University of Texas Austin - Cactus Yearbook (Austin, TX)

Page 195 text:

First to come and last to leave, many graduate students haunt the library. Working at desks in obscure offices can be lonely for TA ' s. it.Ita ssunls (he education psy sorteachtSa.nl- I realities of the earl; I i of lie academ I tols relisted trips to IJK master ' s or doctoral! ' : ' rifli ROB Sculpture students suit-out to work with the bronze melting furnaces. Graduate art students spend many long hours working in various labs on campus. Graduate Students 187

Page 194 text:

The Professional Student Computing research is hard work for student father John Parsons. Married graduate students could not always find a babysitter. Teaching in the classroom was only one part of the educa- tional process. Consultation, guidance and instruction on a one- to-one basis between teacher and student were also important especially at the graduate level. When scanning the Main Mall, most onlookers could not pick out graduate students from undergraduates. Spotting the grad might be difficult because most tried to avoid the mainstream of life. After four years of college, they frequented more obscure places around the community. The soon-to-be professionals traveled incognito between home, class and the eggroll stand. As one of the privileged in the student population, the grad was often invited to the professors ' homes for coffee, dinner and discussions of the weightier matters of academia. To him, a pro- fessor ' s door was rarely closed, even during undergraduate office hours. When a professor tardily entered a class, he excused him- self by saying that he was talking to one of his graduate students. One pharmacy graduate student reflected, When I was an undergraduate I went to college, now I ' m a student. I ' m lucky to be one of the few. The Graduate School encouraged its students to seek higher academic ideals. Independent course work, study and long hours of extensive research led to publication of a thesis or dissertation. Along with privileges came extra responsibilities. Many graduate students took on research projects for professors, often receiving little or no recognition. Privileges, responsibilities and sometimes teaching faced the graduate students in the upper echelon of the University. Those who taught were christened Teaching Assistants and given desks in obscure cubby-holes called offices. One education psy- chology TA admitted, Why should a professor teach at 8 a.m., when a TA can do it? Besides knowing the realities of the early morning hours, astute TA ' s learned the ways of the academic professionals, including how to balance consultant work against course preparation and how to establish Catch 22 office hours. In their spare time, graduate students relished trips to the library to do research. Upon achieving the master ' s or doctorate degree, the graduate students became professors, learned con- sultants or the wizards of the financial community. Some very fortunates find funding to support and prolong their academic endeavors, and they never worry about entering the labor mar- ket, one astronomy doctoral candidate said. First-year law stu- 1 dent Lily Plummer upon admission into law school said that she i was told that she was now a professional student. Graduate stu- j dents have to change their frame of reference towards school and themselves. Everything counts now, she said. 186 Graduate Students

Page 196 text:

Prigogine ' s Nobe Another Firs Dr. Ilya Pngogine spent 30 years contemplating and research- ing the mechanics of order and disorder in nature. As a result of the effort, the Swedish Royal Academy of Sciences announced that the Belgian scientist was to receive the 1977 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Pngogine became the University ' s first Nobel Prize laureate. Prigogine spent nearly half of his lifetime puzzling over the biological question How did life begin? His predecessors have assumed that the first life forms organized themselves by pure chance; by random-events at the molecular level. According to this theory, the origin of life occurred as the result of the highly improbable event of the spontaneous formation of DNA, the complex chemical compound responsible for life. In this way, scientists were isolating life from the rest of the physical universe, contradicting one of the most important gen- eralizations in science, the second law of thermodynamics. According to the second law, a natural tendency for disorder, or entropy, increases within any system of molecules. The exact opposite occurs, however, in the complex machines of living organisms. Instead, biological reactions result on levels of ever increasing organization and diversification. Resolving the conflict, Prigogine ' s Nobel Prize-winning theory extended the laws of thermodynamics to include biological systems and other self-organizing phenomena such as cities. According to his theory, dissipative structures use energy from outside sources to build and maintain inherent order. In this way the structures are open systems, utilizing energy and produc- ing disorder. A living system depends on its interaction with the outside world, Prigogine explained. Whether it is a simple bacterial cell, a human indivi dual or a city, death will follow isolation once reserves have been exhausted, he said. It can survive only if there is a continuous inflow of food, fuel and other commodi- ties, and an outflow of product wastes. Prigogine incorporated three elements in his theory: time, structure and complexity. In time, the concept of time, the laws of change become sufficiently complex to be compared. The Russian-born scientist drew on examples from history, lit- erature and sociology to illustrate his theory. Moving beyond the boundaries of science, Prigogine explained that it is not enough to know what the particle is. you must also know its function. The individual and society define each other. he said. Unlike a crystal, a town will decay if it is taken out of context. Embed- ded structures interact with other structures, he said. Dr. Prigogine divided his time between UT and the Free Uni- versity of Brussels, where he served as director of the Interna- tional Institute of Physics and Chemistry. At UT he directed the recently-renamed Ilya Prigogine Center for Studies m Statistical Mechanics. He first came to The University of Texas in 1968. Hya Prieogine Dr. Ilya Prigogine became Receiving an undergraduate degree in Psychology, Prigogine went on to earn a Master ' s Degree in Physics and a PhD in Chemistry. He has also earned a Degregatton Degree, a higher degree awarded by the Free University of Brussels, in Physical Chemistry. Prigogine completed all of his degrees in Brussels. people le to large relate as saenc very diversified ople ' s lives Besides gogine said | intellectuality of are uninformed. ' societies. r educa have a big i that everyo through col lab '