SYSTEM NEWS
Augusta Chronicle
Georgia Regents University and Georgia Military College’s Augusta campus named military friendly again
http://chronicle.augusta.com/news/education/2013-09-16/georgia-regents-university-and-georgia-military-colleges-augusta-campus?v=1379359613
By Wesley Brown
Sept. 16, 2013
For the second straight year, two Augusta schools of higher learning have received national recognition for providing outstanding educational opportunities to the area’s military community. Victory Media, a U.S. media relations firm that helps military personnel transition into civilian life, has added Georgia Regents University and Georgia Military College’s Augusta campus to its 2014 Military Friendly Schools list. The honor represents the top 20 percent of colleges, universities and trade schools in the country that are doing the most to embrace – and ensure the success of – America’s military service members, veterans and spouses, said Victory Media Vice President Sean Collins.

Thomasville Times-Enterprise
Technology soars
http://timesenterprise.com/mobile/x72686856/Technology-soars#sthash.DAtvmHnp.dpuf
Clint Thompson – University of Georgia, College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences
Unmanned aerial vehicles could soon be a soaring success for Georgia farmers. University of Georgia cotton and peanut researchers in Tifton are excited about the prospect “You’ve really got to be able to keep up with the technology to stay in business,” said Glen Harris, a UGA Cooperative Extension soil scientist who studies cotton,peanuts and other crops. “We have less growers running more acres. They’re really utilizing all kinds of technology to keep up.” The next stage in technological advancement may lie with unmanned vehicles. Unmanned aerial helicopters used to take images of cotton and peanut research were featured at the Sunbelt Expo grounds in Moultrie on Aug. 20. Harris and fellow UGA peanut team members John Beasley and Scott Tubbs attended to discuss the possible use of unmanned aerial vehicles in agriculture.

Red & Black
Brain-scanning, movie trailers help UGA professors understand cognition
http://www.redandblack.com/uganews/science_health/brain-scanning-movie-trailers-help-uga-professors-understand-cognition/article_adc39f10-1e59-11e3-b121-001a4bcf6878.html
Updated: Sep 17, 2013.
Taylor West
Three University of Georgia professors plan to use grant money to peer into students brains through brain-mapping technology. They received a faculty research grant from the Willson Center for Humanities and Arts to study the brain’s understanding of movie trailers through a project titled Neuroimaging, Movie Trailers and Spectator Cognition. Tianming Liu, an associate professor of computer science and a co-director of the project, said he and his two co-directors will eventually be taking brain scans of volunteers watching movie trailers in an MRI machine to monitor their brains’ reactions.

Red & Black
SGA to petition for tax-free textbook weekend to battle rising costs
http://www.redandblack.com/uganews/politics/sga-to-petition-for-tax-free-textbook-weekend-to-battle/article_f19d68a8-1e5c-11e3-93f6-001a4bcf6878.html
September 16, 2013 5:00 pm
Emily Kopp
The Student Government Association will petition for a tax-free holiday for textbooks when the state legislature convenes next year, according to a senate resolution passed Sept. 3. But it may not have to. In Utah, students convinced the state tax commission textbook sales served the mission of higher education, and deserved the tax exemption accorded other nonprofits. The University of Georgia Libraries Acquisitions Department confirmed it does not pay sales tax on the books it secures for the library.

EDUCATION NEWS
Atlanta Journal-Constitution Get Schooled Blog
Sept. 16, 2013
A Georgia Tech researcher asks: Where are the black students in science, math?
http://www.ajc.com/weblogs/get-schooled/2013/sep/16/georgia-tech-professor-asks-where-are-black-studen/
By Maureen Downey
Dr. Kamau Bobb is a research scientist at the Center for Education Integrating Science Mathematics and Computing at Georgia Tech. This is his first piece for the AJC Get Schooled blog.
By Kamau Bobb
“Stem for All. All for Stem” is the refrain heard throughout the nation and in Georgia. The national emphasis on improving Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics education is to ensure the United States maintains global technological and economic leadership.
Emphasis on STEM has become the cornerstone of the national education dialogue. National and state level focus is on increasing the number of students who graduate from college with STEM degrees to meet growing workforce needs.
Behind the mask of those broad and very real concerns is the withering reality of the under-preparedness of black students in the basics of mathematics and science. The vast majority of black students in Georgia are completely excluded from real participation in the STEM education conversation. Not since the launch of Sputnik in the late 1950s has the United States put so much emphasis on mathematics and science education. In the 50s, black children were locked out of many educational opportunities because of segregation. Now, more than a half century later, there is resurging attention to STEM fields, but most black children are locked out because of inadequate preparation.

Diverse: Issues in Higher Ed
New College Options for Students with Disabilities
http://diverseeducation.com/article/56019/
by Justin Pope, AP Education Writer
As he sits in class at Eastern Michigan University, a flood of images streams from Tony Saylor’s vibrant, creative mind down through his pen and onto paper.
Often, his doodling features the 9-year-old character, Viper Girl, who battles monsters with her pet fox Logan. Saylor, 22, has even self-published three books of their adventures.
Saylor’s professors didn’t exactly welcome his constant drawing, but once he explained it was the only way he could hope to process their lectures and even to stay awake, most let him continue.
For college students with autism and other learning disabilities, this is the kind of balancing act that takes place every day, accommodating a disability while also pushing beyond it toward normalcy and a degree, which is increasingly essential for finding a meaningful career.

Diverse: Issues in Higher Ed
Colleges: The Little Engines That Could
http://diverseeducation.com/article/56015/
by Brian C. Mitchell
In the recent blizzard of press over the cost of higher education, the impact of technology and the continued relevancy of the curriculum, much of the ongoing effort by colleges and universities to improve their environment has been lost.
For much of their history, most colleges and universities stood as well-defended “cities upon a hill,” isolated by perceived images of wide green lawns, brick walls and massive gates sending an unwelcome and exclusionary message to outsiders.
By concentrating on the academic enterprise, colleges and universities failed to develop an organic, systemic relationship with their environment. As urban environments changed — and many older urban centers declined — local pressure to increase tax revenue set higher education institutions against their communities.
Reactions differed depending upon the circumstances encountered. Almost every educational institution produced an economic impact brochure that included an indirect economic benefits calculator to maximize the impact of the college on the local community. These are useful exercises because they create research from which talking points can be drawn to defend higher education institutions against charges of decades of perceived neglect and indifference toward their environment.

Www.InsideHigherEd.com
A Market Approach
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2013/09/17/eastern-washington-u-adopts-market-approach-faculty-raises#ixzz2fAtzbHh0
September 17, 2013
By
Colleen Flaherty
Few professors would turn down a raise, but even standard contract pay bumps of 3 or 4 percent can leave long-serving faculty feeling less valued than their newer colleagues. That’s because junior faculty often are recruited at similar or even higher salaries fresh out of graduate school, especially those in high-demand fields such as business and medicine. The issue, known as salary compression, compounds over time, and it’s not great for morale.
But at least one university has stepped outside the box in its approach to equity in professor pay, aiming to bring all faculty salaries up to current market rates for their ranks and discipline, with some getting big percentage raises, and others less. And those involved in contract negotiations at Eastern Washington University say they’d be surprised if other universities didn’t take note.
“All the other schools would be crazy not to do what we did,” said Tony Flinn, professor of English and president of the United Faculty of Eastern, the faculty union affiliated with the American Federation of Teachers and the National Education Association. “Across-the-board pay increases by mathematical definition reward those who already have more and it doesn’t help those at lower income levels.” One-time lump sum salary adjustments, as other universities have made, don’t solve the problem long-term, either, he said.

Huff Post College Blog
In Higher Education Social Media Is Your Job
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-james-michael-nolan/in-higher-education-socia_b_3932373.html
Dr. James Michael Nolan,
President, Southwestern College
Posted: 09/16/2013
I have altogether too many friends and colleagues in higher education who seem to think that being active in social media is a choice, on par with, say, choosing to watch Breaking Bad, or taking up golf. Others righteously, publicly, and aggressively eschew the cute points and go after the moral high ground points of “Who has TIME for that nonsense?” or “People have forgotten how to have a real relationship…” Blah blah blah. I’m here to announce that in the world of higher education, we are no longer awarding cute points or righteousness points to naysayers of social media. Those presentations are uninformed, and to be honest, they just annoy the hell out of me.

Www.Chronicle.com
September 16, 2013
In Admissions, Old Playbook Is Being Revised
http://chronicle.com/article/The-Admissions-Playbook-Is-Up/141625/
By Eric Hoover and Beckie Supiano
To solve a mystery, one must search for clues. So in August, St. Mary’s College of Maryland polled the 1,700 teenagers who had been offered slots in this fall’s freshman class. The underlying question: Why had so many of them decided not to come? St. Mary’s offered students a chance to win an iPad if they answered a handful of questions. Those who planned to enroll elsewhere were asked what, if anything, the college could have done to sway them. All were asked whether parents, friends, and high-school counselors “spoke positively” about the college. Also: “What news have you recently heard about St. Mary’s?” Lately the news hasn’t been good. In May the public honors college announced that it was about 150 deposits short of its goal of enrolling 550 freshman and transfer students for this fall. The deficit was projected to cost as much as $3.5-million in lost tuition. Budget cuts followed. The president and the top enrollment official left. A few months later, the college’s bond rating was downgraded.

Sun-Sentinel
Florida college presidents call for immigration reform
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/os-florida-college-presidents-call-for-immigration-reform-20130916,0,107854.post
By William E. Gibson Washington Bureau
September 16, 2013
Four university leaders from Florida urged Congress on Monday to reform immigration laws so that high-skilled foreign students aren’t forced to leave this country to compete with Florida businesses. They also said many students are stifled because their immigration status is in limbo. Their media teleconference was part of an ongoing lobbying effort by many in Florida, home to an estimated 825,000 undocument immigrants. “Every single one of us has wonderful students whose immigration status may be questionable, who may have come here as small children and are having a very difficult time both getting into universities and getting access to financial aid,” said Donna Shalala, president of the University of Miami. “They really are the breadwinners of the future and the young people we want to invest in.”

Www.ccnewsnow.com
Fla. Colleges To Receive Money-based Student Outcomes
http://www.ccnewsnow.com/fla-colleges-to-receive-money-based-student-outcomes/?utm_campaign=0917ccnewslettery&utm_medium=email&utm_source=Eloqua&elq=2442ceb3496c4cea88ca9b71e657ca9f&elqCampaignId=83
Source: Associated Press, in DiverseEducation.com
September 13, 2013
For the first time ever, Florida’s universities are getting money based on how well their students do after graduating. The Florida Board of Governors, meeting in Sarasota, approved $20 million in performing funding that will be split among 11 universities. Universities were ranked in three different categories, including the percent of their graduates who were employed or continuing their education one year after graduation. The universities were also ranked based on the average wages earned by graduates.