Hip Hip, Hey There, Hooray: It’s Milwaukee Day
Milwaukee Day is finally here, and we can’t think a better way to celebrate the 414 on 4/14 than with an up-close look at how UWM and MKE are better together – and have been since 1885 when UWM first opened its doors as the Milwaukee Normal School.
To say that things have changed since then for our hometown and the university that now bears her name is quite the understatement. But here’s a sentiment that can’t be understated: Happy Milwaukee Day! Hey there, MKE, all of us at UWM couldn’t be prouder to be your partner university. Let’s do great things together for another 140 years.
So come here once, and read for yourself some of the things that make us most proud to be the region’s premier public urban institution. And benefit from a few only-at-UWM, very-much-Milwaukee traditions that might be very new to you.
Four things you can do at UWM ASAP
Watch science explode before your very eyes.
Every Friday this month, Michael Carvan, associate professor of freshwater sciences, presides over the interactive show “The Dose Makes the Poison” – part of UWM’s long-running Science Bag series. Carvan’s live demonstrations prove that some things that are good for us in one dose can be lethal in another.
Explore the Cosmos.
Open most Fridays for its popular $2 Friday Night Show – featuring a rotating range of astronomical topics, constellations and cultural connections – the UWM Manfred Olson Planetarium is a community treasure that draws stargazers from across southeastern Wisconsin. Free Wednesday lunchtime Astrobreaks and other special events round out the Planetarium’s budget-friendly program calendar. “A Night in Greece” is the featured Friday show through May 9.
Get lost in Downer Woods.
Milwaukee’s hometown university is a leading green campus nationally, and has made the Princeton Review Guide to Green Colleges each of the last four years. One small, 11-acre reason why is the Downer Woods nature preserve – an emerald space of solitude, natural species, restored walking trails and obscure UWM history. Finding your way into this fenced-in free-for-all forest is just part of the journey.
Feast your eyes on free galleries.
The Institute of Visual Arts (INOVA) is the contemporary art gallery and research center of the Peck School of the Arts at UWM. Exhibitions by Nigerian-American duo Mendi + Keith Obadike, Chicagoan Benjamin DeMott and Londoner Lisa Selby are free and open to the pubic through May 18.
Today is the final drop-off day for artists participating in the 41st annual Juried Art Show in UWM’s Union Art Gallery. Open April 17-May 16, this exciting annual event showcases the best work of local, emerging student artists from universities and colleges in the Milwaukee metro area.
More than 7,000 wide-ranging works of art – Western and Non-western art, spanning ancient to contemporary art, fine collections of Russian icons, 15th-20th century prints, modern European art, American Folk Art, Ancient and Oriental decorative arts, and African art – comprise the permanent UWM Art Collection that calls the UWM Art History Gallery “home.” Works on display vary by exhibition, including curated shows by graduate students in the university’s unique Museum Studies Certificate and arts history programs.
Four ‘uniquely UWM’ opportunities
Majoring (or minoring) in architecture in the School of Architecture & Urban Planning at UWM, a University of Wisconsin System Center of Excellence, and one of only a handful of schools nationwide that offer bachelor, master and Ph.D.-level programs in architecture.
Our two graduate level schools of public health and freshwater sciences are actually local partnerships, and the only schools of their kind in the state – or country. The Zilber School of Public Health operates at the same location and in tandem with the City of Milwaukee’s Health Department. The School of Freshwater Sciences, the only school in the U.S. dedicated to freshwater study, offers the workforce development and technology research components to the Milwaukee Water Council, which focuses on turning the city into a destination for water-related industries.
Root for Wisconsin’s only NCAA Division 1 Milwaukee Panthers baseball team, one 15 D1 teams that offer UWM year-round opportunities for school pride, great spectating and more. Learn more about the team and review their schedule.
Browse Greetings from Milwaukee, 755 historic postcards depicting “The Athens of the Midwest.” Available online from the UWM Libraries Digital Collections http://collections.lib.uwm.edu/cdm/search/collection/gfmmke
Four UWM alumni making an impact in MKE today
Gretchen Mead (’04) Founder of Victory Garden Initiative a ground-breaking nonprofit that will install 500 raised-bed gardens in Milwaukee this spring.
Nick Wichert (’07) Co-founder and president of the Global Entrepreneurship Collective, a business accelerator that launches its second class of Milwaukee entrepreneurs this year.
Carlton Reeves (PhD ’13) is the inaugural Entrepreneur in Residence at the UWM Research Foundation, where he’s seeking and supporting “innovation, entrepreneurship and commercialization at UWM” and throughout the greater Milwaukee Community. As founder and president of Reeves Technologies, he’s developing his own award-winning ideas in the areas of engineering technology, business development and strategy and software development.
Megan McGee (’04) is co-founder of Ex Fabula, a live storytelling extravaganza that is now in its fifth season of hilarious, heart-wrenching, always honest entertainment.
