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

National Coverage

Football Searches for the Cause of Another Tragedy
Time

…About 100,000 high school football players are concussed per year, and a recent study at the University of North Carolina found that college players suffer a stunning 950 to 1,100 sub-concussive injuries every season. "We've been collecting data at the collegiate level using accelerometers [in helmets] for about six years," U.N.C. neuroscientist Kevin Guskiewicz told me when I was reporting my story. "There's a three-fold increase in risk of depression among ex-NFL players if they've had three or more concussions during their careers and a five-fold increase in risk of mild cognitive impairment."

Regional Coverage

Arizona bills a test of federal government authority
The Arizona Republic (Tucson)

Some Arizona lawmakers are tired of the federal government telling the state what to do. …Kareem Crayton, a political scientist and associate professor of law at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, said the court based its opinion on the "notion that this was a population that was being unduly targeted without sufficient justification on the part of the state." "That was a very different Supreme Court than the one that exists now," Crayton said.

Childhood mental illness
The Baltimore Sun (Maryland)

Join us at noon CT (1 p.m. ET/10 a.m. PT) on Tuesday, March 1, for an hour-long web chat on children and mental illness hosted by Chicago Tribune health reporter Deborah L. Shelton and panelists Dr. Bennett Leventhal and Dr. Lynn Wegner. …Dr. Lynn Wegner is an associate professor of pediatrics, developmental and behavioral pediatrics at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, and a consultant to the American Academy of Pediatrics Task Force on Mental Health.

State and Local Coverage

Duke, UNC to share summer reading
The Herald-Sun (Durham)

Incoming UNC and Duke University students will read together this summer. "Eating Animals" by Jonathan Safran Foer, an examination of vegetarianism and how society tells stories to justify its eating habits, will be the 2011 summer reading book for incoming students at both campuses. Administrators at the two universities decided to consolidate their summer reading programs for the first time this year to further strengthen ties between the neighboring schools. This is UNC's 13th year with a program and Duke's 10th.
UNC Release:
http://uncnews.unc.edu/content/view/4331/75/

Kind of Blue
"The State of Things" WUNC-FM

A new play that explores male identity draws inspiration from jazz music. Playwright Kuamel Stewart’s “Kind of Blue” asks theater goers to consider different perceptions of masculinity with a narrative set in 1940s New York City. Stewart, a senior communications major at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, is the first African-American undergraduate to have a full-length production performed on a UNC mainstage. “Kind of Blue” debuts this week at the Historic PlayMakers Theatre and Stewart talks with host Frank Stasio about his creative approach to playwriting, which fuses musical technique with social critique.

NCCU to foster intellectual climate
The News & Observer (Raleigh)

…UNC-Chapel Hill took on a similar project in the late 1990s. A task force on that campus spent a year studying the issue and produced a 68-page report that called for a series of sweeping changes and improvements. A decade or so later, that initiative's fingerprints can be found all over campus. It created first-year seminars and a summer reading program for new students. The seminars gave freshmen a small-class oasis amid the typical first-year lecture hall courses. And the summer reading program, which assigns all incoming students the same book to read, injected some academic rigor into that traditionally lazy summer before the first year of college.

Mobile planetarium enhances space education
The Sun Journal (New Bern)

…The PLANETS – Portable Learning for All North Carolina’s Elementary Teachers and Students – was at Creekside Elementary Tuesday and at Brinson Memorial Elementary Wednesday, where it will be the rest of the week to lift students’ minds into space with a visual learning experience. With planet science educator Elysa Corin leading the mission, the science education outreach Portable Planetarium Program operated by Morehead Planetarium and Science Center at UNC-Chapel Hill is here this week sharing its multimedia planetarium shows “Earth, Moon and Sun” and “Magic Tree House Space Mission.”
UNC Release:
http://uncnews.unc.edu/content/view/4323/107/

At UNC: Comparing a coach and a researcher (Blog)
The News & Observer (Raleigh)

Are the cases of Butch Davis and Bonnie Yankaskas similar? Were the two UNC-Chapel Hill employees, each quite well-regarded in their respective fields, treated equally? Should they have been? News & Observer Executive Editor John Drescher raises these points in a recent column comparing the way UNC-Chapel Hill Holden Thorp dealt with two high profile cases.

Issues and Trends

GOP spending targets $1.4 billion less than Perdue
The Associated Press

Republican legislative leaders aim to cut much further than Democratic Gov. Beverly Perdue's proposed budget by seeking to spend $1.4 billion less next year in key areas, with more than half the reduction coming from education programs, possibly from preschool through college. The numbers released Wednesday are targets for House and Senate budget-writers to meet in six large spending categories as they work on a two-year spending plan that begins July 1.
Related Link:
http://www.heraldsun.com/view/full_story/11571918/article-GOP-targets
-education-for-cuts?instance=homefirstleft

Nelms: Pell Grant cut 'devastating'
The Herald-Sun (Durham)

A potential cut in federal Pell Grant funding would be "devastating" to N.C. Central University, school officials say. …President Barack Obama's proposed budget calls for maintaining the maximum award for a Pell, which provides need-based grants to low-income undergraduates, at $5,500 per year. But House Republicans have proposed trimming that amount by 15 percent to $4,705.
Related Link:
http://blogs.newsobserver.com/campusnotes/nccus-nelms-pell-cuts-would-devastate

Ga.'s Trendsetter HOPE Scholarship Faces Deep Cuts
The Associated Press

Georgia's promise was simple: Get good grades in high school, get a free college education. More than a million students took advantage. Soon, however, it may be offered only to the brightest of the bright. …UGA senior Alex Sevy said he turned down the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the University of Michigan to stay in state because of HOPE. "HOPE is such a good deal," said a 21-year-old biochemistry major with plans to go to the Peace Corps. "If not for HOPE, they would have chosen somewhere else."

Early action returns
The Harvard Gazette

Harvard College announced today (Feb. 24) that it will restore nonbinding early action as part of its admissions process this fall and significantly enhance its recruiting program to assist talented students from modest economic backgrounds in navigating the admissions process. Harvard also announced it will increase its investment in undergraduate financial aid next year to more than $160 million. Currently, more than 60 percent of Harvard College students receive scholarship aid, and the average grant is about $38,000.

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