2002
|
Volume 4 2002 |
INSIDE THIS
ISSUE:
Special Points of Interest:
Department of Physics and Astronomy College of Liberal Arts and Sciences The University of Iowa Iowa City, Iowa 52242-1479 Phone: 319-335-1686 Fax: 319-335-1753 Email: cheryl-reardon@uiowa.edu Web: http://www.physics.uiowa.edu/ Visit the Alumni Web Site! http://www.physics.uiowa. edu/alumni/ |
Letter from the DEOIt is my pleasure to welcome you to the 2002 Newsletter for the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Iowa. I hope you'll take a moment to read about the exciting activities of our students, faculty, staff, and alumni during the past year.
We are very fortunate this year to welcome two outstanding new faculty to the Department. Assistant Professor Cornelia Lang, who specializes in radio and X-ray observations, joins the astronomy group, and Assistant Professor Markus Wohlgenannt, whose expertise is in the area of organic semiconductors, will strengthen our condensed matter and optics program. Another very significant event that has occurred since our last Newsletter has been a dramatic increase in the number of students in our Department. I am especially excited to report that we've increased the number of women in both our graduate and undergraduate programs. Thanks in part to the hard work of our faculty and staff and to creative use of our available funds, we'll be welcoming 23 new graduate students, more than doubling last year's cohort. Our undergraduate program, which was recognized this year by Fiske Guide to Colleges as one of the strongest programs at the University of Iowa, has also grown this year, with enrollment nearing 100. Our undergraduates continue to excel, competing favorably for external research opportunities (see, e.g., the student profile story on Christopher Jones, p. 6) and for entry into top graduate programs. While I'm pleased to acknowledge the efforts of our faculty and staff in building our academic programs, I would like to point out another essential element of this success - YOU. Our many alumni and friends have given the Department indispensable resources to aid in recruiting and retaining top scholars for our undergraduate and graduate programs. Your gifts have created awards and scholarships that not only provide well deserved recognition for our best and brightest but also much needed help in dealing with the ever increasing cost of education. You've provided travel funds for visits to our Department by prospective students, something that has proven to be an extremely effective recruiting tool. Your gifts have also allowed us to enhance the stipends that we offer graduate students, something that has undoubtedly helped in our recruiting efforts. I hope that you enjoy reading the Newsletter. On behalf of the Department, I thank you for your continuing support - it does make a measurable difference in the quality of education that we can provide our students. If you happen to find yourself near Iowa City, please stop by the Department. We'd love to visit with you. |
Grad students Firdevs Duru and Carrie McGivern take a
break in the student lounge. |
For the 2002-2003 academic year, both undergraduate and graduate student numbers have increased substantially from the previous year. This fall's undergraduate student enrollment is 96 with 31 new incoming students, and graduate student enrollment is 59, with 23 new incoming students.
The graduate students come to Iowa from the following 12 different countries: USA-21, Turkey-13, China-12, India-3, Japan-2, Korea-2, Burkina-Faso-1, Ethiopia-1, France-1, Indonesia-1, Pakistan-1, and Puerto Rico-1.
Female graduate student numbers have also increased. This year 8 female students will be enrolled in the graduate program, which is up from 5 female students enrolled last year.
Because of the significant increase in graduate students the Department has had to make office space available for them by relocating several staff and faculty members.
