Good Trouble

On September 26, 1963, Salt Lake City’s population was only 189,000. Yet more than 100,000 people gathered along North Temple to welcome President John F. Kennedy to Utah.

In his speech at the Salt Lake Tabernacle, Kennedy used the words “black and white,” but he was not referring to the 200,000 strong March on Washington a month earlier or to the killing of four African American girls attending Sunday school 10 days earlier. Black and white referred to positions on foreign policy. Communism was the threat.

With the Salt Lake metro area only 1.4 percent non-white (Latinos were counted as white), it was easy for many residents to ignore the tumult occurring across the nation. Not so on college campuses. The Daily Utah Chronicle reported regularly on student civil rights activism around the country. One article stated that U student Stephen Holbrook, “active in the Republican Party and the NAACP, ” had participated in the Freedom March on Washington.

Two months after Kennedy’s visit to Utah, he was assassinated. For many, it was the end of innocence.

University of Utah Professor Mark Matheson MA’85, who grew up in Salt Lake City, remembers “watching the aftermath of sorrow on black and white TV. By elementary school, we were writing essays on integration, which sparked a developing interest in the civil rights movement.”

Since Matheson began teaching, after receiving his master’s degree in English from the U and his doctorate from the University of Oxford, he has included Dr. King’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail” in his curriculum.

MUSE

Matheson now heads up the U’s MUSE Project (My U Signature Experience), which aims to provide undergraduate students with transformative educational opportunities. Each year, the MUSE staff chooses a theme for campuswide discussion, with the centerpiece being a text by a distinguished national guest. MUSE then organizes events including lunchtime lectures, book groups, and student dinners with professors and community leaders.

ComicThe 2014-15 theme was justice; its book was My Beloved World, by U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor. Her visit to campus drew more than 7,000 people from the campus and well beyond. How do you follow that? Matheson learned that an icon in the civil rights movement, U.S. Congressman John Lewis from Georgia, had written a book—a graphic novel inspired by a 1956 comic book telling Martin Luther King, Jr.’s story. Congressman Lewis created March—which became a trilogy of books— with co-author Andrew Aydin and illustrator Nate Powell. Matheson, a humanities professor, saw the graphic novel style as “a fresh genre that students are drawn to and excited about and find accessible.”

The theme was perfect: Community. “At the heart of all Lewis’s activism is the concept of the ‘Beloved Community,’ which implies growth and development and change in every person who works toward that goal,” says Matheson.

MARCH

Eight U professors incorporated March into their classes for 2015-16, and more than 1,000 students received copies of March: Book One (and in some cases, Book Two) donated by the O.C. Tanner Company. (Book Three comes out this August.)

March provided Matheson the opportunity to teach the role of texts in the civil rights movement. “Dr. King invoked Western cultural traditions—including the Bible, the Declaration of Independence, and the U.S. Constitution—i n the service of a profound message of justice for African Americans,” he says.

Matheson’s prediction that students would connect with March was correct.

“There are some books that just touch you right in the heart…. For me this was that book,” says Said Abdirahman Samatar, a chemical engineering/pre-law major. “It put a spotlight on some topics that I was unaware of.”

Students Said Samatar and Jessica Ramirez discuss the powerful impact of Lewis’s story.

Students Said Samatar and Jessica Ramirez discuss the powerful impact of Lewis’s story.

Finance major Jessica Ramirez, who had learned little about civil rights in school, said the book was very informative, yet not intimidating. “It was the perfect way to tell a story of the civil rights movement,” she says. “This book is a good way to get people’s interest, and now those who have read the graphic novel can go and read more about the movement.”

Tyrell Pack, who studies chemical engineering, already had a deep knowledge of the civil rights movement. Still, he found March “very powerful.” Its graphic format “helped make stories and situations relatable and easy to visualize,” he says. Pack had written an essay on John Lewis in elementary school. He was excited for this “once in a lifetime” opportunity to hear him speak in person.

GOOD TROUBLE

On November 11, 2015, to a capacity crowd of more than 800 at the U, Lewis shared his story of growing up one of 10 children of sharecroppers in highly segregated rural Alabama. As a child, he saw “whites only” signs and asked why. When he had to sit in the balcony of movie theaters, he asked why. Lewis was told, “That’s the way it is. Don’t get in the way, don’t get in trouble.”

At age 15, he heard a radio show about Rosa Parks, who refused to sit in the “colored” section of a bus, and about Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. “The actions of Rosa Parks and the words of [Dr.] King inspired me to find a way to get in the way, to get in trouble,” he told the crowd. “And that’s what I did, I got in trouble. Good trouble, necessary trouble.”

Lewis’s first act of civil disobedience, at age 16, was to request a library card.

Inspired by Dr. King, Lewis began “studying the way of peace, the way of love, the way of nonviolence. ” Lewis joined students and adults of all ages who bravely challenged the segregation laws of the South.

U.S. Congressman John Lewis speaking passionately about civil rights to a capacity crowd at the U last November.

U.S. Congressman John Lewis speaking passionately about civil rights to a capacity crowd at the U last November.

Sitting at “whites only” lunch counters in Nashville, they suffered attacks. People “spit on us. Put a lit cigarette out in our hair or down our backs,” he said. As soon as one group of students was knocked unconscious or thrown in jail, another group arrived to request to be served. Then came the Freedom Rides, in which blacks and whites rode together on segregated buses. In town after town, they suffered assaults, firebombs, and beatings.

Lewis was one of six people who organized the August 28, 1963, march on Washington. He spoke just prior to Dr. King’s “I Have a Dream” speech. It was one of the actions that spurred the passage of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. The following year, Lewis led a march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama, to demand voting rights. The bloody attack on the marchers, broadcast nationwide, hastened the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

In 1986, after more than 40 arrests, Lewis entered political life. “If you would have told me that some day I would be a U.S. Congressman and that an African American would be the president of the United States…,”

Lewis said to an impassioned round of applause near the end of his speech. Lewis urged students to become involved in the political process. “There are forces in America today that are trying to take us back to the time when it was impossible or difficult for students, young people, people of color, and seniors to participate in the democratic process,” he said. “In the final analysis, it doesn’t matter if we are black or white or Latino or Asian American. We’re one family. We live in the same house.”

INSPIRATION

Pack was impressed by Lewis’s message that “if there is a problem within our society, the best way to fix it is to organize a method of altering the obstruction.” As citizens, he says, “we have the ability to elect officials who can implement change on a government level.”

However, Pack is skeptical that activists today will tolerate the violent attacks that characterized the civil rights era. He sees protests, fueled by social media, as a more viable way of drawing attention to the need for social change. “Social media can introduce younger generations to ideas about injustices around the world, which is powerful enough to lead to change if enough people follow the movement,” he says.

A finance major and MUSE intern, Ramirez already knew the power of MUSE speakers. She had first learned about the MUSE program when she heard that Sonia Sotomayor was coming to campus in 2014. She immediately wanted to invite Latino students from her high school, Cyprus High, in Magna. “I thought it would be a great opportunity for them to be inspired by a successful Latina woman,” she says. The program gave her the green light and copies of Sotomayor’s books (Ramirez led a book discussion). She anticipated 30–40 students attending the speech, but more than 100 came.

Tyrell Pack

“Race relations will remain stagnant if no action is taken and people do not speak about injustices,” says student Tyrell Pack.

Ramirez found the timing of Lewis’s talk propitious. “His speech was inspiring,” she says, “especially with everything going on in the country today. It definitely made me think more about how to approach things with peace, not violence or hate. I already believed we still have a long way to go regarding civil rights and equality, and meeting the congressman only made me want to be more involved and informed.”

Samatar’s first experience with MUSE and the U was when he was “lucky enough to miss school for a day,” at West High School, to hear 2013 MUSE keynote speaker Wes Moore, a black combat veteran and author. While on campus, Samatar learned more about MUSE. And later when he was trying to decide which university he wanted to attend, he came back to campus to help run the MUSE table at Red, White, and U day. “That night, I applied to be a MUSE Scholar and was accepted,” he says. “The MUSE program is one of the reasons I am at the University of Utah.”

Prior to Lewis’s speech, Samatar had been deeply concerned about racial injustices happening on campuses such as the University of Missouri. “A student went on a hunger strike and was willing to risk his life for justice,” Samatar explains. “This really made me question if I am doing enough to educate myself.” He says he learned from MUSE keynote speakers Wes Moore and Congressman John Lewis that he has to take responsibility to educate himself. “You can’t do something if you know nothing,” he adds.

BROADENING PERSPECTIVES

Ramirez, Samatar, and Pack share a common experience with MUSE. They all grew up in Utah. None has lived anywhere else except as small children. For them, the MUSE experience, especially the speakers, has opened their eyes and minds to the broader world and encouraged them to explore new possibilities. In Utah, says Samatar, it’s frightening to see “how comfortable” you can become. “You know there are injustices, but they don’t always affect you as much as they should.” Through his experience with MUSE, the Black Student Union, and Diversity Scholars, he is becoming more aware.

March 1March 2March 3Pack agrees that “race relations will remain stagnant if no action is taken and people do not speak about injustices.” He says, “Both March and Lewis’s presentation helped me realize that I can get involved with programs focused on topics I am passionate about.”

Ramirez notes that in Utah, young people may not learn about all of the educational opportunities available to them, or may be discouraged from pursuing them. “At my high school,” she says “a speaker came to our class and told us ‘college isn’t for everyone.’ ” It was an AP class.

She sees the MUSE program as “helping students meet people in positions of power and see that these positions and the ability they offer to make change in the world are accessible to them.” Hearing the speakers, she says, “helps you realize they are very similar to you in a lot of ways and that you have the same opportunities.” Personally, she learned from Sotomayor and Lewis that “If I want something, I can fight for it. I can make a difference.”

Following Lewis’s lead, Ramirez is looking for a way to “get into ‘good trouble.’ ” She will apply to law school this fall.

—Susan Vogel is a freelance writer, publisher, and attorney based in Salt Lake City.

To learn more about the U’s MUSE program, see the 2011 Continuum feature here.

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Experiencing Rio Mesa

Water, sustainability, creativity, inspiration: The U of U’s multifaceted field center.

~It should be about a 75-minute drive from Moab, but by the time you reach the small “Rio Mesa” sign, you have already stopped several times to look at jaw-dropping scenery that includes fluffy pink, chocolate swirled, whipped cream-topped rocks as big as buildings.

The unfolding of this stunning landscape prepares you for the sense of wonder and possibility to be experienced a half-mile ahead, where the road dips down to the banks of the Dolores River on the Colorado Plateau.

Rio Mesa (formerly called the Entrada Field Station), which the University of Utah established in 2008, consists of 380 acres along nearly three miles of the Dolores River, structures dating from the 1870s, a 60-year-old USGS water-monitoring station, tamarisk trees, and old mining equipment, all surrounded by spectacular box canyons.

It is becoming one of the U’s most exciting projects: a remote but easily accessible treasure of nature, a magical place that draws people from all disciplines to consider questions that arise naturally in this environment—questions regarding water, preservation, history, sustainability—and to collaborate to find solutions to the challenges of the upcoming decades.

At Rio Mesa, research, instruction, artistic interpretation, and professional training emanate from a common feeling of concern and interest—and the work looks a lot more like fun. Rio Mesa has great potential to advance the U’s mission in the areas of engagement with southeastern Utah, interdisciplinary experience, and the integration of instruction and research.

Afternoon at Rio Mesa

Just past a 1950s-era pickup truck, the dirt road smoothes into concrete slabs leading down, through, and up the side of a creek bed. Polka-dotted straw matting covers the dirt banks. Civil engineering undergrad students at the U designed this crossing to prevent road washout during storms.

This is one of many Rio Mesa projects researched and designed by U students. Forty-six students from six disciplines participated in creating Rio Mesa’s master plan. In 2010, civil engineering graduate students undertook a flood-plain analysis and road improvements. A student from the Department of Parks, Recreation, and Tourism designed an interpretive trail. This particular week, students in Biomimicry, a graduate class co-taught through the College of Architecture and the Department of Biology, are studying designs found in nature and how they can be translated into human-built structures. Two MUSE (My University Signature Experience—see the Spring 2011 issue of Continuum) scholars are assessing the viability of restoring or salvaging wood from a 1970s barn; architectural students are researching the design and construction of a bathhouse. Alternative Spring Break students are analyzing and documenting the site’s two 1880s-period homestead buildings. And last fall, more than 20 Alternative Fall Break students from the U’s Bennion Center worked to restore the center’s ailing orchard.

“No other field station has gotten students involved in its development like this,” says Sylvia Torti PhD’98, the manager of Rio Mesa, who is working at her laptop in the Dalton House’s small communal kitchen, which, as the only indoor gathering spot, has become the heart of the center.

Torti, who has taught biology and creative writing at the U, is the perfect model for the kind of interdisciplinary scholar Rio Mesa attracts. An Argentine-American, Torti is not only a research biologist with a specialty in migratory birds but also a prize-winning novelist. Torti, who credits U of U Professor of Biology Jim Ehleringer with first seeing Rio Mesa’s potential, envisions the site as a unique place that will provide opportunities for research, education, art, and professional development to anyone “whose future,” she says, “will require environmental literacy.” Few field stations attempt this level of disciplinary integration. Vice President for Research Tom Parks, who oversees Rio Mesa, agrees. “We are trying to create a distinctive built environment to foster multidisciplinary research, teaching, and artistic activities in a harsh natural environment with a unique beauty and human history,” he says.

The kind of research Rio Mesa sparks is the kind that feels effortless, like counting the ants crawling over your leg when you were a kid enjoying a long summer day with no school. In fact, counting ants was one of the first research projects undertaken at Rio Mesa. Biology Professor Don Feener and a group of K-12 teachers from around the state mapped two species of seed harvester ants that compete for food.

Ryan Smith, associate professor of architecture and Rio Mesa’s research director, says Rio Mesa is unique because it goes much farther than offering research possibilities. “The research becomes a jumping-off point for other disciplines,” he says. “Students learn to engage with people outside their disciplines. They learn to be very flexible.”

Smith, whom Torti describes as “a very broad thinker,” stands in a dilapidated wood barn next to a pile of magazines, odd items of clothing, and a rusted metal plate with nails. Students scan the rough-hewn wood that looks almost golden in the late afternoon sun. “Is it structurally sound?” a student asks.

“The connections to the posts are questionable,” replies Smith, an approachable teacher who always wears a smile. “There’s a quality to this that’s very nice,” he says. “But it’s a little like there’s a murder going on in here,” he adds, glancing at the pile of detritus in a corner.

While a murderous history has not been uncovered, the land speaks of a difficult past. Last year, Jennifer Buchi BS’10, then a senior in anthropology with a minor in creative writing, found out about the Rio Mesa Fellowship in a book art class. She won the fellowship and used it to create a handcrafted pop-up book interpreting Rio Mesa’s history through photographs and poetry. For Buchi, the book provided “an opportunity to blend together everything I had been learning in school,” she says. “Everything came together with this project.”

Dinnertime

Rain brings the students into the Dalton House, where 22 students and instructors crowd around the kitchen table for a group-cooked dinner of pasta and meatballs. A conversation that starts out about buildings turns to energy production, waste management, and how to get people to use less water, less energy, less packaging.

Ideas fly. What if visitors to Rio Mesa had to haul out their own trash to remind them of how much we produce without even thinking about it, suggests a doctoral student in civil engineering. In Berlin, notes another student, you are allowed to throw away only a specified amount of garbage per week, by weight. Another student points out that in Europe, companies pay the cost of excess packaging.

After the students wash the dinner dishes (no paper plates here), Torti hustles them outside, where the rain has abated and a campfire is blazing.

A group of geology students gathers nearby. Torti expertly coaxes the two groups together at the campfire, and soon the discussion soars to a new level, thanks in part to the presence of Genevieve Atwood MPA’91 PhD’06, adjunct assistant professor of geography and former director of the Utah Geological and Mineral Survey—the first female state geologist in the nation.

Having Atwood drop in on your campsite is like having Eric Clapton stop by your local club to play a set. Atwood and nine students from her geomorphology class are at Rio Mesa for the night on a tour of Utah’s major landscapes.

“What’s with the cross-hatching on the pink rocks across the river?” asks a student. Atwood, wearing a black baseball cap studded with rhinestones, responds with enthusiasm, “If you were a solid wall of sandstone rising up on a bed of salt, how would you crack?”

When an architecture student mentions how patterns can look the same from both close up and far away, Geography Professor George Hepner brings up the concept of fractals (geometrical shapes that, when split into parts or magnified as a whole, appear as multiple copies of the same shape).

Smith deftly latches onto student comments and spins them into questions. “What is the next step in achieving sustainability?” The ideas swirl upward like the fire itself: “There’s no market motivation for sustainability,” observes one student. Smith prods, “Do we legislate higher prices?” Another student: “Solutions will come from outside of the government.”

By the time the students and instructors wander off to their tents, cabins, and dormitory bunks, the clouds have cleared and the stars are bright against the black sky. The evening’s discussion had veered into capitalism, consumerism, and government subsidies. Smith was pleased. “This sort of spontaneous, student-initiated discussion, where their fundamental understanding of government and society is being challenged,” he says, “rarely occurs in the classroom.”

Morning

By midmorning, the campsite and Dalton House are deserted as students disperse throughout the site to study, measure, and ponder. The geomorphology students had left early to begin their day with Landform Yoga, in which Atwood leads them into poses representing geological formations.

The students visiting the Rio Mesa Center over spring break give it high marks. They agree that being away from the campus and classrooms and having discussions in casual settings makes them more apt to share impressions and ideas. Architecture student Jessica Gilmore says the challenges at Rio Mesa present “a cool opportunity to be creative,” noting that she also feels freer there to share ideas and let others respond to them.

Smith observes that students also slow down. “There is a quietness to their work. Away from their computers they have to really connect with what they do. There are no distractions. You see them getting into the rhythm of the work, silently passing tools between them and listening to the river.”

Reaching Out Year-Round

Moab welcomes its new neighbor. Mayor David Sakrison says, “The University of Utah, through Rio Mesa, is bringing some great educational opportunities for kids here as well as adults. It’s a win-win situation. Rio Mesa is a great addition to the community.” The center is building its partnerships with Grand County schools and nonprofits in hopes of becoming “a lively conduit for sharing educational opportunities and visions between the Moab community and the University,” says Torti.

Beginning this fall, visitors from both Grand County and the U will enjoy a new campsite with 20 tent pads and well-appointed wall tents, a bathhouse, solar power setup, and a fire pit. Eventually, Torti hopes, Rio Mesa will have a central structure in which students and instructors can gather year-round, regardless of weather, to share experiences and observations. Architectural students are already discussing ideas for a 1,100-square-foot pavilion that will accommodate as many as 40 students. Rio Mesa hopes to raise funds (approximately $300,000) for its construction.

Perhaps by next fall, students coming in from a thunderstorm will be able to sit together, sharing food and thoughts, looking out across the river and marveling at bursts of lightning lighting up the pink cliffs. Where that conversation might end up is for anyone to guess.

Rio Mesa By the Numbers and Nodes

  • 380 acres, three riverfront miles, 40 miles northeast of Moab
  • Four canyons emptying into the Colorado River, which provides water to 25 million downstream users
  • 330 user days in 2009; 750 in 2010
  • Visionary Professor of Biology Jim Ehleringer first saw Rio Mesa’s potential and brought it to the attention of the U
  • Now part of the Utah Field Station Network, or UFSN, a state network of sites administered by universities, as well as state and federal agencies
  • Sustainable Campus Initiative Fund awarded a grant in 2010 to restore the historic orchard
  • State of Utah awarded a matching grant in 2010 to fund solar panels for the campground
  • Additional wish list: more solar photovoltaics, composting toilets
  • Spring 2011: Rio Mesa hosted its first artist-in-residence, painter Kathryn Stedham
  • Rio Mesa Center offers two student fellowships a year (click here for more information)
  • Other opportunities to visit Rio Mesa are available through the Bennion Center, the Office for Equity and Diversity, Environmental Studies, and the Honors College

—Susan Vogel is a freelance writer and publisher based in Salt Lake City.

Learn more about some of the activities at the Rio Mesa Center in this entry on the University of Utah blog RedThread by grad student Ross Chambless, who organized the orchard rejuvenation project.

The MUSE Project

A new student-centered initiative seeks to invigorate the educational mission of the U.

~In the last five years, the University of Utah has become one of the top 30 public research universities in the country. It has recently overtaken MIT as number one in the nation in spawning new commercial ventures, and both a current and a former faculty member have received Nobel prizes, among many other notable achievements.

While this has been a boon for the U’s bottom line financially and has increased its national and international profile, the bright spotlight on research and commercialization has caused some to ask, What about the students? How is the U making sure that students benefit from its successes and that it holds to its core mission to educate them?

In fall 2009, University of Utah President Michael K. Young met with his cabinet to review the University’s goals and priorities, and to discuss these issues. Their first observation was that students have indeed been involved in many of the University’s successes. For example, many undergraduate students assist faculty in research projects ranging from developing new techniques for environmental cleanup to assessing how music lyrics affect teens. And even projects that lead to commercial successes, such as those resulting from research conducted by faculty with USTAR (the Utah Science Technology and Research initiative), have students at the center, developing business plans and budgeting venture capital. “When we put students front and center,” says Young, “remarkable things happen.”

The U’s three-pronged mission—teaching, research, and public service—results in an educational environment that can offer students experiences to help them find educational and career paths that are right for them. Internships, assisting in research, and study abroad can give students a chance to try on different roles and, through what Young has termed “transformative intellectual experiences,” direct them toward pursuing their passions.

The cabinet and President Young made the commitment to ensure that all students have opportunities for such experiences. They also pledged to strengthen the U’s mission to educate—and to support a student-centered culture with the goal of ensuring that every student has the best possible experience during his or her time at the U, and that every interaction on campus reinforces that objective. The working title for this effort became the “Signature Experience Project.”

The Professors

The first step in setting up the project involved pinpointing faculty members to coordinate the project—those who believe in the power of the educational experience to inspire passion and to transform lives, and in the ability of students to make personal decisions about their own education.

Mark Matheson

Mark Matheson MA’85, professor/lecturer in the Department of English, was appointed director, and Mimi Locher, assistant professor in the School of Architecture, associate director. Both are also advisors able to personally share with students the ways in which their own transformative intellectual experiences have set them on the paths to rewarding careers. Matheson’s signature moment took place in an English class taught by legendary U of U professor Brooke Hopkins. “He transformed my understanding of what was possible in terms of college education—how one can grow through the educational process,” says Matheson, who went from being an undergraduate history major to a graduate student in English, committing himself to explore “the power of the imagination to transform the world.”

Mimi Locher

For Locher, it was a study abroad program in Germany. Seeing the siedlungen neighborhoods that were built under the Nazi regime (settlements designed to build loyalty among working-class members of the Nazi party) sparked her interest in architectural history and the study of nationalism. Also fluent in Japanese, Locher became interested in the role of tradition in contemporary architecture in Japan. She now teaches Japanese architecture and takes students on study trips to Japan.

Putting students in the driver’s seat meant it was crucial to get their input for the project. So the Presidential Interns, students who consult weekly with the University administration on issues in higher education, were summoned. Interestingly, each of these high-achieving students had had a transformative educational experience at the U.

The Interns

Courtney Gwinn

The interns quickly envisioned the project in concrete terms—as a wall on which graduating students imprint their signatures, along with a word or two about their most meaningful U of U experiences.

Courtney Gwinn would write “Impact.” Jonathan Ng, “Learner.” And Tiffany Murillo and Masoud Mortazavi, “Presidential Intern.”

Murillo, who grew up in Hyrum, Utah, was set on a career practicing law. Now, after her experiences as a Presidential Intern and a research assistant studying English learners in higher education, she says, “I know I want to be involved civically. I realized my passion in education—that everyone should have a post-secondary education.” Murillo may still go to law school, she says, but is more likely to become a lobbyist for education or otherwise be involved in policy rather than a lawyer “working ridiculous hours.”

Tiffany Murillo

Ng, who attended high school in Murray, Utah, plans to graduate in May with degrees in math and economics. He is also applying to law school, which sounds fairly straightforward, although his undergraduate experience has been anything but. Over the past three and a half years, he has declared more than 10 majors, including English, film studies, biomedical engineering, and business. He planned to pursue a career in medical research until he worked in scientific research labs, which convinced him otherwise. “I’ve worked in several research labs since high school,” says Ng, “and the real world experience one day made me realize that the science was interesting to me, but the process became less and less so.” In choosing a career path, Ng says, “Mark Matheson was very insightful—he encouraged me to ‘go with my instincts.’ This advice was rare to me, as many people question my differing interests and somewhat discourage my decisions.” Ng has hopes of using his science background in a career utilizing an interdisciplinary take on law.

Jonathan Ng

Mortazavi, a Salt Lake City native, began his studies as a political science major and expects to graduate in that field. He too once had his eye on law school, but along the way he also considered medical school—for a while. Like Ng, after working in a campus lab, he decided that it was not for him. Involvement in the Sigma Chi fraternity led to a leadership role in student government. A career as an elected official seemed alluring, until he tried it out through an internship in Washington, D.C. “I’d talk to the congressmen, and they would tell me how hard they would work and then have to go home and beg for money. They would never see their families. I decided, ‘No way am I going to make that my life.’ ”

“Many of us,” says Gwinn, “started on a specific path and then encountered something that sparked indecision and changed our path. It’s better to experience this now than 20 years from now.”

Gwinn’s path has been fueled by a passion she found at an early age as she watched her father struggle with cancer. “Ever since I was 8,” she says, “I wanted to be a doctor.” She was admitted to 12 different universities, “seven with full rides,” but chose the U to be closer to her dad and the Huntsman Cancer Institute. She started volunteering at Huntsman and now assists in research to find better drug-delivery mechanisms to kill cancer cells.

Gwinn’s indecision arose when she began to think that she could accomplish more as a researcher than as a doctor. Through a mentor, Senior Vice President of Academic Affairs David Pershing, she learned of an M.D./Ph.D. program that offered financial incentives to ease the debt load at the other end. “I enjoy the research people who are creating,” she says. “They are doing good [for patients by] finding cures.”

Adopting a MUSE

Masoud Mortazavi

After several months of study and many meetings with Matheson and Locher, the interns put their own signatures on the initiative: they changed its name. Based on their own experiences, they saw that transformation is highly personal and cannot be imposed. “It’s nothing that can be thrust upon you,” says Mortazavi. The idea, adds Gwinn, is to allow students “to choose their own opportunities, as you do in life.”

According to the interns, the concept of a blank canvas kept coming up, along with the idea that you make of it what you choose and adopt a muse—that is, someone or something that inspires creativity. “With the word being the basis for ‘music,’ it evokes originality and uniqueness,” explains Gwinn. “It encapsulates the emotional sense, passion, and personality—who you are. It’s empowering,” says Gwinn. MUSE as an acronym for the new U program stands for “My U Signature Experience.”

Matheson and Locher describe the students’ input as “invaluable and inspiring.” “As an advisor,” says Matheson, “I’ve talked with many students who aren’t sure about what their life’s work will be. Students tend to get alienated from their deeper interests by consumerism and by our far too hectic pace of life. We need to help them reconnect with their own inner passion.”

And what about student loans? “I don’t think passion and practicality exclude each other,” says Matheson. “Students can be pragmatic and at the same time driven by idealism and the desire to be productive in ways that help their fellow human beings.”

The second step in implementing the initiative is to support a student-centered culture at the U in both teaching and service. The first of these will be the focus of the campus-wide MUSE teaching summit this April, which will be followed by a student-service summit next year. “The idea,” explains Matheson, “is that all interactions between our staff and our students can be actively educational, with the campus a place of continuous and ubiquitous learning.”

Even the campus-as-workplace, which employs 7,500 students this year—1,500 more than last year—will become a place of learning.

“Everyone on campus becomes a teacher,” says President Young. “A supervisor in food services teaches student workers team building, and an office manager teaches conflict resolution.”

Hitting the Ground Running

Matheson and Locher are busy working to “scale up” the many opportunities on campus and off, with the goal of providing at least one opportunity to every U of U undergraduate in the areas of study abroad, undergraduate research, professional internships, and community outreach, including funding.

This spring, new students are learning of the MUSE project during the orientation process, from advisors, and through student-led projects. Current students can expect classroom presentations, a MUSE office in the Olpin Union, and information from faculty.

Tolstoy said, “One can live magnificently in this world if one knows how to work, and how to love, to work for the person one loves, and to love one’s work.” The MUSE project’s true effectiveness may be measurable 10, 20, or 30 years from now, when rather than burn out in their chosen professions, alumni can’t imagine leaving them. In the short term, however, the U may consider setting up a virtual wall on which graduating students inscribe their farewell signatures.


When Faculty Make a Difference

Michael K. Young, President, University of Utah

During his sophomore year of college, Michael Young had been sitting at the very back of the class when, to his shock, the professor called him into his office. The professor convinced Young that, based on the papers he had turned in, he “had a capacity for real analytical thought.” A few years later, when Young was in law school, a professor insisted that students not simply understand the judge’s reasoning in a case, but criticize it. “When I saw how deeply you had to drill down intellectually, it was terrifying,” says Young. “I studied out of sheer panic, but I awoke one morning realizing I was exhilarated by it. I found I had a passion for unraveling things.”

These experiences were transformative in setting Young on his career path as a legal scholar.

Jennifer Williams Molock, U of U assistant vice president for Student Equity & Diversity

Molock, too, discovered her passion thanks to a professor’s belief in her. Molock had been a star high school student but had a dismal first semester of college. The director of her college’s Office of Black Student Services, who met with every African-American student, asked her, simply, “What’s going on?” “She told me she knew I could do better,” says Molock. “She began challenging me in ways I hadn’t been challenged before. And she told me to start identifying what I am passionate about.” Mainly through work experiences while in school, Molock found her passion in higher education. Understandably, Molock believes in the power of mentors. “I had a lot of people supporting me,” she says. “If I hadn’t, I would have given up.”

Gretchen Dietrich, executive director of the U’s Museum of Fine Arts

Dietrich was a sophomore business major when she took a class in Renaissance art history. As she learned about the Italian Renaissance, she thought, “This is the coolest thing that anyone has ever talked about! That was it for me. I thought my head was going to explode,” says Dietrich. Intrigued, she changed her major to art history. Internships during college convinced her she did not want to sell art, and a semester in Paris taught her she belonged in a museum. She found museum education through a job at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. “I was passionate about art, and I became passionate about making art in the museum accessible to the broadest segment of the public,” Dietrich says, adding, “Art is about knowing about the world, the history of the world, and your place in the world.”


A WORLD OF OPPORTUNITIES

Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program
Students who participate in research with a professor may earn stipends of up to $1,200.
www.urop.utah.edu

Capstone Projects
The Honors College and many other University programs and disciplines require seniors to complete a Capstone Project, an extended research paper that prepares them for careers or for graduate work in their respective disciplines at a research university.
www.honors.utah.edu

Honors College Think Tanks
Students spend a year collaborating with community partners on topics of social importance, such as immigration, religion, or bioethics.
www.honors.utah.edu

Hinckley Institute of Politics
The Hinckley Institute of Politics places more than 300 students each year in local, state, national, and international internships with government and nonprofit organizations.
www.hinckley.utah.edu

The Bennion Center
Through the center, students select community service projects in the areas of education, health, and the environment, among many others. Each year, more than 8,500 Bennion Center volunteers give about 175,000 hours of community service.
www.sa.utah.edu/bennion/index.htm

LEAP
The Learning, Engagement, Achievement, and Progress program encourages the formation of a learning community by allowing students and professors to remain together through multiple semesters.
www.leap.utah.edu

University Impact Fund
A student-run venture capital fund investing in start-up companies.
www.uimpactfund.com

Study Abroad
More than 600 U of U students in 2009-10 studied in 39 countries.
www.goabroad.com

On-Campus Employment Resources:
http://careers.utah.edu/jobs/studentjobs.htm

—Susan Vogel is a freelance writer and publisher based in Salt Lake City.

A Rock Star of a Structure

The new Frederick Albert Sutton Building serves as a symbol for campus sustainability and didactic construction.

~ Briquelle Schreiter is so excited that her words barely keep up with her thoughts. “I love conglomerate rocks. I like it that a conglomerate rock is a collection of things. I like collections.”

Briquelle, a fourth-grader at Salt Lake City’s Ensign Elementary School, is on a field trip to the University of Utah campus to visit the Frederick Albert Sutton Building, which houses the College of Mines and Earth Science’s Department of Geology & Geophysics. Leading the field trip is Ian Semple, a U of U graduate student in geology. He brings students to the Sutton Building “to get them excited about rocks, fossils, and plants,” and of course, he says, “to get them excited to come to the U.”

Briquelle’s enthusiasm is typical of many who enter the Sutton Building—and stop in their tracks. Is it an art gallery or a museum? The round entry with a broad band of glass that brings in the sky suggests the earth itself. And the Precambrian slate floor, with river rocks winding through it like a stream, grounds visitors in a material world, though not the one Madonna sang of.

The Sutton Building, dedicated in 2009—the first LEED-certified (Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design) new construction on the lower campus—has set a new standard for sustainable buildings. Thanks to a team of imaginative earth scientists, it has also redefined the role of a campus building in general, making it a dynamic platform for learning.

A Team of Explorers

By the 1990s, the Department of Geology & Geophysics had outgrown the 1927 Mines Building, in terms of not only space—faculty, administration, and students were scattered across campus—but also of technology.

The Rev. Marta Sutton Weeks, the daughter of Frederick Albert Sutton BS’17, wanted to remember her father and honor future geologists with a building that would create the kind of community she had experienced as a student. Weeks donated more than $12 million in gifts toward the eventual $27 million cost of a new building and joined the geoscientists in the adventure of creating a structure that would bear her father’s name.

Adventure is nothing new to Weeks, an Episcopalian minister. Her father, an engineer whose passion was geology, led a life worthy of Indiana Jones. The family had lived in Argentina and Chile, and was separated for many years while Sutton rode burros and camels through the mud and dust of Bolivia, Tibet, and Mongolia in search of oil. Marta was born in Argentina and grew up in Venezuela and Utah. After graduating from Stanford, she married a petroleum geologist, Austin Weeks.

The faculty members who oversaw the fundraising for and the design and construction of the building, Frank Brown and Marjorie Chan, matched Weeks in terms of spirit, sense of exploration, and generosity. Both are professors who challenge the status quo in their research—Brown, here on earth, and Chan, in space—and who feel a deep passion for their fields and for the U.

Brown, dean of the College of Mines and Earth Sciences, is a geochronologist who was on the 2001 expedition with Maeve Leakey that uncovered the skull of Kenyanthropus platyops, or “flat-faced human from Kenya,” older than the famous “Lucy” unearthed in Ethiopia in 1974.

Chan, professor and former chair of the Department of Geology & Geophysics, is using the wind and water-shaped landscapes of Southern Utah to interpret imagery from Mars. She was the first female geology professor at the U and the first female department chair of a U science or engineering department.

Combine this leadership with a discipline that, in Chan’s words, “has a central role in bringing about a sustainable society,” and add to it a once in a lifetime building opportunity, and it is not surprising that the result was, in a word used by many of the students, awesome.

The University hired as architects Brixen & Christopher and Coopers Roberts Simonsen Associates. Their mandate was to design a 91,000-square-foot, four-story building that would connect to the existing 1970s-era Browning Building and be solid enough to house the University of Utah Seismograph Stations (UUSS).

The next step (that of creating a steering committee of building users, administration, and members of the design and construction team) was not novel—it is routine on all University construction projects—but the ideas that came out of it were.

The Gold Standard

First, the steering committee upped expectations in terms of sustainability. University construction, at the time, was required to follow only State guidelines established primarily to promote energy savings and efficiency. The department wanted more.

“We are studying the earth, its environments and resources, and the balance of systems,” says Chan. “Geologists understand the interactions of climate change. If we are looking to the future, earth scientists are the ones who have the perspective of ‘deep time’—time scales of hundreds of millions of years.”

Brown went to Weeks, somewhat hesitantly, to ask for her support to achieve LEED certification. Weeks’ response? “That’s what I had hoped for all along.” In fact, she encouraged them to seek the gold level of certification, the second most difficult of the three levels (achieved by points earned via sustainability efforts in the design and construction process). [Ed. Note: In early September 2010, just after this issue went to press, the College of Mines and Earth Sciences received official notification that the Sutton Building had received gold-level LEED certification.]

Chan also aimed high in terms of the educational value of the building’s interiors. Department faculty David Chapman and Barbara Nash helped craft a request to the University administration, which granted $275,000 toward interior basics, and the college’s development director, John Kaloudis, assisted Chan in raising another $700,000 in cash and in-kind donations to integrate more displays and teaching elements into the building.

Chan retained Diamond Phillips Architecture & Design, which came up with many of the building’s most striking features, including a river motif that brings a dynamic element to the structure, reinforcing the evolving nature of the earth and the role of rivers in carving out Utah’s landscape. A creek bed of stylized river rocks appears to flow into the interior, meander through it, and flow out again.

The entire north wall, designed by John Diamond, is decorated with a school of 104 real Eocene-age (50-million-year-old) fossil fish swimming toward the lecture hall. Around the corner, laid out with the care of a mosaic, are 150 rare carbonized plant fossils, also Eocene, so delicate that they look as if they could blow away.

Expanding Learning Opportunities

William Johnson, professor of geology and geophysics; Fred Montague, recently retired professor of biology; and Steve Burian, associate professor of civil engineering, “turned the building design into a community project,” says Johnson. The three tossed a class on sustainability into the campus’s course offerings just two weeks before the Winter 2007 Semester began. To their amazement, 40 students signed up, likely inspired by the blossoming campus interest in sustainability led by the student group Sustainable Environments and Ecological Design (SEED), which, in 2007, successfully lobbied the University to establish an Office of Sustainability.

The entire north wall, designed by John Diamond, is decorated with a school of 104 real Eocene-age (50-million-year-old) fossil fish swimming toward the lecture hall.

In the class, students presented ideas, and the architects responded with practical answers. The students saw their ideas bump up against building codes, and financial and aesthetic constraints (composting toilets were a tough sell). “For students pushing a particular project, it was an excursion into the real world,” says Johnson.

Ultimately, a number of student proposals were incorporated into the design: solar tube lighting, a porous concrete loading dock that allows water to percolate into the subsurface (rather than propagate via storm drain to the Great Salt Lake wetlands), a rainwater collection pond, covered bicycle parking, xeriscaping, low-emission glass that reduces heat loss, a rooftop garden, and a flat screen in the entry area that monitors energy use in specific campus buildings.

Now called Sustainability Practicum, the class is expected to be a permanent campus offering.

Throughout the building, Diamond Phillips incorporated elements that serve both decorative and pedagogical purposes. Metaconglomerate stone slabs are hung with curatorial care as works of art. Petrified wood encourages touch and exploration.

“We are always fascinated by nature,” says Chan. “Nature is an artist that has created amazing things. When you present geology as art, people want to know more.”

Interactive features offer that opportunity. Only the rare visitor can resist jumping on a floor tile that records the jolt as a “seismic event” on the lower floor’s earthquake monitors. On the third floor of the building, small magnets invite discovery of layers of magnetic minerals in an ironstone slab.

Abby Rudd BS’07, now a graduate student in geologic engineering, notes that the many displays and rotating posters of student research enhance learning. “You get a sense of what others are doing, from paleontology to geophysics to water chemistry. You might not have realized the variety of work before.”

Even the tables teach: Study tables fabricated in the U’s metal shop and topped with polished rock slabs “make you really start thinking about geology,” says senior Katherine Clayton.

A Sense of Community

Matt Heumann, the student representative on the display committee, says, “The students are very pleased with the way the building turned out. They like that there are informal meeting areas for those who want to talk, and quiet offices for when you don’t want to be disturbed.”

“The alcoves are really cool,” adds Rudd. “We have awesome lab facilities here, much bigger than in the old building, and with windows.”

According to Professor Erich Petersen, former associate chair of the department, “The building has brought everyone closer. It has a feeling of community, which is what we wanted. We all take a lot of pride in it. You want to be here.”

Wednesday mornings, the whole department is invited to grab a drink at the espresso bar and talk about their work. Rudd says that this fosters a greater sense of community and makes it easier to get to know people.

Ripple Effect

The Sutton Building, according to the Utah Chapter of the U.S. Green Building Council, “is serving as the University’s icon for ‘Green building design.’ ”

The success of the building is sending ripples throughout the campus. Its use of xeriscaping has spread. And, since 2009, every new building on campus will seek LEED silver-level certification, says Michael G. Perez, the U’s associate vice president for facilities. “They really had a vision,” he says of the Sutton Building team, “and it was really successful. We are taking that success to other buildings. It’s an opportunity to make buildings of even greater value to our campus.”

Petersen points out that the number of students who have signed up for his basic geology class over the last few years has doubled. In the fall of 2010, he will have his biggest class in 25 years. “The building has helped a lot in increasing enrollment,” he says, “Now that we have everyone together, it keeps the energy high. The building is a big part of the increased student interest.”

Petersen may have to order more chairs. Ten-year-old Briquelle has gone through two pencils filling up the pages of her scientific notebook. Her classmate Britannia Raynor has already labeled her notes “U of U,” using the appointed bold font with serifs.

—Susan Vogel is a freelance writer and publisher based in Salt Lake City.


LEEDers

“The whole village concept really worked on the Sutton Building,” says building designer John Diamond. He especially credits Marjorie Chan, professor of geology and geophysics, for her leadership. “She is an explorer. From her research of rocks on Mars, she has a real sense of stretching the boundaries of imagination.”

“Village” members critical to the success of the building include alumni, faculty, staff, students, consultants, professionals, and partners. Broad participation within the department and its community of friends helped them achieve something unique. Donor contributors are listed on the department’s Web site here.

Up Another Notch

Photo by Ed Kosmicki

Mike Dunn’s commitment to telling meaningful stories with film makes him a great fit as the new head of KUED.

Michael A. Dunn BS’81 MA’06 loves challenges. And in August 1994, he faced one never before taken on by a human being in Grand Teton National Park.

Dunn was on an early morning run when he came across bear tracks. “Knowing that a bear had been in the area so unnerved me,” he says, “that I slowed to a walk. Then I stopped, held my breath and listened while I looked in every direction.”

Mike was on vacation with his wife, Linda BS’81 MEd’95, now director of the U of U’s Lowell Bennion Community Service Center, and their three children. He was training for the St. George Marathon, a qualifying race for the Boston Marathon.

Dunn, at the time a writer for Bonneville Communications, had found his vocational passion in eighth grade. A filmmaking class at Rowland Hall-

St. Marks left him “intrigued with film as a storytelling medium,” he says. After graduating from East High School, Dunn studied communication at the U. An internship in the U’s Athletics Department eventually led to a “dream job” as a reporter and weekend sports anchor for Salt Lake City’s KUTV Channel 2.

Mike and Linda Dunn celebrated their 30th wedding anniversary by completing the St. George Ironman competition this spring.

In 1984, inspired by the romanticized notion of advertising depicted on the TV show Bewitched, Dunn joined Fotheringham & Associates (now Richter 7) as an assistant account executive but eyed the creative department, “like a little kid with his nose up to the window of a candy store,” he says. Dunn soon became a copywriter.

After six years at Fotheringham, he joined Bonneville Communications and spent eight years traveling the globe writing, directing, and shooting public service ads for the LDS Church that promoted good parenting, education, and compassion. A spot featuring a disabled girl who would not give up earned him an Emmy.

Dave Newbold, president of Richter 7, who worked with Dunn at both Fotheringham and Bonneville, noticed Dunn’s leadership abilities early on. “There is a key phrase from a book about leadership: ‘modesty, restraint, and tenacity,’ ” says Newbold. “I think that’s a great depiction of Mike.”

The bear prints in the forest during that fateful morning run were followed by another warning: a pile of berries on the trail. Dunn says he quickly implemented “rule number one in bear country: make as much noise as possible,” and began singing, badly, at the top of his lungs until the dark foreboding lifted and he fell back into enjoying his run.

Two miles later, Dunn heard a “sudden and thunderous sound coming from the forest off to my left,” he says. He turned to see a huge grey- and auburn-colored bear with a hump on its back racing toward him at full speed, “teeth bared, growling, ears laid back.”

The 165-pound Dunn only managed a step or two more up the trail before the 400-plus-pound bear plowed into him, knocking him nine feet off the trail. The bear chewed and clawed Dunn’s mouth, nose, and ribs, and sank teeth into his hip and thigh.

Dunn instinctively fought back until a point when “the injuries were just so overwhelming,” he says, “I actually hoped it would be over really quick.”

But with the thought of his family, he appealed to a higher power. “There is a bear on my back,” he prayed. “I’m dying. But I want to live.” He then received the clear impression to play dead, so he stopped struggling and managed to get into a fetal position. It worked. The bear quickly turned its interest to something else in the forest, got off Dunn, and loped down the trail.

Fearing the bear would return, Dunn limped a mile down the rocky trail, screaming for help, until he was finally spotted by hikers.

Dunn’s injuries were life-threatening. With 300 stitches and a thigh muscle destroyed, he was unable to walk for a month, and it was unclear whether he would ever run again. But he worked hard, fighting his way back through months of therapy. Salt Lake Tribune political cartoonist Pat Bagley, one of Dunn’s running buddies at the time, was impressed by Dunn’s perseverance. “Not only did he continue running,” says Bagley, “but he took it up a notch, doing ultra marathons.” On May 1 of this year, to celebrate their 30th wedding anniversary, Mike and Linda both completed the St. George Ironman competition.

The bear attack, says Dunn, “emboldened me. It expanded my comfort zone, allowing me to take on new challenges while reducing my fear of failure.”

This new courage enabled Dunn in 1996 to take “a scary leap” and start his own ad agency and film production company, Dunn Communications, Inc. “I finally got to be Darrin Stephens,” says Dunn, “writing, directing, and shooting commercials,” including for Surefoot, a custom ski boot company that he helped grow from a small company in Park City into a worldwide enterprise.

It also gave him the courage this spring to step away from the profitable business he had developed over 16 years and into the role as only the seventh general manager of KUED in its 52-year history.

Though Dunn had never managed a TV station, as had some of the more than 100 applicants from across the nation, he had volunteered at KUED for more than 25 years and served on its advisory board. He had also produced several documentary films in partnership with the station. Fred Esplin MA’74—KUED general manager for 20 years and now the U’s vice president for Institutional Advancement, who led the search committee—says that Dunn has “very solid fiscal- and people-management skills, fundraising abilities, and a high aptitude for and interest in working with the community. He has a deep understanding of the state in all its plurality.”

Dunn during the cycling portion of the St. George Ironman competition.

Just as important, says Esplin, Dunn has “an optimistic outlook on life and a belief in the good in people and the potential for good.”

In other words, Dunn is not the guy you would hire to promote Grand Theft Auto V. Dunn’s creative style reflects his view that “people remember what they feel more than what they read or see,” and what he wants people to feel is inspired. This, says Esplin, makes him a good match for public television, which “at the core is about enriching the human condition.”

U of U Communication Professor Robert Avery, who has known Dunn since he was a freshman, agrees, noting that “Mike’s sensitivity and compassionate commitment to utilizing the media in service to the public good” makes him a great match for KUED. In addition, says Avery, “he’s a people person and a natural diplomat. He intuitively understands others, he cares about others, and, in his gentle way, he inspires others to achieve their very best.”

KUED welcomed Dunn, a familiar face, even before he began his new role. Prior to taking the helm on May 10, Dunn was meeting one-to-one with each of KUED’s 110 employees. Linda Lane, who greets visitors and answers the phone, says, “That sent a nice message to employees that he is willing to listen and cares about our concerns.”

Mary Dickson BA’76, KUED’s director of Creative Services, adds: “Michael understands the challenges we and the industry are facing. I have no doubt he’ll skillfully usher us into a new era.”

The challenges ahead include attracting a younger demographic, developing new types of funding, broadcasting in media beyond TV, and staying “at the front of the digital age,” explains Dunn. He says he will approach these challenges with the vision of maintaining KUED’s longtime role as “Utah’s best storyteller.” And that vision returns him to what captured his imagination in eighth grade—the power of film to tell a story.

For the record, Dunn “bears” no ill will toward the grizzly. A year after the attack, he dressed up as a bear for Halloween. Dunn eventually wrote a book about the experience, and he has given motivational talks based on what he took from it. “I have felt nothing but profound gratitude for life and an uncanny affinity with bears in general,” he wrote in an essay. The bear, he notes, “never got to tell his side of the story.” The park rangers, however, did exonerate the bear, concluding that it was only trying to protect a ripening patch of berries.

—Susan Vogel is a freelance writer and publisher based in Salt Lake City.


KUED is a public broadcasting station licensed to the University of Utah and broadcasting the core PBS schedule as well as local programming. It is the 16th most-watched public television station in the U.S. A recent study concluded that adults ages 25-75 in the U.S.:

• trust public television more than courts of law, commercial TV networks, newspapers, the federal government, cable networks, and the U.S. congress

• believe that, in terms of the 15% of its budget that the Public Broadcasting Service receives from the federal government, public television delivers more value for their tax dollars than police and law enforcement, the space program, medical and technological research, and federal aid to college students

• feel that the money public television receives from government, corporations, and individuals is “well spent”

• trust public television’s news and public affairs programs more than those on Fox, CNN, NPR, CBS, ABC, NBC, and MSNBC

—Survey by GfK Roper Public Affairs & Media, January 2010

House, Home, Reception Hall

Michael K. and Suzan Young. Photo by John McCarthy

The University of Utah’s First Family resides in a home that accommodates both their public and private lives.

In his previous position as the Fuyo Professor of Japanese Law and Legal Institutions at Columbia University, U of U President Michael K. Young and his wife, Suzan, lived in Japan for two years. During that time, they were guests in people’s homes “only a very few times,” says Suzan. “Only close friends would be invited into homes.”

However fond of Japanese culture, the Youngs, in Utah, practice a different tradition. They open their home to guests at least once or twice a week—for receptions, art exhibits, lectures, and sit-down dinners for as many as 70 guests at a time. Events at a University-owned president’s home have been part of the U’s tradition since 1986, when Joseph (JD’26) and Evelyn Rosenblatt (’29 diploma in elementary education) donated their Federal Heights home to the University to be used as a residence for its presidents and their families.

Photo by John McCarthy

Before 1986, University presidents entertained in campus buildings, such as the Alumni House, or at their own residence. Grethe Peterson, whose husband, Chase Peterson, served as U of U president from 1983 to 1991, says that University events grew too big for their home even after they expanded it. So when the Rosenblatts offered their 9,452-square-foot, four-bedroom, five-bathroom residence on Military Drive to the University, it was gratefully received. The Petersons sold their home and moved into their new quarters, which sit majestically on 1.47 acres adjacent to the University, with perhaps the largest lawn in the neighborhood, one that cries out for Easter egg rolls and wintertime sledding.

Thus began the tradition of U of U presidents living in a home where their public and private lives are separated only by a single interior door.

The Rosenblatt House was built in 1930 for George Mueller, a German immigrant who relocated to Salt Lake City from Los Angeles in 1890, opened a bakery at 212 S. State Street, and married his first wife (the couple later divorced) in 1893. In 1905, Mueller established the Royal Baking Company with plants in Salt Lake City and Ogden. In 1927, he deeded 1,000 acres he owned near Bountiful to Salt Lake City for recreational use; it is now Mueller Park. The following year, Mueller married Florence Kohler Savage, and a year later, construction began on their new home on Military Drive. They would live there until 1944, raising their two daughters as well as two daughters from Mueller’s previous marriage.

Designed by H.C. Pope and H.W. Burton, practicing as Pope & Burton Architects, the Rosenblatt House is located in the Bonneville-on-the-Hill subdivision. University of Utah architectural historian and professor emeritus Peter Goss, co-author of Utah’s Historical Architecture, explains that the original homes in this subdivision are in the “period revival styles that were popular in the post World War I, pre-World War II period, some of which reflected styles that American service people saw during the First World War.” These include English Tudor, French Norman, Spanish Colonial, and, back home, American Colonial. These styles predominated until the end of WWII, when immigrating Europeans brought with them the Bauhaus and International Style, which gained popularity in the post-war years.

Photo courtesy Special Collections, J. Willard Marriott Library, University of Utah

The Rosenblatt House, says Goss, “was designed in the Colonial Revival style that was popular from the 1920s through the 1950s and reflects the 18th-century architecture of New England.”

Many elements of this style can be seen at the formalized entrance to the home, notes Goss: The broken “swan’s neck” pediment over the paneled front door and the engaged (built in) columns on either side of the front door. Hand-riven shingles on the exterior of the house (sometimes called “shake shingles”) and the wood shingled roof reflect New England vernacular architectural influences. Inside, Colonial Revival style can also be seen in the home’s paneled doors, interior decorative moldings and chair rail, and small-paned glass doors to the exterior.

The blueprints for the house (the original architectural drawings were hand drawn, ink on linen) are worthy of framing. The indigo sheets served as both instructions for the builder and as shop drawings for the craftsmen who contributed extensive decorative plasterwork to the interior, draping garlands of fruit along the walls of the high, coved entryway ceiling and affixing ornate medallions onto the living room and dining room ceilings—“Eighteenth-century English architectural influences carried to the Colonies,” says Goss.

Photo by John McCarthy

Pope & Burton, with offices in Salt Lake City and Los Angeles, was a prominent architectural firm of the time. “Their earliest work showed the influence of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Prairie School style [a uniquely American style characterized by low horizontal lines and open interior spaces] due to Pope’s apprenticing in Chicago architectural firms during the first decade of the 20th century,” notes Goss. “After designing a number of chapels and mission homes for the LDS Church, they won an architectural competition for the Cardston Temple in Cardston, Alberta, in 1913, and in 1915 they received the commission for the LDS Hawaiian Temple.” The architects also designed local LDS ward houses (none extant) as well as Utah artist LeConte Stewart’s home in Layton, Utah.

The Rosenblatt House stood out from among its neighbors when it was built, and it still does. “Set high on the large lot overlooking the neighborhood, with a serpentine driveway and an expansive lawn, it has a very palatial feeling,” says Goss. It was large even in comparison to other expansive homes in the original subdivision, many of which were around 3,300 square feet.

And according to Goss, it is unusual that the lot was not leveled to build the structure. Instead, the house itself follows the soft curve of the terrain, which means that there are several steps up into the dining room and kitchen from the main level.

Photo by John McCarthy

Joseph Rosenblatt and his wife, Evelyn, purchased the house in 1946. They lived in it for the next 41 years, raising three sons and one daughter. In the 1950s they added a large library on the north side to accommodate the parties they enjoyed. In the 1960s, under the direction of landscape architect Karsten Hansen, the backyard was turned into an entertainment wonder with the addition of an oval swimming pool (including a diving board), a pool house/cabana, a stately rose garden, and a brick patio, as well as walls and gates for privacy. A kitchen was built in the pool house at some point—its perfectly preserved turquoise appliances and pendant lights place it mid-20th century. In 1969, architect Boyd Blackner converted the garage into a 288-square-foot family room and added to the master bedroom area dressing rooms, an exercise room, and a sauna, totaling 308 square feet.

The Petersons were thrilled with the gift of the Rosenblatt House. They moved in in late 1987 and soon began a tradition of using the home as a venue for gatherings where administrators, faculty, students, alumni, and others could mingle. Among those who have been guests at the home are Mexican poet and diplomat Octavio Paz, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Wallace Stegner BA’30, former German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt, and U.S. Constitutional scholar Lawrence Tribe. Receptions for The Tanner Lectures on Human Values are held at the residence, as are events for the Honors College and the Crimson Club. Currently, President and Mrs. Young host approximately 27 events each year attended by a total of about 2,500 guests.

Photo by John McCarthy

President Arthur and June Smith lived in the home from 1991 to 1997, and President J. Bernard and Chris Machen from 1998 to 2004, when the Youngs took up residence. Since becoming University property, the house and grounds have undergone very little change besides general maintenance. In 1991, the original kitchen was remodeled to accommodate caterers serving sit-down dinners for 50-70 guests.

Subject to the same financial constraints as the University itself, the house does not have a fleet of subcontractors parked curbside on an ongoing basis as do many other homes in the neighborhood. “I am very careful about what I spend, because this is kids’ tuition money,” says Suzan Young. The Youngs have made the house more energy efficient by replacing drafty doors and windows and have done required maintenance, but they have not undertaken any major remodels. The Petersons, too, were thrifty. One day, the Deseret News reported that they had spent $400 on a faucet. “Thank goodness I’d already sent it back for being too expensive,” says Grethe Peterson.

The Youngs have added a hot tub to the backyard at their own expense. And, as her personal gift to the house, Suzan added a sturdy wine rack to replace one that looks as if it’s about to collapse. “Isn’t that funny?” she says, alluding to the fact that two of the Youngs’ children served on missions for the LDS Church, whose members famously shun alcohol. In fact, humor is not lacking in the Young home—one wall is filled with framed Salt Lake Tribune artist Pat Bagley cartoons, including one showing President Young communicating in local Utah-speak—“Shore preesheaycha” and “Oh my heck!”—when interviewing for his job.

Photo by John McCarthy

Bagley is not the only Utah artist represented in the house. The walls of the large living room are reserved for works of art provided by faculty and local Utah artists selected by Suzan. One artist at a time exhibits work on loan for four months. Much of the rest of the house is filled with art and decorative objects the Youngs collected during their many visits to Japan, as well as possibly the largest assemblage of U memorabilia in existence.

Both the Petersons and the Youngs declare that they have not had any problem sharing their lives, as well as their living room, dining room, kitchen, and yard, with the public. (Around one-half of the house and 2,240 square feet of the yard is considered public space.) The Youngs’ lifestyle is casual, and when the huge library is not filled with visitors, it becomes a big, soft playroom for their grandchildren. On a fall day just before Thanksgiving, Suzan was drying apples in a countertop dehydrator and President Young was pushing one-year-old grandson Bryce around the library on a wooden fire engine. (Two-and-a-half-year-old Trevor had “helped” him in his office earlier that morning.)

The Rosenblatt House has long been a special place for the children and grandchildren of the University’s first couple. While the adults have enjoyed lawn parties on warm summer nights, the home’s most attractive feature for kids is the laundry chute. “We were terrified we were going to lose one,” says Grethe Peterson of their grandchildren.

The Rosenblatt House also serves the University well. Teah Caine, a pre-med senior who has attended formal, by-invitation buffet dinners held for the Honors College at the Rosenblatt House, says, “I know that President Young and his wife, Suzan, shake thousands of hands of students each year, but it is the small events held in their home that are the most special for students. President and Mrs. Young make sure they meet and converse with all the students. You really get to know that they care.”

Rosenblatt Philanthropy

Photo courtesy Special Collections, J. Willard Marriott Library, University of Utah

The Rosenblatts’ donation of their home to the University of Utah was inspired by the Jewish tradition of being part of the community and giving back to it. The gift honored the couple’s father/father-in-law, Nathan Rosenblatt, who immigrated to Utah from Russia in 1880 knowing only that it was a place where people who tended to be religiously tolerant lived. Nathan began selling goods to miners from a pushcart and eventually founded the Eastern Iron Metals Company (EIMCO), which developed and manufactured mining equipment. His three sons later joined him in the business. Son Joseph attended the University of Utah and eventually became head of EIMCO. Joseph Rosenblatt often noted his gratitude for the education he received at the U and how the U adds a vibrant element to life in the community.

The Rosenblatt tradition of philanthropy lives on, and not only on Military Way. In honor of Nathan Rosenblatt and his wife, Tillie, the Rosenblatt family currently endows the $40,000 Rosenblatt Prize for Excellence, given annually to a member of the University of Utah faculty who has made an outstanding contribution to teaching, administration, or research.

A lesser-known legacy lies deep in the heart of the Rosenblatt House and is accessible only to its youngest and smallest visitors. In a secret room with a doorway only three feet high is evidence of a childhood drama in the lives of two young Rosenblatts. Pencil writing on the wall reads: “Mindy R and Robby R were stuck in here for 27 min. Tues, 8/22/61.”

—Susan Vogel is a freelance writer and publisher based in Salt Lake City.

Note: The number of Joseph and Evelyn Rosenblatt’s sons and the name of June Smith have been corrected from the print version.