Stories this week at Wake Forest

Nobel Laureate to Speak at Opening Convocation

Oscar Arias Sanchez, former president of Costa Rica and a Nobel Peace Prize recipient, will deliver the Opening Convocation address, “Diversity, Globalization, and Human Security: A Call to Responsibility,” at 11 a.m. on Thursday, Sept. 17, in Wait Chapel. Immediately following convocation, Arias will be available for questions during a brief press conference in Reynolda Hall, Room 208. The free, public event will officially begin the Year of Globalization and Diversity, a yearlong series of events focused on the world’s development into a more global community. For more information, visit the Year of Globalization and Diversity Web site.

Astronaut Brings Toys in Space to Earth

Former astronaut Rhea Seddon will help more than 1,400 North Carolina students learn important physics principles with some of their favorite toys Monday, Sept. 21. “Toys in Space” is a Science STARS program at the Lawrence Joel Veterans Memorial Coliseum Annex. “Toys in Space” features Seddon, a veteran of three shuttle flights-including one of NASA’s first “Toys in Space” payloads in 1985 aboard the Shuttle Discovery. The program also features Carolyn Sumners, director of astronomy at the Houston Museum of Natural Sciences and author of the best-selling “Toys in Space” curriculum developed from the NASA experiments. Science STARS is an affiliated program of Wake Forest University. To arrange interviews of Seddon or Sumners, contact Sharon Carter at 750-0233.

Secrets of the Suds

Mere millionths of an inch thick, found in countless bathtubs and toy stores, soap bubbles nevertheless are more than just efficient enclosers of air, says popular math columnist, TV show host and award-winning professor Frank Morgan. They teach us about the math found in daily life. Morgan will share those secrets- and award prizes to his audience for their own bubbles-at 8 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 23, at Wake Forest’s Brendle Recital Hall. The lecture, “The Soap Bubble Geometry Contest,” is free and open to the public.

Undercover Journalist Who Exposed Neo-Nazis to Speak

Yaron Svoray, journalist and author of “In Hitler’s Shadow,” will speak at Wake Forest on Thursday, Sept. 24, at 7:30 p.m. in Benson University Center, Room 401. The Israeli son of Holocaust survivors, Svoray risked his life to expose the growing threat of Germany’s neo-Nazi movement. Working with the Simon Wiesenthal Center, he went undercover as “Ron Furey,” a Nazi sympathizer and supporter. His book was made into the critically acclaimed HBO film, “The Infiltrator.” The free event, sponsored by the Student Union, is open to the public.

Wake Forest to Host Thornton Wilder Symposium

A. Tappan Wilder, nephew of Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Thornton Wilder, will discuss his famous uncle at “Thornton Wilder’s Legacy,” a symposium hosted by Wake Forest Sept. 25-26. The symposium will begin with a lecture by A. Tappan Wilder at 3 p.m. Friday afternoon, Sept. 25, followed by the opening performance of “The Matchmaker,” presented by the Wake Forest University Theater. The symposium will continue on Saturday with Winston-Salem biographer Penelope Niven, who is writing a new biography of Thornton Wilder. Symposium events will take place in Scales Fine Arts Center, Room 102. For a more detailed schedule, contact the News Service.

Categories: Arts & Culture, Events, Research, Speakers