Athletics Director Glada Munt helps Jane Mallon, wife of the late Jim Mallon, cut the ribbon to dedicate the new Jim Mallon Baseball Field House Aug. 30. At left are baseball coach R.J. Thomas and President Edward B. Burger. At right is Mallon’s son, Jarret. Read more here.

Top News

FOOTBALL RETURNS TO SOUTHWESTERN SEPT. 7

Southwestern University will play its first football game in 63 years on Saturday, Sept. 7, at 7 p.m. against Texas Lutheran University at Georgetown’s Birkelbach Field.

More than 1,300 members of the Georgetown community have already bought season tickets to watch the Pirates play. Head coach Joe Austin said this is the most sold by any school in NCAA Division III. The first 1,000 fans will receive free gold “rally towels.”

Students, faculty and staff may pick up two free game tickets at the Robertson Center student proctor desk on Wednesday, Sept. 4, and Thursday, Sept. 5, from 8 a.m. to 11 p.m. or Friday, Sept. 6, from 8 a.m. to noon. Game day tickets are $8 each.

For those who can’t make it to the stadium, the games will be broadcast live online by K-MAC Sports. K-MAC Sports also is doing a weekly program with Austin that is broadcast live from Burger University on Wednesdays at 8 p.m. and is archived online. And, they are doing a live broadcast with Austin from Burger University before each game.

To help get fans excited about the first game, Southwestern has partnered with the City of Georgetown to sponsor a pep rally on the Georgetown Square beginning at 6:30 p.m. on Friday, Sept. 6. The rally will take place on Eighth Street on the south side of the Courthouse Square, and will be followed by live music provided by the Kyle Bennett Band.

Tailgating will begin four hours prior to each game in the parking spaces closest to the stadium. Tailgating spots will be $10 each and will be sold on a first-come, first-served basis. Anyone who wants to tailgate must also have a game day ticket.

Because the tailgating is taking place on high school property, no consumption of alcoholic beverages will be permitted. Anyone over the age of 21 with a valid ID can socialize in a special tailgating area adjacent to the stadium that will be run by CJ’s Sports Bar & Grill at Mel’s Lone Star Lanes. This tailgating area will open two hours prior to games, and both beer and food will be served. CJ’s also will be serving food in the stadium tailgating area.

Read more here.

MUSIC PROFESSOR RECEIVES STATEWIDE RECOGNITION FOR HIS TEACHING

When Kiyoshi Tamagawa learned he had been selected to receive the 2013 Award for Outstanding Collegiate Teaching Achievement from the Texas Music Teachers Association, he was surprised because the award usually goes to faculty members at larger schools.

But the recognition came as no surprise to colleagues in the Music Department at Southwestern.

“Kiyoshi really is extraordinary,”  said Michael Cooper, a professor of music who has worked closely with Tamagawa. “We’re fortunate to have him.”

Tamagawa was nominated for the Outstanding Collegiate Teaching Achievement award by the Austin District of the Texas Music Teachers Association. The award is given to one university music faculty member annually in Texas and recognizes “outstanding success in teaching at the collegiate level in music performance, composition, theory, history or any combination.”

“In a state that so strongly supports music education, this award carries a lot of weight and is a distinctive honor,” said Jason Hoogerhyde, associate professor of music and chair of the Music Department.

Read more here.

Events

SPANISH FILM FESTIVAL CONTINUES THROUGH OCT. 3

Southwestern is hosting a film festival this fall that will feature five films from Spanish-speaking countries. The films will be shown in Olin 105 from 7-10 p.m. on Thursday nights beginning Sept. 5. The film to be shown Sept. 5 is a 2012 film from Spain titled “Wilaya,” which is the story of a girl who is born to a Sahrawi family in a Saharan refugee camp in Algeria and later sent to live with foster parents in Spain. After the film is shown, there will be an interview with director  Pedro Pérez Rosado via Skype. The film to be shown on Sept. 12 is a 2012 film titled “La Demora/The Delay.”

Read more here.

FOUNTAINWOOD OBSERVATORY TO HOST PUBLIC VIEWING NIGHT SEPT. 14

The Fountainwood Observatory will host a public viewing night on Saturday, Sept. 14, from 8-10:30 p.m. Faculty members from the Physics Department as well as observers from the Williamson County Astronomy Club will be on hand to guide viewing.

The viewing nights are free, but donations are encouraged to help maintain the observatory. The observatory is located on the northeast side of campus adjacent to the Rockwell Baseball Field (see #6 on the campus map at http://www.southwestern.edu/map).

For weather-related updates about viewing nights, call the Fountainwood Observatory hotline at 512-863-1242.

AAUW CELEBRATES 90TH ANNIVERSARY IN GEORGETOWN WITH SEPT. 16 EVENT AT SOUTHWESTERN

The Georgetown Branch of the American Association of University Women (AAUW) is celebrating its 90th anniversary in Georgetown with three events this fall. The first will take place at Southwestern on  Monday, Sept. 16, when Kathryn Stallard, director of Special Collections and Archives, gives the group a presentation on The Jesse Daniel Ames Collection which is housed at Southwestern. The program will begin at 4:40 p.m. in the Smith Library Center.  Ames, who graduated from Southwestern in 1902, was among the women who  organized the Georgetown Branch of AAUW in 1923.

Following Stallard’s presentation, the group will have dinner in the Commons and then attend a presentation by Kathleen Juhl, professor of theatre. Juhl and students in her feminist studies salon will be working with AAUW members this fall on an intergenerational theatre project that explores the differences between second wave and third wave generations of feminism.  The class will culminate in a performance on Wednesday, Nov. 20. 

On Saturday, Oct. 19, Walter Herbert, professor Emeritus of English, will give the group a presentation on the life and activities of Jesse Daniel Ames.

All three events are open to the public. For more information, contact Mary Kay Pierson at 512-864-9909 or visit http://georgetown-tx.aauw.net

PHI BETA KAPPA VISITING SCHOLAR TO SPEAK AT SOUTHWESTERN SEPT. 19

Lee Epstein, a nationally recognized legal scholar, will give a public lecture at Southwestern on Thursday, Sept. 19, as part of the Phi Beta Kappa Visiting Scholar Program

Epstein will give a lecture titled “The Supreme Court of the United States: Past, Present and Future” at 5 p.m. in Room 110 of the F.W. Olin Building.

Read more here.

Media Coverage

The Williamson County Sun ran a story about Southwestern’s new pep band. It also published a special section previewing Southwestern’s fall sports.

Notables

A saxophone etude composed last spring by David Guidi, part-time assistant professor of music, was recently selected as part of the Texas Music Educator’s Association 2013-2014 audition music. Public high school saxophonists across the state will be performing his work as they audition to become part of region and all-state jazz ensembles.

Phil Hopkins, associate professor of philosophy, has signed a contract with Lexington Press, an academic division of Rowman & Littlefield, for his book Mass Moralizing: Marketing and Moral Storytelling.  The book analyzes the moralistic narratives utilized by much marketing and journalism and explores the interaction of those narratives with popular ideas about morality. 

Junior Robert Lehr and senior Phuong-Hieu Nguyen both moderated panels at the Kemper Scholars Conference in Chicago August 6-7. Lehr moderated a panel on nonprofit internships in Chicago and Nguyen moderated a panel on securing post-junior year internships.

Valerie Renegar, associate professor of communication studies, had an essay titled “Critical/Cultural Scholarship and the Responsibility for Building Theory: Enduring Criticism Revisited” published in the Western Journal of Communication in August.

Retired chemistry professor Robert Soulen has been named a Fellow of the American Chemical Society. He and the other new fellows will be honored at the ACS National Meeting in Indianapolis Sept. 9. Read more here.