| Friday, July 21, 2023 |
| Highest in state history: MSU surpasses all previous records with $259.9M in fundraising success | |
 | Mississippi State University recently announced a milestone in its history of philanthropic achievement that has eclipsed all previous single-year fundraising records among the state's public institutions of higher education. With unwavering support from its dedicated alumni, friends and partners, the university soared to unmatched heights in the 2023 fiscal year, reaching an exceptional level of fundraising success with an astounding $259.9 million in gift commitments and marking the 10th consecutive year of private gifts totaling $100 million or above. "This unprecedented level of support for Mississippi State University is an extraordinary investment in the people and communities we serve. We are proud to have earned the faith and trust of our friends and alumni who recognize how we are taking care of what matters and who also know we will be good stewards of their gifts," MSU President Mark E. Keenum said. "These gifts will positively impact our state for generations to come as more Mississippians gain access to scholarships, campus resources and hands-on education, research and service opportunities -- enabling more students to pursue and earn their degrees, compete for the jobs of the future and serve their communities. I am so grateful to the Mississippi State family for their support of our university and the work we are doing." The success of FY 23, which ended on June 30, was made possible through the generosity of 20,460 unique contributors. Their gifts strengthened support for areas across the university and will enable MSU to propel innovation, empower students and amplify its positive influence both locally and globally. |
| Tech startup gets $250K from Black Founder Fund | |
 | In 2018, all Calvin Waddy and Shelby Baldwin wanted to do was launch a successful startup business at Mississippi State University's Center for Entrepreneurship and Outreach. Just five years later, they have raised $950,000 in investments for their customer relationship management platform, Buzzbassador, and have just received another $250,000 from the Google for Startups Black Founders Fund. "We've been sitting on this exciting news for a while, and I am proud to be able to publicize it now and of being a Black founder," Waddy said. "Less than 1% of venture capital goes to Black or underrepresented founders. So, it's just an honor to be recognized by Google, who's been doing a fantastic job supporting underrepresented founders. It means the world to us." Waddy told The Dispatch he and Baldwin first came up with the idea of Buzzbassador after closing another startup company, Only Pair Fashion, which worked with more than 8,000 influencers to promote fashion on its website. The only problem? Managing how influencers were paid and ran online campaigns proved difficult. "It was like a full overtime business just managing them," Waddy said. "So, we built (Buzzbassador) for our own brands. We were in the Shopify (market) and saw other brands doing similar marketing, so we opened up the app for private use in 2019 and then in 2020, we opened the official beta (Buzzbassador)." |
| Increase taxes or cut $1 million in expenses? | |
| Aldermen are facing tough decisions if they hope to approve a balanced budget for Fiscal Year 2024. Even after freezing hiring in the police and fire departments -- a measure that would reduce expenses by more than $700,000 -- the city is poised to operate at a roughly $1 million deficit next fiscal year without more changes, according to documents presented at a July 14 budget work session. That means the city either must increase the ad valorem tax rate, find even more places to cut or settle on some combination of the two, said Ward 2 Alderwoman Sandra Sistrunk, who serves as the board's budget chair. Sistrunk is prepared to propose a 2.5-mill tax increase, which would generate almost $800,000 in new revenue and minimize the need for additional cuts. "The board has got to wrap their heads around it and decide what four of us, at least, are willing to do and what our priorities are," Sistrunk said. Other board members believe there is more work to do before making that decision. Ward 3 Alderman Jeffery Rupp, who opposed last year's proposed 1-mill increase, said he is more open-minded this year. He's not sure he's open to a 2.5-mill hike, though. "We're still early. We've had one budget session together ... I'm not sure that's where we're going to land," Rupp said. "... This year is different (than last year). We may have to end up doing a small tax increase. I want to get down lower than 2.5 mills." |
| Sheriff's race tops $26K, almost $20K for Phelps | |
| Campaign finance reports show many Oktibbeha County candidates have not received any campaign contributions since the last reporting period. But while other races have slowed, funding in the sheriff's race has continued to grow. The second round of campaign finance reports for June 1 through June 30 were due July 10. Candidates are required to itemize any donation or expenditure greater than $200. The biggest dollar race is still the sheriff's race, with Republican Shank Phelps and Democrat John Rice raising more than $26,000 for their campaigns since the beginning of the year. Phelps reported $19,800 in contributions total, while Rice reported $6,956 in contributions total. Primary elections are Aug. 8, and the general election is Nov. 7. |
| Excessive summer heat putting stress on Mississippi farmers, livestock, crops | |
 | Mississippi farmers and ranchers are battling extreme summer heat to keep their animals and crops alive. A local farmer says many plants can handle the heat, but it is much tougher on the farm workers in the field trying to harvest crops. "With this heat, we are watering every other day just to keep the plants from wilting," said farmer Van Killen said. Killen has an irrigation system at Two Dog Farms in Madison County to keep plants growing. He said the underground system sends water directly to the roots, where it's needed most. Some plants, like squash and eggplants, can tolerate the heat better than others. "The nighttime temperature on tomatoes needs to be in the 70s, which we're not getting right now," Killen said. "That will hurt our yields later on, but there's really nothing we can do about that." Killen said the heat is also putting stress on 1,000 free-range chickens at the farm. The birds are producing fewer eggs weekly. But the heat is having the biggest impact on farm workers. "It's that first heat snap that we had," he said. That's when Killen said one worker got sick. He may have suffered heat exhaustion while he was in one of the fields harvesting crops. "He just felt dizzy and threw up a couple times," Killen said. "We actually put him in our air-conditioning rooms that we hold tomatoes in (to) let him cool off, drink plenty of water, and we ended up taking him home." |
| Extreme heat taking toll on dairy cows | |
 | The warm weather can be very harmful to dairy cows. This includes the cows at Southern Cultured Creamery in Pontotoc County. The business has approximately 20 dairy cows. "We did testing about a month ago and the cows were making about 63 pounds of milk per cow per day," Kaitlyn Anderson said. "We just tested this past week and that's down to 47. [That's a] really big reduction in the amount of milk that they're producing just because they're hot. They're not able to go out and graze and eat as much. It's just their natural response to the heat." Cows don't sweat as much as humans, meaning they have to find other ways to stay cool. Employees at the creamery have even been using fans and spraying the cows with water. Southern Cultured Creamery has temporarily halted cheese production as it struggles to meet the market demand for milk. |
| Neshoba County Fair begins Friday. Statewide political speakers start Wednesday | |
 | The Neshoba County fair begins Friday morning, with the annual mix of politics, entertainment, food and socializing set to take place over the following week. The event, which was first staged in 1889, will see candidates in some the state's top political races face off, often in back-to-back speeches, including those in the hotly contested races for governor and lieutenant governor. On Tuesday, political speakers are limited to local Neshoba County candidates. On Wednesday, Republican candidate for lieutenant governor Chris McDaniel will be immediately followed by the Republican who currently holds the job, and is trying to keep McDaniel from taking it, Delbert Hosemann. Then, on Thursday, incumbent Gov. Tate Reeves, the likely Republican nominee, will immediately follow his Democratic challenger Brandon Presley. There will also be a historic goodbye from Founders Square, as Philip Gunn will give his last fair speech as speaker of the Mississippi House of Representatives on Thursday. Gunn is stepping down from the position, and the chamber, after a new House is elected. Though he has promised to return to public service, he has yet to announce what in what form or position that will be. Gunn is scheduled to speak immediately before Presley and Reeves. |
| An underwater drone company moved to Gulfport. Can it pump up Mississippi's economy? | |
 | The underwater drones dive and float along the Gulf Coast and around the world. They collect intelligence for the U.S. Navy, observe oil fields, study marine life and map seafloors. Could they also help Mississippi's economy? The state's most prominent leaders think so. Ocean Aero -- which makes uncrewed machines that operate on their own above and below water -- moved from San Diego to Gulfport in 2021. The match might have seemed unlikely, but Ocean Aero drew a warm Mississippi welcome. Their executives said they liked the area. They admired the neighbors. And they planned to stay. Gov. Tate Reeves and Mississippi's two senators backed the move. Mississippi, they say, is a perfect place for companies to prosper, and Ocean Aero, which has created at least 50 new jobs, is one worth championing. This fall, Ocean Aero will move into new headquarters at the Port of Gulfport. And with neighbors including the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the University of Southern Mississippi and local industries such as shipbuilding and defense, "that is a perfect sweet spot for a company like ours," said Keith Blystone, Ocean Aero's chief of staff. Any new jobs – especially high-tech roles – are good, said Edward Sayre, an economics professor at the University of Southern Mississippi. But he said 50 jobs do not lead to dramatic impacts and questioned whether other companies would follow. "There's still a long way to go to make Mississippi truly business friendly," Sayre said. |
| Chinese and U.S. officials could meet in person in the coming weeks | |
 | Key U.S. and Chinese officials may have a chance to sit down in person and discuss the fallout from Russia's withdrawal from a key global food security deal next month. The U.S. has invited China's agriculture minister, Tang Renjian, to the 2023 APEC food security ministerial meeting, which takes place in Seattle on Aug. 3, the Biden administration confirmed. Russia's decision to blow up the Black Sea Grain Initiative is expected to be front and center at the meeting of major economies across Asia and North America. Western officials have been hoping Beijing, a key ally of Moscow, can help persuade the Kremlin to rejoin the deal since China has been the top destination of the grain shipments from Ukraine under the agreement. If Tang attends, it would give U.S. officials a chance to make their case in person. The U.S. has also invited Russia to the meeting, since it is a member of APEC. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack will be in attendance. The ministerial on food security is part of the buildup to November's APEC summit, which the United States is hosting in San Francisco and is expected to draw leaders from APEC's 22 member countries. Among them are China and Russia, as well as Canada, Mexico, Japan, South Korea and other countries throughout Asia and the Western Hemisphere. |
| Wheat prices soar for a third day as Russia-Ukraine tensions stoke fears of major food crisis | |
| Wheat prices rose on Thursday after Russia threatened to treat ships heading for Ukrainian ports as military cargo carriers, deepening fears of a global food security crisis. It marks the third consecutive day of price rises. The most actively traded wheat contract on the Chicago Board of Trade was last seen trading around 1.4% higher at 737.6 cents per bushel, notching a three-week high. It follows a jump of 8.5% in the previous session, the biggest daily gain in more than a year, on mounting geopolitical tensions. Wheat prices remain well below the peak levels of 1,177.5 cents per bushel reached in May of last year, however. The rise follows the Kremlin's decision Monday to pull out of the Black Sea Grain Initiative, a critically important wartime deal that provided a maritime humanitarian corridor for the export of Ukrainian grain. U.N. chief António Guterres said he "deeply" regretted Russia's decision to terminate the initiative, which in effect ended a "lifeline" for hundreds of millions across the globe facing hunger, as well as those already struggling with spiraling food costs. Russian President Vladimir Putin has said the country will immediately reinstate the international grain deal if its demands are met. These include lifting restrictions that limit the full dispatch of its own grain and fertilizer exports, and an end to sanctions on the Russian Agricultural Bank. |
| Companies have pledged safe AI development, White House says | |
 | The Biden administration said it has received voluntary commitments from the world's largest developers of artificial intelligence systems that the companies would pursue development in a safe and secure manner. Google, Amazon, Inflection, Meta, Microsoft, Anthropic and OpenAI have committed to developing such technologies in a "safe, secure, and transparent" manner, a White House official told reporters Thursday on the condition of anonymity. Biden is set to deliver remarks on AI on Friday afternoon. The administration is preparing an executive order "that will ensure the federal government is doing everything in its power to advance safe, secure, and trustworthy AI and manage its risks to individuals and society," the official said. The White House also is coordinating with efforts in Congress aimed at establishing a "legal and regulatory regime," the official said. Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer has arranged a series of briefings for senators on artificial intelligence systems and has said he intends to draw up legislation to regulate AI systems in the next few months. |
| Where Is Kamala Harris? Slow start to Biden 2024 campaigning comes as VP contends with low approval ratings | |
 | Vice President Kamala Harris planned to campaign extensively for President Biden's re-election, but her early schedule suggests otherwise. In the 10 weeks following Biden's campaign launch, the vice president has traveled to nine states -- three of them considered battlegrounds in the 2024 election -- and appeared at seven fundraisers, according to her calendar. Biden's campaign said that Harris's early pace of campaigning was similar to Biden's in 2011 when he was vice president. President Biden has crisscrossed the country for a roughly similar number of campaign events during that time. "While history has shown it is incredibly early for an incumbent ticket to campaign, already Vice President Harris is doing the important work of meeting and engaging with voters nationwide," said campaign spokesman Kevin Munoz. The campaign points out that she has visited Arizona this month and that her schedule is growing. On Friday, she plans to travel to Florida. Some campaign donors expressed reservations about her abilities and said she didn't have the same appeal as Biden, with one fundraiser describing her as a "tough sell." "Speaking solely for myself, I don't think I would ever be able to have a very successful fundraiser with her as the headliner," said Democratic donor and trial lawyer John Morgan. "First of all, for many people, Democrats included, she's polarizing." |
| Some critics see Trump's behavior as un-Christian. His conservative Christian backers see a hero | |
 | For eight years, Donald Trump has managed to secure the support of many evangelical and conservative Christians despite behavior that often seemed at odds with teachings espoused by Christ in the Gospels. If some observers initially viewed this as an unsustainable alliance, it's different now. Certain achievements during Trump's presidency -- notably appointments that shifted the Supreme Court to the right -- have solidified that support. He's now the clear front-runner for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, even after he recently was found liable for sexually abusing a New York woman in 1996 and was indicted in a criminal case related to hush money payments to a porn actress. Robert Jeffress, pastor of an evangelical megachurch in Dallas, has been a staunch supporter of Trump since his first campaign for president and is sticking by him even as rivals like South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott and former Vice President Mike Pence tout their Christian faith. "Conservative Christians continue to overwhelmingly support Donald Trump because of his biblical policies, not his personal piety," Jeffress told The Associated Press via email. "They are smart enough to know the difference between choosing a president and choosing a pastor." "In many ways, Christians feel like they are in an existential cultural war between good and evil, and they want a warrior like Donald Trump who can win," Jeffress added. |
| Trump's classified documents trial set for May despite his pleas to wait until after 2024 election | |
 | The federal judge overseeing Donald Trump's classified documents case rescheduled the trial for May 20, despite pleas by the former president's attorneys to hold off until after the 2024 presidential election. In a seven-page order released Friday, U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon said the "interests of justice" warrant a nine month delay from the trial's original August start date -- a compromise between prosecutors' push for a four-month delay and the defense attorneys' bid for an indefinite one. Her decision followed lengthy debate at the first pre-trial conference this week over whether Trump's status as a presidential candidate warranted an indefinite delay. Cannon, like prosecutors, seemed unconvinced that it did. She was skeptical of the Justice Department's proposed Dec. 11 trial date, too, suggesting that the complexity of the case called for a more measured approach. Justice attorney David Harbach rejected the idea that the December date was expedited at all. He told Cannon that the right to a speedy trial doesn't need to be justified; only a diversion from it does. Cannon disagreed. In Friday's order, she called the prosecutors' proposed schedule "atypically accelerated and inconsistent with ensuring a fair trial." |
| This Arkansas Town Could Become the Epicenter of a U.S. Lithium Boom | |
| Slipping a handgun into his belt, the mayor of this small town hopped out of his 1995 Ford pickup and went in search of further evidence of a new energy boom. On the other side of a freshly painted gate, Magnolia, Ark., Mayor Parnell Vann pointed out a squat blue spire of valves, bolts and pressure gauges attached to a long-dormant well -- a telltale sign someone means to bring it back to life. On the thick-wooded back roads, crisscrossing fields where oil drillers gave up long ago, Vann found two more similar wells that day. These days, companies in the area aren't looking to find more oil -- they are instead prospecting for lithium, a metal that is increasingly prized around the world as an essential ingredient in electric-vehicle batteries. If the U.S. is to ease its dependence for lithium on other countries such as China, it may need this quiet corner of southwest Arkansas to lead the way. Exxon Mobil, a new player in the hunt for U.S. lithium, is planning to build one of the world's largest lithium processing facilities not far from Magnolia, with a capacity to produce 75,000 to 100,000 metric tons of lithium a year, according to people familiar with the matter. At that scale, it would equate to about 15% of all finished lithium produced globally last year, according to one analyst. To push the project forward, Exxon will have to profitably scale up the technology used to siphon lithium from brine, which for years has been an elusive goal across the industry. The attraction is what is known as the Smackover formation, a geologic trend that runs from Texas to Florida and is rich with saltwater brine, which once bedeviled companies drilling for oil. That brine also contains small amounts of lithium, and the companies are increasingly optimistic they can scale up technologies to extract it. |
| Many Gen-Xers have zero retirement funds. What can we do to address America's retirement crisis? | |
| Gen-Xers, those born between 1965 and 1980, are falling behind when it comes to saving for retirement. The typical household holds only $40,000 in retirement savings, according to a new report from the National Institute on Retirement Security. The issue is exacerbated when you break down savings by income level and race. The bottom half of earners only have a few thousand in savings, while 40% of Gen-Xers have retirement savings accounts with zero balances. The report explained that Gen-Xers have dealt with stagnating wages and greater student debt as more workers attained four-year college degrees than their predecessors. This cohort also entered the workforce when defined-contribution plans, like 401(k)s, began to overtake defined-benefit pension plans. Only 55% of Gen-Xers participate in an employer-sponsored retirement savings plan. "The big challenge is that the defined-contribution system just doesn't work for a lot of people," said Tyler Bond, research director for the NIRS and a co-author of the report. Only 14% of Gen-Xers are in a defined-benefit pension plan, which has been on the decline in the private sector over the past few decades. (However, many public-sector employees still have access to pension plans, Bond noted.) |
| Tony Bennett, Champion of the Great American Songbook, Is Dead at 96 | |
 | Tony Bennett, a singer whose melodic clarity, jazz-influenced phrasing, audience-embracing persona and warm, deceptively simple interpretations of musical standards helped spread the American songbook around the world and won him generations of fans, died on Friday at his home in Manhattan, where he had lived for many decades. He was 96. His publicist, Sylvia Weiner, announced his death. Mr. Bennett learned he had Alzheimer's disease in 2016, his wife, Susan Bennett, told AARP The Magazine in February 2021. But he continued to perform and record despite his illness; his last public performance was in August 2021, when he appeared with Lady Gaga at Radio City Music Hall in a show titled "One Last Time." Mr. Bennett's career of more than 70 years was remarkable not only for its longevity, but also for its consistency. In hundreds of concerts and club dates and more than 150 recordings, he devoted himself to preserving the classic American popular song, as written by Cole Porter, the Gershwins, Duke Ellington, Rodgers and Hammerstein and others. From his initial success as a jazzy crooner who wowed audiences at the Paramount in Times Square in the early 1950s, through his late-in-life duets with younger singers gleaned from a range of genres and generations -- most notably Lady Gaga, with whom he recorded albums in 2014 and 2021 and toured in 2015 -- he was an active promoter of both songwriting and entertaining as timeless, noble pursuits. |
| Young African leaders meet Hub City officials, tour USM business school | |
 | The City of Hattiesburg and the University of Southern Mississippi hosted a distinguished group of young leaders from several countries in Africa Thursday. More than two dozen fellows from the Mandela Washington Fellowship for Young African Leaders were in the Hub City, visiting with local government officials and the business faculty at USM. The program is sponsored by the U.S. State Department and includes leadership training, cultural exchanges and site visits. Jackson State University will act as the host site for for six weeks for the group that toured Hattiesburg. "We've been exposed to manufacturing plants, we've been exposed to poultry plants, farmers, universities and all that wisdom of knowledge is something we can take back home and apply and improve our systems," said Tarisai Moffat, a program fellow from Johannesburg, South Africa. More than 700 program fellows are taking part in activities at various sites across the United States. "Of course, when you come to Jackson, Mississippi, you want them to see other parts (of the state), so we're grateful that USM has agreed for us to come here, so that the fellows see not only what's happening in Jackson, but also what's happening in Hattiesburg," said Lydia Didia, administrative director of the Mandela Washington Fellowship Program at Jackson State University. |
| Monarch butterfly waystation brings USM Gulf Park campus together | |
| When University of Southern Mississippi Gulf Park Campus staff members Jason Cantu and Jamie Stanfield came together to start a monarch butterfly waystation, they had no idea how big it would become along the coast. In 2018, a USM student had a passion for monarch butterflies and their benefits to the ecosystem they inhabit. Later, the student found out that the USM campus in Long Beach was directly on the Monarch Butterfly Trail. He asked Stanfield how they could put together a plan to build a butterfly garden outside of the library where an old swimming pool used to be. "The students went to Jamie and asked her how they can help these butterflies and their cycle," said Cantu, who works in the physical plant. The library director at the time approved the plan to build the garden, but that was just the beginning. He suggested they reach out to physical plant and apply for a grant to build a gazebo with flowers around it, which would cost a few thousand dollars. "The plan was drawn on notebook paper that Jason still has. We didn't receive the grant, but we did get invited to the physical plant," said Stanfield, a library employee. There, the students presented their idea of the butterfly garden. The plant got on board and looked for ways to build the waystation garden. Instead of the pool transforming into a garden, they decided to transform all the flower beds on campus into certified butterfly campus waystations. |
| Research project examines contamination in Gulf Coast waters | |
| One professor and a Southern Miss (USM) graduate have collaborated on a project they hope will change the way researchers look at contamination along the Mississippi Gulf Coast. Dr. Maitreyee Mukherjee, an assistant professor of biology at West Texas A&M and former faculty member at USM, had this research published in Water, an open access journal from the Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute (MDPI), along with former students and USM alumni Robyn Cuthbert, Kristi Gay, Emma Aitken, and Katonia McKinney. The study details how they found high levels of microbial fecal contamination and concerning levels of resistance within these bacteria to various antibiotics. Dr. Mukherjee saw there was a need for research opportunities for her students along the Gulf Coast, inspiring the creation of the project to examine how contamination ranges within these 10 sites across different beaches between Bay Saint Louis and Biloxi. "This research was planned here considering how many people are using our beaches for swimming, boating, and fishing," said Dr. Mukherjee, who has expertise in environmental microbiology, particularly in water quality and contamination. |
| Conservatives are changing K-12 education, and one Christian college is at the center | |
 | For years, Hillsdale College was best known as a conservative Midwestern school that refused federal funding to avoid government regulations. The private Christian college's Michigan campus features statues of Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher and frequently hosts Republican politicians to give speeches. Recently, though, Hillsdale has become more widely known as the go-to resource for conservatives looking to overhaul K-12 education. For some, the college's name is shorthand for civics lessons that teach children to love America and reject the notion that racism still permeates society. Amid national battles over what children should learn in public schools, Hillsdale is working to export this vision by setting up charter schools in over a dozen states and publicizing its 1776 Curriculum, which emphasizes American exceptionalism. The college says over 8,400 administrators and teachers have downloaded the curriculum, and a growing number of state and local policymakers are also seeking Hillsdale's guidance. Hillsdale, which has fewer than 1,700 students but a $900 million endowment, gives out many of its resources for free. The college's leaders have said they're getting involved in K-12 schools because they believe students should learn about the "very goodness" of America's founding. Amid culture war battles dominating school districts, Hillsdale's deep connections to the conservative movement have made it a trusted brand at top of mind for policymakers looking to reverse what they consider a progressive takeover of public education. |
| New 'race-neutral' college recruitment tool aims to create diversity | |
| An online networking platform for students applying to college released a new tool Thursday aimed at helping schools increase their racial diversity while adhering to the new legal standards in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court's recent ruling that struck down affirmative action in college admissions. Free to use, CollegeVine says its Student Environment Explorer enables college enrollment teams to explore the demographic and academic makeups of states, counties, neighborhoods, and even specific high schools based on factors other than race. The tool relies on both public data from the U.S. census and internal data from CollegeVine users. Vinay Bhaskara, co-founder and chief strategy officer of CollegeVine, said that his team began modeling the tool in October in anticipation of the court's decision. Bhaskara said that the Student Environment Explorer will enable admissions teams both to prioritize recruiting efforts in Black and Hispanic communities and compare students' applications holistically. While the Student Environment Explorer is marketed toward universities, CollegeVine marketing official José Mallabo believes that it will also benefit academically talented students with their college search. Mallabo, who previously worked at Morehouse, a historically Black college for men in Atlanta, said the tool should aid colleges in the "discoverability of good students." Though most public schools in Georgia have not used race-based affirmative action since the early 2000s, Bhaskara said that the tool is still valuable in the state. "Regardless of whether they've used affirmative action or not in the past, part of what's being revealed by this tool is where there is an opportunity to find qualified Black and Hispanic students that can be admitted without legal risk," Bhaskara said. Many college officials anticipate that the decision to outlaw race-based affirmative action practices will lead to a drop in enrollment of Black and Hispanic students at highly competitive colleges and universities. |
| Texas A&M President Katherine Banks resigns amid fallout from failed hiring of journalism professor | |
| After a week of turmoil over the botched hiring of a Black journalist to revive the Texas A&M University journalism department, M. Katherine Banks has resigned as the university's president. Mark A. Welsh III, dean of the Bush School of Government and Public Service, will serve as acting president. Banks' resignation is effective immediately. In a letter sent to A&M System Chancellor John Sharp Thursday evening, Banks wrote, "The recent challenges regarding Dr. [Kathleen] McElroy have made it clear to me that I must retire immediately. The negative press is a distraction from the wonderful work being done here." The decision comes after the university's faculty senate passed a resolution Wednesday to create a fact-finding committee into the mishandling of the hiring of McElroy. During that meeting, Banks told faculty members that she did not approve changes to an offer letter that led a prospective journalism professor to walk away from negotiations amid conservative backlash to her hiring. But she took responsibility for the flawed hiring process. McElroy, an experienced journalism professor currently working at the University of Texas at Austin who previously worked as an editor at the New York Times, turned down an offer to reboot A&M's journalism program after a fraught negotiation process first reported by The Texas Tribune. What originally was a tenure-track offer was reduced to a five-year position, then to a one-year position from which she could be fired at any time. |
| Texas Officials Scramble, Advocates Fret Weeks Before DEI Funding Expires | |
 | Texas colleges stand to lose millions of dollars in funding for their diversity, equity, and inclusion programs starting this fall after a sweeping law goes into effect. College officials now are scrambling to figure out which programs to axe, while diversity advocates fret that the law will have an outsize impact on the retention of students of color and funding for federal grants. Senate Bill 17 bans all DEI offices, programs, and training at public colleges, as well as the use of diversity statements and preferential hiring. It's among a set of seven similar pieces of legislation that have passed in five states, according to The Chronicle's DEI legislation tracker. The law will begin to take hold on September 1, when the state will halt all funding for DEI efforts. The University of Texas Board of Regents has yet to provide guidelines on how colleges should respond to the law. Spokespersons at Texas A&M University and the University of Houston said that the universities are evaluating campus practices to comply with the law once it goes into effect. A spokesperson at Sam Houston State University said the college was unable to provide information since the law hasn't been enacted yet. In addition to concerns over campus life for students and faculty, those who support DEI worry SB 17 will have a negative impact on Texas colleges' competitive edge in applying for state and federal grants. |
| K-9 Jackie retires after six years on University Police Department | |
 | The Texas A&M University Police Department honored K-9 Jackie on Thursday, after she officially retired from the force in June after six years of service to the department. Her handler, A&M canine handler John Browning, will continue to care for her in her forever home. "Now that she is retired, she has become my pet," Browning said. "She will stay with me and my family and has gone from being my work partner to being my pet." The state of Texas passed a law requiring departments to give the K-9s to the handlers first, where previously after retirement the dog would have been sold. "My chief made it very clear to me that when she retires, she would be mine," he said. "She was about 5 years old when I got her. The initial transition from her previous handler to me was a little difficult. It took her about three weeks until she decided I wasn't that bad of a person and she kind of liked me. She said: 'You aren't so bad; you feed me and play with me so I think I'll stick around.' Her personality is phenomenal; she is a great working dog and has endless work drive. All she wanted to do was go to work." K-9 Jackie is a 9-year-old Belgian Malinois and joined the department in 2017 as one of the first canines in the program's history, according to A&M Police Lieutenant Bobby Richardson. |
| U. of Missouri researcher uses gene editing to understand diseases, improve food production | |
 | A University of Missouri researcher was awarded a $3 million grant to investigate the building blocks of diseases like Alzheimer's through gene editing. Kiho Lee, an associate professor in MU's College of Agriculture, Food and Natural Resources, is leading a study with the goal of discovering clinically significant explanations for human diseases, cancer and infertility while working on a solution to global food insecurity. Genome editing, also sometimes referred to as gene editing, is a method that allows scientists to change, or edit, the DNA of various organisms. This can result in changes to physical traits and disease risk, according to the National Human Genome Research Institute. In the future, gene editing could be the solution to some early-onset Alzheimer's cases, which are often linked to a person's genetic background. Lee is hopeful the research will also encourage agriculture change that will improve pig welfare and increase food production for farmers, a news release explained. The grant comes from the Dual Purpose with Dual Benefit program, a partnership between the U.S. Agriculture Department and National Institutes of Health that encourages scientists to use domestic animals to improve human health. The researchers will assess the safety and efficiency of gene editing technology, also known as the CRISPR/Cas system, to improve the gene testing process and design approaches that help researchers make the most of a targeted genome editing event. |
| Q&A: How this Stanford freshman brought down the president of the university | |
 | Rumors of altered images in some of the research papers published by Stanford University President Marc Tessier-Lavigne had circulated since 2015. But the allegations involving the neuroscientist got little attention beyond the niche scientific forum where they first appeared -- until Stanford freshman Theo Baker decided to take a closer look. Baker, a journalist for the Stanford Daily, published his first story on problems surrounding Tessier-Lavigne's research in November. His dogged reporting kicked off a chain of events that culminated this week with the president's announcement that he would step down from his post at the end of August. Tessier-Lavigne acted Wednesday after an expert scientific panel convened by the university determined that he failed on multiple occasions to correct errors in his published research on Alzheimer's disease and related topics, and that he managed labs that at times produced sloppy or even manipulated data. Of course, Baker covered that too. In February, the 18-year-old from the Washington, D.C., area became the youngest-ever recipient of journalism's prestigious George Polk Award for his work on the investigation. Journalism runs in the family: Baker is the son of the New York Times' chief White House correspondent, Peter Baker, and New Yorker columnist Susan B. Glasser. The Los Angeles Times caught up with him to discuss his reporting and its consequences. |
| 'Teaching on Eggshells': Students Report Professors' Offensive Comments | |
 | Nearly three-quarters of all college students, regardless of their political affiliation, believe professors who make comments the students find offensive should be reported to the university, according to a new report. A similar rate of students would also report their peers for making insulting or hurtful remarks. The report by the Sheila and Robert Challey Institute for Global Innovation and Growth at North Dakota State University is based on a survey of 2,250 students from 131 public and private four-year institutions across the country and was released Wednesday. Over all, the percentage of students who said they would report a professor was higher among self-identified liberal students (81 percent) than among self-identified conservative students (53 percent). Sixty-six percent of liberal students and 37 percent of conservative students said they would also report peers who made offensive comments. John Bitzan, author of the report, said the survey findings are troubling and reflect continuing challenges on college campuses to encourage students to think critically and engage in healthy debates -- with each other and with faculty members -- over issues on which they disagree. |
| Economics website is filled with racist and sexist speech, some blame the nation's top universities | |
| Anonymous comments with racist, sexist and abusive messages that were posted for years on a jobs-related website for economists originated from numerous leading U.S. universities, according to research released Thursday. Some economists have long condemned the website, Economics Job Market Rumors, for its toxic content. The site, known by its acronym EJMR, is run by an anonymous individual and is not connected to a university or other institution. That fact had fed speculation that those who posted hateful messages on it were mostly online cranks who might not be economists. Yet the new research indicates that users of the website include individuals at top-tier colleges and universities, including Harvard, Stanford and the University of Chicago, and many others. "Our analysis reveals that the users who post on EJMR are predominantly economists, including those working in the upper echelons of academia, government, and the private sector," the paper concluded. It was written by Florian Ederer, a management professor at Boston University, Paul Goldsmith-Pinkham, a finance professor at the Yale School of Management, and Kyle Jensen, an associate dean at Yale. "It's not just a few bad apples," Ederer said in a presentation Thursday at a conference sponsored by the National Bureau of Economic Research in Cambridge, Massachusetts. "It's very, very widespread. And the toxicity is widespread." The revelations have provoked debate on social media among economists about privacy, free speech and online abuse. |
| In Statehouses, Tenure Was Bruised, but DEI Was Walloped | |
| In multiple states where Republicans targeted tenure and diversity, equity and inclusion this year, tenure survived while DEI was curtailed. That doesn't mean tenure is safe. It's been eroded for decades, including through posttenure-review policies that higher education leaders enact outside of statehouses, and by institutions offering fewer tenured positions. The American Association of University Professors says 68 percent of U.S. faculty members held contingent appointments in fall 2021, compared to about 47 percent in 1987. "It's not like we've seen this constant decrease in the number of institutions with a tenure system," said Glenn Colby, senior researcher at AAUP. "It's more that the institutions are relying more and more on faculty working contingent positions and graduate assistants and so forth." Colby noted that his own reports might understate tenure's decline by, for instance, considering Georgia public universities to still have tenure despite the University System of Georgia's controversial posttenure-review policy. On the other hand, many institutions are improving employment conditions for those in contingent roles, including through multiyear contracts, he said. Tenure's defenders can include seemingly strange bedfellows. It protects researchers whose discoveries anger industry, and aid it. It protects minority and white professors. And it protects liberal and conservative scholars. |
| Biden's new student loan relief plan -- and its legal challenges -- face a long road | |
 | President Biden's first student loan forgiveness plan lasted 10 months from its proposal to death by Supreme Court. His next one could take much longer to even implement, let alone challenge. The new plan will be subject to a lengthy rulemaking process under the Higher Education Act (HEA), potentially leaving the fate of relief up in the air well into election season. Those involved in the recent high court fight are already raising red flags about the legality of Biden's second swing at the issue. Nebraska Attorney General Mike Hilgers (R), whose office argued the first case at the Supreme Court earlier this year, said in an interview that suing over Biden's new plan was on the table but that it was too early to preview any legal action. "Our office, and I think a lot of other state AGs, our sister states, are very vigilant with this administration's executive actions, whether they're proposed rules or regulation or executive orders. And that would include this potential proposal -- to see whether or not they're within the constitutional boundaries," Hilgers said. Hours after the Supreme Court struck down his earlier proposal last month, Biden announced his new plan to use the HEA to deliver debt relief to students. At minimum, it is likely months before it could be finalized under the negotiated rulemaking process. Currently, little is known about how much debt relief will become available under the plan and who would qualify for it. |
| 'This Is a Really Big Deal': How College Towns Are Decimating the GOP | |
| Spring elections in Wisconsin are typically low turnout affairs, but in April, with the nation watching the state's bitterly contested Supreme Court race, voters turned out in record-breaking numbers. No place was more energized to vote than Dane County, the state's second-most populous county after Milwaukee. It's long been a progressive stronghold thanks to the double influence of Madison, the state capital, and the University of Wisconsin, but this was something else. Turnout in Dane was higher than anywhere else in the state. And the Democratic margin of victory that delivered control of the nonpartisan court to liberals was even more lopsided than usual -- and bigger than in any of the state's other 71 counties. The margin was so big it that it changed the state's electoral formula. Under the state's traditional political math, Milwaukee and Dane -- Wisconsin's two Democratic strongholds -- are counterbalanced by the populous Republican suburbs surrounding Milwaukee. The rest of the state typically delivers the decisive margin in statewide races. The Supreme Court results blew up that model. Dane County alone is now so dominant that it overwhelms the Milwaukee suburbs (which have begun trending leftward anyway). In effect, Dane has become a Republican-killing Death Star. "This is a really big deal," said Mark Graul, a Republican strategist who ran George W. Bush's 2004 reelection campaign in Wisconsin. "What Democrats are doing in Dane County is truly making it impossible for Republicans to win a statewide race." In isolation, it's a worrisome development for Republicans. Unfortunately for the larger GOP, it's not happening in isolation. In state after state, fast-growing, traditionally liberal college counties like Dane are flexing their muscles, generating higher turnout and ever greater Democratic margins. They've already played a pivotal role in turning several red states blue -- and they could play an equally decisive role in key swing states next year. |
| Meet the Real-Life Scientists Who Got to Play Scientists in 'Oppenheimer' | |
| Shane Fogerty and a dozen other scientists watch as J. Robert Oppenheimer, the world-famous physicist, weighs the world-changing news: The Soviets have an atomic bomb. After Oppenheimer makes the case against escalating the situation, a government official, Lewis Strauss, cuts in to disagree. Only Oppenheimer isn't Oppenheimer, but the actor Cillian Murphy. And Strauss is Robert Downey Jr. Fogerty, by contrast, is a real-life physicist at Los Alamos National Laboratory, where Oppenheimer was the founding director during World War II. Along with dozens of colleagues, Fogerty jumped at the chance to bring the Manhattan Project to life as extras in the hotly anticipated Oppenheimer, which opens in theaters on Friday. Fogerty normally spends his days modeling large-scale physics simulations and running code on ultra-fast supercomputers -- but truth be told, acting wasn't much of a stretch. "As a scientist," Fogerty says, "I just had to be myself a little bit." The sci-fi epics of Christopher Nolan, Oppenheimer's writer-director, probe the nightmarish frontiers of innovation. Whether they're hijacking dreams (Inception), traveling through wormholes (Interstellar), or going back in time (Tenet), Nolan's pioneers grapple with moral dilemmas in lawless spaces. Oppenheimer was not so different. Born in New York, the theoretical physicist was educated at Harvard University, the University of Cambridge, and the University of Göttingen, in Germany. He was rising through the ivory tower, teaching at the University of California at Berkeley and the California Institute of Technology, when he was recruited to run a new government weapons lab in the high desert of Los Alamos, N.M. |
| Why so many top candidates are ignoring Mississippi's worsening hospital crisis | |
| Mississippi Today's Adam Ganucheau writes: The hospital crisis has emerged as the state's most dire problem. Yet with Mississippi's major statewide primary election less than three weeks away, only one candidate for an office that could do anything about it is even acknowledging its existence. Gov. Tate Reeves, who faces two Republican primary opponents on Aug. 6, would rather voters think about problems that apparently don't exist in Mississippi like trans athletes and the influence of national liberals on our state's policies -- not the fact that dozens of hospitals are on the brink of closure. Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann and his Republican primary challenger state Sen. Chris McDaniel appear most focused on out-flanking each other on the right and arguing over who is the truer conservative Republican. Never mind the fact that at least 200,000 working Mississippians cannot afford doctor visits and dying hospitals are underwater having to cover those bills. ... Right now, no Mississippi hospital -- large or small, urban or rural, private or public -- is immune from potentially debilitating financial concerns. Hospital leaders are having to make life-changing decisions about how they can balance their budgets. They've slashed health care services, laid off staff or even closed doors permanently just to make ends meet. State Health Officer Dr. Daniel Edney put it bluntly a couple weeks ago on a radio program: "No one is knocking it out of the park right now. We have a spectrum of hospitals that literally see their drop-dead date ahead of them if something does not happen." |
SPORTS
| How Mississippi State's Zach Arnett is balancing lessons from Leach and own coaching style | |
| By the time Mississippi State football coach Zach Arnett had finished the first sentence of his opening statement at the podium during Tuesday's SEC Media Days session, he had already surpassed the seven words his predecessor, Mike Leach, used in his short statement last year. "I've already said too much, and that combined with wearing a tie, I'm sure I've disappointed (Leach) a little bit here today," Arnett said. "In recognition of his tremendous impact and influence not only on the game of football but on myself, I'm going to do my best to keep this short and sweet." Arnett, who took over MSU's football program after Leach's sudden death in December, spent nearly 20 minutes discussing his team on Tuesday, as well as who he is as a head coach. Part of that included lessons learned from Leach that Arnett is carrying into his tenure. "There's obviously a lot of wisdom, nuggets of wisdom that I received from Coach Leach over the last three years," Arnett said. "Simply put, I look at it as a blessing. I got to spend three years under, in my opinion, a unanimous first ballot Hall of Famer. His fingerprints and impact on the game of football are evident throughout, particularly offensive play in modern football." In hopes of continuing that success, Arnett is finding the balance between his own style and things that worked while he was an assistant coach for Leach. That balancing act isn't lost on Arnett's players, either. |
| Bulldog Trio Named To Media Preseason All-SEC Team | |
| The Mississippi State trio of Will Rogers, Nathaniel Watson and Lideatrick Griffin have been named to the 2023 Preseason All-SEC Teams in a vote for by the media covering SEC Media Days in Nashville, the League announced on Friday. Rogers enters his senior season having thrown for 10,689 career yards, the eighth most in SEC history, and just 2,478 yards shy of becoming the SEC's all-time leading passer. The senior from Brandon, Miss., has rewritten the Mississippi State record book in his time wearing Maroon and White. Watson earned his spot on the Preseason All-SEC team as a linebacker. He is coming off a career year that saw him finish with 113 tackles. Griffin, named an All-American kick returner by Pro Football Focus last season, earned two Preseason All-SEC honors by the media as a return specialist and an all-purpose athlete. Mississippi State will kickoff the 2023 campaign on Saturday, Sept. 2, when the Bulldogs host Southeastern Louisiana at 3 p.m. (CT). Season tickets are on sale now and can be purchased by visiting hailstate.com/tickets. |
| SEC commish Greg Sankey rails against lack of NIL progress as college sports leaders struggle for answers | |
| In late June, the next step in college sports' pursuit of solutions for name, image and likeness (NIL) unfolded in a large conference room within NCAA headquarters in Indianapolis. Members of the Division I council -- some of college sports' top athletic administrators -- gathered around a table for a report from members of the NIL working group. The report was vague in nature -- an outline of a general pathway for a possible permanent solution to an issue that has vexed college leaders for months now. After the presentation ended, the room fell silent -- aside from the voice of the commissioner of the SEC. "I am concerned that we had the opportunity for observations, comments or questions and I was the only one who spoke," Greg Sankey said in an interview with Yahoo Sports this week from SEC football media days. "You have a DI leadership group receiving a report from a working group, well presented, and only one of 40 representatives engaged in this conversation. "We spend more time talking about the committee selection process than we do about the leading issue we are facing, which is name, image and likeness," he continued. "Maybe for some within Division I, there is an imaginary world where name, image and likeness doesn't touch them. I think that's exactly what I described it as -- an imaginary world. Those in leadership positions owe their time and position to this topic." These comments, perhaps strategically fired toward his colleagues, emanate from a person who is exhausted by the NCAA's bureaucratic governing process and frustrated at the lack of NIL enforcement from the governing body. |
| Lane Kiffin says state of college football is 'a disaster' | |
| Ole Miss coach Lane Kiffin didn't wait for questions on the impact of the transfer portal and name, image and likeness deals at SEC media days on Thursday. Instead, he addressed both topics during his opening statement, calling the current state of college football a "disaster." Kiffin prefaced his comments by saying he's happy that players can get paid but that the unintended consequence of NIL is a "pay-for-play" system where players follow the money and the teams with the deepest pockets get the best talent. With the transfer portal, Kiffin said, "free agency" now exists -- except that, unlike professional sports, every college player can enter into free agency twice a year with the spring and winter transfer windows. Said Kiffin: "We've got professional sports," except with no salary cap or luxury tax, and the result is myriad "issues" for coaches. "And I'm not complaining about it cause we take advantage, obviously, of free agency," he added. Ole Miss has been among the most active teams in the country in the transfer portal. |
| Dan Mullen recalls intense rivalry with Hugh Freeze in Egg Bowl | |
| Dan Mullen recalled some intense battles with Hugh Freeze when the two men coached Mississippi State and Ole Miss. The Egg Bowl is a wild rivalry and Mullen knew he and Freeze escalated the back-and-forth game to game. It got wild to a point where it was "out of control," per Mullen. Mullen described the tussles with Freeze, now at Auburn, when the two squared off for Mississippi supremacy. "I mean, there's the cordial hello," Mullen said on The Matt Barrie Show. "I think the one thing that that changed that that made it tricky, I think both of us within the Egg Bowl when I got to Mississippi State, there wasn't a lot that you're building off of. The program was winning, they weren't doing well. There's not this massive tradition. And so it kind of went of 'Alright, let's start with the Egg Bowl. And how do we make this game bigger than life?' "You know, not that it wasn't already. We're gonna start by just, I mean, we are stoking the fire on this. I think Hugh came in and then we started having success. Hugh came in and said hey, we gotta do the same thing." |
| Hazing remains ingrained in team sports and experts say they see increase in sexualized attacks | |
| Georgia coach Kirby Smart remembers having his head shaved when he was a freshman football player at his alma mater back in the mid-1990s and busing tables after team meals. Older players putting the newbies in their place by hazing remains ingrained in team sports at all levels in the United States. That is not the way Smart wants to run the Bulldogs, who have won two straight national championships. "Now, those freshmen, the guys we sign, they have to play," Smart said this week at Southeastern Conference media days. "So when you create this separation of, they have to do this and they have to do that, they're not ready to play. They're like a different team." While major college sports programs have become multimillion-dollar, high-stakes businesses run more like professional teams, ritualistic hazing remains a problematic tradition within them. School rules forbidding hazing, more than 40 state laws against it and horror story after horror story have not stopped it. "I think it's happening more often than people realize and we see it making the headlines around what's happening in high school locker rooms," said Elizabeth Allan, a professor at the University of Maine who has studied hazing on campus. "And so students are coming to college often having experienced hazing in their high school athletics programs." Allan said studies have shown about half of all students report experiencing some type of hazing in high school. She said hazing can be found wherever a large group is trying to establish a hierarchy. |
| A college betting scandal this fall? 'We'll probably see two,' says expert | |
| As football season nears, college sports stakeholders hold their collective breath. Sports wagering concerns have escalated in light of separate recent investigations involving Alabama baseball -- whose coach, Brad Bohannon, was swiftly fired in May for suspicious betting activity -- and dozens of student-athletes at Iowa and Iowa State. And news that 17 investigations related to college sports betting are ongoing -- which NCAA President Charlie Baker disclosed in a document obtained by the Associated Press -- puts a finer point on the scope of the issue. Nearly 40 states have legalized sports gambling. And more than $150 billion will be wagered on sports this year in North America. Tom McMillen, CEO of LEAD1 Association, has told On3 that sports wagering represented his No. 1 personal concern in all of college athletics because the ramifications could potentially be "catastrophic." And McMillen said that before the Alabama and Iowa probes attracted headlines. On3 this week caught up with Matt Holt, CEO and founder of the Las Vegas-based monitoring firm U.S. Integrity, which initially alerted the SEC to the abnormal betting on Alabama baseball. Holt discussed the chances of a sports betting scandal in college football this year (likely), the value of some 14 partnerships U.S. Integrity has with conferences (in addition to partnerships with 30 schools) and why he believes leagues are "way ahead" of the NCAA in proactive strategies. |
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