To help the 1,100 new first-generation college students on the University of Iowa campus, the UI seeks to identify first-generation faculty and staff to serve as role models and mentors to ensure these students succeed.

Poet Jared Stanley, an alumnus of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, will present a free reading at 7 p.m. Friday, Sept. 14, in Prairie Lights Books, and on a live stream of the Virtual Writing University website of the University of Iowa.

University of Iowa alumna Jill Savage, host of a sports radio talk show in Oregon, says callers try to test her knowledge. "You have to be confident, especially as a female in the industry," she says.

Demolition in downtown Iowa City uncovered part of a mural painted in the 1970s by UI art students during urban renewal. A paid subscription is required.

James Miller, the associate principal trombonist with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, will present a free recital as a guest of the University of Iowa School of Music at 7:30 p.m. Monday, Sept. 17, in the University Capitol Centre Recital Hall.

Don Gurnett of the University of Iowa, who has worked on the Voyager mission since the mid 1970s, celebrates the space probe's 35th anniversary.

UI School of Music faculty member Kristin Thelander will play a free recital of music for horn by American composers at 7:30 p.m. Friday, Sept. 14, in the Riverside Recital Hall. She'll perform with pianist Sue Haug and with the Bon Vivant Horn Quartet.

Alumna Judy Hyland is Iowa's Music Teacher of the Year.

Writers' Workshop alumnus T. Geronimo Johnson talks about his debut novel, Hold it 'Til it Hurts.

The University of Iowa Museum of Natural History begins the annual UI Explorers Seminar series Thursday, Sept. 13, at 7 p.m. in the Biosphere Discovery Hub in Macbride Hall. The first lecture examines vast diversity among earthworms.

Short stories by Writers' Workshop alumnus Thomas Derr echo the landmark memoir by Frank Conroy.

Inara Verzemnieks, a graduate student in the University of Iowa Nonfiction Writing Program (NWP), is one of six 2012 winners of the prestigious Rona Jaffe Writers’ Awards. She follows in the footsteps of former recipients such as Eula Biss, Amy Leach, Lan Samantha Chang, and ZZ Packer.