UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Friday, October 20, 1995
5A
Nobel winner has Kansas ties
Former KU professor wins prize for research on ozone depletion
By Novelda Sommers
Kansan staff writer
Those who stopped using aerosol sprays in order to save the ozone layer have a former KU professor to thank for their heightened awareness.
That professor, Sherwood Rowland, was awarded a Nobel Prize in chemistry last week for contributing to the discovery that chlorofluorocarbons were depleting the ozone layer.
Mario Molina of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and
Paul Crutzen, a Dutch citizen working at the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry in Germany, share the prize with Rowland.
Rowland taught at KU from 1956 to 1964. He left the University of Kansas to teach at the University of California at Irvine, where he still teaches.
Ralph Adams, distinguished professor emeritus in chemistry, taught with Rowland while he was at the University.
Adams said he was not surprised Rowland's work had earned a Nobel Prize.
"I've been expecting it for the last five or six years, in light of the international importance of what he has done," Adams said.
research he did while at the University.
He said Rowland's research with ozone may have been based on
"I think we are all pretty proud to have had him here," Adams said. "We are very pleased we had some minor part in it."
Larry Hathaway, a senior scientist at the Kansas Geological Survey, studied under Rowland from 1968 to 1963. Hathaway said Rowland was a stimulating teacher and had a good rapport with students.
"Back then, students and faculty played softball and basketball on the same teams. He was a good athlete, Hathaway said.
Rowland was exposed to Nobel Prize-caliber work early in his career. As a graduate student at the University of Chicago, he studied under Willard Libby.
Libby won a Nobel Prize in chemistry in 1960 for his work with carbon dating.
More minorities study medicine
By Joann Birk
Kansan staff writer
When Charisse Sparks, a 32-year-old owner of a construction company, was told that she could not live her dream of becoming a doctor, she listened.
But Sparks, one of a growing number of minority students at the University of Kansas Medical Center, finally stopped listening to the people who said she couldn't succeed and started listening to the people who said she could.
Shadrach Smith, associate dean of minority affairs at the Med Center, was one of the first people to tell Sparks that she could become a doctor.
"It took me a while to get here, but once I came in contact with the minority affairs office, it took no time at all." Sparks said.
And Sparks is not alone.
Efforts to recruit high-quality minority and women applicants to the Med Center have contributed to a 633-percent increase in minority freshmen, up from three to 23 students, and an 8-percent increase in women freshmen in the last decade.
"Women didn't even consider it
Sparks said that a portion of the increase could be attributed to changing attitudes.
an option before," she said. "But once they started to see others do it, it made women wake up and say 'hey I can do that.'"
But minority recruitment, which helped bring Sparks to the Med Center, was also a factor.
Smith said he worked with undergraduate universities to establish programs that helped prepare minorities for medical school.
The increase is consistent with medical schools throughout the country, which had 13.4 percent minority freshmen and 41.9 percent women freshmen in 1994, according to the Association of
American Medical Colleges.
Enrollment figures for 1995 at the Med Center showed that 12.6 percent of freshmen were minorities, and 38.3 percent were women.
Smith, who became the first associate dean of minority affairs at the Med Center in 1991, said he did not deserve all the credit for the increase in diversity.
Programs on the Lawrence campus, such as the Health Careers Opportunity Program, a summer program to prepare students for pre-med courses, help improve the quality of applicants from KU, he said.
KU and State of Kansas Employees You and your family are cordially invited to an OPEN HOUSE
at Mt. Oread Medical Arts Centre Saturday, October 21, or 28, 1995 from 9:00-11:30 am
Mt. Oread Medical Arts Centre Staff will provide facility tours and answer questions regarding services and participating health plans.
For more information call:
Open House Hotline 838-1502
Complimentary beverages
and doughnuts will be served,
balloons for children!
Member Columbia/HCA Healthcare Corporation
MT. OREAD MEDICAL ARTS CENTRE
3500 CLINTON PARKWAY PLACE
838-1502
Red Lyon Tavern
A touch of Irish in downtown Lawrence
944 Mass.
832-8228
STUDENT UNION ACTIVITIES SUA FILMS