Photo Spotlights

The RIT men’s basketball team shared a dinner with local veterans recently. The team will honor veterans during their game at 4 p.m. Feb. 7 in Clark Gymnasium versus Skidmore College. The Tigers will wear camouflaged shirts in recognition of Wounded Warriors and donations will be accepted for the Veterans Outreach Center. The center is a nonprofit offering supportive services to veterans and their families in the Rochester area.

RIT’s Better Me Wellness Program is offering free blood pressure tests at various locations on campus for the month of February. Rebekah Way, right, a pharmacist from Wegmans, checks Jeff Hibbard’s blood pressure. For dates and locations, visit the Better Me website.

“Research, Scholarship and Creativity in the College of Imaging Arts and Sciences” opens with a reception from 5 to 7 p.m. Feb. 5 at the University Gallery. The exhibition runs through March 20. Each of the six schools in RIT’s College of Imaging Arts and Sciences as well as RIT’s Image Permanence Institute are featured in this second-annual event that focuses on the rigorous and creative research in the visual arts and sciences. Shown here is the work of Peter Pincus, visiting assistant professor in ceramics in the School for American Crafts.

RIT’s ARM Developer Day program, which took place Jan. 30, has grown from a handful of students and national companies involved to more than 250 students and a dozen companies at the annual conference. It is a chance for students to meet industry professionals and gain firsthand knowledge, skills and insight to jump-start development of their ARM-based projects. Ideas for these new technology products and equipment often begin at this annual event and then are showcased at the ARM Developer Day Student Contest that takes place during the Imagine RIT: Innovation and Creativity Festival and in the Freescale Cup Competition. Here, participants work during the Atmel demonstration.

Students from RIT’s School of Communication and NTID met with former CNN anchor Soledad O’Brien before her keynote presentation at the Expressions of Kings Legacy celebration on Jan. 29. The undergraduate and graduate students discussed trends in journalism today, including diversity and the media. Each year, keynote-guests are invited to spend time in a class setting with RIT students as part of the overall Expressions event.

Former CNN anchor Soledad O’Brien was the keynote speaker for the annual Expressions of King’s Legacy celebration on Jan. 29. She spoke to a large audience from the campus and local area about diversity and media.

Minoru Yoshida ’04, ’08 credits RIT/NTID with giving him the experience to land a job as a grant officer with The Nippon Foundation of Japan. He screens applications for grants, primarily for international disability projects as well as deafness-related projects in Japan.

Biomedical engineering student Alexandra LaLonde introduces fluid and electrical impulses onto a micro-device situated on a portable microscope. Under the guidance of professor Blanca Lapizco-Encinas, who finds great value in incorporating undergraduate students in research, the two are working together to develop microfluidic systems and techniques to separate, screen and analyze biological cells, as seen in the computer image. This is what a student-centered research university looks like under RIT’s new Strategic Plan as more undergraduates, like LaLonde, are immersed in lab experiences, collaborating with graduate students and post-doctoral scientists, and being mentored by faculty like Lapizco-Encinas. To read more, go to www.rit.edu/news/athenaeum_story.php?id=51140.

Matt Schwartz (foreground) an engineering supervisor with Bendix, demonstrates one of the brake system instruments in the new Knorr-Bremse North America Mechatronics Laboratory, located in RIT’s Kate Gleason College of Engineering. Just behind him is co-worker and RIT engineering alumnus Tim Spath ’11. Both were part of the first class of students in the new mechatronics engineering certificate program, developed by the engineering college, Bendix and New York Air Brakes. The 1,000 square-foot lab, dedicated on Jan. 23, is equipped with state-of-the-art instrumentation for commercial automotive and rail safety technologies including vibration, pneumatic controls and valve control software.

Fourth-year College of Imaging Arts and Sciences student CiCi Turner lent a helping hand at the Gay Alliance of the Genesee Valley as part of an RIT Residence Life staff program to give back in the Rochester area. The student staff came back from intersession early to take part in professional development and one day was devoted to volunteering. Staff volunteered at 11 organizations, including Foodlink and Hope Lodge, on Jan. 21.

The RIT women’s basketball team regularly volunteers at School 35 in the Rochester City School District to teach a group of 20 sixth-grade girls about proper nutrition and exercise. The after-school program, Ladies Attaining Self-Sufficiency (LASS), is designed to support and strengthen pre-teens in life skills and character building. Here, Aicha Decius participates in an activity with the team.

Rachel Toor, author, professor and columnist for The Chronicle of Higher Education, was the keynote speaker for “Publishing Without Perishing,” an all-day intersession symposium held Jan. 15 at RIT. The event was sponsored by RIT Press and The Wallace Center.