November 5, 2002

Carolina in the News

Current National Coverage

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

Early Decision Takes a Battering 
The Washington Post 
One of Sally O'Rourke's students had received early decision acceptance to the College of the Holy Cross, 
then decided she could not afford to go -- breaking what the college considered a binding agreement... In 
the past year, a few colleges -- including the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Mary Washington 
College in Fredericksburg -- have dropped early decision to ease the pressure on students and be more fair 
to those from low-income families, who need to wait for the best financial aid offer...
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A4885-2002Nov4.html

A new generation speaks up 'Muslim feminist cowgirl' tells her own American story 
USA Today 
When Asma Hasan was majoring in religion and American studies at Wellesley, she decided she wanted to 
read more about Islam, especially about American Muslims like herself... Some object to Islamic studies. A 
local group sued the University of North Carolina recently over an assigned book on the Koran. A federal 
appeals court rejected the case...
http://www.usatoday.com/usatonline/20021104/4588765s.htm

Pell Grant Awards as a Measure of Student Diversity at America's Highest-Ranked Colleges and Universities 
The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education
The percentage of students receiving Pell Grants at a given college or university is a useful, though short of 
perfect, measure of economic diversity within a student body. The Pell Grant percentage also provides some 
clues about racial diversity and the economic characteristics of blacks in a particular college or university's 
student body. About one half of all college students in the United States receive some kind of federal aid. 
Much of this aid is in the form of student loans. Only about 22 percent of U.S. college students receive 
financial aid in the form of grants. And black students are far more likely than white students to receive 
federal grants... 
http://www.jbhe.com/features/37_pell_grants.html
(Note: Carolina is listed on a chart in this story as the sixth highest campus for the percentage of undergraduates 
receiving Pell Grant Awards for the 2000-01 academic year. UC-Berkeley topped the list and is the only public 
university ranked higher than Carolina. To view the rankings, go to the above url and scroll down the web page.)

In India's Violence, a Civics Lesson 
The Washington Post 
From 1950 to 1995, approximately 7,000 Indians lost their lives in violent clashes between Hindus and 
Muslims. Roughly half of these deaths took place in just eight cities, which represent a mere 6 percent of the 
vast nation's population, according to political economist Ashutosh Varshney... Susan Ariel Aaronson and 
James T. Reeves have moved from the National Policy Association to the Kenan Institute of Private 
Enterprise, a D.C. think tank affiliated with the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill business school...
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A5385-2002Nov4.html

Russian Gas Still Mystifies
Newsday (Long Island, N.Y.)
Russia's tactics in using a gas to end last week's hostage standoff in a Moscow theater have generated more 
questions than answers... "It's not used in any kind of vapor or aerosol way in medicine," said 
anesthesiologist Fred Spielman, at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine...
http://www.newsday.com/news/printedition/health/ny-dsbelow2992170nov05,0,2320384.story?coll=ny-discovery-print

Temple Opens Door to Jewish History 
The Los Angeles Times 
Temple Beth El in Aliso Viejo will open a small museum today dedicated to educating the public about Jewish 
history, becoming one of only a handful of synagogues in the United States that house such an institution... 
Jodi Magness, a professor of religious studies at the University of North Carolina and author of the recently 
released book "The Archaeology of Qumran and the Dead Sea Scrolls," will speak at 7:30 tonight on 
menorahs in the ancient synagogues of Israel...
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/orange/la-me-museum3nov03.story
(Note: The Los Angeles Times requires free registration to access articles.)

Malpractice panel sees opportunity
Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Florida lawmakers should seize the medical malpractice crisis to improve patient safety and more effectively 
reimburse victims of medical negligence, researchers told a state task force on Monday... "The crisis is an 
opportunity to look at true reforms, not just those that leave the basic, flawed insurance system in place," 
testified Dr. Robert Berenson, an adjunct professor at the University of North Carolina School of Public 
Health, who ran the Medicare program under the Clinton administration...
http://www.gopbi.com/partners/pbpost/epaper/editions/today/business_d37c3bde407a31a51022.html

Living large causes sizable health risks
Orlando Sentinel 
People on the Florida State University campus call Montrae Holland "Big Swoll." The 6-foot-3 guard weighs 
336 pounds, the heaviest player on the school's 2002 football team... "I think there are a lot of physics that 
still needs to be figured out, so we have to be careful to just assume that these collisions are more violent,"
said Kevin Guskiewicz, the director of the Center for the Study of Retired Athletes at the University of 
North Carolina at Chapel Hill...
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/sports/college/orl-sptweight04110402nov04,0,2551459.story?coll=orl-sports-headlines

Today's football players may see longer, healthier lives
American Medical News
When orthopedic surgeon James Andrews, MD, gave a speech a few years ago to the National Football 
League Alumni Assn. about health issues affecting retired professional players, he was saddened by what he 
saw... Researchers at the Center for the Study of Retired Athletes at the University of North Carolina, 
Chapel Hill, are trying to fill voids in the research on this population and are analyzing data from 
questionnaires sent to 3,000 retired players. "Our overall goals will be to find out what happens to 
professional and other top athletes and, over time, to try to lessen whatever negative impacts playing has on 
their health and quality of life," said Kevin Guskiewicz, PhD, research director at the center...
http://www.ama-assn.org/sci-pubs/amnews/pick_02/hlsc1111.htm

Oprah Turns Rituals Into a 'Religion'
The Salt Lake Tribune
Sitting atop a media mountain named for her, Oprah Winfrey has become prophet, guru, and high priestess 
ofa new kind of "religion."... and she has laid out a process towards spiritual enlightenment with set patterns 
and practices -- what religion scholars call rituals, scholar Kathryn Lofton said Friday at the annual meeting 
of the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion in Salt Lake City. The most common rituals in the religion 
of Oprah are reading, writing and buying, said Lofton, who teaches at the University of North Carolina at 
Chapel Hill...
http://www.sltrib.com/11022002/nation_w/12819.htm

Fine arts briefs 
Green Bay (Wisc.) News-Chronicle
... Fred Alley, founder of the American Folklore Theatre in Door County, received the national Mark R.
Sumner Award, the only award that recognizes excellence in outdoor theater... The award was presented 
by the Institute of Outdoor Drama at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill, which has a constituency 
of 123 theaters in 37 states...
http://www.gogreenbay.com/page.html?article=116676
(Note: To view this brief, go to the above url and scroll down the web page.)

National News Note

Dr. Stephen Offenbacher, professor in the department of periodontology in the School of Dentistry, was 
scheduled to appear this morning on the NBC-TV program "Today" to discuss his research related to the link 
between periodontal disease and arteriosclerosis. No online links are available at this time.

State and Local Coverage

UNC salary gap found -- but how to fix it? 
The Herald-Sun
Now that UNC has proof of a salary gap between male and female faculty on campus, university leaders are 
starting a department-by-department salary review in hopes of finding specific examples of inequity... "We 
have to get down to the individual unit levels and figure out who this is actually affecting," said Provost Robert 
Shelton... In the medical school, female faculty members overall earn $6,976 less than their white male 
counterparts. "If that proves to be accurate, we’re going to have to fix it," said Jeffrey Houpt, dean of the 
medical school... But the numbers alone don’t necessarily indicate widespread gender equity problems. To 
draw such conclusions, university officials must do further study, cautioned Bernadette Gray-Little, the 
executive associate provost who helped put the study together ... 
http://www.herald-sun.com/orange/10-284627.html

Bioterrorism training focuses on teamwork
Charlotte Observer
An N.C. bioterrorism training session that emphasizes cooperation between medical and law enforcement 
agencies will become a model for other states to follow, officials said Monday... Former CDC director 
William Roper, now the public health school dean at the UNC Chapel Hill, said bioterrorism is a fact of life 
in modern America....
http://www.charlotte.com/mld/observer/news/local/4445623.htm

UNC trustee seeking new N.C. Senate seat 
Chapel Hill Herald 
For 16 years, Richard Stevens was neutral, a county administrator navigating the choppy waters of local
politics... "I'd been very concerned with the state budget over the last couple years," Stevens, a longtime 
member of UNC's Board of Trustees, said this week. "I know that one freshman senator can't change 
everything, but I figured I can't do anything if I don't run."...
http://www.herald-sun.com/archives/URNDetail.cfm?URN=0401717096
(Note: This article was previously not available online. The Chapel Hill Herald requires free registration to 
access archives.)

Hope for a son's rise 
News and Observer
Julian Nazar spends his school days in an attic playroom showing the volunteers what to do. They paint, discuss 
dragons and bounce on a trampoline -- the adults taking their cues from the animated, autistic 5-year-old while 
his parents watch through a one-way mirror... Behavioral therapists don't. Neither does the nationally 
recognized TEACCH program at UNC-Chapel Hill, which many local public schools follow. They treat autism 
as a lifelong disability families can learn to live with...
http://www.newsobserver.com/news/story/1885997p-1873421c.html

Sorrell is chemist, artist, rolled into one
The Herald-Sun 
Thomas Sorrell teaches one of the most challenging courses in UNC's premed curriculum, but it's his mixing of 
colors, not chemicals, that has landed him in at least a corner of the limelight. Sorrell's "White Rim, Green River," 
a scene from Canyonlands National Park in Utah, recently was chosen for an international exhibit organized by 
The National Park Academy of the Arts... Sorrell, at Carolina for 25 years, has painted "on and off for about 
20 years, seriously for the past five or so."... Longtime pal Tonu Kalam, a UNC music professor who conducts 
the UNC Symphony Orchestra Sorrell also plays in, says the group practices from 7-9:30 p.m. Mondays and 
Wednesdays and plays one concert each semester...
http://www.herald-sun.com/archives/URNDetail.cfm?URN=040171711
(Note: This coverage was the result of a UNC news release 
http://www.unc.edu/news/archives/oct02/sorrell102302.htm. The Chapel Hill Herald requires free 
registration to access archives.)

Village Voice: The black carpetbaggers (Commentary)
Chapel Hill News
Occasionally, I find the time to watch “60 Minutes.” I was particularly struck by a segment that aired on Oct.
27. It focused on black migrants from the North to the South, especially to the suburbs of cities such as 
Atlanta, Houston and Charlotte...
http://www.triangle.com/triangle.com/communities/chapelhill/community/story/1881268p-1870351c.html
(Note: Trudier Harris-Lopez is the J. Carlyle Sitterson professor of English at UNC-Chapel Hill. )

College resources just clicks away 
News and Observer
For Anita Sivakumar, an East Chapel Hill High School senior interested in computer science, the pursuit of 
the right college started 17 months ago with her own personal database... Online applications are on the rise, 
too. Two years ago at UNC-Chapel Hill, only 15 percent of prospective students applied online. So far this 
fall, it's 81 percent, partly because online applications come in faster. UNC-CH admissions officials expect 
to receive about 35 percent to 40 percent of the total this year online....
http://newsobserver.com/news/story/1886006p-1873430c.html

Issues and Trends Affecting Carolina

Students Work Overtime Amid Squeeze on Economy
The Wall Street Journal
After high-school graduation, Paul Dinehart dreamed of becoming a teacher or a principal. He thought he
could work his way straight through college with sheer determination and be the first in his blue-collar family 
to earn a degree. Now in his fourth year at Kent State University, the 21-year-old isn't sure... After 
adjusting for inflation, the average tuition at a four-year public school increased 117% between 1981 and 
2001. The rise was 123% at private schools. The increase in financial aid available per full-time student lagged, 
at 112%, during the same period, while the inflation-adjusted median family income rose only 25%...
http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB1036447644158802628,00.html?mod=home%5Fpage%5Fone%5Fus
(Note: The Wall Street Journal requires a subscription to access articles.)

Boom's End Is Felt Even at Wealthy Colleges
The New York Times
Suffering the worst investment losses in three decades, the nation's wealthiest universities are cutting spending 
sharply, postponing new buildings, imposing hiring freezes and preparing to lay off faculty members. The cuts 
signal the end of the flush period that peaked in the late 1990's, when some universities saw their investments
earn nearly 60 percent in one year... Universities lost an average of 3.6 percent on their investments in the 
year ending in June 2001, according to the National Association of College and University Business Officers...
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/11/05/education/05COLL.html
(Note: The New York Times requires free registration to access articles.)

OWASA secrecy goes too far (Editorial)
Chapel Hill News
Orange Water and Sewer Authority seems to have successfully navigated its way out of the drought 
emergency, but the agency has left the public high and dry in another respect....
http://www.triangle.com/triangle.com/communities/chapelhill/opinion/story/1886386p-1873691c.html

Free speech thrives at conference on academic freedom (Commentary)
Chapel Hill News
Former UNC President Bill Friday found himself wandering into an ideological lion’s den recently. Friday 
was among the speakers at a conference on academic freedom sponsored by the Pope Center for Higher 
Education. The center is an arm of the John Locke Foundation, an influential conservative think tank based in 
Raleigh that espouses limited government, lower taxes and untrammeled individual freedom. The conference 
was held, fittingly, at the William and Ida Friday Center for Continuing Education on the UNC campus... 
http://www.triangle.com/triangle.com/communities/chapelhill/opinion/story/1886379p-1870470c.html

Note: If you have any questions about Carolina in the News, 
please call Cathleen Keyser or Mike McFarland at News Services, 
(919) 962-2091 or news@unc.edu or mike_mcfarland@unc.edu