In Brief

Rachel Waddell is the new director of orchestral activities in the Department of Music.

Previously the associate conductor of the Canton Symphony Orchestra, a professional regional orchestra in northeastern Ohio, and music director of the award-winning Canton Youth Symphonies, Waddell will conduct both the Symphony and Chamber Orchestras, mentor the Chamber Ensembles, and teach the course The Symphony and the Conductor. She holds a doctor of musical arts in orchestra conducting from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, and has served on the faculty at Kent State University, Malone University, as well as Nevada.

Eastman Jazz Sextet Makes Tokyo Festival Debut

MUSICAL TOUR: An ensemble from the Eastman School of Music represented the University for the first time at the Tokyo Jazz Festival late this summer. Under the sponsorship of the US Embassy in Japan, the Eastman Jazz Sextet—Ryder Eaton ’17E (bass), Luke Norris ’17E (saxophone), Christian Crawford ’17E (trumpet), Sterling Cozza ’18E (piano), graduate student Chase Ellison ’16E (drums), and C. J. Ziarniak ’17E (saxophone)—performed a series of concerts. The ensemble is led by jazz professor Jeff Campbell ’92E (MM), ’02E (DMA).

University Offers Gender-inclusive Housing Option

The University is making the option of gender-inclusive housing assignments available to sophomores, juniors, and seniors in the College. As of this fall, upper-class students can choose to live in a double room or a double room in a suite with someone of a different gender or gender expression.

The new policy is aimed at fostering a residential experience that’s welcoming and supportive of all gender identities, as well as giving students greater flexibility to have roommates with whom they are most comfortable.

The University joins more than 200 colleges and universities in the United States that offer gender-inclusive housing, including Cornell University, Case Western Reserve University, RIT, and SUNY Geneseo.

The Office for Residential Life and Housing Services has permitted mixed-gender groups to live together in on-campus suites and apartments. The new option extends that option to double rooms and suite double rooms on coed floors. Consistent with other University housing policies, students in a romantic relationship are discouraged from being roommates through the option.

The policy does not apply to first-year students.

Golisano Children’s Hospital Opens Two New Floors

The Medical Center celebrated the opening of two new floors of Golisano Children’s Hospital this summer, a milestone that marked the completion of the second phase of construction on the new hospital building that opened in 2015.

The $45 million endeavor adds to the hospital’s position as one of the top surgical and complex care facilities in the nation. The new areas on the fourth and sixth floors include six new pediatric operating rooms in the William and Mildred Levine Pediatric Surgical Suite; new facilities in the Clay E. and Rita M. Buzzard Pediatric Cardiac Cath Lab Suite; a gastroenterology surgical procedure suite, and 23 new private pre-op and post-op recovery rooms.

The work also included the relocation of ICU and general care pediatric beds and the addition of new pediatric ICU beds.

“For the first time, we will have operating rooms that are designed specifically for the complex needs of children,” says Walter Pegoli, the Joseph M. Lobozzo II Professor and chief of pediatric surgery. “The larger, modern facilities will give us the space and resources we need to provide patients with the most advanced surgical care.”

Fundraising for the construction is ongoing and has been supported by numerous gifts, including a $2 million donation from Rita Buzzard in honor of her late husband, Clay, and a $750,000 pledge from Andy McDermott and Rob Burch, creators of the Fairport Music Festival.

Experiment by East High School Students Orbits the Earth

A project designed by East High School students went into orbit this summer.

As part of NASA’s Student Spaceflight Experiments Program, students De’aunte Johnson, Binti Mohamed, and Tailor Davis in August watched from Rochester as their project was rocketed to the International Space Station.

Working with Mary Courtney, a chemistry teacher and spaceflight experiments community project director at East, the three designed an experiment to test how quickly chlorophyll degrades in microgravity conditions.

Students ultimately hope to learn how organisms, in this case phytoplankton, are able to survive in space without sunlight or gravity. East was one of only 21 schools across the United States and Canada selected to have their science experiments aboard the space station.

As part of an Educational Partnership Organization established in July 2015, the University has assumed management responsibilities for East, a Rochester city school that includes grades 6 through 12.

“Everything that we’re trying to do here at East under the University of Rochester partnership, in terms of turning the school around, is all research based,” says Courtney, “I think when you take a science project like this and show kids how it can have real-world applications and involve them and really immerse them, it really builds on everything that we’re trying to do and it reinforces the whole U of R research philosophy.”

University Hosts International Baccalaureate Conference

More than 200 high school students from around the globe gathered on the River Campus this summer for the sixth annual International Baccalaureate World Student Conference.

The University has long had a special relationship to the International Baccalaureate program, a rigorous precollege educational system emphasizing critical thinking. Rochester was the first university in the Northeast to offer scholarships to students with International Baccalaureate, or IB, diplomas, and about 10 percent of incoming students each year come from IB schools.

“Like Rochester on the college level, the International Baccalaureate program has for 50 years led students in an innovative approach to curriculum,” says Jonathan Burdick, the University’s vice provost for enrollment initiatives and dean of admissions and financial aid. “It’s one that requires them to choose a few subjects they love most and immerse themselves in them to high levels of mastery.”

International Baccalaureate started with one school in Geneva, Switzerland, in 1968 and today is offered in more than 3,400 schools in 150 nations.

The University also hosted the world conference in 2015. This summer, students came from nations such as Cambodia, China, Egypt, Mozambique, and New Zealand, and states as far away as Oregon, Texas, and Idaho.

Through a broad spectrum of speakers and classes, the students explored the theme “Defining and Defying Boundaries.”