Universities Remember the Victims of the Sandy Hook Elementary School Massacre in Newtown

It has been a very difficult week and, this morning, we are marking the one week anniversary of the massacre of innocents at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, which took away innocent, beautiful lives on a golden morning during what is considered a holiday season.

Everyone in the US continues to mourn and, as we go about our daily lives, we have often stopped to reflect and to remember the children and the educators and to thank the first responders.

At 9:30AM today, we will be having a moment of silence at UMass Amherst, as we were informed by our Chancellor, and the bells will peel 26 times, to honor the 20 young children who lost their lives and the six educators.

Nature is mourning as well -- we are experiencing torrentials rains and high winds.

As we all reflect on this senseless, horrific tragedy, those of us who are educators can't help to try and ease the pain somehow in whatever way that we can.

Some universities have had alums die in the massacre and have had children of alums perish -- my husband's university, the University of Hartford, for example, which has set up a Support page.

The University of Connecticut has established a memorial scholarship.

In times like these, we need to embrace one another for support and to watch out for one another.

Make the most of each minute that you are on planet earth.

Remembering Professor John M. Quigley of UC Berkeley

The sad news reached me during a time when we celebrate many college graduations and other milestones.

John M. Quigley, a renowned urban economist and regional scientist, passed away last Saturday, May 12, 2012.

The news reached me via David E. Boyce, both an INFORMS Fellow and an RSAI Fellow.

The Goldman School of Public Policy at the University of California Berkeley issued a statement on his passing, and Ed Glaeser of Harvard University wrote the following column for Bloomberg on Quigley's outstanding contributions to the understanding of housing and its pricing, "An Economist Who Changed the Way We Think About Housing." in which he also noted the important role that Quigley played in mentoring young scholars.

I couldn't agree more.

As a relatively fresh PhD, I published both co-authored (with Stella Dafermos) and single-authored papers in the journal, Regional Science and Urban Economics, on spatial competition and oligopolies and just this morning I was working on a draft of a paper  that cites the paper published therein with Dafermos in 1987, which, in my opinion, contains some of the very first ideas that are relevant supply chain network competition. John Quigley was then the Editor in Chief of this journal.

In addition, David E. Boyce wrote in a message, reprinted below, that went out to RSAI Fellows today:

It seems appropriate to mention at this time John's role in establishing the RSAI Fellows Award. On November 7, 2000, I sent a letter to Geoffrey Hewings, then President of RSAI, proposing the establishment of a Fellows Award for our association. I did not discuss the proposal, or argue for its implementation, but only asked that it be presented to the RSAI Council for discussion.

As I recall, one member of the Council especially liked this idea, drafted a resolution for its implementation, and lobbied for its adoption. That person, of course, was John Quigley. We all have John to thank for whatever recognition we have received as RSAI Fellows.

John received the RSAI Fellows Award in 2004, the third group of scholars to be so honored.

David Boyce


We were honored to have known John M. Quigley. He will be missed.