University System News

USG NEWS:
www.onlineathens.com
http://onlineathens.com/local-news/2014-05-26/university-system-georgia-announces-new-vice-chancellor-extended-education
University System of Georgia announces new vice chancellor for extended education
By ASSOCIATED PRESS
ATLANTA | The University System of Georgia has named a new vice chancellor for extended education. Officials said in a statement that Cecil Staton will begin serving as vice chancellor for extended education June 1. Staton is tasked with leading strategic and long-term initiatives in the areas of extended and continuing education, military affairs, entrepreneurship and international education. Officials say Staton will serve as a liaison between the Board of Regents, system institutions and partners in the government and business fields.

www.globalatlanta.com
http://www.globalatlanta.com/article/26933/four-georgia-schools-to-help-us-double-study-abroad-figures/
Four Georgia State Schools to Help U.S. Double Study-Abroad Figures
by Trevor Williams
Four Georgia universities have joined a national effort to double the number of U.S. students who participate in international study programs by 2019. The New York-based Institute of International Education, which helps administer the U.S. government’s Fulbright program and publishes the annual Open Doors report tracking international student exchange, aims to sign up 500 institutions for its five-year Generation Study Abroad pledge. … The four Georgia universities signed up so far include Dalton State University, Georgia Institute of Technology, Spelman College and Oglethorpe University.

GOOD NEWS:
www.redandblack.com
http://www.redandblack.com/uganews/georgia-museum-of-art-offers-discount-to-military-families/article_1532844a-e5ab-11e3-9385-001a4bcf6878.html
Georgia Museum of Art offers discount to military families
UGA News Services
The Georgia Museum of Art at the University of Georgia will participate this summer in Blue Star Museums, a program that offers free admission and special discounts to all active-duty military personnel and their families through Labor Day. Although admission to the museum is always free, the museum shop is offering a 10 percent discount for all active-duty military personnel and their families. The museum has signed on to the program in an effort to connect the arts and military communities and as a way to thank military families for their service and sacrifice.

RESEARCH:
www.albanyherald.com
http://www.albanyherald.com/news/2014/may/27/key-to-controlling-kudzu-bug-may-be-wasps/
Key to controlling kudzu bug may be wasps
Study under way by Department of Agriculture and UGA entomologists
By Clint Thompson
TIFTON — A parasitoid wasp controls kudzu bug populations in its native Asia. University of Georgia entomologist Michael Toews hopes those wasps will one day reduce the kudzu bug’s presence in the United States. “(Finding a predator) is exactly what we need to do for long-term suppression,” said Toews, a researcher with the UGA College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences. …U.S. Department of Agriculture and UGA entomologists are studying the wasp to see if it will parasitize other insects native to the U.S.

www.blog.pennlive.com
http://blog.pennlive.com/pa-sportsman/2014/05/deer_stats_salmon_river_rod_an.html
Deer stats, Salmon River rod and reel line, birders as environmentalists and more: Outdoor Insider
By Marcus Schneck
The Quality Deer Management Association has compiled a list of statistics about white-tailed deer presented at the last four annual meetings of the Southeast Deer Study Group, a subcommittee of The Wildlife Society. For example, the average fall home range size of mature bucks in a University of Georgia GPS-collar study in unfragmented hardwood forest in northern Pennsylvania is 407 acres.

www.news-press.com
http://www.news-press.com/story/life/outdoors/2014/05/27/archaeologists-use-old-new-technology-mound-key/9605037/
Archaeologists use old and new technology at Mound Key
Kevin Lollar
With a soft whir, four propellers lifted the DJI Phantom 2 drone smoothly off the ground. Its mission was not to gather intelligence on enemies foreign or domestic, but rather to collect photographic data on an archaeological excavation at Mound Key in Estero Bay. Mound Key was probably the Calusa Indian capital when Ponce de Leon arrived in Southwest Florida in 1513 (at the time, the Calusa dominated South Florida, demanding tribute from as far away as Cape Canaveral and the Keys); it was likely the site of the first Jesuit mission in the New World. Researchers from the University of Florida and the University of Georgia, with the help of FGCU students, are trying to determine the location the mission and the island’s main Calusa structure. Funding from the project is from the National Geographic Society, the University of Georgia and The Knight Foundation for Florida Archaeology.

www.reuters.com
http://www.reuters.com/video/2014/05/27/reuters-tv-researchers-see-solar-powered-cars-on-th?videoId=313103458&videoChannel=118065
Researchers see solar-powered cars on the road ahead (2:29)
May 27 – The idea of solar powered cars may seem far-fetched but researchers at Ford Motor Company and the Georgia Institute of Technology are developing a system they hope will spark a revolution in sun-powered transportation.

www.theverge.com
http://www.theverge.com/2014/5/27/5754126/the-next-challenge-for-robots-morality
Can a robot learn right from wrong?
Researchers are working on robots that can make ethical choices and then explain why
By Adrianne Jeffries
In Isaac Asimov’s short story “Runaround,” two scientists on Mercury discover they are running out of fuel for the human base … Ron Arkin, a well-known ethicist at Georgia Institute of Technology who has also worked with the military, wrote what is arguably the first moral system for robots.

www.paperage.com
http://www.paperage.com/2014news/05_23_2014ipst_new_name.html
Georgia Tech’s Institute of Paper Science and Technology Renamed Renewable Bioproducts Institute
May 23, 2014 – Georgia Tech is pleased to announce a broader research mission, additional resources and a new name for the Institute of Paper Science and Technology (IPST), one of Georgia Tech’s 10 interdisciplinary research institutes. IPST is being renamed the Renewable Bioproducts Institute [RBI] effective June 1, 2014. Over the past decade, the research mission of IPST has broadened beyond papermaking to include technologies that produce chemicals, biofuels and new material products from forest raw materials. The new name reflects this broader research scope designed to better serve the global development of new forest-based economies.

Editorials/Columns/Opinions
www.myajc.com
http://www.myajc.com/news/news/opinion/real-time-information-is-transits-future/nf6b6/#19748bad.3566685.735381
Real-time information is transit’s future
By Simon Berrebi
Like any self-respecting student, I was running late for class by the time I left my apartment in the up-and-coming mixed-use development around Ponce City Market … At the Urban Transportation Information Lab at Georgia Tech, we work on tools to improve transportation services using real-time information.

www.ccdaily.com
http://ccdaily.com/Pages/Campus-Issues/In-their-own-Inspiring-words.aspx
In their own inspiring words
By Tabitha Whissemore
Across the country, community college graduates are donning caps and gowns and celebrating with pomp and circumstance. While leaders in government, education and business provided many of the keynote speeches at this year’s ceremonies, graduates also were given their time to shine at the podium.

www.huffingtonpost.com
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-brian-c-mitchell/restating-american-higher_b_5396399.html?utm_hp_ref=college&ir=College
Restating American Higher Education as a Public Good
Dr. Brian C. Mitchell
Director of the Edvance Foundation
There has been a good deal of discussion lately on America’s college campuses about how to strengthen the reputation of an institution. Much of the conversation focuses on the decision by the Obama administration to publish a consumer scorecard to help applicants and their families better understand their choices, relying in part on an intensified examination of outputs like persistence, graduation rates, and employment after graduation. This “scorecard” debate illustrates the deeper conversation about how America’s colleges and universities build their reputation.

www.hechingerreport.org
http://hechingerreport.org/content/college-340-students-lost-220-million-five-years_16141/
How a college with 340 students lost $220 million in five years
A case study in the baffling realities of higher-education financing.
By Jon Marcus
New England Center for Investigative Reporting
NEEDHAM, Mass. – The Franklin W. Olin College of Engineering, with its sleek, glass-walled buildings around a peaceful grass oval, has earned glowing international attention for the successful ways it has pioneered the teaching of undergraduate engineering. Built from scratch with hundreds of millions of dollars from a private foundation and a commitment to charging no tuition, 12-year-old Olin has attracted standout faculty, even though it does not give tenure. Top companies recruit its high-achieving students, who graduate at enviable rates into jobs with above-average starting salaries. Behind the accolades, however, Olin has been bleeding red ink. …While no one tracks operating losses at universities and colleges, national higher-education specialists said they could not recall an institution similar to Olin’s size that has lost so much.

www.thegallupblog.gallup.com
http://thegallupblog.gallup.com/2014/05/fraternity-and-sorority-membership.html
Fraternity and Sorority Membership Linked to Higher Well-Being for College Grads
As incoming college freshmen weigh the pros and cons of pledging a fraternity or sorority this fall or next spring, they should consider this: Being part of the Greek system may have benefits that reach far beyond their college years. A new Gallup survey, released Tuesday, of more than 30,000 college graduates across the U.S. finds that those who were members of fraternities or sororities are more likely to be “thriving” in their well-being and engaged at work than college graduates who did not go Greek.

Education News
www.11alive.com
http://www.11alive.com/story/news/local/cumming/2014/05/26/global-workforce-initiative/9590691/
Companies train students for future work
Donna Lowry, WXIA
FORSYTH COUNTY, Ga. — Georgia is suffering a skills-gap, or a lack of production workers, scientists, engineers and technology specialists. But the Georgia Department of Education is trying to do something about it. The department created the Global Workforce Initiative, which brings private companies into classrooms to train workers of the future. Shawn Kemner is only a sophomore in high school, but he’s already gotten the opportunity to tour Siemens’ Drive Technologies plant. He is one of the first students to go through the company’s Manufacturing Pathways program, which brings work skills into schools. “We want to make it real for the students. And if it’s real, they get interested,” said Denis Brosnan with the Global Workforce Initiative. Kemner admitted the program further ignited his interest in school.

www.insidehighered.com
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2014/05/28/public-comments-flood-us-department-education-gainful-employment-proposal#sthash.reYoAkS5.dpbs
Many Comments, Few Surprises
Michael Stratford and Paul Fain
WASHINGTON — As the public comment period for the U.S. Department of Education’s proposed “gainful employment” regulations ended last night, the department had received thousands of comments, most of which argued either that the rules go too far or that they don’t go far enough. The White House is pushing hard for the new rules after a previous effort was largely blocked in a federal court.

www.diverseeducation.com
http://diverseeducation.com/article/64534/?utm_campaign=Diverse%20Newsletter%203&utm_medium=email&utm_source=Eloqua&elq=55f381ce4dce4e8cbd3c686db9fc9d46&elqCampaignId=173
Tennessee Gov. Haslam’s Bold Promise Taking Root
by Jamal Watson
When Tennessee Gov. William Haslam proposed legislation in February aimed at offering a free community college education for all graduating high school seniors in his state, Darius Green was quick to take notice. Like many of the students in his class, Green, 16, a high school junior, was planning to enroll at the University of Tennessee, the state’s flagship institution. But in the wake of the Tennessee legislature’s decision to pass the Tennessee Promise — a scholarship that will provide a tuition waiver for students to attend the state’s community and technical colleges beginning in fall 2015 — Green has reconsidered.

www.ccnewsnow.com
http://www.ccnewsnow.com/community-college-regains-the-right-to-enroll-veterans/?utm_campaign=052814ccnewsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_source=Eloqua&elq=a69dc855a72b463584ccecaade266b2e&elqCampaignId=297
Community College Regains the Right to Enroll Veterans
Source: usnews.com
After serving their country as members of the U.S. armed forces, many veterans return home and pursue associate’s degrees at nearby community colleges. A number of these schools, as well as other providers of higher education, are committed to supporting former service members in the classroom. In fact, the White House website states that more than 250 community colleges and universities have agreed to embrace the Obama administration’s “8 Keys to Success.” Following these eight steps helps schools provide veterans with quality higher education, as well as services that can help them thrive.

www.ccnewsnow.com
http://www.ccnewsnow.com/how-online-courses-boost-college-completion-but-lower-actual-learning-in-3-charts/?utm_campaign=052814ccnewsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_source=Eloqua&elq=a69dc855a72b463584ccecaade266b2e&elqCampaignId=297
How online courses boost college completion but lower actual learning (in 3 charts)
Source: venturebeat.com
The availability of online learning is doing some really strange things to California’s community college students: It’s dramatically increasing their persistence to a degree, but it’s lowering how often they finish each course with a passing grade. “In every academic subject area, students are less likely to succeed in online than in traditional courses,” explains a new report from the Public Policy Institute of California. On the other hand, the report says, “It appears that the availability and flexibility of online courses help many students achieve their long-term educational goals.”

www.chronicle.com
http://chronicle.com/article/Berkeley-Gives-Hope-to-the/146729/?cid=at&utm_source=at&utm_medium=en
Berkeley Gives Hope to the Undocumented
By Libby Sander
Terrence Park arrived at the University of California at Berkeley as a transfer student in the fall of 2011 with a keen interest in the sciences. He was, he says, “desperate” for the chance to do research at an institution that is world-famous for it. But there was one problem. Mr. Park, who came to the United States from South Korea at age 10 with his mother and two younger sisters, lacked immigration papers. That meant he couldn’t hold a paying research job on the campus. Before long, he learned about a forthcoming program designed to help immigrant students just like him. He met Meng So, director of the new Undocumented Student Program and, at that time, its sole employee. …At the heart of Berkeley’s program, which began in 2012 and is among the first of its kind in the nation, is academic counseling. But the program also has other components, meant to respond to the spectrum of these students’ needs:

www.chronicle.com
http://chronicle.com/article/Retention-Is-a-Growing-Issue/146807/
Retention Is a Growing Issue as More International Students Come to U.S.
By Karin Fischer
San Diego
Like many American colleges, the University of West Florida has seen marked growth in recent years in its international-student enrollment. But it was a different trend that alarmed Rachel Errington, director of the university’s Office of International Students. The number of foreign students leaving the public institution, on Florida’s Gulf Coast, without earning a degree was also on the rise. In 2008, West Florida’s retention rate for international students was 95 percent. Three years later, it was 83 percent.

www.nytimes.com
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/26/world/asia/for-some-foreign-students-us-education-is-losing-its-attraction.html?_r=0
For Some Foreign Students, U.S. Education Is Losing Its Attraction
By KARIN FISCHER | THE CHRONICLE OF HIGHER EDUCATION
SEOUL — Each fall, thousands of students from South Korea arrive on American campuses. They come from a culture that views education as the key to success, where mothers and fathers save to send their children overseas. On top of tuition, parents shell out for test prep and cram schools, supplemental English lessons and recruitment agents to shepherd them through an unfamiliar admissions process. In the past, only a small elite pursued advanced degrees internationally; today, many sons and daughters of the nation’s emergent middle class go abroad. This is South Korea but the description could fit China equally well. Recently however, after years of robust enrollment increases, graduate applications from South Korea to American colleges have fallen off; and last year the number of South Korean undergraduates in the United States also dropped. Fewer South Koreans study in the United States now than did five years ago.

www.independent.co.uk
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/education/education-news/michael-gove-axes-to-kill-a-mockingbird-and-other-american-classics-from-english-literature-gcse-syllabus-9432818.html
Michael Gove ‘axes’ American classics including To Kill a Mockingbird from English literature GCSE syllabus
Antonia Molloy
Classics of American literature, including Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird and John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men, have been dropped from the English literature GCSE syllabus following demands reportedly made by Michael Gove. The Education Secretary said students ought to focus on works by British writers such as Jane Austen and Shakespeare, The Sunday Times reported.

www.insidehighered.com
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2014/05/28/mla-report-calls-phd-program-reform-including-cutting-time-degree#sthash.81OdQ3yZ.dpbs
5-Year Plan
By Colleen Flaherty
Criticizing humanities doctoral programs is easy. They take too long, they continue to emphasize training for tenure-track faculty positions in an era when such positions are scarce, they encourage the book-model of dissertation at a time when books are hard to publish, even full funding isn’t always “full” – the list goes on. Solving the Ph.D. predicament is much harder, but that’s what the Modern Language Association is attempting to do, or at least start to do, in a new report.

www.sfgate.com
http://www.sfgate.com/news/education/article/Graduates-face-long-road-of-loan-repayment-5502512.php
Graduates face long road of loan repayment
By DAVID WENNER, PennLive.com
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — Elyse Hain went straight from Kutztown University to the $100,000 club. Unfortunately, the figure refers to her college debt, not her salary. The Millersburg resident has a job she considers well-paying and satisfying as a county mental health case worker. But at 25, she lives with her parents and wonders how she’ll ever afford to move out on her own. …Hain isn’t alone in sounding an alarm. According to the Project on Student Debt, 71 percent of students who graduated in 2012 had student loan debt, with an average debt of $29,400. The organization said Pennsylvania, where the average debt was $31,675, had the third highest level.

www.hawaiinewsnow.com
http://www.hawaiinewsnow.com/story/25603222/exclusive-hpu-lays-off-full-time-professors-as-it-loses-10-percent-enrollment
EXCLUSIVE: HPU loses 10% of students; lays off professors
By Keoki Kerr
HONOLULU (HawaiiNewsNow) – – Hawaii Pacific University laid off about seven percent of its full-time faculty this week, as the school cut its spending to deal with a nearly 10 percent drop in enrollment. It’s the second year in a row the university has made budget cuts and reduced its payroll as it deals with a cash crunch from fewer tuition dollars. HPU said 18 out of 251full-time professors did not have their contracts renewed at the end of the school year.

www.lj.libraryjournal.com
http://lj.libraryjournal.com/2014/05/academic-libraries/u-michigan-libraries-open-nap-stations/#_
U Michigan Libraries Open Nap Stations
By Ian Chant
Stephen Griffes, operations supervisor at the University of Michigan’s (UM) Shapiro Library, remembers studying in the library during his time as an undergraduate at UM. He also remembers occasionally taking an inadvertent nap or two in that library—as hallowed a college tradition as the keg stand and far more in line with academic values. Now,, the Shapiro library is officially enshrining the importance of a catnap among the stacks, opening a napping station where weary students can recharge by crashing out on convenient cots.

www.ctmirror.org
http://ctmirror.org/college-budgets-300-part-time-teaching-jobs-eliminated/
College budgets: Nearly 300 part-time teaching jobs eliminated
By: JACQUELINE RABE THOMAS
The number of part-time lecturers throughout the state’s largest public college system is likely to be cut back severely next school year as officials wrestle with budgetary constraints.
“We have been understaffed for years in order to control our budget,” Housatonic Community College President Anita Gliniecki recently told the finance committee that oversees the budgets of the 16-campus system. “It has been challenging to operate,” said Norwalk Community College President David Levinson. “What we have been doing is increasing class sizes.” Seven of the nine college presidents who have presented their proposed budgets to the finance panel so far collectively want to cut the number of part-time teaching staff by 297 positions — a 9 percent reduction.

www.online.wsj.com
http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303403604579586292493304298?mg=reno64-wsj&url=http%3A//online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303403604579586292493304298.html
For-Profit Colleges Face Test From State, Federal Officials
Governments Say Some Programs Lack Proper Accreditation
By ALAN ZIBEL
WASHINGTON—Federal and state officials are conducting probes into for-profit colleges over concerns that schools are marketing career-training programs that lack proper accreditation for students in certain fields, according to government agencies and regulatory filings. The investigations, being conducted by the Federal Trade Commission and some state attorneys general, focus on whether students are being deceived by for-profit colleges offering programs in career paths such as nursing, education, psychology and law enforcement. States are forcing for-profit colleges to refund money to students who say they were misled.

www.universitybusienss.com
http://www.universitybusiness.com/article/online-not-alone-campus
Online, but not alone off-campus
Seven keys to top-notch remote academic support services
By: Mark Rowh
When it comes to online education, careful course development is hardly the only piece needed for successful student outcomes. “Some institutions, eager to jump in the field, think once they’ve developed their online courses, they are set to launch,” says Jacqueline Moloney, executive vice chancellor at the University of Massachusetts, Lowell. “But many neglect to prepare their institutions to support online students with services customized to their needs.”

www.npr.org
http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2014/05/25/315698759/uc-santa-barbara-hosts-vigil-for-victims-of-shooting-rampage
UC Santa Barbara Hosts Vigil For Victims Of Killing Rampage
by EYDER PERALTA
A day after a gunman went on a killing spree in the college town of Isla Vista, Calif., the community was trying to come to terms with the loss of the victims and the cold, deliberate manner in which the rampage was perpetrated. The Santa Barbara Independent reports that as the sun went down on Saturday, students and faculty gathered on campus, holding candles and singing “Amazing Grace.”

www.chronicle.com
http://chronicle.com/article/NotAllMen-but-YesAllWomen-/146811/?cid=at&utm_source=at&utm_medium=en
#NotAllMen, but #YesAllWomen: Campus Tragedy Spurs Debate on Sexual Violence
By Monica Vendituoli
The shooting rampage on Friday near the University of California at Santa Barbara, apparently motivated by the gunman’s anger at having been rejected by women, has sparked a broader discussion of violence against women on campuses and beyond. College students and young alumni raised their voices over the weekend on Twitter, responding to the hashtag #NotAllMen with the label #YesAllWomen.

www.seattletimes.com
http://seattletimes.com/html/localnews/2023691310_idahocampusgunsxml.html?syndication=rss
Idaho colleges get ready for concealed weapons on campus
A new Idaho state law takes effect July 1 and applies to people with an enhanced license to carry concealed weapons, along with retired law enforcement officers.
By Scott Maben
The Spokesman-Review
Public colleges and universities in Idaho are getting ready to comply with a new state law they strongly opposed: allowing concealed weapons to be carried on campus. The law takes effect July 1 and applies to people with an enhanced license to carry concealed weapons, along with retired law-enforcement officers. College leaders universally opposed the law, but pro-gun-rights lawmakers pushed it through the Legislature this year. Now college administrators and campus-security departments are preparing for the new reality: guns in lecture halls, labs, offices, cafeterias — everywhere but dormitories and entertainment venues with seating for more than 1,000, like stadiums and auditoriums.