Jeomi Maduka ‘09 advanced to the women’s long jump finals at the U.S. Olympic Track and Field trials in Oregon. She jumped 20 feet, 10 inches to earn the 12th and final spot. Maduka, a two-sport athlete who hails from Arlington, Texas, is a four-time All-American, earning the distinction twice in outdoor track, once in indoor track and once in women’s basketball. She is also the 2007-08 Ivy League Women’s Basketball Player of the Year and the 2005-06 Ivy League Women’s Basketball Rookie of the Year.

Two Hotel School professors have found that the French classification system of Bordeaux wine châteaux is out of date. This may not come as a shock when you realize the system was developed in 1855.

The study from Cornell’s Center for Hospitality Research, “An Analysis of Bordeaux Wine Ratings, 1970-2005: Implications for the Existing Classification of the Médoc and Graves,” finds that while the three major modern wine raters - Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate, Steven Tanzer’s International Wine Cellar and the Wine Spectator - are reliable. Some Bordeaux châteaux wines have moved up in rank based on ratings by the three.

“However, because one rater is consistently higher than the others, consumers should not consider all equally rated wines as being equally good, when those ratings are coming from different sources” Thompson wrote. Vive la France. Thus, certain wine prices do not correspond perfectly with quality. The full report is here.

Mickey Rapkin ‘00, a veteran of the genre during his Cornell days, has written “Pitch Perfect: The Quest for Collegiate a Cappella Glory,” in which he reports on his travels with the Tufts University Beelzebubs, the University of Oregon’s Divisi and the University of Virginia’s Hullabahoos.

“I also sang in an a cappella group myself when I was at Cornell, and I just always thought there was a bigger story to tell - the heartwarming, bizarre and exciting story about what amounts to collegiate rock stars,” Rapkin told U.S. News & World Report. “So much of collegiate a cappella is just about being stupid with your friends.” The magazine says there are more than 1,200 American college groups with 200,000 alumni.

An editor at GQ, Rapkin sang with the all-male Cayuga’s Waiters, founded in 1949. Pictured: several original Cayuga’s Waiters performing in Bailey Hall on June 9, 2007.

Flash versions of two chapbooks, “Poetry in Your Pocket” and “Art in Your Pocket,” which were distributed April 17 in New York City as part of the city’s sixth annual Poem in Your Pocket Day, can be seen on the College of Architecture, Art and Planning Web site.

A CD by Charles Mingus titled “Cornell 1964,” previously reported on in The Essentials, was named Reissue/ Historical Release of the Year by the Jazz Journalists Association June 18.

Colin Hines wrote a whodunit called “Murder at Arecibo: Life – and Death – at the Arecibo Observatory” while working there as its head in the 1970s. The book “gained some notoriety and gave some insight into life in Puerto Rico and at AO as well as a murder mystery,” he recently wrote to his former lab colleagues. “This has now been published (by iUniverse) along with two prequels.” Amazon.com’s description of his first volume reads, in part, “Laureen Fortune, still foxy at 40, visits the Arecibo Observatory as guest of former lover Kelly Collins, an astronomer from the University of Chicago. The observatory’s spectacular radio/radar telescope, comprising a twenty-acre reflecting dish of exquisitely shaped aluminum sheeting, a 600-ton cat’s cradle of steel girders suspended 50 stories above to hold its radio feeds, and cutting-edge radio and computing equipment, has drawn a number of other scientific investigators and hangers-on to its site in northwest Puerto Rico… Laureen inhales the tortured history and mixed-up culture of the Isle of Enchantment until the idyll is broken one day by the discovery at dawn of a body that has fallen from the suspended structure, pierced the dish, and been disemboweled in the process.”

Fine beach reading.

If you’re thinking of touring the Finger Lakes wine trails this summer, a perfect starting point is a tour of Cornell University Library’s “wine exhibition trail.”

Begin by viewing “Song of the Vine: A History of Wine,” a comprehensive look at viticulture, from its origins in Europe to present-day developments in the Finger Lakes, on display in the Hirshland Gallery, Kroch Library.

Wonder if “cartobibulosity” is even a word? Find out when you visit a colorful display of cartographic approaches to the world of grapes and wine in the lower level of Olin Library. Next, stop at the Nestlé Library to learn more about the Hotel School’s popular Introduction to Wine class and view highlights from the Restaurant Menu Collection.

The Entomology Library exhibition in Comstock Hall details how one tiny insect – the phylloxera vastatrix – nearly destroyed the European wine industry.

Enjoy Mann Library’s visual tour of exciting new research developments in New York viniculture. Also on display are period books, nursery catalogues and herbarium specimens from Bailey Hortorium.

And finally, as you head to the wineries on Seneca Lake, Cornell’s Lee Library in Geneva provides highlights of innovations originating at the Experiment Station. Exhibition hours.

With the shaky economy, many Cornell graduates are finding it difficult to land their dream jobs right out of college. And while many may initially scoff at the idea, the wisest thing for them to do may be to get a temp job. They will certainly not be alone. Temporary employment agencies are responsible for placing more than two-and-a-half million Americans in jobs every day. And the numbers continue to grow each year. The rise of today’s temp agencies is the subject of the just-published Cornell University Press book, “The Good Temp.” Authors Vicki Smith and Esther B. Neuwirth highlight the history of temp agencies and show how they have revolutionized the workplace, offering businesses effective, efficient and committed employees. Good temps are sometimes even more valued than permanent staff, and the variety of positions open up interesting new job opportunities and personal connections. So don’t fret if your favorite company isn’t hiring at the moment. Just start temping.

METAezra reports that Forbes magazine has taken it upon itself to see which universities have produced the most megabucks alumni. With nine Big Red billionaires, including Chuck Feeney ’56 (pictured), Cornell ties for ninth place on the list with the University of California Los Angeles and UC Berkeley, Northwestern, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of Southern California. Above us on the list: Harvard, which has produced a staggering 50 billionaires, Stanford (30), Penn (27), Yale (19), Columbia (15) and New York University, tied with Chicago at 10 each. Who knew?

The Mario Einaudi Center for International Studies has put out a call for proposals from tenured and tenure-track Cornell faculty, along with Cornell programs and centers, for its biannual seed grant program. Proposals are sought that advance research by junior faculty, request seed funding for the preparation of external funding requests, and are thematically related to the Einaudi Center’s initiatives on contemporary foreign policy and international development, or to Cornell’s Africa initiative. Proposals should also demonstrate long-term benefit to international studies students at Cornell and conform to the highest academic standards. The deadline to apply is Aug. 15.

Submit the following to Heike Michelsen: A description of background, objectives, activities, work plan, expected outputs, beneficiaries and impact (no more than 2,000 words); plans for pursuing future research and external funding; a detailed budget with justification of expenses; CVs for principal faculty involved; and human subjects approval, if necessary.

Grants can be used to support conferences, workshops and virtual networks, research, equipment, meetings with potential funders and collaborators, data collection and travel. Grants, of up to $20,000, will not fund salary replacement or summer salaries and must be used within one year of award date.