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Welcome Welcome to the September 2013 issue of the Social Sciences eNews! Make a Difference Invest in tomorrow's leaders today. Learn how!Follow us on 
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Happy Jack Peltason Day City of Irvine honors UCI's second chancellor on his 90th birthday
Summer fun Social sciences faculty, staff and students share how they've spent their summer months
Peace education in action Political science undergrad wins Microsoft's Challenge for Change to create global peace curriculum program
Behind the scenes of the Smithsonian museums Morales takes part in competitive summer Latino Museum Studies Program
UC Irvine listed among America's top 10 'Coolest Schools' for fourth year Campus places third in Sierra Club ranking of colleges committed to sustainability
VIDEO: Expert on airline mergers Brueckner on airline mergers
Beyond the prison walls UCI sociology professor studies how incarceration affects U.S. families
Huttegger is named a UCI Chancellor's Fellow Honor recognizes the logic & philosophy of science associate professor for research excellence
Minimum wages and living wages Research evidence from Chancellor's Professor Neumark in the public debate
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Jack W. Peltason was one of the very first faculty at UC Irvine. In 1963, while the campus was still in its planning stages, he was selected to be the inaugural dean of the College of Arts, Letters and Science. A year later, he was named vice chancellor for academic affairs, guiding the academic growth of the nascent university.
In 1984 Peltason was selected by the UC Board of Regents to be UC Irvine's second chancellor. During his eight-year term UC Irvine underwent unprecedented physical growth, increased funding for endowed chairs and distinguished professors, initiated community partnerships, and attracted major institutes, notably the UC Humanities Research Institute in 1987 and the National Academies of Sciences & Engineering in 1988.
On August 29, Jack Peltason turned 90 and UC Irvine and the City of Irvine celebrated his extraordinary contributions by proclaiming August 29, 2013, as "Jack Peltason Day" in the City of Irvine.
As summer winds down and UCI gears up for students to arrive for fall classes, we thought it would be fun to share what some of our faculty, staff and students have been up to. From international travel for conferences and research to surfing So Cal's beautiful waves, one thing is perfectly clear – UCI social sciences knows how to have a good time.
It's one thing to say you want world peace. It's another to go out and make it happen.
For political science undergraduate Christina Ong, that's the goal, and in July, she received a boost from Microsoft for her efforts. Ong was one of five U.S. students named a winner in the technology giant's Challenge for Change contest.
The $2,500 prize money and tech goodies she received – including an Xbox 360 and Windows 8 phone – are helping her create the groundwork for a global peace curriculum that will push the current and future generation to become "solutionaries" – using creative methods to solve problems in their communities and beyond. She's working with Students for Global Peacebuilding, a UCI group associated with the Center for Citizen Peacebuilding at UCI, to develop a peace curriculum that could be made available to educators, students and policymakers. She's also expanding the project to include new after school programs and conflict resolution training.
For the past month, Alberto Morales, anthropology graduate student, has been working behind the scenes of Smithsonian museums and collections in Washington, D.C. as part of the Latino Museum Studies Program. Sponsored by the Smithsonian Latino Center, the competitive summer research and leadership program allows graduate students to develop their museum practices within a Latino framework under professional curators, researchers, historians, archivists and professors. The program includes a two-week leadership seminar designed to enhance research and creative skills through a series of panel discussions, hands-on workshops, interactive discussions and tours of Smithsonian museums. The second component is a four-week practicum.
Morales is one of fifteen students selected from a nationwide pool to participate in the program.
UC Irvine has placed third in Sierra magazine's seventh annual ranking of the country's "Coolest Schools," making this the fourth consecutive year the university has been included among the top 10 "greenest" campuses nationwide. The publication's September/October cover story spotlights what colleges are doing to address climate issues and operate sustainably, from UC Irvine's highly efficient cogeneration power plant and more than 4,800 solar panels to American University's new campuswide composting program. 
What does the potential American Airlines-US Airways merger mean for passengers? Jan Brueckner, UC Irvine economics professor and transportation economics expert, weighs in.
As the incarceration rate in America continues to climb, researchers are studying just how wide its effects spill beyond the prison walls. Kristin Turney, UCI sociology assistant professor, is looking at two residual outcomes impacting the families of those behind bars: education and food insecurity. "When mom or dad goes to prison, the whole family suffers," she says. "A father's incarceration, for example, makes maintaining relationships with the child's mother difficult. It also means the family loses the father's income and increases family expenses because of costly travel for visits and collect phone calls." Turney is interested in knowing how incarceration, and its spillover effects on family life, impacts educational outcomes for children and availability of food for families.
Simon Huttegger, logic & philosophy of science associate professor, has been awarded the title of Chancellor's Fellow, effective through June 2016. The honor recognizes scholars of exceptional value to the university whose recent achievements in scholarship show extraordinary promise for world-class contributions to knowledge. It includes $25,000 per year to support research efforts during the three-year term.
Huttegger's research interests include game and decision theory, philosophy of biology, and philosophy of science. He is currently working on a study, funded by the National Science Foundation, that builds upon existing signaling models to find how incomplete communication can still achieve objectives. Findings will have wide theoretical applications in biology, economics and business.
Given the persistence of poverty in the United States, policymakers justifiably struggle with the design of policies to reduce it and increase economic resources of low-income families. A number of recent developments - including President Obama's proposal to raise the federal minimum wage and the recent wave of fast-food strikes in New York, Chicago, Detroit and elsewhere - have again thrust attention on using a higher minimum wage to combat poverty.
The idea behind the minimum wage is simple and appealing: If we force up the wages paid to low-wage workers, then low-wage workers will earn more income, and the low-income families in which low-wage workers live will be better off. However, economists have long pointed out that things aren't so simple. Hear more from David Neumark, economics Chancellor's Professor and Center for Economics & Public Policy director. |
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