We begin this week with some great news for our graduates. Austin Kocher successfully defended his Ph.D. Dissertation this Wednesday. Austin’s dissertation is titled ‘Notice to Appear: Immigration Courts and the Legal Production of Illegal Immigrants’. Austin’s dissertation explores how immigration courts play a fundamental role in the production of immigrant illegality in the U.S. context. Committee members Joel Wainwright, Mary Thomas (WGSS), and Amna Akbar (Moritz College of Law) joined Advisor Mat Coleman in guiding Austin to completion. Thanks also to the Grad School rep, Bernadette Hanlon (Knowlton School of Architecture). We are all delighted that Austin has completed this work on such a timely topic.

Zhiqi Yu passed his Masters exam this Thursday. Zhiqi’s research paper is titled “Absolute and Relative Location Information Retrieval in Twitter Data: An experimental Study.” His committee includes Harvey Miller, Dan Sui, and Ningchuan Xiao as the advisor. Zhiqi will continue his work here at OSU as a Ph.D. student starting this Autumn.

Jiayong Liang passed her Ph.D. candidacy exam on Thursday afternoon. Jiayong's research proposal is entitled "Flood Detection in Coastal Urban Areas by Fusing Multi-Sensor Imagery, In Situ Information, and Storm Surge Model." Her committee members consist of Ethan Kubatko (Civil, Environmental and Geodetic Engineering), Srinivasan Parthasarathy (Computer Science and Engineering), Steven Quiring, and Desheng Liu (Advisor).

Please join me in congratulating Michael Niedzielski (PhD, 2009) who has just received official word of his promotion and tenure at the University of North Dakota effective this August. Mike completed a dissertation entitled: How far is too far? Spatial and socio-demographic determinants of 'locked-in' commuting. Since that time he has published on transport and urban patterns. Congratulations Mikael We are so proud of our graduates.

I am pleased to pass on the good news that our recent marquee speaker Dr. Karen Seto has been elected to the National Academy of Sciences. I’m pleased to say that Karen was very favorably impressed with her visit to our department. Thanks to Ellen Mosley-Thompson for first passing on this news to me. You read about her recent Robinson Lecture here.

Next Monday, Harvey Miller will present at a conference in Ontario on Big Data in Cities: Barriers & Benefits.

Just to offer a tiny bit of trivia: Brantford is often known as the "Telephone City". Former city resident Alexander Graham Bell invented the device at his father's homestead, Melville House, now the Bell Homestead.

Today, we mark the end of the Spring Semester, wrap up exams and grading, and prepare for the Annual Awards celebration in The Faculty Club. Please join us this afternoon as we celebrate awards and recognitions to students, staff, and faculty. Thanks to Diane Carducci, Caitlin Naber, and Suzanne Mikos for preparing a great slide show. A full list of awardees will appear in next week’s news.