More than 150 students, parents, faculty and alumni attended a commencement forum yesterday, demanding that administration bring back the university-wide commencement ceremony in December.

Organized by ASUA, the two-hour forum gave audience members a chance to ask questions, express frustrations, identify existing problems with graduation and suggest solutions.

Alistair Chapman, student body president, said the goal of the forum was to initiate communication between students and administration. [Read article]

The UA and Arizona Center for Innovation honored two faculty members yesterday who have used their professional expertise to transform their ideas into viable commercial products.

The faculty members were honored for their successful commercial ventures at the inaugural luncheon of the Technology Innovation Awards.

The awards are sponsored by the Office of Vice President for Research, Graduate Studies and Economic Development, UA Office of Technology Transfer and the Arizona Center for Innovation. The center is located in the UA Science and Technology Park, near Vail, Ariz. [Read article]

Today marks the Jewish New Year for many UA students, faculty and staff, but some Jewish students will not be attending Rosh Hashana services this morning due to class commitments.

"This is the first time that I haven't gone to services," said Samantha Kantor, a junior majoring in English.

Kantor is missing Rosh Hashana services this morning because she said she does not want to miss her science professor's review for an exam Tuesday. [Read article]

Last year's tentative plans to merge the departments of journalism and communication with another department have been altered to include the School of Information Resources and Library Science, instead of media arts.

Once merged, the three would create a new college, but lack of funds due to budget cuts has postponed plans for the merger.

Ed Donnerstein, dean of the College of Social and Behavioral Science, said this was an idea last year, and no discussions are in the works at the moment. [Read article]

Students in the Media Arts Productions club hope to gain hands-on media experience by producing original short films and a TV show.

Phillip Lyband, president of the Media Arts Productions club, originally started the group in fall 2003 for media arts students who wanted to produce films, but had not yet reached the upper division production classes.

"I had some boring classes," Lyband said. "We wanted to make stuff at the time, so we just thought, 'Hey.'" [Read article]

Two Arizona/Sonora residents were seen shooting pellet guns in the parking lot of their residence hall Friday, but the students are not facing legal charges despite UA weapons policies prohibiting guns on campus.

According to reports, when UAPD arrived they found a car in the Arizona/Sonora parking lot with pellet guns in the front seat.

Police were able to find the two students based on the Resident Assistant's description of them, reports stated. [Read article]

Things you always never wanted to know