BITS student Ken Sprull designed the logo above in the summer of 2007 as part of his experience to engage in actions to improve local environmental quality in North Philadelphia.  He, along with other students in his group, strongly articulated the viewpoint that North Philadelphia environmental concerns are deeply connected to social ones. Their perspective was that those include the need to foster racial harmony and reduce violence in their daily lives. His logo and the group's sponsorship of community-building  events to raise local environmental awareness captured this sentiment.

With this, and many other similar exchanges in our experiences implementing the BITS Program during the past four years in mind, we followed with great interest the events of the presidential election campaign throughout last year. Our staff, the students and  families with whom we work, and Temple students have found the campaign season and Obama's story of community organizer to President-elect to be fascinating as well as inspirational. Our attention has been on the use of information technologies by the candidates, the shocking media attention paid to one of our own staff who was at the center of a national debate on journalistic ethics in a web 2.0 era, and Obama's visit to historic Progress Plaza in October, a site that students in the BITS Program have been depicting as part of our community geographic information systems (GIS) initiative during the past four years.

The logistical juggernaut of the upcoming historic Presidential Inauguration has been the topic of lively conversation during the past few weeks at ITSRG. We spent considerable time debating whether or not to attend, and if so how. We ultimately decided to follow events from the ITSRG Workroom, the spot that has been our vantage point throughout the past year.

We are pleased to share the news that the Office of the Provost of Temple University recently announced that classes in session on the first day of the semester - Inauguration Day - Tuesday,  January 20th may be canceled at the discretion of the instructor from 10:10 am through 1:00 pm so that students and faculty can watch the Inauguration Ceremony. Events will be shown on large screen TVs at five locations across campus:

Howard Gittis Student Center, Room 200, Main Campus
Mitten Hall, Great Court, Main Campus
Bright Hall Lounge, Ambler
Learning Center Auditorium, Ambler
Student Faculty Center, Health Science Campus

ITSRG will share perspectives throughout the day via our blogs and Twitter feed, including those of BITS students with whom we have worked over the years.

Michele Masucci, Director
ITSRG