UAB Briefs: Dance premiere, record enrollment, big grant
Welcome to another installment of UAB Briefs.
In this weekly online feature, we keep track of interesting people and events on campus.
Know people, places and programs on the UAB campus that deserve a mention? Email jchambers@starnespublishing.com.
A SPECIAL PERFORMANCE
Seán Curran Company, an acclaimed dance troupe, will open its 20th anniversary season at Alys Stephens Performing Arts Center on Friday, Oct. 5, at 8 p.m., according to a UAB news release.
The troupe’s performance will feature live music by Grammy Award-winning ensemble Third Coast Percussion, who performed at the ASC in March 2018.
Seán Curran Company will present a new version of its popular piece “Abstract Concrete,” originally performed in 2000.
The piece has been reimagined with new music by Third Coast Percussion and ensemble member David Skidmore.
The dance company will also present the world premiere of “Everywhere All the Time,” a piece commissioned by the ASC.
“Everywhere All the Time” deals with such issues as human connections, relationships and loneliness, and includes music by celebrated Irish composer Donnacha Dennehy.
Like most of the company's work, “Abstract Concrete” and “Everywhere All the Time” take advantage of the power of percussion, according to the news release.
The company, founded in 1997, has played more than 65 venues in the United States and Europe.
An “Inside the Arts” pre-performance talk is scheduled for 7 p.m.
Tickets are $25; student tickets are $10.
To order or for more information, call 975-2787 or go to alysstephens.org.
ANOTHER RECORD
UAB has notched a record enrollment for the third year in the row with a student body numbering 21,923 — an increase of 1,021 students from last fall’s record of 20,902 — according to a news release from the school.
The school’s Office of Enrollment Management reports growth this fall in the institution’s honors, out-of-state and dual-enrollment programs and the retention of more than 450 undergraduate students from the 2017-18 academic year.
In addition to the growth in total enrollment, undergraduate enrollment was up more than 5 percent from 2017.
“It says a lot about the attractiveness of our institution when we can continue to increase our enrollment numbers in a climate where many colleges and universities are experiencing declines,” Vice Provost Bradley Barnes said in the release.
GRANT
UAB researchers have been awarded a five-year, $11.7 million grant from the federal National Institutes of Health and the National Cancer Institute to test diet and exercise interventions among underserved older cancer survivors in Alabama, Mississippi, North Carolina and Tennessee.
“Cancer survivors age 60 and older are an at-risk population for obesity, functional decline and many other chronic diseases after their cancer diagnosis,” said principal investigator Wendy Demark-Wahnefried, the Webb Endowed Chair of Nutrition Sciences at UAB.
Demark-Wahnefried and her team will recruit 652 participants in the four states for three separate initiatives, each of which will test a different diet and exercise intervention.
The multidisciplinary study involve faculty members from across campus.
Recruiting of subjects will begin soon. For more information, call 975-4022.