University Times

Paul A. Supowitz, associate general counsel at Pitt for the past five years, has been named associate vice chancellor for commonwealth and city/county relations in Pitt's Community and Governmental Relations Office (CGR).

In his CGR position, Supowitz will assist the University in developing, maintaining and enhancing its relationships with Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, City of Pittsburgh, Allegheny County and surrounding county government officials. He also will continue to serve as associate general counsel, handling legal matters pertaining to governmental relations and environmental health and safety.

Prior to joining Pitt's Office of General Counsel, Supowitz was an associate in the Pittsburgh law firm of Klett Rooney Lieber & Schorling. He is the immediate past chair of the environmental law section and is a member of the professional ethics committee of the Allegheny County Bar Association.

Supowitz earned his J.D. from Pitt's School of Law in 1989 and a B.S. in public affairs from Indiana University-Bloomington in 1985.

Two faculty members in the School of Information Sciences (SIS) recently received the 2002 Ted Nelson Newcomer Award from SIGWEB, a special-interest group of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM).

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Peter Brusilovsky, assistant professor of computer science, and Riccardo Rizzo, visiting scholar from the Italian National Research Council, are both in the Department of Information Science and Telecommunications.

The two faculty members were honored at the 12th annual ACM International Conference on Hypertext and Hypermedia held in June at the University of Maryland, College Park. The award was given for their paper titled "Map-Based Horizontal Navigation in Educational Hypertext."

The Ted Nelson Newcomer Award, also known as the "Teddy," was established in 1999 to honor Theodor H. Nelson, known as the father of hypertext, for his numerous contributions to the field of hypertext and hypermedia. The award carries a cash award of $1,000.

Papers rated among the best overall and written by authors who have never published in earlier hypertext proceedings are eligible for the Teddy.

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Last week Pitt dedicated the Baierl Student Recreation Center, made possible by a gift from alumnus Bill Baierl. Baierl (Class of '51) is president and CEO of Baierl Family of Dealerships in Wexford, one of the largest automobile dealership groups in western Pennsylvania.

The 43,000-square-foot Baierl Center is spread over two floors of the Petersen Events Center. The Baierl Center is a student exercise and recreation facility featuring four racquetball courts, two squash courts, Cybex weight machines, a large free-weight area, a state-of-the-art aerobic area complete with treadmills and bikes, a health assessment area, an aerobics classroom and a martial arts practice room.

Also, the basketball teams' practice facility has been named the Baierl Basketball Center in recognition of Baierl's contributions to Pitt.