Alpha Phi Sigma honor society to hold inductions

Induction ceremonies for four new members of the Epsilon Chi Chapter of Alpha Phi Sigma at the University of Illinois at Springfield, the national criminal justice honor society, will be held at 6 p.m. on Sunday, April 26, in the Public Affairs Center restaurant on the UIS campus. A dinner will accompany the induction ceremonies.

Alpha Phi Sigma, the only national honor society for criminal justice majors, recognizes the academic excellence of undergraduate and graduate students. To be eligible, students must have completed at least one-third of the total hours required for graduation and must maintain specified grade-point averages overall and in the major.

Students being inducted are Ashley Douglas, Kaila McKenzie, Leslie Ochoa and Joe Sawyer. Leanne Brecklin, associate professor of Criminal Justice at UIS, serves as chapter adviser.

The ceremony will also honor 12 members who are graduating this academic year: Joe Dattoli, Ashley Douglas, Michelle Edwards, Karen Harrold, Jon Hartwig, Shane Hibbs, Jennifer Lamb, Anthony Mikels, Audra O’Brien, Howard Purdue, Nicole Reynolds and Samantha Wood.

UIS’ Criminal Justice department is housed within the College of Public Affairs and Administration and offers the baccalaureate degree and undergraduate minor.

Earth Day speaker to focus on cleaning nation's rivers

The University of Illinois at Springfield will be celebrating Earth Day on Tuesday, April 21, with a presentation by Chad Pregracke called “Making a Difference in the World: My Journey to Clean America’s Rivers.” The program will be held at 7 p.m. in Brookens Auditorium, located on the lower level of Brookens Library on the UIS campus. It is free and open to the public.

Pregracke is the founder and president of Living Lands & Waters, a not-for-profit environmental organization based in East Moline, Ill. The organization has involved tens of thousands of volunteers with community-based river cleanups, Riverbottom Restoration Projects, Adopt-a-River Mile Program and Big River Educational Workshops.

Pregracke has been the recipient of more than 40 national awards for his service and is the author of From the Bottom Up: One Man’s Crusade to Clean America’s Rivers, which chronicles his journey to clean up America’s rivers one tire at a time.

During Pregracke’s Earth Day program at UIS, he will discuss his experiences growing up on the Mississippi River and how it led to his unique vision to clean up the Mississippi River, from underwater shell-diving to open-air community clean-ups.

Sponsors of the event include the ECCE (Engaged Citizenship Common Experience) Speaker Series and Office of the Provost. Co-sponsors are Students Allied for a Greener Earth (SAGE), College of Public Affairs and Administration, Department of Environmental Studies and the Senate Committee on Sustainability.

For more information, contact Tih-Fen Ting, professor of environmental studies, at 217/206-7876 or tting1@uis.edu.

PAPS series continues with showing of "War Made Easy"

The University of Illinois at Springfield series Political Art and the Public Sphere continues with a screening of the film “War Made Easy” at 6 p.m. Monday, March 23, in Brookens Auditorium, located on the lower level of Brookens Library on the UIS campus. Both the film and the discussion session that follows are free and open to the public.

Based on the best-selling book of the same title, written by Norman Solomon, “War Made Easy” exposes various strategies used by administrations, both Democratic and Republican, to promote agendas for war, from Vietnam to Iraq. The film offers an analysis of the role of media in producing popular support and encourages viewers to think critically about the techniques of persuasion used to promote and prolong the option of war.

Each month, Political Art and the Public Sphere will feature a showing or performance of some kind of “political art,” followed by a group discussion of the issues it raises. “The basic idea behind PAPS is to consider how ‘art’ raises provocative social and political questions,” noted Richard Gilman-Opalsky, professor of political philosophy at UIS and coordinator of the series.

“Public spheres are the places where people come together to communicate, to evaluate and to circulate ideas and arguments,” he added. “In the public sphere, people form a collective political opinion and will. Ultimately and ideally, the public sphere brings the interests and demands of the public to bear on those who hold power.”

For more information about this program or the PAPS series, contact Gilman-Opalsky by phone at 206-8328 or by e-mail at rgilm3@uis.edu.

Political cartoonist visits UIS for exhibit, ECCE series and PAPS program

The University of Illinois at Springfield series Political Art and the Public Sphere (PAPS)will resume for the spring 2009 semester with an open discussion with syndicated columnist and political cartoonist Ted Rall on Friday, February 27 at 1 p.m. in the Visual Arts Gallery, located in Health and Sciences Building room 201 on the UIS campus.

Rall's collection of cartoons, called Search and Destroy, will be on display at the Visual Arts Gallery from Thursday, February 26 through Monday, March 23. He will also participated in an Engaged Citizenship Common Experience (ECCE) Speaker’s Series artist’s talk in the Brookens Auditorium on Thursday, February 26 from 5:30 to 6:30 p.m. An opening reception will follow, including food and refreshments, in the gallery from 6:30 to 8 p.m.

The exhibit and both events are free and open to the public.

Rall’s first cartoons were published in the Kettering-Oakwood (OH) Times. Inspired after meeting pop artist Keith Haring in a Manhattan subway station in 1986, Rall began posting his cartoons on New York City streets.

In 1991, Rall’s cartoons were signed for national syndication by San Francisco Chronicle Features, and later moved to Universal Press Syndicate. His cartoons now appear in more than 100 publications around the United States, including the Los Angeles Times, Tucson Weekly, Willamette Week, Newark Star-Ledger, Village Voice and The New York Times.

Rall considers himself a neo-traditionalist who uses a unique drawing style to revive the aggressive approach of Thomas Nast, who viewed editorial cartoons as a vehicle for change. His focus is on issues important to ordinary working people. His work comments on un- and under-employment, the environment and popular culture, and political and social trends.

During the PAPS event, Rall’s political cartoons will be on display in the gallery, followed by an open discussion with Rall about his cartoons.

Each month, Political Art and the Public Sphere will feature a showing or performance of some kind of “political art,” followed by a group discussion of the issues it raises. The basic idea behind PAPS is to consider how ‘art’ raises provocative social and political questions, noted Richard Gilman-Opalsky, coordinator of the series and professor of political philosophy at UIS.

“Public spheres are the places where people come together to communicate, to evaluate, and to circulate ideas and arguments,” Gilman-Opalsky said. “In the public sphere, people form a collective political opinion and will. Ultimately and ideally, the public sphere brings the interests and demands of the public to bear on those who hold power.”

For more information about this program or the PAPS series, contact Gilman-Opalsky by phone at 217/206-8328 or by e-mail at rgilm3@uis.edu.

For more information about the Visual Arts Gallery, go to www.uis.edu/visualarts or contact the gallery at 217/206-6506 or gallery@uis.edu. Gallery hours are 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Thursday.

Sustainability brown bag

"Save Time, Save Money, Save Trees: Conserve Your Limited Resources through Office Sustainability"

noon to 1 p.m., Thursday, December 4, PAC F

Speaker: Rose Schweikhart Cranson, dean's assistant, College of Public Affairs & Administration

Next program: February 4. Jamie McGill, campus recycling coordinator, will talk about Recycling at UIS.

UIS hosts expert to discuss “The Psychology of False Confessions”

The University of Illinois at Springfield will be hosting Richard Leo, associate professor of Law at the University of San Francisco, for a presentation on “The Psychology of False Confessions” on Monday, November 10 at 7 p.m. in the Lincoln Residence Hall Great Room on the UIS campus. The lecture is free and open to the public.

Leo is an expert on false confessions and his research of police interrogation procedures has led to a movement toward the video-taping of custodial interrogations. During the event, Leo will address questions regarding why individuals would falsely confess to crimes they did not commit and discuss measures to avoid false confessions from being used in the justice system for wrongful convictions.

Prior to the event, there will be an author’s reception in the Public Affairs Center restaurant in the lower level of the PAC from 5:30 to 6:45 p.m. The cost is $50, and funds raised during the reception will go to support the work of the Downstate Illinois Innocence Project. The book The Wrong Guys, which Leo co-authored, will be available for purchase, and Leo will hold a book signing after both the reception and the presentation.

The subject of Leo’s book The Wrong Guys - a group of four Norfolk, Virgina men wrongly convicted based on false confessions - is also the focus of a film called “Eight Men Out,” which the Downstate Illinois Innocence Project will be running on cable channel Access 4.

Leo’s appearance is sponsored by the UIS Speakers’ Award Committee. The lecture has been certified for 1.5 hours of credit in the Massachusetts Continuing Legal Education, a national organization that provides continuing legal education to lawyers.

The UIS Downstate Illinois Innocence Project is housed within the Institute for Legal and Policy Studies. Under the project, students in Legal Studies and other degree programs provide research and investigative assistance to attorneys who are helping individuals who have been arrested, tried, found guilty and imprisoned for crimes the Project believes they did not commit.


For more information, contact Rhonda Keech at 217/206-7989.

UIS political art series to screen "American Blackout"

The University of Illinois at Springfield series Political Art and the Public Sphere will conclude for the fall semester with a screening of the film "American Blackout" at 6 p.m. Monday, November 10, in Brookens Auditorium, lower level of Brookens Library on the UIS campus. Both the film and the discussion session that follows are free and open to the public.

While much has been said about alleged voting irregularities during the presidential elections of 2000 and 2004, these incidents are nevertheless often dismissed as rumors or unintentional mishaps resulting from an overburdened election system.

Filmmaker Ian Inaba's "furious documentary" chronicles recurring patterns of voter disenfranchisement from Florida 2000 to Ohio 2004 and follows the story of Georgia Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney, who not only took an active role in investigating these election debacles, but found herself in the center of another controversy after publicly questioning the Bush Administration about the 9/11 attacks. New York Times movie critic Jeannette Catsoulis concluded: "'American Blackout' isn't a conspiracy rant. It's a methodical compilation of questions and irregularities that deserves a wider audience."

This fall the PAPS series focused on questions of race and class in modern American politics. Series facilitator Richard Gilman-Opalsky, assistant professor of political philosophy at UIS, said, "This is a provocative film and it should lead us into an open discussion about the disenfranchisement of African American voters one week after the 2008 presidential election, where tales of long lines, voter suppression, and vote counting questions littered the news in the preceding weeks."

Gilman-Opalsky explained that the basic idea of PAPS is to consider how "art" can raise important social and political questions. "Public spheres are the places where people come together to communicate, to evaluate, and to circulate ideas and arguments," he added. "In the public sphere, people form a collective political opinion and will. Ultimately and ideally, the public sphere brings the interests and demands of the public to bear on those who hold power."

For more information about this program or the PAPS series, contact Gilman-Opalsky by phone at 206-8328 or by e-mail at rgilm3@uis.edu.

Sustainability Brown Bag Series

A new monthly event sponsored by the Senate Committee on Sustainability

• "Sustainability Initiatives at Food Service" - noon to 1 p.m., Wednesday, November 5, PAC G

Speakers: Alan Barnhart, food service Administrator, and Howard Seidel, executive chef. Presentation will also discuss the Local Food Initiative.

• "Save Time, Save Money, Save Trees: Conserve Your Limited Resources through Office Sustainability" – time and place tba, Wednesday, December 4

Speaker: Rose Schweikhart Cranson, dean's assistant, College of Public Affairs and Administration

For more information, contact Tih-Fen Ting, SCS chair, at 6-7876 or TTing1@uis.edu.

UIS will offer workshop on basic GIS applications

The Geographic Information Systems Laboratory at the University of Illinois at Springfield will present "Using GIS to Explore Your Community: A Fundamental GIS Applications Workshop" from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Friday, November 14, at UIS. Advance registration is required and space is limited.

The program is designed for anyone with a beginning interest in spatial visualization and mapping. Basic computer skills and familiarity with Microsoft Office are the only prerequisites.

In addition to the basics of GIS and how to use the ArcGIS 9.2 software, participants will learn how to: create thematic mapping; display data specific to individual interests; find the best locations for projects; conduct spatial queries and spatial processing; and map addresses, locations, and other points of interest.

Instruction will also be given in downloading and mapping community data, as well as how to work with census data, natural resources data, economic data, housing data, and other specific data.

All participants will receive a comprehensive workbook, including step-by-step instructions, and a copy of Illinois Data Inventory Handbook.

Geographic Information Systems provide a new way to explore the world and offer a dynamic digital environment for visualizing and analyzing geographic information. GIS users can access, acquire, analyze, and display information in the forms of maps, 3-D simulations, tables, and figures.

UIS' Geographic Information Systems Laboratory was established in 2005 and currently supports research and teaching for many academic units.

Cost to attend the workshop (does not include lunch) is $125 for current UIS students, faculty, or staff members, and $250 for all others. A limited number of student scholarships are available.

To register or for more information, or contact Angela Maranville, GIS Lab coordinator, at 217/206-8403 or amara2@uis.edu.

UIS presentation will examine sustainable agriculture

"Rethinking the Economics of Energy, Climate, and Food," an examination of sustainable agriculture, will be presented beginning at 7 p.m., Monday, September 29, in conference room C/D, lower level of the Public Affairs Center at the University of Illinois at Springfield. The program is free and open to the public.

The featured speaker will be Dr. John Ikerd (above left), emeritus professor of agricultural economics at the University of Missouri-Columbia and a recognized expert on issues related to sustainable agriculture.

Ikerd's major research and educational efforts have included evaluations of the impact of sustainable agriculture on the quality of life for farm families and others in rural communities. He has also served as the head of a three-state, five-year program funded by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation that linked sustainable agriculture and sustainable community development. As Missouri's co-coordinator of extension programs in sustainable agriculture, Ikerd initiated a national professional development program for those whose jobs involved providing the public with information on the subject. He is the author of numerous books, including Sustainable Capitalism (Kumerian Press, 2005), A Return to Common Sense (R.T. Edwards Inc., 2007), and Small Farms are Real Farms (Acres USA).

Dr. Ikerd's address is presented as part of the ECCE Speakers Series at UIS -- events that aim to exemplify engaged citizenship as part of the university's effort to foster appreciation for and practice of diversity and the active effort to make a difference in the world.

Upcoming ECCE programs include "99 Questions You've always Wanted to Ask an African American," with actor/playwright Mark Cryer, on October 1; "Japan and a Changing Asia," with international security expert R. Michael Schiffer, on October 6; and "Lawyers, 'Lawfare,' the War on Terrorism, and the Rule of Law," with law professor Steve Vladeck, on October 9. The complete schedule of speakers and topics for the 2008 Fall Semester is available at www.uis.edu/generaleducation/about/index.html.

For more information about Dr. Ikerd's presentation, contact Denise Keele, UIS assistant professor of Environmental Studies, at 206-7895.

For information about any ECCE event, contact Kimberly Craig, series coordinator, at 206-6245 or send an e-mail to speakerseries@uis.edu.

UIS Pre-Law Center offers preparation for LSAT

The Pre-Law Center at the University of Illinois at Springfield will offer an LSAT Primer Program -- designed for UIS students and others planning to take the Law School Aptitude Test (LSAT) -- from Friday, September 19, through Sunday, September 21, in room 3B of the Public Affairs Center on the UIS campus.

Sessions for the three-day program will meet from 8:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. on Friday, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Saturday, and from 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. on Sunday.

Presented primarily for UIS students but open to others on a space-available basis, the program will be particularly helpful to those planning to apply to law school within the next two years.

Cost is $190. Advance registration is due by Wednesday, September 17.

"The primary purpose of this course is to provide affordable LSAT preparation to students who will eventually apply to law school," said Pre-Law Center Director Dennis Rendleman. "In addition, it gives students the confidence to know they can succeed on the LSAT."

Rendleman noted that the course includes two LSAT exams administered under simulated conditions; instructional sessions in each section of the exam; test-taking strategies and hints for better performance; and personal strategies and writing tips.

The program is presented with support from UIS' Institute for Legal, Legislative, and Policy Studies.

To register or for more information, send an e-mail to prelawcenter@uis.edu, or telephone 217/206-4529.

UIS political art series resumes for fall with documentary on 1908 riot

The University of Illinois at Springfield series Political Art and the Public Sphere resumes for the fall semester with a screening of the documentary "Springfield Had No Shame" at 6 p.m. Monday, September 15, in Brookens Auditorium, lower level of Brookens Library on the UIS campus. Both the film and the discussion session that follows are free and open to the public.

Written and produced by David Antoine, staff member in the Office of Electronic Media at UIS, this film examines Springfield's August 1908 race riot through historical photographs, dramatic readings, and re-enactments of original newspaper accounts. Comments from historians and eyewitnesses are also included.

Political Art and the Public Sphere is a monthly event on the UIS campus; each program features a showing or performance of some kind of "political art," followed by a group discussion of the issues it raises. "The basic idea is to consider how 'art' raises provocative social and political questions," said series facilitator Richard Gilman-Opalsky, UIS assistant professor of political philosophy.

This fall the PAPS series will focus on questions of race and class in 20th century American politics. Topics for subsequent programs will include the Black Panther Party and the disenfranchisement of black voters in the 2004 elections.

"Public spheres are the places where people come together to communicate, to evaluate, and to circulate ideas and arguments," said Gilman-Opalsky. "In the public sphere, people form a collective political opinion and will. Ultimately and ideally, the public sphere brings the interests and demands of the public to bear on those who hold power."

The presentation of "Springfield Had No Shame" is also co-sponsored by the ECCE Speakers Series at UIS – events that aim to exemplify engaged citizenship as part of the university's effort to foster appreciation for and practice of diversity and the active effort to make a difference in the world.

The next PAPS event will be a showing of the film "What We Want, What We Believe" at 6 p.m. Monday, October 13, in Brookens Auditorium. For more information about the PAPS series, contact Gilman-Opalsky by phone at 206-8328 or by e-mail at rgilm3@uis.edu.

UIS will offer workshop on basic GIS applications

The Geographic Information Systems Laboratory at the University of Illinois at Springfield will present "Using GIS to Explore Your Community: A Fundamental GIS Applications Workshop" from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Friday, September 19, at UIS. Advance registration is required and space is limited.

The program is designed for anyone with a beginning interest in spatial visualization and mapping. Basic computer skills and familiarity with Microsoft Office are the only prerequisites.

In addition to the basics of GIS and how to use the ArcGIS 9.2 software, participants will learn how to: create thematic mapping; display data specific to individual interests; find the best locations for projects; conduct spatial queries and spatial processing; and map addresses, locations, and other points of interest.

Instruction will also be given in downloading and mapping community data, as well as how to work with census data, natural resources data, economic data, housing data, and other specific data.

All participants will receive a comprehensive workbook, including step-by-step instructions, and a copy of Illinois Data Inventory Handbook.

Geographic Information Systems provide a new way to explore the world and offer a dynamic digital environment for visualizing and analyzing geographic information. GIS users can access, acquire, analyze, and display information in the forms of maps, 3-D simulations, tables, and figures.

UIS' Geographic Information Systems Laboratory was established in 2005 and currently supports research and teaching for many academic units.

Cost to attend the workshop (does not include lunch) is $125 for current UIS students, faculty, or staff members, and $250 for all others. A limited number of student scholarships are available.

To register, go to www.uis.edu/gis. For more information, contact the GIS Lab at 217/206-8403 or gis@uis.edu.