March 2014 Newsletter
IN THIS ISSUE
FOUNDER’S DAY AWARDS
CUAA NEWS
LETTER TO THE ALUMNI FROM JOHN LEEPER, AR ’85, PRESIDENT, CUAA
PROPOSED AMENDMENT TO THE CUAA CONSTITUTION
CUAA GENERAL MEMBERSHIP MEETING: MARCH 27
ELECTION NOTIFICATION
FOUNDER’S DAY REMINDER TO RSVP AND CALL FOR VOLUNTEERS
EVENT ANNOUNCEMENT | CU@LUBALIN CENTER: APRIL 2
CUAA PROVIDES DOCENTS FOR KEN BURNS CHARITY EVENT
ALUMNI PROFILES
SHIGERU BAN, AR ’84, WINS PRITZKER PRIZE FOR ARCHITECTURE
MICHAEL LEBRON, A ’76
ARIEL COTTON, A ’13
PHONATHON RECAP
SCHOOL NEWS
CU MOTORSPORTS UPDATE
THE 2014 COOPER UNION CULTURE SHOW: APRIL 5
THE COOPER UNION SUMMER WRITING PROGRAM
MARCH EVENT SUMMARIES
ENGINEERING MOCK INTERVIEW NIGHT II: FEBRUARY 27
CROWDFUNDING CORNER
UPCOMING EVENTS
FOUNDER’S DAY AWARDS
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Each year, the Cooper Union Alumni Association selects the recipients of the prestigious alumni awards. The awards honor alumni achievements in the fields of Art, Architecture, and Engineering, as well as The Alumni Service Awards, and The Peter Cooper Award for Public Service. We are pleased to announce the alumni awardees for 2014.
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| Alumnus of the Year |
Augustus Saint-Gaudens Award |
| Special Recognition for Extraordinary Service |
COOPER UNION ALUMNI ASSOCIATION NEWS
LETTER TO THE ALUMNI FROM JOHN LEEPER, AR ’85, PRESIDENT, CUAA
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Dear fellow alumni and friends of the Cooper Union:As we all know, our Cooper Union has recently made a fundamental change: the incoming class of 2014 will be the first that will be charged tuition. The Board of Trustees made this decision after considering the financial position of our school. Many of us are unhappy with the decision and are unwilling to accept this as a long term solution.
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PROPOSED AMENDMENT TO THE CUAA CONSTITUTION
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| The Alumni Association has undertaken a revision to its governing Constitution, in order to streamline our operational function, and to ensure that we are positioned to be responsive to the needs of the Alumni. This proposal is a restructuring of the Constitution, maintaining the structural elements of the organization within the Constitution, and reorganizing the operational elements into the bylaws. We are providing a draft copy of the Constitution for your information, review, and vote.
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CUAA GENERAL MEMBERSHIP MEETING: THURSDAY, MARCH 27, 2014
| On Thursday evening, March 27, the Alumni Council will hold a special closed General Membership Meeting, open only to Alumni and current students, in LL101, from 6:30-9:30PM.The first topic of discussion is our CUAA constitutional rewrite, which (among other important improvements) will allow us to include graduating seniors in alumni elections starting in 2015, immediately following graduation.We will also discuss the Mission of the School, the Mission of the Alumni Association, and the responsibility of the CUAA Council as a representative body to its constituents. We plan to continue this discussion topic in a series of future events as well.LL101 has limited seating, so please RSVP.If you are not able to join us in person, please contribute your thoughts on the discussion points in the open agenda Google document. We will circulate compiled responses to council members prior to the meeting on March 27. http://tinyurl.com/cuaa-20140327-agenda
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ELECTION NOTIFICATION
| It’s election time again! The Nominating Committee has finalized the ballot and it will be released electronically on March 26. If you did not opt in for electronic ballot, the paper ballot will reach you within the next few weeks. Please take the time to read the bios for our candidate slate and cast your vote!Completed ballots must be received by Thursday, May 1, 2014
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RSVP, CONTRIBUTE, AND VOLUNTEER FOR FOUNDER’S DAY!
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| Please CLICK HERE TO RSVP for Founder’s Day.Our goal continues to be to keep the event revenue-neutral for the school. Please contribute to help us make that goal.We are also in need of helpers on Founder’s Day! Please email foundersday2014@gmail.com if you can usher guests, serve food, move supplies, or generally lend a hand on April 13. |
EVENT ANNOUNCEMENT
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CU@LUBALIN CENTER: WEDNESDAY, APRIL 2, 2014
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Join fellow alumni at the Herb Lubalin Study Center of Design and Typography, an archive of design ephemera, on April 2nd at 6:30pm. Selected works from the collections of acclaimed design alumni Herb Lubalin, A ’39; Lou Dorfsman, A ’39; Milton Glaser, A ’51; Seymour Chwast, A ’51; Ellen Lupton, A ’85, and many others will be on display. The discussion will be led by alumnus, curator and adjunct professor, Alexander Tochilovsky, A ’00.
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CUAA PROVIDES DOCENTS FOR KEN BURNS CHARITY EVENT
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| On Thursday evening, March 6, the Unitarian Church of All Souls honored filmmaker Ken Burns at the Great Hall as part of their 25th Anniversary Heart & Soul charity auction. The Great Hall was selected as the venue to underscore the rich historical connections between Peter Cooper, All Soul’s (where he was an active congregant), and Abraham Lincoln, the subject of Burns’ latest feature length documentary, “The Address.”The CUAA provided four docents for the event. Rocco Cetera, CE ’99, Paul Garrin, A ’82, Kelly Occhiuzzo Zach, A ’90 and Carol Wolf, A ’84, briefed event volunteers and offered personal guided tours to guests recounting the history of the Great Hall, Peter Cooper’s close, personal relationship with All Soul’s minister, the Rev. Henry Whitney Bellows, and the instrumental part both men played in arranging Abraham Lincoln’s 1860 appearance in the Great Hall to deliver his “right makes might” speech. This speech is credited with Lincoln’s emergence as a leading candidate for the Presidency.This latest collaboration follows soon after the CUAA’s January 19th panel discussion at All Souls. Together these events mark what both All Soul’s and the CUAA hope to be a long and productive cooperative relationship with roots reaching back directly to Peter Cooper and his church.Ken Burns’ “The Address” will premiere on PBS on Tuesday, April 15. |
ALUMNI PROFILES
CONGRATULATIONS TO SHIGERU BAN, AR ’84, RECIPIENT OF THE 2014 PRITZKER ARCHITECTURE PRIZE!
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| Shigeru Ban, AR ’84, who has spent a great deal of time designing projects for large groups of people displaced by natural disasters in Rwanda, Japan and many more, has been awarded the 2014 Pritzker Architecture Prize, the highest honor in the field of Architecture. In this article from The New York Times, Robin Pogrebin highlights Shigeru’s career as both designer and humanitarian.
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MICHAEL LEBRON, A ’76
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Michael Lebron is a freelance advertising art director. He describes himself an art guy with a love for science and techie stuff. He has worked mostly in healthcare advertising in a number of therapeutic categories and produced work for the entertainment sectors. He has also created advertising campaigns for political and environmental groups. He was recently interviewed by Mary Lynch, ChE ’82.
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ARIEL COTTON, A ’13
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Ariel Cotton gives real meaning to the name The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art. As a recent graduate, she effortlessly crosses the boundaries between art and science. Her work ranges from fine art to robotics to soft circuits to web design to many other combinations of design and technology.
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PHONATHON RECAP
PHONATHON 2014: MARCH 17 – 20
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| The 2014 volunteer Phonathon began on Monday, March 17, with a flash of excitement. Only hours before calling was scheduled to begin, a blackout in 41 Cooper Square forced everyone to relocate at the last minute to 30 Cooper Square for the kick-off shift. Despite the surprise, a small but mighty group of nine callers got Phonathon 2014 off to a great start. By Tuesday night, Cooper’s trusty team of engineers had restored the power to 41 Cooper Square and calling was able to carry on as planned. Every night saw more volunteers joining in with many returning for two, three and even four shifts in a row. All told, nearly 50 Cooper alumni, parents, students and friends came together on campus to make fundraising calls on behalf of the school. At the end of the week, more than $100,000 in gifts and pledges had been made on top of the $100,000 already received from the pre-Phonathon mailing, keeping Cooper on track to exceed the overall $2.7 million Annual Fund goal for the year.Thank you to everyone who participated in Phonathon. While many of Cooper’s Annual Fund supporters are now giving earlier in the year, this year’s results show that there are still those who await their yearly Phonathon call to give. Regardless of outcome, every conversation between fellow alumni, parents, current students and friends is an important step in continuing to build Cooper’s culture of philanthropy.If you missed your call, it’s not too late to be a part of the success. To make your gift today simply visit cooper.edu/give.Annual Fund calling will continue to take place through the end of the fiscal year, both on and off-campus. To learn more about how you can be involved email annualfund@cooper.edu. |
SCHOOL NEWS
CU MOTORSPORTS UPDATE
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| On Sunday March 15, the Cooper Motorsports team test drove our 2014 racecar for the first time. The parking lot at The New York Times‘ facility in College Point, Queens has served as our proving grounds for the past several years. The test day was a huge success. The car performed well and all four of our competition drivers got time behind the wheel. In just under two months, we will bring the car to the Formula SAE competition at Michigan International Speedway where we will compete against more than 120 universities from around the world. From now until then, we will be testing the car nearly every weekend to train our drivers and troubleshoot any problems we uncover.On April 19, we are planning to race the vehicle at the New York Region Sports Car Club of America autocross event at Nassau Coliseum. We welcome alumni at this event and any of our weekend test days. Please email motorsports@cooper.edu if you are interested in attending.Daniel Bach, E ’15 |
THE 2014 COOPER UNION CULTURE SHOW: SATURDAY, APRIL 5, 2014
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| Get ready for an evening of musical, dance and comedy performances. The Culture Show, taking place on Saturday, April 5, 2014 at 6pm, is organized by the students in the Cooper Union South Asian Society and includes performances by students from all three schools and from many ethnicities. Students, Parents and Alumni are invited. Come and enjoy. Click here for a video of the 2013 Culture Show. |
THE COOPER UNION SUMMER WRITING PROGRAM: GET A JUMP ON COLLEGE-LEVEL WRITING
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Are your children, nieces and nephews, or grandchildren entering college in the fall? Are you worried that they may not have the tools they need for the analytical writing they’ll be asked to do in college? The Cooper Summer Writing Program can help. Offered both on campus and online, the SWP gives reluctant writers or students focused on other subjects (engineering, say, or art or architecture), the techniques and approaches they need to move past the five-paragraph essay. Topics include close reading, using writing to generate ideas, developing and supporting an argument, and writing more clearly and precisely. Class time is divided between discussion and hands-on work that lets students practice new skills, and small classes mean individualized attention and lots of feedback.
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MARCH EVENT SUMMARIES
ENGINEERING MOCK INTERVIEW NIGHT II: FEBRUARY 27, 2014
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| A Second mock Interview Night was held this school year on Feb. 27. It was Co-sponsored by the Albert Nerken School of Engineering, the Office of Alumni Affairs and Development, and the Center for Career Development. During this Engineering Mock Interview night, 20 students, all upperclassmen, had an opportunity to practice their interviewing skills with Cooper Engineering alumni. Each Student had multiple interview practice sessions. Prior to and after the interview sessions, the students and alumni had an opportunity to network with one another. Introductory remarks were made by Jolie Harris Woodson, Assistant Director, Center for Career Development, and George J. Delagrammatikas, Acting Associate Dean and Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering. Alexis Lenza, CE ’05, Project Manager at SHoP Constructions Services LLC, spoke on interview preparation and gave tips for handling various types of interview questions.
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| Metamorphosis will be a companion to Brian Rose’s, A ’79, earlier book Time and Space on the Lower East Side. Working again with Golden Section Publishers, the book will include a series of before/after images from 1985 and 2013 and a number of newly made images of the Meatpacking District. It will be available in a hardcover trade edition and a limited edition with slipcover and 8×10 print. Your help is needed to make this unique book possible.
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UPCOMING EVENTS
3/27/14 CUAA GENERAL MEMBERSHIP MEETING LEARN MORE
4/2/14 CU@LUBALIN CENTER LEARN MORE
4/5/2014 THE 2014 COOPER UNION CULTURE SHOW LEARN MORE
4/13/14 FOUNDER’S DAY 2014: THE PETER COOPER BLOCK PARTY LEARN MORE
4/21/14-4/24/14 CU@SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA SAN DIEGO, ORANGE COUNTY, AND LOS ANGELES
4/25/14 CU@SILICON VALLEY HAPPY HOUR
4/26/14 NORTHERN CALIFORNIA CU@AT&T PARK
5/5/14 THE COOPER UNION ALUMNI COUNCIL MEETING
5/30/14-6/1/14 REUNION WEEKEND 2014
|CLASSES 1964, 1974, 1989, 2004 AND 2009
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| Whether you’re celebrating your Golden Legion or you graduated only five years ago, Reunion Weekend 2014 is a time for you, your family, and friends to reminisce, return to Cooper Square, and renew your commitment to your alma mater. While Reunion Weekend 2014 highlights five milestone classes, all Golden Legion members are encouraged to attend, and graduates of any year are welcome to join the festivities!Registration opens Wednesday, April 1. In the meantime, there are plenty of things to keep you busy. LEARN MORE |
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