As we become increasingly more dependent on newer and faster computers, a computer is considered “outdated” soon after it leaves the store, and after a couple of years, many computers are relegated to the attic or set out on the curb. Often, those of us who rely on these machines don’t quite know what to do with an old computer once we’ve purchased its replacement.

In “Biology of Global Change,” a new course at Carleton College, students study the serious impact modern human existence is having on the environment. Outside of class, they are doing something about it.

E. Philip Sheridan, emeritus professor of English at Carleton College and former resident of Northfield, died on Wednesday, Feb. 2, 2000, at his home in Barrington, R. I. He was 83.

For students in rural Minnesota in the dead of winter, one might think the options for fun are limited to the indoors, or at least to traditional outdoor sports like hockey or skiing. Not so at Carleton College, where students will exit their cozy dorm rooms this weekend for some imaginative fun in the ice and snow at the College’s Winter Carnival, a tradition that dates back to the 1930s.

Ada M. Harrison, one of Carleton College’s most admired and beloved professors, died Monday, Dec. 27, in Northfield, Minn. She was 85. A respected economist and devoted teacher, Harrison taught economics for 31 years at Carleton, specializing in industrial organization, economic theory, and accounting. A public memorial service was held Friday, Jan. 28, 2000, in Carleton’s Skinner Memorial Chapel.

For two-and-a-half months last summer, Carleton College senior Rachel Bercovitz of Des Plaines, Ill., studied the “junior high” phase of sierra dome spiders, observing the species’ mating rituals-from avoidance of the opposite sex to two boys fighting over one girl to ultimate consummation. Bercovitz conducted lab experiments to test an established hypothesis linking a female’s weight to the length of her “associative” period, and along the way developed a new hypothesis that a male sierra dome spider will fight harder for a female who is about to mature, versus one who is farther from her sexual prime.

Carleton College French professor and self-described expatriate Chérif Keïta is going home. He will return to his native Mali in January, bringing 19 of his students with him for a three-month stay, his longest visit since he left the West African country as a teenager to pursue his education in 1972.

The Carleton College Board of Trustees recently approved the appointment of Professor of Philosophy Perry C. Mason as the College’s first John E. Sawyer Professor of Liberal Learning. The five-year appointment honors Mason for his skills in mentoring colleagues in teaching, scholarship, and service, and for his ability to forge consensus on difficult issues, particularly through his leadership in important administrative roles and on key committees.

A new endowed professorship at Carleton College, given through a generous gift by one of the College’s former trustees, Francis T. (Fay) Vincent, Jr., will be named in honor of John Sawyer, a former president of Williams College and of the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

The role of photography in the personal lives and public history of 20th-century America and the profound impact photographs have had on every aspect of life will be the focus of “American Photography: A Century of Images,” a new PBS documentary executive produced by John Schott, the James W. Strong Professor of the Liberal Arts at Carleton College.