FEBRUARY MARCH 1999 
SHORT TAKES ON BIG SUBJECTS
Chemist leads the faculty
Robley Light - a chemistry professor who has been recognized numerous times for his research - was elected president of the Faculty Senate last year.
Light joined the FSU chemistry faculty in 1962, after studying at Duke and Harvard.
From 1983 to 1990, he was chairman of FSU's department of chemistry. He has been a successful grant seeker, a textbook writer and winner of teaching awards.
His research subject has been lipid metabolism and fungal secondary metabolism.
Caribbean law reform
Since 1988, Florida State's law school has been involved in helping Caribbean countries (except Cuba) write laws in dispute resolution, environmental protection and anti-trust regulation.
A recent grant from the U. S. Agency for International Development allows FSU to continue its law reform assistance in the Caribbean.
The Caribbean Law Institute is a joint project with the University of the West Indies in Barbados.
Elwin Griffith, the institute's director, said Caribbean courts are backlogged with civil cases that could be solved with mediation or arbitration if legal mechanisms were on the books.
The Caribbean nations - all are islands - are searching for protections for their tourism, fishing and other ocean-dependent activities.
And, Griffith said, the islands' economies need fair-competition measures that are taken for granted in the United States.
Scientist on a roll
A Florida State graduate - Mark Thiemens, who earned a Ph.D. in oceanography in 1977 - is doing impressive work at the University of California in San Diego.
Thiemens is studying greenhouse warming and ozone depletion. In 1991, he discovered the "mass independent isotope effect," which applies to the study of global climate, greenhouse gases, acid rain, stratospheric ozone chemistry and chemical physics.
Because of that discovery and subsequent achievements, Thie-mens, now a professor of chemistry and biochemistry at UCSD, won a major national award last year - the U.S. Department of Energy's Ernest O. Lawrence Award in the category of environmental science and technology.
Investment matchmaker
FSU and the Small Business Administration have teamed up to offer investors and entrepreneurs in Florida a way to find each other on the Internet.
The service is administered by FSU's Jim Moran Institute for Global Entrepreneurship in the College of Business.
For information on how to be a part of ACE-Net, call Jerry Oster-young at the Moran Institute. To participate, businesses must have a well developed business plan and investors must have a minimum net worth of $1 million or annual income of at least $200,000. Qualified investors and entrepreneurs will be able to search nationwide.
It must be pretty good
If you aren't sure what a successful dissertation looks like, find a copy of Doug Pearson's. The dissertation that made him Dr. Doug Pearson - a comprehensive investigation of negligent liability in American colleges and universities - won the Outstanding Dissertation Award of the Education Law Association. It's the fourth time a graduate of Florida State's higher-education program has won the national award.
More on finance
FSU is expanding its masters of business administration program - allowing MBA students to begin a concentration in finance. FSU College of Business officials said the expansion would make grads more marketable in an era of mergers and acquisitions.
Another smoking risk
Smoking can hurt you even when you're not doing it, according to a study performed by an FSU associate professor of psychology, Rolf Zwaan.
Through a preliminary study of 36 smokers and 36 non-smokers, he found that when smokers are reminded of their habit, they cannot comprehend as well as non-smokers. They may see a pack of cigarettes, cigarette advertisements or someone smoking and find it difficult to follow a lecture, study, take exams or do a work-related task. Once they were allowed to have a cigarette, however, they were fine.
Arts and social work
Florida State's School of Social Work has had well-publicized success with The Boys' Choir of Tallahassee.
Earle Lee, the director of the choir, notes that the 130 boys in the choir (all great singers) have a new tendency to academic success as well: 80 percent have high GPAs, more than half are on the honor rolls and six are on deans' lists.
Dianne Montgomery, dean of the School of Social Work, has decided to spread the success. Her school and the School of Visual Arts and Dance have started an "arts and community practice certificate program," which will teach the use of the arts in the practice of social work.
"We believe this certificate is the only one of its kind to be offered by a social work school in the United States," said social work Professor Nick Mazza.
Learning to buy
Shoppers who get attached to certain stores can thank the hard-working buyers who know what needs to be in the store, and put it there.
Since there's more than instinct involved, Florida State's College of Human Sciences has a course in buying in its department of textiles and consumer sciences.
Now Burdines, one of the successful stores that depend on good buyers, has given the department a $150,000 grant (with a state match of $75,000) to set up a merchandising technology lab.
The lab, and other technology supplied by Burdines, gives students a simulated buying environment where they can learn business analysis, merchandising management and marketing, financial management and administration.
PGA accreditation
The Professional Golf Association, or PGA of America, has agreed to accredit FSU's professional golf management program next fall. FSU has pursued PGA accreditation since 1993, when it launched the golf program, a major in the College of Business's hospitality administration department.
Working the Super Bowl
Two FSU alums were significant players in the 33rd Super Bowl - not on the field but behind the scenes
Alejandro "Alex" Munoz (B.A '90, M.S.P. '92) was the executive director of the South Florida Super Bowl XXXIII Host Committee. Janine Robinson (B.S '85) was the in-house Counsel/Corporate Relations Director of the committee.
No. 1 CPA
Another star, in another field, is Alison Riley, who took Florida's CPA exam last May and came in first of the approximately 1,000 who were tested that day. Riley had earned a bachelor's in accounting in 1995 and a master's in 1997, both at Florida State.
School board member
Georgia "Joy" Bowen, a Florida State employee with 20 years of helping students, is now on board to help 30,000 more. She's been elected to the Leon County School Board. Bowen is executive assistant to FSU's vice president for multi-cultural affairs.
Beating out Harvard
Not to brag or anything, but Florida State competitors love it when they're declared superior to rivals from Harvard, Cornell, Johns Hopkins and places like that - academically superior.
It happened (not the first time) last fall at the Model United Nations in Washington, D. C., where FSU came in second overall (William and Mary was first) and first or second in nine categories. More FSU students won awards than the students of any other university.
The competition involves public speaking, research, diplomacy and writing. Sponsors say it may be the fastest growing university activity in the country.
Advice for a governor
You don't have to be enrolled in Florida State to get advice from professors. Just be a governor.
Jeb Bush, Florida's new Republican governor, has been given a 37-page "decision transition" hand-book put together for him by FSU, Florida Tax Watch and the Florida Chamber of Commerce.
The book has advice from seven past Florida governors, including Reubin Askew, an FSU grad and now an FSU professor. What did he tell Bush?
"Always set aside appropriate time for your family."
Two days of dancing
Not eager to run a marathon? How about dancing one? Or watching students dance one? Try the fourth annual Dance Marathon in Tully Gym on FSU's campus.
The Dance Marathon will raise awareness and money for the Children's Miracle Network at Shands Hospital. It starts at noon on Saturday, March 27, and shakes until 8 p.m. Sunday the 28th. For information call Hannelore Robins at 850/513-0993.