Conflict of interest training

UC is rolling out two online conflict of interest briefings — one for "designated officials," or employees authorized to spend university funds, and the other one for researchers who receive gifts or grants.

Launched May 8, the online course for designated officials takes about one hour to complete. Similar to the recent UC ethics training exercise, the conflict of interest course can be taken on any computer with Internet access.

Respondents were to receive an e-mail from ucethics@ucop.edu with personalized links to the course site. The course will remain available throughout the year, and participants are encouraged to bookmark it for future reference.

On May 14, UC will distribute an online course for researchers who brought in more than $1,000 from private gifts or grants last year. The online training takes about half an hour to finish and will help researchers handle the kind of conflict of interest situations that may arise during their work. As with the other briefing, researchers will receive e-mails with instructions on how to complete the exercise.

The briefings were developed by a UC team of faculty and research staffs from various campuses, the UC Office of the President's Office of Research, and a vendor, Workplace Answers. In January, UC asked all employees to complete the online training exercise, "Ethics at UC," in the wake of legislators' concerns about UC conflict of interest and compensation issues.

Whole Earth Festival

The 38th annual Whole Earth Festival takes place on the Quad from noon to 10 p.m. today, 9 a.m. to 10 p.m. tomorrow and 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Sunday.

"Arise, Smile and Be the Change" is the the theme of this year's event.

About 30,000 people typically attend the festival. Admission is free. Those planning to attend the Whole Earth Festival are encouraged to bike, walk, ride the bus or car pool.

Vet Med facility renamed

The School of Veterinary Medicine's teaching hospital is now officially the William R. Pritchard Veterinary Medical Teaching Hospital.

At a ceremony April 25, UC Davis officials dedicated the hospital to acknowledge the leadership of former Dean William Pritchard in shaping veterinary training throughout the United States and Canada.