University System News

USG VALUE:
www.statesboroherald.com
http://www.statesboroherald.com/section/1/article/52078/
New GSU freshmen BUILD links with community
Students volunteer to help local nonprofit agencies, schools
By AL HACKLE
Herald Writer
During the past two weeks, 120 incoming Georgia Southern University freshmen did volunteer work for nine nonprofit agencies and six schools. Their tasks included moving furniture, digging a ditch, painting, boxing food at the Food Bank and accompanying foster children on a field trip. It was all part of BUILD, a program of the university’s Office of Student Leadership and Civic Engagement.

www.valdostadailytimes.com
http://valdostadailytimes.com/schoolnews/x596956806/Camp-encourages-students-to-consider-careers-in-computer-science
Camp encourages students to consider careers in computer science
Valdosta State University
VALDOSTA — Thirteen-year-old Priyanka Gupta sees an opportunity to make her mark in the world through technology and the advancements therein. …Gupta is one of 18 area middle school students who participated in this year’s Computing Adventures @ VSU computer science camp, hosted by the Department of Math and Computer Science at Valdosta State University.

USG NEWS:
www.onlineathens.com
http://onlineathens.com/local-news/2013-08-04/university-system-looks-improve-classroom-space-usage
University system looks to improve classroom space usage
By WALTER C. JONESMORRIS NEWS SERVICE
ATLANTA — The state entity with the largest number of buildings uses them an average of one-quarter of the work week, leaving them empty the rest of the time, a new study shows. The University System of Georgia studied the issue at all 31 of the state’s public colleges and universities and found it could be more efficient.

www.georgiatrend.com
http://www.georgiatrend.com/August-2013/Power-Players-Homegrown-Leader/
POWER PLAYERS: HOMEGROWN LEADER
Patty Rasmussen
There’s a new top Dawg at the University of Georgia. Jere Morehead was officially installed as the 22nd president of the university on July 1, replacing former president Michael Adams. But Morehead is hardly an unknown quantity. He served as senior vice president for academic affairs and provost for the past three years and, except for one year as a visiting professor at the University of Michigan, spent the majority of his academic career at the flagship university. Interestingly, the academic world wasn’t More-head’s first career choice.

www.onlineathens.com
http://onlineathens.com/uga/2013-08-02/be-good-service-new-uga-president-tells-new-grads
Be of good service, new UGA president tells new grads
By LEE SHEARER
New University of Georgia president Jere Morehead exhorted hundreds of new UGA graduates to go out and do good in the world on Friday as Morehead presided over his first UGA commencement as UGA president. “Be of good service,” Morehead said, pointing out to the graduates that they are now ambassadors for the university.

www.diverseeducation.com
http://diverseeducation.com/article/55023/?utm_campaign=Diverse%20Newsletter%203&utm_medium=email&utm_source=Eloqua&elq=89313f89f4b54da79bcdeddd36d34967&elqCampaignId=33
Thousands of Students Left Out in Cold by Summer Pell Grant Predicament
by Tina A. Brown
…The junior at Georgia Southern University said becoming a grownup is calling her by name. But no one in her family has the means to help pay for her education. “I decided not to take summer classes because I couldn’t afford it,” Burke said. She expected that she could apply for a Pell Grant, but she learned from her financial aid officer that full-time students who used the free federal funding during the fall and spring semesters could not tap into that resource during the summer terms. Obtaining a Pell Grant this summer was out of the question.

www.timesfreepress.com
http://www.timesfreepress.com/news/2013/aug/05/tuition-hikes-change-summer-jobs-college-students/
Tuition hikes change summer jobs for college students
by Barry Courter
Wes Blanton didn’t expect to be broke so fast. The rising sophomore at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville has worked at AT&T Field for the last five summers, but the bulk of the money he earned for his freshman year — about $1,200 — was gone by Thanksgiving… In Tennessee, state funding for higher education has dropped since 2009, and tuition has increased 44 percent between 2008-09 and the coming fall. It has gone up about 70 percent since 2007 at the University of Georgia, Georgia State University and the Georgia Institute of Technology.

RESEARCH:
www.valdostadailytimes.com
http://valdostadailytimes.com/schoolnews/x1724759108/Associate-professor-explores-disease-management-strategies-in-peanuts
Associate professor explores disease management strategies in peanuts
…Over the next several months, Dr. Emily Cantonwine, associate professor of biology at Valdosta State University, will join colleagues from the University of Georgia, University of Florida and Auburn University to explore multiple strategies for disease management and cost reduction of growing peanuts. This project is sponsored by the National Peanut Board.

www.forbes.com
http://www.forbes.com/sites/gyro/2013/08/05/smart-diapers-and-talking-dogs-where-wearable-technology-is-leading-us/
Smart Diapers And Talking Dogs: Where Wearable Technology Is Leading Us
Judy Abel
Wearable technology is fast creating a world in which technology is no longer an add-on. Instead, it is literally attached to us. It is embedded in our lives, generating and mining data in a way that is useful and functional, both for us and for marketers. It is no longer uncommon to see people wearing smart watches, like Pebble, or tracking their fitness with armbands such as UP and Nike+. Google Glasses are a regular topic of conversation whether it’s a skydiving tech demo or Jon Bon Jovi’s keyboardist wearing them live in concert… The FIDO project through the Georgia Institute of Technology is developing wearable technology that aims to improve communication between working or assistance dogs and their handlers.

www.timesunion.com
http://www.timesunion.com/news/article/Ga-university-studying-football-concussion-risks-4701913.php
Ga. university studying football concussion risks
STATESBORO, Ga. (AP) — Georgia Southern University is using a $385,000 grant to study the impact of concussions on football players, school officials said Thursday. University President Brooks Keel told WALB that Georgia Southern was the recipient of a grant from the National Institutes of Health, and is using technology called the Helmet Impact Telemetry System — or HITS — to record every blow football players take to their heads during games and practice sessions.

Related articles:
www.thepostsearchlight.com
Georgia Southern using technology to prevent football concussions

Georgia Southern using technology to prevent football concussions

www.atalanta.cbslocal.com
Georgia Southern University Studying Football Concussion Risks
http://atlanta.cbslocal.com/2013/08/02/georgia-southern-university-studying-football-concussion-risks/

www.cbsnews.com
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-205_162-57596677/hacked-iphone-chargers-could-let-snoops-spy-on-devices/
Hacked iPhone chargers could let snoops spy on devices
By CHENDA NGAK
The next time your plug in your iPhone into someone else’s charger, you could be putting all your personal data at risk. Malicious software could be installed without your knowledge that lets hackers attack your device. Georgia Tech Information Security Center researchers presented how they were able to hack into an iPhone using its charger at a briefing on Wednesday at the Black Hat cybersecurity conference in Las Vegas.

www.cio.com
http://www.cio.com/article/737537/Apple_Suffers_Bruising_Week
Apple Suffers Bruising Week
From labor issues that span the globe to flat retail store earnings to momentum-grabbing competitors to pressure from the Feds (and the list goes on), this is one week Apple executives, investors and fans would like to forget.
By Tom Kaneshige
From internal strife to competitors hitting their stride, Apple is having one of the roughest weeks of the year. This comes on the heels of a nasty hack to its developer’s site that Apple is working to restore, although developers said earlier this week that it’s still down… One more thing: Georgia Tech researchers have developed a proof-of-concept attack called Jekyll . It uses Trojan horse-style apps to sneak malware past Apple’s app review process, in order to infiltrate iPhones and iPads.

www.independentmail.com
http://www.independentmail.com/news/2013/aug/03/ga-marsh-study-center-suit-over-boat-docks/
Ga. marsh study at center of suit over boat docks
Associated Press
SAVANNAH, Ga. — Clark Alexander spent three years studying the question: Do boat docks built over coastal marshes do less environmental harm if they’re riddled with holes to let sunlight pass through to marsh grasses beneath them? The researcher for the Skidaway Institute of Oceanography in Savannah concluded that, during most of the year, docks made from open grating still block almost as much light as those built of solid wood. Now conservation groups are using Alexander’s work to challenge a rule by federal and state agencies that gives homeowners on the Georgia coast permission to build larger docks if they use grating for the walkways.

www.cen.acs.org
http://cen.acs.org/articles/91/i31/University-Inc.html
University Inc.
After years of distrust, academia and industry are forming alliances for chemical research
By Rick Mullin
President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s farewell address to the nation, delivered on Jan. 17, 1961, warned against the undue influence of a wealthy government-backed arms industry, the so-called military-industrial complex. In that speech, he also warned that the high cost of university science made U.S. campuses prone to the dangerous influence of money, corporations, and government… The past five years have seen a proliferation of collaborative agreements. In addition to the BASF project in Massachusetts, schools including North Carolina State University, Pennsylvania State University, and Georgia Institute of Technology have set up industry researchers in their labs to work directly with academic scientists.

STATE NEEDS/ISSUES:
www.myajc.com
http://www.myajc.com/news/news/state-regional-govt-politics/georgia-pays-millions-for-private-lawyers/nZC9b/?icmp=ajc_internallink_textlink_apr2013_ajcstubtomyajc_launch
Georgia pays millions for private lawyers
BY CHELSEA CARIKER-PRINCE – THE ATLANTA JOURNAL-CONSTITUTION
Georgia has spent more than $100 million during the past three years on private lawyers hired by the attorney general to perform state legal work — one of the largest programs of its kind among the 50 states. The cost of special assistant attorneys general, known as SAAGs (pronounced “sags”), has increased each year since the Great Recession, a time when most of state government was cutting back. …Top 10 Paid SAAGs in 2013… ASKEW, ANTHONY B. ATLANTA GA Fees: $596,138.00 Expenses: $27,121.15 Total: $623,259.15 Board of Regents…CARPENTER, KENNETH W. DECATUR GA Fees: $447,972.50 Expenses: $14,466.86 Total: $462,439.36 Board of Regents …And these attorneys were the 10 highest-paid SAAGs in 2012. Includes hourly fees for legal work for the full year, as well as expenses. …7. Luther Harold Beck, Jr. $448,716.31…LEVY, KENNETH L. DECATUR GA $448,397.50 $8,763.52 $457,161.02 Department of Natural Resources, Board of Regents, Department of Transportation, Georgia Gwinnett College …9. Kenneth W. Carpenter $442,587.01 Georgia Board of Regents (Georgia State, Georgia Tech, Metropolitan College),

Editorials/Columns/Opinions
www.ajc.com
http://www.ajc.com/weblogs/get-schooled/2013/aug/05/georgias-core-values-education-among-them/
Get Schooled with Maureen Downey
Georgia’s core values: Is education among them?
The state of Georgia has pulled out of a consortium developing new national tests that would finally allow parents to compare their children’s performance with kids in Boston and Boulder. Money drove the decision. The new test being developed by the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers, or PARCC, would be more expensive because it would involve more writing than Georgia’s bubble exams and take longer to administer and grade.

www.onlineathens.com
http://onlineathens.com/features/2013-08-03/smith-behind-red-door-georgia-finds-home-england
Smith: Behind a red door, Georgia finds a home in England
By LORAN SMITH
OXFORD, England — The University of Georgia has an enviable presence in this ancient and exclusive seat of learning and has for more than 25 years. You can easily find the UGA compound on Banbury Road by looking for the stone cottage with the bright red door.

www.denverpost.com
http://www.denverpost.com/opinion/ci_23777977/hiltzik-perils-online-college-learning
Hiltzik: The perils of online college learning
By Michael Hiltzik
Los Angeles Times
Let it not be said that San Jose State University hasn’t taught the world a valuable lesson in the promises and pitfalls of the fancy new craze for online university learning. The Cal State University campus set itself up as a pioneer in the field in January, when it announced plans to enroll up to 300 students in three introductory online courses; the fee would be $150, a deep discount from the usual cost of more than $2,000… Strapped for cash? You can vastly expand your program without hiring lots of crabby, expensive professors. For example, Georgia Tech is proposing to expand its computer science master’s program from 300 students to 10,000 by offering its courses online around the world.

www.insidehighered.com
http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2013/08/05/essay-disregard-politicians-who-question-humanities-show-founders#ixzz2b5nqZVSn
Ignoring the Founders
By Carol Geary Schneider and David Townsend
There would be no America if Thomas Jefferson cared more about beans and viticulture than the truth that all men are created equal, if John Adams cared more about the legality of contracts for debt than liberty, if Benjamin Franklin cared more about inventing and marketing new technologies than the pursuit of happiness. America arose on a foundation of ideas, dialogue, values, and aspirations that still stand today at the heart of a strong liberal — and liberating — education.

Education News
www.macon.com
http://www.macon.com/2013/08/03/2590311/testing-changes-in-store-as-new.html
Testing changes in store as new school year begins
By JENNA MINK
For the past couple of years, Kimberly Stephens has encountered additional challenges when preparing to go back to school. As a fifth-grade teacher in Houston County, Stephens not only spent her summers preparing her classroom, she also has been learning about new standards. …Statewide, teachers are in the midst of changes, which transform what they teach and the way schools are held accountable.

www.chronicle.com
http://chronicle.com/blogs/headcount/intersection-of-race-and-other-factors-shapes-colleges-success/35903
‘Intersection’ of Race and Other Factors Shapes Success in College
By Eric Hoover
Among college students whose mothers lacked a college degree, six-year graduation rates were higher for women than for men, but there was no such gender gap among black students whose mothers had a degree. That’s one finding of a study published in the American Journal of Orthopsychiatry (log-in required).

www.insidehighered.com
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2013/08/05/washington-state-2-year-colleges-will-ask-students-about-sexual-orientation
Ask, Do Tell
By Lauren Ingeno
Starting this summer, more than 500,000 students in the 34 institutions that make up the Washington State Community and Technical College System are being asked to answer optional questions about their sexual orientation and their gender identity on registration forms.

www.insidehighered.com
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2013/08/05/tiffin-u-drops-ivy-bridge-college-partnership-altius-over-accreditors-concerns#ixzz2b5nNL5BA
Setting Limits for Outsourcing Online
By Paul Fain
The shuttering of Ivy Bridge College could dump cold water on the online aspirations of some colleges, particularly ones that prefer to play it safe with their regional accreditor. A growing number of colleges are teaming up with outside firms to ramp up their online offerings.

www.chronicle.com
http://chronicle.com/blogs/ticker/cal-state-offers-online-courses-across-campuses-to-ease-a-bottleneck/64289?cid=at&utm_source=at&utm_medium=en
Cal State Offers Online Courses Across Campuses to Ease a Bottleneck
by Charles Huckabee
California State University is starting an online program this fall that will let students on any of the system’s 23 campuses enroll in online courses offered by another campus to obtain credits they need to graduate, the Los Angeles Times reports. Officials hope the program will help students who have been shut out of hard-to-get classes find the courses they need and graduate faster. The classes are not MOOCs, the massive open online courses that have been highly controversial on some Cal State campuses.

www.nytimes.com

Following the Money
Calculating the Net Worth of a College Degree
By SAMANTHA STAINBURN
…It’s not hard for a student today, facing an average single-year college bill of $21,657, to unwittingly take on a life-altering amount of debt. Pick a college or field that doesn’t set you up for a job that’s lucrative enough to pay back loans and you could spend years just scraping by.

www.bigstory.ap.org
http://bigstory.ap.org/article/firms-seek-grads-who-can-think-fast-work-teams
FIRMS SEEK GRADS WHO CAN THINK FAST, WORK IN TEAMS
By PAUL WISEMAN
WASHINGTON (AP) — They can get good grades, earn a diploma and breeze through that campus rite of spring, the job interview. But college graduates still might not land a decent job. The world’s top employers are pickier than ever. And they want to see more than high marks and the right degree. They want graduates with so-called soft skills — those who can work well in teams, write and speak with clarity, adapt quickly to changes in technology and business conditions and interact with colleagues from different countries and cultures.

www.insidehighered.com
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2013/08/05/survey-finds-most-colleges-undecided-adjunct-hours#ixzz2b5ngNOtl
Undecided on Adjunct Hours?
By Scott Jaschik
Most colleges do not plan to alter their use of part-time faculty or staff members as a result of the Affordable Care Act, according to a survey being released today by the College and University Professional Association for Human Resources. But the survey also found that only about one-fourth of colleges have determined the criteria they will use to determine whether part-timers are working 30 hours a week, which would require that their employers provide them with health insurance under ACA.

www.chronicle.com
http://chronicle.com/article/Open-Access-Gains-Major/140851/
Open Access Gains Major Support in U. of California’s Systemwide Move
By Jennifer Howard
After years of discussion, the University of California’s Academic Senate has adopted an open-access policy that will make research articles freely available to the public through eScholarship, California’s open digital repository.

www.insidehighered.com
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2013/08/05/higher-ed-groups-offer-suggestions-revamping-higher-education-act#ixzz2b5nXCeIK
Previewing the Higher Ed Act
By Doug Lederman
WASHINGTON – Creating a federal unit records database to track students into and through higher education. Seeking expansion of the federal antitrust exemption to let private colleges share information about pricing and financial aid. Lowering the amount of federal loan funds students can borrow based on the kind of program they’re in and the kind of credential they’re seeking. …Those are some of the ideas that various higher education groups have put forward in their initial recommendations for how Congress might consider rewriting the Higher Education Act, if and when lawmakers actually get around to considering the main federal law governing federal programs for students and higher education.

www.diverseeducation.com
http://diverseeducation.com/article/55027/?utm_campaign=Diverse%20Newsletter%203&utm_medium=email&utm_source=Eloqua&elq=89313f89f4b54da79bcdeddd36d34967&elqCampaignId=33
From Recession’s Wake, Education Innovation Blooms
by Justin Pope, AP Education Writer
…Major innovations forged by the struggles of the Great Recession and fostered by technology are coming to higher education. Investment dollars are flooding in with a record-smashing 168 venture capital deals in the U.S. alone last year, according to the springtime conference’s host, GSV Advisors. The computing power of “the cloud” and “big data” are unleashing new software. Public officials, desperate to cut costs and measure results, are open to change. And everyone, it seems, is talking about MOOCs, the “Massive Open Online Courses” offered by elite universities and enrolling millions worldwide.

Related article:
www.detroitnews.com
Higher education on a path toward worldwide technological revolution
http://www.detroitnews.com/article/20130804/NATION/308040008/1026/SCHOOLS/Higher-education-path-toward-worldwide-technological-revolution

www.chronicle.com
http://chronicle.com/blogs/ticker/national-science-foundation-cancels-a-round-of-political-science-grants/64301?cid=at&utm_source=at&utm_medium=en
National Science Foundation Cancels a Round of Political-Science Grants
The National Science Foundation has scrapped its next cycle of grants for political-science studies, Nature reports, and scholars in the field are speculating that the agency did so in response to pressure from Congress, which in March imposed strict conditions on NSF funds for political-science research.

www.bits.blogs.nytimes.com

Computer-Brain Interfaces Making Big Leaps
By NICK BILTON
Scientists haven’t yet found a way to mend a broken heart, but they’re edging closer to manipulating memory and downloading instructions from a computer right into a brain. Researchers from the Riken-M.I.T. Center for Neural Circuit Genetics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology took us closer to this science-fiction world of brain tweaking last week when they said they were able to create a false memory in a mouse.

www.chronicle.com
http://chronicle.com/article/Many-Colleges-Change-Benefits/140849/
Many Colleges Change Benefits Over New Health-Care Law, Survey Finds
By Sara Hebel
Many colleges expect their expenses to rise after new federal requirements for employers under President Obama’s signature health-care law take effect, and some institutions are preparing for the new policy by changing their benefit plans to shift more costs to employees, according to survey results being released on Monday.