University System News:
ww.ajc.com
Kennesaw State vote on Sam Olens’ presidency set for Oct. 12
Eric Stirgus The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Georgia Attorney General Sam Olens’ candidacy for Kennesaw State University president took an important step Tuesday when a state Board of Regents committee recommended the entire board vote on Olens next week. Olens met in a closed door session for nearly two hours Tuesday with the board’s Executive and Compensation Committee. The committee voted without any objections to a proposal that the entire board vote on Olens at its Oct. 12 meeting. The committee’s action was not a recommendation to hire, only that the whole Board of Regents vote. Olens, though, apparently swayed several committee members.
www.bizjournals.com
Committee recommends Sam Olens for Kennesaw State president
Dave Williams
Staff Writer, Atlanta Business Chronicle
Georgia Attorney General Sam Olens edged closer Tuesday to becoming the next president of Kennesaw State University. A committee of the University System of Georgia Board of Regents recommended Olens for the KSU post following an interview. “Cobb County is my home, and I care deeply for Kennesaw State,” Olens said after being recommended by the board’s Executive and Compensation Committee. “If I’m fortunate enough to be selected by the Board of Regents, I will do everything I can to earn the trust and support of KSU’s faculty, staff and students.” …The full Board of Regents will select the next KSU president Oct. 12.
www.timesunion.com
Georgia university panel backs Olens for Kennesaw presidency
ATLANTA (AP) — Georgia Attorney General Sam Olens says if he’s chosen to lead Kennesaw State University, he will try to earn support on campus. Olens’ first comments on the issue came Tuesday after he won the approval of a committee of the Board of Regents, which governs the University System of Georgia. The full board plans to discuss Olens’ appointment as Kennesaw State’s next president on Oct. 12.
www.myajc.com
Sam Olens, regents committee to discuss KSU presidency Tuesday
By Aaron Gould Sheinin and Eric Stirgus – The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
State officials ended months of speculation by announcing that Georgia Attorney General Sam Olens will interview Tuesday for the job of Kennesaw State University president. The announcement, made by University System of Georgia Chancellor Hank Huckaby, came within minutes of a previously scheduled midday rally attended by about 100 KSU students and faculty opposing Olens’ candidacy. The protesters cited Olens’ defense in court of Georgia’s same-sex marriage ban. More than 5,700 people have signed an online petition against Olens becoming KSU’s president. The list grew by about 250 names by Monday afternoon.
www.dailyreportonline.com
It’s Official: AG Interviewing for Job as University President
Katheryn Hayes Tucker, Daily Report
Georgia Attorney General Sam Olens has an interview for a new job Tuesday: president of Kennesaw State University. The University System of Georgia Board of Regents on Monday announced the meeting and University System of Georgia Chancellor Hank Huckaby sent a letter to the Kennesaw State community identifying Olens as the candidate. “In higher education and our own University System, we place extreme importance on openness and the responsibility we all share in serving each other. So, it is important you know I have asked the Board of Regents to consider Attorney General Sam Olens for the role of president of Kennesaw State University,” Huckaby said in the letter, which he shared upon request with media. The chancellor’s transparency quiets months of rumors about Olens as the choice to lead the university near his Cobb County home. Olens declined comment.
www.insidehighered.com
Kennesaw Presidency May Go to Opposed Candidate
https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2016/10/04/kennesaw-presidency-may-go-opposed-candidate
By Scott Jaschik
Students and faculty members have been mobilizing against the rumored candidacy of Sam Olens, Georgia’s attorney general, for the presidency of Kennesaw State University. On Monday, state officials acknowledged that they are considering Olens and not planning a national search. Hank Huckaby, chancellor of the University System of Georgia, acknowledged Monday that Olens would interview for the job today, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported. “Initially, I was planning to conduct a national search to find the next president of Kennesaw State,” Huckaby said in an email to KSU students and faculty. “Yet, through sincere and earnest conversations with Mr. Olens, I now believe he should be considered at this time.”
www.mdjonline.com
EDITORIAL: KSU students should meet the real Sam Olens
We have been given the first official affirmation from the University System of Georgia that east Cobb’s Sam Olens is under consideration for the presidency of Kennesaw State University. The chancellor himself, Hank Huckaby, has publicly endorsed the state’s attorney general for the top KSU post. It’s been the worst kept of secrets. The decision-makers had been coy and quiet, despite it reaching levels of common knowledge that Olens was being considered for the job and would leave the political arena for the world of academia at KSU. Olens has remained popular with the electorate, first being elected district commissioner and then county chairman by Cobb voters and then twice winning statewide as attorney general. His policies, demeanor and statesmanship have made him a voter favorite and a rumored candidate for governor. But not all share the love. About 200 showed up on KSU’s campus Monday to protest against him, and a petition saying he’s not the right choice has collected 5,000 or so signatures. So how does one go from popular politician to impugned educator so quickly? …It sounds as though the University System feels it has found its president. You don’t get an endorsement from the chancellor without buy-in from the Board of Regents. The next step is for Olens, as soon as is appropriate, to meet with KSU students and faculty and have an open, frank discussion on his past and KSU’s future. Once they get to know each other, all parties will feel more comfortable moving forward.
www.newstome.blog.ajc.com
Georgia Tech buzzes price of online education
http://newstome.blog.ajc.com/2016/10/04/georgia-tech-buzzes-price-of-online-education/
George Mathis
Technology has a way of making everything cheaper and better. A cheap TV today blows away an expensive set from 10 years ago. My new smartphone is more powerful than the laptop I am typing this on. But technology does not work its magic on all things equally. Is education cheaper? Hearing young people say they wrote a research paper without visiting a library and having to struggle with what I used to call the “Huey, Louie and Dewey decimal system” makes me a bit envious, but it also reminds me that handheld computers have made it possible to learn more while sitting on a toilet than ever. According to federal data, Georgia spent about 10 percent less per student in 2014 — an inflation-adjusted $9,202 — than it did in 2010. Is education better? That’s debatable, of course, and I am not here to change you opinion on that subject. But, Georgia voters will soon decide whether or not the state will be able take over “chronically failing public schools.” If everyone thought public education was top notch we probably wouldn’t be voting on “Opportunity School Districts.” Georgia has many fine schools of course — public and private. One of the best is Georgia Tech. The Holy Grail of fiscally-prudent parenting is to have a child graduate from the North Avenue Trade School on a HOPE scholarship.
www.walb.com
Students and community in Bainbridge learn about Zika
http://www.walb.com/story/33306335/students-and-community-in-bainbridge-learn-about-zika
By Ashlyn Becton, Reporter
BAINBRIDGE, GA (WALB) – Researchers are making progress in finding ways to fight the Zika virus. Monday, a big crowd learned about that progress during a lunch and learn presentation at Bainbridge State College. Sarah Ogden and Christy Hammock have spent the past year studying the Zika Virus. “I consider myself as a grad student very lucky to work on something that is so important and so relevant at the time,” said Hammock. Both Ogden and Hammock work beside a team of researchers at Florida State University, John Hopkins University and the National Institutes of Health. The team has found drugs that could possibly stop Zika from reproducing. …Students who attended the ‘Lunch and learn’ today said it was very beneficial. …Most students walked out of the hour long presentation more educated about a virus that has already reached the U.S
www.globalatlanta.com
Liberia’s VP to Attend Gala Fundraiser at Georgia Tech for the University Consortium on Oct. 13
Phil Bolton
Liberia‘s vice president, Joseph N. Bokai Sr., is to visit Atlanta Thursday, Oct. 13 to attend a black-tie gala to raise funds on behalf of youth development programs in his country. …Liberia’s government has been committed to restoring its educational systems since the country was devastated by civil wars between 1989 and 2003 and later when Ebola swept the country in 2014, killing more than 4,800 people and forcing schools to be shut for months. …Among the invitees to this year’s gala are representatives of the 21 universities and colleges that work with the consortium, U.S. diplomats and local business leaders. …Savannah State University President Dr. Cheryl Dozier will receive the UCL Institutional Partners Award for her outstanding service to the community, at the dinner. Savannah State has helped established a School of Social Work at the University of Liberia, shipped a 20-foot container of educational supplies and materials to the University of Liberia and AME University and sponsored a 14-member study abroad delegation to Liberia to further engage students, faculty and staff. …Themed “Fashioned for Success,” the fundraiser is scheduled for Thursday, October 13, 2016, in the Georgia Institute of Technology Student Center Ballroom beginning at 7 p.m.
www.savnnahnow.com
Volunteers ‘fight dirty,’ work to keep Tybee Island clean
Grassroots groups scrub marsh, beach of litter; researchers say coastline around Savannah has ‘huge’ amount of trash
http://savannahnow.com/news/2016-10-01/volunteers-fight-dirty-work-keep-tybee-island-clean
By Kelly Quimby
…A few days later, about a mile and a half way from where the Marshtenders worked, another dozen or so volunteers grabbed bright green buckets and a grabbers and headed out onto the sand at Tybee’s 3rd Street beach access. Tybee resident Tim Arnold greeted the volunteers as they approached and gave the first-timers a quick overview of the work. They’d be tackling the equivalent of about five blocks of beach, he said, picking up anything that doesn’t belong — cigarette butts, bottles, cans — and bringing them back, either for repurposing or disposal. Like the Marshtenders, this group, the Tybee Clean Beach Volunteers, began a little more than a year ago with just one volunteer: Arnold. …Arnold said the Clean Beach Volunteers also regularly count and categorize the trash they collect, which they combine with the data from the marsh cleanups. The most recent count on the group’s website shows that the Tybee Clean Beach Volunteers have removed more than 50,000 cigarette butts and thousands of other plastic, Styrofoam or paper products …If these volunteer groups ever wonder if they’re having an effect on the problem, researchers at the University of Georgia’s Skidaway Institute of Oceanography say the answer is a resounding “Yes.” Jay Brandes, a Skidaway professor and researcher who was recently awarded a Georgia Sea Grant to study the effects of microplastics along the Georgia coast, said that previous studies have determined that the area of the Georgia coastline closest to Tybee Island and Savannah is far more inundated with trash than other, less populated areas. The larger human populations create larger volumes of waste, he said, which in one way or another makes its way in large quantities to the marshes and the ocean. “There’s a huge amount of trash out there. There are places that are focal points, that take as much attention as we can possibly get and I think (volunteers), by and large, do a pretty good job at that,” Brandes said. “I have a great deal of admiration for people who are willing to take their time and clean up. They do make a difference.” Both Brandes and his colleague, Dick Lee, a professor emeritus at the Skidaway Institute, agree that plastic is the most pervasive problem.
Higher Education News:
www.insidehighered.com
The Case for College Work Programs
To increase student access and affordability, and improve the business model, a college might want to establish a work program for all its students. Lyle D. Roelofs describes the benefits.
By Lyle D. Roelofs
As colleges and universities across the country grapple with challenges of access and affordability and worry about the sustainability of their business models, some institutions are considering whether or not to establish a program of work for all students. Berea College, where I am president, has offered employment to all of its students for more than a century, and it was one of the founding members of the Work Colleges Consortium. This federally recognized organization includes eight residential liberal arts institutions that provide a universal work experience as part of their educational programing. The work program has become integral to the Berea experience, and it might well be worth consideration at other colleges and universities, too.