uncnews.unc.edu

Here is a sampling of links and notes about Carolina people and programs cited recently in the media:

International Coverage

Jury Weighs John Edwards’s Tale of Self-Admitted Egotism
Bloomberg Businessweek
John Edwards campaigned for president with a tale of “two Americas,” one rich, one poor, and vowed to bridge them. ...“I don’t think there is a lot of thirst for him going to jail, and that’s what it comes down to,” said J.F. “Ferrel” Guillory, director of the Program on Public Life at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. “Is he a sinner? Yes. Is he a criminal? Maybe not.”

Living in the jet stream (Editorial)
The Sydney Morning Herald (Australia)
...This phenomenon has a name - ''aerotroplis'' - and a guru, John Kasarda of the University of North Carolina. ''Airports will shape business location and urban development in the 21st century as much as highways did in the 20th century, railroads in the 19th and seaports in the 18th,'' he says.

National Coverage

Adrift in Oratory (Editorial)
The New York Times
...On some campuses, the choice of a speaker is more important than the speech itself — which is why students have so far this year protested the selection of Mitt Romney at Liberty University, a Christian school; Mayor Michael Bloomberg at the University of North Carolina; and Senator Rob Portman at the University of Michigan Law School.

Obama on the High Wire (Blog)
The New York Times
...The roots of Democratic Party vulnerability on affirmative action and other forms of group-based “preferences” lie in the social, cultural and moral revolutions of the 1960s and 70s – revolutions that have been the source of contemporary liberalism’s strengths and liabilities. This is perhaps best illustrated in the following chart, created by two political scientists, Christopher Ellis of Bucknell and James Stimson of the University of North Carolina.

The Debt Debate: What's Real and What's Disingenuous
"Up with Chris Hayes" MSNBC
..."Whatever you believe people think about the debt, at the end of the day, what they care more about is what unemployment is like, what their jobs are like, what their families are experiencing. And if you know and believe [as a member of Congress] that we can lower unemployment by doing this, you take the short term track and then you win the election because unemployment is lower," said Karl Smith, assistant professor of economics and government at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Ballplayers say it's their choice how to slide
The Associated Press
...Arizona State's Cory Hahn was left paralyzed from the chest down last season after going into second base headfirst. He fractured a vertebra in his neck when his head struck the knee of New Mexico's second baseman. ...Hahn is among nine players since 1982 who were paralyzed as a result of headfirst slides, according to the National Center for Catastrophic Sport Injury Research at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill.

Wilmington 10 members seeking pardons from NC governor for 40-year-old race-riot convictions
The Associated Press
...Police originally arrested more than a dozen suspects and despite weak evidence against the Wilmington 10, the members were tried and convicted by authorities intent on clamping down on the unrest, said Kenneth Janken. A professor of Afro-American studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Janken is working on a history of the Wilmington 10.

Will College Students Really Step Up in U.S. Microfinance?
The Huffington Post
I admit it, I was doubtful at first -- college students providing quality training and financing services to under-served small businesses surrounding their campus communities? ...Groups led by students from Yale, Rutgers, Brown and UNC Chapel Hill were quickly learning the ropes, and providing some innovative services and financial products.

State and Local Coverage

Four decades later, Ben Chavis and the Wilmington Ten seek a declaration of innocence
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
...“Ben had come to town and was trying to make the school integration happen in a way that was more acceptable to black students and teachers, but that was rough sledding,” said (Timothy B.) Tyson, who teaches at Duke University and UNC-Chapel Hill. Tyson wrote about Chavis in “Blood Done Sign My Name,” his 2004 book about the 1970 murder of Chavis’ first cousin in Oxford, where both men grew up.

Wilmington 10 members seek pardon from Perdue
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
Forty years after their conviction, the Wilmington 10 are asking Gov. Bev Perdue to declare them innocent, saying pardons would “remove from North Carolina this stain of shame” from a case that became an international symbol for civil rights in the South. ...“All of this pressure built up on N.C. politicians and President Jimmy Carter to comment on the Wilmington 10,” said Kenneth Janken, an Afro-American studies professor at UNC-Chapel Hill who is writing a book about the group. “It was something the nation and world became aware of.”

Taking on Alzheimer’s (Editorial)
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
The National Institutes of Health is taking direct aim at one of the biggest health problems in the world, Alzheimer’s disease. NIH Director Dr. Francis Collins last week announced a multi-pronged effort to prevent the disease from occurring in people who are vulnerable to it and to halt and even reverse its effects in those whose minds are already affected by Alzheimer’s. It’s an ambitious agenda, but one well worth undertaking. Collins, a renowned genetic scientist who received his M.D. degree at UNC-Chapel Hill in 1977, says genetic and biological research has advanced to an “exceptional moment” at which major progress is possible against an affliction that is ultra-costly, in every sense, to care for.

Guggenheim wishes…granted
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
A mysterious email message hit the inboxes of five people in the Triangle in late February. They were among nearly 3,000 who had applied for Guggenheim Fellowships, and the message said their names had been forwarded to the foundation’s board of trustees. Good news, right? ...The five local winners are among 181 receiving five-figure grants this year. Lisa A. Lindsay, 45, Associate professor of history, UNC-Chapel Hill

Drescher: Three defiant voices tell courageous stories (Column)
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
I was asked to speak Sunday to the graduates of the UNC School of Journalism and Mass Communication. Here is a condensed version: Some of you plan a career in news. Many of you do not. You might go into advertising, public relations, law, business, nonprofit work or teaching.

2012 graduates find improving job market
The Times-News (Burlington)
Whatever the job market for college graduates looks like now, it’s still better than it was five years ago when the economy took a nosedive. ...Ray Angle, director of university career services at UNC-Chapel Hill, agreed. “If we look at it from a recruitings perspective … it looks slightly better,” he said and cited a 7 percent increase in on-campus recruiting and the same percentage of employers attending career fairs this school year.

Opening up Facebook’s privacy technology (Opinion-Editorial Column)
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
If Facebook’s initial public offering succeeds in achieving a $90 billion valuation for the social network, each of Facebook’s 900 million users can take pride in contributing $100 toward the company’s fortunes. If you’re a user, Facebook’s founder and 28 percent owner Mark Zuckerberg should consider you his friend. How many of your Facebook friends have enriched you by as much as $28? (Andrew Chin is associate professor of law at the UNC School of Law. He also holds a doctoral degree in mathematics.)

‘Comics’ get serious attention
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
...“It encompasses a whole universe now that has nothing to do with funny,” said Will Hansen, a curator of rare books and manuscripts at Duke University. Hansen was on a scholarly panel talking about comics – or, as he put it, “narrative sequential art” – at the Durham County Library’s Southwest Branch on Sunday afternoon. It was the closing event of a two-day Comics Fest that included workshops on creating comics for kids and grownups, a talk by a best-selling author of graphic novels and the panel on which Duke and UNC scholars discussed comics’ evolution and their recognition as cultural products deserving serious attention.

Sharpless appointed Wellcome Distinguished Professor
The Herald-Sun (Durham)
Dr. Norman E. “Ned” Sharpless, professor of medicine and genetics and associate director for translational research at the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center, has been appointed the Wellcome Distinguished Professor in Cancer Research.

Watching Our Wasteline: Get ready for spring cleaning
The Chapel Hill Herald
...Amy Preble of UNC Office of Waste Reduction reports its end-of-year move-out donation station programs were successful. This year UNC partnered with Triangle Residential Options for Substance Abusers (TROSA), based in Durham, to recover the housewares, furniture, clothing, carpeting and other usable discards from students moving out of dormitories and other on-campus facilities like the graduate student housing at Odom Village.

UNC Physicians named first Sanders Clinician Scholars
The Herald-Sun (Durham)
Dr. Paul Chelminski, MD, MPH, and Dr. Samantha Meltzer-Brody, MD, MPH, have been announced as the first two Sanders Clinician Scholars. Their appointments are effective July 1. In the role, they will develop educational efforts to enhance supportive direct personal contact to the daily care of patients, and to teach others to do the same, according to a news release.

Issues and Trends

William Friday’s condition upgraded
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
UNC President Emeritus William Friday’s condition was upgraded from critical to serious on Saturday, a UNC Hospitals spokeswoman said. Friday, 91, had been hospitalized for several days in critical condition. He improved after receiving a permanent pacemaker on Thursday.
Related Links:
http://abclocal.go.com/wtvd/story?section=news/local&id=8669524
http://www2.nbc17.com/news/2012/may/18/3/friday-remains-
critical-condition-improved-ar-2291430/
http://www.wral.com/news/local/story/11120914/

College students to see hefty insurance price hike
The Star News (Wilmington)
Students at the University of North Carolina Wilmington who buy their health insurance from the school will experience sticker shock in the fall. But they won't be alone. Prices for health insurance at all 16 UNC-system campuses will increase as the program deals with new federal regulations and costs from the high level of medical claims made by students across the system.

As Elite Colleges Invite the World Online, Questions Remain on Their Business Plans
The Chronicle of Higher Education
When Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology announced this month that they were forming a partnership to offer online courses free to the masses, they pledged $60-million to the effort, dubbed edX. That’s about twice the median budget of four-year colleges and universities in the United States. All for courses that, for now, won’t bring in a penny in tuition revenue.