WGAU Radio
UGA closes Griffin campus because of storm damage
By Tim Bryant
The Oconee County Sheriff’s Office says trees came down across the county during a Thursday evening thunderstorm, one that brought damaging winds to several other counties in northeast Georgia and throughout metro Atlanta. The University of Georgia says its Griffin campus is closed because of storm damage.
From WSB TV…
Gov. Brian Kemp has declared a state of emergency as violent storms that included likely tornadoes moved through North Georgia.
Albany Herald
Christina Wynn in Georgia Southwestern spotlight
From staff reports
Christina Wynn of Leesburg was recently featured in a Canes Spotlight feature at Georgia Southwestern State University here. Canes Spotlights highlight GSW students who hold leadership roles, are involved in extracurricular activities and excel academically on campus.
Newsbreak
Augusta events honor the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. in 2023
By Joe Hotchkiss, Augusta Chronicle
The Augusta area is playing host to events large and small to help commemorate the life and legacy of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. Here’s a brief roundup of activities:
Tri-college celebration
Paine College, Augusta University and Augusta Technical College will join in a multicampus celebration honoring Dr. King beginning at noon Friday at Paine’s Gilbert-Lambuth Memorial Chapel. The event is free and open to the public, and will be streamed live online.
Albany Herald
Chamber Foundation, ASU to host King Day dinner
From staff reports
The Albany Area Chamber Foundation will host the 2023 MLK Dinner on Monday in partnership with Albany State University and the King Day Celebration Committee.
Americus Times-Recorder
GSW Alumnus Brandon Blue to serve as keynote speaker at MLK Convocation Day
By Ken Gustafson
Georgia Southwestern State University (GSW) will host its 43rd annual Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Convocation in the GSW Student Success Center Convocation Hall on Wednesday, Jan. 18 at 11 a.m. with GSW alumnus Brandon Blue serving as keynote speaker. This year’s theme for the convocation is “Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community.” Blue, a retention specialist at Chattahoochee Valley Community College, graduated from GSW with his bachelor’s degree in psychology in May 2022.
WGAU Radio
UGA gets $1.5 million gift from Chick Fil A
By Charlie Bauder, UGA Media Relations
The University of Georgia has received a $1.5 million pledge from Chick-fil-A Inc. to support the development of a new statewide youth leadership program and an annual youth leadership summit at UGA. “I am immensely grateful to our friends at Chick-fil-A for their generosity and their commitment to helping the University of Georgia make a positive impact on our home state,” said UGA President Jere W. Morehead. “Building the leadership capacity of our youth is essential to securing a bright future for Georgia for generations to come.” The new Youth LEAD Georgia program will provide college and career readiness through leadership development for 30 to 40 rising high school sophomores and juniors each year from across the state.
11Alive
Georgia lawmaker introduces bill that could help HOPE scholars, expand eligibility
The popular lottery-funded program would include technical college students – giving them a chance for eligibility.
Author: Doug Richards
An Atlanta lawmaker plans to introduce bills to expand the HOPE scholarship to include technical college students. This would give already-enrolled college students a chance for eligibility. “I wouldn’t be at Georgia State without the HOPE scholarship,” GSU freshman Rachel Calhoun said. Calhoun is among the generations of young people who were able to go to college because they were awarded the HOPE scholarship. Funded by the state lottery, HOPE may be the state’s most popular program. …University System Chancellor Sonny Perdue called the growth of the lottery “phenomenal.” “I’m amazed that it continues to grow. And that’s been a phenomenal aspect that most states don’t enjoy. But it continues to grow. How do you put policies in place anticipating what the revenue will be to meet the demand? That’s a real challenge,” said Perdue, a former Georgia governor. Perdue said the HOPE expansion is worth considering at least.
The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education
Four Black Scholars Join the College of Education & Human Development Faculty at Georgia State
The College of Education & Human Development at Georgia State University has four new faculty members for the current academic year.
Bobby Bonwenyue Gueh is a clinical assistant professor in the department of counseling and psychological services. …Tamika P. La Salle was appointed associate professor in the department of counseling and psychological services. …Dionne Cowan is a new clinical assistant professor in the department of educational policy studies. …Christopher Jett is a new associate professor in the department of middle and secondary education.
Patch
Georgia Southern University’s College of Science and Mathematics has been awarded a six-year grant of $493,065 from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) Inclusive Excellence 3 (IE3) initiative. Georgia Southern is among a select group of 104 schools that have received an HHMI IE3 grant to support diversity, equity and inclusion.
AllOnGeorgia
Georgia Dept of Economic Development Commissioner Named Georgia Trend’s 2023 Georgian of the Year
It was 2010 and Gov. Sonny Perdue’s last legislative session had ended. And Pat Wilson was tired. He’d served as director of government affairs, promoting the legislative agenda of the first Republican elected governor in Georgia since Reconstruction, for the past three years. As you might guess, relations between the state’s legislative and executive branches weren’t exactly stress-free. Wilson, who had worked for Perdue in D.C. as federal affairs director and before that in the offices of U.S. Rep. Nathan Deal and the late Sen. Paul Coverdell, wasn’t sure what he wanted to do next. “Gov. Perdue sat down in my office and said, ‘What do you want to do?’” Wilson remembers. “I said, ‘Governor, I don’t know but I can tell you what I don’t want to do – I don’t want to be a lobbyist. I’m really tired of doing what we’re doing.’ “And he said, ‘You’ve done an amazing job selling my policies and I think it would be great if you went to sell something you love – the state of Georgia.”
AllOnGeorgia
Commissioner Russell R. McMurry Named to Georgia Trend’s Most Influential Georgians List
This is the sixth consecutive year that McMurry has been recognized by Georgia Trend.
Georgia Department of Transportation Commissioner Russell R. McMurry, P.E., has been named to Georgia Trend’s 2023 list of Most Influential Georgians. This is the sixth consecutive year that McMurry has been recognized by Georgia Trend. In 2018, the magazine named him Georgian of the Year. …McMurry is a native Georgian, an honors graduate of Georgia Southern University and a civil engineer who has been with Georgia DOT since 1990, having previously served as planning director and chief engineer.
Sean Hannity
NASCAR: More American Than Ever Thanks to Jeffrey Earnhardt and Nine Line Apparel
posted by Hannity Staff
Just when you thought NASCAR and the auto racing industry couldn’t get any more patriotic, Jeffrey Earnhardt and Nine Line Apparel teamed up to raise awareness for U.S. service members, veterans, and their families. It all began over Memorial Day Weekend during the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway in Concord, N.C., when Nine Line emblazoned the names of 617 fallen servicemen on the hood of Earnhardt’s car. They raised over $15,000 for the non-profit Angels of America’s Fallen, which provides support to children of fallen military members and first responders. …Proceeds from the “Leave No Man Behind” design sales (upwards of $20,000) went to the Nine Line Foundation’s Veterans Village initiative. In partnership with Georgia Southern University, Nine Line will construct a “transitional housing community” for homeless veterans in Savannah, GA.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
UGA QB Stetson Bennett serves customers at Raising Cane live on Channel 2
Video
Columbus CEO
20 Years Later: Military, Academic Experts to Assemble in March to Cement Iraq War’s Lasting Legacy
Staff Report
Spanning more than eight years beginning in March 2003, the U.S. War in Iraq eventually involved more than one million U.S. troops. The incursion—known as “Operation Iraqi Freedom”—brought with it evolving wartime policies, modernized equipment and weaponry, and changes to U.S. military strategy. … Columbus State University and the National Infantry Museum will explore those topics and others related to the Iraq War as they co-present a two-day public symposium March 10-11 at the National Infantry Museum. Military policymakers, veterans, Iraqi civilians and academic experts from across the nation will gather for a series of keynotes and panel discussions that will consider the war’s impact on the United States, the Middle East, and globally as well as on veterans and their families, Iraqi civilians, and on military strategy and the future of warfare.
Technology Networks
Key Mechanism Involved in Nerve Pain Identified
News
Neuropathic pain is a type of chronic pain caused by damage to the nervous system due mainly to metabolic diseases such as diabetes and arthritis, or to the side effects of some kinds of chemotherapy. It is believed to affect between 3% and 15% of the population, depending on the country, but specific medications are not yet available. …Now, however, after a decade of research, a group of Brazilian scientists has succeeded in describing a mechanism associated with the production of neuropathic pain, opening up a new stage of their exploration in search of drugs that can act on the metabolic pathway in question and pointing to an avenue for the development of targeted therapies. …In this study, the scientists found that neuropathic pain was nullified when the kynurenine pathway initiated by the enzyme IDO1 (indoleamine 2,3-dioxygenase 1) was blocked pharmaceutically or genetically. An article reporting the results is published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation. “It was a very lengthy study because we wanted to explore in depth all the mechanisms that could be involved. It required collaboration in Brazil and abroad with leading experts, such as Andrew Mellor [a professor at Augusta University, formerly Georgia Regents, in the United States], one of the world’s foremost specialists in IDO.
Times-Georgian
UWG soccer announces new assistant coach
By Bryant Gray UWG Sports
On Thursday, the University of West Georgia women’s soccer team and head coach Stacey Balaam announced the hiring of Jacob Crawford to be the team’s next assistant coach. Crawford previously coached at South Georgia State College for the past four seasons, accumulating a record of 48-36-5 during his time with the Hawks. During the 2022 season, Crawford led SGSC to a 12-3 overall record, a regular season championship, a GCAA Tournament Championship, as well as being named the GCAA Coach of the Year.
Higher Education News:
Higher Ed Dive
Rick Seltzer, Senior Editor
Dive Brief:
A unit within the U.S. Department of Education charged with making sure colleges aren’t misrepresenting themselves to students has been dogged by frequent reorganizations, changing priorities, and staff and leadership turnover, according to a new congressional watchdog report. The unit had nine different directors in roughly six years, the Government Accountability Office wrote in a report released Thursday. At one point in 2017, the Education Department placed all of the unit’s open investigations on hold and diverted its staff to other offices. That resulted in fewer new probes over the next several years. The Education Department penalized 13 colleges for substantial misrepresentations from 2016 to 2021. Ramifications can range from fines to ending colleges’ participation in federal student aid.
Diverse Issues in Higher Education
Panel Discusses Rapid Shift in U.S. Opinion on Responsibility for Paying for College
Jon Edelman
In America, changes in public opinion typically move at a snail’s pace, a gradual accumulation of person-by-person shifts that stretch over decades until a new belief becomes dominant. However, for the question of who is responsible for paying for college—parents and students or the government—American beliefs have shifted in a comparative blink of an eye. Dr. Natasha Quadlin, an associate professor of sociology at the University of California, Los Angeles and Dr. Brian Powell, a professor of sociology at Indiana University were planning to write a book about the stubbornness of American beliefs about college payment responsibility. In 2010, they found that 65% of people believed that the two most responsible groups were parents and students. Only 9% believed that the government should be mainly responsible. …But when they repeated the survey in 2015, their results shocked them. Just five years later, only 50% of people thought that parents and students should be most responsible, and 19% said that the government should be the primary stakeholder.
Inside Higher Ed
Sociologists Affirm Importance of Teaching About Race
By Colleen Flaherty
The American Sociological Association said in a statement this week that it “strongly supports scholars, teachers and researchers who are committed to raising awareness about the impact of race and racism in American and global society. Unfortunately, many sociologists and sociology teachers are currently facing fear for their livelihoods and careers due to the suppression of discussions of race and structural racism.” As a result, the statement says, referencing recent news that University of Central Florida sociologists had canceled their courses on race amid larger concerns about the climate for academic freedom in Florida, “some educators are canceling their classes.” The ASA “firmly opposes any efforts to prevent educators from teaching and sharing sociological knowledge.”
Inside Higher Ed
By Sara Weissman
The City University of New York system ended the last of its remedial math and English courses this fall, according to a press release sent Thursday. The classes have been replaced by corequisite courses, which offer credit and include extra academic supports. The move is the culmination of a remedial education reform effort at CUNY that started in 2016. At the time, 78 percent of new students in CUNY associate degree programs were placed in a remedial class in at least one subject. Most of these students had low course completion, retention and graduation rates. For example, students in remedial math were about half as likely to earn an associate degree in three years compared to their peers, according to data from the system.
Inside Higher Ed
Florida Adds $300K Pool to Sasse’s Presidential Mansion
By Josh Moody
Former U.S. senator from Nebraska Ben Sasse formally resigned last week and will start as president of the University of Florida next month with a base salary of $1 million a year. But UF just threw in a deal sweetener: building a $300,000 pool at the university mansion where Sasse will live.