University System News:
Georgia Trend
By Mary Ann Demuth
Columbus State University (CSU) recently received a $1 million gift from The Coca-Cola Foundation to establish the William B. Turner Center for Servant Leadership. The donation, which honors the late Columbus businessman and civic leader who served on The Coca-Cola Company’s board of directors, will allow CSU’s undergraduate Servant Leadership program to continue with an enriched academic and service curriculum. Turner was instrumental in initiating and financially supporting CSU’s early servant leadership initiatives. Today the center offers an annual stipend and leadership development opportunities for undergraduates, leadership development for CSU faculty and staff and a food pantry serving CSU students.
WGAU Radio
UNG Gets Another Big Donation From Cottrells
By: Tim Bryant
The University of North Georgia gets another $10 million gift from Mike and Lynn Cottrell: it’s money that will be used to expand the UNG Business School that already bears his name. “I am grateful to Mike and Lynn Cottrell for their exceptional generosity,” UNG President Bonita Jacobs said. “The Cottrells have made the two largest contributions in UNG’s 145-year history, and, in doing so, they have provided transformational support for our students and graduates to be regionally and globally competitive business leaders.”
Americus Times Recorder
Veterinarian establishes scholarship at GSW in former teacher’s name
By Beth Alston
Sam Adams, Ph.D., and the Georgia Southwestern Foundation Board of Trustees established the Rebecca McNeill Scholarship Endowment in honor of educator and Georgia Southwestern State University (GSW) retiree Rebecca McNeill. Adams, a GSW alumnus (’73) …He created the scholarship in honor of McNeill because of the influence she had on his life as well as her service to education at the high school and collegiate levels. McNeill, fondly known to many as “Mrs. Rebecca” and long-time Americus resident, was a beloved teacher and mentor to her high school students. She was also highly respected on GSW’s campus, where she served as a faculty administrator until her retirement in 1992.
The Red & Black
UGA set to launch alumni-student mentor program
Francisco Guzman | News Editor
The University of Georgia will launch an alumni-student initiative, the UGA Mentor Program, on June 12 after the success of a pilot program that paired 115 students and alumni. UGA President Jere W. Morehead formed a presidential task force to create the program at the recommendation of the Board of Visitors. Morehead said in a UGA news release that UGA alumni are eager to support and explore the career paths and life goals of students.
Walton Sun
Georgia Southern president outlines vision for the future
Georgia Southern University’s new President Kyle Marrero is pledging to be a president for both Statesboro and Savannah campuses. Since the consolidation of Georgia Southern and the former Armstrong University, students haven’t understood the strengths of the combined university, Marrero said. That’s partly because the leadership has changed so often, he said. …Marrero said he’s optimistic about what the university can become, despite recent enrollment declines. Those prompted a “redirection” for the next fiscal year, with departments asked to cut 10 percent from their budgets. The new president views programs designed to meet the needs of businesses in the area as a way to expand Georgia Southern. There are also growth opportunities in online courses, he added. They grew by 25 percent at the University of West Georgia, during his tenure as president there before being named Georgia Southern president. “I think there’s incredible opportunity here for Georgia Southern as a whole to elevate its distance learning program,” he said. Addressing students, Marrero said: “We want you post-graduation to be able to find a job and live in southeast Georgia. That’s our goal.”
Marietta Daily Journal
Graduates of Cobb high schools, colleges defy foster care odds
By Thomas Hartwell
Katrina Oglesby was 16 when she moved out of her abusive home in southwest Atlanta and into the Carrie Steele-Pitts group home on the west side of the city. …But Oglesby said when she was placed into the Carrie Steele-Pitts home, she learned she could work to receive scholarships to pay her way through school. She’d already earned her GED through homeschooling and said she felt a drive to keep learning. She attended technical school in Atlanta before moving to Kennesaw State University, where for the first time she lived the life she had chosen for herself, studying biology and, in her words, being “spoiled” by the college’s cushy dorms. Oglesby said it was her support system, made up of staff at Carrie Steele-Pitts and KSU, that helped to motivate her to keep pushing through school. Oglesby said, with that support, she graduated from KSU this year and she’ll move on to medical school at Southern Illinois University in the fall.
Gwinnett Daily Post
After five years, Live Healthy Gwinnett continues promoting better lifestyles
By Curt Yeomans
It doesn’t seem like five years have passed to Gwinnett County Outreach Manager Lindsey Jorstad, but that’s exactly how long it’s been since the Live Healthy Gwinnett program was launched. Established in spring 2014 as a Gwinnett County Parks and Recreation initiative to collaborate with community partners and promote healthier lifestyles to county residents, Live Healthy Gwinnett has hosted 838 events over the last half decade. …Live Healthy Gwinnett interns Morgan Hess, a health promotion student at the University of Georgia, and Katherine Cook, a public health and promotion student at Georgia Southern University, said working with the program has been an eye-opening experience.
GPB News
Amidst Calls For Reparations, Lessons In Diversity From One Georgia College To Another
By Grant Blankenship
There’s a building on the campus of the University of Georgia where the foundation rests on the bodies of enslaved people. That’s Baldwin Hall on UGA’s picturesque North Campus. It’s been years since more than 100 burials of enslaved people were discovered during an expansion of the building that houses the Anthropology Department. …The protesters used a megaphone to give voice to their demands once they marched to the steps of the building where UGA President Jere Morehead has his office. They want UGA to acknowledge publicly, and in history classes, that enslaved people built much of UGA’s North Campus. …That frustration over unrecognized history has also focused attention on a longstanding source of friction between UGA and the surrounding city of Athens, namely the gulf between who goes to college in Athens and who lives there. …That something needed to be done was clear to Tim Renick years ago. Renick is the senior vice president for student success at Georgia State University. He says when he first arrived at GSU in the 1990’s it looked like the University of Georgia does today, very white. But that was changing.
Gainesville Times
UNG professor named to state Board of Early Care and Learning
Joshua Silavent
Dr. Cristina Washell, an Associate Professor and the Coordinator for the Elementary and Special Education Program at the University of North Georgia, has been named to state Board of Early Care and Learning by Gov. Kemp.
Albany Herald
Jani among Medical College of Georgia volunteer faculty honored for teaching efforts
Dr. Chirag Jani, hematologist/oncologist at Phoebe Cancer Center, honored for teaching efforts
From Staff Reports
Four volunteer clinical faculty at the Medical College of Georgia at Augusta University have been honored for their teaching efforts with Excellence in Clinical Education awards. Among them is Dr. Chirag Jani, a hematologist/oncologist at Phoebe Cancer Center. …Jani, also a palliative medicine specialist, has taught students at the MCG Southwest Campus in Albany since 2010. “Dr. Jani creates a full immersion experience in palliative care for students,” officials at AU said in a news release announcing his recognition. “Students say he teaches them how to see each patient as an individual and how to practice medicine without taking away the human element of being a physician.” Nominations were sent in from the AU/University of Georgia Medical Partnership, a second four-year campus of MCG in Athens in partnership with UGA, as well as the medical school’s clinical campuses for the third- and fourth-year students based in Albany, Rome and Savannah/Brunswick. Students from each campus voted for the winners.
AllOnGeorgia
Georgia Southern professors team up to reduce food waste on Statesboro Campus
Three Georgia Southern University professors have been awarded a $40,000 grant from the Center for Sustainability to fund a project that will focus on recycling and reducing food waste in the dining halls on Georgia Southern’s Statesboro Campus. …The project will also implement on- and off-campus educational intervention activities to educate students on the most effective and efficient means of reducing food waste. Long-term benefits of the project include increasing awareness about food waste, decreasing campus food waste, enhancing the profitability of farming and reducing the impact of food waste on the environment.
Rockdale Newton Citizen
Trailblazer in education inducted into Black Heritage of Rockdale Hall of Fame
By Chris Starrs Special to the Citizen
At the dawn of her professional career, Jacquelyn Belcher did not have her sights set on being a pioneer. She just wanted to follow in the footsteps of a favorite aunt and work as a nurse. But a trailblazer — and an excellent one — she turned out to be, serving from 1995 to 2005 as president of DeKalb College/Georgia Perimeter College, becoming the first black woman in the Georgia Board of Regents School System to lead a non-historically black institution of higher learning. In March, Belcher was inducted into the Black Heritage of Rockdale County Hall of Fame, joining journalist and educator E.R. Shipp and educator and longtime Conyers City Councilmember Cleveland Stroud as the first recipients of the organization’s Lifetime Achievement Award. …Belcher pointed to former University System of Georgia Chancellor Stephen R. Portch, who served in that position from 1994 to 2001, as being the critical link that brought her to DeKalb College. “Steve made the sell,” she quipped. “I’d never been to the South and didn’t know anything about it but … I was always willing to check things out and see if was a fit for me. “I knew the vision he had for that college and he knew it could be more than it was and he wanted to take it national. All of the things I helped do was toward his dream, too, for that college.”
Fox News
Illegal immigrants can hurt US economy, professor argues, prompting calls for his firing
By Dom Calicchio | Fox News
A college professor in Georgia is drawing criticism for his online comments about illegal immigrants, including his contention that people in the U.S. illegally can be a drain on the nation’s economy. “If you are going to reward illegal immigrants, there will be more illegal immigrants,” Fang Zhou, an associate professor of history at Georgia Gwinnett College near Atlanta, told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Zhou says he welcomes the criticism, including from those who say he should lose his job, according to the report. “I am against political correctness,” Zhou, a legal immigrant from China, told the newspaper. “I speak truth to power in class and my students learn about the financial drain of illegal immigration on the economy and the high crime rates of illegal immigrants. “My students are ‘woke’ and are overwhelmingly against illegal immigration after taking my class,” he added.
Breitbart
Students Want Legal Immigrant Professor Fired for Criticizing Illegal Immigration
A professor at Georgia Gwinnett College has come under fire from students for his perspective on illegal immigration.
According to a local news report, Georgia Gwinnett College Professor Fang Zhou, an immigrant from China, is facing calls for his termination after he expressed unpopular views about illegal immigration. …Now, some Georgians are calling for his termination. Bee Nguyen, the State Representative for Georgia House District 89, posted screenshots from Zhou’s social media pages on her Twitter account. “Are these the values supported by Georgia Gwinnett College?” Nguyen wrote in the tweet.
The Washington Times
Trump-supporting Gwinnett professor under fire for ‘illegal immigrants’ comments
By Jessica Chasmar
An associate professor at Georgia’s Gwinnett College is facing criticism after he said on social media that illegal immigrants are a drain on the economy and criminal justice system. Fang Zhou, a Chinese immigrant and President Trump supporter, told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution that he considers himself an “active anti-illegal immigration activist.” But Facebook comments he made recently about “ghetto thugs” and “libtards” caught the attention of Georgia state Rep. Bee Nguyen, who demanded an explanation from the college. …Mr. Zhou also wrote support for Mr. Trump’s famous slogan, Make America Great Again, and he boasted about a sign he keeps in his office that says, “Deportation of illegal immigrants.”
Gainesville Times
Drum circles to stem chronic pain? UNG giving it a shot
Layne Saliba
The University of North Georgia in Dahlonega is trying to beat the need for pain medication. After receiving a grant from Move Together’s Pro Bono Incubator, professors from the physical therapy and music departments teamed up to research the link between chronic pain and drum circles.
Savannah Morning News
Kevin Jackson column: A vision for Savannah’s 300th birthday
By 2033, the Savannah region will make tremendous progress in its continuous efforts to achieve the highest value and greatest good for our region and for our citizens. This directed progress is the result of strong collaborative and far-seeing political and business leaders, high quality of life amenities, unparalleled business and educational assets and a thriving and diversified economy with inclusive prosperity for all its residents. Business, education and community leaders, locally and regionally, are working together to achieve a shared vision and strategic goals, each going forward where applicable and all supportive. …As enrollment of students and recruitment of exemplary faculty at Georgia Southern University continues to increase, it is expected to reach Tier 1 Research University status within the next few years. …Savannah State University has become a model for success among historically black colleges with the highest enrollment and greatest academy recognitions since its founding in 1890. …As the Savannah region builds on the economic development accomplishments, drives the collaboration with our political and city leaders, strengthens life amenities, and develops more business and educational resources we are now more prepared than ever to be assured of attaining a leading role as a purposeful and planned economic engine for our region’s economy and for our citizen’s future.
Gwinnett Daily Post
GGC softball seniors’ legacy includes 192 wins, two World Series runs
By Christine Troyke
The seniors graduating from the Georgia Gwinnett College softball program won 192 games over the last four years, brought the Grizzlies their first No. 1 national ranking and made back-to-back World Series trips.
Higher Education News:
The New York Times
She Left the Education Dept. for Groups It Curbed. Now She’s Back, With Plans.
By Erica L. Green
Depending on whom you ask, Diane Auer Jones has returned to the Education Department with either a mission or a vengeance. A little more than a decade ago she resigned as an assistant secretary for postsecondary education in the George W. Bush administration, after protesting the department’s treatment of an accreditor that oversaw religiously affiliated, liberal-arts colleges. Department officials saw accountability in their crackdown; Ms. Jones saw bias against a gatekeeper for nontraditional college degrees. “Favored accreditors are treated differently than unfavored accreditors,” she said in an interview. “That was my awakening to how the current system could be manipulated to pick winners and losers.” Now, as the chief architect of Education Secretary Betsy DeVos’s higher education agenda, Ms. Jones is leading the charge to overhaul the accreditation system, and, to critics, revive the fortunes of for-profit organizations that operate low-quality education programs that have a track record of shortchanging students and taxpayers.
The Chronicle of Higher Education
By Liam Knox
The University of Alabama system’s Board of Trustees voted on Friday to return a $26.5-million gift to Hugh F. Culverhouse Jr. after the businessman and philanthropist encouraged students to boycott the university in protest of the state’s new law effectively banning abortions. The gift, to the University of Alabama School of Law, was the largest in the university’s 187-year history. Of the $26.5 million Culverhouse pledged, $21.5 million had already been paid. The rest was on its way, before the board’s vote. The university’s law school, which was named for Culverhouse last September in honor of his pledge, will return to its original name.