San Diego philanthropist, literacy advocate, and longtime supporter of the University of California, San Diego, Audrey Geisel, has donated $3 million toward the renovation of the university’s iconic flagship building, Geisel Library. The gift kicks off a major initiative to transform and revitalize the interior public spaces of Geisel Library to meet the evolving needs of students, faculty, and other Library users in the digital age. Geisel’s gift will be used to renovate and update the entry level of Geisel Library, which opened in 1972 as the university’s Central Library. In 1995, the William Pereira-designed building—known by many as “the spaceship”—was named in honor of Audrey and her late husband, Theodor “Dr. Seuss” Geisel, in recognition of a major gift from Audrey Geisel.
Thomas J. Csordas, renowned anthropologist and director of the Global Health Program at the University of California, San Diego, has been appointed the inaugural holder of the Dr. James Y. Chan Presidential Chair for Global Health in the Division of Social Sciences.
The University of California, San Diego was joined by members of the Spanos family at the ceremonial groundbreaking for the new Alex G. Spanos Athletic Performance Center earlier this week. The new center is made possible by a lead gift of $500,000 from Dean Spanos, chairman of the board of the San Diego Chargers, and his family to revamp and expand the existing Alex G. Spanos Training Facility, located on the northwest side of campus.
In a major step toward broader adoption of document-oriented data and the JavaScript Object Notation (JSON) data format, University of California, San Diego computer science and engineering professor Yannis Papakonstantinou and Couchbase Inc., today announced their collaboration on a next-generation query language for big data. Their work brings together the full power of SQL with the flexibility of JSON.
Composer Rand Steiger, currently chair of the UC SanC Diego department of music, is known for pushing the boundaries and exploring the combination of classical instruments with digital audio processing. Throughout his diverse career he has composed for and conducted critically acclaimed concerts and recordings with distinguished ensembles both here and abroad. In support of his teaching, research and service activities, Steiger has been appointed the inaugural holder of the Conrad Prebys Presidential Chair in Music in the Division of Arts and Humanities.
Steven Schick, a percussionist, conductor, author and distinguished professor of music at UC San Diego, is known for charging into new frontiers of contemporary music. As a soloist and director, he has performed with and led numerous local and international ensembles. In support of his teaching, research and service activities, Schick has been appointed the inaugural holder of the Reed Family Presidential Chair in the Division of Arts and Humanities.
