University System News:
WSAV
Georgia Southern launches CARES center for students, faculty to self-report COVID-19 cases on campus
Georgia Southern University is providing students, faculty and staff with a new resource during the COVID-19 pandemic to help ensure the safety of all on campus. On Monday, the university launched a new reporting center called CARES, which stands for COVID-19 Answers Resources Evaluation and Self-reporting. Georgia Southern says it is designed to be a central portal where the University community can self-report a confirmed or suspected COVID-19 diagnosis, or submit questions and concerns. A trained staff team will follow up submissions.
Gainesville Times
What a return to class could look like at the University of North Georgia
Nathan Berg
Students at the University of North Georgia can expect quite a different college experience this fall, according to insight gleaned from a virtual town hall meeting on Monday, July 27. UNG held the town hall to provide students and their parents with an update of what the imminent return to fall classes may look like for the university. UNG is based in Dahlonega, with additional campuses in Blue Ridge, Cumming, Gainesville and Oconee. WHAT WILL CLASS LOOK LIKE? Classes and instruction will be altered heavily, as many courses adopt a hybrid model of teaching that will involve both virtual and face-to-face instruction, according to UNG provost and senior vice president for academic affairs Chaudron Gille. Each hybrid class will be labeled as either H1, H2 or H3.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
International college students face barriers as semester nears
By Eric Stirgus
By some estimates, more than 23,000 students from other parts of the world took classes at Georgia’s colleges and universities last school year. Experts are bracing for a major decline this school year. The potential enrollment drop worries educators and others because international students, on average, pay more for their tuition, assist in more research and work as teaching assistants. “It seems like student enrollment may be the lowest in years for U.S. universities,” said David Bier, a policy analyst at the Cato Institute, a prominent, Libertarian public policy organization that supports efforts to help international students study here. …Many students overseas feel isolated and confused. “There’s a lot of uncertainty,” said Saurabh Parimal Doodhwala, 25, who is in India and a semester away from completing his master’s degree in operations research from Georgia Tech.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Georgia Tech sought student to pack up, drive peers with COVID to quarantine sites
Get Schooled with Maureen Downey
The ensuing outcry led Tech to rethink hiring a student to transport and deliver meals to infected peers
When a Georgia Tech professor shared this student job posting with me, I thought it might be a joke. Would Georgia Tech advertise for a “health and safety resident assistant” to oversee protocols and transportation when students in dorms tested positive for COVID-19 or were exposed to it? The answer is yes. The job posting is authentic, but Tech has rethought the position after blowback. Here is a statement Tech gave me today after I reached out:
Tifton CEO
ABAC Opens Fine Arts Building, Carlton Center This Fall Semester
Staff Report
From gigantic rooms for the concert band and concert choir to cozy individual practice areas, the new fine arts building at Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College is guaranteed to be a certified smash hit when ABAC students return for the fall semester on Aug. 12. Just as impressive is the newly renovated Carlton Center in the heart of the campus, which has undergone a two-year rehabilitation process that changed the overall look of the building as an integral part of the $21.4 million combined project. ABAC plans to return to in-person instruction for the fall term after teaching classes online for the final weeks of the spring semester and the entire summer term.
Athens CEO
UGA Plans Celebration of the 60th Anniversary of Desegregation
Staff Report
President Jere W. Morehead has appointed a committee to plan a celebration of the 60th Anniversary of Desegregation at the University of Georgia. The committee will work with the university community to develop a calendar of events, with a central focus of the annual Holmes-Hunter Lecture sponsored by the Office of the President on Feb. 23, 2021.
Mainstreet News
Whitworth reflects on FFA experience
When Kylie Whitworth heard her name called and rushed out of the stands and onto the stage, it had been 15 years since a Madison County student had been selected to serve as a member of the Georgia FFA state officer team. After an unforgettable year of interacting with students, teachers, and agribusiness leaders across the state, the Madison County High School graduate and rising sophomore at Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College shared some of her most memorable experiences. While many think of the role state officers play in hosting the annual state FFA convention for nearly 6,000 participants, there are quite a few hats state officers wear throughout the year.
Alabama News Center
Birmingham’s McWane Science Center announces two new fossil shark discoveries
By Erin Harney
A team of scientists, including Jun Ebersole of the McWane Science Center in Birmingham, announced Wednesday the discovery of two new species of prehistoric shark that lived in the southeastern U.S. millions of years ago. The two new species are ancient relatives of modern sand tiger sharks and lived 35 million and 65 million years ago, respectively. Until this discovery, members of this same genus, Mennerotodus, which are now extinct, were known to have lived only in Europe and Asia. …The second shark, Mennerotodus parmleyi, lived during the Eocene Epoch, roughly 35 million years ago. It was named for Dr. Dennis Parmley, retired professor at Georgia College and State University, in honor of his contributions to the study of fossils in Georgia.
Other News:
WGXA
COVID-19 counts in Georgia hospitals drop, deaths stay high
by JEFF AMY Associated Press
Deaths remain at elevated levels and newly detected cases keep rising, but the number of Georgians in the hospital with COVID-19 is dropping a little, one hopeful sign in a state where infections have been flaring since early June. Those mixed signals are what pass for progress right now in Georgia’s fight against the coronavirus pandemic. The number of people in Georgia hospitals fell for the fifth straight day on Sunday, to 3,079, but remain above where they were on July 19. That tentative trend could be good news for Georgia hospitals, many of whom have been hard-pressed to find critical care beds for the sickest patients with the respiratory illness. The share of the state’s critical care beds in use also eased slightly on Sunday, as did the number of people on ventilators. Both those numbers include some patients with other illnesses.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Map: Coronavirus deaths and cases in Georgia (updated July 27, 3 p.m.)
An updated count of coronavirus deaths and cases reported across the state
DEATHS: 3,509 | Deaths have been confirmed in 149 counties. County is determined by the patient’s residence, when known, not by where they were treated.
CONFIRMED CASES: 170,843 | Cases have been confirmed in every county.
Higher Education News:
The Hill
COVID-19 testing at universities threatens to strain nationwide capacity
By Jessie Hellmann
Demand for COVID-19 testing could soar in the fall with the reopening of some universities and schools, threatening to overburden an already strained system. Many schools and universities are planning to regularly test students and staff in an effort to stop the spread of COVID-19 on their campuses. But public health officials and experts worry there is not enough capacity and supplies to test thousands of people who aren’t showing any symptoms of the disease.
The Chronicle of Higher Education
Every Faculty Member on This Campus Can Teach Outside
By Megan Zahneis
Colleges preparing for a return to face-to-face learning this fall are confronting the complex logistics of creating socially distanced teaching spaces. Eckerd College, in Florida, has a secret weapon on that front: its campus. The grounds at Eckerd’s 188-acre campus in St. Petersburg will allow any faculty member who so chooses to teach outside, with faculty members and students all spaced up to 12 feet apart — in the shade and with a Wi-Fi connection, to boot. Outdoor instruction has been floated at many campuses as a means of adding additional classroom capacity and allowing for social distancing.
Inside Higher Ed
Communicating Risks to Foster Compliance
Colleges are employing multipronged strategies to inform students about the pandemic. Will their efforts get students to take safety precautions seriously?
By Lindsay McKenzie
Wearing face masks and practicing social distancing are not what many students had in mind when they pictured their college experience. Yet for students returning to campus this fall, these behaviors must be normalized if institutions stand a chance of slowing the spread of COVID-19. Communicating the importance of COVID-19 safety measures to students is a huge challenge, said Erin Hennessy, vice president of TVP Communications. Institutions that are planning to reopen their campuses this fall must walk a “very fine line” between instilling confidence in students and their families that it is safe to return and warning them that bad things could happen if they do, said Hennessy. “It’s a really tough spot for an institution to be in,” she said.
Inside Higher Ed
How Will Regional Publics Fare This Fall?
Many regional public universities plan to open campuses this fall, against a backdrop of financial, political and enrollment pressure — and a push by many students to return.
By Madeline St. Amour
When colleges began considering what to do for the fall semester, as the COVID-19 pandemic raged on, decisions were relatively easy to make for some. Community colleges, for the most part, don’t rely on residence hall revenue, which helped tip the financial scales toward staying online across the sector. Highly selective institutions can be relatively confident students will still enroll if they go online, given their brand power. Selective or elite institutions planning to open up campuses tend have the funds to test students and take other safety precautions. But for regional public colleges and universities, which serve roughly 40 percent of all undergraduates, the decision to reopen or stay remote includes many moving parts.
The Chronicle of Higher Education
What Equity and Student Support Mean at Colleges That Have Been at It for Generations
By Chronicle Staff
At a time when the nation is in the throes of both a movement for racial justice and a raging pandemic that is disproportionately affecting people of color, what can leaders across higher education learn from minority-serving institutions, especially in terms of supporting students and becoming more inclusive? Last week The Chronicle brought together presidents who hailed from historically black institutions, a tribal college, and community colleges serving Hispanic and Asian American and Native American Pacific Islander students. The discussion — co-hosted by Michael J. Sorrell, president of Paul Quinn College, and Sarah Brown, a senior reporter at The Chronicle — included Twyla Baker, president of Nueta Hidatsa Sahnish College; William Serrata, president of the El Paso County Community College District; Walter M. Kimbrough, president of Dillard University; and Rowena M. Tomaneng, president of San José City College. The event was underwritten by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The leaders discussed how they’re prioritizing the academic success, basic needs, and activism of students of color.