University System News:
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
…Georgia State’s presidential search committee
Speaking of upcoming presidential vacancies, the University System of Georgia on Friday named the 23 men and women who will lead the search committee for Georgia State University’s next president. The current president, Mark Becker, announced in September he’s leaving in June. The committee’s chair is Georgia Board of Regents member Neil Pruitt. Six other Regents members are on the committee. The remaining members of the committee consists of nine faculty members, two students, two graduates, two trustees and a business executive.
The McDuffie Progress
Search Committee formed to find new Georgia State president
From staff reports
The Board of Regents of the University System of Georgia has named members of the Georgia State University Presidential Search Committee. The committee will conduct a national search to replace Georgia State President Mark Becker, who will leave as president at the end of June 2021. “President Mark Becker has led Georgia State to national prominence,” USG Chancellor Steve Wrigley said. “GSU is a national leader in student success with significant increases in graduation rates. Our national search seeks someone with the knowledge, energy and skills to lead GSU to greater heights. We are excited about the future of GSU.”
AllOnGeorgia
SGA adopts resolution supporting COVID testing, CSU’s continuing public health protocols
Columbus State University students are accepting the university’s call to be proactive about following pandemic-era public health guidance, as demonstrated by a Student Government Association resolution presented Tuesday to CSU President Chris Markwood.
Columbus State University students are accepting the university’s call to be proactive about following pandemic-era public health guidance, as demonstrated by a Student Government Association resolution presented Tuesday to CSU President Chris Markwood. The resolution, presented virtually to the president’s full Executive Leadership Team and other university administrators, adds it support to CSU’s continued call for its students, employees and campus visitors to wear face coverings and adhere to physical distancing guidelines. It even goes a step further — imploring students to get tested and to encourage their peers to do the same.
Georgia Recorder
After COVID shook fall semester, colleges plan to ease back to class
By Ross Williams
A fall semester rife with pandemic anxiety and online lessons on Georgia’s college campuses is coming to a close and school officials are preparing for students to spend more time together in a classroom next semester. The University of Georgia’s English department is working to nail down classrooms to accommodate 100% of social-distanced freshman writing classes, according to an email sent last week to instructors from Nate Kreuter, associate professor and director of first-year writing. Half of the students in those classes, some of the largest on campus, will be studying in-person at any given time, with the other half attending via Zoom, Kreuter said. …The change comes as the Board of Regents of the University System of Georgia is pledging to “maximize safe in-person instruction” and “ensure hybrid instruction includes a vast majority of in-person interactive instruction where appropriate and safe,” according to a resolution passed by the regents Oct.13. That sounds good to Nicole Johnson of Oconee County, the mother of a daughter who is a senior at the University of Georgia and a son who is a freshman at Kennesaw State University. Johnson is an administrator for a Facebook group with more than 5,000 members dedicated to keeping Georgia’s universities open. …Johnson said she and her family are feeling positive about the upcoming semester, provided her son’s schedule does not change again. A meeting with University System of Georgia Chancellor Steve Wrigley left her feeling better about the spring. Wrigley urged schools to get back to the classroom as much as possible early in fall semester, even as school faculty and staff resisted for fear of contracting COVID-19.
The Brunswick News
CCGA to host modified in-person fall graduation
By Lauren McDonald
College of Coastal Georgia announced plans to host an in-person 2020 fall commencement ceremony. The modified in-person event will take place at 1 p.m. Sunday, Dec. 13, at the Jekyll Island Convention Center.
Statesboro Herald
October sees fewest total cases since May
From staff reports
Bulloch County recorded only one new case of COVID-19 Friday, the lowest single-day number since June 9. Bulloch also recorded one case that day, and June 4 was the last day no new local cases were reported. …Local colleges
Georgia Southern reported 14 new cases for the week of Oct. 19-25. Georgia Southern will report again next Monday, Nov. 2. East Georgia State College has not reported any new cases on any of its three campuses since Oct. 21. The college has had a total of 92 cases across its three campuses since Aug. 17.
Savannah Business Journal
Georgia Southern featured on Princeton Review list of green colleges for 10th consecutive year
Savannah Business Journal Staff Report
Promoting sustainability as a core value has landed Georgia Southern University on the Princeton Review Guide to Green Colleges for the 10th year in a row. Director of the Office of Leadership and Community Engagement Jodi Kennedy said being featured in the guide is a massive achievement. “Having Georgia Southern University recognized on the Princeton Review Green Colleges list speaks to the efforts that Sustainability Programs, in partnership with the facilities team and Academic Affairs, have made over the last decade to educate students and our community on sustainability topics while also implementing infrastructure to positively contribute to Georgia Southern’s environmental impact,” Kennedy said.
AllOnGeorgia
A Day to Give: West UWG raises $1M for annual giving campaign
The final amount makes the 2020 campaign, conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic, the second-largest in the university’s history.
The University of West Georgia recently concluded its annual A Day to Give West – known as A Day – campaign, notching more than $1 million in gifts to support the university’s annual fund. The $1,000,496 raised will support scholarships, enhancements to campus, laboratory equipment, recreational activities, and other initiatives and programs. The final amount makes the 2020 campaign, conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic, the second-largest in the university’s history.
Savannah Morning News
World Trade Center Savannah names International Business of the Year
The World Trade Center Savannah has named Statesboro-based Brodie International as the 2020 World Trade Center Savannah International Business of the Year. Given annually, the award recognizes companies that excel in international trade and acknowledges the importance of trade to the region’s economy. Formed in 1928, Brodie is a manufacturer of liquid flow meters, equipment and engineered measurement solutions for the petroleum and industrial markets. “To be the recipient of World Trade Center Savannah’s 2020 International Business of the Year award is a true honor to everyone here at Brodie,” said Brodie International President Ruppi von Gwinner. …The company is also in the process of introducing lean manufacturing to its shop floor with the help of Georgia Southern University (GSU) which will allow Brodie to be a stronger supplier for the oil industry in years to come. This year’s award was sponsored by GSU. “We are honored to be a part of this day and event and honored to present the 2020 International Business of the Year award to our dear friends at Brodie International,” said Georgia Southern University President Kyle Marrero.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
OPINION: Education can and should address lack of civility in politics
Get Schooled with Maureen Downey
University of Georgia professor and UGA student say classrooms can model how to approach sensitive and contentious issues
I am just back from two weeks’ vacation in the Georgia mountains where there were regular news reports of stolen or vandalized political signs across parties. On one Main Street corner, supporters would vie to keep their candidate’s signs in front of those of opponents, leading each day to a political version of line jumping. A guest column today addresses this marked lack of civility in our current political season. Joseph Watson Jr. is the Carolyn Caudell Tieger Professor of Public Affairs Communications and director of the Public Affairs Communications program at the University of Georgia. Sarah Geary is a Tieger Fellow in Public Affairs Communications and an undergraduate student majoring in public relations at UGA. By Joseph Watson and Sarah Geary
Other News:
WABE
White House: Stronger Efforts Needed In Georgia As Community Spread Picks Up
Sam Whitehead
The Trump administration says Georgia must step up its efforts to slow the COVID-19 pandemic as it continues to gain steam in the state. The latest report from the White House Coronavirus Task Force, obtained by WABE, says there are early indications of “expanding community spread.” “Georgia continues to see an increase in COVID-19 cases, increase in test positivity, and no declines in new hospital admissions week over week,” the report reads. The document says new infections rose in percent in the week leading up to Oct. 25, while test positivity grew just .5%. It also points out that nearly all Georgia hospitals reported either new confirmed or new suspected COVID patients each day during the same time period. “We never really got community transmission down to low levels here,” said Ben Lopman, an epidemiologist at Emory University’s Rollins School of Public Health.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Map: Coronavirus deaths and cases in Georgia (updated Nov. 1)
An updated count of coronavirus deaths and cases reported across the state
DEATHS: 7,981 | Deaths have been confirmed in all counties but one (Taliaferro). County is determined by the patient’s residence, when known, not by where they were treated.
CONFIRMED CASES: 361,982 | Cases have been confirmed in every county.
Higher Education News:
The Griffin Daily News
Georgia’s college savings plan sees record growth
By Staff Reports
The state of Georgia’s college savings plan, the Path2College 529 Plan, saw strong growth in the last quarter, with 4,740 new accounts opened—a 26% increase in new accounts opened and a 23% increase in contribution dollars when compared to 2019. The Path2College 529 Plan was established in 2002, and as of 9/30/20, there are more than 188,000 accounts and $3.5 billion invested in the plan. Additionally, more than $1.2 billion that was saved in the plan has been used for education expenses on behalf of over 63,000 beneficiaries.
The Chronicle of Higher Education
What Higher Ed Has Learned From Covid-19 So Far
The spring and summer were full of predictions, many of which didn’t come to pass.
By Lee Gardner
The pandemic has locked down parts of the country for more than seven months now, and colleges have made it at least halfway through their fall terms. What have they learned? Which predictions from the spring came true? The pandemic still poses many uncertainties, but some lessons for college leaders have emerged and can help them better weather the months, and possibly years, of Covid to come. Many of these lessons have upended the assumptions of the spring. The pandemic would quickly subside. In the scramble in March to get students safely off campus, many college leaders perceived Covid conditions as a temporary challenge that a societywide lockdown would bring under control by summer. “In April, we were definitely thinking of this as a short-term something,” says Sean M. Decatur, president of Kenyon College, a small private institution in Ohio. In the months since, with no coordinated national response to the virus, and with distribution of an effective vaccine unlikely until next year, college leaders have reached a fuller understanding of the pandemic’s tenaciousness, and are shifting their perspective and planning, accordingly. “My mind-set is changing to thinking that this is a 24-months-plus crisis to navigate,” Decatur says.
Fall would be a financial bloodbath for colleges. …
Inside Higher Ed
What Counts as Success in a COVID Semester
With less than a month to Thanksgiving, some colleges are starting to tell their stories of how they’ve contained the virus — and they’re feeling pretty good about the results of their efforts.
By Elizabeth Redden
The decision to bring University of Vermont students back to campus for an in-person fall was not a popular one with local residents in Burlington. Like residents of many college towns, they worried the university students might spread COVID-19 among themselves and in the broader community. …Through a program of weekly required testing for all students and enforcement of social distancing and masking rules — and the luck of being located in a state with the lowest COVID rates of any state in the nation — the university has kept the virus largely at bay. …”The general curve in the aggregate in the number of cases that we’ve seen each week throughout these 94 schools has decreased from that initial kind of shock period in August and September,” Renton said. Renton said while it’s good colleges have brought case numbers down, he would have liked to see more colleges do entry testing at the start of the semester. While some colleges chose to do entry testing, guidance for colleges from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that was available over the summer did not recommend entry testing; that guidance has since been updated to say that “a strategy of entry screening combined with regular serial testing might prevent or reduce” virus transmission. “The problem is we’ve kind of become numb to numbers that are really terrible,” Renton said. As Thanksgiving approaches, some colleges say they made the right decision to reopen for in-person classes.
The Chronicle of Higher Education
A Quarter of Alumni Supported Their Alma Maters This Year, Survey Says
By Emily Haynes
One-quarter of college alumni indicated they had made a gift to their institution in the current year, according to a new study from Anthology, an education technology company. The national survey of more than 17,360 graduates of four-year colleges was conducted in June, August, and September. It found 23 percent of respondents — which included those who had not given to their college in recent years or at all — said they were less likely to make a donation this year. Among respondents who had given to their alma mater in the last five years, 17 percent said their drive to donate was down this year. A small portion of alumni indicated that they were more inspired to donate this year. Ten percent who had contributed to their college in the last five years said they were more likely to give again this year. That share dropped to 7 percent among all respondents. Motivated donors said they were most drawn to support emergency relief funds for students and the annual fund.
Inside Higher Ed
Chief Health Officers Draw Attention
Chief health officers can help craft and lend credibility to colleges’ pandemic response, but they don’t come cheaply.
By Emma Whitford
Since the pandemic began, Preeti Malani’s name has appeared in news articles, television segments and thousands of in-boxes. Her comments are consistent and confident. She debunks COVID-19 myths, provides updates on the University of Michigan’s pandemic response plans and urges students to get out of their rooms and spend time outside. Malani is the chief health officer at the University of Michigan, a role she’s held since 2017. She’s one of a small but growing number of chief health officers at colleges and universities. Malani, like many chief health officers, serves as the public face of the University of Michigan’s pandemic response. As the pandemic drags on, some colleges have considered adding chief health officers to their executive teams. Their goal would be to lead campus health and safety strategies, build out connections with state and local hospitals, connect with health agencies, and communicate with credibility to students, employees and parents. “…Colleges need someone who can speak with authority on health and pandemic-related topics, said Richard Skinner, senior consultant at Harris Search Associates and former president of Clayton State University in Atlanta. He recently co-wrote a white paper advocating for the inclusion of a chief health officer in college cabinets.
Inside Higher Ed
We know about gender bias in student ratings of professors. A new study finds the same, troubling trend in evaluations of teaching assistants.
By Colleen Flaherty
Students’ biases about gender and other factors have been shown to skew how they evaluate their professors’ teaching. Growing wise to this, more and more universities are limiting the role that student evaluations of teaching, or SETs, play in high-stakes personnel decisions such as tenure and promotion. But what about teaching assistants, who aren’t quite faculty, but whose instruction is still often rated by the students with whom they interact? Do the same biases show up in SETs of graduate student instructors as in SETs of professors? Yes, according to a forthcoming study in the North American Colleges and Teachers of Agriculture Journal. Simple in design and sobering in its results, the study found that students in an online course who had the same TA gave that TA five times as many negative evaluations when they believed that she was a woman, as compared to when they thought she was a man.