Students burnt in lab
One male and two females, all sophomores, were taken to Samaritan Hospital for sulfuric acid burns during an organic chemistry lab at around 9 am on Tuesday. Professor Jim Moore’s students were working on a routine synthetic organic chemistry experiment when one student dropped a flask containing about 10 milliliters of the acid. The splatter caused burns on one female student’s face as well as burns to one male and a second female students’ hands.
A hazardous materials truck was dispatched to Walker Laboratories and applied sodium bicarbonate to neutralize the spill. Troy Fire Department and RPI Ambulance also responded. After being treated at the hospital, the three students were able to return to campus with only minor injuries.
Jackson takes third
In a recent article in The Chronicle of Higher Education, President Shirley Ann Jackson was third on a list of highest-paid presidents of private research universities in the United States.
Jackson had compensation of $1.2 million in 2005-2006. In the annual survey by The Chronicle involving 1,017 U.S. public and private schools and community colleges, presidents at private research universities gained 6.2 percent, and their counterparts at public schools added 10 percent to their receipts.
The list was led by William Brody of Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore with $1.9 million, followed by Gordon Gee of Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tenn., who received $1.8 million; Jackson at $1.2 million; James Wagner of Emory University in Atlanta at $1.1 million; and Constantine Papadakis of Drexel University in Philadelphia at $969,006. Richard Levin, president of Yale University in New Haven, Conn., earned $869,026, the most of all Ivy League headmasters.
The median pay for presidents of private research universities was $528,105, compared with $497,046 a year earlier. For similar public schools, the median was $397,349, up from $360,000.
Alumni killed in Kajaki
Jeffrey R. Calero ’96 was recently killed by a roadside bomb during his second deployment with an Army National Guard unit based in Springfield, Mass. Newsday reported that the 34-year-old was on patrol in Kajaki when he was killed in a blast from a roadside bomb.
He had served six years of active duty in the Army, attained the rank of second lieutenant, won numerous medals, and joined the Green Berets, RPI’s alumni office said.
Calero was posthumously promoted to major.
