Sara Mitchell receives the 2012 Graduate College Outstanding Faculty Mentor Award in social sciences. She is professor of political science in the University of Iowa College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.

Long before she made a career of seeking out and scaling the world’s most unreachable places, about the only thing University of Iowa communications alumna Brittany Griffith was climbing was the Jefferson Street hill on the UI campus.

Jeannette George, a nursing and international studies major with an emphasis in African studies, reflects on her life-changing decision to pursue awareness of sickle-cell anemia research far beyond her UI classroom.

If you’ve ever watched a sleeping baby, you’ve probably noticed the twitching movements they make in their sleep. A research team at the University of Iowa has provided compelling evidence that these involuntary movements are important to the developing brain.

Ed Folsom, 65, is a University of Iowa faculty member who is widely regarded as a leading Walt Whitman scholar worldwide. (Note: A paid subscription may be required.)

Julie Orringer and Ryan Harty, alumni of the University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop, will present a free reading at 8 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 29, in the Frank Conroy Reading Room of the Glenn Schaeffer Library, adjacent to the Dey House.

University of Iowa alumnus Charles Rowan Beye will read from "My Husband and My Wives: A Gay Man's Odyssey" at 7 p.m. Friday, Nov. 30, in a free reading at Prairie Lights Books in downtown Iowa City. The reading also will be streamed live on the University of Iowa Writing University website.

Dylan Nice, alumnus of the University of Iowa Nonfiction Writing Program and adjunct lecturer, will read from his collection of short stories, "Other Kinds," at 7 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 28, in a free reading at Prairie Lights Books in downtown Iowa City. The reading also will be streamed live on the University of Iowa Writing University website.

The University of Iowa Museum of Art (UIMA) and School of Art and Art History (SAAH) will host Midwest Matrix, a free weekend-long tribute to mid-20th century fine art printmaking on Dec. 1 and 2. The event features a symposium, film world premiere, exhibitions, Iowa Print Fair, and more.

The Gallery series of the University of Iowa Department of Theatre Arts will present Mémoire, a student production written by Micah Ariel James and directed by Rachel Korach Howell, at 8 p.m. Thursday–Saturday, Nov. 29–Dec. 1, and at 2 p.m. Sunday, Dec. 2, in Theatre B of the UI Theatre Building.

NASA announced in a ceremony Friday that the recently launched mission studying the Van Allen Probes was renamed to honor the late James Van Allen, the head of the physics department at the University of Iowa who discovered the radiation belts encircling Earth in 1958.

The Mill in downtown Iowa City plays host to the University of Iowa School of Music’s jazz series, which features student ensembles and collaborations with professors from the jazz program. Each installment features one or two particular groups focusing on a style or sub-genre of jazz.