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UWA awards honorary degree to Obama adviser
I thought I'd pass this on. My daughter who is a UWA student just mentioned it to me. No disrespect to Professor Gates himself who I'm sure is a good a physicist as his position and degrees warrant, but the UWA awarding him an honorary degree on the basis he is an 'advisor to Barrack Obama' and the first African American Professor of physics, smacks of tokenism to me. But then I may be reading too much into the UWA's press release.An adviser to US President Barack Obama and world expert on supergravity will tonight deliver a free public lecture at The University of Western Australia, a day before being honoured at the University's Autumn Graduations. Professor Sylvester (Jim) Gates will have the Honorary Degree of Doctor of Science conferred on him by UWA Chancellor Dr Michael Chaney during tomorrow night's graduation ceremony. Professor Gates serves on President Obama's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, part of the Executive Office of the President. The council represents the nation's leading scientists and engineers who advise the President and Vice President and formulate policy in the many areas where the understanding of science, technology, and innovation is central to strengthening the US economy. The first African-American to be awarded an endowed Chair in Physics in a major US University, Professor Gates has visited The University of Western Australia to work with the School of Physics' Supersymmetric Quantum Field Theory Group. Posted by: phil_b 2010-03-20 |
| http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=292923 |