Homewood-JHMI shuttle adds coaches, improves scheduling

The university has reached an agreement with Veolia Transportation to add two coaches to the Homewood-JHMI shuttle fleet, providing for more reliable service and improved scheduling to better meet passenger needs.

The new schedule goes into effect today, Jan. 22, and is available in print on the coaches and online at www.parking.jhu.edu.

 

Name change announced for Berman Bioethics Institute

A new name has been approved by President William R. Brody and Provost Steven Knapp for one of the largest bioethics centers in the United States. A decade after it began formal operations, the Phoebe R. Berman Bioethics Institute at Johns Hopkins has been renamed the Johns Hopkins Berman Institute of Bioethics.

The new name reflects extensive feedback solicited from faculty, staff and an advisory board that the institute's identity be more closely aligned with Johns Hopkins. In celebration of the institute's 10-year anniversary, the university is planning its first Bioethics Week, beginning April 16. Details will be announced in February.

 

Peabody students join BSO for 150th anniversary concerts

Baltimore Sun music critic Tim Smith used words such as "potent" and "impressive," among other praises, to describe the recent Baltimore Symphony Orchestra concerts that featured 61 student musicians from the Peabody Institute.

As a tribute to the school's ongoing 150th anniversary celebration, the students joined forces with the BSO from Jan. 11 to 14 to create the massive ensembles that performed Richard Strauss' An Alpine Symphony and Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring at Baltimore's Joseph Meyerhoff Symphony Hall and the Music Center at Strathmore in North Bethesda, Md.

Jeffery Sharkey, Peabody director, said that the BSO-Peabody collaboration provided the students a rare and unique training experience to be fully integrated into a professional ensemble.

The concerts, which by all accounts were a tremendous success, were conducted by the BSO's music director designate, Marin Alsop.

 

JHPIEGO gets $1 mill grant for Malaria in Pregnancy programs

JHPIEGO has been awarded a $1 million grant from the ExxonMobil Foundation to improve health services through Malaria in Pregnancy programs in Angola and Nigeria.

Each year, 30 million pregnancies are threatened by malaria in endemic countries throughout Africa. Among the hardest hit are Nigeria, where the disease accounts for 11 percent of maternal mortality and 12 percent to 30 percent of mortality in children under the age of 5, and Angola, where malaria accounts for 25 percent of maternal mortality and 35 percent of child mortality.

Many pregnant women in these countries do not have access to the simple technologies that can prevent and control malaria, including intermittent preventive treatment, the drug regimen recommended for protecting women and their unborn babies from the effects of malaria, insecticide-treated bed nets to protect them from malaria-carrying mosquitoes and effective case management.

This new project follows a five-country MIP program needs assessment that JHPIEGO conducted for ExxonMobil in 2006 to identify a country-specific "roadmap" of future actions in key areas such as policy, commodities, training, supervision and community awareness.

Leslie Mancuso, president and CEO of JHPIEGO, said, "JHPIEGO has been working to lower malaria mortality rates in pregnant women for more than six years in a total of 24 African countries, and with the support of companies like ExxonMobil, our services continue to grow. We look forward to collaborating with ExxonMobil and we are thankful to them and all our partners for helping us to improve the health of women and newborns."

JHPIEGO works in close collaboration with the Roll Back Malaria Partnership, which was launched in 1998 by the World Health Organization, the United Nations Children's Fund, the United Nations Development Programme and the World Bank to provide a coordinated global approach to fighting malaria. The partnership's goal is to halve the global burden of malaria by the year 2010.

 

SAIS commemoration of Nitze to focus on nuclear weapons

In commemoration of the birth 100 years ago this month of its co-founder, Paul H. Nitze, SAIS is hosting a forum on Monday, Jan. 29, to address the challenges of nuclear weapons, the issue that most consumed Nitze's energies in a long and distinguished career.

Max M. Kampelman, leader of the U.S. team negotiating with the Soviet Union on nuclear and space arms from 1985 to 1989, will give the keynote address. A discussion on the future of nuclear weapons will feature Thomas Graham Jr., special representative of the president for arms control, nonproliferation and disarmament from 1994 to 1997; Avis Bohlen, assistant secretary of state for arms control from 1999 to 2002; Christopher F. Chyba, professor of astrophysical sciences and international affairs at Princeton University; and Strobe Talbott, president of the Brookings Institution, deputy secretary of state from 1994 to 2001 and author of The Master of the Game: Paul Nitze and the Nuclear Peace.

The event will be held at 9:30 a.m. in the Nitze Building's Kenney Auditorium. Non-SAIS affiliates should RSVP to saisevents@jhu.edu or 202-663-5636.

 

JH safety initiatives recognized by the state of Maryland

Johns Hopkins received top honors in the Identity Theft and Integrated Smart CCTV/Communications categories at the 27th annual Governor's Crime Prevention Awards presentation. The program, which is overseen by the Governor's Office and four state agencies, recognizes the role crime prevention efforts play in the reduction and control of criminal activity in Maryland.

To help thwart identify theft, the university recently implemented a number of measures, including incorporating identity theft into the Campus Safety and Security Department's daily Crime Prevention Tips bulletin and disseminating brochures on the subject. The department also has dedicated a page on its Web site to the prevention of identity theft and relevant information for victims of this crime.

In response to a series of high-profile crimes near the Homewood campus, the university last year launched the Homewood Communications Center, a state-of-the-art facility that allows its staff to maintain a constant vigil over the campus, primarily through a "smart" closed-circuit TV system that alerts operators when it spots suspicious activity. During its first year of operation, the CCTV system registered 116 alerts — including thefts in progress, minor traffic accidents and acts of vandalism — that triggered responses.

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