Retirement Association of Portland State Portland State University Post Office Box 751 Portland, OR 97207-0751 Koinonia House, second floor SW Montgomery at Broadway Campus mail: RAPS Web: www.raps.pdx.edu Office hours: Tuesdays and Thursdays, 9:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. Officers Larry Sawyer President Clarence Hein President-elect / Program Chair Marge Terdal Past President / Membership Chair Robert Vogelsang Treasurer / Regional Retirement Association Ad Hoc Committee Chair Joan Shireman Secretary Doug Swanson Editor Board Members-at-Large Priscilla Blumel Susan Jackson DawnWhite Committees Alumni Association Pat Squire Awards Committee Chair Robert Tufts History Preservation Committee Chair Steve Brannan Pictorial History Book Committee Chair Mary Brannan Social/Friendship Committee Co-Chairs Beryl and Vic Dahl Office Manager MiMi Bernal-Graves 503-725-3447 / raps@pdx.edu THE RAPSSHEET NOVEMBER 2009 continued on page 2 Photo by Larry Sawyer Coming up with a ‘framer plan’ to plot Portland State’s campus growth Portland State is looking to the future to determine where and how it should grow over the next generation or so. It’s hardly the first time the University has peered into a crystal ball, and even a casual look at any Portland State master plan from a few decades back will reveal a fundamental truth: planning for the future is a very difficult task indeed. A master plan from the mid-1960s, for example, envisioned a series of covered pedestrian bridges through the Park Blocks that would allow students and faculty to avoid the busy city traffic on the streets below. In fact, those bridges were so important, they were called the “backbone” of the master plan. Four years later, the Park Blocks streets were closed to vehicular traffic. Some backbone. Portland State isn’t producing a master plan this time around. As Mark Gregory, associate vice president for Finance and Administration, explained to RAPS members last month, the administration started work about a year ago on a “framer plan” that contains less specificity than it does analysis. What the plan does do is outline a general direction for expansion of the campus and a framework to establish partnerships in the city and region to facilitate the expansion. The project does more than look at growth and campus planning—it also examines Portland State as an economic entity for the city and region. The project isn’t complete, said Gregory, but it’s close. Gregory spoke Oct. 15 at the second edition of the 2009-2010 RAPS Program/Speakers Series. One of the reasons for the lessspecific framer plan is simple: “When you’re downtown and you don’t own the land,” Gregory said, “you can’t write a definitive plan. If I wrote a definitive plan, and said that I’m going to acquire this block and this block and that block, I would pay twice as much for every one of them.” That’s reason enough for the University to not advertise its precise intentions. The other reason is that its intentions are not terribly precise. “A framer plan gives us rough ideas, and it leaves us the flexibility to acquire properties and work with partners as opportunities come up,” he explained. NEXTUP Prof. Grant Farr on the future of the Middle East and U.S. policy in the world’s hottest hot spot. Thursday, Nov. 19, 1 p.m. 238 Smith Memorial Union See preview story on page 4. Mark Gregory
—2— President’s Message LARRY SAWYER Plans are being made for the annual dinner at the Multnomah Athletic Club (MAC), which is scheduled for Dec. 17. Prior to 2008, RAPS underwrote the cost by $10 or more per person—equivalent to your total annual RAPS dues. Last year the Board elected not to underwrite the dinner and charged $50 per person. This covered the meals and some of the entertainment. At that time, the MAC representative suggested that we consider a luncheon as a cost-saving measure. This year we are asking you for your opinion—luncheon or dinner? An e-mail was sent recently to the membership, and the limited response was evenly split among “don’t care,” “luncheon,” and “dinner.” A quick raise of hands at the October general meeting produced about the same result. We have access to the MAC through sponsorship of club member Mary Brannan. She’s also the one they bill. Our costs are basically for the food, drinks, and entertainment. I have seen the two menus, and the luncheon would definitely be cheaper. Pros for lunch have been cost and the concern about driving or using public transportation at night. Pros for dinner include a more formal three-course dinner. The musicians that entertained us last year are available again this year but both have day jobs. Clarence will have to come up with different entertainment for a luncheon. If you have a preference, please let us know as soon as possible at raps@pdx.eduor voice mail at 503-7253447. If we choose a dinner, would some of you be willing to drive a fellow member who has concerns about night driving? PSU looks to the future . . . continued from page 1 To get the job under way, Portland State gathered the usual suspects from campus—deans, faculty, and students—but also brought in people from the neighborhoods and members of the Portland Development Commission. Then PSU sought outside professionals. Sasaki Associates, of Boston and San Francisco, has extensive experience in campus planning, and SERA Architects, Inc., of Portland, was invited to provide local knowledge. Transportation analysts as well as parks and green space specialists were also hired. The cost? About $850,000, Gregory said, of which $500,000 went to the physical plant analysis and the balance to the economic development facet. “Is it wise to spend that much on planning?” he asked. “Well, I would suggest that each building we build costs about $100 million—more than 100 times (the cost of the plan)—so if we’re doing anything wrong, and we’re building one (building) a year, we’re really better to stop and think, ‘What kind of buildings do we want to build and where do we want to build them?’” One of the big planning issues is student enrollment, and the projections tend to waver a bit. Oregon University System estimates, Gregory said, have been consistently low over the years, when compared to the number of students that have actually enrolled at Portland State. OUS projects Portland State to have 36,000 students in 20 years. On the other hand, last December, in his remarks on his budget proposal, Gov. Ted Kulongoski said his goal for Oregon by 2025 would have 40 percent of the population holding a four-year degree, 40 percent holding a two-year degree, and 20 percent having a high school diploma. If that were to come to pass, Gregory said, about 50,000 students would have to be enrolled at Portland State—nearly twice the number enrolled today. A more realistic estimate, Gregory said, is about 40,000 students. “People say that Portland needs a great university. Well, PSU is at least becoming a great big university,” he said, drawing laughs. “We’re starting to look a lot more like the big institutions in the United States.” ‘If I wrote a definitive plan, I’d pay twice as muchfor every block.’
—3— By Marge Terdal, Past President My husband, Leif Terdal, and I traveled with 14 other members of the Columbia Cascade Friendship Force to stay with Australian host families in late August. Friendship Force International is a worldwide people-to-people organization that promotes international good will through meeting and living with people from other places and cultural groups. Leif and I had previously hosted “ambassadors” (the name given to those participating in exchanges) from New Zealand, Brazil, and Australia, but this was our first outward-bound exchange. We began with a 14-hour flight from Los Angeles to Sydney, and then traveled on to Canberra, the capital of Australia. In Canberra our homestay was with a man who is a wildlife veterinarian with the federal government, and his wife, who is program manager for the Old Parliament House Museum. Our second week was in Perth on the west coast of Australia, where we stayed with a woman who keeps busy with many volunteer activities, including tutoring ESL students. On our first day in Canberra we enjoyed lunch at the Botanical Gardens and a scenic view of the entire area from a tower on Black Mountain. The second day included a guided tour of a museum focusing on the founding of Canberra, a planned city; a picnic lunch in the rain (welcome in drought-ridden Australia), and a boat tour on the lakes around which Canberra was built. Other days included tours of the Australian Museum, the Parliament House, the War Museum, and the Canberra Deep Communications Center. We even had a guided tour of the gardens around the U.S. Embassy. Our host made sure we spotted kangaroos and birds close in to the city. There were several potluck dinners at various members’ homes and a High Tea before we flew on to Perth, our second exchange. On our first day we had a chance to ring bells in the Swan Bells Tower by the riverfront, visit the Perth Mint, and have tea with the very gracious mayor of Perth. On our second day a new member of the Perth club, who owned a private charter bus service, contributed his bus and time to give us a several-hour tour of Perth and its surrounding areas. The next day we took a ferry down river to Fremantle, located on the Indian Ocean. Another day our hostess drove us north of the city to the “bush” for a barbecue at another member’s home. Our final day was a visit to a Wildlife Park, where we enjoyed feeding kangaroos, petting a wombat, and gently touching a koala. Again there were dinners at other members’ homes, with an opportunity to discuss world concerns. Leif was particularly interested in talking about the treatment of Aborigines. Visiting ambassadors on Friendship Force exchanges always take their hosts out to dinner one evening, as a small way to repay the great hospitality. Many of us stayed on in Australia for a third week. Leif and I flew to Ayers Rock in the center of the country, and then closed out the Australian trip by visiting the ambassadors from Sunshine Coast, north of Brisbane, whom we had hosted last year at this same time. If you are interested in joining Friendship Force and/or participating in our next outgoing exchange to Bangkok, Thailand, in January, please talk with me or check the Web site thefriendshipforce.org. Making friends in Australia, from Canberra to Perth to Brisbane The Terdals (center back) and friends in front of the U.S. Embassy in Canberra.
AVAILABLE AT: PSU Bookstore University Market in Smith Union Annie Bloom’s Books Oregon Historical Society Powell’s City of Books —4— What does the future hold for the Middle East? RAPS members will get insight on the question on Thursday, Nov. 19, when Portland State professor Grant Farr, a leading authority on the region, speaks at RAPS’ monthly meeting. The meeting is at 1:00 p.m. in 238 Smith Memorial Student Union, 1825 SW Broadway. According to the Congressional Budget Office, the United States expects to spend about $24.3 billion a month on the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Since September 11, 2001, some $859 billion has been spent, $189 billion in Afghanistan. President Obama faces critical choices on the future of the wars on both fronts, with Afghanistan potentially the most serious. What should the U.S. position be? Farr, associate dean for the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences and professor of sociology, was originally a Peace Corps volunteer in Afghanistan. He has lived extensively in both Afghanistan and Iran and has been a consultant for both the United Nations and the U.S. Department of State. The annual RAPS Holiday event will be Thursday, PORTLAND STATE: A History in Pictures It’s taken three years, but the wait was worth it. Portland State: A History in Pictures, is a handsome, large-format book that documents PSU’s history in more than 300 photos and text spread over 180 pages. Dec. 17, at the Multnomah Athletic Club. More information about this event will be forthcoming. Afghanistan’s on the table at RAPS’ November meeting RAPS Hikers brave the rain at Tillamook Forest Bob Vogelsang (right) and his daughter, Karen, pause on a suspension bridge spanning the Wilson River during the RAPS Hikers outing on Oct. 23. The nearby Tillamook State Forest Interpretive Center offers a 15-minute video on the devastating Tillamook Burns of 1933, 1939, and 1945. A three-dimensional map shows the areas burned, and visitors can view exhibits on replanting, wildlife, and transportation. Photo by Larry Sawyer
—5— Book Club: ‘Out Stealing Horses’ The RAPS Book Club will meet on Tuesday, Nov. 17, at 1:30 p.m., at the home of Betsey Brown at Holiday Park Plaza, 1300 NE 16th Ave., Portland. Contact her at 503-280-2334 or aebport@hevanet.comto RSVP and for directions. We will discuss Out Stealing Horses, written by Per Petterson, translated by Anne Born. On the cover, it is described as: Out Stealing Horses has been embraced across the world as a classic, a novel of universal relevance and power. Panoramic and gripping, it tells the story of Tround Sander, a 67-year-old man who has moved from the city to a remote, riverside cabin, only to have all the turbulence, grief, and overwhelming beauty of his youth come back to him one night while he’s out on a walk. From the moment Trond sees a strange figure coming out of the dark behind his home, the reader is immersed in a decades-deep story of searching and loss, and in the precise, irresistible prose of a newly crowned master of fiction. Six of us met in October to discuss Wuthering Heights, a classic by Emily Bronté. We found it to be incomprehensible that such a book could be written by Bronté, a woman in her 20s who had lived a sheltered life. If you want to read further ahead, we will be reading The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, by Stieg Larsson, for December. —Mary Brannan Bridge Group: Bids on Nov. 10 The next meeting of the RAPS Bridge Group will be at Willamette View, 12705 SE River Road, Portland, at 1:00 p.m. on Tuesday, Nov. 10. The group is open to all members of RAPS. If you need information about the group, please call me at 503-2920838. If you would like to play, please let me know no later than Friday, Nov. 6. —Colin Dunkeld Hikers: Forest Park on Nov. 20 Due to the Thanksgiving holiday, our November hike will be a week earlier, on Nov. 20. We will hike a loop of Past Tense SHERIDAN ENDS ON A HIGH NOTE Wilma Sheridan was a young teacher in the Portland Public Schools when Portland State College experienced strong growth in numbers of students. John Stehn, head of the Department of Music, contacted Verne Wilson, the supervisor of music in Portland, and asked if there was a music teacher who could teach a class in elementary music methods. Wilson recommended Wilma, and her association with Portland State began. Within a year, a night class was added, and with Marge Albertson’s retirement, Wilma was invited to join the faculty of Portland State University. When John Trudeau was chosen dean of the College of Liberal Arts, President Joseph Blumel appointed Wilma head of the Music Department. Three benchmarks during her tenure as department head were the addition of the Florestan Trio to the faculty, the establishment of the Piano Recital Series, and the Bachelor of Music degree. She also took advantage of a sabbatical to finish a Ph.D., strengthening her music history background. In a reorganization of the departments of PSU, the Departments of Art and Architecture, Dance, Music, and Theater Arts became the School of Fine and Performing Arts. Several years into this new organization, John Trudeau retired and Wilma was appointed the first woman dean at PSU. During her career at Portland State, Wilma saw the mission of the departments in Fine and Performing Arts broaden from that of primarily training public school teachers to offering professional preparation for many diverse careers in the arts. Past Tense features glimpses into Portland State’s history. To submit a story (or an idea for one), e-mail the RAPS History Preservation Committee at raps@pdx.edu. trails in Forest Park north of Cornell Road. Round trip will be four miles or less with some elevation gain. Lunch will be at a restaurant in Northwest Portland. Meet at 9:30 a.m. at the Portland Audubon Society located on Cornell Road. A small group of hikers traveled 45 miles to the Tillamook State Forest Interpretive Center on Oct. 23. There we viewed the exhibits and a 15-minute video on the Tillamook Burns of 1933, 1939, and 1945. Afterwards we opened our umbrellas and walked a little more than three miles round trip along the Wilson River. Confirm your participation with Larry Sawyer at 503-771-1616 or larry_sawyer@comcast.net. —Larry Sawyer RAPS club reports
In memoriam: Robert Colescott, 1925-2009 Robert Colescott, a distinguished figurative artist with a global reputation, was born in Oakland, Calif., Aug. 26, 1925, and after a long bout with Parkinson’s disease died on June 4, 2009, at his Tucson, Ariz., home. Prof. Colescott held a PSU Art Department appointment from 1957 to 1967. During those years, he regularly exhibited his work at local galleries and actively participated in the Portland metropolitan area’s thriving art community. In 1919 Prof. Colescott’s African-American parents, both of whom were talented musicians, moved from New Orleans to California in order to enhance their children’s educational opportunities. His father, a jazz violinist, supported the family by working as a railroad porter. The Colescotts developed a close family friendship with Sargent Johnson, a highly productive African-American sculptor who resided in San Francisco. In childhood Prof. Colescott began a lifetime’s dedication to drawing, painting, and enthusiastically playing drums. After wartime U.S. Army service in France and Germany, he enrolled in the University of California, Berkeley, where he completed a baccalaureate degree in art, emphasizing painting and geometric abstract design, in 1949. After a year of further study in Paris, Prof. Colescott returned to Berkeley to earn a master’s degree in 1952. When Prof. Colescott joined PSU’s Art Department faculty in 1957, the institution had reached the threshold of a formative growth period. In 1964, when the University’s Middle East Studies Center began to flourish, he took a sabbatical leave to accept a yearlong fellowship in Cairo under the auspices of the American Research Center. In 1966 he and his family returned to Egypt, where he held an appointment as a visiting professor at the American University in Cairo, until the outbreak of the Arab-Israeli War in 1967. He and his family then evacuated to Paris for an extended work and study experience. He returned to the United States in 1970 to engage in painting and art instruction variously at California State University-Stanislaus; the University of California, Berkeley; and the San Francisco Art Institute. In 1983 he accepted a visiting professor appointment at the University of Arizona in Tucson, which led to a permanent position, culminating in promotion to emeritus professor in 1998. Some art critics and scholars detected an Egyptian influence on Colescott’s subsequent artistic productivity. Others sensed that his work had upturned ideas expressed by traditional art, and found the results to be innovative and pleasing. In 1997 he achieved the distinction of being the first African-American artist to exhibit at the Venice Biennale in Italy. Survivors include his widow, Jandava Cattron, and five sons: Alexander, of Napa, Calif., Dennett, of San Rafael, Calif., Daniel, of Modesto, Calif., Cooper, of Tucson, Ariz., and Nicolas, of Portland; and grandson Rubin, who also lives in Portland. An older brother, Emeritus Professor Warrington Colescott, Jr., of the University of Wisconsin and a distinguished artist in his own right, also survives him. Prof. Colescott’s PSU career brought him into close contact with the local art community and certainly influenced his subsequent professional development. Through the legacy of his work, he deserves to be remembered as a worthy contributor to our academic enterprise. A full-scale obituary (Roberta Smith, “Robert Colescott, 83, Artist Who Toyed with Stereotypes”) appeared in The New York Times, June 10, 2009. An in-depth review in The Oregonian, June 20, 2009, (D. K. Row, “Noted artist’s legacy has link to Portland”) sets forth his career. These published remembrances may be consulted at the RAPS Office files. —Victor C. Dahl, Professor Emeritus of History RAPS Scholarship Fund gets green light The Retirement Association of Portland State Scholarship Fund has been established! The purpose of the scholarship is to aid students who are emphasizing health- and/or age-related majors. The scholarship will be awarded based on grades and the need for upper division/graduate students at PSU. Department chairs will select qualified candidates with faculty advisement; the RAPS Board will ratify these candidates. The first scholarship(s) will be awarded as soon as sufficient funds develop. To contribute to the scholarship fund please contact MiMi Bernal-Graves, RAPS Office manager, at 503-725-3447 or raps@pdx.edu. Each donation is tax deductible and a receipt will be provided to donors via the PSU Foundation.
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