Campus News: nominate outstanding scientists

Joanna Burdette, associate professor of medicinal chemistry and pharmacognosy, was a 2013 Researcher of the Year. Nominations are due Nov. 7 for this year’s award. Photo: Roberta Dupuis-Devlin/UIC Photo Services

Researchers of the year

Deadline is Nov. 7 for nominations for the UIC Researcher of the Year Awards. Ten $5,000 awards will be presented: five Distinguished Researcher awards for outstanding research achievements and five Rising Star awards to early career researchers. Categories include the basic life sciences, clinical sciences, natural sciences and engineering, social sciences and humanities, art and architecture.

Promotion, tenure committee elections

Online voting continues through 1 p.m. Oct. 24 for faculty representatives to the campus Promotion and Tenure Committee. The committee includes 18 professors on indefinite appointment at 100 percent time, elected by tenured and tenure-track faculty. They serve three-year terms.

Each college and school has one representative, except the colleges of Medicine and Liberal Arts and Sciences, which have three each. The provost may appoint up to nine additional members.

Information about the candidates is available on the voting website. For more information, contact Elizabeth Dooley, clerk of the UIC Senate, edooley@uic.edu or 312-996-2926.

Driver’s license, plate renewal Nov. 4

The Illinois Secretary of State mobile unit is in Student Center East today to provide driver’s license and state ID renewal and replacement, vehicle stickers, license plates (including UIC plates), disabilities parking placards, written driver’s exams and other services. The mobile unit will be open 9:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. in the SCE concourse.

Employee recognition ceremony

Winners of this year’s campus employee awards will be honored at the 2014 Employee Recognition Awards Ceremony and Reception, 10:30 a.m. Nov. 4 in the UIC Forum. All UIC community members are invited.

The event honors winners of the Award of Merit, CAPE Award, INSPIRE and Luminary Awards, Woman of the Year, Janice Watkins Award and UI Health Class Act and Academy Award. Employees marking 25, 30, 35, 40, 45 and 50 years of service will also be recognized.

Parking relocation will be honored in Lot 5 for drivers with a current campus parking permit. For more information, email rfortier@uillinois.edu

Feed the World

Author, academic and activist Raj Patel will present “Cook, Eat, Man, Woman — Competing Ideas to Feed the World in the 21st Century” at 4 p.m. Nov. 13 in the Illinois Room, Student Center East.

Patel became an outspoken critic of the World Bank, World Trade Organization and the United Nations after working at those organizations. He is the author of Stuffed and Starved: The Hidden Battle for the World Food System and The Value of Nothing: How to Reshape Market Society and Redefine Democracy.

Patel is research professor at the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs, University of Texas, Austin, and a fellow at the Institute for Food and Development Policy/Food First. His lecture is part of the Chancellor’s 2014-2015 Initiative in the Humanities focusing on food studies at UIC.