Category: Events and Recreation

The Office of Academic Affairs will interview three dean candidates for the College of Engineering. 

The first candidate, Dr. Anthony Muscat, from the Department of Chemical and Environmental Engineering at the University of Arizona, professor, will be on campus on May 25 and May 26. 

Faculty, staff and students are invited to attend a public forum at 4 p.m. May 25 at the Rhatigan Student Center in Room 233. The forum will also be streamed live on YouTube.

Candidates for a new Visiting Teaching Professor, who will also be Director of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in the Cohen Honors College, will make presentations open to the campus community 2-3 p.m. at the Rhatigan Student Center in Room 265. The presentations are open to the campus community and will occur on the following dates:

• May 25
• May 26
• June 1

Each presentation is about 20 to 30 minutes and will be followed by a question and answer period. The topic is “Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in Honors.”

Information about each candidate can be found on DEI website.

The Wichita State State Staff and faculty senates, in partnership with the President’s Office and Office of the Vice President for Finance and Administration, invite you to come-and-go reception to celebrate the re-integration back to campus 9-10:30 a.m. June 4 at the Rhatigan Student Center Ballroom.

Grab-and-go breakfast items will be served.

Join classmates, faculty and staff for this year’s Academic Convocation beginning at 9:30 a.m. Sept. 2 at Wilner Auditorium. Academic Convocation is an event that blends Wichita State University’s Common Read program with other student learning and engagement opportunities.

At this year’s event, winners of the 2021 University Faculty Awards will be recognized and will feature a student speaker from the Wichita State Student Government Association. Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha, author of WSU’s Common Read book “What the Eyes Don’t See,” will be the keynote speaker. A reception and book signing will follow at the Ulrich Museum on the second floor at 10:45 a.m.

Visit  the official website for Academic Convocation 2021 to learn more or to watch a live stream of the event.

Carol Lewis, a Wichita State University Child Development Center employee, is retiring after 39 years.  Please join in celebrating her years of service 5:30-7 p.m. June 18 at the WSU CDC.

For questions about the event, contact Jillian Hoefer.

Two new exhibitions, “On Vacation!” and “Art Is a Superpower!,” go on display at the Ulrich 11 a.m.-5 p.m. May 20-July 31. The museum is open Monday-Saturday and admission is free. Click here for directions and parking.

On Vacation! features pieces from the Ulrich’s permanent collection that celebrate excursions and adventures. This includes John Baeder’s photographs of 1970s American diners, the art of Alexander Calder and George Grosz and a series of colorful prints from Dutch artist Karel Appel  among other works.

Art is a Superpower! shines a spotlight on the amazing new pieces the museum has acquired over the last five years, including stunning photographs of powerful Black women by rising star Ayana V. Jackson, a series of drawings on blue disposable face masks by world-famous Chinese-born artist Ai Weiwei and giant sculpture pieces from Tom Otterness, creator of the iconic Millipede and Shockers sculptures on campus. These works represent themes of identity, human rights, democracy and patriotism.

The Ulrich will have lots of wonderful programming to accompany these exhibitions. Check ulrich.wichita.edu/programs  for updates.

The Wichita State Society of Public Historians will host a virtual meeting at 5:30 p.m. May 19 via Zoom.

After the general meeting, a presentation featuring published author Ken Spurgeon will follow at  6 p.m. Spurgeon was born and raised in Wichita. He earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in history from Wichita State University. He is an associate professor of history at Friends University, He has written or co-written and directed three documentaries that have also aired on various PBS stations throughout the Midwest.

The F1RST-Generation Student Celebration Week at Wichita State will take place Nov. 8–12. To commemorate the national First-Generation Student Celebration Day, the annual F1RST-Gen group photo of students, faculty and staff will be Nov. 8.

On Nov. 10, the inaugural members of the Alpha Alpha Alpha Honorary Society for First-Generation College students will be inducted.

For more information on events and services designed to serve our first-generation community members, visit the website.

The College of Fine Arts will host its second annual Commencement Cruise at 7:30 p.m. May 13. The tradition started last year because of COVID-19. All fall 2020 and spring 2021 CFA graduates, faculty and staff are invited to decorate their vehicles and cruise around the perimeter of campus. Family, friends and other members of the university community are invited to cheer on the graduates.

All graduating students will also be invited to join. Participants are encouraged to wear their regalia, and to make signs for their vehicles that represent their creative practice or program area. Staging for cruise participants begins at 7 p.m. The caravan will start rolling at 7:30 p.m.

Observers are invited to park and watch along Perimeter Road, WuShock Drive and Mid-Campus Drive.

For more info, visit the Commencement Cruise website.

Kevin Crowston, Syracuse Univeristy professor, will present at the Disaster Resilience Analytics Center (DRAC) seminar series 10 a.m. May 21 via Zoom. Crowston is a Distinguished Professor of Information Science in the School of Information Studies at Syracuse University. He received his Ph.D. in Information Technologies from the Sloan School of Management, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1991. His research examines new ways of organizing made possible by the extensive use of information and communications technology. He is currently editor-in-chief for the journals “ACM Transaction on Social Computing and Information, Technology & People.”