MSU Alumni Magazine, Fall 2004 issue - MSU Alumni Association ...

each demonstrates the diversity,
quality, historical and cultural
content, and community impact
of the council’s grants program
over the years.
The MSU Museum’s Great
Lakes Folk Festival was named
“Most Outstanding Humanities
Project, 1974-2004.” This annual
event, produced by the
Michigan Traditional Arts Program
at the MSU Museum,
showcases the traditional cultural
treasures of the nation’s Upper
Midwest and a sampling of the
best of traditional artists from
around the country and the
world.
“The MSU Museum is honored
by this recognition by the
Michigan Humanities Council
on the occasion of their 30th
anniversary,” says Kurt Dewhurst,
museum director. “The
projects recognized reflect truly
successful collaborations with
other community partners to
connect humanities scholars
with public life of the people of
Michigan.”
The other winners included
Kresge Art Museum’s “Wrapped
Words: Handmade Books from
Cuba’s Ediciones Vigia” (2002),
and the MSU Museum’s “Uneasy
Years: Michigan Jewry During
Depression and War” (2003)
and “A Community Between
Two Worlds: Arab Americans in
Greater Detroit” (1998).
DETROIT VOICES AT MSU
The words of prominent
African Americans such as author
Alex Haley, musician
James Brown, and former Detroit
Piston Dave Bing will be
accessible to the public through
an online archive at MSU.
The project—Voices From
Detroit: American Black Journal
Online—will give access to
interviews from Detroit Public
Television’s “American Black
Journal” over the past 36 years.
“This project underscores
MSU’s 21st century land-grant
commitment to inclusion and of
offering the community broad
access to knowledge,” says Lou
Anna K. Simon, MSU provost
and president-designate. “It is an
outstanding example of a longterm
collaborative partnership
that links university researchers
with external organizations.”
Funding is provided by a
$285,000 grant from the National
Endowment for the Humanities.
GRANT FOR MSU
COLLEGE OF LAW
MSU College of Law has been
awarded a $100,000 grant to help
ALUMNI CAREER
SERVICES
By Keith A. Williams,
Executive Director
I’m pleased to announce another
member benefit. As
an agreement with MSU
Career Services and Placement, if you graduated
from MSU one year ago or more and need career
guidance, the MSU Alumni Association will be at
your service. Effectively immediately, the
MSUAA will be your contact point for a wide array
of career services.
To avail yourself of our Alumni Career Services,
you need to be a member of the MSUAA.
Membership in the MSUAA gives you access to
our database of alumni, regional clubs, and college
constituent groups, networking tools that can really
be helpful in advancing your career, especially in
the second or third career transition stages. We
have an experienced staff that can help with all the
issues facing job seekers, including placement contacts,
how to write resumes, how to plan a jobseeking
campaign, and so on.
We hope this service will also bring many young
alumni, who are most likely to use our career services,
into our association. The more people who
join us, the stronger and more useful our network
becomes. Alumni who receive job search help from
create and support
the college’s new
Small Business/
Nonprofit/Entrepreneurial
Law Clinic.
“The goals of the
new clinic are to assist
would-be and
existing small business
owners in developing
their entrepreneurial
prowess, to counsel
Michigan’s many nonprofit entities
in their business endeavors,
and to provide a rare opportunity
for MSU law students to develop
special expertise in transactional
business law practice,”
says professor Michele Halloran,
tax clinic director and clinical
professor.
The grant is funded
by the Coleman
Foundation’s Awareness
and Education
program. MSU is
currently working to
match funds from
law firms and alumni.
The clinic is the
seventh in the college
to provide community service in
the Lansing area. Second- and
third-year law students, under
the supervision of Halloran,
clinical programs director and
clinical professor MaryAnn
Pierce and other attorneys, offer
legal services to a wide array of
clients.
our Alumni Career Services can participate in the
MSU Alumni Network (ACAN), which helps current
students in the career exploration process.
Check out our web site at www.msualum.
com/careers. Here you can link to top-notch employers,
post your resumes for review by employers,
examine job listings posted by employers seeking
MSU alumni, and have your resume critiqued
if needed. Career assessment resources are also
available.
Our network of volunteer leaders in regional
clubs throughout Michigan, the United States and
around the world can provide career help. Some
alumni volunteers are willing to distribute cover
letters and resumes from alumni to MSU alumni
in their geographical areas. Constituent groups on
campus operate similarly.
Employers can post job listings for experienced
applicants on the Alumni Career Services web site
at www.msualum.com/careers/jobs/ or send them
to jobs@msualum.com. In addition, a resume
database is provided (free) so employers can review
the resumes of MSU alumni of interest. I can tell
you, based on many testimonials and even gifts
we’ve received from successful alumni, that this
process works.
Go Green!
PAGE 8
FALL 2004
MSU ALUMNI MAGAZINE