Observer the
The Independent Newspaper Serving Notre Dame and Saint Mary’s Volume 44 : Issue 134
wednesday, April 28, 2010
ndsmcobserver.com
Lacrosse brings hope to Ugandan children Fields of Growth International, a non-profit organization, works to aid women and children afflicted by AIDS By SARAH MERVOSH News Editor
Playing lacrosse gives children in Uganda whose parents have been afflicted by AIDS one thing they can’t find anywhere else — something to call their own. “They love playing lacrosse specifically because they all have their own stick when they get to play, and they don’t really own anything,” said Kevin Dugan, Notre Dame’s director of men’s lacrosse operations at Notre Dame. “That is just an incredible experience for them because they‘re just not used to having something [that is their own.]” Children in Uganda have been able to play lacrosse and other sports since Dugan created Fields of Growth International, a non-profit organization that strives to facilitate development in Uganda. Notre Dame athletes, and particularly members of the m en’s l a c r o s s e t e a m , w o r k with t h e o r g a n i z a t i o n t o empower both children and their parents in Uganda. “Lacrosse is certainly not the main priority in what we’re doing. The main priority is social entrepreneurism, AIDS education and real, grassroots
v i l l a g e e c o n om ic development,” said Dugan, a 2001 g r a d u a t e o f No tre D am e. “What we really want to do is be able to intersect the things that bring us passion and joy with the need in the world.” Sophomore lacrosse player J a k e B r e m s w ill tra vel to Uganda this summer to intern with the organization. “I’m excited to get over there and be able to help other people. I’ve never done an intern a t i o n a l s e r v ic e lik e this,” Brems said. Brems will study the effectiveness of the organization’s poultry-rearing project, which i s m e a n t t o b enefit wo men w h o s e h u s b a nds ha ve died from AIDS. “It’s a $500 project where we build a chicken coop. We buy about 100 young chicks and we buy the family the vaccinations they need to keep the chickens healthy,” Dugan said. “We buy them all the things they need to get the project up and running.” The family can then sell the eggs for profit or use them for familial nourishment, he said. Dugan said the organization will pilot the poultry-rearing project in May. “The woman is 31. She is
Photo courtesy of Kevin Dugan
see LACROSSE/page 11
Ugandan children gather on their lacrosse field. Director of men’s lacrosse operations Kevin Dugan started Fields of Growth International to aid those afflicted by AIDS in Uganda.
ND alum discusses work for Avatar University supports research initiatives
By LIZ O’DONNELL News Writer
Notre Dame alum Allan Hemberger told students who packed the DeBartolo Hall auditorium Tuesday evening that the most enjoyable and difficult area of his career is working in visual effects. Hemberger discussed his experiences working in the field of feature films and the technical background that accompanied it. “Every time I come here, I try to summarize what I do and the answer changes each time,” he said. Hemberger, a 2001 graduate of Notre Dame, has worked for WETA Digital, a five-time Academy Award winning visual effects facility in New Zealand, for several years. He will start work at Pixar in May. “I spent the past year working on Avatar,” he said. “I carved out a niche at WETA as a person who loved working on really hard problems. It was a lot of headaches and long hours, but I liked having an area to work on.”
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TODAY’S PAPER
By JOSEPH McMAHON Associate News Editor
transferred over into my work with ‘Avatar,’” he said. While working on “Avatar,” Hemberger said he was in charge of creating the graphics for the
The University recently announced the administration will continue to push its goal of becoming one of the best research institutions in the world and announced an additional $40 million of internal funding to support nine projects. “Doing research is fundamental to the University,” Executive Vice President John AffleckGraves said. “The goal of the University is fairly simple — to be a source for good throughout the world. We do that through three ways: our undergraduate
see AVATAR/page 10
see RESEARCH/page 13
SUZANNA PRATT/The Observer
Allan Hemberger, a 2001 Notre Dame graduate, discusses his work on the movie Avatar. He has worked with five-time Academy Award winning visual effects facility, WETA Digital for several years. Hemberger worked as computer graphics supervisor for the Academy Award-winning movie “Avatar” and as a 3D digital water technical director for “King Kong”. He began the presentation by
showing students a demo reel he created while working as a computer graphics supervisor on the movie “The Day the Earth Stood Still.” “A lot of tricks that I learned on ‘The Day the Earth Stood Still’
New leprechaun chosen page 3 ◆ Campus rapper Will Thwaites interview page 16 ◆ Men’s lacrosse seeks win page 32 ◆ Viewpoint page 14