Today is a special anniversary, though likely unknown to many. On this day in 1887, the Hatch Act — named for Rep. William Henry Hatch of Missouri — was enacted into law. This somewhat unheralded piece of legislation provided the federal funding mechanism for the agricultural experiment station system at land-grant universities, including the University of Idaho. The Idaho Agricultural Experiment Station — the College of Agricultural and Life Sciences' research umbrella — is the outgrowth of that act here in Idaho. If you’ve driven by our farm fields, seen our booming food industries or met a U of I graduate with a great career connected to agriculture in some way, you’ve seen why March 2 is a noteworthy day for this university, Idaho and the nation. I’m in Washington, D.C., this week to share that story of deeply rooted success with industry leaders, alumni and members of our state’s congressional delegation. We may have started with an emphasis in agriculture, but over 129 years our $109 million research enterprise has grown and flourished in many areas. Traditional areas of excellence include fire science, rangeland management and water resources, among others. Emerging fields like computer science and partnerships with leaders like the Idaho National Laboratory put U of I on the cutting edge of critical issues and societal challenges such as cybersecurity and clean energy. One project that highlights our leadership progress and potential is the Idaho Center for Agriculture, Food and the Environment. A sustainable source of protein is absolutely critical to health and prosperity not just in Idaho but across the world — few things could me more central to life. With what will be the nation’s largest research dairy, U of I will be the leader in delivering the research and teaching expertise that helps meets that essential need. We’ll also contribute to an Idaho economy where livestock is 61 percent of agricultural cash receipts, where we are fourth nationally in milk production, and where food processing has been a boon to southern Idaho, especially in the Magic Valley. William Hatch would be proud of this project! He’d also be proud of the connection between research and education. Research is not in a silo at U of I — students both benefit and contribute. In fact, most Vandal undergraduates participate in research and scholarship, high-impact experiences that promote persistence toward a degree and prepare students for success after graduation. I’ve reminded people this week that 90 percent of Vandal graduates have a job or plans for future study as they complete their degrees, and after they’ve been in the workforce, they lead graduates of all other Idaho institutions in career earnings – financial stability that underpins contributions to families and communities. One notable example of graduate success I’ve been pointing to is College of Engineering graduate Tom Mueller. If you’ve heard of SpaceX, and seen their progress in launching rockets to explore space, you’ve seen Tom’s work in action. As a kid in St. Marie’s, Idaho, he wanted to fix airplanes. His teacher asked him, “Why not design the airplanes?” The University of Idaho, just down the road, had an engineering program that helped launch his career. Today he's the chief technology officer of propulsion and one of the founding employees of a game-changing company whose next stop is Mars. I’m proud to announce here that Tom will join as U of I our commencement keynote speaker this May. What a great example for our graduates and others. How many more young Tom Muellers are out there, looking for a chance to do something they might never have expected? That’s the land-grant mission — provide opportunities for the people of our great state, deliver research helps us grow and prosper, and foster a vital connection to our communities. I’m glad I got to tell that story this week. Now, home to Idaho. | | Go Vandals! Chuck Staben President | | | Daughter Honors Father with MFA Scholarship Endowment Last year, Julia Ames began raising money for the Leo Edwin Ames Arts Scholarship Endowment in honor of her father and long-time creative director of university publications, Leo Ames ’65. This important endowment marks the first scholarship available for Master of Fine Arts students in U of I's art program. In addition to raising over $9,000 toward the scholarship endowment so far, Julia has named her father’s scholarship as the beneficiary of a life insurance policy. If you would like to learn more about the Leo Edwin Ames Arts Scholarship Endowment or giving to UI, contact Eric Billings, director of Annual Giving, at 208-885-5369 or ebillings@uidaho.edu. | | Fighting Poverty, ONE Step at a Time This article was written by Taylor Nadauld and published in the Moscow-Pullman Daily News on Wednesday, Feb. 21, 2018. Read the original article here. University of Idaho Martin Institute Director Bill Smith has been with the university for 17 years, but his student Abby Rowe is the first he has seen to triple-major in international studies, crop management and Spanish. Rowe, 19, comes from a rural farming town in southeast Idaho. Were she to keep with tradition, she would continue a fifth-generation legacy of family farmers. Someday, Rowe said, she may go that route, but right now, she's focusing her knowledge and skills on an international cause: fighting poverty in Africa. This Saturday, Rowe will travel to the 2018 ONE Power Summit in Washington, D.C., representing the ONE Campaign, an international, nonpartisan organization that fights poverty in countries around the world and focuses particularly on poverty in Africa. Co-founded by U2 lead singer Bono, the campaign solicits students from around the world to participate in advocacy efforts for countries in poverty. When its members contacted Smith about a year ago, he knew Rowe should be the one to establish the UI's own chapter. Read more. | | Turning Trash to Treasure Last summer, Kenny Sheffler filled a water bottle with excrement from his brother’s dog and left the contraption in the sun. Within a day, the bottle had inflated and the waste had decomposed — turning into biogas and fertilizer. “It was really disgusting,” said Sheffler, a junior at the University of Idaho. But the gross combo was the beginning stages of a clean energy system, aided by anaerobic digestion, which can produce fuel suitable for cooking and even heating homes. An electrical engineering major in the College of Engineering, Sheffler was inspired to build his own backyard digester after studying at the University of the South Pacific (USP) in Suva, Fiji, during the 2017 spring semester. Nearly everyone living in the island’s rural communities has a similar, albeit more advanced, set up, Sheffler said. The reasons are twofold: the 7,056 square-mile country has little space for landfills; also, the citizens of the island nation experience the impacts of climate change on a daily basis. It’s why the country aspires to become 100 percent reliant on clean energy by 2030, and it’s what attracted Sheffler to study abroad at USP in the first place. A Potlatch native, Sheffler has aspirations of working for a renewable energies firm on global projects — especially in developing nations vulnerable to the carbon footprint of larger countries like the U.S. and China. Read more. | | | | |