February 20, 2017

Dear members of the Hajim School community,

Good news from the National Science Foundation: Another research experience for undergraduates (REU) has been funded for our campus this summer. “Computational Methods for Understanding Music, Media, and Minds,” offered through the Goergen Institute for Data Science, will leverage our Hajim School and University strengths in machine learning, audio and music engineering, music theory, and cognitive sciences to explore how computational tools can help students tell the history of popular music, restore ancient music manuscripts, and teach a person to become a better public speaker. Six Hajim school faculty members — Mark Bocko and Zhiyao Duan of electrical and computer engineering; and Daniel Gildea, Ehsan Hoque, Jiebo Luo and Chenliang Xu of computer science — will be among the mentors for this program, which will bring underrepresented minority and female students here from other campuses. (Read more here.) Combined with our other new REU “Advancing Human Health, From Nano to Network,” and ongoing REU’s in chemistry and physics, the Xerox Research Fellows program, and the McNair Scholars program, we are going to have an exciting undergraduate research community here this summer.

One of the organizers of the DandyHacks hackathon this past weekend — Anis Kallel ’17, a dual computer science and business major from Tunisia — is living up to the high expectations the University had in offering him a full-tuition, four-year scholarship. He is president of the Computer Science Undergraduate Council, and has been a TA, peer adviser, and research assistant in that department. He’s played club volleyball, landed two internships, worked at the UR Tech Store, and studied abroad in Spain. “I was given something most people wouldn’t dream of receiving,” Anis says. “That comes with some responsibility. Whatever potential Rochester saw in me, I wanted to live up to it.” Read more about his remarkable story here.

A lot of you probably know that Stephen Roessner, lecturer in audio and music engineering, won a Grammy Award in 2011 as engineer/mixer for a recording of Messiaen’s 18-movement organ piece, Livre Du Saint-Sacrement, performed by Paul Jacobs. But you may not realize the challenges he encountered recording multiple takes of this hour and a half long piece, from 10 p.m. to 4 a.m., five nights in a row, in St. Mary’s Cathedral, directly over the Times Square subway station. Hear all about it in this podcast featuring Stephen and Dan Kannen ’17, one of his students. The podcast was produced by Nick Bruno ’17, also of audio and music engineering.

The Institute of Optics recently hosted a visit by 14 students from Greece Olympia High School. Thanks to Yvie Bodell ’17 and David Lippman ’18 who did a great job providing demos to the students, and to Thomas Brown, professor of optics, for his introductory remarks.

Congratulations to Marian Ackun-Farmmer, a student in the lab of Danielle Benoit, associate professor of biomedical engineering. Marian is the recipient of an AfterCollege Engineering Student Scholarship. Founded in 1999, AfterCollege Inc., is an online professional platform that connects students, faculty, alumni, and employers through customized career networks at colleges and professional organizations across the country.

Have great week,

Your dean,
Wendi Heinzelman