Surge in enrollment sets engineering-school records

Published in the Oct. 26, 2011, issue

At the engineering school, the numbers are up: The biggest freshman class ever. A boom in course enrollment. A jump in sponsored research funding. More classroom and research space. “It’s been a really good period,” said H. Vincent Poor *77 of his first...Read more

A pause in progress toward meeting grade-deflation goal

Published in the Oct. 26, 2011, issue

Though the University had hoped to limit A’s to 35 percent of all undergraduate course grades as part of its grade-deflation policy, faculty members have found the target to be elusive.  The Faculty Committee on Grading reported Sept. 19 that 40.1 percent ...Read more

Endowment rises to $17.1 billion with annual return of 21.9 percent

Published in the Oct. 26, 2011, issue

The University’s endowment earned a 21.9 percent return on investment for the year ending June 30, growing from $14.4 billion to $17.1 ­billion.  The endowment provides about half of Princeton’s annual operating budget. Despite the strong financial...Read more

Professors share Nobel Prize in economics

Published in the Oct. 26, 2011, issue

Christopher Sims, the Harold Helm ’20 Professor of Economics and Banking, was awarded the 2011 Nobel Prize in economics Oct. 10. Sims shares the prize with Thomas Sargent, an economics professor at New York University, who is a visiting professor at...Read more

A biographer’s view of de Kooning’s work

Published in the Oct. 26, 2011, issue

[Image removed in accordance with one-year limit for usage online.]Read more

FYI: Findings

Published in the Oct. 26, 2011, issue

Keeping cool Yawning may be more than an oral stretch for the sleepy. New research by a Princeton postdoc suggests that yawning helps to regulate brain temperature in humans. The study, by evolutionary biologist Andrew Gallup and colleague Omar Eldakar of...Read more

A master class in opera: Tips from Costanzo ’04

Published in the Oct. 26, 2011, issue

After Katie Dubbs ’14 took“Music 214: Projects in Vocal Performance Opera” last fall, she wanted to provide more opportunities for Princeton’s talented classical singers to perform. So last winter she and Maddy Bernstein ’12 co-founded the Princeton Opera...Read more

In this course, musicians are front and center

Published in the Oct. 26, 2011, issue

The kind of music that the duo Alasdair Fraser and Natalie Haas play — contemporary Scottish folk music — is not the type that one can learn merely by playing notes on a page. Musicians learn by ear, directly from each other — watching and listening to see...Read more

In Brief

Published in the Oct. 26, 2011, issue

A group of area residents filed a lawsuit in early October that seeks to block the University from moving the Dinky train station 460 feet south of its current location, as part of the arts and transit neighborhood proposal.  The complaint argues that...Read more

Allen to step down as dean of architecture

Published in the Oct. 26, 2011, issue

Stanley Allen *88 will step down at the end of the ­academic year after 10 years as dean of the School of Architecture.  “I believe the time is right both for me to move on and for someone new to come in and build on what I have accomplished,” Allen said, ...Read more

From Princeton’s vault

The lost art of autograph canes

Published in the Oct. 26, 2011, issue

What: The rural folk tradition of cane carving briefly flowered into a ­college fad during the Civil War era.  In 1863, Clay MacCauley 1864 returned from fighting in the Civil War, during which he was briefly imprisoned by the Confederates in Virginia, to a...Read more