Mason Media Blog

Dani Miller, left, and Brittany Burkhart. Photo by Evan Cantwell

With only two months to plan, two Mason sophomores muddled their way through a series of setbacks to pull off a successful universitywide fund-raiser. The auction, called GBAY, netted more than $10,500 for Mason scholarships.

Brittany Burkhart and Dani Miller are members of the Mason Ambassadors, a program of the Office of Admissions that encourages pride among the Mason community by promoting the unique traditions and opportunities that define the university. Together the two students chair the Ambassadors Service Committee.

Combining two important goals, the students organized an activity to raise money for scholarships that would bring the campus community together and involve multiple groups in the planning and implementation.

Some of the most popular auction sales were spending a day as the Mason president, priority registration for classes, reserved parking, Redskins tickets, round-trip airline tickets, a “super single” dorm room and having a sandwich in La Patisserie designed and named for oneself.

In the end, 100 auction items or services were secured, 500 bidding tickets were sold and the event grossed $14,229.11.

More information about the GBAY auction can be found here.

Sports play many roles in our lives and as part of a U.S. Department of State cultural exchange program are even being used to promote awareness and understanding of diverse cultures in foreign countries. Through a grant awarded by the SportsUnited Division of the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, Mason professors of sport management Bob Baker and Craig Esherick are not only looking to develop awareness of basketball in India but also to increase cultural awareness.

Through a series of combined coaching clinics and youth basketball camps, Baker and Esherick hope to provide a formative experience in the lives of participating Indian boys and girls. During their current trip, their second since November 2009, the pair, along with consultant J.D. Walsh, will hold clinics and camps in Chennai and Bangalore. Baker and Esherick will provide direct instruction, cross-cultural exchanges and hands-on experiences for players, coaches and league administrators that will not only enhance skill development, but also broaden participants’ understanding of diverse cultures.  Baker, Esherick and Walsh have also identified 10 sports leaders to travel to the United States in summer 2010 to attend a Coaching Academy at Mason.

To hear more about what they hope to accomplish through their grant, as well as more information about their previous trip to India, check out the video below and read the full press release online.

For Earth Week next week, George Mason University professors and students from Mason’s Potomac Environmental Research and Education Center (PEREC) will be leading more than 1,000 middle-schoolers outside for field trips in the Manassas and Woodbridge areas.

The project is made possible by a three-year grant from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Dann Sklarew, associate professor of Environmental Science and Policy, discusses water quality with Prince William County science teachers.

The kids will be out in the meadow running through a team-building game or alongside a stream conducting water quality testing. They will use nets to collect and examine bugs and walk through cold water using waders for the first time.

If you are looking for stories for Earth Day, this would be a great one. The students will rotate through three stations, and all of the stations will provide excellent photo/video opportunities. The field trips are designed to let the kids have fun while learning about ecological issues affecting the Chesapeake Bay and understanding and appreciating the natural world around them.

The trips will be conducted over five days next week in Manassas or Woodbridge areas.

More information about the project can be found at this link: http://news.gmu.edu/articles/216.

A photo gallery of the middle school teachers training for these field trips can be seen here: http://www.facebook.com/georgemason?v=photos&ref=ts#!/album.php?aid=21545&id=5625209996.

Kids will have the opportunity to take water samples and test for water quality.

Just in time for National Careers in Aging Week, Mason has announced a new master’s degree in senior housing. With the National Institute on Aging estimating that one of every five people in the U.S. will be over the age of 65 by 2030, this new degree should help to meet the growing demand for executives trained in operating niche communities for older adults.

“The first of the 78 million baby boomers will turn 65 next year, and their interest and expectations for retirement housing will be high,” says Andrew Carle, a former senior housing executive and director of the Program in Assisted Living/Senior Housing Administration. “Just as the Cornell School of Hotel Administration set the standard for the hospitality industry, we want to set the standard for senior housing as it moves forward.”

A cottage industry through the 1980′s, senior housing today is represented by a host of national and regional providers, with up to 400 communities each. Assisted living communities typically combine housing, hospitality and basic health care under one roof. Continuing care retirement communities, which include independent as well as assisted living and skilled nursing services, may house more than 2,000 seniors, employ more than 1,000 staff and manage real estate valued at more than $500 million. In addition to community administrators, large companies require regional, divisional and corporate executives.

“The industry is projected to double to more than 100,000 communities housing 5 million seniors in the next two decades,” says P.J. Maddox, chair of Mason’s Department of Health Administration and Policy. “We expect executive positions in the field to be among the fastest growing career paths in the U.S.”

To learn more, visit http://eagle.gmu.edu/newsroom/813/.

When Haiti was struck by a magnitude 7.0 earthquake on January 12 it made international headlines. With an estimated three million people affected by the quake, donations came pouring in from around the globe and a star-studded fundraiser was held to raise even more money for the grief stricken nation.

Now, nearly three months later, Mason professors of counseling and development Fred Bemak and Rita Chi-Ying Chung are headed to Haiti as part of Counselors Without Borders, a group founded by Bemak after Hurricane Katrina in 2005. With expertise in the fields of cross-cultural and multicultural psychology and counseling, Bemak and Chung will provide training and consultation to staff members of a major non-governmental organization (NGO) as well as NGO leaders, all of whom are experiencing high levels of trauma and stress following the quake.

Joined by a colleague from San Jose State, the trio will be in Haiti from April 7-18 working in Cap Haitien, Jacmel and Port au Prince. Funded by USAID and hosted by Partners of the Americas, the group will be training NGO leaders to better understand and help humanitarian aid workers about dealing with the trauma and stress they are experiencing while conducting post-disaster work. In addition, the trio will be working with the Ministry of Agriculture and possibly with the Ministry of Education and Ministry of Health to train senior officials to help the members of their staff who are also experiencing significant trauma and stress.

If you are interested in speaking to Bemak and Chung about their work in Haiti, please contact Jennifer Edgerly at jedgerly@gmu.edu or 703-993-8699.

The Center for Climate Change Communication’s survey of television weathercasters is featured on a humorous segment that pits a climatologist against a meteorologist to debate global warming predictions.

Science catfight indeed!

“Isn’t the climate just made of thousands of little weathers”

The Linguistics Speaker Series is outdoing itself this time. Tomorrow, Friday, April 2 from 7 to 9 p.m., the program will be hosting Marc Okrand, creator of Klingon. In his presentation, Okrand will discuss the linguistic features of the Klingon language. The event will take place on Mason’s Fairfax Campus, Research I, Room 163.

The event is free and open to the public, and light refreshments will be served.

For more information, see the Linguistics Program events page.