Welcome back to campus! The beginning of a new academic year is always one of the most exciting times for all of us in higher education, whether we are students, faculty, or staff. I am energized by the hustle and bustle of welcoming students to campus and getting our classrooms ready for another year of teaching and learning. I hope you also feel energized by a summer that included some time for rest and recreation as well as some space to contemplate goals for the coming year.
In the next few weeks and months, I look forward to sharing stories of the amazing accomplishments that result from our teaching, research and scholarship, creative endeavors, patient care, and public engagement. I will be sharing those stories across campus, the state, and the country to let people know about the incredible innovation happening on this campus and the difference we’re making in people’s lives.
For example, the UI has long been a leader in cancer research and treatment, and now we are making great efforts to expand our reach to rural communities across Iowa, a state that unfortunately has the second-highest cancer rate in the country. Mary Charlton, professor of epidemiology in the College of Public Health, and Ingrid Lizaragga, clinical professor of surgery in the Carver College of Medicine, have teamed up to devise a plan to help rural hospitals provide the highest level of care for cancer patients so they don’t have to travel as far for treatment. The collaborative network of community hospitals is called the Iowa Cancer Affiliate Network, or I-CAN, and it offers support and strategies to hospitals all across the state.
As the Writing University, we have an abundance of stories to tell. This past year, two of our recently hired writing faculty received prestigious Guggenheim Fellowships, showing that the future of writing at Iowa remains bright. Kaveh Akbar, associate professor and director of the undergraduate English and creative writing major, has published two books of poetry and serves as the poetry editor for The Nation. He has received numerous other awards, including multiple Pushcart Prizes. Akbar is multitalented, recently publishing his first novel and also loves painting and sculpture. He calls Iowa City and the UI “Narnia for writers,” and I couldn’t agree more!
Our other Guggenheim winner is Jamel Brinkley, assistant professor in the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, whose short story collection, A Lucky Man, won the Ernest J. Gaines Award for Literary Excellence and was a finalist for the 2018 National Book Award. His latest short story collection, Witness, was released last year and was a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction and other honors. Himself a graduate of the Writers’ Workshop, Brinkley says, “This university is the institutional setting that has allowed me to be my most creative self, in my work and in my teaching.”
Many of us enjoyed a good swim this summer, and many of us also enjoyed watching Olympic swimmers in Paris. Cathleen Moore, professor of psychological and brain sciences in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences and Starch Faculty Fellow, has received a $400,000+ grant from the National Institutes of Health to make swimming even safer by studying how lifeguard training can be improved. Lifeguarding involves very complex and constantly changing methods of surveillance, and Moore and her team are researching the limitations of attention and perception using virtual reality technology. Virtual reality in lifeguard training will allow for precise control over the environment and can introduce specific critical events at controlled times to see how perception is impacted. Moore’s ultimate goal is to develop customized environments that simulate real pools and to make the training system available to the public.
I am so pleased to share stories like this that show the remarkable work our university community is doing and the wide-ranging impact it has on the world. I look forward to hearing and sharing many more of these stories in the coming year, and I urge you all to share your own stories with others on campus and with as many as you can outside the university. When people see the differences we are making in their lives, the University of Iowa is strengthened.
Thank you for all you do to make us the best public, flagship university we can be, and best wishes for another successful year!
Go Hawks!
Barbara J. Wilson
President