The Nashville Tree Foundation recognized one of Belmont’s biggest and oldest trees, the White Ash located on the west side of the maintenance building near the Foutch Alumni House, as one of 53 winners from this year’s Big Old Tree Contest. Belmont’s White Ash is approximately 80 years old.
Ash trees are facing a threat across the country from the Emerald Ash Borer, an invasive beetle species that is killing these trees at a rapid rate. Ash trees were once quite plentiful, and Belmont is taking preventative measures to ensure the trees will be around for many years to come.
“Belmont is committed to preserving and protecting one of our most precious resources: our trees. Over the past 20 years we have significantly increased our awareness in tree health with certified arborist inspections, routine pruning, subsurface and deep root fertilization, borer treatment and new construction protection,” said Belmont Horticulturist Mary Weber.
This is not the first time Belmont’s trees have been recognized, as the Hackberry near the Bell Tower, approximately 125 years old, was a big winner in 2009. The more than 200-year-old Mulberry in front of Fidelity, the 150-year-old Magnolia near Gabhart and the 150-year-old Gingko Biloba beside the Leu Art building were also winners in 1990. However, this year’s winner coincides with Belmont’s recent Conservation Covenant, Tree Campus USA recognition and 2012 official Arboretum status.
The Nashville Tree Foundation seeks to preserve and enhance Nashville’s urban forest by educating the public, planting trees in urban areas and identifying the oldest and biggest trees in Davidson County. Since its founding in 1986, the foundation has added more than 10,000 trees to the Nashville’s landscape and named 25 arboretums.
For images of all of Belmont’s recognized trees, click here.
Gibson Brands is providing a $100,000 fund to Belmont University in honor of Les Paul, whose 100th birthday would have been today. “The Les Paul Music Innovation Award” (powered by Gibson) honors the life and contributions of Les Paul by funding research for faculty and students, inspiring the next generation of industry leaders to express innovation and creativity to strengthen the music economy. It will provide annual funds to students and faculty of the Curb College of Entertainment & Music Business at Belmont.
Belmont’s Director of Service-Learning Tim Stewart and Associate Professor of Social Entrepreneurship and the Director of the Center for Social Entrepreneurship Dr. Bernard Turner presented at the 6th International Summit on Service-Learning at the University of Indianapolis, held May 27–30. Their presentation, “Connecting Campus to Community: Integrating a Web-based Software Platform to Support Service-learning and Civic Engagement,” shared Belmont’s experience with the implementation of the “Get Connected” software platform, designed to assist in better connecting campus to community service opportunities and tracking student involvement.
Sarah Bonaparte, a May 2015 biology graduate, was recently hired for a year-long contract through Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education for a Human Papillomavirus (HPV) serology laboratory fellowship in the chronic viral disease branch at the Center for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, Georgia.
School of Music Professor and Coordinator of Instrumental Studies Joel Treybig, Faculty Member Andrew Risinger and Trumpeter Adam Hayes were recently lauded as featured recitalists at the 2015 International Trumpet Guild Conference in Columbus, Ohio.
A trumpet ensemble comprised of twelve Belmont student trumpeters and a timpanist performed by invitation last week at the 2015 International Trumpet Guild conference, held this year in Columbus, Ohio.
Pinter presented a poster session titled “Two Engaging Activities for Student or Faculty Groups” in which he described the Three-Hat Game (with its counterintuitive outcome), the Dekaaz poetry form (including random generation of form variations), suggestions for using the activities with groups, and the connection for both activities to binary numbers. The conference offered hands-on workshops, plenary sessions with teaching and learning scholars, dozens of concurrent sessions and a variety of poster presentations. Because of the cross-disciplinary nature of the conference, participants had the opportunity to interact with college and university teachers from around the country in explorations connected to promoting enhanced teaching and learning outcomes. Many of the presentations were related to the scholarship of teaching and learning as well as the scholarships of integration and application.
Belmont junior and singer/songwriter James Morris will be returning to the 