University System News:
Marietta Daily Journal
KSU student organization recognized at international conference
Staff reports
Kennesaw State University’s Association of Energy Engineers student organization was recognized at the 2021 International AEE Conference in New Orleans. AEE is a multidisciplinary organization that focuses on learning and innovation in environmental studies, sustainability and energy. KSU’s group was honored with the Best Community Service Award and Best Student Chapter Meeting Award. Lance Soo was given the Outstanding Student Chapter Member Award.
SeedQuest
University of Georgia plant pathology researcher Melissa Mitchum will co-direct a $1.2 million award from the joint National Science Foundation and U.S. Department of Agriculture National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NSF-NIFA) Plant-Biotic Interactions Program to help combat a devastating soybean pathogen with colleagues at the University of Missouri (MU). The soybean cyst nematode (SCN), a microscopic roundworm, is responsible for annual crop losses of $1 billion in the U.S. alone. Mitchum, a professor in the Department of Plant Pathology and the Institute of Plant Breeding, Genetics and Genomics in the UGA College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, will co-direct the four-year award with MU biochemistry researcher Lesa Beamer.
Savannah CEO
Georgia Southern Establishes Center for Rehabilitation and Independent Living
Georgia Southern University’s Waters College of Health Professions has established a new research center that will bring together faculty and student researchers in the human movement sciences to improve the health and quality of life for individuals in the coastal Georgia region. The Center for Rehabilitation and Independent Living (CRIL) will offer specialized services to include clinical gait screenings, sport-specific, athletic movement analyses, concussion assessment, overuse injury prevention methods and evaluations of daily activity performances for clinical populations.
India West
Georgia Southern University Indian American Professor Arpita Saha Honored with Hall of Fame Award
India-West Staff Reporter
An Indian American professor at Georgia Southern University, Dr. Arpita Saha, who is a recipient of the university’s Hall of Fame award, was recently honored at a gala in Atlanta attended by Gov. Brian Kemp. The “Felton Jenkins, Jr. Hall of Fame Award” is the highest academic faculty award in the state of Georgia that is given by the University System of Georgia Board of Regents, according to an email received by India-West. Saha was also among the distinguished honorees at the recent 17th annual Regents’ Scholarship Gala that raised more than $625,000 to support and provide need-based scholarships for USG students across the state, according to a university press release.
Toggle Magazine
Allen C. Saylor Jr. – Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College
Sowing seeds for Georgia college’s cloud migration
Written by: Neil Cote
Like so many other schools, Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College hadn’t focused much on remote education prior to COVID-19, but it’s been making strides since. …With a small student-to-faculty ratio, the personalized approach can be furthered by technology, assures Saylor, who has spent the last decade on the ABAC infotech team, the past year as an assistant vice president of IT and chief technology officer. Last May the role of chief information officer was added to his letterhead, following the predecessor’s retirement, making Saylor the highest-ranking member of the IT team. While students have been back in their classrooms since the start of the new academic year, there are provisions for them to stream lectures, as well as access remote sites. It’s all been part of a comprehensive IT upgrade, he explains, with a slow but steady transition to the cloud and managed services.
11Alive
How to achieve financial success in 2022
Feeling the post-holiday pinch? Here are expert tips to get back on track for the new year
Author: Liza Lucas
Whether it’s travel, gifts or final medical bills, you may be feeling a financial pinch post holiday. But Dr. Cathy McCrary, a certified public accountant and assistant professor at Georgia Gwinnett College, said there are ways to get on track for the new year. …She added that the way to start is by first reviewing your expenses, evaluating what you spend and where.
WTVM
CSU announces updated COVID-19 guidelines
By Dajhea Jones
Columbus State University (CSU) has updated their COVID-19 guidelines. If you get positive COVID results, the CSU COVID Response Team recommends isolation for five days regardless of vaccination status. If exposed to COVID, students should quarantine – the isolation time depends on vaccination status. Face coverings are required in the health clinic and on campus shuttles. CSU urges students to take advantage of vaccines and boosters for protection.
Seed Today
For most row crop producers in Georgia, corn, cotton and peanut are planted in the spring and harvested in late fall. After harvest, the ground is left relatively bare, with the residue of the harvested crop the only organic material left on the ground. That is when cover crops come in. Cover crops are non-crop plants like crimson clover and rye that are planted after cash crops are harvested in the fall. They are left to grow until producers prepare for spring planting, at which point cover crops are terminated. …Now, UGA weed scientist Nicholas Basinger and doctoral candidate David Weisberger, researchers in the University of Georgia’s College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, are studying the use of both annual and perennial cover crops called “living mulches” in cotton. Weisberger developed a program to test the use of living mulches and annual cover crops in cotton production in Georgia based on previous work using living mulches in corn production performed by UGA Professor Emeritus Nick Hill.
WGAU Radio
UGA economists offer Augusta area forecast
Noon at Augusta Marriott
By Tim Bryant
Economists from the University of Georgia’s Terry College of Business are in Augusta today, offering their annual economic forecast for the Augusta area in a noon-hour luncheon at the Augusta Marriott.
From the UGA master calendar…
The 2022 Georgia Economic Outlook brings the expertise of the University of Georgia Terry College of Business to attendees across the state, offering specific and reliable insights into next year’s economy.
Other News:
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Map: Coronavirus deaths and cases in Georgia (updated Jan. 6)
An updated count of coronavirus deaths and cases reported across the state
CONFIRMED CASES: 1,493,254
CONFIRMED DEATHS: 26,472 | 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.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
State running ‘hotel’ for some vulnerable COVID-19 patients
By Andy Miller, Georgia Health News
As the latest COVID-19 surge intensifies, state public health officials are running an “isolation hotel’’ for virus patients who are homeless or in living situations where disease spread is more likely. State health officials said Wednesday that the metro Atlanta facility, which was not identified, has capacity for 50 people, along with additional space in trailers if needed. The state effort renews the public COVID isolation effort that local agencies, with state and city funding, ran from April 2020 to June 2021 in an Atlanta hotel. This recent COVID wave, driven by the Omicron variant, has caused explosive growth in infections across Georgia.
Higher Education News:
Inside Higher Ed
Fewer High School Graduates Go Straight to College
New reports from the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center and some states show an “unprecedented” decline in college enrollment among high school graduates—especially the most underserved.
By Maria Carrasco
The share of high school students enrolling directly in college continues to fall, data from the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center show. College enrollment by the high school Class of 2020 showed an “unprecedented” decline of between four and 10 percentage points depending on the high school category, according to the finalized version of the High School Benchmarks report released last month. Prospects for the graduating Class of 2021 don’t appear much better; preliminary data from the clearinghouse show freshman enrollment declined 2.7 percent from last fall—13.1 percent since 2019—across all sectors except private nonprofit four-year institutions, which increased 2.5 percent over last fall. Overall postsecondary enrollment for fall 2021 is running 2.6 percent below 2020’s level, for a total 5.8 percent drop since 2019.
Inside Higher Ed
Academic Minute: How Best to Educate Future Business Leaders
By Doug Lederman
Today on the Academic Minute: Arran Caza, associate professor of management at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, explains the best way to educate future business leaders