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June 24, 2022

Higher Education/System

Medical College of Wisconsin receives $50 million Kern Family Foundation gift to ‘transform medical education’

Posted on
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Noted: The Kern Institute collaborates and shares ideas on new approaches to medical education with a number of other schools through what’s called the Kern National Network.

The other founding members of the network are the Dell Medical School at the University of Texas at Austin, Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth, Mayo Clinic Alix School of Medicine, University of California San Francisco School of Medicine, University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, and Vanderbilt University School of Medicine.

State news

Former WPM Director Gene Purcell inducted into WBA Hall Of Fame

Posted on
Wisconsin Public Radio

Wisconsin Public Media and the Educational Communications Board joined broadcasters from around the state to celebrate the life and career of former WPM Director Gene Purcell who was one of four people inducted into the Wisconsin Broadcasters Association Hall of Fame on June 23, 2022. Purcell was a longtime WPR reporter, regional manager, and former director of the ECB before becoming director of WPM at UW-Madison in 2018. He was killed in a traffic collision in August 2021.

Crime and safety

Arts & Humanities

New novel by UW–Madison French professor explores love and loss in the early years of the AIDS crisis

Posted on
Madison Magazine

Richard Goodkin wrote the first draft of what would become his new novel, “Mourning Light,” over the course of a few months back in 1993. For the University of Wisconsin–Madison French professor, working on the novel was a way of processing some difficult personal emotions surrounding the loss of his partner two years earlier — and so he wrote a fictionalized story about a UW–Madison professor who loses his partner during the early years of the AIDS epidemic.

Health

Baby formula shortage highlights benefits of human milk banking

Posted on
PBS Wisconsin

Quoted: Donated milk is a safe and nutritious formula alternative for families who aren’t able to supply their own milk, according to Dr. Anne Eglash, a clinical professor in the Department of Family Medicine and Community Health at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Eglash has long been a proponent of breastfeeding through her medical practice at UW Health, where she leads the healthcare system’s lactation clinic.

“We know that in the short-term, using donor milk for premature infants is a game-changer,” Eglash said. Donor milk helps stave off a type of gut inflammation that commonly affects infants born prematurely called necrotizing enterocolitis. The condition can lead to tissue death, forcing doctors to remove a large part of the baby’s intestinal tract.

“That has a huge impact on growth and development,” Eglash said, adding that when mother’s milk is unavailable, donor milk can also play a role in preventing other negative outcomes common among premature infants, including eye and lung disease and sepsis.

Athletics

On the 50th anniversary of Title IX, the volleyball community says there’s more work to be done

Posted on
NBC-15

University of Wisconsin Volleyball Coach Kelly Sheffield has been vocal on social media, advocating for better broadcast coverage of college volleyball during the postseason. “We didn’t have a single match on TV from the end of our regular season through the first two rounds of the tournament,” Sheffield said. “Thirty-some matches we were completely in the dark.”

To compete in the 1970s, Wisconsin women’s athletes dealt with cramped cars and uniform sharing

Posted on
Wisconsin State Journal

Editor’s note: June 23 is the 50th anniversary of historic Title IX legislation being passed. This is the second in a series of stories about its impact on the University of Wisconsin.

Title IX gave University of Wisconsin women’s athletes and administrators a legal backing for their pursuit of better opportunities as the teams started under the athletic department umbrella in 1974.

Slow progress under Title IX dominated early years of women’s sports at Wisconsin

Posted on
Wisconsin State Journal

Editor’s note: June 23 is the 50th anniversary of historic Title IX legislation being passed. This is the first in a series of stories about its impact on the University of Wisconsin.

The $3,500 operating budget for the first-year University of Wisconsin women’s track and field team had enough left over for two athletes to travel to the national championship in the spring of 1975.

UW Experts in the News

Black bear sightings increase across southeast Wisconsin

Posted on
Wisconsin State Journal

UW-Madison Professor of Wildlife Ecology Tim Van Deelen weighed in on what to do if you see a black bear. Likewise, he offered an opinion on whether the sightings were unusual for the region.

“Yes and no,” Van Deelen said. “The majority of the bear population is at the northern half of the state. Just like teenagers, young bears set out on their own.”