Emory Report

January 19, 1999

 Volume 51, No. 16

Taking a peek back at the year that was at Emory

 

While news at Emory this past year may not have been as riveting as the drama unfolding in Washington and the rest of the world, plenty happened in our own universe these past 12 months. A year that began in the aftermath of a young women's tragic death ended with the University planning to break ground for an unprecedented number of buildings, which will dot the campus landscape in the new century and adhere to the newly announced Campus Master Plan.

 

January

Yerkes starts on somber note

Yerkes continued to deal with the aftermath of Research Assistant Beth Griffin's December 1997 death after contracting herpes B. In April the center was cited and fined by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration after a 19-week investigation; by December Yerkes had settled its case with OSHA, after the agency agreed to retract or amend its most serious charges.

Call him 'Professor Miller'

Georgia Gov. Zell Miller's three-year appointment as Presidential Distinguished Fellow in History and Political Science was announced in January 1998, and he begins his duties this month. Miller also joined the Dalai Lama as a recipient of an honorary degree at commencement.

 

February

Goizueta School triples endowment with two large gifts

A $20 million bequest from the estate of Roberto Goizueta, the former Coca-Cola chairman and CEO who died in October 1997, will provide "a wonderful and visionary challenge to new Dean [Thomas Robertson]," President Bill Chace said in announcing the gift. Soon after, the Woodruff Foundation announced a $20 million gift to the business school to honor the memory of Goizueta.

 

March

Forgotten Candler frieze found

Library staff uncovered a long-lost and forgotten frieze that hung from Candler Library's mezzanine level more than 40 years ago. The 26 crates holding a plaster copy of Danish sculptor Bertel Thorwaldsen's "The Triumph of Alexander" will be reinstalled eventually in a renovated Candler.

Hospitals shore up profits

Lower-than-expected managed care reimbursements and increased reserves for bad debt and charity care helped erode Emory Hospitals income in January, after which the hospitals embarked on a cost-reduction plan of $1.2 million per month to get back on track.

 

April

Master planners look to past to build Emory of future

Open house meetings unveiling the new Campus Master Plan on the Atlanta and Oxford campuses were well attended by faculty, students, administrators and staff in early April. Master plan architect Adam Gross of Ayers/Saint/Gross laid out the philosophical principles that guided the planners, including removing daily car traffic from core areas on both campuses.

Rebecca Chopp named provost

Noted theologian and feminist scholar Rebecca Chopp became the first woman to serve as provost and executive vice president for academic affairs at Emory. "There are no enormous problems," she said at the time of her appointment. "We just need to determine the next level of academic quality and be driven by our own standards."

New high-tech library addition

Woodruff Library's new Center for Library and Information Resources (CLAIR) was officially opened. At the time of the dedication, the 65,000-square-foot center bringing together traditional library resources and electronic technology was already heavily used--and praised--by the University community.

 

May

First in long line of ozone days

May 1 marked the beginning of the ozone season with the summer's first Ozone Action Day and, correspondingly, the launch of Emory's "Hazy Days" program. The voluntary program was part of Emory's three-pronged approach to cutting harmful emissions by stressing commuting options such as car and van pooling, flexible work hours and telecommuting, and other environmentally friendly measures on campus.

Emory launches another set of graduates into the world

More than 3,232 graduates, their relatives and friends crowded the Quadrangle for Emory's 153rd commencement May 11 to hear the exiled spiritual and secular leader of 6 million Tibetan Buddhists the Dalai Lama. The beautiful, sunny day was a marked contrast to the heavy rains that fell the day before. Two days earlier, more than 250 sophomores gathered under Oxford's stately trees to receive their associate's degrees.

Master plan gets underway

The first phase of the Campus Master Plan began with the partial closing of Asbury Circle, from Pierce Drive to Emory Hospital, to create a space solely for pedestrians and service vehicles. The $1.2 million project was completed in August. A similar pedestrian walkway was completed on North Kilgo in 1997, before the plan was approved.

 

June

After 10 years, King papers office closes

The Emory office of the Martin Luther King Jr. Papers Project closed its doors at the end of spring semester. First opened in 1988, some 50 student researchers contributed to the preparation of a multi-volume documentary edition of King's writings and speeches. Recent cutbacks in federal grant support made it necessary to move the entire operation to Stanford University, where the project's director is based.

 

July/August

Emory community learns of Kroger's impending close

Quickly organized meetings in late June confirmed rumors that had been circulating for weeks: the Emory Village Kroger, a neighborhood mainstay since 1942, would soon close. Rounds of meetings and neighborhood boycott threats against drugstore CVS Pharmacy, the property's new occupant, filled the fall to no avail. The Village Kroger closed Nov. 28.

Emory athletics ends year on high note

A school-record seven Emory student-athletes were named GTE Academic All-Americans in recognition of their excellence in academics and sport. Emory finished 14th among the nation's approximately 350 schools in the NCAA's Division III, the third consecutive year the University has placed in the Top 15 nationally.

Hospital programs, University rank high on U.S. News lists

After a year's absence, Emory Hospital returned to U.S. News & World Report's annual list of hospital rankings with a ven-geance, including a Top 10 ranking among heart programs. The Heart Center placed seventh in the nation, outranking Johns Hopkins and Stanford universities, among others. The hospital also placed 14th in ophthalmology and 14th in orthopaedics. Nine other hospital programs, including neurology and neurosurgery (16th) and rheumatology (30th), also made the list. Later in the month the magazine ranked the University 16th in the national university category, where Emory has been in the Top 25 since 1992.

Emory buys GMHI site

Emory announced plans to buy the 42-acre site of the Georgia Mental Health Institute on Briarcliff Road, which will house a new biotechnology center developed in conjunction with Georgia Tech, among other uses. Tentatively called "Emory West" and badly in need of repair, the property yielded one immediate payoff: some 600 useable parking spaces where many employees have been parking free since Sept. 1.

Making way for freshmen proves easy

Emory College's largest class in history moved onto the campus in late August after administrators scrambled to find housing and open additional class sections for them. "We need to act, in effect, by the principle that we are in this place together," President Bill Chace told the 1,347 members of the entering class at convocation, "not just a loose assembly of competing individuals."

 

September

Graduate school will grant nursing PhDs

The School of Nursing and the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences announced a new nursing PhD program. There are 64 nursing PhD programs in the country, and Emory hopes to distinguish itself by emphasizing outcomes measurement, ethical decision-making and policy issues in this era of managed care, said Graduate School Dean Donald Stein.

AIDS research site created

The National Institutes of Health made Emory and its collaborators, the AIDS Research Consortium of Atlanta among them, an official Center for AIDS Research. The designation comes with a three-year, $2.3 million grant for this unprecedented collaborative effort among academic, public health, government and private AIDS researchers and clinicians.

 

October

Wyoming death unites Emory community

More than 200 members of the Emory community held a candlelight vigil in memory of Matthew Shepard, the Wyoming man who was abducted, beaten, tied to a wooden fence and left to die because he was gay. Hate crime legislation was called for in the aftermath of the murder--"Changing our culture is truly the only way to prevent murders and bashings," said Jeremy Corry, an Emory Hospital employee.

 

November/December

Emory, Columbia/HCA strike deal

Emory Healthcare and the nation's largest for-profit hospital chain, Columbia/HCA Healthcare Corp., signed an agreement to jointly manage eight hospitals and five surgery centers owned by Columbia/HCA, with Emory responsible for clinical management and quality assurance and Columbia/HCA providing day-to-day operations management.

Marsalis opens University Speakers Series

Trumpeter Wynton Marsalis kicked off the first University Speakers Series lecture a day after his sold-out Glenn Auditorium performance with the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra. His lecture, "No America, No Jazz," found an element of the American character in just about every aspect of his favorite music.

Calm before building storm

Administrators announced a record eight major buildings, costing approximately $243 million, will be constructed on campus over the next three years, supporting programs in the Arts and Sciences and health sciences. "We cannot do the things we want to do, be what we want to be, without further building," President Bill Chace said.

An 'umbrella-like' approach to international scholarship

Emory College created the Arts and Sciences Institute for Comparative and International Studies, eliminating a previously "scattered" approach to international scholarship. The primary goal is "to try to coordinate, integrate and develop an overall strategic plan for international scholarship and education," said the institute's director, Howard Rollins.

--Compiled by Stacey Jones


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