University System News

USG NEWS:
www.onlineathens.com
http://onlineathens.com/uga/2014-01-05/regents-might-ban-all-tobacco-use-uga
Regents might ban all tobacco use at UGA
By LEE SHEARER
The University of Georgia might soon lose its status as the only educational institution in Athens that still allows smoking on campus. Under a policy the state Board of Regents is set to discuss at its monthly meeting Wednesday, tobacco use would be banned on all the state’s public college and university campuses, including UGA. If the Regents adopt the policy, the ban would take effect July 1.

www.technicianonline.com
http://www.technicianonline.com/news/article_412285bc-7690-11e3-adad-001a4bcf6878.html
UGA professors offer educational alternative for immigrant students who do not have documentation
Ravi Chittilla, Assistant News Editor
Educators and students in Georgia have established an “underground railroad” to higher education for those students who don’t have access or are barred from attending the public institutions of the state. For the past three years, Freedom University has been educating those students who co-founder Betina Kaplan said have “emerged from the shadows.”
Kaplan, a professor of romance languages, helped found the institution after the Board of Regents, the governing body of the public university system, barred students without legal documentation from having access to in-state tuition. “The classes we teach aren’t for credit, but they offer a chance for students and professors of all backgrounds to come together and participate in a collaborative experience,” Kaplan said. Now hosting two classes per semester, Freedom has offered classes in ethnic studies, gender relations, American civilizations and Latin-American literature and culture.

www.online.wsj.com
http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303870704579298302637802002?KEYWORDS=%22Georgia+Tech%22
Degrees of Value: Making College Pay Off
For Too Many Americans, College Today Isn’t Worth It
By GLENN HARLAN REYNOLDS
In the field of higher education, reality is outrunning parody. A recent feature on the satire website the Onion proclaimed, “30-Year-Old Has Earned $11 More Than He Would Have Without College Education.” Allowing for tuition, interest on student loans, and four years of foregone income while in school, the fictional student “Patrick Moorhouse” wasn’t much better off. His years of stress and study, the article japed, “have been more or less a financial wash.”… Traditional universities are experimenting too. The Georgia Institute of Technology is offering an entirely online master’s degree in computer science for $7,000. This isn’t a ghettoized offering from the extension school but rather, in the words of Georgia Tech Provost Rafael Bras, “a full-service degree.”

USG VALUE:
www.digitaljournal.com
http://www.digitaljournal.com/pr/1664599
CookingSchools.com, a Directory of the Culinary Schools, Affirms Learning to Cook Leads to Better Nutrition
Bohemia, NY (PRWEB)
CookingSchools.com, an online directory of culinary schools, responds to an article published by the Times-Herald on December 19th, which discusses how the University of West Georgia is offering cooking classes to promote healthy eating. According to the Times-Herald article titled “UWG Students Learn Better Nutrition on a Budget,” the University of West Georgia (UWG) recently implemented a new program called Cooking Matters in order to promote better nutrition choices on campus. The program is part of the Tanner Health System’s Community Transformation Grant, which was funded by the Centers for Disease Control. It is designed to teach students about nutrition, so they can make healthier eating decisions.

GOOD NEWS:
www.huffingtonpost.com
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/01/05/most-wired-colleges-unigo-ranking_n_4546120.html
The 10 Most Wired Colleges In The Country: Unigo Ranking
These days, it’s hard to imagine life on a college campus without an Internet connection. It’s no longer just a matter of having a connection for students’ laptops, they need something to hook up their tablets, smartphones, smart TVs and digital TV devices too. But some colleges do it better than others. And we know which ones those are thanks to a ranking of the most wired campuses from our pals at Unigo… #2: Georgia Tech – Georgia Tech attracted attention in 2013 for creating an online master’s degree program that will cost less than $7,000.

RESEARCH:
www.onlineathens.com
http://onlineathens.com/uga/2014-01-04/scientists-seek-sustainability-ugas-newest-farm
Scientists seek sustainability on UGA’s newest farm
By LEE SHEARER
WATKINSVILLE — Scientists working at the University of Georgia’s newest farm recently met to discuss research they’re conducting and to start building new research initiatives for the future. The 1,047-acre J. Phil Campbell Sr. Research and Education Center was until recently a federal research farm. But the federal government transferred management of the farm to UGA’s College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences in 2012 as the U.S. Department of Agriculture downsized its research branch.

www.albanyherald.com
http://www.albanyherald.com/news/2014/jan/04/south-georgia-bananas-drawing-attention/
South Georgia bananas drawing attention
Tifton economist creates his own corner of the tropics on UGA’s Tifton campus
By Chris Beckham
TIFTON — Greg Fonsah, a College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences economist, has created his own little corner of the tropics on the University of Georgia Tifton campus. …Amid the experts who deal in peanuts, cotton, vegetables and tobacco, Fonsah likes to tell people about his beautiful field of bananas. Bananas? “This is not a surprise to me,” said Fonsah in his thick accent that has never left the Cameroon native. “Most of my colleagues said it would not be possible to grow bananas here. But because the conditions are similar, I knew it was possible. The bananas here are different, but they are very good.” While unique, Fonsah and colleagues actually started their banana research in Savannah in 2002 before starting a project in Tifton in 2009.

www.news.msn.com
http://news.msn.com/videos/?videoid=da6b2150-d743-148f-831b-5c03766747d3&ap=True
A sense of touch makes robots more ‘human’
Researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology are developing robots with a sense of touch. They have produced artificial skin that works with computer software to allow robots to physically interact with humans and, as Ben Gruber reports, one man is already seeing the benefits.

www.dispatch.com
http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/business/2014/01/06/ford-tries-to-harness-sun-in-new-hybrid-car.html
Ford tries to harness sun in new hybrid car
Associated Press
Ford Motor Co. plans to unveil at this month’s International CES gadget show a solar-powered concept car that offers the same performance as a plug-in hybrid but without the need for a plug.The C-MAX Solar Energi Concept car uses a gasoline engine combined with a gizmo that acts like a magnifying glass to concentrate the sun’s rays on the vehicle’s roof-mounted solar panels. The automaker says the vehicle’s estimated combined city-highway mileage is 100 mpg… The sun-ray concentrator was developed by researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology and uses what is known as a Fresnel lens, which concentrates light but can be made thinner than a conventional lens. A full day of sunshine is equivalent to a four-hour battery charge, or 8 kilowatts, Ford says.

www.theverge.com
http://www.theverge.com/2014/1/5/5272200/the-best-writing-of-the-week-january-5
The best writing of the week, January 5
By Thomas Houston
We all know the feeling. You’re sleepless in the sad hours of the night or stumbling around early on a hazy weekend morning in need of something to read, and that pile of unread books just isn’t cutting it. Why not take a break from the fire hose of Twitter and RSS and check out our weekly roundup of essential writing from around the web about technology, culture, media, and the future? Sure, it’s one more thing you can feel guilty about sitting in your Instapaper queue, but it’s better than pulling in vain on your Twitter list again… On Netflix: Alexis Madrigal and Ian Bogost (Georgia Tech) reverse engineered Netflix’s tens of thousands of genre categories to see how .

www.chronicle.com
http://chronicle.com/article/What-5-Tech-Experts-Expect-in/143829/
What 5 Tech Experts Expect in 2014
Education technology enjoyed a headline-grabbing year in 2013. Debate about the potential, and the limitations, of massive open online courses reached a fevered pitch. Technology-enabled, competency-based degrees got a green light from the U.S. Department of Education. And data analytics proved to be an increasingly important reference point in campus operations. The momentum shows little sign of abating in 2014. New tools are shaping everything from in-classroom instruction to White House policy making. The Chronicle asked five education-technology experts to think about the year ahead and identify major themes at the intersection of education technology and higher education.

STATE NEEDS/ISSUES:
www.onlineathens.com
http://onlineathens.com/health/2014-01-05/doctor-shortage-georgia-remains-acute-rural-areas
Doctor shortage in Georgia remains acute in rural areas
By ANDY MILLER GEORGIA HEALTH NEWS
Georgia’s physician shortage continues to limit patients’ access to care, especially in rural areas, a recently released report indicates. But the report by the Georgia Board for Physician Workforce also highlights some promising trends on doctors practicing in Georgia. The state ranked 39th in the ratio of doctors per 100,000 population in 2010, the latest year for which data are available. That’s a slight improvement from Georgia’s 40th-place ranking in 2008.

www.times-georgian.com
http://www.times-georgian.com/news/article_8ecea982-75a8-11e3-844e-001a4bcf6878.html
Budget to be main issue of expected short session of Legislature
Winston Jones/Times-Georgian
The 2014 Georgia General Assembly is likely to be one of the shortest sessions in recent history and the budget is the issue on the front burner, according to local legislators.
“Since the only constitutionally mandated requirement is that we pass a balanced budget, I expect the budget to be front and center,” said Rep. Randy Nix, R-LaGrange, who represents a portion of Carroll County. State revenues are expected to be up this year, said Sen. Mike Dugan, R-Carrollton, but population has also increased, meaning that the budget situation is “revenue neutral.” …“Other significant topics I expect are education, health care and continued work on gun legislation that stalled on the last day of the 2013 session,” Nix said. Nix said that while he hasn’t pre-filed any legislation, he has been engaged in listening sessions on education.

Editorials/Columns/Opinions
www.washingtonpost.com
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/im-no-common-core-fan-but-give-it-a-chance/2014/01/04/c8abc41e-6c3e-11e3-aecc-85cb037b7236_story.html?wpisrc=nl_cuzheads
I’m no Common Core fan, but give it a chance
By Jay Mathews
As our national battle over the Common Core standards escalates this year, remember that new standards and curricula rarely improve schools. What does work is families becoming more affluent, teachers becoming more proficient and students spending more time and energy on their studies. New lesson plans and textbooks such as those being unleashed by the Common Core in nearly all states have no effect on parental income. Some teachers and students may do better when there are changes in what they study, but so far there is little proof of that. That does not mean, however, that we should dump the new standards.

www.forbes.com
http://www.forbes.com/sites/toddhixon/2014/01/06/higher-education-is-now-ground-zero-for-disruption/
Higher Education Is Now Ground Zero For Disruption
Todd Hixon, Contributor
Why? US Higher Ed has a product that does not work, ridiculous costs, and an antiquated business model. For many years we accepted this because we see extraordinary value in education. Now, most middle and upper-middle class parents find they cannot give their children the education they enjoyed. Technology has recently put a spark to this fuel: on-line education works and dramatically improves costs and access. This is a big opportunity for entrepreneurs and investors. Many new companies and programs will emerge in 2014. The Product Does Not Work. A college(1) degree provides multiple sources of value, but the one that motivates parents and government to dig deep for tuition is the belief that college is the ticket to upper-middle-class life. ROI calculations show a range of results (e.g.), with grads of top technical schools showing strong ROIs and those less-known liberal arts schools often doing poorly.

www.chronicle.com
http://chronicle.com/blogs/bottomline/why-more-colleges-might-want-to-measure-what-regulation-costs-them/?cid=at&utm_source=at&utm_medium=en
Why More Colleges Might Want to Measure What Regulation Costs Them
By Scott Carlson
Marco Island, Fla. — Many people in higher education complain about the increasing burdens of regulation, with some insisting that it has driven administrative bloat, but the exact toll on colleges remains a mystery. That’s because very few colleges have bothered to measure the cost of compliance in dollars or employee time, because that task is too complicated or too costly in itself. But it may be time that some colleges tried.

www.newrepublic.com
http://www.newrepublic.com/article/116013/mooc-student-survey-who-enrolls-online-education
Who Takes MOOCs?
For online higher education, the devil is in the data
BY BRANDON ALCORN, GAYLE CHRISTENSEN, AND EZEKIEL J. EMANUEL
Massive Open Online Courses, or MOOCs, represent one of the most momentous—and contentious—changes to higher education in decades. But the debate over the free Internet classes has been a conspicuously fact-free zone. While techno-utopians tout MOOCs’ potential to topple barriers to college educations for disadvantaged people worldwide and skeptics warn of the downsides to automated instruction, neither side has been able to point to reliable data to support its claims. So our team at the University of Pennsylvania decided to inject some empiricism into the discussion. Surveying people who have enrolled in a MOOC offered by the university and completed at least one full lecture, we collected nearly 35,000 responses from students hailing from around the world. From the survey results, a clear portrait emerges: MOOCs, at least thus far, are serving the world’s haves more than its have-nots.

www.ajc.com
http://www.ajc.com/weblogs/get-schooled/2014/jan/05/indifferent-distracted-students-frustrated-and-dis/
Get Schooled with Maureen Downey
Indifferent, distracted students. Frustrated and disengaged faculty. Welcome to college.
The Wall Street Journal featured a provocative essay by a South Carolina State University professor on the degradation of a college degree. Psychology professor Geoffrey Collier writes that college has become a con game in which both faculty and students are willing players. Students want their degree, which society has deemed essential to getting a decent job. But students don’t want a demanding workload. They want college to be a fun-filled experience rather than an arduous one. Their focus is gaining the necessary credential rather than deep learning. And professors, faced with a lecture hall full of indifferent and, in some cases, incapable students, deliver an hour’s worth of entertainment because they have come to see their jobs as keeping the paying customers happy.

Education News
www.myajc.com
http://www.myajc.com/news/news/state-regional-govt-politics/deal-in-election-year-ready-with-raises/nccfz/?icmp=ajc_internallink_invitationbox_apr2013_ajcstub1
Deal, in election year, ready with raises
BY JAMES SALZER – THE ATLANTA JOURNAL-CONSTITUTION
Gov. Nathan Deal heads into his election-year legislative session next week with an economy on the uptick and a relatively fat state bankroll, the first since the Great Recession.
If past gubernatorial re-election sessions are a measure, he won’t have any trouble finding ways to spend the money. But Georgians shouldn’t expect a Pork-o-Rama, either. With $900 million in reserves and revenue climbing, Deal is expected to put enough money into the $20 billion state budget to give teachers raises and let agencies and colleges offer merit increases. They would be the first state-funded raises in five years for the roughly 200,000 state workers who are not senior executives in their departments.

www.thebrunswicknews.com
http://www.thebrunswicknews.com/open_access/local_news/C-SPENCER-010114-hr#
Legislator pushing for Camden campus
By GORDON JACKSON The Brunswick News
WOODBINE — Obtaining funding for a new technical college campus in Camden County is the No. 1 priority for state Rep. Jason Spencer when the General Assembly convenes for its annual legislative session Jan. 13. Spencer, R-Woodbine, said he and Sen. William Ligon, R-St. Simons Island, will work together to make a technical college a reality in Camden County.

www.diverseeducation.com
http://diverseeducation.com/article/59873/?utm_campaign=Diverse%20Newsletter%203&utm_medium=email&utm_source=Eloqua&elq=2f55f686481543f48d5c5bd8d71d5d24&elqCampaignId=173#
Community Colleges’ Most Challenging Task: Increase Completion Rates
By Kissette Bundy
Community colleges across the nation are in the throes of a system-wide reinvention. With 13 million students served by more than 1,132 community colleges, topping the list for reforms is improving completion rates. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, at two-year, degree-granting institutions, 31 percent of full-time, first-time undergraduate students who began their pursuit of a certificate or an associate degree in fall 2008 attained it within 150 percent of the normal time required to do so (or within three years). This graduation rate was 20 percent at public two-year institutions, 51 percent at private nonprofit two-year institutions and 62 percent at private for-profit two-year institutions. At the same time, the American Association of Community Colleges’ (AACC) 21st-Century Commission has pledged to add 5 million college degrees to the global economy by 2020.

www.insidehighered.com
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2014/01/06/syracuse-after-refusing-play-rankings-game-may-care-again#ixzz2pcz8CHOm
About-Face on Rankings
By Ry Rivard
Syracuse University, which suffered on college ranking lists as it admitted more poor and minority students who didn’t necessarily have the grades and SAT scores of other applicants, is looking to reverse that rankings slide under its incoming chancellor. Outgoing Chancellor Nancy Cantor famously ignored and repeatedly criticized the “volatility and mystery” of college rankings, which she said were designed to sell magazines, namely U.S. News & World Report.

www.nytimes.com

Backlash Against Israel Boycott Throws Academic Association on Defensive
By PETER SCHMIDT | THE CHRONICLE OF HIGHER EDUCATION
With its recent vote to boycott Israel’s higher-education institutions to protest the country’s treatment of Palestinians, the American Studies Association has itself become the target of widespread criticism and ostracism. It has gone from relative obscurity to prominence as a pariah of the United States higher-education establishment, its experience serving as a cautionary tale for other scholarly groups that might consider taking a similar stand on the Middle East. In sharp contrast to the international campaign for an academic and cultural boycott of Israel, which had been slow to gain a foothold in the United States, the campaign to rebuke the American Studies Association has spread rapidly since the group’s mid-December boycott vote. The presidents of more than 80 United States colleges have condemned the vote.

www.freep.com
http://www.freep.com/article/20140105/NEWS05/301050063/university-of-michigan-presidential-search-mary-sue-coleman-secret-board-of-regents
University of Michigan regents keep quiet about search for new president
By David Jesse
Detroit Free Press Education Writer
The University of Michigan Board of Regents is remaining tight-lipped about its search to replace President Mary Sue Coleman, but education experts say the university should have no trouble attracting high-caliber candidates. The search is occurring behind closed doors because state law allows regents to keep presidential searches secret. University officials aren’t saying whether their quest to replace Coleman — who plans to leave at the end of the academic year — is just starting or nearly complete.

www.insidehighered.com
http://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2014/01/06/lonely-presidents-youtube-greeting#ixzz2pctfkFuU
A Lonely President’s YouTube Greeting
With students away and many faculty members on vacation, what’s a president to do? Troy D. Paino, president of Truman State University, posted this video to YouTube to give students a sense of what a president does when there’s hardly anyone around.

www.insidehighered.com
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2014/01/06/study-tracks-economics-phds-and-their-career-paths
Econ Jobs, Money, Love
By Scott Jaschik
In some academic disciplines in the humanities and social sciences, graduate programs are just starting to consider the implications of training large number of students for non-academic careers. The tight academic job market has forced the issue.

www.profit.ndtv.com
http://profit.ndtv.com/news/global-economy/article-many-jobs-in-europe-go-begging-for-skills-376766
Many jobs in Europe go begging for skills
Liz Alderman, The New York Times
Dublin: Week after week, newspapers issue hopeful headlines: Microsoft, PayPal, Fujitsu and scores of other companies are expanding in Ireland, creating thousands of jobs as unemployment hovers near record highs. There is just one hitch: Not enough people are qualified to fill all the jobs. In some cases, the companies have had to look outside Ireland to recruit candidates with the right skills.