University System News:
www.savannahnow.com
Savannah State officials address campus safety concerns after fatal weekend shooting
http://savannahnow.com/news/2018-02-27/savannah-state-officials-address-campus-safety-concerns-after-fatal-weekend-shooting#
By Brittini Ray
Savannah State University President Cheryl Dozier said during a Tuesday press conference that keeping students safe is a top priority for officials, just three days after a man was fatally shot on campus. “We are taking this situation very seriously,” Dozier said. “And we continue to look for opportunities to improve our campus safety as we move forward. Our students, faculty staff and campus visitors are of our utmost importance as we provide a safe and secure campus.” …“Prior to this incident, people do not need ID to access campus,” Dozier said. “Our students do have ID and when we need to go into secured alert situations, we do require identification. On that particular day, there were a lot of activities on our campus. We had lots of visitors. …Dozier said that Burke’s “quick arrest” was the result of security measures implemented in the last two years under Campus Police Chief James Barnwell. Barnwell joined SSU in March 2016. “This quick response was a collaborative effort of the patrol officers and the investigators of our public safety department,” she said. “Chief James Barnwell has introduced various programs and state including enhanced security and surveillance cameras, implementation of a campus security app “LiveSafe” and new technology including license plate readers and body cameras for all police officers.”
www.walb.com
CLOSER LOOK: A breakdown of ASU Foundation’s recent audit
http://www.walb.com/story/37606050/closer-look-a-breakdown-of-asu-foundations-recent-audit
By Amanda Hoskins, Reporter
A recent financial audit of the Albany State University Foundation reveals serious suggestions by auditors having to do with internal controls and record-keeping. University officials said they have created new policies to strengthen the internal control of the foundation’s finances. But, overall they described the audit as “clean.” The Albany State University Foundation is the non-profit organization and fundraising entity for Albany State University. “The foundation as a whole maintains the charitable assets, the endowments, some properties, gifts and contributions that benefit Albany State University advanced education,” explained Randae Davis, the interim chief development officer at ASU. According to the 2016-2017 year audit, the Foundation has almost $83 million in liabilities and net assets.
www.bizjournals.com
Retired Coca-Cola exec picked for College of Coastal Georgia role
https://www.bizjournals.com/atlanta/news/2018/02/27/retired-coca-cola-exec-picked-for-college-of.html
By Eric Mandel – Digital Producer
A recently retired Coca-Cola executive is shifting to the world of academia. The College of Coastal Georgia announced Tuesday that it picked Scott Williamson as the school’s interim vice president for public affairs and communications. Williamson previously served as VP for public affairs and communications at Coca-Cola North America in 2017, working for the Atlanta-based beverage giant for 25 years. In the new role, he will oversee the College’s communications and development teams while working closely with the College of Coastal Georgia Foundation. Williamson has been working as an adjunct professor for the past two months, teaching a marketing course in the School of Business and Public Management.
www.albanyherald.com
University of Georgia senior, Madison Hickey, serves as legislative intern at General Assembly
Intern interested in the policies that shape agriculture since days with Future Farmers of America
http://www.albanyherald.com/news/local/university-of-georgia-senior-madison-hickey-serves-as-legislative-intern/article_0ad078fd-f7a7-5935-aead-b4a33c8d30d9.html
By Merritt Melancon
ATLANTA — It’s 11 a.m. on Thursday during the General Assembly’s spring session, and people from all over Georgia start to the fill the wide hallways of the state Capitol building in downtown Atlanta. It’s noisy, and it’s noticeably warmer inside than the weather outside on this brisk February morning. “This happens every day about this time,” Madison Hickey, a senior studying agricultural communication at the University of Georgia College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, said. The crowded hallways are a far cry from the small town of Toccoa, where Hickey grew up, or even the quiet calm of the South Campus at UGA — but it suits her. Hickey is a legislative intern with the state Senate Committee on Agriculture and Consumer Affairs as part of CAES’s legislative internship program. Through this program, students spend 12 weeks working full-time at the Capitol, helping legislators craft policies that will impact the state’s largest industry — agriculture. CAES and the Senate committee sponsor the program.
www.washingtonexaminer.com
Code Yellow: Georgia Southern’s speech code impedes freedom of assembly
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/code-yellow-georgia-southerns-speech-code-impedes-freedom-of-assembly/article/2650202
by Richard Abel
Georgia Southern University is a public university located in Statesboro, Ga., that holds “yellow light” policies on free speech, as determined by the Foundation for Individual Right in Education. According to FIRE, yellow light policies are those which “restrict a more limited amount of protected expression or, by virtue of their vague wording, could too easily be used to restrict protected expression.” The most problematic policy for students attempting to voice their opinions on campus is the university policy on assembly and demonstration, which states that “requests to reserve campus grounds for an assembly and/or demonstration must be made at least forty-eight (48) hours in advance of the activity.” Students can request use of the space with a “Free Speech Area Request Form,” located on the school website. The area in which students are allowed to hold these events is limited to a “Free Speech Area” located between Russell Union and Williams Center. Restricting students to a relatively small section of the 900-acre campus is unconstitutional.
www.bizjournals.com
Hundreds of Georgians celebrate Film Day at the Capitol (Photos)
https://www.bizjournals.com/atlanta/news/2018/02/27/hundreds-of-georgians-celebrate-film-day-at-the.html?ana=e_me_set4&s=newsletter&ed=2018-02-28&u=xw%2BDRjRaikB6EdaliSJBWQ0ae2f198&t=1519828678&j=80235781
By Ellie Hensley – Staff Writer, Atlanta Business Chronicle
Film industry crew members, actors, studio executives, vendors and other members of the film and television industry met Feb. 27 at the Georgia Capitol to celebrate another blockbuster year. Between July 1, 2016 and June 30, 3017, the industry had an economic impact of $9.5 billion in Georgia. It also generated 92,100 jobs, directly employing 28,700 Georgians, and workers took home $4.6 billion in wages. Georgia Department of Economic Development Commissioner Pat Wilson, Rep. Ron Stephens, R-Savannah; and Lee Wilson, Deputy Commissioner of the Georgia Film office, spoke at the event.
www.ledger-enquirer.com
Hollywood film industry insider threatens Georgia if anti-LGBTQ bill passes
http://www.ledger-enquirer.com/news/politics-government/article202323719.html
BY CHUCK WILLIAMS
A Hollywood insider raised in Columbus said Georgia could be putting the state’s lucrative film and production business in jeopardy if an adoption bill in front of the General Assembly becomes law. The bill, which passed the Senate on Friday and has moved to the House, would allow religious adoption agencies in Georgia to refuse to work with same-sex couples. That is a bad idea, said Franklin Leonard, founder of The Black List, an internet startup that, among other things, publishes an annual list of film industry executives’ favorite scripts that have not been made into feature films. “I and many others don’t particularly want to bring our work and our business to a state where members of the LGBTQ community are second-class citizens,” Leonard said. “It’s a particularly risky move because it puts the state on the wrong side of history and real American values.” Using tax incentives and a heavy recruiting effort, Georgia has pushed its way into the film industry in a major way over the last decade. In July, Gov. Nathan Deal announced that feature film and television productions in Georgia from July 2016 to June 2017 generated an economic impact of $9.5 billion. The 320 feature film and television productions shot in Georgia represent $2.7 billion in direct spending in the state, Deal said at the time.
www.wtoc.com
State lawmakers on the fence about offshore drilling
http://www.wtoc.com/story/37605726/state-lawmakers-on-the-fence-about-offshore-drilling
By Russ Riesinger, Anchor
TYBEE ISLAND, GA (WTOC) – South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster has come out strongly in opposition against a plan to open coastal waters to offshore drilling and exploration. Georgia Governor Nathan Deal, however, is still considering the idea. He tells WTOC he’s waiting until a study can be completed by the Department of Natural Resources. “I feel very sure they will do an in-depth study of what the pros and cons were to be if we were to have offshore drilling off the coast of the state of Georgia,” Governor Deal said. Proponents of offshore drilling and exploration say that it is safer, cheaper, and easier to get to previously inaccessible areas, but those against it are quick to point out that even one mistake could cause irreparable harm to one of the area’s most valuable treasures. …Congressman Carter says the decision to open coastal waters to drilling could provide independence for America – and economic opportunity for Georgia. “There would be many jobs as a result of this. …There is a big question of whether there is much of anything to be had off our coast. Studies, last done in the 70s, weren’t that promising. “Those studies basically show that there are very limited resources in the Southeastern U.S. Certainly, oil is one of the smaller quantities and there is more gas,” said Dr. Clark Alexander, Skidaway Institute of Oceanography. Dr. Alexander is the director of the Skidaway Institute of Oceanography and studies underwater geology. He says improvements have been made in exploration and drilling.
Higher Education News:
www.myajc.com
New report: Women need more education than men to earn equal wages
https://www.myajc.com/blog/get-schooled/new-report-women-need-more-education-than-men-earn-equal-wages/wKkq3xkwUVfiOj4GLVOp0K/
By Maureen Downey
The Georgetown Center on Education and the Workforce released a troubling new report today on the stubborn wage gap between women and men. The gap persists even as more women than men enroll in college. And women dominate in all degree levels, from associate to doctorate.
The Georgetown Center analysis — which all young women should read — finds women need more education to earn the same salaries as men. It advises women who eschew STEM majors and pursue liberal arts degrees to plan on graduate school if they hope to earn a middle-class income. Women remain concentrated in the lowest earning majors. The report says about 76 percent of all education majors are now women, unchanged since 1970. Also, 72 percent of psychology majors are women today, compared to 44 percent in 1970. The findings also raise doubts about the value of vocational certificates for women. The report finds women enroll in vo-tech certification areas that are unlikely to yield good salaries, …Georgia ought to pay attention to this as we are in the midst of a new push on post-high school certifications. This is an excerpt from the report dealing with certificates:
www.chronicle.com
How to Sway Higher Ed’s Skeptics
https://www.chronicle.com/article/How-to-Sway-Higher-Ed-s/242645/#.Wpad9L1zF-U.twitter
By Peter Salovey
Many Americans today are skeptical about the value of higher education. Last summer, a study from the Pew Research Center found that only 55 percent of Americans say that colleges “have a positive effect on the way things are going in this country.” When Gallup pollsters asked how much confidence they had in colleges and universities, 56 percent of Americans said some or very little. These findings are deeply troubling. Confidence in and support for higher education are essential to our nation’s future. Leaders in higher education, including myself, must work to regain the public’s trust. This begins with empathy — listening to people’s concerns and trying to understand them.