Yesterday, despite experts saying that it absolutely couldn’t happen save for a miracle, one of the NYU hawks’ eggs hatched, bringing joy to campus and forcing the Strawberry Festival bands to turn their music down.
Now we have (finally!) some close-up, high-res pictures of the hawks and their eyass. Thanks to NYU’s Erin Callihan for the fantastic photos.
“If you’re in school today and think you might want to be a writer some day, you need to really focus on the fact that future labor market opportunities in the realm of writing are going to be overwhelmingly focused on hypertext.” — Matt Yglesias, blogger at the Center for American Progress and panelist at our Young Media Weekend.
After months of discussion and planning, the Journalism and Computer Science departments have teamed up to begin offering a new concentration to help aspiring writers learn about hypertext, along with some programming skills. The six-course program — titled ‘Computational and Digital Journalism’ — came out of conversations between CS Professor Evan Korth and Journalism Professor Jay Rosen, who both wanted to help train journalists with more tech know-how.
“There’s a huge demand from employers for people interested in journalism who have some programming skills,” Rosen told NYU Local. “We generally have nothing to offer the editors and executives who call us asking us, ‘Do you have anybody?’”
To that end, five of the six courses in the concentration will be offered by the CS department, including two new courses — Computational Knowledge Management (available Spring 2012) and Media Technology Projects (available Spring 2013). The one journalism course is also new — Data Journalism and Investigative Reporting (available Fall 2012). Read more…
Last week, NYU issued a rather vague press release about an agreement between the university and the Madrid regional government to “explore [an] expansion” of the study abroad site there. NYU spokesman John Beckman told the Washington Square News, “Could this at some point in time become another portal campus? I don’t think we can foreclose that possibility.”
However, according to various accounts from Spanish newspapers, it appears to be more than just a possibility.
La Razón reports that Sexton and Elizabeth Aguirre, the President of the Madrid government, “signed a memorandum of understanding that will make the former Palacio del Marqués de Salamanca de la Quinta de Vista Alegre NYU’s first European campus.”
The article continues, “NYU Madrid will host about 800 students on what will be the third campus in the global network of NYU – Washington Square, after Abu Dhabi and Shanghai. La Quinta de Vista Alegre will also have a dormitory for students from around the world to study at the Madrid campus.” Read more…
Jeremy Friedman, the Director of NYU’s Sustainability office, just emailed NYU Local an alert letting us know that the NYU redtail hawks‘ eggs have begun to hatch.
The New York Times‘ City Room blog has more:
Last evening we captured a (blurry) hawk-cam image (also see below) that appeared to show something poking out of the leftmost egg on Violet and Bobby’s nest high above Washington Square Park.
This morning we showed it to Robert Horvath, raptor rehabilitator and City Room hawk consultant. He wrote back:
“The egg on the left side definitely shows activity on the right side of the egg. It’s just a start but if that’s last night it should be completely out today.”
The birds are, unfortunately, concealing the action right now, but keep an eye on the hawk cam to see the first eyas (baby hawk).
As the Middle East continues to be shaken by pro-reform protests and government crackdowns on demonstrators and journalists, top NYU administrators are no doubt keeping a close eye on such activity near students. Last month, the university asked those studying abroad to cancel any travel plans to Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, or Morocco, due to unsafe conditions.
Pro-democracy demonstrations have not spread to the United Arab Emirates, home to NYU’s new campus in Abu Dhabi. However, according to the Associated Press, online discussions about a need for reform have increased. In response, the UAE government has detained three outspoken advocates for human rights and political reform. Last Friday, police arrested blogger Ahmed Mansoor (his final tweets are chilling) after a request from the UAE Attorney General. He had recently signed a petition calling for a democratically elected parliament.
Over the weekend, authorities detained two more activists. The whereabouts of the detainees are unknown. The AP reports:
The pair includes one of the country’s most outspoken academics, Nasser bin Ghaith, who is a financial analyst and an economics professor at the Abu Dhabi branch of Paris’ Sorbonne university. He was detained Sunday in Dubai, said Mohammed al-Mansouri, the lawyer and a fellow activist. Read more…
In early February, the Hayden dining hall received its first Department of Health inspection under the city’s new letter-grading policy, which gives restaurants an A, B, or C, depending on their cleanliness. Hayden squeaked out a B, scoring 27 points — one below the 28 point C cutoff.
Late last month, health inspectors stopped by Hayden again; the dining hall slipped into C range with a score of 31 points. The reasons why aren’t pretty (bolded terms are critical violations — ones that pose a more serious health risk):
1. Evidence of mice or live mice present in facility’s food and/or non-food areas.
2. Food not protected from potential source of contamination during storage, preparation, transportation, display or service.
3. Food contact surface not properly washed, rinsed and sanitized after each use and following any activity when contamination may have occurred.
4. Facility not vermin proof. Harborage or conditions conducive to attracting vermin to the premises and/or allowing vermin to exist.
5. Pesticide use not in accordance with label or applicable laws. Prohibited chemical used/stored. Open bait station used.
6. Toilet facility not maintained and provided with toilet paper, waste receptacle and self-closing door.
7. Plumbing not properly installed or maintained; anti-siphonage or backflow prevention device not provided where required; equipment or floor not properly drained; sewage disposal system in disrepair or not functioning properly.
8. Mechanical or natural ventilation system not provided, improperly installed, in disrepair and/or fails to prevent excessive build-up of grease, heat, steam condensation vapors, odors, smoke, and fumes. Read more…
UPDATE (5/6): Incredibly, one of the eggs has hatched! Experts had declared earlier this week that the eggs were unviable because the gestation period had ended. Stay tuned.
Looking outside NYU President John Sexton’s office on the top floor of Bobst, you would expect to see an amazing view of Washington Square Park. But you might be surprised to find a large hawk’s nest.
Earlier this year, a red-tailed hawk built a nest on a ledge right by Sexton’s window. And, a few weeks ago, another hawk flew onto the same ledge. The New York Times’ City Room describes the scene:
“We thought they were going to fight,” said Colin Jerolmack. “Instead, they started mating.”
Mr. Jerolmack, an assistant professor of environmental studies at N.Y.U., was hooked. He and his wife watched as the pair started flying back and forth to the university’s Bobst Library, at the southeast corner of the park.
“We saw them carrying sticks.” They were building a nest.
Mr. Jerolmack named them Bobby, after the library, and Violet, after N.Y.U.’s school color.
In order to get a better view, the Times set up a small camera early yesterday to keep an eye on the birds. It turns out that they are now guarding eggs that are estimated to hatch in about two weeks. The stream — available here — will run 24/7; there is an effort underway to add lighting for nighttime viewing. Read more…
In a university-wide email sent earlier today, NYU President John Sexton announced the proposed budgetary changes for the 2011-2012 school year, which are set to be approved by the Board of Trustees.
Sexton stressed the “significant challenges” facing the university, but noted that the re-engineering efforts over the past two years “have placed NYU in a better position to confront these circumstances than many universities and colleges.”
That won’t stop tuition from going up. Here are the proposed changes:
» Undergraduate tuition, fees, and room and board — For the 2011-12 year, we have budgeted an increase of 3.8% in tuition and mandatory fees, and 3.1% in room and board; the aggregate increase in the cost of attendance will be 3.6%.
» Financial Aid — Having a low per student endowment manifests itself more clearly in the financial aid we can offer than in any other area (though we spend over $180 million annually in institutional grant aid); for that reason, financial aid is our foremost fundraising priority. For 2011-12, undergraduate financial aid will increase by 3.8% to match the increase in tuition and fees. In addition, fully-funded graduate students will continue to receive full tuition remission; have premiums for their graduate health care plan paid by the University; and their minimum stipend will be increased by 2.5%.
The aggregate increase in cost of attendance is the highest since 2008. Last year, the jump was 3.1%; in 2009, it was 3.4%. It’s important to note, however, that those increases were the smallest of the past twenty years.
Additionally, the percentage increase in undergraduate financial aid is down sharply from 5.8% last year and 7.8% in 2009.
Photo via AMagill‘s Flickr (CC).
On Friday, NYU announced that 33% of applicants to the Class of 2015 were admitted to NYU. Of the 42,242 students that applied — the school’s largest-ever applicant pool — 13,731 were admitted.
That number, up sharply from last year’s 11,136 and 29% acceptance rate, is much higher for a reason — NYU finally began including Liberal Studies Program (LSP) admissions in their statistics. Shawn Abbott, the head of admissions, explained to WSN that the change came because the university will soon begin offering direct admissions to LSP and felt it should no longer be considered just an Associate’s Degree program. (For a more apples-to-apples comparison, 26% of applicants were admitted if you exclude LSP.)
The failure to count LSP students in NYU statistics was one of the major critiques of the program in our recent profile of it, particularly considering that LSP students constitute nearly a quarter of each year’s freshman class. (About 22% of this year’s admitted students were offered a place in LSP.) Kudos to NYU for more honest reporting, even if it might hurt the school’s US News and World Report rankings.
In Abu Dhabi, 1,184 students applied directly and 4,670 asked to be considered for admission to both campuses. 193 were accepted — a 3.1 percent admission rate, up slightly from last year’s 2.1 percent. Notably, as we reported in February, 58 of those students applied to Early Decision I; 57 accepted.
In an email sent late last night, NYU President John Sexton and Provost David McLaughlin announced that the university will open a degree-granting campus in Shanghai in fall 2013. The new campus — which will join Abu Dhabi and Washington Square as the third portal in NYU’s network — could ultimately hold as many as 3,000 students.
The announcement was not a surprise. Sexton himself has been hinting at the project for years and, just two months ago, China’s Ministry of Education approved NYU’s plan to open the campus. The news of that made it into English-language Chinese newspapers, which prompted NYU to put out a long statement about the project, all but confirming the deal was done. Read more…
