March 9, 2006

News briefs

University collects for hurricane relief

A coordinated hurricane relief effort generated $10,000 in donations from the Northwestern community to the American Red Cross.

The fundraising campaign lasted roughly six weeks from last September to October, according to Associated Student Government (ASG) President Patrick Keenan-Devlin.

"Hurricane Katrina occurred while we were on break," Keenan-Devlin said, "so I called all of the student leaders I knew were on campus at the time, and we got started from there."

Student groups involved in the campaign were ASG, Dance Marathon, Organized Action by Students Invested in Society (OASIS), Naval Reserve Officer Training Corps (NROTC), Northwestern Community Development Corps (NCDC) and Interfraternity Council (IFC).

Students collected funds by canning at football games and in downtown Evanston. They also organized dump-the-change drives at campus cash registers and hosted a hurricane relief concert at Cahn Auditorium, which featured more than 200 dance, hip-hop, jazz and choir performances.

Keenan-Devlin said that the departments of housing and athletics, as well as Sodexho, the University's food service provider, were integral in welcoming displaced students.

New Prentice construction closes walks

Phase one of construction for the new patient tunnel connecting Northwestern Memorial Hospital’s (NMH) Feinberg and Galter pavilions with the new Prentice Women’s Hospital began Feb. 6 and will last approximately six months.

The north side of Huron St. including the sidewalk will be closed. The south side of the street and sidewalk will remain open and available for use. The north half of Superior St. up to and including the Prentice construction site will not be accessible. The south side of the street including the sidewalk will remain open and available for use.

The alley and loading dock of the Health Sciences Building (HSB) is closed to both pedestrians and vehicles. The Feinberg-Galter loading dock in the Huron Garage will be used for all NMH deliveries and pickups previously routed to the HSB loading dock.

Moot court team repeats at regionals

For the second year in a row, the School of Law’s Jessup Moot Court team won first place at the North Central regional round of the annual Philip C. Jessup International Law Moot Court Competition.

Northwestern’s team, consisting of second-year JD students, also took first place in the brief award, and individual members ranked high in the speaking category. Gwen Carroll won first place for the Speaker Award, and John Watkins ranked fourth.

Other team members include Srikanth Reddy, Matthew Vanek and Ben Berman. The team is coached by School of Law adjunct professor and alum Sunil Harjani. They will next compete as one of about 10 U.S. schools among 100 teams from around the world in the international rounds held in Washington, D.C., March 27 to April 1.

Chicago payroll office opens

Human Resources’ payroll division has opened a permanent office on the Chicago campus in room 850 of Abbott Hall.

The office is staffed to answer questions in all areas, including employee verification, direct deposit participation, tax forms, nonresident alien tax forms, employment eligibility, pretax transit deductions and the Electronic Time Entry System.

Open from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday, the payroll office can be reached at (312) 503-9700.