Tag Archives: Princeton University

Take the Nobel Prize, add the Oscars, and you have the Breakthrough Prize, screened on  Science Channel
as I write. Billionaires who made their money on the Net pay homage, Hollywood style, to scientists who get $3 million. What is the Princeton connection? Louis Botstein got one last year, the first year.

Of course he did leave The Sigler Genomic Institute for California later that year, but Princeton University got the credit for the prize at the time. Who will be the next laureate from here?

As the daughter of a scientist it is so exciting for me to watch them lauded as not just celebrities but glamorous celebrities. And heroes. Stockholm, eat your heart out.

Zuckerberg just announced that next year there will be a Breakthrough Prize in mathematics. Wow.

“I don’t think most whites understand what it is to be black in the United States today,” said Douglas Massey, a Princeton University sociology professor in the Office of Population Research. “They don’t even have a clue. They blame the blacks to a large degree for their own problems.  . . . As a white, I can tell you that whites have a lot to do to make it a fair game.”

White privilege is not an easy concept for many of us whites to understand.  Massey investigates the academic side of it. Tim Wise explains it to the general population with books like “White Like Me.”  Wise speaks on Monday, February 10, at 6 p.m. at the Carl Fields Center. Not in Our Town holds “Continuing Conversations on Race and White Privilege” on first Mondays at 7 p.m. (February 3 and March 3) at the Princeton Public Library

The Massey quote came from “And don’t call me a racist! A treasury of quotes on the past, present, and future of the color line in America,” selected and arranged by Ella Mazel, Argonaut Press, available free for download here.

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Cosmo Iacavazzi, left, with Dan Papa of ETS and Coach Bob Surace

Pressure bursts pipes or makes diamonds. Pigeons eat crumbs — be the eagle. 

Princeton University football coach Bob Surace  entertained the Princeton Regional Chamber breakfast crowd with inspirational one-liners that work as well for business as for sports.

At my table was Dan Papa, director of HR at ETS, who had been a senior on the Princeton squad when Surace was a freshman. And Surace was introduced by Princeton’s NFL celebrity, Cosmo Iacavazzi.

Just two years from a 1-9 season, Surace won this year’s Ivy League championship, surely a man worth listening to:  Have answers not excuses. To combat nerves, do what you are supposed to do when you are supposed to do it. Develop habits and rely on your technique when you are under stress.  

In the NFL, only results matter. At Princeton, growth matters. So, says Surace: Constantly evaluate. Make people feel special. Those who had the best workout Monday get to wear the special Tshirts on Tuesday. By working on strength and making other changes, he reduced concussions dramatically.

Here’s one to take home — Surace asks the Princeton business community to consider offering internships to his football players. He’d love to have them in his weight room this summer.

 

I’m delighted to say that my Not in Our Town colleague, Larry Spruill, will be honored with Princeton University’s Journey Award on Martin Luther King day, Monday, January 20, at 1:30 p.m. in Richardson Auditorium. Larry represents Nassau Christian Center on the board of Not in Our Town Princeton.

The program includes music by the Princeton High School Studio Band and a keynote from Omar Wasow. a politics professor at Princeton who founded the social networking site for African Americans (BlackPlanet) and who is known as Oprah Winfrey’s social media tutor. It will be an exciting afternoon and a tribute that Larry richly deserves.

For details, click here.

From Bejing, to Princeton — to Alcatraz. The zodiac animals of Chinese artist and political dissident Ai Weiwei enliven the plaza at the Woodrow Wilson School. Soon visitors to Alcatraz will see his art. As in today’s New York Times.

That’s the good arts news from Princeton today. The bad news is that the funds of the Triangle Club have been embezzled to the tune of more than $100,000. Robin Lord will be the attorney for the defense and this is one case I hope she doesn’t win.

Or is it good news that an arts organization could make that much money and it wasn’t missed?

2013-11-21 exec suite

A Mormon in the corner office: Here is a press release about a free event sponsored by the Princeton University Faith & Work Initiative — a conversation with Jim Quigley, CEO Emeritus, Deloitte, Touche & Tohmatsu Limited, on November 21, 2013 at 7:00 pm, on the Princeton University campus in Lewis Library 138 (the modern building, near the intersection of Ivy Lane and Washington Road in Princeton). The event will be preceded by a reception from 6:30 – 7:00 pm.

Quigley will be interviewed by Prof. David W. Miller, Director of the Princeton University Faith & Work Initiative, on his Mormon perspective on business, leadership, and faith.

Creative Minds at the Keller Center

Business, Technology & Innovation, ,

The Creative Mind: Innovation, Design and Entrepreneurship Lecture Series

Thurs, Nov 7th 4:30pm

Building Entrepreneurial Ecosystems: A Panel Discussion with Trey Bowles; Co-Founder and CEO of Dallas Entrepreneur Center, Michael Goldberg; Co-Founder and managing Partner of Bridge Investment Fund, LP, and Waine Tam; Co-Founder of Learn CS101. Computer Science Building Room 105

Future dates:

Saturday, November 9, at 1 p.m.

Thursday, November 14 at 4:30 p.m.

and Tuesday, November 19 at 12:30 p.m.

Faith and Ethics for Tyson Foods

Business, Faith and Social Justice, ,

11-7 faith and work

Faith & Ethics in the Executive Suite: A Panel Discussion

Press release: The Princeton University Faith & Work Initiative (FWI) will host a panel discussion with Wendy Murphy, Managing Director, Chief Human Resources Officers Practice, RSR Partners; John Tyson, Chairman, Tyson Foods Inc.; and Kevin Weiss ’79, CEO, SkyMall, on November 7, 2013 at 7:00 pm, on the Princeton University campus in Lewis Library 138 (the modern building, near the intersection of Ivy Ln. and Washington Rd. in Princeton). The event will be preceded by a reception from 6:30 – 7:00 pm.

John Tyson, the grandson of the company’s founder, has been part of the company since he was a teenager, has worked in almost every department, and eventually became the company’s chief executive officer. Among other accomplishments, Tyson is known for his development of Tyson Foods’ unique set of “Core Values” and their chaplaincy program.

The panel is free and open to the public and is sponsored by the Princeton University Faith & Work Initiative (http://faithandwork.princeton.edu/), with the Center for the Study of Religion (http://www.princeton.edu/csr/). For questions, please contact Anita Kline askline@princeton.edu or (609) 258-5545.

If you are concerned about excess (the excessive proliferation of goods in Western society)

If you like to discuss and participate actively in the creation of a piece of art —

come to the Princeton University School of Architecture between November 20 and 24 for a contemporary salon, “This Situation,” staged by art/dance/aesthetics rebel Tino Sehgal.

What constitutes a work of art? the art experience? For Sehgal, quoting the press release, it entails a direct engagement, in the here and now, between visitors and players in carefully choreographed situations. The visitor is conceived as a fundamental part of the work and may, if he/ she chooses to participate, dramatically alter its unfolding.

 

The Pinking of American Board Rooms

Around Town, Business, , ,

klawe DSCF1695

In today’s New York Times, in an article on narrowing the gender gap on corporate boards, the name “Maria Klawe” rang a bell.  Klawe sits on two prestigious boards — Microsoft and Broadcom — and is the president of Harvey Mudd College in California. But she used to be the engineering dean here at Princeton; she got in early on what malcontents called “The Pinking of Princeton University.” Early in her presidential tenure Shirley Tilghman put Klawe in charge of the E-quad.

Klawe didn’t hide the fact that she has a different working style from the male geeks. She brought her knitting to meetings. She doodled and drew during planning sessions. And instead of allowing herself to be memorialized in an oil painting, like the other white male engineering deans at the Friend Center, she painted her own self portrait — in water color (shown above).

She left Princeton for California and now, as a member of the International Women’s Forum, mentors women on the rise. “Too often,” she said in the article, “there’s a feeling that you’ve got one or two women on the board, so you don’t need another.” Whereas there are very few women directors “and there is a lot of room for more.”

There are four engineers in my immediate family, half are women. From the stories they tell, there is plenty of room for more.