UND to hold Showcase in Bismarck Jan. 9; public invited It will be "show and tell" higher education-style when the University of North Dakota takes its show on the road Tuesday, Jan. 9, 6-9 p.m. at the Best Western Doublewood Inn in Bismarck. The event is free and open to the public. A program will start at 7:30 p.m. The "show" is the University's Bismarck Showcase, featuring exhibits from 16 of UND's best-known campus units. On display, for example, will be the Mars spacesuit, designed by a five-college North Dakota Space Grant Consortium team led by UND's Department of Space Studies. Other UND departments and units showing their stuff include the School of Medicine and Health Sciences, School of Engineering and Mines, College of Nursing, College of Business and Public Administration, College of Arts and Sciences, College of Education and Human Development, School of Law, Division of Continuing Education, Enrollment Services, the Graduate School, UND Athletics, and the UND Alumni Association. The "tell" is UND President Charles Kupchella, UND Alumni Association Executive Vice President Tim O'Keefe, and others who will talk about the UND of today and tomorrow. The event is free and open to the public. To RSVP, go online at www.undalumni.org or call at (800) 543-8764. "We're being proactive in telling our UND story to our many stakeholders in the Bismarck area," said Kupchella. "We have great things going on and we wanted to share that -- to bring a little bit of the UND experience to our many alumni and friends in the Bismarck-Mandan area and beyond. We want them to know where we are, and where we're going." Kupchella said UND is in the second year of its second five-year strategic plan. He credited the plan, as well as UND's faculty, staff and supporters, for much of the growth that the University has achieved in the past six years. UND, for example, now has an annual economic impact of nearly $1 billion dollars. That includes a doubling in the past five years of the research and supported program dollars to nearly $100 million in 2005-06, said Kupchella. The evening will include hors d'oeuvres, a cash bar, and an opportunity for old friends to reconnect and to meet new friends, said Don Kojich, UND executive associate vice president for university relations.