Tik Root, a junior at Middlebury College who was missing for a week during a study abroad program in Damascus, Syria, was confirmed to be in the hands of the Syrian authorities on Sunday after allegedly taking part in protests, according to The Middlebury Campus. Root has been located and determined "safe and well," according to a statement from Root's father released to The Campus. Syrian authorities have not yet revealed when Root will be released, although several detainees who had been imprisoned for the same amount of time as Root have been freed. Several members of Congress from Vermont have been working with the Syrian government to ensure Root's return to the United States, The Campus reported.
Yale's School of Engineering & Applied Science received a $50 million donation the largest in the school's history on Thursday as part of the "Yale Tomorrow" fundraising campaign, according to the Yale Daily News. The donation from John Malone, a member of Yale's class of 1963, will enable the engineering school to create 10 new endowed professorships over the course of several years. Malone's gift will allow the school to hire new professors for its core departments, interdisciplinary research centers and two joint professorships with Yale's School of Management. The recent donation, which is nearly double Malone's $24 million gift in 2000, will allow the engineering school to expand the university's engineering program by adding more distinguished faculty. The new engineering and applied sciences professorships will be named "Malone Professors" in honor of the donation, according to the Daily News.
As part of an effort to provide American-quality higher education abroad, New York University will create a degree-granting campus in Shanghai, China, in addition to its campus in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, according to The New York Times. The inaugural campus will enroll approximately 150 students, roughly half of whom will be Chinese citizens. The program, which is slated to begin in September 2013, aims to eventually enroll over 3,000 students. NYU faculty members who volunteer to teach abroad in Shanghai will hold classes in English. Plans for the Shanghai campus initially began when Chinese officials invited NYU to establish a campus in China. Although dozens of American universities have branches in cities abroad, NYU is one of the few universities with a degree-granting campus in another country, according to The Times.
