Dalai Lama scholarships

Two UC Irvine undergraduates were named recipients of the XIV Dalai Lama Endowed Scholarship, established in 2004 to recognize UC Irvine students with a demonstrated commitment to ethics and leadership on campus and in the community.

Moran Cohen and Ali Malik each will receive $7,500 and will share an additional $2,500 to promote peace through compassionate, constructive dialogue. They plan to use the funds to launch a yearlong forum on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, according to a statement from UC Irvine.

UCSF chancellor to leave

Chancellor Michael Bishop, who has led UC San Francisco for the past 10 years, today announced plans to step down from his post, effective June 30, 2009. A news release from UCSF notes that Bishop, 72, steered the university through one of its most expansive periods of growth and achievement, which included development from the ground up of a second major campus, establishment of innovative research programs, and record philanthropic support.

He will continue to serve on the UCSF faculty as a professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology and as director of the G.W. Hooper Foundation, a biomedical research unit at UCSF.

UC President Mark Yudof said that his office will begin a national and international search for Bishop's replacement in the near future.

Audit committee to meet

The UC Board of Regents' compliance and audit committee will meet via teleconference on Nov. 3. Beginning at 11 a.m., the committee will convene in closed session to discuss personnel matters and performance of UC personnel.

The committee will then meet in open session to receive information about UC Santa Cruz audit and advisory services and to discuss an update about the Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act, the 2007-08 annual report of the university's external auditors, UC's information technology security inventory, and the 2007-08 annual reports on ethics and compliance services and on internal audit activities.

For the agenda and teleconference locations: www.universityofcalifornia.edu/regents/meetings.html. A live audiocast of the open-session portion of the meeting is available on the Internet. Please see the agenda Web page above for details. For more information about the regents: www.universityofcalifornia.edu/regents.

Communications changes at UCOP

The creation of a new centralized communications unit will transform the way the Office of the President tells the story of UC's public contributions to the people of California, according to a UCOP statement.

Housed under the External Relations division, this newly created department will bring together editorial and creative design services in print, Web and video under one organizational umbrella. It will also handle media relations, speechwriting and marketing and branding efforts.

Alan Hoffman, the recently appointed senior vice president of External Relations, will head the new unit.

— from UC Office of the President