WRBL
Ep. 64: Chancellor Sonny Perdue
by: Chuck Williams
The former governor and member of the Trump cabinet is now the chancellor of the University System of Georgia. In this wide-ranging conversation, Perdue talks about Columbus State University and its search for a new president, the West Point Kia plant he brought to Georgia, and the 2022 Republican gubernatorial primary between Gov. Brian Kemp and Perdue’s cousin, David Perdue. Perdue also weighs in on his relationship with the city of Columbus over the years.
AFSC News
By Angela Startz
Children and spouses of active-duty military in the Air Force Sustainment Center have another reason to consider Oklahoma and Georgia their home, because they qualify for in-state tuition to attend those states’ colleges and universities. Most recently, the state of Oklahoma passed an update to their higher education act extending in-state tuition to dependents and spouses of active duty members “who have been stationed for more than one year in Oklahoma any time in the previous 10 years before the date of enrollment.” The new section of the bill extending the period of residency from five years to 10 years was inspired by the Newbold family, an active-duty family stationed at Tinker Air Force Base. The University System of Georgia lists seven criteria for receiving in-state tuition, including having the military sponsor be previously stationed in or assigned to Georgia within the previous five years.
Albany Herald
PHOTOS: Scenes from the Albany State University Good Life Expo
Photos by Reginald Christian
On Monday, August 29, the Office of Student Engagement at Albany State University hosted the Good Life expo. The expo showcased student organizations, churches/religious groups, local business, community organizations and civic groups with the intention of exposing students to the community options available to them on campus and in the greater Albany community.
Athens CEO
Design Sprint Challenges Students to Use Creative Thinking to Solve Problems
Cal Powell
A three-person team of University of Georgia undergraduates from both the Terry College of Business and the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences claimed the top prize in an annual competition that challenged students to design the ideal campus workspace. The Summer Design Sprint was sponsored by the College of Family and Consumer Sciences, Terry College of Business and the UGA Entrepreneurship Program in partnership with Cox Enterprises. A design sprint encourages students to practice human-centered design methods to create an innovative solution to a complex problem with the help of industry partners, said Dee Warmath, a faculty member in FACS.
WTOC
Pandemic influences new Georgia Southern public health online program
By Camille Syed
As the pandemic has shown just how important public health leaders are, Georgia Southern University is adding an online program to tackle the shortage of people ready to work those jobs. Before now if you wanted to study public health at Georgia Southern, you would have to do it on campus. Now, you can get a bachelors or masters degree in public health online. The vice president of academic affairs says the pandemic pushed them to offer these courses online sooner. Georgia Southern leaders say this new option makes it easier for people, no matter their age, to get a degree in a field that needs more employees. They can even do it while working or taking care of a family.
NewsBreak
‘They truly loved him’: AU faculty remember former university president Dr. William Bloodworth
By Deirnesa Jefferson, WJBF
With a teaching career that spanned over 40 years, Dr. William Bloodworth was known for his passion for education and teaching. “I think his legacy will be more than anything else how he loved to teach,” former Augusta University Athletic Director Clint Bryant said. Some faculty members said it was his love for people that set him apart as a leader. “He was on a first name basis with everybody, he knew things about them. He kind of prided himself on the fact he knew where you came from and what was of interest to you, and he always made sure that you felt welcome,” said Associate Dean of Pamplin College of Arts Dr. Wesley Kisting. Dr. Bloodworth led Augusta State University as president for 18 years, but even after his presidency he returned to the classroom to teach English and American Studies.
Global Atlanta
International Students Contribute to Record Freshman Enrollments at Georgia Universities
Trevor Williams
For the University of Georgia, drawing students from across 148 of the state’s 159 counties might be the most impressive feat. But also peppered in among the record 6,200 first-year enrollees (about 75 percent of them from Georgia) were students hailing from 18 countries, a taste of the growing international diversity that many of the top most heavily attended universities saw as the effects of the pandemic started to slacken. At the graduate level, UGA’s 2,500 students included scholars from 72 countries. Not to be outdone, Kennesaw State University saw 7,507 new entrants, with 66 countries represented among the freshman class, part of its a university-wide 43,000 enrollees for the fall. Georgia State University has always boasted unrivaled international representation, at one time hosting students from 177 of some 210 countries on earth. This year, it wooed 5,133 freshmen to its Atlanta campus, plus another 2,843 at its two-year Perimeter College unit. Across all campuses, more than 51,000 Panthers were enrolled. The trend seemed to hold true at some smaller universities as well. Georgia Gwinnett College saw freshmen enrollment grow 14 percent from the fall of 2021, doubling its international student population and gaining new faces from South Korea, Vietnam and India. Hispanic students account or more than a quarter of the student population.
Atlanta Business Chronicle
Enrollment growth at Georgia universities puts pressure on housing
By Tyler Wilkins – Reporter
When college students switched from in-person lectures to online classes, owners and investors of student housing properties anxiously awaited for occupancy and rents to fall. More than two years later, the tune has shifted from uncertainty to optimism in the real estate world. Large public universities in Georgia and other Southeastern states are experiencing strong enrollment growth. The influx of new students is squeezing supply of off-campus housing, letting property owners raise rents. It’s also an opportunity for developers and investors to seize the surge in demand for a place to live by expanding their portfolios through construction and acquisition. “The fundamentals have never been better,” said Wes Rogers, CEO of Athens-based Landmark Properties, one of the largest U.S. student housing developers. “I’m candidly surprised at how well we’ve come out of Covid. But by all major metrics, we’re having the best year we’ve ever had in our company’s 18-year history.” As enrollment grows, rents rise
When scoping out development deals for new student apartments, Landmark looks for high occupancy rates, steady enrollment and rent growth at existing properties, Rogers said. Georgia Tech, Georgia State University, University of Georgia and Kennesaw State University check these boxes.
Patch
Georgia Southern University: Williams-Johnson Selected As Governor’s Teaching Fellow
Georgia Southern University Professor of Educational Research Meca Williams-Johnson, Ph.D., has been selected to serve as a member of the Governor’s Teaching Fellows (GTF) 2022-2023 cohort. … Williams-Johnson is a 16-year professor in Georgia Southern’s College of Education (COE), and has served as a member of the University Honors Council and mentor to honors students for more than 14 years.
Emanuel County Live
Swainsboro Native Receives Emeritus Status at Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College
Dr. Frank Flanders, a native of Swainsboro, has been selected for emeritus faculty status at Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College. Flanders has been named Associate Professor Emeritus of Agricultural Education. Former ABAC President David Bridges informed Flanders of his emeritus status before Bridges retired on July 31. …A faculty member at ABAC since 2017, Flanders was selected for the 2022 W. Bruce and Rosalyn Ray Donaldson Excellence in Student Engagement award at ABAC. He retired on June 30.
The Brunswick News
College of Coastal Georgia to host job fairs
By Gordon Jackson
College of Coastal Georgia is planning to host a series of job fairs as a way to help area employers recruit prospective employees. Employers have already totally booked spaces for the events planned Sept. 15, Oct. 20 and Nov. 17. There are also “employer spotlights” for employers unable to attend the scheduled job fairs or for those who need additional recruiting time on campus.
Augusta CEO
Rob Gordon Talks About the Carl Vinson Institute of Government
Rob Gordon is the Director of the University of Georgia’s Carl Vinson Institute of Government. He talks about the services they offer to communities through their Propel program via workshops and training.
Cherokee Tribune & Ledger-News
Economist: Georgia farmers struggling with national, global challenges
Dave Williams Capitol Beat News Service
Georgia’s rural economy is being buffeted by national and global headwinds that are making it harder for farmers to make ends meet, an agricultural economist said Tuesday. Supply chain disruptions, trade wars, droughts across the globe, the COVID pandemic and the war in Ukraine are challenging farmers on multiple fronts, Gopi Munisamy, an agricultural marketing professor at the University of Georgia, told an audience of farm industry and political leaders during a summit on ag issues at the Georgia National Fairgrounds & Agricenter. Not to mention inflation, which is driving up the cost of farm inputs including fertilizer, seeds and diesel fuel. …Despite the challenges, agriculture remains Georgia’s No. 1 industry, responsible for $12.2 billion a year in “farm gate value” – the market value of farm products minus the selling costs – and more than 350,000 jobs, Munisamy said.
The Georgia Virtue
Rape Case In Bulloch Superior Court Ends In Mistrial
A Rape trial was underway in Bulloch County Tuesday when the defense filed a motion for a mistrial. Brandon Harris was charged following an incident in November 2019 by the Georgia Southern University Police Department after an investigation by Lieutenant Erick Riner. Police contended that Harris forced himself upon a female in a university dorm after a night out of drinking. Harris, since the beginning of the case, has maintained his innocence, saying the encounter was consensual.
Higher Education News:
The Chronicle of Higher Education
By Oyin Adedoyin
Mental health is now one of the top reasons many college students are considering dropping out of college, according to a recently released report by Gallup and the Lumina Foundation, a private foundation that advocates for equity in higher education. On Tuesday, U.S. Surgeon General Vivek H. Murthy urged college administrators at a “fireside chat,” hosted by the American Council on Education, in Washington, D.C., to hire more counselors and establish programs where students can help each other cope with mental-health struggles. He also stressed the importance of collecting data to see which students on campus are using mental-health resources. One of the goals of the mental-health roundtable was to destigmatize talking openly about anxiety, depression, and other mental issues and to get political leaders to spend more money on colleges’ efforts to provide students with counseling services.
The Washington Post
A dilemma at college drop-off: Is a GPS tracker too much?
Perspective by Petula Dvorak, Columnist
I could still see the flashing green light of the GPS tracker peeking out from under the car’s back seat. So I stood on my tiptoes, trying to see if it would be visible to someone 6 feet tall. Not really. Perfect. The GPS tracking app was loaded on my phone and we were ready to shove off, an eight-hour caravan north to install my firstborn, curly-haired, hockey-playing, computer-building freshman into his college dorm. How did I get here? Covid.
The Chronicle of Higher Education
Why Some Colleges Are Removing Their Covid-19 Vaccination Mandates
By Francie Diep
As the fall semester begins, thousands of students will return to campuses that have taken the uncommon step of dropping their Covid-19 vaccination mandates. Their rationales reflect the still-complicated reality of a policy once hailed as critical for getting “back to normal” on college campuses. Although few colleges have gone so far as to reverse existing mandates, the changed rules are part of a trend toward more relaxed Covid-19 protocols across all of higher education. And they reflect a country that’s going back to normal with fewer vaccine mandates, not more. For some colleges, changes in state laws and politics forced the shift.
Inside Higher Ed
History Hiring in the Pandemic
New report from the American Historical Association shows that job ads, a proxy for faculty hiring, declined dramatically in 2020–21 but have started to rebound. The long-term outlook remains sobering.
By Colleen Flaherty
In 2020–21, history faculty job postings hit their lowest point since the American Historical Association started tracking openings in 1975, at just 347 positions total. “Pandemic-related austerity measures, hiring freezes, and the like were implemented by almost every U.S. university, and the resulting downturn was as expected as it was unwelcome,” says a report on the COVID-era job market, out this week in the AHA’s Perspectives on History magazine. According to the report, written by editor Leland Renato Grigoli, the availability of jobs from 2016–17 to 2019–20 had been stable, as had the relative ratios of tenure-track, non-tenure-track and nonteaching jobs. Specifically, the period saw an average of 536 jobs listed per year: 312 tenure-track jobs, 168 non-tenure-track jobs and 56 nonteaching positions. This represented something of a rebound from the Great Recession.
Higher Ed Dive
ABA cleans up accreditation rules surrounding distance education for law schools
By Lilah Burke
Dive Brief:
Recent amendments to American Bar Association accreditation standards addressed definitions of distance education, but Leo Martinez, immediate past chair of the ABA Council for the Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar, says the resolution won’t change much for law schools without waivers allowing them to conduct extra distance education. The changes, made at the ABA’s annual meeting in August, were meant to clarify language in accreditation standards. The ABA, which serves as the accreditor for 199 law schools and programs, requires waivers for institutions that want to offer more than one-third of J.D. program credits online. But it remains interested in reviewing distance education.
Higher Ed Dive
Education Department grants $1.5B in debt relief for Westwood students
Natalie Schwartz, Editor
Dive Brief:
The U.S. Department of Education announced Tuesday that it will automatically forgive $1.5 billion in student loans for roughly 79,000 borrowers who attended Westwood College, a for-profit chain that closed in 2016. Westwood borrowers are entitled to relief because the institution “engaged in widespread misrepresentations” about the value of its credentials and students’ employment prospects, the Education Department said. Students who attended any Westwood College location or enrolled in its online program between Jan. 1, 2002 and Nov. 17, 2015 will receive full federal loan discharges. They will not have to apply for relief.
Inside Higher Ed
Virtual Exchanges Promote Equity in Global Learning
Proponents argue that virtual exchange programs shouldn’t be dismissed as “second best” to on-the-ground study abroad, and they can expand the global learning ecosystem in important ways.
By Susan D’Agostino
Students in a business class at Porterville College in California recently joined a video call with students from Iraq for an instructor-facilitated discussion on the United Nations’ sustainability goals. Afterward, the groups dispersed to seek input about the nature of local sustainability challenges from members of their respective communities. In the weeks that followed, over Zoom, Slack and WhatsApp, the students connected for synchronous and asynchronous chats to discuss their findings. Then they selected one problem—a strained Iraqi power grid due to an influx of refugees fleeing the Syrian war—to help mitigate. …Once the course ended, the American students reported a deeper understanding of Iraqi infrastructure and Kurdish culture, and the Iraqi students reported an appreciation for the collaboration that offered a first exposure to nonmilitary Americans and helped their community.
Inside Higher Ed
OPINION FREE SPEECH – Safe Space for Me, but Not for Thee?
If universities sign on to principles to “protect and promote” free and open debate, those principles should apply to all members of the university community, Thomas Day writes.
By Thomas Day
One day after the massacre of 19 schoolchildren and two teachers at an elementary school in Uvalde, Tex., NBC News reporter Frank Thorp V posted on Twitter this summary of an exchange with former U.S. senator Heidi Heitkamp: Spotted
@HeidiHeitkamp
in the Capitol, asked her if she regretted her vote against the Manchin-Toomey background checks bill in 2013.
HEITKAMP: “I no longer have to answer your questions.”
*elevator doors close*
Heitkamp was right, of course. She no longer is required to answer a reporter’s question about her votes against gun control measures. But should she be required to directly answer mine? …Because both Heitkamp and I are members of the University of Chicago community, shouldn’t the principles expressed by the university’s principles provide me the opportunity to engage another member of the university community on the issue of gun violence? I tried. I emailed the Institute of Politics directly, a leading member of the university’s (now-disbanded) Committee on Freedom of Expression and the university chancellor, asking that Heitkamp be engaged on her gun control views. Of course, no conversation was facilitated
Inside Higher Ed
High Oil Prices Offer Endowment Boost
Oil prices are on a major upswing and paying off for some endowments, even as colleges face pressure to divest from fossil fuels over climate change concerns.
By Josh Moody
As anyone who has been to the gas pump lately knows, oil prices have boomed this year. Colleges and their constituents are feeling the squeeze, with some institutions even moving courses online to offer students and employees a slight reprieve from gas prices. The surge comes at a time when many universities have backed away from fossil fuels, divesting from the energy sector following sustained pressure from students and environmental activists concerned about climate change and the ways colleges are contributing to it. Others, like the University of Texas system, which has vast oil and gas holdings, are cashing in. …But what do soaring oil prices mean for colleges that have divested from fossil fuels?