This column welcomes the submissions of all Concordia faculty and staff to promote and encourage individual and group activities in teaching and research, and to encourage work-related achievements.

Congratulations to Venkat Ramachandran (Electrical and Computer Engineering) on being selected for the 2003 Outstanding Engineering Educator Award of IEEE Canada. He will be presented with the award at the annual conference of the IEEE, to be held in Montreal from May 4 to 7. This brings to four the teaching awards Dr. Ramachandran has won. In 1997, he was given the Concordia Alumni Association Teaching Excellence Award, in 2001, the Faculty of Engineering and Computer Science Teaching Excellence Award, and last year, the Concordia Council for Student Life Teaching Excellence Award.

Stephanie Bolster (English) was the Reynolds Atelier writer in residence at McGill this term. In addition to her public reading in conjunction with this position, she recently read from her poetry at the University of Toronto (Scarborough) and at Montreal’s Blue-Metropolis-Bleu literary festival, as well as in Kingston, Ottawa, and Stratford, Ont. Her work will appear in forthcoming issues of Arc and International Poetry Review.

Congratulations to Associate Professor Lorna Roth, chair of the Department of Communication Studies, who was recently presented with the YMCA Women of Distinction Award in the category of education. The award recognized her contributions throughout her career to promoting of opportunities and choices for women, and encouraging them to play greater roles in social, political and professional life.

Peter Stoett (Political Science) presented two research papers recently. The first, on “Geopolitics, Renewable Energy vs. Fossil Fuels, and Post-Sept. 11 Security Concerns,” was presented at the Annual Political Science Students’ Invited Speakers Conference at the University of Manitoba, Winnipeg. The second, “Of Whales and People: Normative Theory, Symbolism, and the International Whaling Commission,” was presented to the International Studies Association in Portland, Oregon. During Concordia’s spring break, he participated in a workshop on “Responding to American Unilateralism” at the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, which included sessions with Canadian government officials, including the Minister of Foreign Affairs.

Daniel Dagenais (Sociology and Anthropology) has published, with Jean-Francois Côté, an article, “Dialectical Sociology in Quebec: About and Around Michel Freitag’s Dialectique et Société” in The American Sociologist.

Jean-Philippe Warren (Sociology and Anthropology) published “Anarchism and the French-Canadian Intellectual Tradition” in the Journal of Indo-Canadian Studies. He also published “La sociologie au Québec: préoccupations et orientations” in the Bulletin d’information de l’ACSALF and “L’avenir n’est plus ce qu’il était” in Relations, “ADQ: Une révolution du sur-bon sens” in Argument, and “Autour d’un livre” also in Argument. Finally, he co-edited a book with Gilles Routhier, Les visages de la foi. Figures marquantes du catholicisme québécois (Montréal, Fides).

Majid Fotuhi, a 1983 Concordia Science College graduate who went on to become an outstanding medical researcher at Johns Hopkins Hospital and Harvard University, has written a book about protecting your brain against memory loss and Alzheimer’s disease. The Memory Cure (McGraw-Hill) is part of Fotuhi’s campaign to induce baby boomers to make lifestyle changes before it’s too late.

Congratulations to Arthur Kroker (Political Science), who will be presented with an honorary doctorate by the University of Victoria this spring. Kroker is well known for his philosophical books on the future.

Clarence Bayne, Director of the DIA/DSA Programs and the Entrepreneurship Institute for the Development of Minority Communities, has been appointed by Mayor Gérald Tremblay to the Montreal Intercultural Commission, whose 20 members will provide advice to the municipality on the integration of cultural communities. Dr. Bayne was one of four scholars from Canada invited by the Institute of African-American Research to their annual conference at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, April 1 to 3. He presented a paper, “A Socio-Economic Profile of the Black Community of Quebec: A Response to Social and Economic Change in Quebec.” The conference theme was Engaging North America: Illuminating Black Canada.

A retrospective of work as an animator by Cilia Sawadogo (Cinema) is part of Vues D’Afrique, the African film festival in progress in Montreal. As well, some of her films, along with other African art, are being presented at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts.

Howard B. Ripstein, an alumnus SGW 60), teacher and longtime friend of Concordia, has contacted CTR to say that he is sponsoring a Jewish cairn to be erected in the Air Park of the Royal Canadian Air Force Memorial Museum, in Trenton, Ont. He is a retired RCAF flight lieutenant. The official unveiling will be held this summer.

Calvin Kalman (Physics) has been named senior executive editor of Academic Exchange Quarterly, which has more than 23, 000 readers. The electronic version has the largest circulation of any refereed academic journal.