Park associate dean of 16 years hired at Hobart and William Smith

Virginia Mansfield-Richardson, associate dean of the Roy H. Park School of Communications, is leaving to serve as the associate provost of Hobart and William Smith Colleges. She will begin her new position Oct. 19.

Mansfield-Richardson began working at the Park School in 1999 after holding several positions at Penn State University, Ohio University and American University.

“Virginia has been instrumental in leading the expansion of the school’s fast-changing curriculum and for coordinating our support for student and faculty research and creative activity,” Diane Gayeski, dean of the Park School, said in an announcement. “Having served as associate dean for 16 years, she has provided invaluable continuity and expertise to me and to the leaders who preceded me. It will be difficult for me to imagine the Park School without Virginia, but I congratulate her on this next well-deserved career move.”

Ithaca College professor leaves $500,000 for Jewish organization

Longtime Ithaca residents Robert and Marcia Ascher left $500,000 from their estate to the Ithaca Area United Jewish Community, an organization that supports Jewish programming both locally and around the world, according to a press release from the IAUJC.

Ascher, an Ithaca College professor emerita of mathematics, was a longtime member of Temple Beth-El. Ascher also helped establish the first board of directors for the college’s Hillel, which supports Jewish activities on campus.

“The IAUJC is very grateful to the Aschers for their foresight and generosity,” Marjorie Hoffman, the IAUJC program and campaign chair, said. “Their gift will help us in our efforts to broaden our programming and the opportunities we offer to the Ithaca community.”

To honor the contributions of the Aschers, the IAUJC is sponsoring a community celebration at 3:15 p.m. Oct. 18. in the Emerson Suites. Barbara C. Johnson, professor emerita of anthropology at the college, will present a talk on the Jewish women’s folk songs from Kerala in southern India in honor of the Aschers’ ethnographic interests.

Park Auditorium to screen professor’s documentary project

“Voices of Partition,” a documentary film by Kathleen Mulligan, an associate professor of theater arts, will screen at 4 p.m. Oct. 2 in the Park Auditorium.

Also screening is the original theater piece, “Dagh Dagh Ujala,” or “This Stained Dawn,” of which the film documents the first screening.

The film is an hour long, and Mulligan will answer questions about the project following the screening. The screening is supported by the Dr. John Keshishoglou Center for Global Communications Innovation.

The Voices of Partition project aims to preserve stories of the survivors of the partition of India and Pakistan in 1947 and educate audiences in the United States about that event.

“Dagh Dagh Ujala” will be performed by members of Islamabad’s Theatre Wallay at 8 p.m. Oct. 30 and at 2 p.m. and 7 p.m. Oct. 31 in Clark Theatre.

Performances are free. Donations will be requested at the performances and will go toward building schools.

Library to celebrate Banned Books Week with annual reading

The Ithaca College Library and the
Handwerker Gallery will host the third annual Banned Book Read Out from 12:15 to 1:15 p.m. Oct. 1 in the Handwerker Gallery.

Participants are invited to bring their own favorite banned selections to read in addition to the texts that will already be provided.

Banned Books Week is an annual event celebrating the freedom to read and the importance of the First Amendment.

Professor’s wildlife camera trap featured in regional magazine

Jason Hamilton, chair of the Department of Environmental Studies and Sciences, has been observing the behavior of wild animals passing through the Ithaca College Natural Lands for several years. He set up a network of trail cameras and placed sand-filled tracking boxes at some locations to capture the tracks of passing animals.

The photos and tracks have been a resource for the tracking courses Hamilton teaches within the Honors Program, as well as for student research. The cameras have captured elusive coyotes, as well as fox, deer, raccoon, skunks and opossum. The article describing his fieldwork, as well as that of Mike Sacco of the Cayuga Nature Center, appears in the September and October 2015 issue of Life in the Finger Lakes.