University System News:
www.rollingout.com
Atlanta Metropolitan State College raises $370K in scholarship funds
by BRITTNEY KEITH
Atlanta Metropolitan State College held its annual Celebration of Leadership Awards on Sept. 27, 2018, on the school’s campus. During the awards ceremony, the Atlanta Metropolitan College Foundation raised $370,000 for need-based scholarship funds to aid students. “I am extremely proud of the work of the Atlanta Metropolitan College Foundation board members,” said foundation board Chairman Skip Vaughan. “The efforts of all involved have ensured that we can help even more students at AMSC fulfill their educational goals.” The $370,000 is the largest amount the foundation has ever raised in the award ceremony’s history. It includes a $125,000 donation from Edwin A. Thompson Jr., son of the college’s founding President Edwin A. Thompson Sr. The donation is the largest gift in the school’s 44-year history. “How fitting that this donation comes from the college’s founding family,” said Dr. Gary McGaha, the institution’s president. “This gift is the premier example of the impact and opportunity for which this college is renowned.” Recipients of the scholarship funds are students who are within a semester of graduating and in need of financial assistance to continue their education. This past year, Atlanta Metropolitan State College broke another record, granting scholarship money to 400 students.
www.athensceo.com
UGA Law School Has Highest Bar Examination Passage Rate
Staff Report From Athens CEO
The University of Georgia School of Law is proud to announce that for the fifth consecutive year, its graduates had the highest bar examination passage rate for first-time takers in the state of Georgia for the July sitting. “We make a promise to all students who choose to attend our law school that we will provide a world-class educational experience that prepares them for successful careers,” said School of Law Dean Peter B. “Bo” Rutledge. “For five years now, our graduates have had the highest bar passage rate in our state for first-time test takers, which sends a strong signal that we are indeed delivering on that promise.” This achievement comes only weeks after the law school was recognized as the best value in legal education in the United States. The ranking by National Jurist relies upon outcome-driven factors such as average indebtedness, bar passage and employment.
www.nwcable.net
BRIEF: Terry’s Executive MBA ranked best in state and a top U.S. program
Athens Banner-Herald
The University of Georgia’s Terry College of Business recently ranked No. 12 among U.S.-based executive MBA programs by a survey published by the Financial Times. The Terry College EMBA ranks fourth among public business schools in the country. “This ranking is a strong indication that our executive MBA Program offers significant value to graduates in terms of career momentum and return on investment,” said Terry College Dean Benjamin C. Ayers.
www.thebrunswicknews.com
College partners with Greer Elementary to provide hands-on experience
By LAUREN MCDONALD
Education majors at the College of Coastal Georgia are finding that elementary school education looks dramatically different than it did when they were elementary students. They can’t learn about these changes only by reading a textbook on their college campus, though. These future teachers learn the most from hands-on experience inside the classrooms of local schools. And this year, Coastal Georgia has further expanded its partnership with Glynn County Schools by bringing a class out to C.B. Greer Elementary twice a week to work directly with students in classrooms. The college students spend their entire morning at the school working in pairs, and while on Greer’s campus they receive a “mini-lesson” from their instructor Carol Geiken or from guest speakers. “This is the first time I have ever done it for this class,” Geiken said. “I just saw the need for them.” The college course is focused on teaching students in special education classes.
www.redandblack.com
Three-day Thanksgiving break in 2019 upsets out-of-state UGA students
Madison Dye | Contributor
Every year, students at UGA look forward to Thanksgiving break, which for several years has been Monday through Friday. However, the University Council has decided the 2019 break will only last Wednesday to Friday. According to a report from the University Council, the Educational Affairs Committee recommended the fall semester to begin later than usual — on or after Aug. 15 — and the fall commencement to occur no later than the second Friday in December. In order to meet the University System of Georgia Board of Regents requirements and federal guidelines about what completes a semester, the 2019 Thanksgiving break will only be three days. …The shortening of the break will affect out-of-state students who rely on Thanksgiving break to spend time with the family they may not have seen since the beginning of the semester. Hailey Goldberg, a junior applied biotechnology major, finds this change to be particularly stressful because she travels to New York City, her hometown. “Because of the difficulty of my classes, I cannot afford to skip a day of classes to go home for the weekend. I look forward to the week I get to spend at home with my family before finals week picks up,” Goldberg said.
www.thegeorgeanne.com
Diversity and inclusion expert gives keynote address at Georgia Southern
http://www.thegeorgeanne.com/news/article_fe38e334-82fe-5c8e-8270-1333334e2f00.html
By Rachel Adams, The George-Anne staff
A national expert on diversity and inclusion gave a keynote address Friday Oct.26 in the Carol A. Carter Recital Hall on the Georgia Southern University campus in response to multiple incidents that have taken place over the course of the semester. Damon Williams, Ph.D. gave a keynote address titled “From Awareness, to Action, to Innovation: Empowering Leaders Through Inclusive Excellence” to the GS community. “Georgia Southern was good,” Williams said to kick off his address. “It is absolutely my pleasure and privilege to be with you today, to be with you and have a chance to be a part of the journey that you are on each and every day toward this idea we refer to as inclusive excellence.” Williams begins his address “How do we help, how do we make, how do we inspire, how do we lead our institutions in such a way that they are inclusive and excellent for each and every one of our students, our faculty and our staff, which are citizens of our institutions?” That was the main question Williams proposed to the audience and the topic of his address. Williams stressed the importance of not only being aware of diversity and inclusion and doing things to improve them but also asking questions about how innovation could help society progress in such matters.
www.globalatlanta.com
Q&A: Why Korean is Such a Critical Language
View from the University of North Georgia
https://www.globalatlanta.com/qa-why-korean-is-such-a-critical-language/
TREVOR WILLIAMS
Editor’s note: As the state’s military academy, the University of North Georgia offers Korean language at various levels in hopes of inspiring some students and cadets to take their study on to fluency. The language has been designated as “critical” by the U.S. Department of Defense, meaning that it’s eligible to receive increased government funding to drive proficiency. But beyond national security, Korean has also grown increasingly important globally, as Korea continues to export both its culinary traditions and its pop culture. In Georgia, home to an estimated 150,000 people of Korean descent and a growing parade of Korean investors, the language is also becoming more vital to navigating business with what has become the world’s ninth largest economy. UNG published the below interview with Jiyoung Daniel, who teaches all levels of Korean at the university, to shed more light on why Korean is important and how technology is changing the process of language learning. Dr. Daniel earned both her B.A. and Ph.D. degrees in linguistics from the University of Georgia. The interview has been edited for brevity.
UNG: What is your role at the University of North Georgia?
www.insidehighered.com
My Student Affairs Blindspot
Bundling, the rise of inexpensive online degree programs, and the relational model of learning.
https://www.insidehighered.com/blogs/technology-and-learning/my-student-affairs-blindspot
By Joshua Kim
… Educators who equate the growth of student affairs functions with administrative bloat might want to think through the alternatives. We know what an unbundled higher education experience looks like. The way that Georgia Tech can offer an online master’s in cybersecurity for less than $10,000 is that they are providing an unbundled student experience. Students in the Georgia Tech get courses and content and assessment. It might be the best online content and digitally mediated learning experience on the planet. What they don’t get are strong mentoring and coaching relationships with professors or anyone else on campus. They do not receive what student affairs offers, or anything else that is included in the higher education bundle.
www.wsbtv.com
Professor says she felt pressured to offer extra credit for students to attend rally
A Clayton County professor now says she felt pressured to offer extra credit for a political rally. Channel 2 Action News reported on Clayton State University criminology professor Dr. Andrea Allen’s email to students earlier this month and it gained national attention. On Monday she spoke exclusively with Channel 2 investigative reporter Mark Winne, telling him the university issued a statement on her behalf and she knew nothing about it. In the latest statement from Clayton State University, it said: “The language used in Dr. Allen’s post to her class was in violation of the faculty handbook and Board of Regents’ policy because it had the effect of being partisan, regardless of her intent.” Allen said that’s not true and neither was a key portion of an earlier university statement. …Allen told Winne that the public has been left with a false image of her as a left-wing academic, largely because of a statement the university put out about her and a controversy involving a rally on campus for Democratic gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams and U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren.
www.bizjournals.com
BlackRock plans Atlanta innovation hub, creating at least 1,000 jobs
By Douglas Sams – Commercial Real Estate Editor, Atlanta Business Chronicle
Global asset management firm BlackRock is opening an Atlanta innovation center that will grow to 1,000 employees over time … Atlanta is a national hub for financial technology, with more than 120 fintech companies headquartered here. Georgia Tech is also an influential player in the field and maintains a Financial Services Innovation Lab in Technology Square … “Atlanta adds to our capabilities in leading technology centers offering proximity to top universities, including Georgia Tech, one of the foremost engineering schools,” according to the memo.
www.insidehighered.com
Cutting Ties
Cornell ends a partnership with Renmin University of China, citing academic freedom concerns.
By Elizabeth Redden
Cornell University has suspended a partnership with a Chinese university because of academic freedom concerns. Eli Friedman, director of international programs for Cornell’s School of Industrial and Labor Relations, said that the ILR School had suspended two exchange programs because of concerns that its Chinese partner institution, Renmin University of China, had punished, surveilled or suppressed students who supported workers’ rights in a labor conflict that erupted this past summer … Renmin lists 29 U.S. university partners on its website, including Columbia and Yale Universities; the Universities of Michigan and California, Berkeley; Georgetown University; the Georgia Institute of Technology; and the University of Chicago.
www.eurasiareview.com
Financial Education Key To Reducing Student Loan Stress
By Eurasia Review
It is estimated that a quarter of American adults currently have student loans to pay off, and most do not have the financial literacy to manage debt successfully. The average student in the Class of 2016 has $37,172 in student loan debt. Graduates from the University of Missouri have an average debt of $21,884. In a new study, Lu Fan, assistant professor of personal financial planning at the University of Missouri, found that borrowers are not receiving adequate education to manage their student debt. She suggests that more needs to be done to educate borrowers about managing debt as well as the various repayment options that might be available to them. “A majority of borrowers, 55 percent, reported being worried about their student loans; however, only 30 percent of borrowers said that they had received financial education about paying off their student loans,” Fan said. “Moreover, only 40 percent of borrowers reported having financial influence from their parents. Given the number of people who need student loans to attend college, we need to do better at educating borrowers.” Using the 2015 National Financial Capability Study dataset, Fan and Swarn Chatterjee, professor at the University of Georgia, found that having student loan debt caused mental stress for borrowers. The researchers looked at more than 2,600 responses from the dataset, focusing on respondents who had a student loan, were between the ages of 24 and 65, were no longer a student, were employed, and were the primary decision makers in their household.
Higher Education News:
www.insidehighered.com
New Criticisms of GRE
Study questions utility of the test in doctoral admissions for STEM programs. ETS says the study isn’t about what the exam is intended to do.
By Scott Jaschik
A new study questions whether doctoral programs in science and technology should be using the Graduate Record Examination in admissions. The study, published Monday in the journal PLOS ONE, was based on an analysis of the academic performance of 1,805 students who constituted a representative sample of those enrolled at four flagship universities. Men had significantly higher quantitative scores than women at all four universities. But there were no gender differences in completion rates or time to degree. …The paper suggests that these findings should raise serious questions about using GRE scores in STEM doctoral admissions.