KU Alumni Association honors high school seniors

The Kansas University Alumni Association will honor high school seniors from 17 northeast Kansas high schools today.

The event, part of the Kansas Honors Program, will honor students from Douglas, Jefferson and Leavenworth counties who are in the top 10 percent of their senior classes.

The dinner and program are at 7 p.m. at the Lied Center. John Stephens, professor of voice, will speak and Sheila Immel, the Alumni Association’s senior vice president for membership development, will present the awards.

Award to honor KU alumnus

A national herpetology organization has established a permanent endowment in the name of Kansas University alumnus and biologist Joseph Bruno Slowinski.

The 39-year-old curator of amphibians, turtles, reptiles and crocodilians at the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco died Sept. 12, 2001 one day after being bitten by a venomous, brightly banded krait in the jungles of Burma.

He grew up in Kansas City, Mo., and attended KU, where he received a bachelor’s degree in 1984.

The Joseph B. Slowinski Award for Excellence in Snake Systematics, established by the Center for North American Herpetology, will provide an annual award to the biologist who publishes the premier scientific paper on the classification and relationships of snakes.

For more information about the award, contact center director Joseph T. Collins at 749-3467.

Two show dogs missing

Two Sheltie show dogs and the crates they were in were taken from a barn Monday in rural Douglas County, Sheriff’s officers said.

A 47-year-old woman told Sheriff’s officers the dogs were taken sometime between 7:30 a.m. and 7:08 p.m. from the barn in the 300 section of East 300 Road in Douglas County.

One of the dogs was described as brown and white and is valued at $800. The second dog was blue merle and gray and white. It was valued at $1,300.

Sheriff’s officers have no clues and are continuing to investigate.

Clinic offers free speech screenings

The Schiefelbusch Speech-Language-Hearing Clinic will present a free speech and language screening from 9 a.m. to 11 a.m. Saturday at 2101 Haworth Hall, 1200 Sunnyside Ave., at Kansas University.

The clinic and the Lawrence Sertoma Club sponsor the screenings as part of the Douglas County Communicates campaign. Screenings take about 15 minutes and are for adults 16 or older.

Screening is a first step in identifying a speech problem, where researchers determine if further examinations are needed. Participants visit with researchers, who look at communication skills such as word choice, memory and concentration.

For more information, call 864-4690.

Tonganoxie to receive federal firefighting funds

Tonganoxie is one of 13 Kansas communities that will receive federal funds to aid its local fire department.

Tonganoxie’s cut will be $49,470 more than any other community’s.

The money will be used for fire operations and firefighter safety, including training, wellness and fitness, and the purchase of firefighting and personal protection equipment.

The grants were awarded by the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s U.S. Fire Administration under the Assistance to Firefighters Grant Program.

KU Spanish classes available for children

Kansas University’s Strategic Learning Center has added Spanish classes for children in grades 1-3 to its course offerings.

The center, in Trinity Lutheran Church, 1245 N.H., will offer Spanish I and II beginning in October. Classes will cost $35 for a month’s worth of evening classes and will be taught by Jennie Sichter, an Overland Park senior studying education.

For more information or to enroll, contact the center at 331-3236.