Getting ‘ghosted’ by a tax preparer will haunt you

Still looking for someone to file your return? The IRS warns taxpayers to choose a preparer wisely and provides a few red flags to look out for, how to ensure you’re using a verified professional, and how to report preparer misconduct. University IT also warns that malicious actors are looking to make a quick profit by falsely identifying themselves as tax professionals and promising big returns. Also known as “ghost preparers,” these scammers fake your income and deductions to boost the size of your refund but never sign off as the preparer. To make matters worse, they direct refunds straight to their account instead of yours.

GPT-4 is here: what scientists think

Nature, March 16

Andrew White, an associate professor of chemical engineering, has had privileged access to GPT-4 as a “red-teamer”: a person paid by OpenAI to test the platform to try and make it do something bad. “Early on in the process, it didn’t seem that different,” compared with previous iterations. He put to the bot queries about what chemical reactions steps were needed to make a compound, predict the reaction yield, and choose a catalyst. “At first, I was actually not that impressed,” says White. “It was really surprising because it would look so realistic, but it would hallucinate an atom here. It would skip a step there,” he adds. But when as part of his red-team work he gave GPT-4 access to scientific papers, things changed dramatically. “It made us realize that these models maybe aren’t so great just alone. But when you start connecting them to the Internet to tools like a retrosynthesis planner, or a calculator, all of a sudden, new kinds of abilities emerge.”

Talk on food security and civic engagement

The Office of Residential Life and Housing Services, the Center for Community Engagement, and the Rotary Club of Rochester Southwest host the next “Breaking the Bubble” event on Thursday, March 23, from 5:30 to 6:30 p.m. at Red Tea House, 912 Genesee St. Speakers from Taproot Collective, the Westside Farmer’s Market, and the Campus Food Pantry will lead a conversation about food security in Rochester. Learn more about how students and community members can help address this issue. Those who attend the event will receive a free coffee or tea and a cookie.

Art New York information session

Entrepreneurial workshop on ChatGPT

Join the Ain Center for a new workshop series, Build Your Entrepreneurial Foundation Block-by-Block, designed to help student innovators and entrepreneurs learn more about the tools, resources, approaches, and concepts that could help them with their projects and career paths. In the next session, PhD student Masum Hasan will outline key features of ChatGPT, the AI chatbot developed by Open AI, and lead participants in a hands-on session with sample-use cases and exercises. No prior software experience is needed. Register online to attend on Wednesday, March 29, at 6 p.m. in Genesee Hall, Room 309. Contact the Ain Center with questions.

Koru mindfulness class for student-athletes

Lucinda Snyder, the founder of Peak Flow, hosts a Koru mindfulness class for student-athletes offering skills to help develop mental resilience to reach peak performance and build the habit of using it in one’s life as a student-athlete and beyond. This free, four-week class will be held on Mondays March 27, April 3, 10, and 17, from noon to 1:15 p.m. in Havens Lounge. You can register here.

Facilities, Space Planning, and Real Estate partner to modernize business processes and information technology solutions

The University’s Facilities and Services, Space Planning, and Real Estate Services have partnered to modernize their business processes and information technology solutions with a comprehensive, cloud-based Enterprise Asset Management System (EAMS). The project kicked off on February 28 and the new system combines software, systems, and services to maintain and control operational assets and equipment. The overall goals of the project are to optimize the quality and utilization of assets throughout their lifecycle, increase productive uptime, reduce operational costs, and use full institutional leverage to address opportunities, growth, and risks.

“Implementing an enterprise asset management system gives the University a centralized approach that reaches across our campuses and off-site facilities,” says Elizabeth Milavec, the University’s executive vice president for administration and finance. “It will bring together the work of our teams in facilities, space planning, and real estate, making it easier to collaborate.” To learn more about the project and stay up-to-date with its progress, or to join a committee, visit the EAMS Implementation Project website. Regular updates will be posted, including project milestones, timelines, and other information, to ensure all stakeholders are informed and engaged throughout the process.

Practical ways to get moving with Well-U

Presentation on effective communication

Join Well-U and UR Medicine EAP on Wednesday, March 29, at noon for a presentation on how to develop and practice active listening skills and other means of effective communication. Register here to attend.

Mary Young Lecture on Korean Americans' transnational freedom struggle during World War II

Lili Kim ’01, an associate professor of history and global migrations at Hampshire College and cochair of the Five College Asian Pacific American Studies Program, gives the Mary Young Lecture “Decolonization Dreams: Korean Americans’ Transnational Freedom Struggle during World War II” on Thursday, March 23, at 5 p.m. in the Hawkins-Carlson Room, Rush Rhees Library. Learn more about the talk here.

Register to attend the Women’s Leadership Awards ceremony by March 24

The Susan B. Anthony Center will host its annual Susan B. Anthony Legacy Awards on Saturday, April 1, from 10 a.m. to noon in Evarts Lounge, Helen Wood Hall, to celebrate the University’s undergraduate women’s leadership awardees. During the event, the center will also present the Susan B. Anthony Lifetime Achievement Award to Linda Tesar ’91 (PhD), a professor of economics at the University of Michigan, and the Susan B. Anthony Emerging Leader Award to Erica Miller, an assistant professor of medicine and associate program director for the Cardiovascular Disease Fellowship. Find more information and winner bios here. The event is free, but registration is required by Friday, March 24.

March with the University in the Rochester Pride parade

Members of the University community and their families are invited to march in the Rochester Pride parade on Saturday, July 15, at 11:30 a.m. Find a full FAQ here including shuttle, parking, and shirt information. Please note that in 2019, a decision was made to keep the same shirts every year for environmental and budgetary purposes. If you still have that tie-dye tank-style shirt, you’re encouraged to wear that and not request an additional one as it will not be a different style. Register here; if you need a shirt, register by April 15.

Margaret Atwood visits; AlertUR established

2007: The Plutzik Reading Series welcomed internationally renowned author and poet Margaret Atwood on March 26.

2008: The University launched a new emergency alert communications system called AlertUR. The pilot program included undergraduate students, but it was later phased in for the rest of the University community. AlertUR is still in use today—you should periodically review your contact information at https://alert.rochester.edu; sign in with your NetID and password to verify the fastest method for reaching you.

Congratulations to the Rochester Match Day Class of 2023, who last week joined thousands of medical students across the country in matching to their residency programs. Above, Indigo Gill, who matched with the University of California–San Francisco for family medicine, is surrounded by loved ones, including her father, Saeeda Gill. Read more about Match Day and find photos on the University’s Instagram, Facebook, or LinkedIn pages.