January 31, 2005

Carolina in the News

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

National Coverage

Deal Can Only Raise the Level of Competition, From the Boardroom to Aisle 5
The New York Times
Procter & Gamble has long been the 800-pound gorilla in household products. So will it be more formidable with the added muscle of Gillette?..."All of them have extracted most of the possible production and efficiency gains and the best terms possible from the retailers," said William P. Putsis Jr., a professor of marketing at the Kenan-Flagler Business School at the University of North Carolina.

Crackdown On Otamedia Could Help U.S. Cigarette E-tailers
The Wall Street Journal
With a pack of smokes costing as much as $8 in cities like New York, it is no wonder smokers have increasingly gone online to overseas vendors in search of cheap, untaxed cigarettes in recent years...."The recent actions against Otamedia are a big blow to Internet cigarette sales," said Kurt Ribisl, an assistant professor at the University of North Carolina 's School of Public Health who studies the issue.
Subscription required.

Who's Dying in Our War?
Los Angeles Times
Some months after the Americans took over the sprawling Balad Air Base, about 50 miles north of Baghdad, someone posted an enigmatic sign on the main gate asking: "Is Today the Day?"...Richard H. Kohn, history professor and chair of the Curriculum in Peace, War and Defense at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, argues that the Iraq deployment violates the "citizen soldier" concept at the heart of the National Guard.

Scrushy Not Using 'Dummy Defense'
The Associated Press (National)
Other former CEOs may be dummies, but not Richard Scrushy....``It all boils down to a similar issue. The skills and activities that allow one to make millions of dollars are not the same as financial sophistication and forensic accounting skills,'' [Robert] Bushman, a forensic accounting professor at the University of North Carolina, said in an e-mail interview.

PBS to Air Documentary on Fidel Castro
The Associated Press (National)
People have been trying to figure out Fidel Castro since he came to power in Cuba 46 years ago....``To attribute to Castro alone -- just one man -- the power to have shaped the destiny of so many people is to elevate him to the level of the gods. He would be pleased,'' Louis Perez, a history professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and author of numerous books on Cuba, wrote in The Chronicle of Higher Education.

Aircraft plant raises S.C. hopes
Knight Ridder News Services
S.C. officials cheered last month when Global Aeronautica picked North Charleston as the site where it will build a major part of Boeing Co.'s newest aircraft, the 7E7 Dreamliner....John Kasarda, a professor at the Kenan-Flagler Business School at UNC Chapel Hill, called demand sluggish.

Social Security plan augurs an era's end
Knight Ridder News Service
When he delivers his State of the Union address Wednesday to Congress and the country, President Bush will call for a radical change in Social Security that ultimately could reshape the relationship that Americans have with their government...."It would change the basic assumption that there is a contract between the American people and the federal government," said William Leuchtenberg, a historian of the New Deal era at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill.'

Tragedy in disguise
Rocky Mountain News
Shakespeare plays are a dime a dozen - pick a day, and there's probably one being staged in the area. But look for a professional production of a Greek tragedy, and you may be waiting awhile....Most importantly, though, Marley committed to an extra three weeks' of salary last summer so the cast could study mask work in Denver under University of North Carolina professor Craig Turner, who is serving as the show's mask and movement coach.

Regional Coverage

New study shows minorities more likely to be charged prepayment penalties on their home mortgage loans
The Free Lance Star (Fredericksburg, Va.)
People with shaky credit histories who've paid dearly for a home mortgage often wind up in Laura Alridge's office....This puts them at a substantially greater risk of losing their house--along with any equity they've built up, said Michael A. Stegman, one of the study's authors and director of UNC's Center for Community Capitalism.

State & Local Coverage

UNC-CH backers boost lawmakers
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
A political action committee formed by well-heeled UNC-Chapel Hill backers donated more money to candidates for the last election than most of North Carolina's corporate heavyweights, including big banks and pharmaceutical companies.

UNC's fumble (Editorial)
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
Leaders of the University of North Carolina system's Board of Governors have said they want a freeze on tuition increases for next year, a signal that should be loud and clear to the 16 member campuses. But trustees from the Chapel Hill campus apparently didn't hear the message, or perhaps drowned it out with a collective Bronx cheer to the governing board.

Trustees wrong to approve fee hikes (Editorial)
The Chapel Hill Herald
Let's see if we have this right. UNC's Board of Trustees, in an hour or so, changed the recommended tuition increase for in-state students, changed the planned tuition increase for out-of-state students, moved nearly $1 million away from the university's athletic department and to the financial aid portfolio, and to make up that shortfall, approved more than doubling student athletic fees over the next two years.

Merit-based's merit (Letter to the Editor)
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
Regarding your Jan. 28 article "UNC-CH seeks big increases," a key result of the UNC-Chapel Hill Board of Trustees' recent deliberations is to shine the spotlight on the role of merit-based scholarships in rounding out the full array of opportunities we can offer to talented prospective students.

University could diverge from system
The Daily Tar Heel
Despite every indication from the UNC system's governing body that campus-based tuition increases will not be approved this year, UNC-Chapel Hill officials said the system's flagship institution deserves the hike and needs it to remain competitive.

Program to support soldiers' families
The Daily Tar Heel
As increasing numbers of National Guardsmen and reservists are deployed, families and soldiers are finding themselves in unfamiliar territory - both at home and abroad.

Winter
"The State of Things" WUNC-FM
Host Rusty Jacobs leads a discussion about how people cope with the winter doldrums. Guests include: Michael Hill, Professor of Psychiatry at UNC School of Medicine and expert on Seasonal Affective Disorder; and Jan DeBlieu, Cape Hatteras coastkeeper for the National Coastal Federation and author of "Wind: How the Flow of Air Has Shaped Life, Myth, and the Land."
Note: This program rebroadcasts tonight at 9.

Civil rights pioneer to visit UNC-CH
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
Mary Frances Berry, the first woman to head the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, will speak at 7 p.m. Feb. 10 at UNC-Chapel Hill.

Zoloft debated in, out of court
The Charlotte Observer
Should adolescents take antidepressants?....The theory is that having more serotonin improves mood, said Dennis Williams, associate professor at the UNC Chapel Hill School of Pharmacy.

Voice over Internet has people talking
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
When Peter Pediaditakis moved to Chapel Hill, he remained just a local call away from his pals back in Pittsburgh....Pediaditakis, a research fellow at UNC-Chapel Hill's Department of Cell and Developmental Biology, is part of a telecommunications explosion that industry experts say is turning an experimental technology into a household service.

Local entrepreneurs have good people and good food
The Herald-Sun (Durham)
The Henderson family of Durham sells millions of hot dogs a year, while Carrboro resident Michael Villopoto has built a successful business out of pizza...."The slow process of word of mouth is not fast enough to stay ahead of the debt payments you need," said Randy Myer, a former entrepreneur who now teaches at UNC's Kenan-Flagler Business School.

'Miracle child' Scott Johnson is taking on a new title: 'Ironman'
The Daily News (Jacksonville, N.C.)
Scott Johnson of Wilmington, son of retired Marine Col. William Johnson and Marilyn Johnson, a second-grade teacher at Clyde Erwin Elementary School, came into this world sick....After waiting at UNC Hospitals for two months, a pair of lungs finally became available. Then Dr. Frank Detterbeck performed Scott's transplant surgery in September 2001.
Related link: http://abclocal.go.com/wtvd/news/012805_NW_transplant.html
Note: Other coverage included Today's event was covered by WRAL-TV, WB22, News 14 and Carolina Week.

A bow to the bow tie
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
If you've seen Deondri Clark on TV coaching college football, you may not remember his name....Shaw University's football coach Clark wears one for most games. Two professors at UNC's school of journalism -- Chuck Stone and Phil Meyer -- are known among students for their collection of bow ties.

Issues & Trends

More Students Plan to Work to Help Pay for College
The Chronicle of Higher Education
Record-high percentages of students expect to work while attending college and to take on large chunks of debt to pay their tuition, according to an annual national survey of incoming freshmen conducted by the Higher Education Research Institute at the University of California at Los Angeles.
Subscription required.

Downtown agency says leadership is full-time
The Chapel Hill Herald
The downtown development board will take applications over the next month or so for a job helping downtown businesses thrive and bringing new ones to the Franklin-Rosemary mix....The winning applicant will be the first full-time, permanent executive director for the Chapel Hill Downtown Economic Development Corp., a nonprofit organization set up by the town and UNC last summer. UNC professor Nick Didow has been working as part-time, interim director for the group since August, about a month and a half after the board had its first meeting.

Council gets 1st RFQ from East West
The Chapel Hill Herald
The developer of Meadowmont along N.C. 54 is interested in being the town's partner in the planned redevelopment of several town-owned properties in downtown Chapel Hill....A Stonebridge representative made the rounds with UNC Vice Chancellor Tony Waldrop during some of the public presentations Waldrop made on the draft Carolina North plans last year.

OWASA gets grant to aid water reuse
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
The Orange Water and Sewer Authority has been awarded a $644,605 grant to help pay for a water reuse project that will make it possible to reclaim and treat wastewater for industrial and outdoor use at UNC-Chapel Hill and elsewhere.

Produced by News Services, Carolina in the News is an e-mail sampling of current news media coverage about Carolina people and programs, as well as issues and trends that affect the university. Stories usually will be online and available free for a limited time - often one to two weeks. Expiration dates before stories move to archives vary by media outlet. Some outlets require free user registration or a subscription.

Carolina in the News is also posted daily to the News Services Web page, http://www.unc.edu/newsserv/clipsindex.htm.

Please share any questions, comments or suggestions at news@unc.edu.