University System News:
www.ajc.com
SW Georgia university gets new president
http://www.ajc.com/news/local-education/georgia-university-gets-new-president/ugO7f6Mtav8iY48aPAwz4I/
Eric Stirgus
The Georgia Board of Regents announced Thursday it has appointed Neal Weaver the new president of Georgia Southwestern State University. Weaver will start in his new position on July 15. Weaver is currently the vice president for university advancement and innovation at Nicholls State University in Thibodaux, La.
www.ledger-enquirer.com
Neal Weaver, Ph.D, named president of Georgia Southwestern State University
http://www.ledger-enquirer.com/news/local/article158994684.html
BY SCOTT BERSON
The Board of Regents named Dr. Neal Weaver president of Georgia Southwestern State University (GSW) in Americus, Ga. He will begin the position July 15, 2017. “Neal is an experienced leader in advancement and external relations, including enrollment, recruitment, and fundraising,” said Chairman C. Thomas Hopkins in a news release. “His skills will serve Georgia Southwestern and the University System well, building on the success of the institution and our partnership with the Americus community.”
www.savannahnow.com
The last president: Armstrong’s Bleicken heads to D.C. nonprofit after officially retiring here
http://savannahnow.com/news/2017-07-01/last-president-armstrong-s-bleicken-heads-dc-nonprofit-after-officially-retiring
By Dash Coleman
Linda Bleicken calls herself “the most unlikely college president you would ever want to know.” The Cedar Rapids-area native started school at the University of Northern Iowa “many years ago” but left, got married and started a family. Eventually, by way of Wisconsin and Tennessee, she made her way to the Atlanta area. Then came a sea change. “At the ripe age of mid-thirties, I found myself with two young children, a husband who had recently died of cancer, and needing a way forward,” Bleicken said last week. “I went back to school, finished a marketing degree and went to work in marketing research in Atlanta.” Soon, she went back to Georgia State, where she had earned her bachelor’s degree, and worked her way up to a Ph.D. in management. Along the way, as she tells it, she “fell in love” with higher education and started teaching at the university in 1987. A few years later, she took a job as an assistant professor at Georgia Southern University, relocating to Savannah with her second husband, Carl. Before long, at the suggestion of a colleague, she applied for an administrative role, starting as an acting department head in 1994. From there, she kept climbing the ladder, eventually becoming vice president and provost. Nineteen years after moving to Savannah, she was named president of Armstrong State University, where she retired Friday at 68.
www.gainesvilletime.com
Jacobs to speak about UNG consolidation as part of panel in Austria
http://www.gainesvilletimes.com/section/6/article/124253/
By Norm Cannada
University of North Georgia President Bonita Jacobs will spend this week in Vienna, Austria, where she plans to talk about the university’s 2013 consolidation as a panelist on trends in education during the International Association of Presidents triennial conference July 5-8. “I was honored to be asked to serve on the panel to discuss innovative trends in higher education,” Jacobs wrote in an email to The Times Friday. “The University System of Georgia is unparalleled in its approach to institutional consolidations in the United States, but mergers have taken place in many countries around the world with varying degrees of success. Our successful consolidation of two strong institutions with differing missions presents a strong case study for other institutions.” The University of North Georgia was formed in 2013 through a consolidation of North Georgia College and State University in Dahlonega and Gainesville State College in Oakwood. The university also has campuses in Watkinsville (Oconee), Blue Ridge and Cumming.
www.valdostadailytimes.com,
Campus carry takes effect at VSU, Wiregrass
http://www.valdostadailytimes.com/news/local_news/campus-carry-takes-effect-at-vsu-wiregrass/article_753cf579-dfcf-5f75-85e5-ece28febeec3.html
By John Stephen
Alisa Williams didn’t know until Thursday that Saturday, July 1, marked the day when guns would be allowed at Valdosta State University, where she has worked for nine years. July 1 is when Georgia’s controversial campus carry bill, House Bill 280, takes effect across the state at all public colleges, including VSU and Wiregrass Georgia Technical College in Lowndes County. Williams, a longtime employee at VSU’s Palms Dining Hall, said she hasn’t seen a lot of violent altercations in her time on campus, but she’s worried the new bill could change that. “It does raise some concerns,” Williams, 36, said. “I probably will be a little more cautious. All you can do is be more cautious.” Williams isn’t alone in her misgivings. Valdosta Police Chief Brian Childress and many VSU faculty have voiced strong opposition to the new law, saying it will compromise campus safety.
www.gwinnettdailypost.com
Questions abound as campus carry becomes law
http://www.gwinnettdailypost.com/local/questions-abound-as-campus-carry-becomes-law/article_303b4f04-3cf7-5675-9b3b-197f289f4430.html
By Keith Farner
If you’re looking for signs posted for areas where guns are now allowed on the Georgia Gwinnett College campus, they are nowhere to be found. And there are no plans to add them. Campus officials are directing people with questions about the new law, commonly called “campus carry,” which goes into effect on Saturday, to either the University System of Georgia, or to an email sent to the GGC community from the school’s legal department. University system Chancellor Steve Wrigley issued a statement of guidance in May, asking everyone to exercise patience, understanding and respect as the law is implemented. “It is incumbent upon each of us to follow the law,” Wrigley said in the statement. “Students, faculty, and staff should not attempt themselves to monitor, or to enforce, compliance with the statute by those who do carry handguns. Only law enforcement personnel, including the University System’s more than 800 POST-certified officers, will be responsible for enforcing the law. “If others have concerns or questions, they should contact their campus law enforcement departments. … Our mission remains unchanged before and after July 1.” GGC spokeswoman Asia Hauter said the Office of Public Safety is scheduled to conduct campus presentations as the fall semester begins, and campus police officers received training from the university system’s police chief. Additional guidance and information will be shared with the GGC community during town hall meetings scheduled throughout fall semester, Hunter said.
www.timesfreepress.com
Saturday it’s official: Guns legal on Georgia college campuses
http://www.timesfreepress.com/news/georgia/story/2017/jun/30/guns-legal-georgiacampuses/436126/
by Associated Press in Georgia
After years of political debate, partisan pleas and protests, Georgia as of Saturday will allow guns on any campus in the state’s public college and university system. The “campus carry” legislation is the most high-profile of a slew of laws that become effective July 1, including an expansion of Georgia’s medical marijuana law and permission for the state to take over failing schools. Campus administrators and law enforcement officials have spent weeks holding town hall-style meetings. Fact sheets have gone out to digital in-boxes. Officials with the University System of Georgia, which has 45,000 employees, have posted online information and guidance about the new law. Yet a number of faculty and students say they are still confused about what to expect, in part because guns are allowed on some parts of the campuses and prohibited in other areas. Some worry their campus communities aren’t prepared, an unease heightened by a schedule that brings an influx of hundreds of thousands of people mid-August when the fall semester begins. “I think the university is being responsive but I just don’t think there will be a clear answer for a while,” said Victoria Smith-Butler, a communications professor at Albany State University and chairwoman of the University System’s faculty advisory council.
www.chronicle.augusta.com
Campus Carry Bill goes into effect on state campuses
http://chronicle.augusta.com/news/2017-07-01/campus-carry-bill-goes-effect-state-campuses
By Amanda King Staff writer
Georgia’s “campus carry” bill went into effect on Saturday, July 1, but some students at Augusta University feel as though some fellow students may have already been carrying weapons on campus without official permission. “I think it was already happening before,” graduate student Stephanie Anderson said while relaxing outside the library on Saturday afternoon. “I think it’s just legal now.” The bill permits persons with a concealed weapons permit to carry a firearm on state campuses. Private institutions are exempt from the bill. …The new bill does not permit firearms at sporting events, classrooms, student housing including fraternity and sorority houses, any space used for high school students and childcare space. The bill also does not permit guns in faculty, staff or administrative offices or in offices or rooms where disciplinary proceedings are conducted.
www.onlineathens.com
Georgia colleges now must implement concealed handgun law
http://onlineathens.com/local-news/2017-05-06/georgia-colleges-now-must-implement-concealed-handgun-law
By Kathleen Foody Associated Press
Georgia’s public university presidents and police chiefs were strongly opposed to letting people carry concealed handguns on college campuses. Now that Gov. Nathan Deal has signed the campus-carry law, it falls on them to figure out how to implement it before the next school year begins. Opponents and supporters alike agree that the law Deal signed Thursday could create complicated landscapes for concealed weapon permit-holders to navigate when they carry their handguns on campus. The law, which takes effect July 1, excludes on-campus preschools, faculty or administrative offices, disciplinary hearings and areas where high schoolers take college classes. Also off-limits to concealed weapons are dormitories, fraternity and sorority houses and buildings used for athletic events. Lawmakers provided no instructions on how campuses should implement the law, unlike the approach Texas lawmakers used last year, which gave campuses latitude on policies, as long as they don’t effectively prohibit people from carrying weapons. In a message to leaders of the University System of Georgia’s 28 institutions, Chancellor Steve Wrigley asked individual campuses not to change their policies and said the system will provide guidance. “We recognize that many have strong feelings about this new law,” Wrigley wrote. “It is important that we all work together across our campuses to implement the new law appropriately and continue to provide a top-quality education to our students.”
www.wgauradio.com
CAMPUS CARRY BECOMES LAW
http://www.wgauradio.com/news/local/campus-carry-becomes-law/VM19dT4y7ClhHKLBlIyJxM/
By: Tim Bryant
Over the objections of administrators at the University of Georgia and at other schools around the state, campus carry is now the law in the state: the measure that was passed by the Georgia House and Senate and signed by Governor Nathan Deal took effect over the weekend.
www.georgianewsday.com
Guns on campus and other New Georgia laws taking effect in July
http://www.georgianewsday.com/news/441199-guns-on-campus-and-other-new-georgia-laws-taking-effect-in-july.html
Dozens of new laws are now in effect with the start of Georgia’s fiscal year, including an end to a ban on guns on the state’s public college campuses. Gov. Nathan Deal signed 275 measures into law after the General Assembly adjourned at the end of March, and more than 100 of them took effect as of July 1. The rest became effective with Deal’s signature or were written to take effect at later dates. Georgians can see a full list of the laws at the General Assembly’s web site. Here’s a look at some of the key measures taking effect this month:
GUNS ON CAMPUS
Starting July 1, Georgia joins nine other states that allow concealed weapons to be carried on campuses. Permit-holders must be at least 21 — or at least 18 with proof of basic training or active service in the military. Applicants must provide fingerprints for a criminal record check and undergo an additional federal background check. But students on campus over the summer or returning to school this fall won’t find new storage facilities or signs.
www.news.wabe.org
‘Campus Carry’ Brings Mixed Feelings For Ga. Students, Parents
http://news.wabe.org/post/campus-carry-brings-mixed-feelings-ga-students-parents
By ADHITI BANDLAMUDI
As of Saturday, July 1, students with a proper license can carry a concealed gun on any public college or university in the state of Georgia. Earl Kang, a graduate student at the University of Georgia, says he’s not too worried about the new “campus carry” bill. “Even without these rules, there’s always going to be people who, if provoked enough, they will bring a gun or cause havoc. But campus carry will give us an opportunity to defend ourselves if necessary,” Kang says. Nag Bondada came with his daughter from Alpharetta for orientation. He disagrees with Kang and says even looking at a gun is intimidating. “It’s a distraction. You came here for learning, not for carrying arms, right?” Bondada says. Bondada says students should rely on campus police to protect them instead of taking matters into their own hands. But Betty Leigh Miller, a parent from Atlanta, says campus police can only do so much to protect students.
www.myajc.com
Get Schooled with Maureen Downey
Georgia colleges must allow guns starting Saturday. Will students arm themselves?
http://getschooled.blog.myajc.com/2017/06/29/georgia-public-colleges-open-to-guns-saturday-will-students-arm-themselves/
The AJC welcomed a dozen talented college interns this summer, including Nathan Harris of the University of Georgia. Harris is a senior journalism major, who has been covering campus carry and gun topics for the Red & Black newspaper for three years. With campus carry about to become the law in Georgia Saturday, Harris addresses the implications and the experiences of other states that allow guns on their public colleges and universities. This is his first column for the Get Schooled blog. I hope for more from him and the other interns. If you want to read more about the nuts and bolts of the new law, go to this excellent AJC news story. By Nathan Harris
www.mdjonline.com
Kennesaw State University students’ reactions mixed on guns in classrooms
http://www.mdjonline.com/news/kennesaw-state-university-students-reactions-mixed-on-guns-in-classrooms/article_64a6c720-5ecf-11e7-88fd-1335620469d6.html
Ross Williams
Campus carry is now the law of the land in Georgia. The MDJ spoke with Kennesaw State University students on Saturday, the day the law officially went into effect. The students were all aware of the new law, which allows those with concealed carry permits to bring firearms onto public college campuses, but their opinions on the matter varied widely. “I just think it’s not safe, honestly,” said Jamilah Briggs, a senior studying psychology. Briggs was in the student center during a patch of bad weather while the school was holding its Independence Day celebration. With her was her friend, Joel Greene, a junior studying business management and military leadership. “How is it not safe?” Greene asked. “You’re not interviewing me,” Briggs said. “I just don’t think it’s safe honestly because there’s a lot of things going on at Kennesaw right now, like rape,” she alleged. “I don’t think a student should have a gun, regardless if you have it legally or not. I just don’t like it. I don’t feel safe at all.”
www.cnbc.com
15 colleges that pay for themselves if you want to work in business
http://www.cnbc.com/2017/06/30/colleges-with-the-best-roi-if-you-want-to-work-in-business.html
Emmie Martin
Where you go to college isn’t just an investment in the next four years, it’s an investment in the rest of your life. And depending on which industry you want to work in, some schools may be a better bet than others. As part of its annual College ROI Report, Payscale found the schools that both funnel students into jobs in business and provide substantial returns on their investments. Payscale’s report determines the return on investment for schools across the U.S. by subtracting the cost of attendance from graduates’ 20-year pay. For the report, Payscale draws its data from the approximately 1.3 million college-educated workers who successfully completed PayScale’s Employee Survey over the last 10 years. Read a complete breakdown of the methodology here … 11. Georgia Tech – 20-year net ROI: $751,000 – Total cost for four years: $174,000 – Average loan amount: $31,700
www.ajc.com
UGA housing crunch spurs $1,000 offer for students to live off-campus
http://www.ajc.com/news/local-education/uga-housing-crunch-spurs-000-offer-for-students-live-off-campus/8wef5t8SUYiX009xgGmW9J/
Maureen Downey The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Facing a critical fall dorm shortage after more freshmen chose to enroll at the University of Georgia this year, the popular Athens campus is attempting to entice local area teens to live at home. UGA is offering them $1,000 to give up their dorm rooms. “The increase is due in part to the rising popularity of the University of Georgia among prospective students,” said UGA spokesman Gregory Trevor. “University housing has offered a $1,000 incentive for incoming first-year students from Clarke and contiguous counties to waive the university’s requirement that they live on campus their first year.” That is not the only deal. UGA is offering a $3,500 housing discount fee for non-first-year students who agree to live in Brown Hall, which is on the Health Science Campus off Prince Avenue and two miles from the main campus. Non-first-year students willing to forgo their on-campus housing contracts and live off campus will get $3,500 cash, said Trevor.
www.wgxa.tv
Fort Valley State given 12 month accreditation warning for non-compliance
http://wgxa.tv/news/local/fort-valley-state-given-12-month-accreditation-warning-for-non-compliance
by Maggie McGlamry
Fort Valley State University was placed on a year-long warning this month by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges (SACSCOC). SACSCOC’s Board of Trustees determined the school was non-compliant with core requirements, comprehensive standards and Title IV responsibilities, according to the SOCSCOC website. In June 2018, the Board of Trustees will review the school’s Second Monitoring Report addressing the issues.
Higher Education News:
www.insidehighered.com
DeVos Allows Career Programs to Delay Disclosure to Students
Shift on gainful-employment rule is latest move by Trump administration that pleases for-profit sector but dismays its critics.
https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2017/07/03/education-department-announces-new-delays-gainful-employment
By Andrew Kreighbaum
Two weeks after announcing a regulatory rewrite of the gainful-employment rule for nondegree career education programs, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos announced late Friday that she was delaying key provisions of the existing rule.
The department will give those programs until July 2018 to disclose information such as graduate employment rates or debt levels to prospective students, a year later than originally scheduled. And it will also extend a deadline to file alternate earnings appeals, citing a Wednesday court order in a lawsuit brought by cosmetology schools. A Federal Register notice from the department indicated that within 30 days it would set new deadlines for alternate earnings appeals. Those appeals allow programs to address underreported income from tips or self-employment for the debt-to-earnings ratios that determine if they pass or fail under the rule’s metrics.
www.nytimes.com
Women in Tech Speak Frankly on Culture of Harassment
By KATIE BENNER
Their stories came out slowly, even hesitantly, at first. Then in a rush. One female entrepreneur recounted how she had been propositioned by a Silicon Valley venture capitalist while seeking a job with him, which she did not land after rebuffing him. Another showed the increasingly suggestive messages she had received from a start-up investor. And one chief executive described how she had faced numerous sexist comments from an investor while raising money for her online community website. What happened afterward was often just as disturbing, the women told The New York Times. Many times, the investors’ firms and colleagues ignored or played down what had happened when the situations were brought to their attention. Saying anything, the women were warned, might lead to ostracism. Now some of these female entrepreneurs have decided to take that risk. More than two dozen women in the technology start-up industry spoke to The Times in recent days about being sexually harassed. Ten of them named the investors involved, often providing corroborating messages and emails, and pointed to high-profile venture capitalists such as Chris Sacca of Lowercase Capital and Dave McClure of 500 Startups. …The new accounts underscore how sexual harassment in the tech start-up ecosystem goes beyond one firm and is pervasive and ingrained. Now their speaking out suggests a cultural shift in Silicon Valley, where such predatory behavior had often been murmured about but rarely exposed.
www.chronicle.com
U. of California System Changes How It Responds to Sexual Harassment and Violence
http://www.chronicle.com/blogs/ticker/u-of-california-system-changes-policies-for-responding-to-sexual-harassment-and-violence/119173
by Fernanda Zamudio-Suaréz
The University of California system has new policies to respond to allegations of sexual misconduct by faculty and staff members, the university announced in a news release on Thursday. Changes will be in place systemwide by September 1. The changes include a clear timeline for completing investigations; chancellor or chancellor-designee approval of discipline proposed for a staff member’s supervisors; and informing complainants, as well as respondents, of all outcomes. In the news release, Kathleen Salvaty, the system’s Title IX coordinator, said the new polices aimed to strengthen the adjudication process across campuses.
www.insidehighered.com
Fighting to Keep Leaders Who Are Academics
UW Madison professors oppose legislative proposal to ban university system from requiring that campus chancellors and presidents have academic backgrounds.
https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2017/07/03/madison-professors-fight-keep-requirement-administrators-be-academics
By Colleen Flaherty
Faculty members at the University of Wisconsin at Madison want to kill a state budget proposal that would ban the university system’s Board of Regents from requiring the system president and campus chancellors and vice chancellors be academics themselves. There is currently is no regent policy or rule requiring that the system president, chancellors or vice chancellors have tenure or terminal degrees. But Madison campus policy holds that its chancellor, provost and vice chancellor must hold a tenured faculty rank — effectively disqualifying nonacademics. And members of the Public Representation Organization of the Faculty Senate (PROFS) want to keep it that way, they wrote to state legislators last week. Madison’s current requirement, which stands in potential opposition to the legislative proposal, “underlines the need for incumbents to have experience, preparation and understanding of universities,” PROFS wrote to the Wisconsin Legislature’s Joint Committee on Finance, “paralleling leadership qualifications demanded by most industries.” …But nationwide, most campus presidents still have traditional academic backgrounds. The trend of hiring presidents from outside academe is also on the decline nationwide, according to a study from the American Council on Education released last month. While the share of presidents from outside higher education had grown from 13 percent in 2006 to 20 percent in 2011, it dropped to 15 percent in 2016, according to ACE. The percentage of presidents who had never been a faculty member also fell, from 30 percent in 2011 to 19 percent in 2016.