Championship men's lacrosse team honored at White House

The 2007 NCAA Champion Johns Hopkins men's lacrosse team was among nine national championship teams honored in a special ceremony on Friday at the White House, where they were welcomed on the South Lawn by President George W. Bush. This was a return visit for the Blue Jays, who were also recognized after winning the 2005 national championship.

Johns Hopkins posted a 13-4 record in 2007 and won the program's ninth NCAA Championship and 44th overall national championship.

Poet Beth Ann Fennelly, novelist Tom Franklin to give joint reading

Poet Beth Ann Fennelly and novelist Tom Franklin will present a joint reading hosted by the Writing Seminars at 6 p.m. on Thursday, Sept. 27, in 3 Shaffer Hall, Homewood campus. Fennelly and Franklin, who are married, both teach at the University of Mississippi.

Fennelly's first book, Open House, won the 2001 Kenyon Review Prize and was a BookSense Top Ten poetry pick. Her second book, Tender Hooks, was published in 2004. She has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference.

Franklin is the author of Poachers: Stories, Hell at the Breech and Smonk. His stories have appeared in The Black Warrior Review, The Southern Review and The Oxford American, as well as in Best American Mystery Stories of the Century, New Stories from the South, 1999 and Stories from the Blue Moon Cafe. He was a winner of a 2001 Guggenheim Fellowship.

 

APL-managed MESSENGER approaches 2 billion miles

On Sept. 13, MESSENGER reached the 2 billion-mile mark, placing the spacecraft about two- fifths of the way toward its destination to orbit Mercury. "This type of milestone is an impressive measure of how far we've traveled," said APL's Sean Solomon, principal investigator. "We can't take our craft into the shop for its 2 billion-mile checkup, but our experienced team is doing everything we can to ensure that at the end of our journey our mission will be accomplished in full."

APL built and operates the MESSENGER spacecraft and manages the mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington.

On its 4.9 billion-mile journey to becoming the first spacecraft to orbit Mercury, MESSENGER has flown by Earth once and Venus twice to pick up gravity assists that are propelling it deeper into the inner solar system. Still to come are three flybys of Mercury.

Up next is an Oct. 17 course correction event that will adjust MESSENGER's orbit in preparation for an encounter on Jan. 14, 2008, that will bring it 124 miles above the surface of Mercury. Even though the spacecraft is three and a half years from reaching its final destination, the mission team has been sharing data with the larger scientific community. Those results are available online at messenger.jhuapl.edu/soc/index.html.

 

Fall registration open for classes at Baltimore Free University

Seventeen courses are on the fall schedule for Baltimore Free University, including lessons in shower singing, aging gracefully, financial fitness, scrapbooking, Zydeco dancing, the secrets to great soup making, and beer history and appreciation. The number of class sessions in the noncredit adult education program varies from one-time workshops to courses that meet for several weeks.

Sponsored by the Village Learning Place and the Center for Social Concern at Johns Hopkins, BFU features a wide array of personal enrichment, social issues and practical trade courses for a nominal registration fee of $10 per course; some also have small fees to cover materials. Many of the instructors are doctoral candidates, professors and students at Johns Hopkins.

Classes will be held in various locations, including the Homewood campus and nearby Village Learning Place. The course list and other information are available online at www.jhu.edu/csc/baltimore_free_u.html.

Registration is open now at the VLP during library hours ( www.villagelearningplace.org); to register by phone using a MasterCard or Visa, call the VLP at 410-235-2210, ext. 204, between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. weekdays. Mail-in registration is not accepted.

 

Consumer Choice Award goes to JHH for 12th consecutive year

For the 12th straight year, National Research Corporation has given The Johns Hopkins Hospital its Consumer Choice Award for the Baltimore region. The award is based on ratings from Maryland health care consumers.

Nationwide this year, NRC surveyed those among almost 200,000 households who make their family health care decisions. In all, 225 hospitals were cited as regional consumer choice winners, including Washington County Hospital and Winchester Medical Center, both in the Hagerstown, Md., area, and Inova Fairfax Hospital in the metropolitan Washington, D.C., area.

"For more than a century, Hopkins has been committed to improving patient care by developing new treatments and getting them to the bedside quickly, and the Hopkins family pledges to continue that commitment," said Edward D. Miller, dean of the medical faculty and CEO of Johns Hopkins Medicine. "It is gratifying to see our commitment to quality care recognized by our fellow Marylanders."

 

Biological Chemistry at SoM to honor administrator

Albert McCauley, administrator for the Department of Biological Chemistry in the School of Medicine, will be retiring after more than four decades of service in the same department. In 46 years McCauley did leave once, but the department begged him to come back, and he did. He started as a junior technician, spent time as lab administrator to run the departmental lab courses, then went on to become administrator. All are welcome to the retirement celebration at 2 p.m. on Friday, Sept. 28, in the WBSB Auditorium and Lobby.

 

JHPIEGO named NGO of the year by malaria group

JHPIEGO has been named Non-Governmental Organization of the Year by the Malaria Foundation International, which honored JHPIEGO for its work in advocacy, education and training, with a special emphasis toward preventing and treating malaria in pregnant women throughout Africa.

Other honorees this year include Laura Bush, Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, and Bono.

The awards program was established in 2006 to honor individuals and organizations that make important contributions in the fight against malaria. It also serves to engage new leaders, including teachers, students, scientists, journalists, business leaders, celebrities and politicians.

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