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Spring 2008 www.clemson.edu/clemsonworld Written in water Dealing with drought Pinpointing mental illness Clemson in Antarctica Students vs. alcohol SPRING 2008 VOL. 61, NO. 2 www.clemson.edu/clemsonworld Features Prime-time Clemson 8 Departments Clemson shines in the national spotlight during the S.C. presidential primary. President’s View page 2 Mapping the mind 12 World View page 4 Discover a nationally renowned geneticist with a groundbreaking theory on mental illness. Faces of Philanthropy page 11 Our future written in water 14 Lifelong Connections See what Clemson is doing to combat the page 26 pressing problems of drought and other water issues. Alumni National Council page 28 EXtreme biology 16 Student Life page 30 A biological sciences professor transports her research all the way from Antarctica Classmates to the Clemson classroom. page 32 Commitment Facing down alcohol abuse 20 page 46 Students have begun fueling a culture Taps change from the inside out. page 48 Cover photo by Alumni in action 22 Patrick Wright Meet five alumni improving the world through their expertise, boundless energy This page: Cadet and sense of service. WRIGHT PATRICK Life Garden in the S.C. Botani- cal Garden “Ol’ Sweets” 25 This remarkable alumnus embraced Clemson, as he did his family, straight from the heart. Spring 2008 1 PRESIDENT’S VIEW The Architect as University President By James F. Barker As an architect, I’m a rarity among university that magnitude without having a background presidents, and I’ve often wondered why. in architecture and urban planning. While Architecture is the ideal background for my many of my colleagues who are chemists, phy- job for reasons that are both philosophical sicians, and historians do a fine job, I would and practical—very practical. not want to attempt it. That’s because architecture offers one of On a much deeper level, however, I believe the last Renaissance educations available. architectural education offers a model of how At its best, it strikes just the right balance we can meet some of the clearest challenges I believe architectural between art and science, the creative and facing universities today. How do we teach the pragmatic. I often tell people I learned creativity? Where do ideas come from? How education oers a everything from plumbing to poetry in do we educate fact-based critical thinkers and model of how we can architecture school, and I use every bit of individualists? How do we then teach those that knowledge as president of Clemson students to communicate, to understand one meet some of the University. another and other cultures, and to work well clearest challenges To begin with the most obvious advan- together as part of a larger team? Those are the Atage: A big part of my responsibility is to help demands and expectations of higher education facing universities plan, financially support, build, and maintain in the 21st century. It is a matter of national campus facilities, as well as to develop concern in a world where prosperity aligns today. campus master plans. As a land-grant institu- so clearly with innovation and a creative, tion, Clemson has more than 30,000 acres knowledge-based economy, and we must not of campus and research lands statewide, 200 fail. buildings, and at least 6 million square feet In my view, the architecture design studio of built space. Those buildings range from is the best learning experience ever invented cow barns to one of the nation’s top academic to produce the kind of deep, engaged learning Reprinted with permission electron-microscope facilities. It clearly helps and creative graduates that are so needed from The Chronicle of Higher that I understand planning and design, speak today. Small groups of students work with a Education, March 7, 2008 the language of architects, and have the master teacher on a semester-long or yearlong technical ability to read a set of architectural team project to design solutions to a specific drawings. (I may be the most challenging problem or to meet a particular need. Some higher-education client an architect must projects are purposely fanciful, purely imagina- face!) tive. Others, often the best projects, tackle real We have made a commitment to sustain- problems for actual clients. able design and building in all new campus For example, our students in planning and construction, and the first of five “technology design have helped communities throughout neighborhoods” is almost complete on a new our state preserve historic buildings, revital- 250-acre automotive-research campus, with ize dying town centers, and plan new parks, its own master plan, that is nearby. I can’t bikeways, and green space. For every project, imagine presiding over a building program of they interview the key people involved; gather 2 Clemson World 8 www.clemson.edu/clemsonworld statistics on demographics and traffic patterns; emergency-evacuation planning in order to collect previous plans, deeds and plats; photo- design improvements. graph the site from every conceivable angle; and It seems, at times, as though our entire cam- put all of those data on a computer. pus is one big studio. My goal is to have every Executive Editor Dave Dryden Eventually, they brainstorm ideas, discuss undergraduate participate in such a research them, refine them and present them to their or creative-inquiry experience before he or she Art Director teachers and clients in a process that we, in graduates. Judy Morrison architecture, call a “design charette.” Then, and In Building Community, a 1996 report Editor only then, are the best ideas sifted through the published by the Carnegie Foundation for the Liz Newall filter of what is possible and affordable. As the Advancement of Teaching, Ernest L. Boyer Classes Editor & great Charles Eames once said, “Design depends and Lee D. Mitgang challenged architectural Advertising Director Sallie Leigh largely on constraints.” It’s important for stu- educators to integrate the design curriculum (864) 656-7897 dents to learn that, too, if they ever want to see more fully within and outside the architecture their plans on paper leave the file cabinet to live discipline, and to prepare architects for Contributors Dale Cochran in the real world of bricks and mortar. In the lives of civic engagement. That notion has Debbie Dunning process of doing such public-service projects, our been a subject of intense debate for years Catherine Sams News Services students learn about research, communication, among architecture deans, but I have always Publications and Promotion interpersonal relationships, culture, politics, been firmly in Boyer and Mitgang’s camp. If Photographers municipal government, creativity (its power and architects want to be influential, we need to Patrick Wright its limits), and teamwork. get out of our ateliers and connect with the Craig Mahaffey The longing to once again be a part of that curriculum, engage the culture, and serve our University Officials creative ferment sparked my personal journey larger communities. That is why we require President back to education from architectural practice. our architecture students to have four years of James F. Barker And the desire to bring the power of that languages, to declare a minor, and to work on Board of Trustees educational model to the larger world led me projects that contribute to society not only in Leon J. Hendrix Jr., chairman; Joseph D. Swann, vice chairman; into administration and, ultimately, university this country but abroad. Bill L. Amick, leadership. As the president of a university, I interact John J. Britton, In the mid-1990s, when a radical reorga- on a close and daily basis with leaders in the Louis B. Lynn, Patricia Herring McAbee, nization reduced Clemson’s nine colleges to world of business and politics. I’m amazed Leslie G. McCraw, four (now five), I realized that it, too, was an every day at the subtle ways in which my archi- E. Smyth McKissick III, Thomas B. McTeer Jr., opportunity and a challenge for me as the tectural education and background prepared Robert L. Peeler, college’s dean of architecture. (It was also a me for this responsibility. It taught me to think William C. Smith Jr., constraint.) The designer in me took over. visually as well as verbally, to listen intently David H. Wilkins Could architecture—an applied, professional to the needs of clients and colleagues, to © 2008 Clemson University Clemson World is published quarterly for discipline—collaborate with the basic arts and seek feedback and test my ideas, to dream big alumni and friends of Clemson Univer- humanities in a new college? Could we adapt dreams but make concrete, “buildable” plans. sity by the Division of Advancement. Editorial offices are in the Department the “design studio” as a pedagogical model for And, as the American Institute of of Publications and Promotion, Clemson University, 114 Daniel Dr., Clemson, engaged learning across the curriculum? Could Architects says on the Web site of its SC 29631-1520 (FAX: 864-656-5004). we design a university community with bridges, Communities by Design initiative: “There’s a Copyright© Publications and Promotion, Clemson University. Story ideas and let- instead of barriers, to teamwork? reason you became an architect. It wasn’t just ters are welcome, but publisher assumes We could, and we have. Project-based about buildings. It was about people, it was no responsibility for return of unsolicited manuscripts or art. Send address changes learning has increased significantly across about making communities more livable.” to Records, 110 Daniel Dr., Clemson, SC 29631-1520 (FAX: 864-656-1692), or call our campus. Service learning has increased. University presidents spend a great deal of 1-800-313-6517. More than 75 percent of our seniors last year time thinking about the future and sketching reported working on a research project with out what that future might look like for the CLEMSON WORLD a faculty member to the National Survey of people and the communities we care about.