Please join the Great Lakes Center for the seminar "Soil and Vegetation Indices for Wetland Quality: A Predictive Modeling Approach," presented by Martin A. Stapanian, Ph.D., research ecologist with the U.S. Geological Survey Lake Erie Biological Station, on Thursday, April 10, from 12:15 to 1:30 p.m. in Classroom Building B332. Faculty, staff, and students are welcome. Light refreshments will be served.

Please encourage graduate students to take advantage of the opportunities listed below:

1. The Graduate Student Association (GSA) is seeking nominations for executive board members to lead the GSA senators for the 2014–2015 academic year. All matriculated graduate students who are in good standing (cumulative graduate GPA of 3.0 or higher) are eligible to be nominated for an executive board position. If elected, students must be able to serve for the duration of the 2014–2015 academic year.  Nominations will be received through Sunday, April 13, and must be submitted online. Voting for the executive board will take place through the GSA Blackboard group April 20–27.
    
2. The GSA will sponsor a Graduate Research Poster Presentation on Friday, May 9, from 4:30 to 8:00 p.m. in the Science and Mathematics Complex. Students must register in advance to present their research.  Interested students should e-mail Ashley Lanning by Friday, April 4. The first 40 students to register will be reimbursed for the cost of their posters by the GSA. All are welcome to attend.

Please direct questions to gradstudentassoc@buffalostate.edu.

A screening of the new documentary film Deep River: Samuel Coleridge-Taylor and His Music in America, 1900–1912, and a discussion with the filmmaker, Charles Kaufmann, will take place on Wednesday, April 9, from 4:00 to 6:30 p.m. in Ciminelli Recital Hall (third floor of Rockwell Hall). This fascinating new film explores the life of Afro-British composer Samuel Coleridge-Taylor and his touring experiences in early twentieth-century America, during which he brought the spiritual “Deep River” to prominence and redefined the role of race in American music. The event is free and open to the public.

Presented by the Equity and Campus Diversity Office and the Music Department and curated by Carolyn Guzski, assistant professor of music history, the film also features insights into Coleridge-Taylor’s celebrated choral setting of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s epic poem The Song of Hiawatha and his creative partnership with Maud Powell, the first woman to achieve international renown as a concert violinist.

Award-winning composer, conductor, and documentary filmmaker Charles Kaufmann is a graduate of the Eastman School of Music in Rochester and Yale University.

The Student Life Office is pleased to welcome Helen Benedict, professor of journalism at Columbia University, who will talk about sexual assault in the military on Tuesday, April 8, from 12:15 to 1:30 p.m. in Bulger Communication Center West, followed by a reception and book signing. She will also speak briefly at 7:00 p.m. in the Performing Arts Center at Rockwell Hall for Take Back the Night.

Benedict is an award-winning journalist and novelist focused on female soldiers, military sexual assault, and Iraqi refugees. She received the Ida B. Wells Award for Bravery in Journalism and inspired the documentary film The Invisible War, winner of the Sundance Audience Award (2012) and nominated for an Oscar (best documentary, 2013).

If you would like to send students for extra credit, we are happy to offer sign-in sheets. Please contact Eileen Merberg, interim director of student life, to make arrangements.

This event is co-sponsored by the Student Life Office, the Equity and Campus Diversity Office, the Women and Gender Studies Program, the Continuing Professional Studies Office, the Veteran and Military Services Office, Weigel Health Center Health Promotions, the Counseling Center, the Communication Department, and the Buffalo State Chapter of Student Veterans of America.

Inviting all faculty, staff, and students to participate in the 2014 Mental Health Awareness Week celebration scheduled for April 7–11. This year's theme focuses on encouraging our Buffalo State family to be UPstanders (as opposed to bystanders), thereby contributing to building a civil and caring community. Come and enjoy the therapy dogs, movie screenings, and theater production and participate in workshops teaching how to respond to colleagues, friends, and family in distress. Upstander Awards will be presented and will include the first community recipient, Darnell Barton, the NFTA bus driver who compassionately reached out to stop a troubled young stranger and keep her out of harm's way. Please encourage your students to attend. The Counseling Center website details all the week's events, which are free to everyone.

Two screenings of United in Anger: A History of ACT UP, an inspiring documentary by Jim Hubbard about the birth and life of the AIDS activist movement, will be shown on Monday, April 7, at noon and 4:00 p.m. in the Campbell Student Union Assembly Hall. Using oral histories of ACT UP members as well as rare archival footage, the film depicts the movement's efforts from the perspective of the people in the trenches fighting the epidemic, as they battle corporate greed, social indifference, and government neglect. Study and discussion guides are available.

HIV testing by Evergreen Health Services.

For more information, contact Ron George or Char Vetter in the Counseling Center, ext. 4436.

The Buffalo State Pride Alliance and the Counseling Center will present a display of Mending of the Hearts Quilt Memorial panels to honor those lost to HIV/AIDS on Monday, April 7, from 10:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. in the Campbell Student Union Assembly Hall. Hearts Quilt Memorial panels were provided by Evergreen Health Services.

Two screenings of United in Anger: A History of ACT UP, an inspiring documentary by Jim Hubbard about the birth and life of the AIDS activist movement, will be shown in the Assembly Hall at noon and 4:00 p.m. Using oral histories of ACT UP members as well as rare archival footage, the film depicts the movement's efforts from the perspective of the people in the trenches fighting the epidemic, as they battle corporate greed, social indifference, and government neglect.

HIV testing by Evergreen Health Services.

Mending of the Hearts: Honor our past; protect our future.

Funding provided by a grant from the Faculty-Student Association Founders Fund. Sponsored by Buffalo State Pride Alliance and the Counseling Center.

For more information, contact Ron George or Char Vetter in the Counseling Center, ext. 4436.

The Newman Center Catholic Campus Ministries will sponsor a drive-through/pick-up fish fry by Krolick’s at the Newman Center, 1219 Elmwood Avenue, on Friday, April 4, from 4:00 to 7:00 p.m. The pick-up will be off Penhurst Place. Tickets are $10, which includes a 10-ounce piece of fish, two sides, and a roll and butter. Tickets are available by phone: call 882-1080.

Please save the date for First-Year Convocation 2014. This year's event will be held on Wednesday, August 20, at 9:00 a.m. in the Sports Arena.

To succeed, First-Year Convocation requires the enthusiastic participation of our campus community. All departments and offices are encouraged to allow their staff to support this event as a work assignment for that morning by allowing personnel to march, volunteer, or simply attend the event as an audience member. Faculty and staff are urged to process in regalia to demonstrate Buffalo State's commitment to incoming students.

Those interested in marching in regalia or volunteering to staff the event can register online.

On behalf of the Buffalo State Campus Intercultural Communications Committee, the International Student Affairs Office is delighted to invite all internationally minded faculty, staff, and students to attend its well-known weekly International Social Hour, which allows all international students, scholars, and their friends to meet informally. This special get-together takes place every Thursday from 12:15 to 1:30 p.m. in Assembly Hall 1 of the Campbell Student Union.

Coffee, tea, and other light refreshments are graciously shared.

Looking forward to seeing you on Thursday, April 3.