Here is a sampling of links and notes about Carolina people and programs cited recently in the media:
International Coverage
Save this city
The Globe and Mail (Canada)
Many of Hamilton's Big Ideas involve generating jobs, to replace those it has lost. Back around 2002, the salvation-du-jour came from John Kasarda, an economic thinker from the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. Kasarda's idea was to translate the 18th-century practice of building cities around ports into a 21st-century model that would see them built around airports.
National Coverage
In Health Care Debate, Fear Trumps Logic
"Morning Edition" National Public Radio
Past efforts to overhaul the nation's health care system had different proponents, different opponents and different plans that were under consideration. …So Jonathan Oberlander, a political scientist at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, says he's not at all surprised to see recent claims — all thoroughly debunked — that suggest, for example, that bills under consideration would encourage senior citizens to commit suicide when they become ill or infirm.
Regional Coverage
Fear, Greed and X-Rays
The Huffington Post (New York, N.Y.)
Fear and greed are potent motivators. When both of these forces push in the same direction, virtually no human being can resist. And doctors — despite many expectations to the contrary — are human beings. …A 2002 University of North Carolina study showed doctors who own imaging equipment sent patients for roughly two to eight times more imaging tests than those who don't own.
Rural NC school system closing desegregation case
The Associated Press
A federal judge is about to close the book on a 1967 civil rights lawsuit against the rural Bertie County schools that dates back to the days of separate schools for black and white students, the school district's superintendent and attorney said Thursday. … Michael Crowell, a professor of public law at the University of North Carolina School of Government, suggested the move is a little unusual because school systems in recent years have not sought to close desegregation cases that are echoes of an earlier generation. "The orders were dealing with circ*mstances in place in the 1960s," said Crowell, who has advised several North Carolina districts on handling vestigial desegregation cases.
State and Local Coverage
2nd 911 tape of student's shooting released
The Herald-Sun (Durham)
Archdale police on Thursday released an audio recording from Sunday morning's shooting of a UNC Chapel Hill student that indicates officers attempted to tell the man to get back into his vehicle moments before police opened fire. On Wednesday, Guilford Metro 911 released an audio recording that indicated Courtland Benjamin Smith, a 21-year-old junior and fraternity president from Houston, Texas, told a 911 dispatcher he was driving drunk, was suicidal and was armed with a 9 mm pistol.
Related Links:
http://www.newsobserver.com/news/story/1665310.html
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/6590445.html
Family: UNC student unarmed, shot four times
WRAL-TV (CBS/Raleigh)
The family of a college student who was killed during a weekend traffic stop said Thursday that evidence they have reviewed in the case shows a police officer shot him four times even though he had no weapon. …Smith was a junior majoring in biology at the University of North Carolina and was president of the Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity on the Chapel Hill campus.
Related Links:
http://abclocal.go.com/wtvd/story?section=news&id=6986402
http://www.heraldsun.com/pages/full_story/push?article-Tragedies+ hold+grim+reminders
%20&id=3295154-Tragedies+hold+grim+reminders&instance=main_article
Colleges say skip if you have flu
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
In returning to campuses this month, Triangle college students are getting an unusual message from university leaders: Don't go to class. Not if you have flu-like symptoms, anyhow. …"There is a fear of the unknown and a fear that the virus will change and become worse," said Mary Covington, director of Campus Health Services at UNC-Chapel Hill.
Funding cut to cost jobs at UNC-CH’s Kannapolis unit
The Triangle Business Journal
The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s fledgling Nutrition Research Institute in Kannapolis is facing job losses after the university cut more than $1 million in funding for the operation. …The institute’s funding was reduced as part of a $12 million state budget cut for UNC System research centers and institutes. UNC is shifting money from other operations to make up about half of what began as a $2.4 million cut in funds for the local institute, says Tony Waldrop, vice chancellor for research and economic development.
Heads up! Writer on road (Blog)
The News & Record (Greensboro)
Randall Kenan, the novelist, short story and nonfiction writer, will read and talk in Winston-Salem on Sept. 8. … He’s now associate professor of English and comparative literature at UNC-Chapel Hill, where he graduated in 1985. Kenan’s appearance at the library is part of Authors on the Road, a program preliminary to the N.C. Literary Festival.
UNC Release:
http://uncnews.unc.edu/content/view/2755/73/
'Ladies of Covington' series author to speak at library Tuesday
The Hickory Daily Record
Boo Bost was thrilled when one of her favorite authors responded to her fan mail with a personal letter. Now Bost, 78, will get a chance to meet Joan Medlicott, author of "The Ladies of Covington" series, in person. Medlicott is a Barnardsville author with stories set near Asheville. She will be in Hickory to sign books, talk about her work and answer questions Tuesday. Her appearance is part of the N.C. Literary Festival, scheduled for Sept. 10 through 13 at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
UNC Release:
http://uncnews.unc.edu/content/view/2755/73/
UNC study: Rogers Road wells tainted
The Carrboro Citizen
Just weeks after being told their neighborhood wouldn’t qualify for a federal improvement grant, the Rogers-Eubanks community has learned from a new UNC study the extent of its well and septic tank failures. …Preliminary findings from the study conducted this summer through a partnership of UNC’s Gillings School of Global Public Health and the Rogers-Eubanks Neighborhood Association (RENA) indicate failing wells and septic tanks throughout the community.
Will Paying Girls To Attend School Reduce HIV Risk?
WFMY-TV (CBS/Greensboro)
The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill has been awarded a $2.7 million grant from the National Institute of Mental Health to study if monetary incentives and community mobilization can help prevent young women in South Africa from becoming infected with HIV. Audrey Pettifor, Ph.D., an assistant professor of epidemiology at UNC's Gillings School of Global Public Health, is the study's principal investigator. She also is a faculty fellow at the Carolina Population Center, where the study is based.
UNC Release:
http://uncnews.unc.edu/content/view/2818/71/
Charges against Sen. Soles hinge on defense statute
The Fayetteville Observer
A law that state Sen. R.C. Soles Jr. helped enact may determine whether any charges are filed in Sunday's shooting at the lawmaker's home. …Joseph E. Kennedy, an associate professor at the University of North Carolina School of Law, said the basic idea is for the person to have a reasonable threat. "The force you use has to be both necessary and proportional," he said.
UNC To Host Talk On Immigration & Education
WCHL 1360-AM (Chapel Hill)
Whenever there’s a discussion regarding health care reform and immigration, tempers are sure to rise. A forum coming soon to UNC regarding higher education access to undocumented immigrants aims to take a more civil tone. Jan Boxill, director of the UNC Parr Center for Ethics, says the discussion will be in conjunction with UNC’s summer reading selection “A Home on the Field.”
A smorgasbord of fall theater productions
The Herald-Sun (Durham)
…PlayMakers will take on a rotating repertory again this year, but with a twist. Rather than two complementary plays, the plays will be parts one and two of the Charles Dickens novel "The Life and Times of Nicholas Nickleby" by David Edgar. PlayMakers artistic director Joseph Haj will direct the east coast premiere of Edgar's version. The cast will feature 24 actors performing on stage at Paul Green Theatre.
UNC Release:
http://uncnews.unc.edu/content/view/2803/66/
Iranian rapper YAS at UNC
The Herald-Sun (Durham)
For the 2009-2010 season, Carolina Performing Arts has added a new series called "Loading Dock." In the past, Carolina Performing Arts has had to turn away artists who prefer a more intimate setting. To accommodate those artists, the series has created "Loading Dock," which will allow the audience to enter the stage at UNC's Memorial Hall through the loading dock, and share the stage with the performers.
Issues and Trends
Out-of-state students still covet UNC, NCSU, NCCU
The Triangle Business Journal
The number of out-of-state students choosing to pay higher tuition to attend the Triangle’s three public universities is holding steady, despite predictions that such numbers would decline due to the sour economy. The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, North Carolina State University and North Carolina Central University each have enrolled enough out-of-state freshmen to match historic percentages, with UNC and NCCU nearing the state-mandated cap of 18 percent and NCSU falling in line with its 10 percent range.
Getting behind brain cancer research (Opinion-Editorial Column)
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
…The nonprofit American Brain Tumor Association, founded in 1973 to promote research and support patients and their families, reports that 12,000 people are diagnosed every year with this form of cancer. …In 2008, it awarded more than $2.7 million to research fellowships, translational and project grants, medical student programs and epidemiology and causation research. In years past, researchers at Duke University, Wake Forest University and UNC-Chapel Hill's medical schools have been recipients. For these men and women receiving ABTA funding, a ray of hope always exists that one day they will discover a successful treatment for this most common form of primary brain cancer.
Phony patients facing charges
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
Hospital patients who gave false names were once merely a headache for hospital administrators. Now, those who are discovered are likely to face criminal charges. …UNC Health Care officials said that they have not taken any patients to court, but that they have begun closely monitoring patients' files and will seek charges against those who give false names. …"People should know that everyone is watching for this now," said Karen McCall, a spokeswoman for UNC Health Care. "Protection of identity has become such an important issue."
UNC tuition break for out-of-staters is crazy (Editorial)
The Charlotte Observer
We've already called it outrageous that N.C. taxpayers subsidize booster clubs by allowing them to pay in-state tuition for out-of-state scholarship athletes. But here's how truly outrageous it is. …That edge may be true at other UNC system schools too. In any case, the 2005 state law allowing in-state tuition for these out-of-staters has enabled schools to exceed a state limit on out-of-state students.
Teachers should be last to go in budget cuts (Editorial)
The Fayetteville Observer
Despite a host of earnest promises that it wouldn't happen this way, North Carolina has chosen to eat its educational seed corn. …One recent study showed that numbers of administrators in the UNC system have grown 28 percent in the past five years, far outpacing the growth of teachers or students. UNC-Chapel Hill Chancellor Holden Thorp, for one, has begun cutting some of them. "We're here to educate the citizens of North Carolina and produce scholars that help North Carolina and the rest of the world with their problems, and if we are spending money on the administration, we are not spending money on that."
