University System News:
Atlanta Business Chronicle
University System of Georgia economic impact grows to $18.6 billion
By Crystal Edmonson – Broadcast Editor
Despite the Covid-19 pandemic and many universities shifting to virtual learning last year, Georgia’s public colleges produced a positive effect on the state’s economy. The University System of Georgia reports it had an $18.6 billion economic impact statewide during fiscal year 2020 (FY2020). That represents a 0.6% increase from FY2019 but a much smaller gain than the 4.5% growth between FY2018 and FY2019. To read the full report, click here.
See also:
WRBL
What’s a University System of Georgia degree worth? A lot, study says
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
New study shows economic impact of college degree for Georgia grads
By Eric Stirgus
Atlanta Business Chronicle
WRBL
$272 million: That’s Columbus State University’s regional economic impact, study says
fiscal year 2020, according to a university news release. University president Chris Markwood said in a
Polk Today
GHC holds second highest economic impact among state colleges in Georgia
WGAU Radio
Study assesses UNG’s economic impact
$720 million during FY 2020
The Morning Call
By Michelle Merlin
Pennsylvania is just the latest state to come up with plans to merge several universities into a few. The state’s plans, which were unanimously approved by the Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education board of governors last week, calls for Bloomsburg, Mansfield and Lock Haven universities to merge into one school and Clarion, California and Edinboro universities to merge into another. The state system plans to keep all six campuses, but for each new school there will be a single administration, budget, unified faculty and student information system, according to Pennsylvania’s State System of Higher Education. …Whether the consolidation works remains to be seen, but one expert pointed to Georgia as an example where similar mergers offer a promising example. …She said the success of some mergers, including in the Georgia state system, may have led to consolidations becoming more popular. Russell, who studied the first few Georgia mergers, said the system’s consolidation represents a best-case scenario. After the merger, the schools had better retention rates and more students graduated on time, she said. The consolidation led to a drop in spending on student services — on items like cafeterias and athletic programs and places they could save by having economies of scale — and an increase in spending on academic support.
Times-Georgian
McCraw, professor emeritus, makes $1 million gift to UWG College of Business
By Sam Gentry Special to the Times-Georgian
Whether through service in the military or his years as a revered professor at the University of West Georgia, Dr. Joseph “Harrison” McCraw Jr. has always put others first. Now, through an incredible life estate donation of $1 million to UWG, McCraw is ensuring a bright future for his former department in the Richards College of Business and for students in need. McCraw said the choice to offer such an extraordinary donation to UWG was an easy one.
Middle Georgia CEO
Staff Report
Once he graduates from Middle Georgia State University (MGA) later this summer, Brant Daughtry is off to Auburn, Ala., to work for Tiger Communications as an entry level sports journalist. He’ll be part of a team covering Auburn University athletics. The 23-year-old Warner Robins resident partly credits his current internship as a videographer for the Macon Bacon baseball team with helping him land a job before he graduates.
Growing Georgia
ABAC Student Selected for National Teach Ag Ambassadors
Erin Pearce, a junior agricultural education major at Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College, is one of 18 students nationwide selected as a National Teach Ag Ambassador for the 2021-22 year. …The 18 ambassadors will begin their training this summer to become advocates for agricultural education at the 94th National FFA Convention in Indianapolis on Oct. 27-30. These students will represent the National Teach Ag Campaign at the convention as they promote agricultural education as a career choice. Ambassadors will utilize enthusiasm and personal stories to spread the mission of Teach Ag.
Valdosta Daily Times
Chasing a Dream: Serbian student fulfills goals in Valdosta
By Amanda M. Usher
Simovic is now a Valdosta State University graduate assistant and will graduate in late July, earning a master’s degree in exercise physiology. She came to VSU in fall 2020 after meeting Dr. Michael Webster, a university program director, at the American College of Sports Medicine conference in Jacksonville, Florida. She does not currently play collegiate volleyball since she has completed her four years of eligibility. …The 23-year-old has not seen her family in two and a half years, afraid to visit them last year, nervous she would not be able to return to the States to complete her college education. …Simovic is now a Valdosta State University graduate assistant and will graduate in late July, earning a master’s degree in exercise physiology. She came to VSU in fall 2020 after meeting Dr. Michael Webster, a university program director, at the American College of Sports Medicine conference in Jacksonville, Florida. She does not currently play collegiate volleyball since she has completed her four years of eligibility.
Athens CEO
UGA Grow It Know It Training Prepares Educators for Food-focused Classroom
Aaron Cox
As a kindergarten teacher, Robin Edens was an outlier in the group of mostly middle and high school teachers at UGA learning how to introduce food-based learning to their students. The three-day workshop immersed participants in the ins and outs of the food system, including how to plant and maintain a garden, the intricacies of the food distribution network, and how to integrate food into the school curriculum to talk about larger societal issues. …A dozen teachers traveled to Athens for the workshop this summer, now in its third year. The program is a collaborative initiative of the UGA Office of Service-Learning’s Grow It Know It program, UGA Cooperative Extension and the student-run UGArden.
AllOnGeorgia
Georgia Southern’s 3D Art Students Create Collaborative Public Project for College of Education
Following more than a year of preparation for an interactive artwork display based on Georgia Southern University’s bald eagle mascot, “Birds of a Feather” is now on display in the College of Education’s (COE) classroom building on the Statesboro Campus. …Collaborating with the Betty Foy Sanders Department of Art (BFSDoArt), the artwork came to life under the leadership and guidance of Kimberly Riner, adjunct professor of art.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Savannah VOICE Festival turns Deep Center poems into song
By Polly Powers Stramm
Two local young women artists are thrilled that poems they wrote with guidance from mentors at the Deep Center creative nonprofit organization are being turned into songs with the help of folks from the Savannah VOICE Festival (SVF). Poems by Settie Lee and Ella “Bubbles” Zipperer were selected to be transformed into music in the first creative collaboration between Deep Center and the highly-esteemed VOICE Festival, with the results debuting at a SVF/Deep Center presentation in May. …Clearly, Lee’s instructor was fascinated by the teen’s literary talent and told her about a local program that she might want to consider becoming involved with to sharpen her writing skills. “I was fascinated,” recalled Lee, who is now 20 and a junior at Georgia Southern University. Deep Center has several subgroups, including one called Block by Block for creative writing, leadership and community building, which appealed to both Lee and Zipperer.
Web MD
Do Women or Men Make the Best Doctors?
By Cara Murez
HealthDay Reporter
When you’re hospitalized, you’ll want qualified medical professionals treating you, but does it matter if your doctor is a man or a woman? It might. A new study in Canada found that patients cared for by female physicians had lower in-hospital death rates than those who had male doctors. …Dr. Theresa Rohr-Kirchgraber is a professor of medicine at Augusta University/University of Georgia Medical Partnership in Athens, Ga. Men and women bring different strengths to the job, she said. Women are more often caregivers in their own homes and they bring that outlook to their jobs, added Rohr-Kirchgraber, who was not involved with the study.
Medical Xpress
Copper transporter potential new treatment target for cardiovascular disease
An internal transporter that enables us to use the copper we consume in foods like shellfish and nuts to enable a host of vital body functions also has the essential role of protecting the receptor that enables us to grow new blood vessels when ours become diseased, Medical College of Georgia scientists report. The findings published in the journal Nature Communications point toward the copper transporter ATP7A as a potential new therapeutic target in treating cardiovascular diseases like heart attack, peripheral artery disease and stroke.
The Post and Courier
Museum exhibit remembers Cold War life at Savannah River Site nuclear plant
By Jamie Lovegrove
A recent exhibit at the Savannah River Site museum portrayed life during the Cold War at the Aiken-area nuclear plant. Georgia Southern University post-graduate student Jessica Forsee created the exhibit, which shows a range of artifacts provided on loan from the site’s curation space.
WTOC
University of Georgia Skidaway Institute of Oceanography assists in nanosatellite research
By Andrew Gorton
Researchers at the University of Georgia Skidaway Institute of Oceanography are working on a project that is, “out of this world.” They have teamed up with the University of North Carolina Wilmington and other partners to launch a nanosatellite, named the SEAHAWK-1 CubeSat.
The Augusta Chronicle
UGA law clinic warns Augusta’s panhandling ordinance violates First Amendment
Jozsef Papp
The University of Georgia School of Law First Amendment Clinic, along with the National Homelessness Law Center, have sent a letter to Augusta city leaders in opposition to any expansion of the current panhandling ordinance and asking for the current ordinance to be repealed. In the letter sent to the Augusta Commission, Mayor Hardie Davis and City Attorney Wayne Brown, the clinic argues the ordinance violates the First Amendment rights of people by “criminalizing the innocent act of requesting charity” and “is accordingly a content-based restriction on speech.”
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Groups demand medical colleges mandate employees get COVID-19 vaccine
By Eric Stirgus
Pressure is mounting on medical colleges, including Atlanta’s largest, to require their employees get the COVID-19 vaccine. The Association of American Medical Colleges released a statement Friday afternoon urging its member institutions to mandate employee vaccinations, citing an increase in COVID-19 cases exacerbated by the Delta variant. Its Georgia members are Augusta, Emory, and Mercer universities and Morehouse School of Medicine. …Augusta University is part of the University System of Georgia, which currently encourages, but not requires its students and employees to get vaccinated.
WRDW
Health experts recommend masks in school: ‘Delta variant is running rampant’
By Will Volk
Top pediatricians are recommending all kids older than two should wear a mask to school this fall. The American Academy of Pediatrics made the announcement just weeks before students are set to head back to the classroom. And it comes after our local school districts did away with mask requirements. This is a hot topic on social media. We talked to a local infectious disease expert about what all this means. “The issue is that the delta variant is running rampant throughout the country,” said Dr. Rodger MacArthur, infectious disease specialist with the Medical College of Georgia. MacArthur has watched the number of COVID cases in Georgia rise about 60 percent just in the past week. And he says the delta variant is mostly responsible.
Other News:
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Map: Coronavirus deaths and cases in Georgia (updated July 19)
An updated count of coronavirus deaths and cases reported across the state
CONFIRMED DEATHS: 18,624 | This figure does not include additional cases that the DPH reports as suspected COVID-19-related deaths. County is determined by the patient’s residence, when known, not by where they were treated.
CONFIRMED CASES: 912,776
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Surging delta variant accounting for 83% of U.S. COVID cases
By Tim Darnell
Health officials say the delta variant of the coronavirus continues to surge and accounts for an estimated 83% of U.S. COVID-19 cases. That’s a dramatic increase from the week of July 3, when the variant accounted for about 50% of genetically sequenced coronavirus cases.
Higher Education News:
Inside Higher Ed
Judge Sides With Indiana U in Vaccine Mandate Case
Federal judge finds Indiana was reasonably pursuing legitimate public health aims in first court decision considering the constitutionality of a college’s COVID-19 vaccination requirement.
By Elizabeth Redden
A federal judge sided with Indiana University in a lawsuit filed by eight students who challenged the university’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate and related face-masking and testing requirements. The ruling is the first evaluating the constitutionality of a COVID-19 vaccine mandate. In denying the students’ motion for a preliminary injunction, U.S. District Court Judge Damon R. Leichty ruled that the students failed to show a likelihood they will succeed on their claim that IU lacks a rational basis for its vaccine requirement. The students had claimed that the vaccine requirement violated their due process rights under the 14th Amendment.
Diverse Issues in Higher Education
College Students and Scholars Concerned with DACA in Limbo, Again
by Rebecca Kelliher and Walter Hudson
With a federal judge in Texas ruling on Friday against the Obama-initiated program protecting young undocumented immigrants from deportation, college students who receive the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) are understandably concerned about what comes next. The court’s decision blocks first-time DACA applications, which limits college-aged students and their family members who only just became eligible.