USDs Phi Beta Kappa to Host Victoria L Sork as Lecturer Oct 7
Sork, director of the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) Missouri Botanical Garden and Herbarium, will discuss how acorns are not only essential for the viability of oak populations, but they also provide a valuable food source for humans, wildlife and insects. The talk will address related questions about the biology of acorns, including how and why trees produce acorns synchronously, the impact of climate change on future acorn production, how acorns are dispersed and the role of acorns in indigenous cultures.
Author of more than 140 publications, Sork’s research spans conservation genomics, evolutionary biology and plant ecology. She maintains an active research program studying evolutionary and ecological processes in tree populations with a particular commitment to discovering how long-lived trees will survive rapid climate warming.
Sork is an elected fellow of the American Association for Advancement of Sciences and the California Academy of Sciences. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Michigan. Sork has been a professor at UCLA since 2001 and has served as department chair for five years and dean of Life Sciences for 11 years.
Aside from her public lecture, Sork will also visit with undergraduate classes, meet informally with students, faculty and staff and participate in discussions on environmental justice. The Visiting Scholar Lecture and campus visit is sponsored by the USD College of Arts & Sciences and the Alpha Chapter of Phi Beta Kappa.
Ed Gerrish, president of Phi Beta Kappa and assistant professor of public administration, said the organization is hosting this event as part of their long tradition of bringing world-class scholars to campus.
“It’s a chance for students to learn from and to talk to a world-class scholar in the area of ecology right here on our campus, and we hope that it contributes to the intellectual development of the students and faculty on campus,” Gerrish said.
Phi Beta Kappa is the most prestigious academic society for undergraduates in the United States, and USD is the only institution of higher learning public or private in the state of South Dakota with a Phi Beta Kappa chapter.
Alpha Chapter, chartered in 1926, has enrolled some of the most distinguished graduates in the history of USD. Formally sheltered in the College of Arts & Sciences, Phi Beta Kappa is open by invitation to students who have excelled in the traditional liberal arts.
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