Members of the UAF community are invited to meet University of Alaska presidential finalists during campus and community forums Monday, March 1. Finalists will be available to meet with the UAF community from 1 – 5 p.m. on March 1 in the auditorium at the UA Museum of the North. The candidates will appear one at a time and will each have 45 minutes to give a short presentation and answer questions. They will begin and end on the hour. Those who cannot attend the forums at the museum are also welcome to attend the community presentations from 6 – 9 p.m. at the Carlson Center. Candidates will give rotating presentations every 45 minutes. The finalists’ names will be announced the evening of Sunday, Feb. 28. A website has been set up by Staff Council to submit questions for the finalists. Faculty members can submit their questions as well.

UAOnline and Banner will be unavailable beginning 5 p.m. Thursday, March 4, so OIT can upgrade to Banner 8. The systems are scheduled to be online again Thursday, March 11. During the outage you will not be able to access UAOnline, Banner, grades, bills, financial aid, pay stubs, course drop/add, benefit information and some other online systems. You will still be able to access Blackboard, Rasmuson Library and Goldmine, e-mail and the Internet.

The Patty Center ice rink is closed for repairs after a refrigerant leak was discovered under the ice Feb. 16. The rink is closed until further notice.

The UAF Faculty Senate has moved its next meeting to 1 – 3 p.m. Friday, March 5, in 201 O'Neill Building due to the UA presidential finalists' visit. For more information contact Jayne Harvie at 474-7964 or fysenat@uaf.edu.

UA alumni and other volunteers are taking part in the annual I Know I Can outreach program, a partnership between the UA College Savings Program and the Alaska Commission on Postsecondary Education. Volunteers will read the book I Know I Can  in second grade classrooms throughout the state from Feb. 17 – 26. The book helps children start thinking about career choices and preparation.

The Office of Information Technology is changing the file retention policy on the OIT FTP server effective March 1. Files residing in the incoming and outgoing folders will be deleted at 11:59 p.m. 30 days after the file is created. For more information contact OIT at 450-8300 or helpdesk@alaska.edu.

The Poker Flat Research Range launched its final rocket of the 2010 season Feb. 16. The rocket, one of the largest used at Poker Flat, gathered data on electric particle and wave interactions in the upper atmosphere.

The March training calendar for the Office of Information Technology is now available. Several new classes are offered including Using Smartboard to Teach, Effective use of Your Macintosh Computer, Basic Adobe Acrobat Pro and Effective Use of Your Web Browser: Firefox. Banner is being upgraded in March; Banner training will be offered after the upgrade is complete.

John Scanlin, a senior psychology major, co-authored two studies chosen for presentation at the Astrobiology Science Conference 2010 conference. Scanlin’s study, What the World Needs Now: Identifying the Relative Degree of Specific Maslovian Needs and Degree of Species-Level Self-Identification in Interstellar Messages Submitted by a Multinational Sample, will be presented orally in the Search for Intelligent Life section of the conference. The second study, Earth Speaks: Identifying Common Themes in Interstellar Messages Proposed from Around the World, will be presented in the poster session. Both studies use messages gathered by the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence Institute's Earth Speaks project.

The Academic Advising Center is hosting a series of skill workshops including, Successful Test Taking, Feb. 23. Most workshops take place at 1:05 p.m. in 409 Gruening. For more information contact the Advising Center at 474-6396 or advising@uaf.edu.

The 2010 Science for Alaska Lecture Series concludes Tuesday, Feb. 23 at 7 p.m. in the Westmark Gold Room. "Surviving Sub-Zero: The Ingenuity of Alaska's Lemmings and Voles" will be presented by Ian van Tets, associate professor of biology, UAA.

Music at One, free recitals by UAF music students, take place throughout the semester on Thursdays from 1 – 2 p.m. in Davis Concert Hall. The next recital will be Feb. 25. Admission is free. For more information call 474-7555.

UA Press author Bill Sherwonit will read from Changing Paths and Living With Wildness Thursday, Feb. 25, at 6 p.m. at Gulliver's Books.

Jonathan Dillon presents a junior voice recital Thursday, Feb. 25, at 8 p.m. in Davis Concert Hall.

UAF TRiO Programs, Upward Bound and Student Support Services, are celebrating national TRiO Day by volunteering with the Interior Alaska AIDS Association on Saturday, Feb. 27. The programs will host a TRiO Day banquet to recognize high-achieving students Tuesday, March 5. The event will feature a student speaker, an address by Tanana Chiefs Conference President Jerry Isaac, presentation of an award for a community member who has supported TRiO students and recognition of a successful former TRiO participant. For more information contact 474-6844 or fysssp@uaf.edu.

The Famous for Fifteen Minutes playwright workshop festival takes place Saturday, Feb. 27, at 7 p.m. in the Salisbury Theatre. Admission is free.

Karl Knapp, College of Liberal Arts, presents a faculty cello recital Sunday, Feb. 28, at 8 p.m. in Davis Concert Hall. Admission is free. For more information call 474-7555.

The University Employee Assistance Program provider, ComPsych, is hosting webinars on select Wednesdays throughout the year including Sailing On: A Guide for Transitioning Into Retirement (PDF) Wednesday, March 3 at 11 a.m. Webinars are 45 minutes long. For more information call Anne Sakumoto at 786-1432.

The Festival of Native Arts takes place Thursday – Saturday, March 4 – 6. For more information contact 474-7181 or festival@uaf.edu.

The Skiathon, a 20k classic ski race and tour, takes place Saturday, March 20, on the UAF ski trails. Registration is $15 by March 19 or $40 after March 19. Register at the Wood Center, Beaver Sports or Raven Cross Country.

Career Expo 2010, hosted by Career Services, takes place Wednesday, March 24, from 10 a.m. – 5 p.m. in Wood Center. Employers will be on campus to recruit for internships, jobs and summer employment. For more information contact 474-7596 or careerservices@uaf.edu.

Check out the UAF Weekly Science Calendar, sponsored by the Center for Global Change and Arctic System Research, for science-related events at UAF.

Visit UAF's online calendar for information on UAF events or to publicize an event.

Brien Ashdown, College of Liberal Arts, is the 2010 recipient of the Leigh Minturn Memorial Award for Early Career Cross-Cultural Research, awarded annually by the Society for Cross-Cultural Research.

The UAF MicroMouse team won first place in the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers NW Area MicroMouse contest. This is the UAF team's fourth consecutive win.

Dion Knelsen, Nanook hockey, is one of 10 finalists for the 2010 Lowe's Senior CLASS award. Fan voting is available on the website or via text message; text H5 to 74567 to vote for Knelsen. Fan votes count for one third of a player's total score.

Nanooks men's basketball junior Nashorn Maynard was named the Great Northwest Athletic Conference Co-Player of the Week for the week ending Feb. 14.

Nanook hockey faces off with UAA in game two of the Alaska Airlines Governor's Cup Saturday, Feb. 27, at 7 p.m. in the Carlson Center.

The Alaska Nanook athletic event scores from last week are: Home games – hockey vs. Lake Superior State, 4-0 and 5-1. Away games – men's basketball vs. Saint Martin's, 75-91, and vs. Western Oregon, 95-83; women's basketball vs. Saint Martin's, 74-80, and vs. Western Oregon, 61-102.

Feb 23: Registration for the 2010 Alaska Weather Symposium is due.

March 1: Applications for the Alaska Summer Research Academy are due. ASRA, hosted by the College of Natural Science and Mathematics, takes place July 19 – 30 and is for students entering grades 8 – 12.

March 1: Applications for the IARC Summer School 2010, The Arctic in a Changing Climate: Physical and Biological Linkages to Permafrost, are due. The school takes place May 20 – June 4.

March 3: Revisions to the general information sections of the 2010 – 2011 UAF academic catalog are due. For more information contact LJ Evans at 474-6479 or ljevans@alaska.edu.

March 5: Nominations for the Faculty Senate Committee on the Status of Women are being accepted. For more information e-mail fysenate@uaf.edu.

March 5: Applications for the 2010 Global Change Student Research Grant Competition for UAF and UAA graduate and undergraduate students are due. For more information contact Susan Sugai at 474-5415 or susan.sugai@alaska.edu.

March 10: Nominations for the Spring UAF Exceptional Student Employee Award are due. For more information call Career Services at 474-7596.

March 19: Nominations for the 2010 Staff Make Students Count award are due.

March 19: Nominations for several UAF awards administered though the UAF Staff Council, including the Chancellor's Staff Recognition Award, the Chancellor's Supervisory Recognition Award and the Outstanding Staff Council Achievement Award are due.

March 25: Nominations for the Brina Kessel medal for Excellence in Science are due. For more information contact Hild Peters at 474-7941 or hmpeters@alaska.edu.

March 31: Nominations (PDF) for the Chancellor's Diversity award (PDF) are due. For more information contact Ginny Tschanz at vrtschanz@alaska.edu or Abel Bult-Ito at abultito@alaska.edu.

April 2: Nominations for honorary degrees for Commencement 2011 are due.

Cornerstone banner photo by Todd Paris, UAF Marketing and Communications.