University System News
Yahoo!News (The Albany Herald)
Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College ag ed program receives national award
By Staff Reports
The National Association of Agricultural Educators recently recognized the Agricultural Education program at Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College with the NAAE Outstanding Cooperation Award. Andrew Thoron, head of the Department of Agricultural Education and Communication at ABAC, said the award is based on three levels of criteria, including program services, support for and cooperation with state and national agricultural educators’ associations, and awards and honors.
11 Alive
‘This is an achievement’ | 71-year-old farmer, widow graduates with Georgia Tech master’s degree
By Makayla Richards, Dalia Perez
After starting her master’s degree at Georgia Tech 40 years ago, a 71-year-old woman finally crossed the stage in her cap and gown to prove that nothing can get in the way of a goal. Beth Quay’s accomplishment challenges anyone who thinks they are too old to learn a new skill. At the age of 71, she graduated with her master’s degree in analytics from Georgia Tech, where she first earned her bachelor’s degree in industrial engineering in 1974.
MEAT+POULTRY
UGA receives $3M gift from Harrison Poultry foundation
By Ryan McCarthy
The University of Georgia announced a significant gift for its upcoming poultry science complex near its main campus. The Luther and Susie Harrison Foundation pledged $3 million toward the project on Dec. 15, the largest single gift for the building to date. The building, which is scheduled to open in fall 2023, is estimated to cost $54.1 million and will increase the size of existing poultry science facilities in Georgia to more than 70,000 square feet. The complex is designed to modernize instructional and lab space, provide centralized student-focused facilities, and help attract and retain world-class researchers.
13WMAZ
University System of Georgia enrollment declines for second straight year
By TJ Anthony
Many high schoolers spend senior year choosing the place to call home for their next four years of education. However, this year The University System of Georgia (USG) noticed a pattern that shows many students may not be taking the college route at all. For the second straight year USG noticed an enrollment declined. They say enrollment grew by 1.2% at research universities like Georgia Tech and The University of Georgia but declined in the three other institutional sectors.
WABE
Return to in-person learning didn’t significantly affect metro Atlanta students’ achievement: report
By Martha Dalton
A recent study from Georgia State University shows that the return to in-person learning didn’t substantially improve student achievement in Clayton, DeKalb and Fulton counties. Tim Sass is the director of GSU’s Metro Atlanta Policy Lab for Education (MAPLE), which conducted the research. He says achievement increased a little once students returned to school, but not much.
Other News
Athens CEO
Georgia Department of Education Announces 2023 Priorities
By Staff Report
The Georgia Department of Education is announcing its 2023 priorities, which will guide its work during the 2023 legislative session and beyond. “As we look toward 2023, we will remain laser-focused on investing in academic recovery and preparing Georgia’s students for a stronger future,” State School Superintendent Richard Woods said. “I look forward to working with the Georgia General Assembly and other partners to strengthen supports and opportunities for students, support for public education, school safety, and the teaching profession and educator pipeline. We have an enormous opportunity as we move beyond the pandemic to build a public education system that is truly centered on the needs of Georgia students.”
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Inside City Hall: Atlanta continues to fight public sector brain drain
By Wilborn P. Nobles III
Last week, we learned that Atlanta’s Department of Watershed Management has 345 vacancies, which includes 180 positions for what Commissioner Mikita Browning described as mission-critical roles. Her department is budgeted for 1,615 positions, but she told city councilmembers that they’re competing with the private sector and neighboring counties for talent.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Opinion: In funding schools, formula’s inadequacies must be addressed
By Maureen Downey
In a guest column, Dana Rickman, president of the Georgia Partnership for Excellence in Education, urges the General Assembly to reconfigure education funding to reflect current student and school system needs or state priorities. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution Get Schooled blog asked Georgia advocates for children and schools to explain what they would like to see state lawmakers tackle — or avoid — this upcoming legislative session.
WABE
Teaching program gives refugee women opportunity to rebuild careers in Atlanta
By Emily Wu Pearson
Dozens of second graders happily jostle their way toward the cafeteria at Decatur’s International Community School. Sima Niroula is headed in the other direction. She’s a kindergarten teaching assistant, and she’s heading back to her classroom where kids are getting ready for a brain break. Niroula is one of three women in a new pilot program that is retraining incoming professionals who immigrated from other countries to be teachers.
The Moultrie Observer (Capitol Beat News Service)
Georgia should amp up its music-industry tax incentives, legislative committee recommends
By Rebecca Grapevine
Georgia should institute a 30% to 35% tax credit for music-production expenses to help grow the state’s music industry, a bipartisan legislative study committee recommended this week. The tax incentive would encourage out-of-state productions to invest in Georgia musicians, the committee said. The state should also set the amount of spending needed to qualify for the tax incentive to $25,000 for recorded musical productions and allow companies to aggregate multiple projects to meet that threshold. The committee also recommended lowering the spending threshold to earn the tax credit to $200,000 for musical or theatrical tours that start in Georgia. This would encourage productions, including Broadway touring companies and major musical acts, to launch their tours in Georgia.
See also:
Georgia Recorder: Georgia legislative panel sounds call for state music promoter, revamped tax credit
Higher Education News
Apprenticeships Open Doors for Georgia’s Future Workforce
By Staff Report
Georgia is proactive in educating the workforce of the future and is proving its commitment by investing in apprenticeship programs so more Georgians can enter the workforce prepared for success. Georgia Governor Brian Kemp and the Technical College System of Georgia (TCSG) recently announced a round of $1 million in funding to create 120 new apprenticeships across the state. These apprenticeships will train students for careers in-demand industries such as healthcare, manufacturing, and construction, and provide employers with opportunities to fill their workforce needs.
The Chronicle of Higher Education
Got College? Can A National Marketing Campaign Change the Souring Conversation About College?
By Francie Diep
Higher ed has an image problem. Everyone is eyeing the same surveys and headlines with gritted teeth: the Gallup and Pew polls showing declining public confidence in colleges and universities, particularly among Republicans. The donors and politicians trying to take a heavier hand with public institutions in Florida, North Carolina, and elsewhere, signs that they no longer trust college leaders to run their own affairs. he public conversation about college has come to focus on its faults. The average American likes their local institution but has misgivings about “college” in general. This is a headache for college leaders. For marketers, it may present an opportunity.
Higher Ed Dive
McGraw Hill exposed student data and grades, online privacy firm says
By Natalie Schwartz
Education publishing company McGraw Hill had a data breach that potentially exposed hundreds of thousands of students’ email addresses and grades, a recent report from vpnMentor said. Higher education has increasingly been a target for cybercriminals. While cyberattacks on individual colleges often dominate headlines, their software providers and other vendors also suffer from attacks that could compromise student data.
The Chronicle of Higher Education
‘Higher Ed Is a Scam of a Career’: Readers Speak Out on Dead-End Jobs
By Readers React
In a recent Review essay, Kevin R. McClure describes how many college workers are trapped in jobs that provide no opportunities for advancement. Those affected have limited options: They can simmer in silence, pursue more credentials, or leave. We wanted to know what Chronicle readers made of McClure’s diagnosis, so we posted some open-ended questions. A large number — more than 150 — of you responded, describing frustration at the lack of clear career ladders, bitterness at being passed over for jobs, and bewilderment at seeing those on the outside, often with less education, finding more financial success.
Higher Ed Dive
University of Texas, Google team up on career training for students
By Ginger Christ
The University of Texas System and Google on Dec. 9 announced that the university would begin offering Google Career Certificates to students at eight of the system’s institutions. The certificates will be built into undergraduate degree programs and offered as co-curricular experiences and will not be an additional cost to students, according to a news release.
Higher Ed Dive
Colleges’ expenses rose 5.2% in FY22, the biggest increase since 2001
By Laura Spitalniak
The cost of running a college jumped 5.2% in the 2022 fiscal year, according to data from Commonfund, an asset management firm that tracks inflation in the higher education sector.
That’s the highest rate of inflation the Higher Education Price Index, or HEPI, has tracked since 2001, when it hit 6%. It’s also a sharp increase from 2021, when the college inflation rate was 2.7%.
Inside Higher Ed
Education Department Releases Additional Guidance for 90/10 Rule
By Katherine Knott
The U.S. Education Department is updating the list of federal education assistance funds that proprietary institutions have to include in their calculations of federal revenue. By law, for-profit colleges and universities have to bring in 10 percent of their revenue from non-federal sources. Initially, federal money from the GI Bill and Department of Defense were not considered a federal source until Congress changed the law in March 2021 as part of the American Rescue Plan Act. The department issued final regulations for that change in October, which will go into effect July 1 of next year. The department released a list Friday of federal education assistance funds for qualifying students included in the federal revenue calculation for fiscal years beginning on or after Jan. 1. The funds include the GI Bill and military tuition assistance.
Higher Ed Dive
How can colleges adapt their financial aid offices for prison education programs?
Colleges interested in providing prison education programs need to adapt their financial aid practices to best serve incarcerated students, according to a new report from the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators. Federal Pell Grants, which typically help low-income students pay for college, had been broadly unavailable to people in prison under a 1994 law. But since 2015, the Second Chance Pell pilot program has allowed incarcerated people to receive Pell Grants to fund their education at a limited number of colleges. The widespread ban was repealed in 2020 legislation, and beginning July 1, the U.S. Department of Education will allow incarcerated students enrolled in eligible prison education programs to receive Pell Grants to cover up to the cost of attendance.
The Chronicle of Higher Education
A Dean Says He Was Ousted for His Opposition to Police and Prisons
By Megan Zahneis
A dean at the University of Houston, Alan J. Dettlaff, who since 2015 had served as dean of the Graduate College of Social Work, says he was ousted this week because of his support for abolitionism, a movement that calls for the elimination of police and prisons. In an interview with The Chronicle, Dettlaff, who will return to the Houston faculty, said that the college has focused its work and programming on racial justice since shortly after he began as dean, and that conversations about abolitionism had intensified after the 2020 murder of George Floyd. Dettlaff has led faculty study groups on abolition, and the college has purchased copies of books on the subject for all faculty, staff, and students, he said.
The Chronicle of Higher Education
How Diverse Are College Staff Members?
By The Chronicle of Higher Education Staff
Statistical snapshots of the percentage of minority noninstructional employees, by job category, at four-year public and private colleges. Data cover full-time noninstructional, nonmedical staff members at degree-granting institutions of higher education in the United States that were eligible to receive Title IV federal financial aid in 2018-20. For-profit institutions and two-year private nonprofit institutions were not included. Those institutions employed 2.2 percent of all eligible staff members in 2020. Percentages of the racial or ethnic groups were calculated by dividing their numbers into the totals minus the numbers of nonresident aliens and people whose races were unknown.
WABE
BLM sets up student relief fund as loan forgiveness stalls
By The Associated Press
The Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation launched a new relief fund Monday aimed at Black college students, alumni and dropouts overburdened by mounting education costs and the student loan debt crisis. The foundation said it set aside $500,000 for the fund and plans to award more than 500 recipients with relief payments ranging from $750 to $4,500. A public application process for the fund opened on Monday, and recipients will receive their money in January if selected.