NIU Today

Northern Illinois University senior honors student Kate Green comes from a family of overachievers—and she seems destined to follow in those same footsteps. Green’s mom and dad are both Ph.D.-trained chemists and NIU alums. Her grandfather, retired Political Science Professor James Banovetz, is an NIU legend, credited with founding the university’s nationally ranked graduate program in public...

Megan Geyer, a 2010 recipient of USOAR and Psi Chi grants, and Rebecca J. Hannagan, a professor in the Department of Political Science and recipient of 2010 grants from the Committee on the Improvement of Undergraduate Education and the National Science Foundation, will present a lecture Wednesday, Nov. 17, called “Can You Really ‘Lie to Me’?...

A “New in Chicago” column on Chicagobusiness.com, a website powered by Crain’s, features a company founded by four former NIU football players. Three of the players are graduates of the College of Business while the fourth earned a degree in communications from the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. According to the article, “Four former...

NIU history professor Brian Sandberg has a written a new book that explores warrior values and violence in French noble culture during the early modern era. Sandberg will deliver a talk on the book – titled “Warrior Pursuits: Noble Culture and Civil Conflict in Early Modern France” (Johns Hopkins University Press) –  at 2:30 p.m....

Interested in working with kids? Interested in helping children achieve their learning potential? NIU’s School Psycholgy Student Organization will host a brief exploration of the school psychology profession, its role in the educational system and how school psychologists can make a difference in the academic lives of children. The event will take place from 10 to 11 Tuesday, Nov. 2, in Room 412...

George Hillocks, Jr., professor emeritus at the University of Chicago, will visit the NIU campus Thursday, Oct. 28, for two presentations hosted by the Department of English and supported by the Larry R. Johannessen Fund. Hillocks will conduct a workshop from 2 to 3:30 p.m. in Reavis Hall 211 on “Basic (and Commonly Overlooked) Principles...

In an era when women like Sarah Palin are calling themselves feminists, there is renewed debate about who gets to be in the club and who doesn’t, and who has the power to decide. Can conservative women who have benefited from the gains of the women’s movement while resisting the fight for reproductive rights, gay...

The Capitol Room at the Holmes Student Center was nearly full late afternoon Monday, Oct. 18, as more than 150 students, faculty and others gathered to hear an address by Dino Patti Djalal, the newly appointed Indonesian ambassador to the United States. Djalal, who was in Chicago for a speech earlier in the day, came...

NIU’s College of Liberal Arts and Sciences held its first Distinguished Alumni, Faculty, and Staff Awards dinner Friday, Oct. 15, in Altgeld Auditorium. Eleven honorees were selected from the many nominations submitted by fellow faculty, staff, alumni and friends of the college. Eight of the honorees attended. President John Peters congratulated the honorees and addressed the...

Professor Philippe Piot in the Department of Physics is working on a plan to build a portable device that could be taken to airports, sports stadiums or subway stations to detect radioactive material. A $591,000 grant from the Defense Threat Reduction Agency is funding Piot’s project. The agency’s goal is to help the U.S. Department of...

Historian Ramón Gutiérrez — an award-winning author and director of the Center for the Study of Race, Politics and Culture at the University of Chicago — will visit Northern Illinois University later this month to deliver the seventh annual W. Bruce Lincoln Lecture. The lecture, titled “Thinking About Race in a Post-Racial America: From Plessy v. Ferguson...

Far from the stereotypes many people envision, the most common faces of homelessness in the United States belong to women and children. And NIU communication professor Laura Vazquez, partnering with nationally known homeless advocate Diane Nilan, has spent the last four years working to tell their stories. The result is “on the edge,” a powerful...