This week's Chronicle has an article about colleges that are working with heirloom or "heritage" foods in their dining halls or in their research. Emory University is one of them—last week Emory served up 1,600 pounds of Standard Bronze and Bourbon Red turkeys, two breeds that date back to the 1800s but are in danger of dying out for lack of demand. Here's an excerpt from the article:

Producers of heritage or "heirloom" foods are fighting an uphill battle against the agriculture industry, which selects animals and plants for mass production and broad commercial appeal. In the process, foods that fed generations have been lost, along with their DNA and their traditions.

The heirloom-food movement might be the philosophical ground where gourmands and...

Campus architecture and facilities news from around the Web:

• Renovation of U. of Oklahoma Architecture Building Reaches Halfway Point (Left: Gould Hall rendering; U. of Oklahoma image)

• U. of Nebraska Regents Approve Plans for an Innovation Campus

• Cost of Campus Projects in Indiana Worries Some

A new contemplation garden at the University of California at Davis honors the Patwin people, who once inhabited the land that became the campus. The garden, part of the university's 100-acre arboretum, is located on the bank of Putah Creek and includes 34 kinds of trees and plants that the Patwin used. The garden identifies many by their Patwin names.

The shape of a seating area in the new garden at the U. of California at Davis recalls the initial coil of a Patwin basket. (U. of California at Davis photo)

The garden also includes a series of engraved basalt columns, one of which records the names of 51 Patwin men, women, and children who were removed to missions between 1817...

Campus architecture and facilities news from around the Web:

• Georgetown U. Shows Off a 10-Year Campus Plan (Left: the plan; Georgetown U. image)

• Virginia Tech and Blacksburg Pursue Sustainability Together

• Blue Mountain Community College Plans New Facility in Hermiston, Ore.

•

The University of California at Berkeley has scrapped high-profile plans for a $143-million art museum by the Tokyo firm Toyo Ito & Associates Architects, the museum's director said Wednesday. According to the San Francisco Chronicle, the university canceled the project after raising only $81-million of the $200-million it sought in a capital campaign for the museum. But the museum's director, Lawrence Rinder, said it would still build an "innovative and affordable" new museum at some point.

The Toyo Ito building, planned for a site in downtown Berkeley, was to have replaced museum's current home, a poured-concrete Modernist structure on Bancroft Way that dates to 1970. Designed by Mario Ciampi and associates Richard...

Campus architecture and facilities news from around the Web:

• 1914 Yale Bowl Gets a $30-Million Modernization (Left: the stadium's new entrance; Yale U. photo)

• Contractors Vie for Yale Construction Projects That Aren't on Hold

• In Iowa, Scott Community College Breaks Ground for Culinary-Arts Facility

The National Wildlife Federation is releasing a report today that documents more than 160 student-led projects in sustainability and offers tips on how to start similar projects on campuses across the country.

Julian Keniry, director of the Campus Ecology program at the federation, said that the examples in the report document what many have observed about the current sustainability movement: There is unprecedented student interest in sustainability issues that has given rise to a diverse set of activities.

Ms. Keniry also said interest in sustainability cuts across some geographic and political demographics. "We have been impressed by the breadth of involvement," she said. "They are schools small and large, state, public, and private."

And although sustainability programs...

Campus architecture and facilities news from around the Web:

• Trustees Approve $200-Million Facelift for Kent State's Main Campus

• Housing Project for U. of Minnesota at Rochester Is Back on Track

• U. of Tennessee Architecture Students Reimagine a Vast, Empty Mill Building

Former President George W. Bush is to unveil this design for his presidential-library complex at Southern Methodist U. Wednesday afternoon. (Robert A.M. Stern Architects renderings)

The George W. Bush Presidential Library at Southern Methodist University will be a fairly contemporary structure whose clean lines call to mind the shapes of Georgian architecture without replicating its ornament and details, according to drawings that the former president and his wife, Laura Bush, are scheduled to release at a press conference this afternoon.

But USA Today had the drawings online Tuesday evening, along with an article that described "a lantern-shaped roof that will...

Any facilities administrator or campus architect who has had to add ramps, elevators, heating-and-cooling systems, and other modern features to grand old college buildings will appreciate this article. The Guardian reports on controversies at Britain's venerable universities, as officials try to balance modern additions with historical sensitivity.

At the University of Cambridge's Old Schools, people noticed a hole in the floor of the Regent House Combination Room and wondered if maintenance people were fixing the pipes or somesuch. When they found out the university was putting in an elevator, they were appalled.

"It is historically the most important room in the universities of the English-speaking world. It is the cradle of Cambridge's democracy, our...