Here is a sampling of links and notes about Carolina people and programs cited recently in the media:
International Coverage
Study finds association between lyrics with degrading sex, early sexual experience
The Canadian Press (Wire Service)
High exposure to lyrics that describe degrading sex is associated with high levels of sexual behaviour in teens, a new study suggests. …Jane Brown, a professor at the School of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, said the findings corroborate a couple of previous studies.
Calcium linked to lower risk of digestive cancers
Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (Canada)
Dairy and other calcium-rich foods might help protect against some types of cancer, a study of nearly half a million older men and women suggests. …The study provides evidence that calcium might help keep cells from becoming cancerous, said University of North Carolina nutrition expert John Anderson, who was not involved in the study.
National Coverage
Extreme Measures
The Washington Post
After 15-year-old Christina received a diagnosis of anorexia nervosa in 2006, her parents were told there was only one thing to do: Send her to a residential treatment center. "The nutritionist, the family physician, the therapist: They all said she's got to go," her mother, Anna Grieco, remembers. …Grieco's search led her to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, whose hospital-based eating disorders program uses the Maudsley approach to teach parents how to help their child reach and maintain a healthy weight upon discharge.
Calcium tied to lower cancer risk in older people
The Associated Press
A study in nearly half a million older men and women bolsters evidence that diets rich in calcium may help protect against some cancers. …But because of its huge size — 492,810 people and more than 50,000 cancers — the new study presents powerful evidence favoring the idea that calcium may somehow keep cells from becoming cancerous, said University of North Carolina nutrition expert John Anderson, who was not involved in the study.
State and Local Coverage
UNC-CH to test campus alert sirens Tuesday
News 14 Carolina
UNC-Chapel Hill officials will sound emergency sirens on Tuesday afternoon to test the Alert Carolina system. The system is a safety awareness campaign designed to alert students, faculty and staff to take cover in a real emergency.
Related Link:
http://www.wchl1360.com/details.html?id=9534
http://heraldsun.southernheadlines.com/orange/10-1105020.cfm
UNC News Release:
http://uncnews.unc.edu/news/campus-and-community/university
-to-test-emergency-sirens-feb.-24.html
UNC chancellor speaks to J.H. Rose students
The Daily Reflector (Greenville)
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Chancellor Holden Thorp told a group of J.H. Rose High School students that the world needs them to go to college and address its difficult challenges. Thorp spoke Monday to about 75 Rose students who are interested in attending UNC-CH. “The world needs you right now,” he said. “We are facing an energy crisis, and an economic crisis and you are going to go and straighten all that out.”
Thorp Creates Fund for Future Lay Offs
WCHL 1360-AM (Chapel Hill)
Despite trying economic times, UNC Chancellor Holden Thorp announced a new fund that’ll help laid off University employees find work. Joe Templeton, chairman of UNC’s Faculty Council, said the fund will help employees who might be laid off in the future, even though that how many might need to tap into the money is still uncertain.
Memorial is March 5 for UNC's Eve Carson
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
A memorial service for Eve Carson will be held at UNC-Chapel Hill on March 5, the first anniversary of the killing of the popular student body president. A ceremony that day will be held in The Pit at 4 p.m. Chancellor Holden Thorp will speak, and the Clef Hangers, a student a capella singing group, will perform.
Related Links:
http://www.news-record.com/content/2009/02/23/article/unc_to_honor_
slain_student_body_president
http://abclocal.go.com/wtvd/story?section=news/local&id=6673865
http://www.wral.com/news/local/noteworthy/story/4593570/
http://www.wchl1360.com/details.html?id=9533
http://heraldsun.southernheadlines.com/orange/10-1105013.cfm
UNC News Release:
http://uncnews.unc.edu/news/campus-and-community/unc-to-honor-
slain-student-body-president-with-march-5-remembrance.html
When will economy rebound? Not this year, new survey warns
WRAL.com
If you thought the economic meltdown that’s evaporating share values worldwide faster than global warming is supposedly shrinking the polar ice caps is getting better soon, think again. …"I had hoped we might see a bottoming out this quarter, but conditions continue to deteriorate, albeit at a slightly slower rate than last quarter," UNC Kenan-Flagler accounting professor Mark Lang said in the latest quarterly survey from the school and the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants in Durham.
Is India labeled as Slumdog Superpower? (Opinion-Editorial Column)
The Triangle Business Journal
A common person in the western world mostly hears or sees about Indian stereotypes in various flavors – India’s glory in the medieval past, acute poverty in current days and the prevalence of the caste system and arranged marriages coexisting with religious tension and terrorism in the region. The most recent news about India has been the movie “Slumdog Millionaire,” a story about rags to riches that has become a darling of the awards season. (Jayshankar Swaminathan is a professor at the Kenan-Flagler Business School at UNC-Chapel Hill.)
Former US poet laureate to speak at UNC
The Associated Press
The former U.S. poet laureate who will be a writer-in-residence at the University of North Carolina will speak in Chapel Hill. Pulitzer Prize winner Mark Strand will give a free public reading Wednesday on the UNC campus.
Related Link:
http://www.wral.com/news/state/story/4597918/
UNC News Release:
http://uncnews.unc.edu/news/humanities-and-social-sciences/former-
poet-laureate-and-pulitzer-winner-to-visit-unc.html
Homeless housing aid may run out
The News & Record (Greensboro)
Three housing programs, including one in Guilford County that has worked with 79 chronically homeless residents, will run out of state funding this year. …Researchers who tracked 31 program participants found that the overall costs for services they used in Buncombe and Guilford counties decreased by 19 percent — or about $74,000 — in the first year they lived in supportive housing, according to the Jordan Institute for Families at UNC-Chapel Hill.
Less food, more need
The Citizen-Times (Asheville)
Every day brings another story of need to Diana McCarthy of Lilies of the Field, an agency that provides food to people in need. …A county-by-county study by the School of Social Work at UNC Chapel Hill, estimated that an additional $21.8 million in federal dollars could be brought into the state, generating an economic impact of $482.8 million statewide — $54 million in WNC alone — if all eligible people were enrolled in SNAP.
Legislator wants Salvia declared illegal in N.C.
News 14 Carolina
A state lawmaker is working to make buying a potent hallucinogenic plant illegal in North Carolina. State Sen. Bill Purcell, D-Scotland County, has proposed legislation to declare an herb called Salvia a Schedule I drug, the same category as cocaine and heroin. …At UNC Chapel Hill, researchers say they probably agree that Salvia should not be taken recreationally.
Friends of Downtown meeting welcomes Thorp
The Chapel Hill Herald
UNC Chancellor Holden Thorp is scheduled to be the featured speaker at this month's meeting of Friends of the Downtown. Organizers said the chancellor is planning to spend most of his time at the session in an interactive question-and-answer forum.
Global health talk on WUNC
The Chapel Hill Herald
Starting Monday, North Carolina Public Radio/WUNC-FM 91.5 will air a special series of reports highlighting the public health connections between North Carolina and southeastern Africa. The series "North Carolina Voices: Global Health Connections" examines research and service projects organized by North Carolinians abroad. …Reporter Rose Hoban will examine a project managed by UNC's Gillings School of Global Public Health in the Malawian capital, Lilongwe. Health care workers at the UNC project provide medical care as well as perform groundbreaking research in treatment for HIV, malaria and other diseases.
UNC News Release:
http://uncnews.unc.edu/news/health-and-medicine/n.c.-public-radio—wunc-
to-air-global-health-reports-as-part-of-nc.-voices-series.html
Art project needs town mementoes
The Chapel Hill Herald
UNC is joining the towns of Chapel Hill and Carrboro in "Our Stories, In Focus — a Community Art and History Project." The project invites local residents, including Carolina students, faculty and staff, to bring mementoes connoting snapshots in time that relate to the area — postcards, old photos, letters, newspaper clippings — to any of three different places on any of three separate dates.
UNC News Brief:
http://uncnews.unc.edu/news/arts/unc-to-participate-
in-community-art-project.html
Deadline March 6 for library trip
The Chapel Hill Herald
The deadline to register for a summer seminar in Prague, the Czech Republic, or Oxford, England, sponsored by the School of Information and Library Science at UNC, has been extended to March 6.
UNC News Brief:
http://uncnews.unc.edu/news/humanities-and-social-sciences/
tours-of-libraries-in-oxford-prague-offered.html
Issues and Trends
Eve's brother a believer
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
…Of course, if you are anything like me, you wouldn't think that you could change the world, either. Yet, that's what Andrew Carson and his pals are trying to do. …Carson, the brother of slain UNC-Chapel Hill Student Body President Eve Carson, and his friends are on a mission to call attention to the deadly affliction Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy. …Carson and his friends hope to raise awareness and about $17 million by selling DVDs of "Darius Goes West," a documentary film they made in 2007.
Heading to when A is average (Opinion-Editorial Column)
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
…Everything you need to know about grading in colleges across America can be found in those six schools, one private and elite, Duke; one private and modestly selective, Elon; and four public, including an engineering school, N.C. State University, and a flagship liberal arts school, UNC-Chapel Hill. …But it's also interesting to look at the actual GPAs of these schools. At the top of the heap grade-wise, you have Duke, which has for at least 40 years graded about 0.2 higher than UNC-Chapel Hill. (Stuart Rojstaczer is a former professor of geophysics from Duke University. He is the author of a book, "Gone for Good: Tales of University Life After the Golden Age," and many articles on higher education and grading.)