ECU Notes: Former U.S. Ambassador Joseph Wilson to speak

ECU News Services

Sunday, April 05, 2009

In 2003, White House officials leaked the identity of CIA agent Valerie Plame after her husband, former U.S. Ambassador Joseph Wilson, spoke out against the Bush administration.

The incident and its message for democracy will be the subject of a talk Wilson will deliver when he visits East Carolina University Tuesday. He will present his lecture, “Speaking Truth to Power,” at 2 p.m. in the Hendrix Auditorium at the Mendenhall Student Center. The event is free and open to the public.

The Bush administration asked Wilson in 2002 to investigate reports that Saddam Hussein was seeking to acquire uranium from the West African nation of Niger for Iraq’s nuclear program. Wilson reported back to Washington that there was no truth to the claims, yet President George W. Bush asserted in his 2003 State of the Union Address that “Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa,” identifying British intelligence as the source of this information.

Wilson’s presentation at ECU will focus on the First Amendment right and responsibility of citizenship. A question-and-answer session will follow.

The event is sponsored by the ECU College of Human Ecology’s Carolyn Freeze Baynes Memorial Lecture in Social Justice Series, Student Union Programming Board and Office of Institutional Diversity.

Brody honored for family medicine grads

The Brody School of Medicine at ECU is one of the top 10 medical schools in the country for sending graduates into family medicine, according to the American Academy of Family Physicians.

Representatives of the Brody School of Medicine and the other schools will be recognized May 1 at the Society of Teachers of Family Medicine meeting in Denver.

This is the third consecutive year ECU has been ranked in the top 10.

“This award is recognition of the Brody School of Medicine’s support and commitment for the training of family physicians,” said Dr. Kenneth Steinweg, interim chair of the Department of Family Medicine at Brody. “Family physicians are in huge demand throughout our region and state, and we are working hard to meet that need.”

ECU students win big in drafting competition

Thirteen East Carolina University students received national recognition for work performed in the fall 2008 semester. The students, who are pursuing a degree in the Design program through the Department of Technology Systems, were recognized in the 42nd Annual Design Drafting Contest conducted by the American Design Drafting Association (ADDA).

First place winners received the Board of Governors award; second place received the Board of Directors award; and third place earned the Presidential Award.

Winners in the residential architecture — computer aided division were Travis Roundtree (first), Tyler Priest (second) and Mathew Gardner (third).

Winners in the commercial architectural — computer aided division were Jeremy McKee (first), Christopher Denton (second) and Daniel Stiles (third).

Winners in the manual architectural rendering division were Joel Howard (first), Marcus Dill (second) and Brian Bell (third).

Winners in the GIS presentation division were: Jennifer Weigand (second) and Clay Suggs (third).

John Sweitzer won the Presidential Award in the computer-aided architectural rendering division. Edgar Santos won the Board of Governors award in the computer-aided structural division.

ECU sponsors History Day competition

The annual History Day competition sponsored by ECU’s Department of History will be held Wednesday in the Mendenhall Student Center.

Middle grade and senior high contestants from schools in N.C. Education District I will compete in groups and individually in eight contest categories, including exhibits, documentaries, dramatic performances, historic papers and web sites. The 2009 National History Day competition theme is “The Individual in History.”

This competition is held each spring on ECU’s campus. The Pitt County Historical Society provides plaques in recognition of winning schools in each of the categories.