—2— Our PSU community and campus continue to experience growing pains as we grow to meet the future. The Academic and Student Recreation Center is under construction and Shattuck Hall is under renovation. Extended Studies building occupants will be moved to nearby quarters in several months in order to make room for Lincoln Hall relocations during the summer. Science Building 2 has been vacated by other state offices in preparation for lab upgrading and structure improvements in a year. The two-story Clay Building, located between SW Sixth and Broadway, has been leased for instructional support. For the latest campus map, go tohttp://www.pdx.edu/map.html. Doug Swanson has now edited this publication for a year. We appreciate his time, devotion, and professional skills in its preparation and publication. His involvement has been extensive, even making this message more readable for you. And you, the membership, have told us The RAPS Sheet is a valued benefit. Included in this mailing is a RAPS Award nomination form. Please consider nominating a colleague for a RAPS Award. In this way we honor our members, who are recognized at the PSU President’s Luncheon in April. On Feb. 21 we will enjoy a tour of “The Dancer” at the Portland Art Museum, arranged by President-Elect Marge Terdal as part of her 2008-2009 Program Series. We all have had the joy of celebrating life’s events: births and birthdays, life passages, marriages, and so on. But I’ve learned that a memorial service is a collective celebration of one complete set of life events to be embraced by those who follow. So, on a personal note, I wish to recognize one of our members, Bill Williams, with whom I worked. I found Bill to be fair to students, ethics, and the University. Please turn to page 4 to learn more about Bill and his service to Portland State. —BobTufts President’s Message Internationalization . . . continued from page 1 tuition more affordable for nearly all international students. VanDyck’s office, International Student and Scholarship Services, is one of two main offices under the Office of International Affairs. (The other is Education Abroad.) Once international students arrive in Portland, they come under the umbrella of VanDyck’s office. “A lot of our growth if through word of mouth,” said VanDyck. The Admissions Office staff makes an annual recruiting trip to Asia, but VanDyck also credits her office’s strong Web site that includes videos made by PSU international students. The international student life coordinator, Jill Townley, recruits 40 to 60 international and domestic students to serve as mentors to ease the transition for new students coming from overseas. “Contact starts with e-mails while the students are still home,” VanDyck explained. “Students want to know everything from how to get to campus from the airport to what it’s like to attend classes to how to talk to a professor.” PSU is also trying to increase the quality of its international students by providing scholarships to exceptional applicants. Private universities often offer scholarships “and we needed to compete with that,” said VanDyck. Although a one-time scholarship might be helpful, come sophomore year students are facing a full tuition bill. So one proposal, VanDyck said, calls for a retention scholarship that is renewable annually. Vatter lecture set for Feb. 15 Nobel Laureate Douglass C. North will give the PSU Economics Department’s Second Annual Harold G. Vatter Lecture on Friday, Feb. 15, at 7 p.m. in Hoffmann Hall. North will speak on “The Natural State or Why Economic Development is so Difficult to Achieve.” Admission is free and open to the public; a reception will follow. North is well known as a pioneer in the “new economic history,” which uses economic theory and econometric statistical techniques to investigate historical questions. He has also been a leader among economists, championing the recognition of the key role of legal and social institutions in economic development. The Vatter Lecture honors Harold Goodhue Vatter, an eminent economic historian and faculty member at Portland State University from 1965 until his death at the age of 89 in 2000.
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