CAMPUS/SPORTS

Channing named Academic All-American

New Mexico State men’s basketball player Eric Channing was named to the 2001 Verizon Academic All America Basketball Team in March. Channing was named a first team All-American and is one of 15 student-athletes in the nation honored for success in the class-room as well as on the playing court. He is the only player from the Sun Belt Conference represented and the only junior to garner first team honors. To be eligible for the team, student athletes must be a starter or top reserve and must have a minimum 3.20 overall grade-point average. A 6-4 guard majoring in business, Channing was second in the conference in scoring and led the Sun Belt in free throw percentage this season. He was the leading scorer for the Aggies with an 18.6 points-per-game average and scored in double-digits in 27 of the team’s 28 games during the season. Channing, who is from Wheaton, Ill., became the 23rd player in school history to reach the 1,000-point plateau in a career and finished the season ranked seventh on the all-time Aggie scoring list with 1,360 points.

Channing Photo by Michael Kiernan

New Mexico State University 2001 Football Schedule
Aug. 23 Sept. 1 Sept. 8 Sept. 15 Sept. 22 Sept. 29 Oct. 6 Oct. 13 Oct. 27 Nov. 3 Nov. 10 Nov. 17	at Louisville^ at Texas Oregon State at New Mexico at Kansas State at Louisiana-Monroe* at Tulsa Idaho* at Middle Tennessee* North Texas* Arkansas State* at Louisiana-Lafayette*	TBA TBA 7 p.m. TBA noon 5 p.m. 1 p.m. 6 p.m. 1 p.m. 3 p.m. 3 p.m. 3 p.m.
The Sept. 8 Oregon State game replaces the traditional University of Texas-El Paso game. Oregon State, the nation’s fourth-ranked football team last season, will be the first Pac-10 school to play in Las Cruces. ^ Inaugural John Thompson Foundation Football Challenge Classic * Sun Belt Conference game Home games in bold All times Mountain

Henson becomes Aggies’ winningest coach

Henson Photo by Matt Bernhardt

Setting milestones has become a common occurrence for Aggie basketball coach Lou Henson, ’55, ’56. After last season’s 14-14 record, Henson became New MexicoState’s all-time winning coach with a 250-117 record. The Aggie coach also became the 10th winningest coach in National Collegiate Athletic Association Division I history. He passed long-time University of Missouri coach Norm Stewart for the 10th slot with an overall coaching record of 740-377. His 740 victories rank him in the top five among active Division I coaches. Henson’s career covers four seasons at Hardin Simmons, 21 at the University of Illinois and 13 at his alma mater.

Cooperative Extension Service to receive
$1 million for 4-H outreach

New Mexico State University’s Cooperative Extension Service will receive $1 million in federal funding for 4-H outreach to at-risk youth and strengthening 4-H clubs in New Mexico.

4-H, which stands for head, heart, hands and health, is the world’s largest youth organization, with 6.4 million members. It helps young people gain the life skills they need to become productive citizens, using a hands-on, “learn by doing” approach. New Mexico 4-H programs began in 1911.

U.S. Justice Department funding approved Feb. 1 for New Mexico includes about $750,000 for at-risk youth programs and nearly $300,000 for 4-H youth development program support.

The money will be used to hire six new 4-H agents for three years, said Jesse Holloway, 4-H department head. The program will target areas with at-risk youth populations and understaffed county extension offices, he said.

“The new 4-H agents will spend three-quarters of their time in outreach to youth at-risk, to establish new clubs with those groups,” he said. “The other quarter of the agents’ time will be spent in working with the 4-H programs already in place.”

Six counties will be selected for new staff based on proposals submitted to district extension directors. New agents are expected to begin work in the fall, Holloway said. The 4-H funding stems from a very supportive congressional delegation, he said.

“This fits very well with one of the major goals we’re emphasizing, which is strengthening our 4-H club programs,” Holloway said. “Adding six new agents to work with new audiences and in areas where we’re not represented should certainly strengthen our overall 4-H program.”

Currently, 50,200 youth in New Mexico participate in 4-H. About 7,600 are enrolled in traditional 4-H clubs, and the rest take part in school enrichment or special-interest programs, Holloway said.

“This funding will provide additional 4-H opportunities for youth from various communities and settings to experience hands-on learning,” said Linda Schultz, state 4-H specialist. “Any time we can help youth succeed and gain skills in the process, we all win as a society.”

D’Lyn Ford, ’97

Business Hall of Fame inducts four New Mexico State’s College of Business Administration and Economics inducted four distinguished alumni into its Business Hall of Fame April 21. The four included retired Lt. Gen. Robert D. Chelberg, ’74, of Aiken, S.C.; Hugh F. Barham, ’42, of Columbus, Ga.; Michael P. “Mickey” Clute, ’68, of Las Cruces; and Kevin Johnson, ’81, of Seattle, Wash. Chelberg, who earned a Master of Business Administration degree, has held numerous positions of authority in the U.S. Army during a 32-year career. Barham, who entered what was then the New Mexico College of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts in the 1930s, also had a distinguished military career and is co-owner of a national restaurant chain. Clute, who received a Bachelor of Arts in business administration, is president of GenCon Corp., a major New Mexico contractor. Johnson, formerly of Los Alamos, N.M., received a Bachelor of Business Administration and is now vice president of U.S. sales and service for Microsoft.

New Mexico State’s College of Business Administration and Economics Business Hall of Fame inductees include, from left, Rod Barham, who accepted for his father Hugh Barham, ’42, Mickey Clute, ’68, Kevin Johnson, ’81, and Bob Chelberg, ’74. Photo by Jack Diven

All courses for an MBA at New Mexico State switch to night schedule

In response to the growing number of full-time workers interested in obtaining a higher degree, New Mexico State University changed its master of business administration program to an entirely night schedule, said Wayne Headrick, director of the MBA program.

“We saw that in the region there was a demand for an MBA program on the part of professionals who work full time and that, to provide a high-quality degree to both full- and part-time students, it would have to be a night program,” he said.

Headrick said that, in making the change, the College of Business and Economics worked closely with its Business Advisory Council, composed of business and professional people from around the region. The aim was to make the MBA program available to a wider spectrum of students, while retaining the high quality of the existing program, he said.

All the courses are taught by professors with doctorates in the subject. Because of its high academic standards, the program is accredited by the International Association for Management Education, making its students eligible for the financial assistance programs offered by some private businesses, government and professional organizations, he said.

But, while maintaining a level of academic rigor in keeping with a university degree, the MBA program’s reorganization makes it accessible to students juggling a full-time work load, he added.

“We’ve set up the program so that both full- and part-time students are studying in a night program. At the same time, we’ve scheduled the courses so that a full-time student can begin the program in a fall semester and complete it in one calendar year,” he said.

“We also have schedules for those who want to finish in two, three or even four years, with or without summer attendance,” he added.

In the fall and spring, courses in the program are offered on a one-night-a-week schedule, starting at 6 p.m. During the summer, the courses will be scheduled for two nights a week, Headrick said.

Since the program was reorganized in the fall of 2000, he added, response to the change in schedule has been positive. The MBA program has been adding students to its roster as fast as the other students graduate. The program is maintaining its full-time population and attracting more and more part-time enrollees, he said.

“Our enrollment is counter to the national trend, where enrollment in most MBA programs is tending downward,” he said.

To be eligible for the program, students must have completed a core group of business and management courses, some of which can be replaced by business experience. They must be admitted into New Mexico State’s graduate school and pass the Graduate Management Admissions Test, he said.

For more information, call (505) 646-8003; e-mail mba@nmsu.edu; or check the Web site at mba.nmsu.edu.

Jack King

Professor lays groundwork for anti-air pollution program

New Mexico State University economics professor Soumendra Ghosh is helping to lay the groundwork for a program that could provide incentives for controlling air pollution in the United States-Mexico border region.

Ghosh has received a $233,000 grant from the Environmental Protection Agency to conduct workshops and seminars along the border from California to Texas on a process known as “emissions permit trading.” Under an emissions trading program, businesses receive permits allowing them to emit a certain amount of polluting substances. If a business reduces the amount of a pollutant it emits, it can sell the remaining pollution credits granted in the permit to another entity.

By instituting emissions permit trading along the border, authorities could show polluters that it pays to reduce emissions, rather than threatening them with government sanctions, Ghosh said, adding that a cross-border emissions trading program will require intense negotiations between the United States and Mexico and is still years away.

General Dynamics opens new satellite center

General Dynamics Space Systems Services officially opened its new SpacePlex on the south side of the New Mexico State University campus in a ceremony this spring.

The new facility can provide satellite command and control services, network operations and ground-station support for up to 100 satellites.

The company had been operating from a smaller center at New Mexico State’s Genesis Center since late 1997. More than 20 students have worked at the center, getting hands-on experience in the fast-growing field of commercial space systems.

Mike Chandler, president of General Dynamics Worldwide Telecommunications Systems, said one of the reasons the company chose the university location was to be able “to partner with a Space Grant university.” He noted that New Mexico State has a Center for Space Telemetering and Telecommunications that is recognized as a center of excellence in the field.

The SpacePlex is located in the Arrowhead Research Park in the southeastern corner of the main campus.

Researchers creating self-monitoring bridge inspection system

New Mexico State University researchers are developing a new self-monitoring system to test and evaluate the safety of bridges, said Gabe Garcia, assistant professor of mechanical engineering.

With a $225,000, four-year grant from the National Science Foundation, Garcia and his research assistants
will develop a system that will allow the bridges to be monitored under normal operating conditions. The grant is part of NSF’s Career Award program, which is intended to help top-performing scientists and engineers in the early stages of their academic careers.

Currently, vibration-based methods used to test bridges require shutting a bridge down and “exciting” it with a machine called a “shaker.” The method is expensive and is not practical for bridges that have large amounts of traffic, Garcia said.

Under the proposed self-monitoring system, sensors placed on the bridge will be linked to a “data acquisition system” composed of an analog-to-digital signal converter and a small computer. The system will acquire data about the bridge’s condition at specified intervals and report the results of the tests to a central computer.

Goddard Restored The restoration of Goddard Hall was completed in early May. Designed by noted architect Henry Trost, the New Mexico State landmark was built in 1913 and expanded in the 1930s and 1960s. Its tower is one of the campus’ most recognizable landmarks. During the restoration, the interior was completely replaced, but exterior walls on the north and east sides were preserved and reinforced. New classrooms, seminar rooms, offices and lab space for the College of Engineering also were added. The National Science Foundation contributed about $1.5 million toward restoration. Another $1 million came from alumni and friends of the university. The remaining amount came from New Mexico severance taxes and general obligation bonds. Photo by Michael Kiernan