti and meatballs, anything on the grill and smoking ribs. I do have to confess, though, that my secret food vice is rocky road ice cream.

Do you have a favorite book?

I read One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest when I was in college. I really envied the imagination and writing style of Ken Kesey in being able to develop the characters and the storyline to not only entertain, but also to use symbolism to describe society in the 1950s.

Is there someone famous you wish you could meet?

My grandfather was a vaudeville magician. You’d have never heard of him, but he’d met Harry Houdini and I wish I could meet Houdini, too. Houdini could do miraculous things like escape from chains inside a safe in 40 feet of water. He could do things no one else could do. I’d ask him how he did it and why. It’s a safety thing, ya know?

photo credits: Dee Fontenot

No place is so synonymous with the written word and the community surrounding it as New York. And why wouldn’t it be? NYC is “the capital of the world” and an undisputed creative hub, and writing is what brings other worlds, or different ways of looking at this one, into the public domain. New York is the ultimate public domain—an often overwhelming convergence of culture and cultures, everyone swimming around its concrete sea in trains sliding underground like eels, multitudes of pedestrians like darting schools of brightly colored fish. 

As an aspiring writer and a devoted linguaphile, I knew that I had to go there. I’d always loved writing. As a creative writing major at Vanderbilt, I thrived on the energy of our writing community and constant conversation about poetry and poets. New York was where so many of the writers we admired had explored their art in this same way. I felt the tug every time I read the poetry of Frank O’Hara or any of the countless versifiers who breathed the magic of New York into their work. Whitman, in typically effusive fashion, exclaims his love: “Proud and passionate city! mettlesome, mad, extravagant city!”—and all I could do was turn my gaze northward and decide that this California native wanted to be a part of the madness. 

A New York summer 
Wears sunglasses that fog up
From its bazaar breath.

At the farmer’s market, crowds
Select greens for small kitchens.

Each of you is part 
Of the soil of this city
Which doesn’t hold roots.

Between my sophomore and junior year in the College of Arts and Science, I wrote to Alice Quinn, then-poetry editor at The New Yorker, where she had sifted through poems for as many years as I’d been alive. I admired her literary career and expressed interest in the path she took to get there. I then had the chance to meet her during fall break my junior year, which led to the opportunity to work as a summer intern at the Poetry Society of America (PSA), of which she was executive director. With vague directions from the PSA’s managing director to “let us know when you’re in town,” I moved into the New York University dorms on Union Square at the end of May, armed with two suitcases, a few books, and an endless supply of curiosity.

I live on the corner of a college street,
And the park keeps dancing, no matter the hour,
As the coffee shops and the flip-flopped feet
Get their second wind like electric power.

Surrounded by a World of Words

Then I ended up with three internships. 

It was as sudden as that. In addition to interning at PSA for the months of June and July, I worked at The Hudson Review as editorial intern and at the Guggenheim Foundation as Director Edward Hirsch’s project assistant. 

During the school year I had been in touch with Paula Deitz, editor of The Hudson Review, through my adviser for Vanderbilt’s creative writing program, poet Mark Jarman. Paula invited me to visit her office once I was in the city. I left the office with a job. A week later, when I was at a poetry reading featuring Ed Hirsch, a conversation with him became a month of research for his new book. I was working 9 to 5 and then some. So I managed one of the most challenging balancing acts of my life, because loving New York City is also a full-time job.

Surrendered to the City Beat

While I lived in New York, I took it upon myself to be a constant explorer, like some sort of urban, contemporary Christopher Columbus. In fact, like Columbus, I often thought I had found parts of New York that were already part of the vibrant network of the city. I once made a local Manhattanite laugh hysterically by expressing my enthusiasm about Chelsea, which I declared would be the next great neighborhood. Apparently others know it’s there. But my adventures weren’t limited to what one would expect of a visitor to NYC, although I did attend two Broadway plays and two musicals, frequented museums from MoMA to the Met, picnicked in Central Park, and rode the subway at least twice a day.

I once saw a man on the subway,
Who sat, fully nude, in a calm way,
Though the passengers glared,
He couldn’t have cared,
And, at the next stop, went on his way.

The memories that stick are unique: a visit to a slam at the Bowery Poetry Club, an experimental theatre production in a deserted public pool in Brooklyn, the two-hour adventure to find a slice of red velvet cake favored by a review in The New York Times. While others might remember Times Square, I remember the poetry reading held there. While others might savor a slice of New York pizza, I stood in two-hour lines at our local, legendary parlor Artichoke, which serves only artichoke pizza. Instead of going to the block-long Barnes and Noble on one side of Union Square, I became a regular at The Strand down the street, wandering its musty aisles with a cup of too-hot coffee from my friendly street vendor. 

The myth that New Yorkers are unfriendly 
Is a lie: New Yorkers are helpful, kind,
But they won’t invite you into their lives.
They’ll show you how to get where you’re going,
And wish you well on your parallel path.

photo credits: Marc Iserman

Written into the Poem of Life

My summer was about words, about poetry. At The Hudson Review, I found a family in the amazing editors under whose supervision I worked. I had the pleasure of reading dozens of past issues and categorizing the works within, a process through which I was introduced to wonderful poets, fiction writers, reviewers and critics. In my project for Ed Hirsch, I delved into the histories of limericks and ghazals, rengas and skeltonic verses, gathering materials for his follow-up glossary volume to How to Read a Poem. And at the Poetry Society of America, I saw how poetry could be brought to the people who wanted it, through events, contests and newsletters.

In my own little way, I brought poetry to the world. I scribbled verse, I observed, I shamelessly stole New York and wrote it into the poem of my life. I frequently sat my two roommates down—a Condé Nast intern and a Carolina Herrera-employed fashionista—and read them poems that moved me. I said, “Isn’t this beautiful?” 

I learned this summer what I want to do. I want to sit people down with a poem like I’m setting up a blind date. Poetry matters. I had three angles from which to view that one truth. Three lessons in what I love. Four if you count New York City.

When I left this city, I wrote a letter on the plane,
I love you—hate to leave you—but I’ll see you again.

The interdisciplinary network integrates faculty and student researchers in natural sciences, social and behavioral sciences, engineering, and law and policy with the goal of uncovering a grass-roots solution to climate change. Members are conducting theoretical and applied research on one of the most important and most widely overlooked sources of greenhouse gases: individual and household behavior.

The 20-plus member network includes, among others, Brooke Ackerly, associate professor, political science; Florence N. Faucher-King, associate professor, European studies and political science; Ford Ebner, professor, psychology; Jonathan Gilligan, senior lecturer, earth and environmental sciences, who also serves as CCRN associate director for research; and Michael Vandenbergh, professor of law and CCRN director. These group members recently discussed climate change, the media, and the role individuals play in averting this crisis. 

What is the biggest obstacle to stopping global warming?

VANDENBERGH: Two things. First is the belief that there is uncertainty about some aspects of the science, so we should not act. The second is the belief that acting requires increasing the role of government in ways that are worse than the harms of climate change.

GILLIGAN: Erosion of trust. People can’t achieve political consensus on what to do because they don’t trust those who disagree with them. They dig in their heels, demonize opponents and produce gridlock.

EBNER: If people accepted the premise of global warming, they would change their everyday lives to produce a sustainable level of resource use. More importantly, they wouldn’t vote for anyone who didn’t espouse environmental sustainability as a high priority national goal.

Is the media’s reporting on climate change accurate?

ACKERLY: Global warming is a much more urgent issue than portrayed in the media. If we fail to address the climate crisis in the near term, I expect our grandchildren will wonder why we didn’t use our resources and resourcefulness to address this crisis before it became irreversible.

GILLIGAN: Yes and no. Where the media often gets it wrong is the timing. The truly catastrophic consequences are unlikely to occur in the next 50 years. For instance, the media doesn’t explain that even in the worst-case scenario, the predicted 80-plus feet rise in sea levels won’t occur for 300 years or more.

FAUCHER-KING: Fake science has been given equal attention and the discussion of scientific facts increasingly politicized. The media remain far too shy [about reporting on the threat of global warming] because they’re too dependent on advertising income from companies that benefit from energy consumption.

What do you say to those who insist climate change isn’t occurring or that it’s part of a natural weather cycle?

EBNER: I point to the fact that no one disputes the fact that the current atmospheric carbon dioxide levels of approximately 380 parts per million are far above the average measured from ice samples over the last 600,000 years. This includes the ups and downs of at least five ice ages. Yet current greenhouse gas levels are far above any prior level, and predicted to go higher. Even so, as long as water comes out of the faucet and the lights switch on, global warming remains too gradual to generate a sense of urgency about a warming planet in most people.

VANDENBERGH: There is certainty that increased carbon dioxide levels will increase temperatures and that the source is the burning of fossil fuels, forest burning and other activities. The only real question is how quickly the change will occur and how massive it will be. By the time there’s absolutely no doubt about global warming, the game will be up.

FAUCHER-KING: These people haven’t been paying attention. Some delude themselves when confronted with troubling events, taking an “it can’t happen to me” position. They think global warming is too challenging, that someone else will fix it. Those are fatalist, defeatist and amoral positions.

If people were to commit to one permanent change to slow global warming, what would it be?

ACKERLY: Why make one big sacrifice when many little changes add up? Biking or taking the bus to work, having a “local” vacation, eating more fruits and vegetables and less meat make a difference. At my house, we sealed the ductwork so we’re not paying to heat and cool our basement and we weather-stripped our windows. I never idle my car.

EBNER: Reducing demand for fossil fuels can make a difference, including the energy needed for transportation and electricity that mainly comes from coal-fired steam generators.

GILLIGAN: Drive less and use less electricity—these are directly responsible for about one-third of all carbon dioxide emissions in the U.S. This personal use is larger than all the industrial emissions in the U.S. combined.

Do you believe it is already too late to slow or stop climate change?

GILLIGAN: The urgency of climatic change is that greenhouse gases remain in the atmosphere for centuries to millennia after we release them. We must act urgently today to prevent a catastrophe 100 years or more in the future. If we wait until we see the catastrophe starting, it will be decades too late.

EBNER: We can make individual changes, but we also desperately need a new attitude in leadership at the federal level. Elections are coming, and we should all ask each candidate what he or she proposes to do at the federal level about global warming.

ACKERLY: After Australia (which, like the U.S., relies heavily on coal for electricity), the U.S. has the highest per capita carbon emissions. This is due to the amount of energy we use and the way our energy is produced. We can reduce our individual non-productive energy use, but only a few individuals can make the energy they use cleaner—by purchasing solar panels, for example. The nation as a whole will need to clean up its energy sources if we are going to reduce our carbon footprint. With public investment in the infrastructure necessary to have a national electricity grid, market forces will lead to increased production of, and demand for, carbon-free energy, as well as increased employment in the building of a carbon-free energy infrastructure.  

VANDENBERGH: It seems clear that human-induced climate change is already occurring and some parts of further change are unstoppable. My hope is that we still have a decade or two before we pass the point of no return. If we miss that point, we’ll have to deal with the knowledge that we have set into motion tens of feet of sea level increase that will occur for centuries to come. Yet, with small lifestyle changes and a several percent reduction in gross domestic product, all of this could have been avoided. It’s not a great legacy to leave to our grandchildren.

          

Junior Vivien G. Haupt (pictured), psychology, is reading Brain Sex by Anne Moir and David Jessel for her neuroscience class. 

Other recent reads:

Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides

The Pickup by Nadine Gordimer (as part of a reading group with her mom)

The State Of The Earth by Paul Conkin, professor of history, emeritus (makes me want to meet the author)

Papers on the synchronous discharge of nerve cells in the cerebral cortex

The Bourne Betrayal by Robert Ludlum (airport reading)

—Ford Ebner, professor of psychology and professor of cell and developmental biology

The New Yorker

The New York Times (online)

Empire Falls by Richard Russo

Dreams From My Father by Barack Obama

The Republic in Print by Trish Loughran

The Postal Age by David M. Henkin

—Teresa A. Goddu,
director of American studies and associate professor of English

Ghost Riders by Sharyn McCrumb

Spider Woman’s Web: Traditional Native American Tales about Women’s Power by Susan Hazen-Hammond

Traditions of the Arapaho by George A. Dorsey and Alfred L. Kroeber

— Anne Hill, administrative assistant, history of art

Rethinking Expertise by Harry Collins and Robert Evans

Why Posterity Matters by Avner de-Shalit 

New Foundations of Cost-Benefit Analysis 
by Matthew D. Adler and Eric A. Posner 

Worst-Case Scenarios by Cass Sunstein 

Climate Change 2007, Vol II: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability
by IPCC Working Group 2 

Experience and Nature by John Dewey

The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman
by Lawrence Sterne 

Judge Fogg by Randy O’Brien 

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (bedtime reading to my daughter) by J.K. Rowling

Out of the Labyrinth: Setting Mathematics Free by Robert Kaplan and Ellen Kaplan 

—Jonathan Gilligan, senior lecturer in earth and environmental science and public policy

Linda Tressel by Anthony Trollope

Miss Majoribanks by Margaret Oliphant

Mary Barton by Elizabeth Gaskell

The Glimpses of the Moon by Edith Wharton

The Monk by Matthew Lewis

—Jo Ann Staples, senior lecturer in mathematics and director of teaching

The New Yorker 

Now a Major Motion Picture by Christine Geraghty

Scripts by a very talented Russian script writer of the 1970s, Iurii Klepikov

— Irina Makoveeva, Mellon Assistant Professor of Russian

Blogs: Hot Air, Protein Wisdom, The Next Right and American Thinker

Defending Identity by Natan Sharansky

— Mike Warren, junior, economics

Where Wizards Stay Up Late: The Origins of the Internet by Katie Hafner and Matthew Lyon

Back issues of The New York Times and various books on the Vietnam War 

Propitious Esculent: The Potato in World History by John Reader (reading it was more fun than it sounds) 

—Peter Brush, librarian and East Asian studies bibliographer

Michael Bess, Chancellor’s Professor of History, and Jay Bloom, assistant professor of history of art, have received 2008 fellowships from the American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS). ACLS fellowships and grants are awarded to individual scholars for excellence in research in the humanities and related social sciences.

William Caferro, professor of history, received the 2009 Otto Gründler Prize for his book, John Hawkwood: An English Mercenary in Fourteenth Century Italy. 

Anastasia Curwood, assistant professor of African American and diaspora studies, received the Woodrow Wilson Career Enhancement Fellowship for junior faculty.

Ellen Fanning, Stevenson Professor of Molecular Biology, has been named a fellow by the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). She was also recently elected to the German National Academy of Science (Duetsche Akademie der Naturforscher Leopoldina), the world’s oldest continuously existing academy for medicine and natural sciences.

The trade paperback version of Investing in College: A Guide for the Perplexed by Malcolm Getz, associate professor of economics, was published by Harvard University Press in September. Harvard first published the hardcover edition in March 2007.

Victoria Greene, professor of physics, has been appointed executive dean in the College of Arts and Science.

Arts, Inc., a cultural assessment of the U.S. arts system by Bill Ivey, director of the Curb Center for Art, Enterprise and Public Policy, has been published by the University of California Press.

John Janusek, associate professor of anthropology, has received a Dumbarton Oaks Fellowship in Pre-Columbian Studies for 2008–2009.

Gary Jensen, professor of sociology, has been appointed editor of the journal, Homicide Studies.

David E. Lewis, professor of political science, has been awarded the Herbert A. Simon Best Book Award for The Politics of Presidential Appointments: Political Control and Bureaucratic Performance. 

Richard Lloyd, assistant professor of sociology, has been appointed consulting editor of the American Journal of Sociology.

John McLean, assistant professor of chemistry, received a 2008 research award from the American Society for Mass Spectrometry and a 2008 Starter Grant Award from the Society for Analytical Chemists of Pittsburgh/Spectroscopy Society of Pittsburgh.

Dana Nelson, Gertrude Conaway Vanderbilt Professor of English and American studies, has been elected to the American Antiquarian Society.

Antonis Rokas, assistant professor of biological sciences, has been named a 2008 Searle Scholar. The honor, given to exceptional young faculty in the biomedical sciences and chemistry, is accompanied by a $300,000 research grant. 

Allison Schachter, assistant professor of Jewish studies and English, was awarded a National Endowment for the Humanities summer grant.

Robert Scherrer, professor of physics and chair of the Department of Physics and Astronomy, co-authored “The End of Cosmology,” the cover story of the March 2008 Scientific American journal. 

Robert B. Talisse, associate professor of philosophy and political science, has been appointed editor of Public Affairs Quarterly.

Lenn E. Goodman and his wife, Roberta Goodman

Chancellor Nicholas S. Zeppos honored several arts and science professors with 2008 faculty awards. David Wood, Centennial Professor of Philosophy, received the Joe B. Wyatt Distinguished University Professor Award, given annually in honor of faculty whose contributions span multiple academic disciplines. Daniel B. Cornfield, professor of sociology and director of the Vanderbilt Center for Nashville Studies, received the Harvie Branscomb Distinguished Professor Award for distinguished accomplishments at furthering the aims of Vanderbilt University. Stephen G. Buckles, senior lecturer in economics, received the Madison Sarratt Prize for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching. The 2008 Thomas Jefferson Award, made annually for distinguished service through extraordinary contributions in the councils and government of the university, was awarded to Randolph Blake, Centennial Professor of Psychology. Douglas G. McMahon, professor of biological sciences and director of graduate studies, Tracy G. Miller, associate professor of history of art, Frank Tong, associate professor of psychology, and Mark A. Wollaeger, professor of English, were honored with 2008 Chancellor’s Awards for Research. Lenn E. Goodman, Andrew W. Mellon Professor in the Humanities and professor of philosophy, received the Earl Sutherland Prize for Achievement in Research, given annually for achievements in research, scholarship or creative expression that have had significant critical reception and recognition nationally or internationally.

In this global, fast-changing, digital age, people in business need to know more than just business. That’s why the Managerial Studies program in the College of Arts and Science combines a liberal arts education—cultivating creativity, knowledge, innovation and the ability to think critically—with a strategic foundation in business methods.

The Managerial Studies program complements a student’s liberal arts major with the addition of a minor or specific courses in business. That union prepares students for life after college and has won approval from business leaders, students, parents and faculty alike. 

Focusing on the liberal arts allows students to find their hearts and souls, and to study topics for which they have passion, says William Damon, professor of economics and director of the Managerial Studies program. “Their majors provide a broad base of knowledge and then managerial studies provides the tools to help them shape their careers.”

A diversity of majors adds depth to group presentations by students.

The program offers minors in three areas: corporate strategy, financial economics, and leadership and organization. Currently, more than 1,400 students are enrolled in managerial studies courses, making it one of the most popular campuswide. Last year, students from more than 32 majors and four Vanderbilt schools selected managerial studies as their minor.

“The Managerial Studies program delivers an alternative model to the business major, one that we think is better,” says Cherrie Clark, associate director of the program and associate professor of managerial studies. “Being able to draw students from throughout the university brings depth to classroom discussions. It’s a different classroom and different perspective than one would find at a school with a traditional undergraduate business program.”

The program’s three tracks have drawn future entrepreneurs, business people, doctors, lawyers, artists and other professionals. The track in corporate strategy explores the methods businesses use to create competitive advantage in the marketplace. Financial economics develops understanding of financial markets, corporate finance, personal wealth management and government. The third track, leadership and organization, focuses on how to be effective, successful leaders. 

Understanding how business operates helps students apply the knowledge they’ve gained in their majors. Jacqueline Kumar will graduate in May with a major in psychology and double managerial studies minor in corporate strategy and leadership and organizations. The Memphis native has completed two internships in human resources, her chosen field. “I had not really taken any managerial studies classes when I started the first internship,” she says. “I realized that HR is people skills, but now know that in order to be a successful, strategic partner, you need to understand core business processes. I really appreciate the corporate strategy that is more numbers-based. I’ve become stronger and I understand things a little better.”

Real-World Applications

Managerial studies grew out of the economics department, then known as economics and business administration, nine years ago. Initially the program had one professor and one senior lecturer. Today the program has grown to include four full-time faculty and 13 adjunct professors, most of whom have executive experience at top corporations.

Having so many professors with corporate backgrounds gives the program credibility with students, Clark says. She brings experience as a partner in the computer-based education firm Executive Perspectives and as a consultant with Bain & Company. “Students often wonder ‘How does this work in the real world? How am I going to use this?’ Our professors are able to share first-hand knowledge on how classroom concepts can translate to the business world,” Clark says.

Associate Professor of Managerial Studies Cherrie Clark.

Clark uses her business contacts to bring in outside guest speakers who provide additional real-world knowledge, experience and career advice. She says that because they speak from experience, speakers can provide valuable knowledge and career direction that is on target. 

Zhou Zhang, a 2007 graduate now working at Wachovia in Charlotte, N.C., found the guest speakers “gave us a lot more breadth of what you can do, how things apply, and what kind of options were out there.” The courses she took in financial economics contrasted with the individual study that marked her double major in mathematics and economics. Managerial studies courses offered “more of a real world application. With a lot of heavy math classes, it’s all about theories. With the managerial studies classes, there’s a lot of practical application,” Zhang says.

Opportunities and Passions

Some of the popularity of the program, which graduated 230 minors in spring 2008, may start with parents, Damon believes. “We know that some parents, while they see the value in a liberal arts education, are also saying ‘Have some idea about what’s going to happen next.’” One goal of the Managerial Studies program is to help students identify opportunities for combining their passions with business. The three-course sequence in entrepreneurship has been particularly effective in meeting this goal, he says.

The ultimate goal of the Managerial Studies program is to allow students to build upon their liberal arts education, Damon and Clark say. The popularity of the program, however, leaves the program directors with the challenge of balancing an appropriate
number of course offerings with the traditional liberal arts education. “We have some students who would take every course offered in managerial studies,” Damon says. “But if they’re taking all of our courses, they’re not taking the courses where they have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to broaden their view of the world. That goes against the basic philosophy of the liberal arts.”

Damon and Clark believe that a liberal arts education is the best preparation for life as well as the best preparation for business. And that is not just the educators’ opinion. “We’re listening to Arts and Science alumni, individuals who majored in history, philosophy and psychology, for example, and who have gone on to achieve great success in the business world; we’re listening to our guest speakers at the upper levels of business,” Damon says. “They say liberal arts is the way to go.”

photo credit: Lize Rixt

Today’s ViF program has adapted to contemporary students’ needs and gives them a more global view of France and its people, says Associate Professor of French Virginia Scott, who served as professor-in-residence for summer 2008. “A critical topic among people who teach French is ‘why French?’” Scott says. “Because of global trends, many students want to study Spanish, Arabic or Chinese.” 

That shift has challenged ViF to find new relevance and appeal. Key to meeting that challenge has been the establishment of a resident director of the program in France. Maïté Monchal, who became the resident director in 2005, is credited with revitalizing the program and instituting new initiatives.

The ViF team, from left: Alice Cheylan, financial manager; Manu Meize, administrative assistant; Virginia Scott, professor-in-residence summer ’08; and Maïté Monchal, resident director.

ViF is Vanderbilt’s oldest study-abroad program. Begun in 1961 by the College of Arts and Science, ViF cultivated language fluency and cultural understanding. While those aspects remain, ViF now strives to be international, innovative and focused beyond cultural exploration. 

Stepping Stones 

Cannon Kinnard, BA’08, spent a semester with ViF, refining his French during a four-month internship at La Provence, the newspaper in Aix. Providing internships is a recent ViF innovation. They enable students to put a practical edge on their language skills and gain international work experience. ViF students also have done internships at Ballet Preljocaj, Marseilles’ children’s hospital and Aix schools.

Following his internship, Kinnard became the first ViF student to spend a semester at the Institut de Sciences Politiques (Sciences Po), a Paris university. Vanderbilt and Sciences Po now have an agreement to exchange up to five students annually. 

Today, Kinnard is pursuing graduate studies in journalism at New York University (NYU). “The head of admissions at NYU said he was impressed I’d worked at a newspaper abroad,” Kinnard says. “My experience in France was mind-opening and a fluid study in cultural differences.”

Living and Learning Language

Exposing students to different experiences has long been a hallmark of ViF. Marion West Hammer, BA’69, remembers her ViF days fondly. “It showed me a whole new culture,” says Hammer, now a Memphis, Tenn. middle school teacher of French and English. While in Aix, she lived with an older couple and became part of their extended family. “It helped me to be more open to the different ways people think.”

Although ViF students no longer board with local residents, they do interact with them. “Now we rent apartments around the city. Each has three or four ViF students and one or two French students,” Scott says. “The native speakers tie our students directly to student life. At the same time, the students form life-long bonds with each other and the city.” To provide a complementary view of life, several nights a week, students eat dinner with local host families. 

Senior Corinne Hartong spent summer 2008 falling in love with Aix. “The people I have met evoke all the elements that I now associate with the culture of Provence: colorful exuberance, respect for provençal traditions, love of cuisine and lively, long meals, and care for the earth,” she says. “The stories told at the dinner table by my host family offered me first-hand insight into their deeply-rooted love of the language and culture of Provence.”

The program’s life-changing impact was spoken of often during the first ViF alumni reunion, which took place in Aix in June 2008. More than 50 past participants, including three pioneers from the first session in 1961, traveled to France to celebrate the program, share memories and discover the ViF program that today’s students experience. They participated in activities alongside current students, enjoying trips, language and cooking classes, and long, laughter-filled dinners with host families. 

Senior Rachel Hanemann helps alumni attending the ViF reunion brush up on their French.

Cultural Strengths

In its 40-plus years, the program has evolved, but some aspects of ViF remain consistent. Students still attend classes taught by French faculty at the Vanderbilt Center located in a historic building in Aix. They experience trips to Nice, the Luberon, Avignon, the Pont du Gard and Marseille, plus excursions to museums and theater performances, French cooking classes and a week in Paris. Fall and spring sessions draw students with some level of proficiency in French although they do not need to be French majors. The summer session includes non-French speakers. 

In a new partnership initiated by Monchal, those students with greater proficiency can take classes alongside native French speakers at the Université de Provence in Aix. “MaÏté capitalized on our long history in Aix by creating internship opportunities, as well as relationships with the University of Provence so that our more proficient students may take courses there,” Scott says. “Her work makes it possible for our faculty in French to serve as professors in residence, teaching and doing research, instead of administrating.”

Reunion attendees assemble on the famous Cours Mirabeau in the center of Aix-en-Provence.

Citoyens du monde

For junior Fabiani Duarte, the program opened his eyes to “the power of communication, of connecting with people at a basic human level and the amount of respect, candor and human connection that engenders,” says Duarte, who used his French this summer while working as a congressional aide. “It’s important for Americans to be citizens of the world, to be able to communicate on a basic level with people.”

Increasingly, ViF serves students with interests in disciplines other than language. ViF includes a summer dance component and a two-week music program in which the Blair School of Music collaborates with the European Academy of Music. In spring 2009, the program will explore an alliance with a center for Islamic studies in Aix. This link could attract religious studies students who want to study Muslim faith and culture.

To reinforce the relevance of French and French culture internationally, ViF has added a spring semester week of study in the North African nation of Tunisia, where French is spoken. “Marseille is the gateway to North Africa and French-speaking countries there,” Scott says. “French isn’t just France, and we want to distinguish ourselves by having our students experience the greater Francophone world. By refining and recreating ViF, we’re able to create new niches for ourselves and our students.”

Cows and crops dominated the area that is now Brentwood, Tenn. In the 1930s, the way of life was rural and times were hard. For a farm girl from Brentwood, attending the College of Arts and Science at Vanderbilt was a life-changing experience. When it changed Dorothy N. Niederhauser Wallman, BA’39, it started a legacy that continues changing lives today.

From left, Richard Wallman, BE’72, and Amy Wallman meet with scholars past and present Jessica Lewis, BA’03, EdD’07; junior Naila Wahid; and senior Bittu Majmudar.

“Going to Vanderbilt gave my mother confidence and a sense of accomplishment. She was happy I went there,” says Richard Wallman, BE’72. “When I got into graduate school at the University of Chicago, she wasn’t nearly as impressed as when I enrolled at Vanderbilt.” 

Fred Niederhauser, Dorothy’s father, was a farmer who worked to send his four daughters to college. Sisters Helen Niederhauser Parker, ’40, Irma Louise Niederhauser Keisling, BA’41, and Freddie Ann Niederhauser Phillips, BA’51, all followed Richard’s mother, Dorothy, a French and English major, to the College of Arts and Science. 

“Richard’s mother would volunteer every year at registration,” says Richard’s wife, Amy Wallman,  formerly a partner with Ernst & Young. “Vanderbilt was the only school she ever talked about. She had a deep love for the institution.” 

In honor of her love, Amy and Richard established the Dorothy N. and Dick H. Wallman Scholarship. It now is the first of five, need-based, full-tuition scholarships for women in the College of Arts and Science endowed by the Wallmans.

“The scholarships are our way of making a difference in the lives of bright, motivated young women,” says Richard, former chief financial officer of Honeywell International and a new member of the Board of Visitors for the College of Arts and Science.

What a Difference

Jessica King Lewis, BA’03, EdD’07, was the first to receive a Wallman scholarship. “Without the undergraduate scholarship, it would have limited what I could have done in graduate school and maybe caused me to reconsider going at all,” says Lewis, who majored in Spanish and sociology in the College of Arts and Science. Currently a research associate with Peabody’s Center on Performance Incentives, she says she knows tuition debt can limit students’ options.

The Wallmans do more than provide financial support, important as that is. “When I was an undergraduate, Mr. Wallman e-mailed me and wanted to hear how I was doing,” says former recipient Ashley Long, BA’06. “Sometimes, when things weren’t going well, getting a great e-mail from him gave me the encouragement I needed.”

Now a student at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, Long says the Wallmans have continued to be friends, supporters and encouragers. “If I hadn’t gotten the Wallman scholarship, I wouldn’t have been able to go to Vanderbilt,” she says frankly.

The relationship between Wallman scholars and the donors is a strong one. As scholarship recipients are chosen, the couple connects with them, eager to hear about their studies, struggles and successes. Each year, Amy and Richard attend a luncheon with their Arts and Science scholars and hear about the young women’s achievements and evolving lives. 

Current scholarship recipient Bittu Majmudar values that connection. “I love the way the Wallmans care about their scholarship recipients,” the senior says. “It’s been a real bonus having the Wallmans on my side. I think of them as my second parents.” Majmudar says that without the scholarship, she would have gone to a state university. Today she’s majoring in neuroscience with dual minors in biology and psychology with the goal of becoming a physician.  

Worthwhile Investments

Amy and Richard Wallman say that when they were in graduate school, the financial aid they received was important to their ability to stay focused on academic success and on cultivating their professional lives. They have chosen to reciprocate by giving a leg up to young women who might otherwise be unable to attend Dorothy Wallman’s beloved institution.

“Vanderbilt is a wonderful school,” Richard says. “I got a good education and learned how to solve problems there. The College of Arts and Science scholarships are our way of doing our part to help keep it a terrific school. Even if you’re not in a position to endow a scholarship, just giving $1,000 or $500 can be a big help to a student who is struggling. Any investment is worthwhile and the payout can be high.”

In 2004, Amy and Richard endowed the Cleo and Fred Niederhauser Scholarship to honor his maternal grandparents.

To commemorate Richard’s 35th Vanderbilt reunion, the couple is endowing three more scholarships in the College of Arts and Science: the Irma Louise Niederhauser and Claude J. Keisling Scholarship in memory of his aunt and uncle, the Eva and Henry Wallman Scholarship in memory of his paternal grandparents, and the Edith and Roy Witte Scholarship in memory of his great-aunt and great-uncle.

The Legacy Continues

The Wallmans say the scholarships pay off twofold. They enable students to receive an outstanding liberal arts education at a top university. At the same time, they create a legacy of generosity that encourages the recipients to also be generous with their time and money and to help others.

“Endowing scholarships is truly the gift that keeps on giving,” says Richard. “Every recipient has said how grateful they are, and that they want to give back when they have the means, whether it is money or volunteerism.”

Lewis concurs, but sees even more worth. “The value of the scholarship isn’t just the money, it’s also the relationship I’ve built with the Wallmans over the years,” the young researcher says. “They are a good reminder of why it’s important to give back. They’re busy, successful professionals. Yet they find the time and resources to help others. I’m looking forward to being at a point where I can help others in the same way the Wallmans have helped me.”

Go to the answer.

Bruce Corser, left, records a family portrait after moving son Nick (second from right), a first-year Arts and Science student from Cincinnati, Ohio, into the Hank Ingram House in The Commons. Also sharing the landmark moment are Nick’s brother Pete, mom Janet, and sister Amy.

Hustler, Vol. 72, No. 6

Before Deal or No Deal, Who Wants to Be A Millionaire or even Jeopardy, there was the GE College Bowl Quiz program. In 1960, Vanderbilt’s team of “thinking people”—Bob Andrews, BA’62; Rollin Lasseter, BA’61; Charles Ryan, BA’63; Jon Wilson, BA’61; and alternate Jim Moody, BA’61—became one of only a handful of university teams with a string of four quiz program wins. The students and their coach, Philip Hallie, professor of philosophy, flew to New York City every week to appear on the nationally televised program before losing to Vassar in their fifth match. The competition earned $6,500 for university scholarship funds, gave team members bragging rights, and brought awareness of Vanderbilt to millions of homes across the country. The excitement on campus ranged from 70 students vying for the five team slots to what was estimated as one-half to nearly two-thirds of the student body tuned into the team’s television appearances.

Hustler, Vol. 72, No. 4

Hustler, Vol. 72, No. 9;

The Vanderbilt Hustler, Vol. 72, No. 1

Alumnus, Jan.–Feb. 1961

Hustler, Vol. 72, No. 10

In central Peru, bioarcheologist Tiffiny Tung and her team examine human remains excavated during an earlier season’s dig. The assistant professor of anthropology is currently studying the Wari culture, a pre-Incan civilization that lived in the Andes about 1,400 years ago.

Click wherever you see a to find out more about this photo!

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For several years, Tung’s summer research base has been the archeology lab at Peru’s National University of Huamanga in Ayacucho.

2

These trophy heads (human skulls that were modified after death and displayed or worn) were recovered from the Wari site of Conchopata. Iconographic depictions and strontium isotope tests on bones and teeth helped Tung and colleagues establish that the trophy heads were most likely of Wari enemies, rather than of venerated ancestors.

3

Animals were often used as offerings in houses and tombs; the llama and guinea pigs skeletons serve as comparative samples for identifying animal bone fragments found at the dig. (The duck skeleton is part of another archeologist’s research; the lab is shared by a variety of researchers and students.)

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Carlos Mancilla Rojas, one of Tung’s Peruvian colleagues, has partially reconstructed these ceramic urns from pottery sherds found at the Conchopata archeological site.

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Kristina Kitko, BE’08, a Ph.D. student in Vanderbilt’s School of Engineering, molds dental casting material to make casts of cut marks on bone fragments. The casts will be analyzed with a scanning electron microscope at Vanderbilt. From that analysis, they’ll learn whether the marks were made by stone or metal tools, or if they indicate accidental damage caused by non-human agents.

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First-year anthropology graduate student Matthew Velasco measures a bone using an osteometric board. When femora (thigh bones) are measured, bioarcheologists can estimate stature.

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In addition to teaching, research and publishing, Tung also
consults for media such as the Discovery Channel, History
Channel and National Geographic. She was featured in the Discovery Channel’s 2005 series, Mummy Autopsy.

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Peruvian archeologist and graduate student Mirza del Castillo uses a magnifying lens to look for human-induced modifications such as cut marks or drill holes on skull fragments while Emily Sharp, BA’08, records the findings. They also search for evidence of healed fractures or lesions that would indicate disease.

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Tung’s work draws researchers from all over. Tung is on the dissertation committee of Christine Pink, a Ph.D. student at the University of Tennessee at Knoxville. Pink is comparing the morphology (shape and form) of human teeth, which are under strong genetic control, to document biological relationships between various Wari-era populations.

Founded in 1988 to promote interdisciplinary research among faculty, the role of the Robert Penn Warren Center for the Humanities has expanded to serve as a catalyst for people in the humanities to come together around ideas and learn from each other.

Collaboration and Discovery

The center, originally known as the Vanderbilt Center for the Humanities, grew out of the Mellon Regional Faculty Development Program, a seminar housed at Vanderbilt each summer from 1979 through 1987, recalls Charles Scott, Distinguished Professor of Philosophy, who directed the seminars and chaired the philosophy department for a decade. The collaborative seminars generated so much energy and excitement among faculty that the need for the center was clear.

“A major problem that the center was designed to address was the relative isolation in which most humanities faculty members did their work. There were few occasions for collaborative endeavor,” says Scott, who served as the first faculty director of the Warren Center and is now director of the Vanderbilt Center for Ethics.

Renamed for Vanderbilt’s most famous literary alumnus after his death in 1989, the Robert Penn Warren Center serves as a site of discovery for Vanderbilt’s faculty, as well as for national and international scholars. Each year the Warren Center Fellows Program brings together eight professors from different departments to focus on an area of exploration. A visiting fellow joins the Vanderbilt faculty in the yearlong study of the topic, which may include discussions, meetings, lectures and seminars.

In addition to the fellows program, the center is home to a number of monthly seminars, with topics ranging from food politics to ancient and medieval studies.

“We really are a revolving door of people coming through with many different areas of specialties addressing a variety of topics,” Executive Director Mona Frederick says.

Supporting Young Scholars

Today the humanities center also serves graduate students, or “young scholars,” as Frederick prefers they be called. The Graduate Student Fellows Program, now in its third term, appoints seven graduate students who are expected to complete and defend their dissertations by the end of the following summer. Unlike the faculty program, it is not themed. The participants meet together, give presentations from their research, and provide feedback to each other.

David Richter, PhD’07, now an assistant professor of Spanish at Grinnell College, was in the first Graduate Student Fellows Program. “I knew the experience of working in the moderately structured environment that the Warren Center program provided would be a good motivation for me to be productive and finish my dissertation,” he says. “It was an exciting environment of intellectual growth and stimulation. This was key for me as a young scholar. Our conversations were relaxed, but intellectually rigorous.”

Such programs fit with the center’s mission to “provide a space for countless meetings of the mind,” says the center’s new faculty director, Edward H. Friedman, Chancellor’s Professor of Spanish and professor of comparative literature. “The Warren Center promotes innovative scholarly undertakings and collaborations, and at the same time, foregrounds the role of the humanities at Vanderbilt and in academia in general. Our students—notably, our undergraduates—have not forsaken the humanities. On the contrary, they seem to realize that, whatever their ultimate professional goals, it behooves them to take classes in literature, philosophy, history, religious studies and theater.”

Republican incumbents whose home districts saw heavy casualties in the Iraq War faced a harder re-election in the 2006 U.S. House elections than Democrats. According to a study by Bruce Oppenheimer, professor of political science, and Christian Grose, assistant professor of political science, for every two Iraq war deaths from Republican-controlled districts, there was a 1 percent increase in the Democratic partisan swing. The study was published in Legislative Studies Quarterly.

How long did it take for the Americas to be populated with people? The theory has been that ancient settlers would have moved quickly down the west coast from Siberia, drawing resources from the ocean. Findings from a team headed by Distinguished Professor of Anthropology Tom Dillehay and reported in Science back that theory, but point intriguingly to the possibility that migration might have been slower than presumed. In examining evidence from Chile’s Monte Verde archeological site located over 50 miles from the coast, the team found coastal artifacts and inland materials. This suggests that the residents of Monte Verde moved between areas. “It takes time to adapt to these inland resources and then come back out to the coast,” Dillehay says. If other early groups followed a similar pattern, then the peopling of the Americas may have been “a much slower and more deliberate process.” 

Harth

The biggest small thing in transportation is Assistant Professor of Chemistry Eva Harth’s creation of a new drug delivery system using nanoparticles.

Teeny, tiny nanoparticles—molecules so small that about 90,000 of them total the width of a human hair—have unusual properties, structure and applications that have great promise for innovation in science and medicine. Harth’s discovery is in the area of one of their most promising applications, their potential to distribute drugs in the body and to enhance drug effectiveness.

Harth developed a specially designed particle called a nanosponge, which can carry large numbers of drug molecules. Then, collaborating with Heidi Hamm, Earl W. Sutherland Jr. Professor of Pharmacology in the School of Medicine, Harth synthesized a molecule with the ability to slip through cell membranes and reach the cell’s nucleus. Harth’s lab established how to attach this transporter to the nanosponge; the transporter then pulled the nanosponge (and its piggyback drug molecules) into cell compartments. Since inner cell compartments are difficult for most drugs to reach, the findings have possibilities for disease treatments.

Harth is already applying her drug delivery system to fighting cancer. Dennis E. Hallahan, Ingram Professor of Cancer Research and professor of cancer biology and biomedical engineering in the School of Medicine, had identified a molecule that targets a surface feature on lung carcinomas. Harth improved the molecule and attached it to her nanoparticle. The two scientists determined that the combination could deliver drugs to the surface of lung tumors. They are now working to adapt the delivery system to carry cisplatinum, a chemotherapy agent used to treat several kinds of cancer but that is highly toxic and has unpleasant side effects. By delivering the anti-cancer agent directly to the cancerous tissues, Harth’s system decreases the adverse effects and increases its potency.

“The people in my lab have tried a number of different drug delivery systems, and Eva’s works the best of those we’ve looked at,” Hallahan says.

Harth’s research is supported by a National Science Foundation grant awarded to her as part of a Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) award, NSF’s most prestigious honor for junior faculty.

Tong and Pearson

New research published in the online journal Current Biology has found that mental imagery—what we see with the “mind’s eye”—directly affects our visual perception.

“We found that imagery leads to a short-term memory trace that can bias future perception,” says Joel Pearson, research associate in the Vanderbilt Department of Psychology and lead author of the study. “This is the first research to definitively show that imagining something changes vision both while you are imagining it and later on.”

To test how imagery affects perception, the researchers had subjects imagine simple patterns of vertical or horizontal stripes. They then presented a green horizontal pattern to one eye and a red vertical pattern to the other to induce what is called binocular rivalry. During binocular rivalry an individual will often alternately perceive each stimulus, with the images appearing to switch back and forth before their eyes. The subjects generally reported they had seen the image they had been imagining, proving the researchers’ hypothesis that imagery would influence the binocular rivalry battle. 

Frank Tong, associate professor of psychology and co-author of the study, says “Our results show that even a single instance of imagery can tilt how you see the world one way or another, dramatically, if the conditions are right.”

The new findings offer an objective tool to assess the often-slippery concept of imagination. “We found that the imagery effect, while found in all of our subjects, could differ a lot in strength across subjects. So this might give us a metric to measure the strength of mental imagery in individuals and how that imagery may influence perception,” Tong says.

The findings by Pearson, Tong and co-author Colin Clifford of the University of Sydney may also help settle a longstanding debate in the research community over whether mental imagery is visual—that one imagines something just as one sees it—or more abstract.

“With advances in human brain imaging, we now know that when you imagine something, parts of the visual brain do light up and you see activity there,” Pearson says. “Our work shows that not only are imagery and vision related, but imagery directly influences what we see.”

Internal political struggles are not new to China. Tracy Miller, associate professor of history of art, researched the architecture and art of the Jin Shrines complex (Jinci) of the Northern Song dynasty (960-1127 C.E.) and found that the very structure and religious art of the complex reflected the struggles of competing social and political groups worshiping different deities. Her book, The Divine Nature of Power, reveals how the wall paintings, sculpture, and temple buildings of the sacred site were manipulated over time, presenting differing ideas about divinity, identity and status depending on who was in power.

He’s not a medical doctor and he doesn’t play one on TV, but Glenn Webb, professor of mathematics, has a prescription for reducing the transmission of drug-resistant infections among hospital patients. While hospitals combat the life-threatening problem with hygiene—which is vital—Webb’s mathematical analysis indicates that the solution could be briefer courses of antibiotics. Webb worked with researchers from Harvard University, France’s Université du Havre and the University of Miami, Coral Gables, on a mathematical model that analyzed the problem on two levels: bacterial and human interaction. The results suggest that changing the way antibiotics are prescribed and administered can limit the spread of resistant bacteria.

In a historic move that strengthens its dedication to accessibility and affordability, Vanderbilt announced last month that it will eliminate need-based loans from financial aid packages offered to eligible undergraduates. Starting in fall 2009, the amount of need-based loans normally included in undergraduate financial aid awards for new and returning students will be replaced with Vanderbilt grants and scholarships. In addition, seniors slated to graduate in May 2009 will have their need-based loans for the spring 2009 semester replaced with grant and scholarship assistance.

“This underscores Vanderbilt’s commitment to the belief that ability, achievement and hard work—not a family’s financial status—should determine access to a great education,” said Chancellor Nicholas S. Zeppos of the historic move. “When financial barriers to a Vanderbilt education are reduced or eliminated, Vanderbilt becomes a more dynamic environment for everyone. Every student benefits from the enriched community composed of highly talented and qualified students of all economic, cultural and geographic backgrounds.”

Provost Richard McCarty noted that Vanderbilt will continue to be one of only a few U.S. universities that employs a “need-blind” admissions approach and additionally guarantees to meet each student’s demonstrated financial need. “We will continue to make admission decisions based on such factors as character, academic strength and leadership skills, but not on a family’s income level or ability to pay,” McCarty said.

No Income Cap for Families

Unlike some other leading universities which have either reduced or eliminated need-based loans solely for low- and/or middle-income families, Vanderbilt will eliminate them for all students who qualify for need-based financial assistance, based on a holistic review of individual family circumstances. In determining a student’s demonstrated financial need, Vanderbilt takes into account each student’s individual family circumstances and all educational costs such as tuition, fees, housing, meals, books and course materials, plus allowances for personal and travel expenses. 

The fall 2009 program will apply to all need-based loans for new and returning undergraduate students. 

Debt Reduction A Priority 

The university started an initiative to reduce students’ education-related debt approximately seven years ago. That initiative has already resulted in the reduction of average overall indebtedness of graduating seniors by 17 percent. The additional funds needed to fully replace need-based loans will come from institutional reallocations and from earnings on an additional $100 million to be raised in new scholarship endowment over the next several years. A top priority of Vanderbilt’s ongoing Shape the Future campaign has been, and will continue to be, increased scholarship support. Vanderbilt will specifically seek philanthropic gifts from alumni and friends for this initiative. 

In addition to encouraging students to consider Vanderbilt who might not have otherwise, the initiative will also allow students to pursue further education or career options that they might not have considered if they had need-based student loan debt. 

Reaction on campus and in the College of Arts and Science was swift and positive. “Put simply, our investment in a no-loan policy is both good business and right business,” said Carolyn Dever, interim dean of the College of Arts and Science. “Good business because it will enable us to attract the best students regardless of their means. Right business because the College of Arts and Science benefits from the socioeconomic diversity of its student body. The impact goes even further: our society benefits from the freedom of young Vanderbilt alumni to choose any career path without the burden of student-loan debt. We’re excited about what this means for our students and the entire expanded Vanderbilt community.”

For more information, visit www.vanderbilt.edu/expandedaidprogram.

If the campuses in Billy: The Early Years or Hannah Montana: The Movie look familiar, it’s because both theatrical-release films shot scenes on the Vanderbilt campus. In the feature about evangelist Billy Graham, the campus stood in for Northwestern Bible College, Wheaton College and even Princeton. Vanderbilt staff and locals in 1940s period dress were also part of the scenes. Filming for Hannah Montana: The Movie occurred outdoors near Kirkland and Buttrick Halls and indoors at Sarratt Cinema and Furman Hall. Production trucks and equipment lined the perimeter of the campus along West End Avenue one quiet day in May. Again, some faculty and staff served as extras in the film. While on campus, the movie’s director, Peter Chesolm, and other crew members visited the Maymester course, America on Film: Performance and Culture. The film opens spring 2009.

Packed with interesting people exploring interesting ideas, the Vanderbilt campus has long been a creative place. Thanks to the vision and support of recording industry executive Mike Curb, that creativity now has a center. The university recently announced the establishment of The Mike Curb Creative Campus Program, administered by the Curb Center for Art, Enterprise and Public Policy at Vanderbilt. The program will include new courses, faculty, internships, guest speakers, and the first national research program on creativity, the arts and higher education. 

Starting in fall 2009 with the naming of a select group of students as Undergraduate Curb Leadership Scholars, the program will feature special courses taught by Vanderbilt faculty and visiting scholars, including new faculty recruited specifically for the Curb program. A master’s degree in Creative Enterprise and Public Leadership will be launched in 2011, as will a series of month-long summer internships. The internships will offer graduate and undergraduate students unique opportunities to test leadership skills through real-life work experiences with government agencies and the recording, film, and broadcasting industries.  

The program will prepare students to work with globalized markets, engage emerging technologies and navigate increasingly complex intellectual property rules.

The College of Arts and Science and the entire Vanderbilt community mourn the loss of anthropology professor Pierre Colas, 32, and his sister, Marie Colas, 27. The pair was shot during an apparent robbery at Pierre Colas’ home in East Nashville on August 26, 2008.

Pierre Robert Colas joined the College of Arts and Science in 2006. Friendly, generous, and with an infectious sense of humor, the assistant professor taught courses in Mayan language, Mayan culture and comparative writing systems. He was popular with students and colleagues alike, and made his office a place for faculty to gather informally in the afternoon to talk over espresso and M&Ms.

“Professor Colas was an accomplished teacher and mentor to his students, and an emerging researcher in the culture and language of the Mayan people,” said Interim Dean Carolyn Dever. “In his time at Vanderbilt, Pierre won the respect and deep affection of his colleagues in both anthropology and Latin American studies. He and his sister, Marie, will be missed by this community and so many others around the world.” 

As an anthropologist, Colas produced groundbreaking work on Maya epigraphy—he was one of a handful of people in the world who could read Mayan hieroglyphs—and focused his ethnographic studies on the Yucatec Maya of Belize. A native of Germany, Colas earned his Ph.D. at the University of Bonn. While a student, he received two grants of the Studienstiftung des Deutschen Volkes, a prestigious award that has been compared to the Fulbright Scholarship. A prolific scholar who spoke
six languages, Colas published three books on the Maya and numerous articles. At the time of his death, he was working on two more books and a monograph based on his field work. 

Also a scholar, Marie Colas was visiting her brother during a break from her postgraduate studies at the University of Zürich. 

The Colases are survived by their father and a brother. A university-wide memorial service was held October 29 in All Faith Chapel.

Of all the universities in America, Vanderbilt University is ranked No. 18 according to U.S. News & World Report. That rank is up one position from last year.  

Among national universities in the Great Schools, Great Prices category, Vanderbilt was ranked No. 14, marking it as a good value for its tuition costs. The magazine noted that 12 percent of Vanderbilt students receive Pell Grants for low-income students, ranking it in the Top 25. 

Vanderbilt’s No. 18 rank in U.S. News & World Report’s 2009 Best Colleges edition is a three-way tie with Emory University and the University of Notre Dame.

“We’re pleased to be recognized once again by U.S. News & World Report as one of the best universities in the country,” said Vanderbilt Chancellor Nicholas S. Zeppos. “We’re diligent about improving the student experience at Vanderbilt, and this is one reflection that tells us we are succeeding.”

U.S. News & World Report issues rankings annually. Harvard University was named the top national university. The Top 5 was rounded out by Princeton University, Yale University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Stanford University.

In the overall rankings, Vanderbilt has progressed from No. 24 in 1989 to consistently cracking the Top 20 since 2003. Vanderbilt waas also ranked No.18 in the years 2006, 2005, 2004 and 1994.

Ken Catania is a funny guy.

The associate professor of biological sciences is also soft-spoken, modest, articulate, creative and quick to laugh. In life, teaching and research, he always looks for the opportunity to do the fun thing—appropriate, since he’s a world-class practical joker. Some of his gems are the stuff of neuroscience legend.

Take the one with the Maryland State trooper, for example.

In the early 1990s, Catania and a carload of fellow neuroscience students were en route to a seminar when the car was pulled over by a huge, surly Maryland trooper. The trooper started asking the students hard questions. Neuroscience questions. It wasn’t until they got into an argument amongst themselves over the number of mammalian cranial nerves that Catania’s friends realized they had been set up—the trooper was a college friend of Catania’s. It took a year to plan, but being meticulous helps make Catania a great scientist. 

He is also a genius; so says the MacArthur Foundation, which in 2006 rewarded Catania’s ground-breaking work on the sensory systems, brain evolution, and behavior of unusual mammals like star-nosed moles, naked mole rats and water shrews with a $500,000 grant. Often referred to as ‘genius grants,’ the MacArthur awards are given annually to a select few to spend as the recipients see fit—no strings attached.

Life in the Woods

Catania’s interest in animals and behavior traces back to countless hours spent in the woods and fields of Columbia, Maryland. “I grew up in a sort of interesting planned community,” the neuroscientist says. “The main feature was that there were a lot of open spaces—lakes, streams and forested land—interspersed with the houses and schools. It had a big impact on me.” 

Catania’s parents also had an impact on his life’s work. “My dad is a psychologist,” Catania says. “He was actually a student of [famed American psychologist] B.F. Skinner, which is a pretty big calling card. He helped me to learn to think carefully about the world and behavior.” His mother’s influence was equally important. She often took the youngster for long walks to look at the plants and trees. “It wasn’t long before I was dragging home everything,” Catania says. “My mother would put up with turtles, snakes, salamanders, toads and frogs, and every creature I could get hold of. She was very understanding.” 

Catania developed insights and intuition about wildlife that served him well. As an undergraduate at the University of Maryland, he volunteered at the National Zoo in Washington, D.C. “I fit in really well there, and they started to ask me to help with the research and even to collect some of the animals,” he says. “I had a knack for being able to find animals and that’s where I first got involved with star-nosed moles.” 

Investigating the Odd and Unknown

Star-nosed moles are some of the oddest-looking creatures on earth and Catania is one of only a handful of people who know how and where to catch them in the wild. At least once a year, he travels to a certain spot in northern Pennsylvania to collect specimens of the amazing little mammal. 

Catania’s research into the neurobiology and behavior of the star-nosed mole began as a graduate student at the University of California San Diego. He has found that an abnormally large part of the mole’s brain and nervous system are devoted to its fleshy, pink, 22-tentacled nose, which gives the animal an amazing sense of touch which, in some ways, parallels human vision. The mole detects food underground by constantly sweeping its nose back and forth. If the tips of the appendages make contact with a potential food item such as a worm, the mole will bring the even more sensitive central portion of its nose to bear on the object. If it is food, the mole then gulps it down. The entire process from detection to dinner takes a mere 200 milliseconds. 

Since coming to Vanderbilt in early 1995, Catania’s name and reputation seem inextricably linked to the moles, although his lab features several species of scurrying little creatures equally as unusual. “Water shrews are smaller than mice and can swim like fish,” Catania says. “We discovered that they can actually smell underwater by blowing bubbles out of their noses and re-inhaling the bubbles.” He also studies naked mole rats: hairless, burrowing little rodents that are the only known non-insect to live in colonies organized like beehives. “One queen bears all of the young while the rest are workers,” Catania says. “They also have life spans far beyond other rodents—twenty years or more. I’d like to find out why.”

Catania likes studying the star-nosed moles, water shrews and naked mole rats, among other things. “I’m very interested in animals with small brains and how fast they are,” Catania says. “I think there’s going to be some advantages to small brains as far as speed goes.” And although many recipients spend their MacArthur grants on personal needs, Catania is trying to purchase, preserve and protect the land in Pennsylvania where he finds the star-nosed moles.

Creative Touches

Catania and his wife, Liz, are both Vanderbilt researchers and avid rock climbers. Catania proposed to her on a flower-decorated ledge located halfway up a cliff face. The elaborate event took months of planning and the help of friends, but he says the surprise was worth it. The couple celebrated their first wedding anniversary on Halloween. 

Between research, collecting trips, and settling into newly-married life, Catania also supervises a research lab, takes stunning nature photography (of his research subjects, but also of animals in the wild), and serves as one of the world’s leading experts on his uncommon mammals.

Catania’s creativity helps his students understand complex concepts. In his Neurology of Behavior class, he uses made-to-order replicas to demonstrate the classic case of railroad worker Phineas Gage, who suffered behavioral changes after surviving an accident which sent a railroad tamping iron through his skull. 

Hefting the nearly 14 pound iron, Catania explains that the demonstration helps students learn and remember. “It’s always good to try to do the fun thing, to help make others’ lives more fun and interesting.”

Robert Penn Warren circa 1964, about the time he was working on Who Speaks for the Negro? © Bettmann/CORBIS—Sylvia Salmi

A photograph taken of Robert Penn Warren in the early 1960s shows not the young Kentucky boy whose life changed at Vanderbilt, but a mature Warren—wiser, with life’s experiences written on his face. This is the Warren who sought out men and women in the Civil Rights Movement, interviewing them, sometimes under the cover of darkness for their protection. The Warren who preserved those interviews so they could be heard, in their own voices, once again, thanks to an inter-institutional initiative spearheaded by the center that bears his name, the Robert Penn Warren Center for the Humanities in the College of Arts and Science.

Southern Stance

Now revered as America’s first poet laureate and the only writer to win Pulitzer Prizes in both fiction and poetry, Warren, BA’25, enrolled at Vanderbilt as an engineering student. In the English class he took to meet basic education requirements, Warren found where his passion lay: writing. He joined a group of fellow poets and intellectuals known as the Fugitives. The Fugitives morphed into the Agrarians, a conservative collection of 12 Southern writers and poets. Again, Warren was among them. In 1930 the Agrarians published a manifesto called I’ll Take My Stand, which included a Warren essay on race titled “The Briar Patch.” In it he argued for separate but equal education for blacks and whites.

The Rev. Wyatt Tee Walker and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. in 1964. © Flip Schulke/CORBIS

“Hollow though that sounds to us now, that was a radical position,” says Mona Frederick, executive director of the Robert Penn Warren Center for the Humanities. “His colleagues and constituents would not have believed African Americans needed to be educated beyond elementary school.”

Despite the then-progressive thinking, Warren regretted the essay. “I never read the essay after it was published,” he later wrote, “and the reason was, I presume, that reading it would, I dimly sensed, make me uncomfortable. In fact, while writing it, I had experienced some vague discomfort, like the discomfort you feel when a poem doesn’t quite come off, when you’ve had to fake or twist or pad it, when you haven’t really explored the impulse.”

The Rev. James Lawson and Rev. Walker at the 2008 “We Speak for Ourselves” panel discussion. photo credit: Rosevelt Noble

Warren later determined to set things right. At the height of the Civil Rights Movement, some 35 years after his essay was written, he lugged a giant reel-to-reel tape recorder to interviews with people involved in the movement, including participants like Malcolm X, the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., Ralph Ellison, and the Rev. James Lawson, ’71. The result was Warren’s 1965 book, Who Speaks for the Negro?, hailed by New York Times reviewer Charles Poore as “one of the year’s outstanding books.” The tapes, though disclosed in Warren’s foreword, were largely forgotten. 

An Audible Discovery

Then, in 2006, Frederick read a brief article that mentioned Warren’s book and related audiotapes. Although the Warren Center is dedicated to interdisciplinary research and study in the humanities, rather than to Warren and his work, Frederick was intrigued. “I thought, ‘Wow, I’ll have to look for those tapes,’” she recalls. 

Frederick obtained a copy of the out-of-print book and discovered that Warren had interviewed almost 50 legendary figures at the height of the Civil Rights Era. Realizing his work represented a major contribution to the historical record of the movement, she and staff associate Sarah Nobles began tracking the whereabouts of Warren’s original reel-to-reel tapes. 

Vanderbilt University Special Collections and Archives and Ratnesh Bhatt.

Nobles traveled to Yale where Warren had been a professor while writing the book and uncovered tapes and related materials in Yale’s library. “No one had catalogued them or listened to them in a while,” Frederick says. “To hear them for the first time was chilling. It’s like getting into a time machine and going back in time. Just hearing the voices is pretty remarkable.”

The humanities center discovered that the University of Kentucky also had some audio interviews by Warren that were part of an oral history project. Initially believing that Kentucky had duplicates, Frederick quickly realized the collection had been split. “Kentucky didn’t know Yale had any, and Yale didn’t know Kentucky had some,” she says. 

Warren’s interviews were significant, particularly because they took place during one of the most critical times in U.S history. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 became law, giving the federal government power to enforce desegregation. Three men in Mississippi registering black voters were found burned to death. The month Warren penned his foreword, Malcolm X was assassinated, and immediately after the book was released, the march on Selma began.

“It was a terribly chaotic time. Why did Martin Luther King and so many others take a couple of hours to sit down and talk to Warren, a white English professor from Yale?” Frederick wonders. 

That makes the tapes, and what will eventually be a broad-based historical repository related to the book, all the more important. 

Mona Frederick, executive director of the Robert Penn Warren Center for the Humanities. photo credit: John Russell

Preserved and Accessible

Working with Paul Gherman, who recently retired as Vanderbilt’s university librarian, and Jody Combs, assistant to the university librarian for information technology, the next step was to bring the tapes into the 21st century. Using digital versions created from the originals at the University of Kentucky and Yale, the librarians created a searchable database and cataloged the tapes, making it easy for anyone to listen by topic or interviewee. The tapes are accessible for free online at http://whospeaks.library.vanderbilt.edu. Transcripts of the interviews are currently being created and digitized, as are related materials that Warren kept. 

One item is a response to a letter Warren wrote, Frederick says. “He wrote to Stokely Carmichael, and Carmichael responded, ‘Oh, I just read your book in jail. We’d tear five pages out at a time and pass them around. When you’re in jail, characters from books become your cell mates.’”

Combs says that the project has been, in some ways, a humbling experience. “You’re going through material, much of it ephemeral and not of huge historical value, but then you run into these amazing pieces of information—beautifully written, beautifully articulated ideas of the time,” he says. “It can be a little daunting to think what we’re doing is putting a historical record together that will outlive us both.” 

A Worthy Commemoration

As the tapes were being digitized and made available online through the three cooperating libraries, the Robert Penn Warren Center was also planning events in honor of its 20th anniversary. The two projects were joined as part of a year-long celebration. 

More than 40 years after Warren asked the question, Who Speaks for the Negro?, the center organized a two-day response. “We Speak for Ourselves,” as the event was titled, brought together leading scholars and activists with as many of the original interviewees as possible, including the Rev. Wyatt Tee Walker, Ruth Turner Perot, Lois Elie, the Rev. Will Campbell and Lawson. Decades had passed since many of these civil rights leaders had gathered. “One said to another, ‘The last time I saw you, we were talking to Bobby Kennedy,’” Frederick recalls.

The 1963 March on Washington. © The National Archives and Records Administration

The event was videotaped and is available in an online collection, displaying the 21st century response side by side with interviews from 1964.

Warren’s children, Rosanna and Gabriel, generously provided permission to digitize the extra material related to the book. For the conference and collection, Rosanna Warren, the Emma Ann MacLachlan Metcalf Professor of the Humanities and professor of English and modern foreign languages and literatures at Boston University, wrote her recollections of life in the Warren household while her “Pa” was writing Who Speaks for the Negro? She remembered her father’s return after being gone for weeks at a time:

 Stories emerged: how he and his hosts often had to travel on back country roads long distances at night in cars without headlights for fear of being shot. … He attended meetings in remote farmhouses where all the blinds were down, and where at night almost no lights were lit.

While her parents tried to shield their children from the danger, it hit home, Rosanna Warren said, when she opened their Connecticut mailbox and found a KKK pamphlet with a threat scrawled across it: 

“We know where you live and we will get you.” … I remember running into the house, to find my parents, and show them and ask them what was happening. There followed anxious, whispered conversations between the grownups, where there was question of contacting the FBI and eventually a sense that that would be useless.

© The National Archives and Records Administration

Rosanna Warren’s recollections put in context some of what her father experienced as he wrote Who Speaks for the Negro? and the risks he took in giving black Americans a voice during the early Civil Rights Era. Thanks to scholarship and technology, their voices—and his—are still being heard. They’re speaking for themselves after all these years, and anyone can listen and learn.

The Who Speaks for the Negro? digital project was made possible with support from the Robert Penn Warren Center for the Humanities and the Jean and Alexander Heard Library, Vanderbilt University. Original materials (recordings) were provided through the generous support of the University of Kentucky and Yale University. Some abstracts are available courtesy of the University of Kentucky. The “We Speak for Ourselves” conference was generously co-sponsored by Vanderbilt’s Program in African American and Diaspora Studies, Bishop Joseph Johnson Black Cultural Center, Center for Ethics, Center for Nashville Studies, Department of English, Law School, the Office of the Provost and the Race Relations Institute at Fisk University. Additional support was provided by various programs and departments at Vanderbilt; a full listing can be found on the Who Speaks Web site.

To think about the College of Arts and Science is to think about diversity. Every day I speak with great pride, for example, about the range of scholarly disciplines pursued by Arts and Science faculty and students. From chemistry to classics, from physics to psychology to philosophy and everywhere in between, our researchers press deeply into the questions of their disciplines—even as their interdisciplinary innovations help to rearrange those disciplines themselves. 

I speak with great pride, as well, about the diverse backgrounds of our faculty and students. The College of Arts and Science is a truly global community: we are committed to bringing the world’s most talented thinkers to our labs and classrooms, and in partnership with our alumni, to bringing the work of our labs and classrooms to every region of the globe. 

Along with Chancellor Nicholas Zeppos and Provost Richard McCarty, we are committed to socioeconomic diversity by making a Vanderbilt education available to every undergraduate we admit, regardless of ability to pay—and we are committed to insuring that every Arts and Science student graduates free of the burden of student-loan debt. 

Each of us benefits from the increasing ethnic and racial diversity among our faculty, undergraduate and graduate students. I am proud of the national leadership of faculty such as Keivan Stassun, associate professor of astronomy, and Richard Pitt, assistant professor of sociology, in helping minority and underrepresented students gain access to educational opportunities. 

To speak of “diversity” as I have here helps me to communicate to you the dazzling energy and scope of this institution. It has surprised me to recognize, then, that the most profound aspect of my experience of the past several months—my first as interim dean—involves the remarkable coherence of a community almost inconceivably heterogeneous. 

For example, when Jay Dickerson, assistant professor of physics, teaches his undergraduate seminar The Art of Physics and the Physics of Art, he presumes not the opposition of science and art but their inseparability. Understanding of the arts illuminates the understanding of science, and vice versa. Professor Dickerson reminds us that we are not the College of Arts or Science, nor the College of Arts vs. Science; we are the College of Arts and Science.

When Assistant Professor of Anthropology Pierre Colas and his sister were killed early in the fall semester, the faculty, students and staff of Arts and Science came together in an inspiring demonstration of the power of a community. Together we shared in those most human of processes: to find meaning in tragedy, to grieve, to heal. 

This College of Arts and Science is as powerfully centripetal as it is centrifugal—a community whose rich diversity fosters its unity. Through the example of this community I have come to a new appreciation of the importance of the “and” in our name: we are the College of Arts and Science at Vanderbilt University.

Carolyn Dever
Interim Dean

“That tells you what I think is important,” Worley, BA’72, says. Even though he’s run multimillion-dollar companies, discovered some of country music’s hottest stars, and produced million-selling albums, the former philosophy major thinks of himself as a guitar player.

The Nashville native started playing music in third grade, moving on to guitar at 13. While in the College of Arts and Science in the late ’60s and early ’70s, he played fraternity parties and clubs. After graduating in 1972, he and his bandmates tried to keep the music alive. But the military draft pulled several away, and others went on to regular jobs. 

Worley tried that, too, applying for a job selling business machines. The interviewer told him not to waste either of their time and to go back to music. 

So he did. He became a session guitarist, playing on albums produced in Nashville. He helped build a studio run by fellow alumnus Richard “Pat” Patrick, BA’69, and continued making music with Marshall Morgan, BA’73, who would go on to become a sound engineer for the Eagles. It took eight years for Worley to get his first job as a producer, for a then-unknown Gary Morris. 

During the nearly 30 years since, he’s produced for Reba McEntire, Marie Osmond, Martina McBride, the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band and more. Producing the Wide Open Spaces and Fly albums for the Dixie Chicks earned him Grammys for best country album. As an executive he worked in the upper echelons of two major record labels, Sony BMG and Warner Bros. At Warner Bros. he signed Big & Rich to their record deal. Most recently, he produced the debut album for Lady Antebellum, a group whose first album hit No. 1 on the Billboard country chart.

Not bad for a guitar player, albeit one who parlayed philosophy and economics into a highly successful career. 

Focus on Learning, Not a Career

“For those of us of our generation, getting an education and finding a career were two separate things,” Worley says. “I know that’s changed now, and for the worse. I went to school to get as broad an education as I could. I majored in philosophy to check out as many different ways of thinking about the world as I could.”

His liberal arts background has served him well in business. Philosophy, sociology and psychology have helped him in working with creative artists, and economics has helped with business. “I minored in economics. I’m glad I did,” he says. “Later in my life as a businessman, it’s been good to innately understand macro- and microeconomics and how they work.”

Understanding economics and a world economy is something Worley learned at home as well. His father, James Worley, was an economics professor and director of Vanderbilt’s influential Graduate Program in Economic Development. The program brings officials and educators from developing nations to Nashville to study economic development. During his tenure the senior Worley worked with more than 900 government officials and academics from 92 countries. Former students include a Lebanese ambassador to the United States, a vice president of Micronesia, a vice president of Ecuador, and a governor of the Central Bank in Turkey. Many of these ended up in the Worley home, providing an international perspective that the lifelong Tennessean says enriched his understanding of the world, education and business. 

Not Ready to Be Irrelevant

In 2004, world and business changes helped Worley decide to reshape his future—and perhaps that of the music business. The music industry now has seen sales drop by half in four years. “Imagine any business that’s now 50 percent of what it was and what that does to the structure of the business, especially if it’s one that has a long history and a certain way of doing things,” Worley says, explaining that Internet downloads are up but CD sales are down. “People are more interested in buying one song at a time than they are albums. We’ve gone from an 18-dollar model to a 99-cent model.”

The changes in the business brought Worley to a point of questioning his own future. He walked away from his job as chief creative officer at Warner Bros. to launch his own business, Skyline Publishing, which specializes in developing artists. 

“I had a good job with a big, fat salary, and all I saw around me was this crumbling of the business. I had three more years available on my contract, but to do what I was doing was a path to irrelevance,” he says. “Am I ready to be irrelevant? The answer was loud and clear: No. I don’t want to live that life. I’ve still got music to make and things to do.”

The music-business model may have crumbled, but consumers clearly still want the content. Worley’s new business develops artists, and then brings the performer, Skyline and the record label into a collaborative profit-sharing arrangement. In the past, record labels made money solely off an artist’s album sales. “Now CD sales are a wallpaper backdrop to the music,” he says. “It’s being able to go in as a business, intersect with other businesses and say, ‘Let’s all win.’ Nobody has to lose. That’s our way of the future.”