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FROM THE DEPARTMENT HEAD: John A. Harrington, Jr.

K-State geography alumni: You have a department of which you can be very proud. In the following pages you'll be able to read about honors earned by students, faculty and staff members, important faculty professional service contributions, and major grants awarded to support faculty and graduate student research. Even a partial list is very impressive: Kevin Blake is honored with the Presidential Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching, Lisa Percival is recognized as an Employee of the Year, Shawn Hutchinson helps K-State get over one million in research support for the Strategic Environmental Research and Development Program (SERDP), Tiffany Dean is selected for Phi Beta Kappa and will spend this summer as an intern at the National Geography Society, and Bradley Hammerschmidt earns a summer Phi Kappa Phi grant to study non-point pollution at Ft Riley.

While you should be impressed with the collective accomplishments of all K-State geographers, these are not "the best of times" (at least from a financial perspective) for Kansas State University. Fortunately, because of a strong tradition of success and continuing outstanding performance by geography students and faculty, the administration has not cut geography budgets and resources that deeply. In fact, we were re-awarded two GTA positions that had been lost several years back, with our student/faculty teaching ratio used as a justification. In addition, resources associated with the numerous externally funded research grants also helped buffer the difficult financial times. You can find a list of the on-going externally funded research projects on the next page.

For those of you who have helped the department out with financial gifts to our Foundation account, the students and faculty are very appreciative! If we missed you at Telefund time (believe me, the student callers tried) and you'd like to make a donation, we welcome your contribution at any time of the year.

Perhaps Kevin Blake should have co-written these introductory remarks with me; since he served as Interim Head during the Fall Semester. Under Professor Blake's outstanding leadership, the faculty worked together to revise/update the requirements for the undergraduate major. Changes include increasing the number of required geography hours to 37 and requiring GIS I, a course in human-environment interaction, and the new Capstone Seminar in Geography.

About this time one year ago, the new Graduate Certificate program in Geographic Information Science was approved. Shawn Hutchinson administers the very popular program (there are over ten students currently going after the Certificate) and one of our geography doctoral students, Jincheng Gao, was the first to complete the program. A description of the K-State GIScience Grad Certificate program appeared in the March 2003 AAG Newsletter.

The April 2003 AAG Newsletter had K-State geography featured prominently on the first page. The department faculty agreed to pledge $1,000 to the AAG's Advancing Geography Centennial Fund and we challenged other departments to do the same. Also on that same cover page was an item announcing that the book, Global Change in Local Places (ISBN 0-521-80950-9), is now available for order from Cambridge University Press. Five K-State geography faculty and a number of graduate research assistants were members of the AAG GCLP Research Group.

Departmental course offerings were again quite popular with K-State students. We frequently have classes fill to room capacity. For the second year in a row, over 3,900 students were enrolled in geography classes. This total is over 1,000 students higher than the average during the mid-1990s and this summary statistic is a quantitative indication of how department faculty are pulling together to help K-State accomplish its instructional mission with fewer financial resources coming from the State budget.

With very few new faculty being hired at K-State, being told that the department could again hire a visiting faculty member was great news for the department. Jeff Smith chaired the search committee that identified Toni Alexander, currently finishing her PhD at Louisiana State, to join us for the coming year. Toni will be teaching two sections of World Regional (a total of over 500 students) and GIS I during the Fall Semester.

Fall Semester should be a busy time for the department. We agreed to host the annual meeting for the AAG's Great Plains / Rocky Mountains Region. Consider coming back to your alma mater and presenting a paper at the meetings in early October. Field trips will be on Friday, October 3rd and the paper and poster sessions will be on Saturday, October 4th. A number of special sessions are being organized and there is still plenty time to submit a topic for presentation at the meetings. Check the departmental web page: www.ksu.edu/geography/ for additional details about the meetings. You are welcome to come visit us at other times as well, please let us know you're coming and we'll give you a tour of geography in Seaton Hall.

I'll finish by letting you know that we continue to get interesting e-mails from students. Lisa Harrington received the following: "I am sending an email regarding the assignment ... I have the flu ... I would like to suggest a grace period until tomorrow so I can drop myself in your office." Lisa responded that the student should make "the drop" in Lafene Health Center.

HYSPIRE - This is year 2 of 3 years of funding for remote sensing research from the NASA EPSCoR program. Doug Goodin is the PI; with Shawn Hutchinson and John Harrington. The project provides funds for two GRAs.

HERO and HERO REU - We are starting year 4 of the NSF and NOAA funded HERO project and this summer is the 3rd year for REU students. Steve White and John Harrington share PI responsibilities; with Doug Goodin, Lisa Harrington, Max Lu, and Dave Kromm. Funds provide for one GRA and the summer research experience for three undergrads.

Assessment of Livestock Stress Models - starting year 3 of a 3-year applied climatology project funded by DOE NIGEC. John Harrington is the PI and there is support for one GRA.

SERDP - beginning year 1 of a 3-year watershed environmental modeling project funded by DOD, DOE, and EPA. Shawn Hutchinson is the geographer on this interdisciplinary team and there is funding for a geography GRA.

Health Seeking Behavior in Bangladesh - finishing year 2 of a 2-year NSF funded project dealing with medical geography and environmental hazards. Bimal Paul is the PI and the grant supports one GRA.

SSURGO Recompilation/Digitizing - year 1 of a multi-year agreement to provide soil map recompilation and digitizing for the USDA NRCS. Shawn Hutchinson is the PI and funding helps support a number of student workers in GISSAL.

Kanapolis Watershed - year 2 of a multi-year, interdisciplinary, environmental modeling effort funded by EPA/KDHE. Shawn Hutchinson and John Harrington are the geography faculty involved. Funding helps support a geography GRA in the summer.