■Thirty-five students from the southwest residential complex at the University of Massachusetts were treated for food poisoning last night, while about 100 others, also affected, were being asked to remain in their dormitories for treatment.
■In the aftermath of the building takeover at Amherst College by black students from the Five College area last week, it has been learned that the occupiers removed more than 300 books from the Robert Frost Library and placed them in the Black Culture Center on campus.
■A summer school program, abandoned 15 or more years ago, is being considered at Amherst Regional High School. Officials say there is growing need of a program to make up courses that students fail and for those who simply want to learn in the summer.
■Jesse Brown, secretary of the U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs, will come to Northampton, Thursday, to dedicate the first independently operated homeless veterans shelter to open in the United States. The center is located at the VA Medical Center in Leeds.
■Mount Holyoke College Dean of Students Elizabeth Braun will leave the Valley this summer to become dean of students at Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania. Braun, a 10-year staffer at Mount Holyoke and dean of students there since 2003, is to become Swarthmore’s dean July 1.
■A physician who practiced medicine in Easthampton for 26 years closed her offices for good Thursday because she has cancer. Dr. Diane DiBenedetto notified patients earlier this month in a newspaper announcement that her 132 Cottage St. office would be closing.