The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Hyundai to partner with Georgia Tech to research hydrogen, EV tech
Hyundai’s top American executive: ‘We believe the future of mobility is going to be led by hydrogen.’
By Zachary Hansen
Hyundai Motor Group signed an agreement with Georgia Tech on Tuesday to collaborate on research and development of hydrogen-fueled engines for large trucks and electric vehicle batteries, both critical steps in the Korean automaker’s plans to be a leader in alternative fuels. The agreement, called a memorandum of understanding, formalizes Hyundai and Georgia Tech’s partnership on EV and hydrogen research and establishes workforce training and curricula for Hyundai’s EV and battery factory near the Georgia coast and a battery plant in Bartow County. …Sonny Perdue, the chancellor of the University System of Georgia, said Hyundai and other companies are clamoring for talent, especially since the state’s unemployment rate remains at near-record lows. As the Metaplant deal was being finalized, he said Hyundai executives were initially focused on financial incentives — of which they received a $1.8 billion deal from state and local governments — but Perdue said that focus has since switch to “talent flow.”
AP News, Cision PR Newswire, The Korean Times, The Macon Telegraph, Valdosta Daily Times,
Griffin Daily News
The first 100 days: What’s new, what’s next for Dr. Green as GSC interim president
By Karolina Philmon Gordon State College
At the end of August, Gordon State College Interim President Donald J. Green marked his first 100 days in office. In those three months and almost two weeks, Green left no room for procrastination and made great progress toward his goal of realigning GSC’s trajectory with central Georgia’s economic boom. …His plan for achieving this goal is to focus on more career-oriented degree programs that will better fit growing labor demands and business environment. Green is currently in the process of proposing four of such programs in the fields of analytics and finance, information technology, AI, and supply chain management. “The value of a Gordon State College education will set them apart with in-demand skills that’ll attract top employers. At graduation, the diploma they hold will be the $1.1 million difference in pay and benefits over a lifetime, as research has shown,” Green said.
Douglas Now
SGSC WELCOMES LEADERSHIP WAYCROSS CLASS TO CAMPUS
South Georgia State College Interim President Dr. Greg Tanner and members of SGSC’s faculty and staff welcomed the Leadership Waycross Class of 2023 to the Waycross Campus recently as part of Leadership Waycross Education Day. The class enjoyed lunch and opening remarks from Dr. Tanner then watched a short demonstration of the newest patient simulation equipment used by SGSC’s School of Nursing. Following a brief introduction from Interim Vice President for Academic and Student Affairs Sara Selby, the group heard from the chairs of SGSC’s bachelor’s degree programs and how the programs are providing a positive impact on the region.
Columbus CEO
Columbus State Maintains Upward Momentum in Several Key U.S. News ‘Best Colleges’ Rankings
Columbus State University retains its status as a “best college” in several categories published on Sept. 18 by “U.S. News and World Report” in its list of “2024 Best Colleges.” This includes moving up three points to No. 64 in its “Best Regional Universities (South)” category — placing it 30th among regional public colleges and universities for the second year in a row. This year’s rankings are the first time Columbus State appears in U.S. News’ “Best Value Schools – Regional Universities (South)” category. At No. 36, it is the highest-ranking public university in Georgia on the list. The 2023-24 academic year marks the fourth year in a row that undergraduate and graduate tuition has remained unchanged. …Columbus State also ranked 28th in the “Best Colleges for Veterans – Regional Universities (South). …Columbus State also moved up 16 spots to No. 38 on U.S. News’ list of “Top Performers on Social Mobility – Regional Universities (South).
The Georgia Virtue
6 military spouses awarded scholarships from Georgia Southern University and supporters
Georgia Southern awarded nearly $20,000 in scholarships to military spouses pursuing college degrees for the fall 2023 semester. This furthers the University’s commitment to supporting military families and indicates a remarkable step forward with the scholarship program for military spouses. The scholarships are supported by the Landings Military Spouse Academic Assistance Fund. This initiative not only recognizes the sacrifices and challenges that military families face but also empowers them to pursue higher education and achieve their academic and professional goals.
The Augusta Chronicle
AU Medical Center does well in state ranking of racial inclusivity, Wellstar less so
Abraham Kenmore
A new study of the racial inclusivity of hospitals across the country show the former Augusta University Medical Center is among the best in Georgia, while the Wellstar Kennestone Hospital and North Fulton Hospitals in the Atlanta area have some of the lowest ratings. The ranking by the Lown Institute, a nonpartisan thinktank, examined how hospitals were serving people of color in the surrounding communities by comparing the demographics of people in the geographical area near the hospital to the makeup of patients in the hospital, using Medicare data. AUMC, now part of Wellstar-MCG Health, is ranked No. 8 in the state for racial inclusivity, while Candler and St. Joseph’s Hospital, who the Medical College of Georgia is partnering with to create a four-year medical school campus in Savannah both make the top 10 in the state. …Part of the merger agreement between Wellstar and AU includes setting up a clinical campus for MCG students at Kennestone, the first such MCG campus in the Atlanta area.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Federal officials say Georgia owes HBCU after years of unequitable funding
By Vanessa McCray
Federal officials are pushing Gov. Brian Kemp to invest more state dollars in Fort Valley State University, Georgia’s historically Black land-grant institution. U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona and Secretary of Agriculture Thomas Vilsack sent Kemp and 15 other governors a letter Monday highlighting what they describe as “unequitable funding” of land-grant HBCUs. The Georgia letter said that Fort Valley State, which enrolled just over 2,600 students last fall, would have received an additional $603 million from the state over the last three decades if its per-student funding was equal to that of the University of Georgia. …The University System said it’s working to collect data and facts and then will respond to the letter.
The Augusta Chronicle
Augusta University launches AU Online with three new graduate programs
Abraham Kenmore
Augusta University has officially launched its newest expansion — Augusta University Online. “The purpose for AU Online is clear: to bring that high quality education that Augusta University has to offer to learners across Georgia and beyond,” said Marc Austin, dean of AU Online in his remarks at the launch of the program. “And I’m pleased to report that we’re really off to a great start, well exceeding our enrollment goal, but also demonstrating the power of Augusta University to attract the best and the brightest.” The new program is launching with three graduate degrees: a Master of Education in instruction, a Master of Public Health, and a Master of Science in information security management. It is a step towards the university’s goal of 16,000 students by 2030, said AU President Brooks Keel, but it is also more than that.
WGAU Radio
UGA leads efforts for military and community partnership
By Margaret Blanchard, UGA Today
The University of Georgia has rolled out a visionary plan to spur economic development in communities surrounding Fort Moore, providing strategic direction aligned with the military mission that protects the rural character of the area and supports quality of life. …The work encompasses six rural counties surrounding the installation: Marion, Chattahoochee, Stewart, Taylor, Talbot and Russell, Alabama. UGA representatives, military personnel and community members gathered in Columbus on Aug. 18 to learn about the plan and to strategize on next steps. … “Promoting economic development within the Chattahoochee Valley area communities is vitally important to the Fort Moore and Maneuver Center of Excellence mission,” said Brandon Cockrell, deputy to the Garrison Commander. “Collectively putting our resources into the future of this community is also investing in the future of Fort Moore.” The plan is notable for its regional approach. UGA research indicates that the rural counties surrounding Columbus have strong potential to tap into a vibrant regional tourism economy by showcasing their natural and cultural resources. The plan recommends infrastructure improvements such as water and sewer upgrades to attract and sustain such efforts.
The Houston Home Journal
CAROLYN WYNN SMALLEY ESTATE GIFT TO MGA TO SUPPORT ENDOWED PROFESSORSHIPS, EQUESTRIAN TEAM
Special to the Journal
A $1.2 million gift to the Middle Georgia State University Foundation from the estate of Carolyn Wynn Smalley, a Wilkinson County woman known for her love of horses, nature, and Georgia history and culture, will fund the creation of two special professorships and develop scholarships and other support for the institution’s equestrian team. Attorney and newspaper publisher DuBose Porter, who serves as executor of her estate, recently announced the gift – the largest ever to the foundation, which is a nonprofit organization that raises and manages private donations to support the University’s mission and goals. Smalley died in 2016 at the age of 93, six years after her veterinarian husband, Frarie. As her estate was settled, some of the proceeds of the sale of her 1,200-acre Wilkinson County property – a rolling landscape on the Georgia Piedmont — were gifted to Middle Georgia State (MGA) for carefully chosen purposes reflecting her many interests. …And so the two endowed chairs/professorships MGA is funding with her gift will reflect those interests. …An endowed chair or professorship is a prestigious position at a university and is typically funded by gifts from benefactors. The endowed funds support the professor’s salary and academic research and activities.
Flagpole
New UGA Student Groups Uses Art to Help International Causes
by Xinge Lei
Third-year UGA students Rana Ahmed and Sarah Hashami have started a new fundraising organization devoted to international crisis relief and cultural appreciation. Their strategy—arts and crafts. Students for International Causes (SIC) is a global affairs and cultural collective committed to igniting change where it is needed most. Its primary fundraising method relies on the artistic expression of its members. The organization plans on hosting informative and interactive meetings where members can create art together for specified, rotating causes. From canvas paintings to fashion jewelry, all proceeds from art sales will be donated toward credible humanitarian agencies or used for club management. These sales are scheduled to occur on campus and online, via the club’s Instagram. Members can also donate their personal artworks.
Columbus CEO
Kimberly Gill on Interdisciplinary Studies at Columbus State University
Department Chair for Interdisciplinary Studies at Columbus State University Kimberly Gill talks about the Bachelor’s Degree in Interdisciplinary Studies and why it might be right for you.
Albany CEO
Signe Coombs of GSW Athletics on Corporate Partnerships
Associate Director of Athletics at Georgia Southwestern State University Signe Coombs talks about the important role corporate partnerships play in the success of GSW Athletics.
Albany Herald
UGA innovation hub offers new hive for creators of honeybee vaccine
By Brandon Ward UGA/CAES
In the fall of 2022, Annette Kleiser was looking for a new professional home. Her company, Dalan Animal Health, was developing the world’s first honeybee vaccine and needed a top research university that offered excellent veterinary and agriculture schools, honeybee research and an established animal health ecosystem. Dalan Animal Health moved to the Delta Innovation Hub on UGA’s campus in the fall of 2022. The company has shipped 500 doses of the world’s first honeybee vaccine, which it developed, to partners in California, potentially protecting as many as 25 million bees.
Medium
Yitzi Weiner, Editor for Authority Magazine
I had the pleasure of talking with Dr. Amy Baxter. Amy Baxter, MD FAAP FACEP, serves as a Clinical Associate Professor at Augusta University’s Department of Emergency Medicine and is an affiliate staff member at Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta. Specializing in pediatric emergency medicine, Dr. Baxter has secured federal funding for her groundbreaking neuromodulation pain relief research, aimed at reducing opioid use for low back pain and enhancing immunization adherence by addressing needle pain. At the end of the interview you can read more about her other scientific contributions, from timing child abuse to COVID prevention, but let’s get to it. …For her innovative contributions, Dr. Baxter was honored with the 2020 SBA Tibbetts award, recognizing the profound economic and social impact derived from her R&D in external pain blocking technologies. …Currently, Dr. Baxter’s research focuses on exploring the regenerative potential and opioid-reducing capabilities of thermal and vibratory energy in addressing low back pain, supported by grants from the National Institute of Drug Abuse.
WGAU Radio
Classic Center hosts UGA Fall Career and Internship Fair
By Tim Bryant
The Classic Center is the site for the University of Georgia’s Fall Career and Internship Fair: it’s a underway at noon and lasts til 5. UGA says shuttles will run from campus to the Classic Center starting at 11:30 this morning.
From the UGA master calendar…
Meet with recruiters seeking students to fill both internship and full-time opportunities. Please dress professionally and bring copies of your resume! Shuttles will run from campus to the Classic Center between 11:30 am and 5:00 pm. Bus stops include: Memorial Hall, Chemistry on Ag Hill, Physics, across from the Main Library, and the Classic Center.
The Tifton Gazette
New Library Everywhere route stop in Ty Ty
From Staff Reports
Library Everywhere has a new scheduled route stop in Tift County at Ty Ty City Hall, 141 E. Elman St, Ty Ty, Ga. 31795. The mobile library will have a lobby stop in the room on the north side of the city hall offices every 1st and 3rd Thursday of every month from 9:30-11:30 a.m., barring holiday closures or emergencies, beginning October 19. Library Everywhere is a project assisted through a grant from the Georgia Public Library Service with funding from the Institute of Museum and Library Services. Its directive is to bring crucial library services to underserved communities. Library card registration and free wireless internet are available at every visit. Library materials like Chromebooks, hotspots for remote learning, books, and DVDs are available for checkout, and copying, printing, notarization, the seed library, and computers for public use will be there as available.
Morgan County Citizen
Morgan County Library debuts Holocaust remembrance exhibit
Special to The Citizen
In partnership with the Georgia Commission on the Holocaust and the Georgia Public Library Service, the Morgan County Library is hosting a touring banner exhibit visiting public libraries statewide in an effort to preserve the memory of the Holocaust and to promote public understanding of the history. Fashioning a Nation: German Identity and Industry, 1914-1945 is on display at Morgan County Library now until Oct. 19. This exhibit explores the powerful history of German fashion from its international impact to its destruction by the Nazi regime. It honors the legacy of the Jewish Germans who contributed to its rise and commemorates the great cultural and economic loss resulting from its demise.
WRBL
COLUMBUS HISTORY: Carson McCullers explores love and loneliness in Southern Gothic work
by: Olivia Yepez
Amongst 20th century writers, Carson McCullers is widely regarded as one of the most impactful. Evidence of her Columbus, Georgia upbringing colors many of her works, including “The Heart is a Lonely Hunter”(1940), which was adapted for film in 1968 and became a #1 New York Times bestseller in 2004, after Oprah Winfrey selected it for her book club. “[She] grew up in Columbus and her novels are mostly set in a fictionalized version of Columbus, Georgia,” said Nick Norwood, director of the Columbus State University (CSU) Carson McCullers Center for Writers and Musicians.
Higher Education News:
Inside Higher Ed
A New Legal Blitz on Affirmative Action
Challenges to race-conscious policies are surging in the wake of the Supreme Court ruling against affirmative action, including a new lawsuit against West Point.
By Liam Knox
The Supreme Court’s June decision striking down race-conscious admissions may have been the most significant higher ed case in years, providing a concrete answer to questions that have spurred dozens of court cases since the 1990s. But it hardly put an end to the legal fight over affirmative action. In fact, the outcome has unleashed a stream of new challenges to colleges’ race-conscious policies and revived cases that had been dismissed or lost before the ruling was handed down. Just yesterday, Students for Fair Admissions, the group that spearheaded the Supreme Court cases against Harvard University and the University of North Carolina, filed a lawsuit challenging the race-conscious admissions policies of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. SFFA began building the case after the Supreme Court left open the possibility that military colleges could be exempt from the affirmative action ruling due to their “potentially distinct interests” in enrolling racially diverse student bodies.
See also:
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Opinion: Students believe in the value of higher education. We all should
Get Schooled with Maureen Downey
In a guest column, Andrew Hsu, president of the College of Charleston, discusses polls showing Americans are losing confidence in higher education. He notes that one group remains confident in the value of college attendance, students themselves.
By Andrew Hsu
…I looked at another Gallup Poll from earlier that same month that told a different and much rosier story regarding our higher education system: 71% of currently enrolled undergraduate students strongly agree or agree that the degree they are receiving is worth the cost and 75% strongly agree or agree that their institution is preparing them well for life outside of college. Overall, approximately three-fourths of students, both currently enrolled and prospective students, report that a college education is either more important than it was 20 years ago or equally as important. For someone in the industry, that reads as good news. …Before news fatigue fully sets in, I encourage you to not lose hope and not let recent polls cloud all judgment. Rather, use it as another data point, one among many, and let’s work together to restore our faith in the things that bind us together — like our colleges and universities. That’s how we change the tide.
Inside Higher Ed
A ‘Lost Generation’ of High School Graduates
Significant numbers of the 2020 high school graduates who didn’t enroll in college immediately that year still have not found their way into higher education, a new report finds.
By Jessica Blake
When fall 2020 college enrollment numbers after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic showed that large swaths of that year’s high school graduating class had not enrolled, many college administrators assumed these 2020 high school graduates would eventually make their way to campuses. Others worried these students might get permanently knocked off their path to higher education. The latter appears to be what happened, according to a report released Tuesday by the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center. The number of students who enrolled in college immediately after graduating high school in 2020 was 53.5 percent, 6.8 percentage points fewer than in 2019. The new report finds that only 0.7 percent of 2020 graduates—an additional 5,631 students nationwide—had enrolled in college by fall 2021, and an even smaller number, 0.2 percent, enrolled for the first time in 2022.
Inside Higher Ed
A Glimpse Into the Class of 2027’s Mind-Set
By Doug Lederman
In 2005, the year most of this fall’s first-time students were born, Dan Rather retired, Pandora was created and Hurricanes Katrina and Rita offered a preview of the weather catastrophes that today have become the norm. This year’s iteration of the Marist Mindset List, the annual guide designed to provide insights into the thinking of incoming college students, cites those developments as indicative of how much the world has changed in the years since this semester’s new learners were born. The list was conceived and produced by Beloit College until 2020, when Marist University took it over.
Inside Higher Ed
A New Campaign to End Unpaid Internships
Research by NACE shows that paid internships benefit graduates far more than unpaid ones. Now the organization is pushing for legislation to ban the latter.
By Johanna Alonso
Unpaid internships have long faced scrutiny for their inaccessibility, especially for lower-income students who can’t afford to work for free. Now the National Association of Colleges and Employers is taking a firm stance against unpaid internships, arguing in a new campaign—called Unpaid Is Unfair—that such internships should be outlawed nationally. “Congress should pass legislation requiring internships to be paid,” the organization wrote in a position statement released Tuesday. “For decades, interns have occupied a nebulous space in the employment world—sometimes being considered unpaid trainees and sometimes being considered fully paid employees. Modern legislation is needed to resolve this inconsistency.”
Higher Ed Dive
SUNY Potsdam looks to eliminate 14 more programs to close $9M deficit
President of the New York public college said it will need to significantly reduce faculty positions alongside academic cuts.
Jeremy Bauer-Wolf, Senior Reporter
The State University of New York at Potsdam is looking to eliminate 14 academic programs over the next few years — including bachelor’s in chemistry, public health and theater — as it tries to bridge a $9 million budget gap. SUNY Potsdam President Suzanne Smith unveiled the cuts in a speech Tuesday, at one point growing teary-eyed as she detailed how the public institution will attempt to recalibrate its academic array in the wake of sliding enrollment and subsequent financial deficits. The university will need to significantly reduce faculty numbers, Smith said during her remarks, although she did not offer the exact number of positions it will seek to cut. Regardless, the process will be painful, but will enable SUNY Potsdam to lean into its strengths as a regional public college, Smith said.
Higher Ed Dive
Vermont State Colleges System chancellor to resign in December
Sophie Zdatny, who took the helm in 2020, oversaw the merger of three financially struggling colleges to create Vermont State University.
Laura Spitalniak, Associate Editor
Dive Brief:
Vermont State Colleges System’s chancellor, Sophie Zdatny, will resign at the end of the year following a three-year tenure marked by the pandemic and financial challenges. Zdatny first led the system as interim chancellor after her predecessor Jeb Spaulding abruptly resigned in April 2020. Under Zdatny’s leadership, the system saw a significant increase in state funding, and formed Vermont State University through a merger of three financially struggling colleges. The system’s board will begin the search for a new system leader in the next few months. Zdatny said she intends to work with her successor to ensure a smooth transition.