Briefly Noted

Stephen Rapp

U.S. Ambassador-at-Large For War Crimes Issues to Speak at Pitt Jan. 28

The University of Pittsburgh School of Law’s Center for International Legal Education will feature Stephen Rapp, U.S. Ambassador-at-Large for War Crimes Issues, in a lecture titled “The Role of the United States in International Criminal Justice,” at noon Jan. 28 in the Barco Law Building’s Teplitz Memorial Courtroom.

Appointed by President Barack Obama, Rapp, an Iowa native, assumed his duties on Sept. 8, 2009. Previously, Rapp served as prosecutor of the Special Court for Sierra Leone, beginning in January 2007, where he led the prosecutions of former Liberian President Charles Taylor and those allegedly responsible for the atrocities committed during Sierra Leone’s civil war.

During his tenure as prosecutor, Rapp and his colleagues achieved the first-ever convictions for sexual slavery and forced marriage as crimes against humanity. He also achieved convictions for attacks on peacekeepers and for the recruitment and use of child soldiers as violations of international humanitarian law.

In addition, Rapp was a senior trial attorney and chief of prosecutions at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda from 2001 to 2007.

Rapp received his BA degree from Harvard University in 1971 and attended Columbia and Drake Law Schools, receiving his JD degree from Drake in 1974.

This lecture has been approved by the Pennsylvania Continuing Legal Education Board for one hour of substantive Continuing Legal Education (CLE) credits. There is a $25 fee for credit. For CLE details, call 412-648-7023 or e-mail cile@law.pitt.edu.

—Patricia Lomando White

Pitt Graduate Student Organization Calls for Teaching Award Nominations

The University of Pittsburgh’s Arts and Sciences Graduate Student Organization is accepting nominations for the Elizabeth Baranger Excellence in Teaching Award.

The award, named after Baranger, a professor emeritus in Pitt’s Department of Physics and Astronomy and a former vice provost for graduate studies, honors outstanding teaching by graduate students in the School of Arts and Sciences. The deadline for submissions is Feb. 12. Nominations can be submitted by Pitt faculty, teaching assistants, teaching fellows, as well as graduate and undergraduate students. To be eligible for the $250 award, an instructor must have been enrolled as a graduate student and teaching a class in any semester of the previous calendar year, 2009.

More information is available at www.pitt.edu/~asgso/teachingawardnomination.html.

Staff Association Council Goes Green

The University of Pittsburgh’s Staff Association Council (SAC) is eliminating the paper newsletters that have been sent to Pitt staff for more than 20 years. Beginning this month, SAC will e-mail electronic newsletters to staffers’ in-boxes on a monthly basis.

Staff members who would like to receive the newsletter should visit SAC’s Web site, www.sac.pitt.edu, to sign up.

“With announcements of upcoming staff initiatives, exciting features, and the broadcast of key events, SAC’s e-Newsletter promises to energize its readership,” said Gwen Watkins, SAC’s president.

—Annabelle Clippinger