About 1,100 fifth graders from Skagit and Whatcom counties will be visiting Western Washington University on Tuesday, Oct. 15, to see firsthand what a university campus is like. The tour kicks off the 11th year of Compass 2 Campus, a proactive effort that sends trained WWU student mentors into schools in order to get more kids to see themselves as capable, lifelong learners.
Western Washington University Professor of Biology Eric DeChaine is working through a three-year grant from the U.S. National Park Service’s Shared Beringian Heritage Program to document the diversity and distribution of plants across the North Pacific — including the Alaskan Peninsula, the Aleutian Islands, and Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula— in an effort to understand how arctic plants are reacting to a planet that is growing ever warmer.
Julia Tatum, a first-year Environmental Science graduate student at Western Washington University, scans the dense forest underbrush around her, decides on a direction, grabs the end of a cloth measuring tape, and pushes off into the thicket to mark the edge of her sample site with surveyor’s tape.
Each weekday this fall, Office of Communications Visual Journalism interns Joely Johnson and Alix Condit will share their views of the student experience at Western through images that help tell Western's story. Check back often!
Western Washington University Professor of English Kate Trueblood’s newest novel, “Take Daily as Needed,” has just been published by the University of New Mexico Press.
Work is continuing on Western’s new Residence Hall, to be sited on the Ridge at the location of Highland Hall and Highland Lounge, which are now in the process of being demolished to make room for the new residence hall.
Demolition and new parking lot
Western Washington University Marine Scientist Kathy Van Alstyne of the university’s Shannon Point Marine Center (SPMC) has received a $151,000 grant from the National Science Foundation to purchase new instrumentation for measuring the physical and chemical properties of seawater that are so critical to the center’s ongoing research into the critical marine science issues facing the region and the world.
The traditional breakfast in the VU this morning was followed by the presentation of the annual Awards for Excellence and President Randhawa's Opening Convocation remarks.
This year's award winners are:
About 4,100 students will move into Western Washington University’s residence halls and apartments, beginning Sunday, Sept. 15, with the majority arriving Friday, Sept. 20 through Sunday, Sept. 22.
The first day of fall quarter classes at Western is Wednesday, Sept. 25.
Western Washington University Distinguished Alumnus Michael Cox, a longtime Environmental Protection Agency official, addressed WWU graduates and their families at the summer commencement ceremony Aug. 24 at 9:45 a.m. in Carver Gymnasium.
About 420 undergraduate and 40 master’s students graduated from Western summer quarter.
WWU photos by Dan Levine
