NPR’s ‘Science Friday’ to broadcast live from FSU with faculty panelists

National Public Radio’s acclaimed weekly science program, Talk of the Nation-Science Friday, will broadcast its April 8 show live from FSU. The popular program, hosted by Ira Flatow, will feature panels of experts predominantly drawn from the FSU faculty.

The program will be broadcast from the Nancy Smith Fichter Dance Theatre in the Department of Dance in Montgomery Hall (formerly Montgomery Gym) on Landis Green. Airtime begins promptly at 2 p.m., and will run until 4 p.m. with two one-hour segments.

For the first half of the show, Flatow and his guests will discuss the Terri Schiavo case and what it may portend for end-of-life care across the country. For the final hour, panelists will discuss the sociological aspects of aging and how technology can be used to assist an aging population.

Guest panelists scheduled for the show’s first segment on end-of-life care are: Jeffrey Spike, an associate professor of clinical ethics within the College of Medicine; Charles Maitland, a neurologist and clinical professor, also within the College of Medicine; and Lois L. Shepherd, the D’Alemberte professor of bioethics and health law in the College of Law.

For the show’s second half, guests scheduled are: Ken Brummel-Smith, chair of the Department of Geriatrics, College of Medicine; Jill Quadagno, professor of sociology with the Pepper Institute on Aging and Public Policy; and Neil Charness, a cognitive psychologist in the Department of Psychology.

The public is invited to attend the broadcast and also to participate in the program. Whenever his show travels, Flatow routinely fields questions from his studio audience and also takes questions from callers as well as e-mailed questions from listeners to the show on the World Wide Web. The show’s average weekly listenership in the United States is 2.6 million, a figure that complements an unknown number of listeners tuning in worldwide to more than 140 foreign stations that carry the program.

Tickets to the show are free, but are required for a seat in the theater that has a capacity of 380. Tickets are available on a first-come, first-served basis from the FSU Fine Arts Ticket Office, 644-6500.

The program is being presented by the FSU Office of Research, administered by Kirby Kemper, Vice President for Research and Robert O. Lawton Professor of Physics. For more information call Frank Stephenson (850) 644-8634, frankstp@mailer.fsu.edu.