Aggie baseball player drafted

UC Davis third baseman Daniel Descalso was selected by the defending World Series champion St. Louis Cardinals with the 112th pick in the third round of the 2007 Major League Baseball first-year player draft.

Descalso, a junior from San Carlos, becomes the highest Aggie taken in the draft, surpassing Justin Reid, who was drafted in the fourth round by the Pittsburgh Pirates in 1999. He is only one of six UC Davis players to be selected in the top 10 rounds and is the first Aggie to be drafted since Ryan Coultas went in the sixth round in 2004 to the New York Mets.

This season Descalso put up some of the best all-around numbers in the history of the program as his .397 batting average, 92 hits and 22 doubles rank second all-time. Descalso also led the team in almost every offensive category — 44 RBIs, 132 total bases, 35 walks, a .474 on-base percentage and a .569 slugging percentage.

This spring, UC Davis baseball finished its final year of reclassification to NCAA Division I status with an overall record of 24-32. The Aggies become official members of the Big West Conference next season.

Horse auction scheduled

A crowd of 100 potential buyers and horse enthusiasts are expected to gather June 23 for the 15th annual Horse Production Sale, coordinated by the students and staff of the Animal Science Horse Barn. This year, the public will have the opportunity to bid on 19 horses, ranging in age from about six months to adult, and on two young mules. The event, including a preview of the horses and a barbecue, begins at 3 p.m. The auction is scheduled for 6 p.m.

Detailed descriptions of the horses and the Equine Management Program, as well as driving directions, are available online at http://animalscience.ucdavis.edu/HorseBarn/ProductionSale/index.htm.

Proton therapy machine

With a new technology transfer agreement announced June 14, the first compact proton therapy system developed with the help of UC Davis scientists, is one step closer to reality. The result of defense-related research, the compact system was developed by scientists at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and the UC Davis Cancer Center. In the new technology transfer pact, the product has been licensed to TomoTherapy of Wisconsin.

Proton therapy is considered the most advanced form of radiation therapy available for cancer patients.

Assembling Summer Fun!

Summer is here, and Staff Assembly has some money-saving suggestions on what to do for fun:

• June 23 — UC Davis Picnic at Great America. Staff Assembly's discount price is $29, including lunch, for ages 3 and up. Tickets must be purchased online, and the last day to buy them is June 22. Buy them at staff.ucdavis.edu (click on "Summer Fun!" and then the Great America icon; enter company code "UCDPICNIC").
• Aug. 11 — UC Davis Picnic at Six Flags Discovery Kingdom (formerly Marine World). Staff Assembly's discount ticket price is $30.99, including lunch, for ages 3 and up. Buy tickets at staff.ucdavis.edu (click on "Summer Fun!" and then the Discovery Kingdom icon; enter promo code "UCDPICNIC").

Staff Assembly also offers Great America and Discovery Kingdom discount tickets good any time. Buy these tickets at staff.ucdavis.edu (click on "Staff Discounts," then "Entertainment," and then either the Great America or Discovery Kingdom icon, and follow the instructions for company or promo code).

• Sept. 23 — UC Davis Day with the San Francisco Giants, celebrating Fan Appreciation Day at AT&T Park. The Giants are set to play the Cincinnati Reds at 1:05 p.m. The discount ticket price is $30; you can buy tickets at staff.ucdavis.edu (click on "Summer Fun!" and then the San Francisco Giants icon).

Summer softball, Frisbee

Faculty and staff are invited to participate in Summer Softball and Ultimate Frisbee. Registration week is June 25-29 at the Campus Recreation office, Room 232 in the Activities and Recreation Center.

Bahar Yaghoubi of Campus Recreation said competitive and recreation leagues are planned in both sports. The recreation leagues, co-sponsored by Staff Assembly, are geared for faculty and staff.

Play is set to begin the week of July 9 and continue through mid-August. The fee is $50 per softball and Frisbee team.

More information: (530) 752-1730 or imsports@ucdavis.edu.

Repro Graphics center moves to Hoagland Hall

The Repro Graphics copy center on the main campus is in a new home: 176 Hoagland Hall. The center vacated its basement quarters in Mrak Hall on June 15.

A campus directive indicates the Hoagland Hall site features a larger area for meetings with clients, plus improved parking availability.

The center, open from 8 a.m. to noon and 1 to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday, offers walk-in, while-you-wait service; digital color and black-and-white printing; collating; stapling and tape binding; and three-hole drilling. The center also takes orders for other services such as offset printing, thesis binding, posters, banners, forms, invitations and Web page design.

The campus directive states that Repro Graphics will continue to support the printing needs of Mrak Hall and surrounding buildings through the "Submit a File Now" link on the Repro Graphics Web site: reprographics.ucdavis.edu. The center also offers free pickup and delivery from any campus location; to make arrangements, call (530) 752-COPY (2679).

For a limited time, people submitting orders at the Hoagland Hall location will receive tokens to be exchanged for gifts in celebration of the new opening.

Community book project

Planning is key to the Campus Community Book Project. Which is why, even before the 2007-08 project gets under way, the organizers are seeking nominations for the campus's next reading selection.

And that one will be even more special, because it will come in the university's centennial year, 2008-09. The book project sponsor, the Campus Council on Community and Diversity, declared in a news release:

"For UC Davis' centennial year, we request books that would foster reflection on the mission of UC Davis as a land grant university: the multidisciplinary education that prepares students for a lifetime of service, and that informs teaching and research efforts that address significant community and global problems, such as climate change, sustainability, inequalities in education, or rising costs of health care."

The committee is seeking books that are "provocative and intriguing to as many members of the community as possible, to invite diverse participation and integration into discussion groups and courses across the sciences, social sciences and humanities."

Nominated books must be available in paperback, and the author must be available to visit campus for a speaking appearance. Nominations, including title, author and a short explanation of why this book would make a worthy selection, are due by June 26. Nominations should be e-mailed to Gary Sue Goodman at gsgoodman@ucdavis.edu.

People also can contact Goodman if they are interested in reviewing the nominations; the committee is expected to start meeting in late June, read intensively over the summer, and resume meeting in mid-August.

The 2007-08 book selection is Devil's Highway: A True Story, by Luis Alberto Urrea, recounting a 2001 border incident in which 14 men died in the desert Southwest while attempting to cross from Mexico into Arizona. They were among a group of 26 men led by inexperienced "coyotes," or human smugglers.

Campus chili champions

Soldiers in war zones can put up with meals-ready-to-eat, or MREs for short. Back on base, though, homemade chili sounds a lot better — and that is exactly what the Department of Military Science served up in the department's 17th annual Chili Cookoff.

The competition, open to everyone on campus, took place May 17 at Toomey Field. Here are the results:

Individuals — 1st: Renee Timas, Undergraduate Admissions. 2nd: Steve Barzo, Military Science. 3rd: Barbara McLaughlin, Office of the Registrar.

Department (one winner only) — Military Science, represented by Robin Thomas.

The contest drew eight individual entries and five department entries. Darlene Hunter was the chief judge, and other judges were Pam Gill-Fisher, Ruth Parcell, Gary Stewart, Candy Thomson and John Vochatzer.

After the judging, everyone dug in to a potluck — with chili, or course, as the entrée.

SmartSite upgrades

SmartSite, the university's new learning management and collaboration system, will shut down this weekend for a software upgrade.

The outage will start at midnight June 22 and end by noon June 24, wrote SmartSite Program Manager Kirk Alexander in an e-mail to colleagues this week.

In less than four months, SmartSite officially becomes the preferred campus system for managing classes online, although its tools are handy for a wide range of uses. It has been tested as a pilot program on campus since early 2006, and more than 8,600 people have used it so far.

"In preparation for the fall launch, the developers must upgrade the entire SmartSite environment to the latest version," Alexander wrote. Users who try to access SmartSite during the outage will see a "down for maintenance" notice with a link to the campus systems status page for more information.

"The upgraded version will include a significant number of fixes and improvements to most tools," Alexander said, but "the overall look and feel of SmartSite will not change."

Send questions about the upgrade, or about SmartSite in general, to smartsite-help@ucdavis.edu or call (530) 754-HELP. For more about SmartSite, including an overview of tools, features, potential uses, and the launch this fall, visit https://smartsite.ucdavis.edu; the Support and Training section includes information about upcoming SmartSite workshops and demonstrations.

Experimental College

It is going to be hot in Davis this summer. So instead of hiding at home to beat the heat, come out to the Experimental College for some fun classes in nice air-conditioned rooms. This way you can stay cool, be social and learn something new.Registration for the summer begins June 25, so drop on in anytime from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. The Experimental College is located at 260 South Silo, across from the Craft Center. See www.experimentalcollege.org.