Search for ASU System President is underway
The Board of Trustees of Arkansas State University met Friday, July 30, to formally begin the search process for a new president to lead the ASU System. Interim President Robert L. Potts brought recommendations to the Board of Trustees to get the search process underway during a meeting held at ASU’s Little Rock office. The board adopted a resolution appointing 11 individuals to comprise a Presidential Search Advisory Committee. Florine Tousant Milligan of Forrest City, who serves as Board chair and will serve as the search advisory committee chair, recommended the committee members based on their experience and familiarity with the ASU System and their ability to represent the broad spectrum of constituencies served by the ASU System. Also, the trustees adopted a resolution formally recommending that the ASU Foundation, Inc., contract with Effective Leadership, LLC, a consulting firm headed by Dr. Tom Meredith, to assist with the search.  Meredith has served as commissioner of Mississippi’s public university system, chancellor of the University System of Georgia, chancellor of the University of Alabama System and president and professor of education at Western Kentucky University.

Dr. Horton publishes article on trumpeter Woody Shaw
Dr. E. Ron Horton, Music, recently published a research article, “Woody Shaw, Above and Beyond: An Analysis of Woody Shaw’s Use of the Pentatonic Scale and Chromatic Substitution in the Improvised Solo’s of Moontrane” in the International Jazz Archives Journal. The article used three different versions of one of Shaw’s signature pieces, “Moontrane”, along with other songs that Shaw recorded, to analyze the improvisation techniques that are considered his footprint on the world of music.  The information in the article will not only help students understand how Shaw created his unique solos, it will also help them develop their own solos using his distinctive musical frameworks.

Dr. Hansen presents paper in Scotland
Dr. Gregory Hansen, English and Folklore, recently presented a paper, "Pranking and Tall Tale Telling within Florida's Old-Time Fiddling Tradition," at the North Atlantic Fiddle Convention (NAFCo) in Aberdeen, Scotland. The conference and fiddle festival, whose theme was "Roots and Routes," was sponsored by the Elphinstone Institute at the University of Aberdeen and featured presentations of European and North American fiddle music. The North Atlantic Fiddle Convention 2010, the largest event of its kind in the UK, featured more than 40 world-class traditional musicians and dance artists from countries around the North Atlantic, including Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Spain, Ireland, England, Scotland, Wales, Canada, and the USA. With more 100 events, including workshops (some expressly for the young), sessions, concerts, ceilidhs/dances, and an academic conference, NAFCo 2010, a festival plus an academic conference, highlighted the way the fiddle, fiddle music, and associated dance styles transcend boundaries of all kinds – geographical, political, and cultural – creating new traditions and fresh musical insights. The festival also marks centuries of cultural exchange, where the northern seas were and are the corridors through which distinctive but related cultures and musical traditions developed and continue to develop, as the local merges with the global. Dr. Hansen received support from the Eleanor Lane International Travel Fund for this trip.

ASU posts records in fundraising efforts
Arkansas State University had a record number of donors and gifts to produce the second-best fundraising effort in the university’s history for the 2009-10 fiscal year. In addition, the school raised more than $10 million for the second consecutive year, marking the first time ever for back-to-back $10 million-plus fundraising for the university. For the fiscal year which ended on June 30, Cristian Murdock, vice chancellor for University Advancement, notes that ASU has received $10,315,563 in 23,039 gifts, an increase of 3.66 percent in the number of gifts over the previous year, from a record 7,146 donors, a 4.18 percent increase over the previous year. This follows a record $14,823,207 received in 2009. Murdock stated he is especially pleased that ASU is enjoying a significant increase in funds raised from philanthropic sources since 2007, when the amount raised was $4.3 million. He also credits ASU’s fundraising success in the past two years to the implementation of new comprehensive advancement goals for the university.

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