KU notes roundup: Better mobile connection at stadium, vampires, food trucks and more

photo by: Nick Krug

The Kansas University marching band and many other high school bands from Kansas and Missouri perform during the halftime show as part of Band Day on Saturday, Sept. 12, 2015 at Memorial Stadium.

It’s been a busy week in Kansas University news. The Ellen DeGeneres Show was here. Bill Clinton is coming here. KU Provost Jeff Vitter is most likely leaving here. And a flurry of construction projects continue to be planned and completed; the finished project of the week is the new engineering building, LEEP2, a formal dedication ceremony for which will be Friday.

Here’s a handful of noteworthy items I’ve been meaning to report but didn’t get to earlier:

• Better mobile connections at stadium: AT&T users tailgating and watching Saturday’s homecoming football game should have a better connection for making mobile calls, sharing on social media or surfing the web on their phones at Memorial Stadium. AT&T has boosted its mobile internet coverage at the stadium by installing new “Distributed Antenna Systems,” according to a recent news release from the company.

AT&T installed a similar system in Allen Fieldhouse in 2014, and — as part of a buildout started in 2013 — plans to further improve connectivity by adding more such systems throughout campus, including West Campus, the release said. AT&T says its systems are open to other wireless companies, should they choose to join the network.

• Vampires for credit: Just in time for Halloween, KU announced this week that it will offer a new course this spring called “The Vampire in Literature, Film, and Television.” Through the Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures, the course will cover everything from 19th century Russian literature to “Twilight,” exploring the origins of the vampire and depictions of the creature over the centuries.

KU’s press release about the class features a few figures inspiring the course material, including a Hungarian countess who believed “that if she bathed in the blood of a young girl her skin would remain young and supple.” Yikes!

• Food trucks on campus: If you find yourself on foot, hungry and near Lot 90 around lunchtime Tuesdays and Thursdays, you’re in luck. KU Dining reports that four local food trucks will be setting up shop in the lot (in front of the student rec center) from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. Tuesdays and Thursdays. They just started this week.

• Professor emeritus of journalism dies: Longtime journalism professor Paul Jess died Oct. 22. He was 83. Jess joined the faculty at the William Allen White School of Journalism and Mass Communications in 1976 and retired from KU in 1996, according to his obituary. While there he served as general manager of the University Daily Kansan, chair of the news-editorial sequence and associate dean, and taught media law, advanced reporting and advanced editing. He was the father of Jill Jess Phythyon, former KU spokeswoman.

• Timelapse of new dorms: And finally, just for fun, check out this cool timelapse video by KU Housing of the new Self and Oswald halls being constructed from the ground up in 47 seconds. I like how the sky is different in every shot — and if you don’t blink you can tell it snowed multiple times. In real time, construction took more than a year.