| Thursday, July 13, 2023 |
| Local camp inspires next generation of entrepreneurs | |
 | Taylor Herron always knew that she had a love for creating art and two years ago her mother pushed her to try out the "I Create Camp" so she could learn how to turn her art into a business. "How I do art honestly I don't know where I want to go but I want to potentially have my own art business and also my own series of comics or anything so I think what this has done is figure out a more social stance instead of just private because a lot of artists stay back in private," said Herron. Herron said she learned different aspects of becoming an entrepreneur, but the one that stood out was the need to sell herself. "This camp showed me that there are ways to do that instead of making a piece and saying here you go look at it I have to present myself with it too and I was able to make personal improvements in ways that I didn't have before," said Herron. Jeffrey Rupp is the Director of Outreach for the College of Business at Mississippi State. He said that camps like these show kids, that anyone has the opportunity to become their own boss. Rupp said becoming a successful entrepreneur isn't something that happens overnight. "Failure is not a bad word in entrepreneurship. Most entrepreneurs fail the first time out, the second time out. It's the resilience and learning from your failure that makes the next venture a success," said Rupp. |
| Area kids to learn importance of money managing at Lemonade Day event | |
| Young entrepreneurs are getting ready to sell fresh glasses of lemonade with a side of ambition. Lemonade Day gives kids their first taste of building a business and many are even able to receive micro-loans from Cadence Bank to get started and learn the importance of managing your finances. Participants will be setting up shop all over the Golden Triangle on July 15 and it's expected to be bigger than ever. "It all started about five years ago with Mark Castleberry wanting to sponsor it and it started just in Starkville and has grown to the Golden Triangle. In fact, we've got over 300 kids signed up and over 100 stands which is amazing and is much bigger than some cities that are much larger than us," said Jeffrey Rupp, MSU Director of Outreach, College of Business. |
| Flash flood emergency issued for Louisville, roads closed due to flooding | |
 | The National Weather Service in Jackson issued a flash flood emergency for Louisville with catastrophic damage possible. Radar confirmed at least 8 inches of rainfall within 24 hours as of 9:30 a.m. on Thursday with rain continuing to fall. NWS confirmed reports of multiple cars and structures flooded. There are also ongoing water rescues in the area. Winston County Sheriff Jason Pugh said Hwy 15 in Louisville is closed. The sheriff also said the four lane/two lane transition toward Ackerman on Hwy 15 is closed because of at least five inches of water over the road. First responders are also responding to Highway 82 in Lowndes County. There are multiple cars off of the highway between GTR Airport and the City of Columbus. Staff Sergeant Derrick Beckom with the Mississippi Highway Patrol said there have been seven accidents in the Golden Triangle area before 10:30 a.m. He said vehicles have run off the road because of rain. |
| Crops, cars and homes battered by hail in Mississippi. Where does it come from? | |
 | Mississippi experienced multiple storms last month with large hail that damaged homes, totaled vehicles and destroyed crops, but where does this stuff come from? The obvious answer is the sky, but how it gets there is fascinating. It starts with warm day, a cold upper atmosphere, moisture and amazingly fast upward winds. Sarah Sickles, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Jackson explained that conditions were ripe for damaging hail in mid-June with warm temperatures in the lower atmosphere, but temperatures above remained very cold. "You're transitioning from spring to summer in June," Sickles said. "So, you still have colder air aloft." This transition makes for unstable, violent weather. Sickles explained that this combination creates warm updrafts that can go high enough to meet the freezing temperatures above and super-cooled water droplets begin to form hailstones. The Crystal Springs area of Copiah County was hit with golfball-sized hail and there were reports of hail about 5 inches in diameter in eastern Mississippi. According to Jaimie Dyer, Mississippi State University professor of meteorology and climatology, it takes an extreme updraft to produce a hailstone like that. |
| Child porn arrest sparks federal agency involvement | |
 | A Maben man's child pornography case may be handed off to federal authorities, according to Oktibbeha County Sheriff's Office. Adam Naramore, 45, was charged Tuesday with possession of child pornography, jail records indicate. OCSO Capt. Brett Watson said Naramore had been extradited from Cordele, Georgia, on an unrelated charge, and the pornography investigation began after his return to Oktibbeha County. Watson did not release many details on the case, citing the potential involvement of federal authorities, but said deputies found the child pornography through "electronic means" after a search warrant was issued. OCSO Lt. Jon Davis said more charges are expected. Naramore is a registered sex offender who was convicted in 2003 of 25 counts of exploitation of children in Greene County. |
| North Mississippi health system announces layoffs | |
 | North Mississippi Health Services is laying off employees, cutting their hours and reassigning them to different jobs. The health system announced the changes in an internal email to staff on Wednesday, sent on behalf of CEO Shane Spees. It is unclear how many and what kind of employees are being impacted by the layoffs and reduction in hours. A spokesperson could not be reached to answer questions by press time. "Financial losses limit the funds available to staff beds, maintain technology and grow services," the email reads. "To fulfill our mission -- our responsibility to the community to continuously improve their health -- we must make our own dramatic shift at NMHS." The changes are part of a massive "redesign" necessitated by financial losses incurred by the pandemic and a movement in health care toward outpatient care, according to the email. However, the same email claims that the health system has a "strong balance sheet" and has received an "A" rating for its financial management during the pandemic. North Mississippi joins other Mississippi hospitals that have announced layoffs in recent months. Other hospitals are shuttering service lines in an effort to stay open. |
| Hosemann keeps cash lead over McDaniel as campaign finance report questions continue | |
 | In the Republican primary for lieutenant governor, incumbent Delbert Hosemann continues to outraise and outspend his challenger, state senator Chris McDaniel, more than 5-to-1. Hosemann reports over 10 times more cash on hand than McDaniel, whose latest reported year-to-date contributions seem to still include $465,000 he previously said he would return. Monday was the deadline for June's periodic campaign finance reports, the last filing before next month's primary. Reports are publicly available on the secretary of state's website. The most heavily funded matchup in the Aug. 8 primary is the Republican nomination for lieutenant governor. In June, Hosemann raised about $547,600 and McDaniel raised about $97,500. Both candidates spent about 1.5 times more than they took in during the month. Hosemann spent over $835,000 and McDaniel over $146,000. McDaniel's latest filing appears to include in his year-to-date contributions the $465,000 he previously said he would return after allegations of accepting improper campaign finance contributions. That money, given to the senator's campaign by his political action committee, reportedly was given to the PAC by the Virginia nonprofit American Exceptionalism Institute. McDaniel has not been criminally charged or sued in civil court over the campaign finance dispute. Hosemann's campaign filed a complaint with state officials earlier this year. |
| Governor candidates clash over Mississippi's Medicaid leadership | |
| Nearly 30,000 Mississippians previously receiving Medicaid benefits are now no longer covered by the government-subsidized insurance program. The Division of Medicaid (DOM) announced in April that it would begin restarting its yearly Medicaid eligibility reviews due to the ending of the national emergency issued for the COVID-19 pandemic. From March 2020 to June 2023, an additional nearly 200,000 Mississippians started receiving Medicaid coverage as a result of DOM putting a halt on periodic reviews of an enrollee's eligibility. On Monday, Mississippi Democratic gubernatorial candidate Brandon Presley unveiled his healthcare policy plan, which included expanding Medicaid services throughout the state and replacing current DOM Executive Director Drew Snyder with a healthcare professional, not a "career political hack." Governor Tate Reeves' staff on Wednesday responded to the shot the Democratic candidate took at the executive director. "Drew is doing a great job, and we are grateful for his service to Mississippi," Reeves' deputy chief of staff Cory Custer told SuperTalk Mississippi News. "Thankfully, Brandon Presley will never be governor, so this is really a non-issue." Snyder was appointed to his current position by former governor Phil Bryant in 2018. Reeves retained him as the DOM's executive director when he took office in 2019. |
| In new TV ads, Presley promotes helping poor Mississippians while Reeves pushes trans athletes ban | |
| Mississippians will soon see a lot more of the state's two leading candidates for governor as Democrat Brandon Presley and Republican Gov. Tate Reeves unveiled new television ads on Tuesday. Presley began airing his first TV ad of the 2023 campaign cycle, a minute-long video detailing the struggles his family faced while growing up poor in rural Mississippi -- a common message he's pushed throughout his campaign. Given his low name ID in central and south Mississippi, television ads for Presley, who has served 15 years as north Mississippi's utility regulator, will be crucial to his quest in trying to oust Republican Gov. Tate Reeves from office. Reeves on the same day released his third TV ad of the year, a 30-second clip featuring one of his daughters playing soccer and touting his support for laws that bar transgender youth from competing in sporting events. Reeves, running for a second four-year term as governor, has used anti-trans rhetoric throughout his campaign and highlighted his efforts to prevent trans athletes from competing in women's sports. |
| Mississippi discriminates against Black residents with appointed judges, Justice Department says | |
 | A new Mississippi law discriminates against residents of the majority-Black capital city of Jackson by requiring the appointment of some judges in a state where most judges are elected, the U.S. Justice Department said in court papers filed Wednesday. The department is seeking to join a federal lawsuit the NAACP filed against the state shortly after Republican Gov. Tate Reeves signed the law in April. Kristen Clarke, the department's assistant attorney general for civil rights, said in a statement that Mississippi lawmakers created "a crude scheme that singles out and discriminates against Black residents" in Jackson and Hinds County, where the city is located. Clarke said the law creates a "two-tiered system of justice" with judges and prosecutors chosen by state officials. U.S. District Judge Henry Wingate has temporarily blocked the law from taking effect. Wingate would have to approve the Justice Department's request to intervene in the lawsuit. The department said in its court filing Wednesday that the Mississippi law discriminates against people based on race, violating the U.S. Constitution's equal protection guarantee. |
| U.S. Dept. of Justice intervenes in NAACP's lawsuit challenging HB 1020 | |
| The United States Department of Justice has motioned to intervene in the lawsuit filed by the NAACP against House Bill 1020 that seeks to assist in clearing backlogs in the court system and expands police presence in the city of Jackson, Mississippi. HB 1020 was passed in the 2023 Legislative session and would ultimately increase temporary appointed judges and prosecutors within the Hinds County court system. It would also establish a new separate temporary court for the Capitol Complex Improvement District (CCID) and expand the jurisdiction the authority of the Capitol Police throughout the city of Jackson. Lawsuits have been filed both on the state and federal level against the legislation which was signed into law by Governor Tate Reeves. In April, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) filed suit to challenge HB 1020 and a companion bill (SB 2343) which increases the boundaries of the CCID and gives the Capitol Police force the additional jurisdiction. The plaintiffs believe that the two bills will discriminate against the residents of Jackson, a majority black city, on the basis of race. Upon hearing of the move by the U.S. Justice Department, Governor Reeves took to social media to express his displeasure with the Biden Administration's action. "Biden's Department of Justice won't prosecute Hunter Biden's drug and gun crimes, but they will work to undermine the cops protecting the citizens of Jackson," Governor Reeves tweeted. "I stand on the side of safety for Jackson residents and law and order in our capital city." |
| Few options remain for Mississippians convicted of certain felonies to regain voting rights | |
| Mississippians convicted of certain felonies have few options to regain their voting rights -- a standard practice in most other states -- after the U.S. Supreme Court refused to take up a case attempting to end the lifetime ban on voting. The nation's highest court, by a 7-2 vote in late June, refused to hear a Mississippi lawsuit arguing that the state's lifetime ban on voting for people convicted of certain felonies was unconstitutional. Racist white lawmakers in 1890 who wrote the provision into the current Mississippi Constitution said plainly that they adopted it to keep African Americans from voting. Now that the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear the Mississippi case, the state remains in the minority as one of fewer than 10 to impose a lifetime ban on voting for people convicted of felonies. It also appears efforts to remove the ban through the courts have been exhausted. Legal advocates who have long been fighting the Jim Crow provision are now turning their focus to the only viable solution left: the legislative process. |
| Mississippi prosecutors call attorney general's request to overturn a conviction 'unprecedented' | |
| The prosecutor's office in Mississippi's largest county says the state's attorney general made a politically motivated decision to ask an appeals court to overturn the conviction of a former police officer in the 2019 beating death of a man who was pulled from a vehicle and subdued by three officers. The Hinds County District Attorney's office issued a statement Wednesday criticizing Attorney General Lynn Fitch for taking an "unprecedented" step of opposing a jury verdict, WJTV reported. "It is the Attorney General's job to defend this verdict," the statement said. "If the Court of Appeals wishes to overturn the verdict, that is their job, not hers." In an email, a spokesperson for Fitch said the attorney general believes there is legal precedent to support overturning the conviction. Last August, a Hinds County jury convicted former Jackson detective Anthony Fox of culpable negligence manslaughter in the 2019 beating death of 62-year-old George Robinson. News outlets reported Fox was accused of pulling Robinson from a car and striking him in the head and chest as police were searching for a murder suspect. Hinds County Coroner Sharon Grisham-Stewart ruled the death a homicide by blunt-force trauma. The Hinds County District Attorney's Office said it could find no other case in which the attorney general, who represents the state in criminal appeals, took such a position. The statement also says several law enforcement agencies issued prepared statements within minutes of Fitch filing the brief on Monday, indicating the statements "could only have been coordinated at the request of the Attorney General." |
| Congress tackles food stamp changes in the farm bill | |
 | Patrons of the Urban Ministries food bank in Raleigh, N.C., line up in their cars outside the door, waiting to be among the first inside. It's a daily ritual. Residents from nearby neighborhoods travel into the city for their weekly groceries. Fruits and vegetables are in bins and canned goods are ready to be bagged. Food bank employees and volunteers line shopping carts with boxes of food. And because it is a food bank, customers don't pay. Urban Ministries, like many food banks across the country, has seen an increase in customers this year after federal expansions to programs like the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program ended. As folks get their boxes of food, they are asked if they are already participating in SNAP, as a way to locally gauge how many people are on the assistance and still need the food bank's help. "What they're seeing is that there's an increase in folks who are saying, 'Yes, I do receive SNAP,' but their distribution numbers here are staying about the same," said Emily Kraft, the director of community outreach and support services at the Foodbank, an organization in North Carolina. "So it really reinforces that idea that SNAP is meant to be supplemental -- that is not meant to be someone's entire food budget, which is why folks are still stopping in here." Perhaps at most disadvantage are people in rural areas. Parts of the state lack jobs, transportation, broadband and grocery stories, Kraft said, which increases reliance on SNAP and food banks. Now lawmakers and advocates have a new vehicle for expanded benefits: the 2023 farm bill. |
| 'Stop demonizing government,' 20-year veteran Senate chaplain urges | |
 | Twenty years ago last week, a new Senate chaplain offered a prayer thanking God for his predecessor's "legacy of faithfulness" and imploring heaven to "give these leaders the gift of discernment that they will know what matters most, and approve what is excellent." It was a job Chaplain Barry Black, a retired Navy rear admiral who had spent 27 years ministering to the military, never expected to still be holding in 2023. "As George Strait puts it so eloquently in one of his songs, in my opinion, this is where the cowboy rides away. So I fully expected for a very brief stint in the legislative branch," Black said in a July 7 phone interview, 20 years to the day after that first Senate prayer. But it's a post that has made Black one of the most visible staff members of the Senate, and one from which he wanted to offer some advice for fellow Americans. "We need to stop demonizing government and governmental workers," he said, saying there needs to be a better appreciation for the role of the government in "holding in check the chaotic." He cited Romans 13:1-7, in particular the part about the need to honor those to whom honor is due. "That's why we call them 'the honorable,'" Black said. "There are people who deserve honor just because of the position, and we need to have respect even when someone we didn't vote for ends up being in charge." Two decades into his open-ended appointment (because the Senate is a continuing body, there doesn't need to be a new chaplain elected until there's a vacancy), Black says he remains fascinated by the work of ministers in pluralistic settings, be it the Navy or the Capitol. |
| Republicans plan efforts to tout early voting tactics they once vilified | |
 | Former president Donald Trump and Republican allies have long vilified mail-in voting and what is called ballot harvesting, alleging without presenting evidence that the practices are rife with fraud and encouraging Republicans to vote in person instead. "There is no way you can go through a mail-in vote without massive cheating," Trump said in August 2020. "GET RID OF BALLOT HARVESTING!" he wrote in a Twitter message that same year, referring to entities in certain states that are authorized to collect ballots and deliver them to elections officials. But now, after disappointing election results in 2020 and 2022, Republicans close to Trump are seeking to raise hundreds of millions of dollars to build programs that would encourage some of the practices that the former president and other Republicans once decried, according to documents reviewed by The Washington Post and interviews with GOP operatives involved in the programs. Many of the people involved in the efforts worked for Trump or Trump-affiliated groups in the last election, and some have espoused claims that the 2020 election was stolen. The Post identified at least five efforts by groups led by prominent Trump allies or former Trump advisers, and strategists involved in the groups say they are competing for donors and support. All appear to have been created within the past year. The groups have little experience in such work, and the jockeying is generating concern among some Republicans. It is unclear how many Republican donors will give to such measures and whether many GOP voters who have been skeptical of mail-in voting will participate. |
| DeSantis is hoping Iowa evangelicals can make his campaign born again | |
 | As Ron DeSantis loses believers in the Beltway, he finds faith among some Iowa evangelical leaders. The Florida governor and his super PAC have been feverishly working the religious circuit in the nation's first caucus state, trying to capitalize on Donald Trump's unleashing of vitriol against the state's Republican governor, Kim Reynolds. Now DeSantis has his best chance yet to appeal to this influential voting base and try to rewrite his campaign's narrative amid lagging poll numbers and a barrage of increasingly negative headlines. On Friday, he will address The Family Leader, an influential Christian organization that draws a large crowd of conservative pastors. "I really think America wants to turn the page," Bob Vander Plaats, CEO of The Family Leader, said in an interview. "If you're looking for an alternative to Trump, I think Gov. DeSantis is the frontrunner right now." For DeSantis, the pressure to find momentum anywhere is growing. Though Trump remains far ahead in polling in Iowa, people in DeSantis' orbit view the state as an opportunity. DeSantis isn't alone as he stumps through Iowa. Former Vice President Mike Pence announced his presidential candidacy there and, like other candidates, has been campaigning throughout the Hawkeye State. Despite his public criticism of Reynolds, the popular governor, Trump rallied supporters in Iowa last week. And while no single entity has spent as much as Never Back Down, Sen. Tim Scott and his super PAC have collectively shelled out nearly $6 million on ads. |
| US House majority in play next year after weak GOP midterm showing and recent court ruling | |
| Republican Rep. David Schweikert used to win his wealthy, suburban Phoenix congressional district by nearly 30 points. Then Donald Trump was elected president, and his victories started shrinking. Schweikert, who won his last election by just 3,200 votes, is now among the top 2024 targets for Democrats, who sense better-than-expected odds of retaking the House majority they lost last year. After an anemic showing in the midterms, Republicans have virtually no cushion in their quest to retain control of the House, which was made all the more complicated by a surprise U.S. Supreme Court decision last month that will likely bring two new safely Democratic districts. Democrats need to pick up just five seats to control the House. Republicans are counting on a strong showing from incumbents like Schweikert, one of 18 GOP lawmakers representing districts that supported Democrat Joe Biden for president in 2020. Many are in upscale suburbs like Scottsdale that lean conservative but have rejected Trump and the party he now dominates. In contrast, only five Democrats represent districts that Trump won. "I've been Republican since JFK," said Roy Ross, a 74-year-old retired oil company manager who registered as an independent when he moved to Schweikert's district from Tennessee two years ago. "But the last two elections, I just said, 'I can't do that.'" Still, he said, "I can't say that I'm hearing a lot from Democrats, either." Schweikert's fate in Arizona, and that of the GOP's House majority, will come down to the decisions of voters like Ross. |
| Chinese Hackers Targeted Commerce Secretary and Other U.S. Officials | |
 | Chinese hackers penetrated the email accounts of Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo and other State and Commerce Department officials in the weeks before Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken traveled to Beijing in June, U.S. officials said on Wednesday. The investigation of the efforts by the Chinese hackers, who likely are affiliated with China's military or spy services, is ongoing, American officials said. But U.S. officials have downplayed the idea that the hackers stole sensitive information, insisting that no classified email or cloud systems were penetrated. The State Department's cybersecurity team first discovered the intrusion. Ms. Raimondo, who has been one of the most outspoken critics of Beijing in the administration, was among the targets, according to two U.S. officials. She has tightened export controls on China and threatened to cut off the country's supply of U.S. semiconductor technology if it provides the chips to Russia. Ms. Raimondo is expected to visit China by the end of the summer. Based on their preliminary investigation, officials believe she was the only cabinet-level official to be successfully hacked. The hackers were not able to acquire emails in Mr. Blinken's Microsoft 365 account, even as they got access to other State Department email boxes, officials said. |
| ChatGPT Under Investigation by FTC | |
 | The Federal Trade Commission is investigating whether OpenAI's ChatGPT artificial-intelligence system has harmed individuals by publishing false information about them, according to a letter the agency sent to the company. The letter, reported earlier by The Washington Post and confirmed by a person familiar with the matter, also asked detailed questions about the company's data-security practices, citing a 2020 incident in which the company disclosed a bug that allowed users to see information about other users' chats and some payment-related information. A representative of OpenAI didn't immediately respond to a request for comment. The FTC probe represents a potential legal threat for the app, which gained wide popularity after it was released late last year for its ability to generate humanlike outputs of text in response to prompts. The FTC letter, known as a civil investigative demand, poses dozens of questions. Other topics covered include the company's marketing efforts, its practices for training AI models, and its handling of users' personal information. The FTC, led by Chair Lina Khan, has broad authority to police unfair and deceptive business practices. The FTC letter focuses closely on how the company is addressing the risks that its AI system could be used to generate false assertions about real people. Lawmakers have been especially concerned about the risks of so-called deepfake videos that falsely depict real people taking embarrassing actions or making embarrassing statements. |
| Black farmers rethink the South's potential in face of climate change | |
 | The Mississippi Delta and the surrounding region, with its abundant water, good soil and inexpensive land, could help feed America as climate change makes California's farms struggle. The World Wildlife Fund has committed to turning eastern Arkansas, western Tennessee, southeastern Missouri and northwestern Mississippi into the "next California." Robinson is part of the advisory panel guiding that project. "Roughly less than a percent of the Delta land acres are in fruit and vegetable production now," said Marty Matlock, a biosystems engineer at the University of Arkansas. "If we were to increase that to 5%, we would increase the economic value to $4.5 billion. We're not talking about a whole transformation." The World Wildlife Fund and its partners -- farmers, scientists, economists and directors of nonprofits -- are currently working to make that change in the middle Mississippi Delta region. They are finding the crops and varietals of fruits and vegetables that will grow in the South. They are figuring out how many workers will be needed in those fields. And they are calculating the environmental advantages of specialty crops in the Mississippi Delta region. The wildlife fund and its partners also see a future for the region that fixes the injustices of the past. "We want to focus on Black farmers," said Julia Kurnik, who leads the Next California project for the fund. "In this region, Black farmers are the hardest hit group and the group that is disappearing." |
| MUW prepares for upcoming semester with orientation sessions | |
| Getting used to a new school can be a challenge at any age, even if you're a college student. Mississippi University for Women has been holding orientation sessions all Summer. Wednesday was set aside for transfer students coming in from community colleges and other universities. These incoming students spent the day learning about housing, student life, campus activities, and all the things that make The W unique. "One thing I can say is definitely a plus is we have one-on-one student and professor relationships, so a lot of students come into college, and they have like 400 to 500 students in a class. Here at The W, we have about 10 to 15, so they will have that one-on-one with their professors," said Keyunda Mayze, Orientation Leader at MUW. |
| The Modern Gentlemen to perform free concert at The W | |
| An acclaimed vocal group with fans around the world will perform a free concert in Northeast Mississippi later this month. The Modern Gentlemen will perform Tuesday, July 25, at 7 p.m. at the Kossen Auditorium in Poindexter Hall on the campus of Mississippi University for Women. This free concert is made possible by the Leslie Farrell Threadgill Lecture and Artist Series. "We appreciate the generosity of the Threadgill family for honoring Leslie Threadgill with this endowment supporting arts and educational opportunities for the local community on our campus," said Andrea Stevens, executive director of development and alumni at MUW. Known for their extraordinary harmonies and captivating stage presence, The Modern Gentlemen have garnered international attention for their vocal talents. "Leslie Threadgill was in the class of '52 here and a home economics major," Stevens said. "Her husband, Bill, and their kids established the endowment in her honor in 1997. She was a fixture on this campus for her lifetime. Most of the programs in the series have been musicals because the family loved Broadway, and they traveled often to New York." |
| Reading for fun plunges to 'crisis' level for US students | |
 | Amid a cascade of devastating reports showing classroom test scores plummeting nationwide, U.S. students have also hit a record low in their leisure time: Casual reading has collapsed. Only 14 percent of students say they read for fun every day, according to the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) report released recently, down 3 percentage points from 2020 and 13 since 2012. The report indicates 31 percent of students never or hardly ever read for fun. Experts say the relationship between reading and academic success is crucial at a time when students are facing roadblocks to reading for fun, ranging from social media to not being introduced to books that interest them. "We definitely have a crisis on our hands, and what's wonderful is I really definitely think that we have an antidote for what ails us here," said Sasha Quinton, executive vice president and president for Scholastic School Reading Events. "If we focus on that book joy and just connecting kids to funny stories and explosive stories and things that sparked their interest, then they are learning to read and they are on the path to being lifelong readers." The crisis Quinton speaks of has built up through multiple factors, one of the biggest arguably being technology and social media, which is reaching younger and younger children. |
| U. of Florida Police Department recognized for mental health response work | |
 | The University of Florida Police Department is making strides in its efforts in handling mental health emergencies around the Gainesville campus. UFPD has recently been honored as a national leader in mental health programs and initiatives. A plaque was given to the police department recognizing their work as a law enforcement-mental health learning site, the department announced. The program, within the Bureau of Justice Assistance, helps law enforcement agencies who aim to build collaborative responses for individuals facing mental health struggles. Leading the way in mental health-law enforcement policies for over a decade, UFPD was part of six initial agencies selected as learning sites in 2011 when the program first launched, according to the Council of State Governments' Justice Center. "I am extremely proud of our agency for its involvement with progressive policing models proven to benefit our UF community and beyond," Chief of Police Linda Stump-Kurnick said in a press release. "We are grateful for this recognition and look forward to our continued partnership with this innovative program." One vital part of its initiatives is the co-responder program, implemented in June 2022, which pairs clinicians with law enforcement officers to improve the department's response to those experiencing mental distress or a mental health crisis. |
| Texas A&M journalism program in flux after McElroy departure | |
 | Chip Stewart termed Texas A&M's hire of Kathleen McElroy last month to rebuild and relaunch journalism as the program's new director a "coup." Stewart was a candidate for the director position, but withdrew his name for personal reasons. He has since accepted an assistant provost role at TCU, where he is also a professor of journalism. McElroy, A&M Class of 1981 who became an esteemed journalist and later educator at the University of Texas at Austin, was touted as a former student who returned to her alma mater. Less than a month later, she left her role before she was supposed to begin in August. Behind the scenes, McElroy said she thinks A&M leadership was forced to listen to outside influences with "great concerns" on diversity, equity and inclusion. McElroy said A&M officials she worked with made it clear they knew she wasn't a "DEI advocate or proponent" and that those views weren't her main academic mission. McElroy's research has included the relationship between news media and race and her doctoral thesis was on the obituaries of civil rights leaders. For the first time ever, Roland Martin is ashamed to be an Aggie. Martin, A&M Class of 1991 and longtime journalist and political analyst, called the actions by A&M leadership that caused McElroy to spurn her offer to return to her alma mater petty and childish. "What Texas A&M is saying is that someone like me, who is in three halls of fame, somehow isn't good enough for A&M," Martin said. "This situation is why Texas A&M is considered by many to be a second-rate university. Actions like this is why we will never be considered one of the nation's preeminent universities." |
| Texas A&M Celebrated a New Journalism Director. Then Came the Complaints. | |
| Kathleen McElroy, who had recently served as the director of the University of Texas's School of Journalism, was thrilled to embark on a new assignment: running a similar program at her alma mater, Texas A&M University. The school celebrated her appointment last month with a signing ceremony, decorated with balloons. Quickly, though, things started to unravel. Dr. McElroy, who once worked as an editor at The New York Times, said she was notified by the university's interim dean of liberal arts, José Luis Bermúdez, of political pushback over her appointment. "I said, 'What's wrong?'" Dr. McElroy recalled in an interview. "He said, 'You're a Black woman who was at The New York Times and, to these folks, that's like working for Pravda.'" Dr. McElroy left The Times in 2011. Within weeks, she said, the terms of her employment had been revised to offer her a one-year contract. She elected to return to her tenured position at the University of Texas. The Texas Tribune first reported the controversy. The controversy is an example of how politics has increasingly influenced university decisions about faculty hiring, once the exclusive purview of academics. At about the time of Dr. McElroy's hiring, Gov. Greg Abbott of Texas signed a law banning diversity, equity and inclusion offices at the state's public universities. |
| After 181 years, UVa implements new honor code | |
| The University of Virginia has made changes to its honor system, introducing new options for sanctions against students who betray the 181-year-old rules governing student behavior. The change, introduced by the student-run Honor Committee, will move the school from a single-sanction to multi-sanction system, drastically revising the code written in 1842 that prohibits lying, cheating or stealing and punishes such acts with expulsion. The change is intended to recognize the evolution of honor, according to a statement released by the Honor Committee. The new system now allows consequences for committing an honor offense to "be proportional to the offense and consider the circumstances of the student," the committee said. "We, I think, have taken a phenomenal and huge leap forward in terms of having a more restorative system that students have been asking for," Hamza Aziz, chair of the Honor Committee, told The Daily Progress. The previous system only gave students who were found guilty of committing an honor offense one option, according to Aziz. "The system has always operated under a single-sanction system, which by the name, implies any time the student was found guilty, there was a single sanction of expulsion," Aziz said. The multi-sanction system now offers four main categories of sanctioning that include, but aren't limited to, amends, education, temporary removal and permanent removal, according to the Honor Committee bylaws. |
| Signs of Weakness: A Survey of Campus Business Officers | |
 | When Inside Higher Ed surveyed college presidents last spring, the campus leaders expressed overwhelming (and to some observers confounding) confidence in their institutions' financial state. Nearly eight in 10 agreed with the statement "I am confident my institution will be financially stable over the next 10 years." And almost six in 10 (58 percent) said they expected their institution to be in better shape next year than it was at the time, with more than two-thirds of those presidents saying they expected enrollment to rise over the next year. Inside Higher Ed's 2023 Survey of College and University Business Officers, released today in conjunction with this weekend's annual meeting of the National Association of College and University Business Officers, finds higher education business leaders to be less optimistic than their bosses -- and arguably more in tune with the financial realities facing their institutions. It's not that they think the sky is falling: a full two-thirds of CBOs (65 percent) say they are confident in the 10-year outlook of their colleges, for instance. But 19 percent of those surveyed say they lack confidence in the financial stability of their institutions over a decade, including about a third (32 percent) of business officers at public master's and baccalaureate colleges. Just 10 percent of campus chief executives answered that way in April. |
| Survey Shows Gen Z's Unique Perspective on Higher Ed | |
| As Americans' perception of higher education continues to slide, research is showing that the youngest are the most skeptical. In a 2022 poll by Morning Consult, only 41% of adults from Generation Z -- those born between the mid-90s and the late aughts -- said that they tended to trust U.S. colleges, 14 points lower than the rate of Baby Boomers. Now, a new report from ECMC, a nonprofit focused on educational opportunity, has added texture to these findings by showing that although Gen Z does value learning, it views higher education predominantly in terms of career goals and future income. The report, based on a national survey of over 1,000 high school students, found that 90% said that their desired career was an important factor in their post-high school path, the most common answer. 88% mentioned how much money they could make over the long term, and 82% said whether there was a direct path to a job. 80% cited the cost of tuition. When asked what was most important in deciding what to do after high school, the most common answer was, "I need to understand different careers available," followed by "I need to be able to feed myself," and "I need to have reliable transportation." Dr. Corey Seemiller, a professor at Wright State University and co-author of Generation Z Goes to College, found it unsurprising that Gen Z students were concerned with finances. "It's just so expensive to go to college," she said. "A lot of Gen Z-ers saw Millennials just saddled with student debt, and it's kind of ambiguous whether there's a solution to it. A lot of Gen Z-ers are like, 'Yikes.'" |
| What Counts as Discrimination on a College Campus? | |
 | Just over a year ago, Mark Perry, a retired professor of economics and finance, filed a complaint with the U.S. Education Department's Office for Civil Rights. He accused the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities of discriminating against males by excluding them from participation in the college's Girls < RUN>:THE WORLD summer camp, where 11th and 12th graders study machine learning. The office investigated and concluded that, while Minnesota maintained that the program was open to males, its marketing materials suggested otherwise. In a signed resolution agreement, the college committed to updating its application and promotional materials, as well as its website. The camp's website now includes a disclaimer stating that it is "open to all students regardless of sex." But the name of the camp hasn't changed, the photo still shows only girls, and a question at the top of the page asks "Why an All Girls* Camp?" Perry, who earned his business degree at the university, says more changes are needed, and has asked OCR to investigate further. Perry's alma mater is not the only institution in his sights. Over the past seven years, he has filed close to 850 complaints with OCR, alleging more than 2,000 violations of federal antidiscrimination law by more than 750 colleges. "Discrimination on the basis of sex or race is unlawful even if the discrimination advantages the 'right' groups for the 'right' reasons," Perry said. "It's a simple matter of the law." That view was upheld, in a different context, by the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling last month that colleges may not consider race when making admissions decisions. While the full consequences of the court's ruling will be hashed out in lawsuits for years to come, the decision has cast into sharp relief a fundamental, and increasingly urgent, question: What constitutes discriminatory behavior on the part of colleges? |
| Affirmative-Action Plaintiff Warns of Consequences if Schools Defy Supreme Court Ruling | |
| The man behind the lawsuits prompting the Supreme Court to ban race-conscious affirmative action sent letters this week to 150 selective colleges and universities warning them not to ignore the court's ruling. If schools try to use application essays or other workarounds to admit or deny admission to applicants on the basis of race, they should expect more litigation, said Edward Blum, founder of Students for Fair Admissions. It is "incumbent on your institution to ensure compliance with this decision, starting with this admissions cycle," Blum wrote in an email this week addressed to the president, dean of admissions and general counsel of most of the nation's public flagship universities and their elite private counterparts. The court's June 29 decision overturned 45 years of legal precedent when it found in a 6-3 decision that the use of race in college admissions violates the Constitution. The ruling, involving cases Blum's group brought against Harvard College and the University of North Carolina, is generating uncertainty in the admissions offices of selective colleges. "We continue to review the court's ruling and consider next steps for the coming admission cycle and beyond," said Michael Hotchkiss, spokesman for Princeton University on Wednesday. Several other schools declined to comment. Though the court narrowed the use of race in admissions, it left some wiggle room. Chief Justice John Roberts wrote, "nothing in this opinion should be construed as prohibiting universities from considering an applicant's discussion of how race affected his or her life, be it through discrimination, inspiration, or otherwise." Some advocates for race-conscious affirmative action said that was a wide enough opening to continue to use race as a criteria. Blum condemned the most aggressive interpretations. |
| A third of student borrowers spent money they thought would be forgiven: poll | |
| More than a third of student loan borrowers spent money they otherwise would not have when they believed a portion of their debt would be forgiven by the Biden administration, according to a new poll. Most borrowers surveyed by Intellingent.com were confident they would receive some student debt relief as part of the Biden administration's plan to forgive at least $10,000 for federal borrowers and up to $20,000 for those who received a federal Pell Grant while in school. The Supreme Court struck down the president's forgiveness plan at the end of June. The survey conducted from July 6 to July 10 measured the responses of 977 respondents who qualified for Biden's student loan forgiveness program . Among borrowers who spent additional money expecting some debt relief, 9 percent spent between $5,000 and $7,501 extra, while another 17 percent spent $5,000 more than they would have had they not expected forgiveness, the poll found. Borrowers used what they believed would amount to extra money in their pockets on a range of items, though 37 percent said they paid off other debts. Others used the funds on home repairs and rent payments. |
| 'Parents' Campaign' opposed Literacy Based Promotion Act, now wants credit | |
| The Magnolia Tribune's Russ Latino writes: The Literacy Based Promotion Act (LBPA) has been widely credited for raising the bar on reading in Mississippi schools, prompting accolades from across the country. The law was not without detractors when passed in 2013. The "Parents' Campaign," an organization that ironically opposes giving parents the right to make their own education decisions, openly advocated for the LBPA's defeat. Speerheaded by former Gov. Phil Bryant, the law passed over the group's protest. As LBPA neared full implementation in 2015, "Parents' Campaign" head Nancy Loome told the Clarion Ledger "we are setting these kids up for failure." Her warning came alongside dire predictions that the LBPA would result in 28 percent of all third-graders being held back. Loome and other doomsayers were wrong. In the first year of the program, the actual retention rate for third-graders in Mississippi was roughly 8 percent. Instead of seeing marked increases in students held back, Mississippi has achieved historic gains in reading. The results are so good even the New York Times cannot deny them. |
SPORTS
| Mike Leach is still part of Mississippi State, but there's no sob story in Starkville | |
| Drive up to Mississippi expecting a sob story, one of a football program crushed by grief and trying to rebuild in the honor and image of the iconic coach gone too soon. Pass through the pine trees and the Cotton District ready for a somber day, pull into the Mississippi State football offices to find a bunch of football coaches. Acting like football coaches. Doing a job. You find a mere rejection of sentimentality. Mike Leach died Dec. 12 at 61, and it was a tragedy. They all make sure to preface that. But a program still needed to be run. Maybe Leach is best remembered for being a goofball, a pontificator, and a schedule-averse Renaissance man who swung his own sword. But he was also a tough, no-nonsense coach who rode his team hard. He built a staff in that image. You find Zach Arnett leaving the meeting room and stepping into the head coach's office. As it's commented upon, he turns to look around and says, "Yeah," as if he's also seeing it for the first time. What was it like being promoted from within, moving into the big chair, replacing the larger-than-life football legend who hired you? "Oh, I don't know that I moved much." Arnett looks like a defensive coordinator, a block-chested man with a buzz cut who occasionally rocks a mustache. He talks like a defensive coordinator, nerding out over leverage and ending each statement with a rhetorical, "right?" And until everything changed, he was really focused only on being a defensive coordinator. But suddenly he's a 36-year-old leader of an SEC West program that won nine games last year and returns enough experience to have another winning year, the youngest head coach in the top conference in the country. |
| Wife of Johnie Cooks shares her favorite memories of the NFL, Mississippi State legend | |
| At 8:20 p.m. on July 5, Maggie Cooks said good night to her husband, Johnie Cooks, before she left his hospital room and returned to a nearby hotel to rest for the night. "I love you," she said Johnie Cooks told her. "I appreciate everything that you do for me and my family. I love my children, I love my grandchildren. I love my brothers and sisters and I love all my friends." Those were the last words he ever spoke. At midnight, Maggie Cooks received a call from the hospital and was told that the medical staff had found blood clots in the back and on the left side of his brain. Cooks, 64, died of a massive stroke in the early hours of July 6. It was not the way anyone envisioned the last days of life for Johnie Cooks. A native of Leland, where he had starred in football at the high school, Cooks went on to earn All-America and All-SEC honors at Mississippi State University, to become a first-round NFL draft pick and to win a Super Bowl during a 10-year professional career. Cooks spent his last 10 months at Baptist East Hospital and then a rehab center, undergoing surgery 20 times. The one constant by his side was his wife of 38 years, Maggie Jo Cooks. He called her "Jo" for short and as a term of endearment. Johnie and Maggie Cooks met when she was teaching at Sudduth Elementary School in Starkville and he was doing his student teaching after his second year in the NFL. The couple were married on Christmas Day 1984. Maggie Cooks said her husband had a heart of gold and never met a stranger. He would never turn down an autograph request and always took time for people, especially kids, who wanted to talk to him. |
| Johnie Cooks Memorial To Be Held July 13 At M-Club Center | |
| A public memorial service honoring the life of legendary Bulldog linebacker Johnie Cooks will be held at 1 p.m. CT on Thursday, July 13, 2023, inside the Leo Seal M-Club Center of Davis Wade Stadium. In lieu of flowers, the family asks that contributions be made to the Johnie Cooks M-Club Endowed Scholarship. Checks may be payable to the MSU Foundation and mailed to POB BT, MSU, MS 39762. For questions, please call the Bulldog Club at (662) 325-3074. Guests are invited to park in available parking spaces within the Barnes & Noble parking lot, Soccer Press box parking lot and Bost Extension parking lot beginning at noon Thursday. Cart service for those with limited mobility will be provided from these lots. Seating for the event will be first-come, first-served inside the M-Club Center. Cooks passed away on July 6 at the age of 64. |
| Mississippi State linebacker Jett Johnson nominated for Allstate Good Works Team | |
| Mississippi State graduate linebacker Jett Johnson has been nominated for the 2023 Allstate American Football Coaches Association (AFCA) Good Works Team. Johnson is one of 136 student-athletes across all football divisions to earn a nomination for his community service efforts, his dedication to academics, and his impact on and off the football field. To be considered for a spot on the Allstate AFCA Good Works Team, each player must be actively involved with a charitable organization or service group while maintaining strong academic standing. A native of Tupelo, Miss., Johnson has made it a point to give back to his community. Throughout his career, Johnson has visited the schools in Tupelo to participate in different school district events. This past season he announced a NIL partnership with Java Juice in Starkville, Miss., but requested the company donate money from his NIL deal to the Tupelo Police Athletic League. On top of giving back to his communities, Johnson is also active on campus, participating in numerous MSU Student-Athlete Development community service events. |
| A look at Mississippi State football's game against Auburn | |
| The Mississippi State football summer series rolls on, previewing the Bulldogs' eighth game against Auburn MSU's rivalry with Auburn welcomes a new, but old friend, in former Ole Miss head coach Hugh Freeze, who takes over for the Tigers after two disastrous seasons under Bryan Harsin. Auburn leads the all-time series 65-28-2, however, MSU has won the last two matchups, including 2022's 39-33 overtime win in Starkville. Mississippi State quarterback Will Rogers threw for 357 yards and three touchdowns, two to Rara Thomas and one to Caleb Ducking, while Jo'quavious Marks ran for 45 yards and a touchdown. |
| A look at Mississippi State football's game against Kentucky | |
| The Mississippi State football summer series rolls on, previewing the Bulldogs' ninth game against Kentucky. Kentucky is under a leadership change at quarterback, with Will Levis off to the NFL with the Tennessee Titans. In steps one of the top transfer quarterbacks this offseason in Devin Leary. The all-time series between Mississippi State and Kentucky is tied at 25 wins each. Kentucky won last year's meeting in Lexington, 27-17. MSU quarterback Will Rogers threw for 203 yards and one touchdown, completed to Austin Williams. |
| A baker's dozen of Bulldogs earn ITA academic honors | |
| Mississippi State tennis is coming off strong seasons for both its men's and women's teams, and this week 13 Bulldogs were honored for their achievements off the court. Seven women's tennis players and six men's tennis players were named Scholar Athletes by the Intercollegiate Tennis Association, a recognition for student-athletes who maintained a grade-point average of 3.5 or better during the 2022-23 academic year. Mississippi State men's tennis was named one of ITA's All-Academic teams in Division I as the team posted a cumulative 3.67 GPA, while Gregor Ramskogler, Petar Jovanovic, Seth Richey, Patrick Lazo, Ewen Lumsden and Nemanja Malesevic were honored individually. Mississippi State women's tennis had the highest GPA of any team on campus this year, with a team GPA of 3.78, the highest in program history. Emmanouela Antonaki, Maddie Bemisderfer, Gia Cohen, Maddie McKee, Maria Rizzolo, Chloé Cirotte and Emily Surcey were selected as scholar athletes. |
| Pat Dye's Crooked Oaks farm donated to Auburn University | |
 | Auburn football coaching legend Pat Dye's homestead, Crooked Oaks Farm, has been gifted to the Auburn University Real Estate Foundation (AUREF) in conjunction with the College of Forestry, Wildlfe and Environment (CWFE). The gift is 415 acres of the property, which includes Dye's main house, a guest cabin, lodge, pavilion, gazebo, two barns and a nursery office. AUREF will be holding the gift on behalf of Auburn University and the CWFE with plans to continue its operations as an event venue. The college also seeks to expand the space for student instruction and community outreach. The land, which is located in Notasulga, was officially donated by the Dye/McDonald Trust and Nancy McDonald, Dye's longtime partner and a retired nursing educator. "We had been longtime supporters of Auburn University through our charitable trust and in hosting fundraising events, and the timing was right to make the gift," McDonald said. "We both knew we would donate the farm to the College of Forestry, Wildlife and Environment and seeing the work CFWE leaders have done since accepting the proposal, I could not be more confident that the land will be valued and held to the standard Pat and I always wanted to see." "Given everything that Auburn has done for dad and our family, he would be thrilled to know that Auburn will be great stewards of his beloved farm, hopefully for many generations," said Pat Dye Jr., echoing McDonald's own sentiment. |
| Former LSU coach Ed Orgeron responds to report that he's interested in Northwestern job | |
 | Former LSU football coach Ed Orgeron was amused to hear the report that surfaced Wednesday afternoon saying he "would have interest" in the vacant coaching job at Northwestern University. Orgeron, who turns 62 on July 27, laughed off the report from InsideNU.com that said he could be a candidate to fill the vacancy at Northwestern, which is located in Evanston, Illinois. The school fired Pat Fitzgerald for cause Monday amid hazing allegations within his program. A former star player at Northwestern, Fitzgerald coached the Wildcats for the past 17 seasons. Orgeron, who led LSU to a 15-0 record and the CFP championship in 2019, told The Advocate late Wednesday night at a downtown Natchitoches restaurant that he's not going to coach again after being fired in October 2021. In town to attend the funeral Thursday of a close friend, Orgeron said he learned about the InsideNU.com report while jogging on the Northwestern State campus, his alma mater. "I started getting all these messages," he said with a laugh. Quoting a source, the InsideNU.com story said Orgeron would be interested in replacing Fitzgerald if school officials made a run at the former LSU coach. "Man, I don't know where they get this stuff," he said, again laughing off the report. Orgeron also shot down the story earlier in the evening when reached by The Athletic's Bruce Feldman. |
| A year in as Big 12 commissioner, Yormark says 'open for business' was about more than expansion | |
| Brett Yormark was definitely trying to send a message during his introduction as the Big 12 commissioner last year when he said the league was "open for business." A year into the job, Yormark said that statement was more than just about ongoing realignment and the potential of additional expansion during a transformative time throughout college football. "I think people took that as, my god, this guy's new and he wants to go and disrupt, I guess, in some respects," Yormark said Wednesday at the start of Big 12 football media days. "Open for business was that we were going to explore every and all possibility to grow revenue, to diversify our conference and do things that hadn't been done before. And we did a lot of that." And, yes, there is still a plan for expansion, even though Yormark doesn't really want to talk about it. The Big 12 is already bigger after BYU, Cincinnati, Houston and UCF officially became members July 1, about 17 months after their invitations to the evolving conference. There will be 14 teams this fall with Texas and Oklahoma, the league's only remaining national champions in football, playing their final seasons before heading to the Southeastern Conference next summer. "We do have a plan and hopefully we can execute that plan sooner than later," Yormark said, without being specific. "I love the composition of this conference right now. ... And if we stay at 12 (teams), we're perfectly fine with that." |
| Colleges rely on honor system when checking sexual assault background of student athletes | |
 | At many of the nation's top sports colleges, vetting athletes for past sexual misconduct and violent acts under a new NCAA policy boils down to one step: asking them. The policy was the national college sports organization's answer to a series of scandals in which coaches recruited athletes with histories of violence against women, some of whom were later accused of reoffending. Starting with the 2022-23 school year, the rule was intended to keep campuses safer. But if an athlete answers "no" to a list of questions about criminal convictions and school disciplinary action, officials at many multi-sport powerhouses -- the University of Alabama, Louisiana State University, Ohio State University and more -- generally take their word for it. "They absolutely don't want to know," said Brenda Tracy, a gang-rape survivor whose nonprofit, Set The Expectation, works to reduce sexual violence in sports by educating athletes and coaches. "It's 'Don't ask, don't tell.'" Adopted three years ago by the NCAA's highest governing body, the policy requires all 1,100 member schools to take "reasonable steps" to confirm whether new and continuing athletes have records of serious misconduct, including sexual assault, dating violence and assault causing serious bodily harm. Athletes must annually disclose any criminal convictions and school disciplinary actions, and schools must have written procedures for obtaining information from athletes' previous schools. The NCAA Board of Governors, however, left the details to each school. It declined to centralize the process, issue uniform standards or define "reasonable steps." The result is a patchwork of protocols full of loopholes and gaps. |
| Letter shows NCAA has found 175 sports-betting violations since 2018 | |
| The NCAA has found 175 infractions of its sports-betting policy since 2018 and there are 17 active investigations, according to a letter from the sports organization's president that was obtained Wednesday by The Associated Press. NCAA President Charlie Baker included the numbers in a letter sent this week in response to a query from Rep. Dina Titus, a Democrat from Nevada whose district includes the Strip in Las Vegas. The NCAA does not release details of active investigations and Baker's letter does not list any schools or athletes. The NCAA told the AP in an email that less than 0.25% of its approximately 13,000 sporting events "are flagged for suspicious betting patterns, and a much smaller percentage have specific, actionable information." The NCAA pays a company to look for and flag potential betting policy infractions; many college conferences do the same thing. In Baker's letter to Titus, he said athletes, coaches and administrators committed violations ranging from $5 wagers to "providing inside information" and that the active investigations have a similar span in severity. |
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