Public policy and economics senior Langtian “Ren” Yuan decided to drop her third major in biomedical engineering, but not before her lab work helped identify compounds that might alleviate the powerful cravings of methamphetamine and cocaine addiction.
Now she’s poised to be lead author on a second paper on managing effects of climate change on health in China. She calls the choice of public policy and economics rather than pre-med “the biggest decision of my life.”
The emerging field of computational journalism offers hope for preserving the “watchdog” function of journalism, an essential element in the healthy functioning of democracy, says a report released today by the DeWitt Wallace Center for Media and Democracy. The report, “Accountability through Algorithm: Developing the Field of Computational Journalism,” identifies four target areas for innovation.
Profile of Sarah Cohen, recently appointed Knight Professor of the Practice in Journalism and Public Policy at Sanford's DeWitt Wallace Center for Media and Democracy
David Rubenstein’s $5.75 million gift to the Sanford School of Public Policy will provide endowment for the Program in Environmental and Energy Policy, a speaker series, and student internship support.
Students from Rachel Seidman’s public policy seminar “Women as Leaders” have continued work they started for a semester project by launching a website aimed at bringing about positive change in Duke’s social scene.
Terry Sanford, North Carolina Governor, U.S. Senator, Duke University President and namesake of the Sanford School of Public Policy, had a long and remarkable life of public service. On Oct. 1, the photography exhibit “Terry Sanford: An American Original” will open at the Sanford School of Public Policy to provide a window into his life and legacies.
The former institute founded by Terry Sanford celebrates its new status as a school
Joel Fleishman, the first director of the Terry Sanford Institute of Public Policy, will deliver the keynote address at Duke University’s Founder’s Day Convocation ceremony on Oct. 1. Fleishman will also receive the University Medal for Distinguished Service.
Bruce Jentleson, a professor of public policy at Duke University’s Sanford School of Public Policy, was sworn in last week as Senior Advisor to the U.S. State Department Policy Planning Director. He will continue active teaching and advising at Duke.
MPP Student in Tanzania
Dana Vettel, MPP ’10, writes from Bagamoyo, Tanzania, where she is interning this summer. In the morning she teaches English to 4- and 5-year-olds, and in the afternoon she volunteers at a local NGO called UKUN in HIV/AIDS patient care and prevention outreach.
In recognition of the Sanford Institute’s growth and success over the last 38 years, Duke Board of Trustees approve its transition to school status as of July 1, 2009. Duke President Richard H. Brodhead says the new school is “crucial to our mission of bringing knowledge to the service of society.”
Alison Dorsey, a senior from Woodside, Calif., graduating with a degree in public policy studies, is the winner of this year’s Terry Sanford Leadership Award for her contributions to Duke and the Durham Community.
A small group of leaders from nonprofit and commercial media, foundations and academia will gather May 4-5 at Duke University’s Sanford Institute of Public Policy for a series of working sessions to explore new models for nonprofit ownership of media. One conference paper has been made available in advance: “A Nonprofit Model for The New York Times?” by Penelope Muse Abernathy.
Sarah Cohen, a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter and expert on computer-assisted investigative journalism, has been named to the Knight Professor of the Practice of Journalism and Public Policy at Duke University. Cohen, database editor at The Washington Post since 1999, will lead a computational journalism initiative spearheaded by Duke's DeWitt Wallace Center for Media and Democracy (DWC).
The Sanford Institute of Public Policy has established the Susan Tifft Undergraduate Teaching/Mentoring Award in honor of the longtime Eugene C. Patterson Professor of the Practice of Journalism and Public Policy. Tifft, who has taught at Duke since 1998, will step down in July.
Philip Bennett, who in four years as managing editor of The Washington Post helped lead the newspaper to 10 Pulitzer Prizes, has been named the new Eugene C. Patterson Professor of the Practice of Journalism and Public Policy at Duke University, university officials announced today.
DURHAM, N.C.-- Patenting of genes has not resulted in a pattern of exorbitant pricing or restricted access to tests for diseases such as Alzheimer’s and breast cancer, Duke University researchers report in Wednesday’s Nature magazine. However, genetic testing monopolies are creating significant problems, say authors Robert Cook-Deegan, Subhashini Chandrasekharanand Misha Angrist.
Fleeing civil war, the “Lost Boys of Sudan” traveled hundreds of miles on foot, surviving militia ambushes, lion attacks, flood waters and starvation to arrive at a refugee camps in Ethiopia and Kenya in the late 1980s and 1990s. After long years of waiting and hardship, thousands were able to resettle in the United States.
The Sanford Institute for Public Policy is moving forward with its plans for becoming a school at the end of the current fiscal year, despite having fallen short of its fund-raising goal, Provost Peter Lange and Institute DirectorBruce Kuniholm told the Academic Council Friday.
DURHAM, NC – The highly publicized story of Bristol Palin, the teen daughter of vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin, focused new attention on the national issue of teenage pregnancy. Meanwhile, government statistics released this month show U.S. teen pregnancy rates rose in 2007 for the second year in a row.
Giovanni Zanalda, a visiting assistant professor of public policy and history, teaches a timely course on the history and patterns of economic meltdowns.
For the last eight years, U.S. military leaders and President George W. Bush knew what they wanted to accomplish in the short run in Iraq, but the long-run objective was less clear. According to John Lewis Gaddis, they lacked a “grand strategy.”
Gaddis, the Robert A. Lovett Professor of History at Yale University, delivered the Von der Heyden Distinguished Lecture Thursday at Duke University’s Sanford Institute of Public Policy in front of a standing-room-only crowd.
Journalism legend John Carroll, who served as editor-in-chief of the LA Times from 2000 to 2005, spoke about the problems with corporate ownership of newspapers and the difficulties the Internet has created for the industry.
Newark Mayor Cory Booker appealed to Duke students to commit themselves to political engagement and social justice.
Students Research Honors Projects Examine Issues of Gender and Faith
Students Research Honors Projects Examine Issues of Gender and Faith
The "digital divide" is the gap between people who have easy access to digital technology and those who don't. Like technology itself, the digital divide is changing rapidly, and countries differ widely in the their approach to the problem.
Photo Exhibit Displays ‘Disparate Worlds’
Arye Carmon, president of the Jerusalem-based think tank Israel Democracy Institute (IDI), will present a lecture and exhibition of his photographs at Duke University’s Terry Sanford Institute of Public Policy on Monday, Jan. 26.
“A Struggling Democracy Confronts Political and Governmental Ethics: The Case of Israel” begins at 4:30 p.m. in the Rhodes Conference Room. The event, which is free and open to the public, will include a reception and exhibit opening immediately following the lecture in the Sanford Building lobby.
In one of his first acts in office, President Obama ordered the closing of the Guantanamo Bay detention camp within a year and the immediate halting the military trials of detainees. The order did not resolve the question of what is to be done with the detainees, which was the topic of a Jan. 22 panel discussion at Duke University.
The STAR study by Associate Professor of PPS Elizabeth Frankenberg is long range study of the impact of the tsumani in Indonesia based on interviews with more than 20,500 adult survivors. It will be the largest ever studies of groups affected by disasters.
As part of his search to fill a newly endowed professorship, Jay Hamilton discusses the emerging field of "computational journalism", a technology-assisted method intended to improve the quality of investigative reporting. Through a process known as data mining, which involves complex mathematical algorithms sorting through immense quantities of data, Hamilton and others hope to make investigative reporting more efficient, and also more economically viable in a difficult time for the newspaper industry.