Nov. 28, 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

Will Fajita Become the New Moon Pie?
The Associated Press (National)
When Flora Lopez moved to North Carolina in the mid-1990s, the grocery stores didn’t sell the kind of cornmeal used to make tortillas. Now, a little more than a decade later, tiendas are sprinkled throughout this town of 28,000 — and not only in Hispanic neighborhoods. ...“Increasingly, Moon Pies will be replaced as a cultural icon by fajitas,” predicted Bill Ferris, director of the Center for the Study of the American South at the University of North Carolina. A recent Associated Press/Ipsos poll was consistent with an analysis of 10 years’ worth of surveys by the University of North Carolina, both finding that barely half of Hispanics living in the region identified culturally with it.'

Fighting Anorexia: No One to Blame
Newsweek
Emily Krudys can pinpoint the moment her life fell apart. It was a fall afternoon in the Virginia suburbs, and she was watching her daughter Katherine perform in the school play. Katherine had always been a happy girl, a slim beauty with a megawatt smile, but recently, her mother noticed, she'd been losing weight. ...The environment "pulls the trigger," says Cynthia Bulik, director of the eating-disorder program at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. But it's a child's latent vulnerabilities that "load the gun."

From Wounds, Inner Strength
The Washington Post
As Hilbert Caesar told his harrowing war story one night recently in the living room of his apartment, he patted the artificial limb sticking from a leg of his business suit. "This, right here," he said, "this is a minor setback." ...University of North Carolina psychologists Lawrence G. Calhoun and Richard G. Tedeschi, who have studied post-traumatic growth for 20 years, said they are careful in describing what occurs.

U Rock, U Roll; For a Crash Course in Today's Music, Head for Three Southern College Towns (Commentary)
The Washington Post
Pink Floyd told us that we don't need no education. I don't want no argument with rock-and-roll royalty, but perhaps the band failed to considered higher education. I say this because -- to borrow one of Jack Black's lines from the movie "School of Rock" -- colleges quite clearly "service society by rocking." ...A 1999 graduate of the University of North Carolina, I always find Chapel Hill pleasantly isolated from the world, with students ambling along brick walkways and beside the town's low stone walls. East Franklin Street, the main drag, distills the college town essence: It's got an old-timey drugstore (Sutton's), a neon movie marquee (at the Varsity Theatre), a killer indie music store (Schoolkids, in two adjoining storefronts) and a string of bars and cheap restaurants.

Alcohol and medications are not appropriate for everyone (Commentary)
Knight Ridder Tribune News Service
My father came from China. He couldn't handle alcohol, and I've inherited this trait. I experience reddish skin, elevated heart rate and bloodshot eyes after only a small amount of alcohol, such as half a beer. ...We checked with Fulton Crews, Ph.D., director of the Bowles Center for Alcohol Studies at the School of Medicine of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He pointed out that humans have genetically determined variations in the enzymes that metabolize alcohol. Many Asians have a variant that increases acetaldehyde in the bloodstream. This causes flushing and other symptoms.

Business on the fly - Airport cities
The Economist
In the 19th century cities and businesses grew up around the railways; in the 20th century the growth of motorways drove development. But these days the magnets for business are airports. With so much emphasis on just-in-time manufacturing and some professionals needing to jump on planes almost daily, airports are becoming the centres of cities of their own. Warehouses, malls, high-tech firms and even consultancies are setting up shop almost within sight of the runway. It is a phenomenon that John Kasarda, a professor of entrepreneurship at the University of North Carolina calls the “aerotropolis”.

Regional Coverage

Boulder bike counters busy
The Denver Post
A laptop and cable at his side, Dale Beaupre nudged open a metallic door along the Boulder Creek Path, plugged into a black box the width of a business card and uploaded thousands of pieces of data about one of this city's key modes of transportation: the bicycle. ...The lack of data has really hindered any (national) studies," said Bill Hunter, who has studied pedestrian and bicycle traffic as a senior research scientist from the Highway Safety Research Center at the University of North Carolina. "We're seeing an increased interest in bicycles, and the inflation means municipalities have to adopt a balanced system to handle that.

Immigrant influx tests schools
The Times-Dispatch (Richmond, Va.)
Sitting on the floor around teacher Angela Naggles, first-and second-graders watch intently as she prints words on her whiteboard and asks the children to read them.Cat. Hat. Sat. ..."We have more emphasis on language and culture study," said Education Dean Thomas James at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, who added three professors to focus on immigrant education. "We are looking at a program of intensive language study for educators, but we have not yet taken that step."

State & Local Coverage

Sustainability - where Carolina leads (Opinion-editorial column)
The Chapel Hill Herald
In recent years, the university has made considerable progress on the sustainability front. Amid unprecedented construction and growth, the campus remains committed to nurturing the sense of place Carolina has long enjoyed. ...Rams Head Center is an example of new connective tissue forming on campus. Students in the residence halls of south campus are no longer relegated to a bedroom community. Being able to stop in for a workout, a good meal or to pick up a few groceries on the way back from class has improved the quality of life for thousands of Carolina students this year. James Moeser is the chancellor of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Note: Not available online. For a copy, email Michelle at mgreene@dev.unc.edu.

Are new colors in the works for UNC's Tar Heels, too? (Editorial note)
The Charlotte Observer
This just in: The bean-counters in Chapel Hill have reached a ground-breaking agreement with Wachovia Corp. to hang 6 x 8-foot "Wachovia" signs at the Dean Dome. The Heels' uniforms have featured the Nike "Air Jordan" logo, but the UNC arena has been off-limits to corporate advertising.
UNC News Release: http://tarheelblue.collegesports.com/sports/m-baskbl/spec-rel/112205aaj.html

Duke's on top, Heels below bottom, yet twain shall meet (Editorial note)
The Charlotte Observer
The Nov. 21 issue of Sports Illustrated was a collectors' item for ecstatic Duke basketball fans, but for UNC Tar Heel followers it was a sharp elbow to the solar plexus. The cover showed eight players clad in Duke blue over big type asking, "Can anyone stop DUKE? Lo, the mighty have fallen. The Heels won the NCAA tourney last season with a team filled with underclassmen. But a repeat was not to be: UNC's top seven scorers departed, including three juniors and a freshman picked in the first round of the NBA draft.

Smith Center welcomes a sign of times (Editorial)
The Chapel Hill Herald
We knew it was coming. But that doesn't make it any more palatable. Permanent advertising signage is now officially inside UNC's Smith Center. It is tasteful. It is discreet. It is even in blue. It is also a 6-by-8 foot permanent display on two video boards located above upper-level seating.

Just another brick from the wall (Editorial)
The Chapel Hill News
Bit by bit, the wall between corporate America and "amateur" athletics erodes. This has been happening for years, of course, and by now it's really more a pile of dust than a wall. Another brick came down last week with the installation of the first commercial advertising signs in the Smith Center. For the privilege of hanging its shingle in the Dean Dome -- and in Boshamer Stadium, Carmichael Auditorium and Fetzer Field -- Wachovia will pay UNC $9.1 million over eight years.

A cash slam dunk for NCSU, UNC
The Triangle Business Journal
The University of North Carolina men's basketball team is not expected to compete for another national championship this season, but the school's bean counters project it will be just as impressive on the balance sheet as it was on the court a year ago. A look at the athletics budgets at UNC and Atlantic Coast Conference rival North Carolina State University show that both basketball programs are cash cows decades after coaches Everett Case and Frank McGuire established the sport's popularity in this region.

Healthy returns at UNC, Duke
The Triangle Business Journal
The 2005 fiscal year was a good one for the endowments at both the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Duke University. The funds gained 15.5 percent and 18.1 percent, respectively. At UNC, the growth in the $1.4 billion fund was a good start for Jon King, who succeeded Mark Yusko as president of the UNC Management Co. in January.

Employment sector gains jobs in Triangle
The Triangle Business Journal
Employment has become a significant job creator in the Triangle. The employment services sector was the top job producer in the Raleigh-Cary metropolitan statistical area during the 12-month period ending September 2005. ...State government was the leading job creator in that area, jumping 7.4 percent. The rise was linked in part to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Chapel Hill's All Kinds of Minds marks 10 years helping kids
The Herald-Sun (Durham)
A boy in a red rugby shirt sat hunched over a desk, working on what appeared to be a test. ... It's a goal All Kinds of Minds founder Mel Levine, a pediatrician, has for all children. "Ever since I was a little boy, I have been fascinated by schools and learning," said Levine, speaking in his All Kinds of Minds office in Chapel Hill. "We're giving schools, parents and clinicians the tools they need to help children succeed.

UNC to honor its war dead
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
UNC Chapel Hill's Memorial Hall, named in honor of Carolina students, staff and faculty who died in the Civil War, will soon be getting a more expansive monument to the university's war dead. ...They've already raised about $260,000 of the almost $300,000 needed, said Sam Magill, special projects major gifts officer in the UNC Office of Development. The money came from private donations, mostly from Navy ROTC alumni.

The unsung heroes of UNC (Commentary)
The Herald-Sun (Durham)
The following article is excerpted from remarks presented at the Unsung Founders Memorial Dedication Nov. 5 at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. " I have long known that I would not be here as a faculty member and dean if not for the sacrifices of the civil rights workers and leaders who came before and influenced the eventual opening of this university's doors to students and faculty of color, and to women. We were reminded of such heroism with the death of Rosa Parks." ...Bernadette Gray-Little is dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

A new public radio powerhouse
The Associated Press (N.C.)
In the world of public radio, the town best known for its national championship college-basketball program is also home to WUNC-FM, a fast-rising source for listeners who prefer their news and information from the left side of the dial.

Issues & Trends

Bowles' way (Editorial)
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
If the heads of the 16 campuses of the University of North Carolina system were listening closely, they didn't just hear what they wanted to hear from the man who in a few weeks will become their boss.

Affordable educations (Letter to the editor)
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
Your positive assessment of Erskine Bowles (Nov. 23 editorial) was right on target. He will be a terrific UNC president. Your advice to him was also excellent. Your advocacy of low tuition and fees had a helpful and very sound nuance. That policy, as you wrote, "helps" keep a university education within financial reach. It is not the whole story. ...Because of all of these factors, not just our still-modest tuition and fee increases, and because of the vision of Chancellor James Moeser and Associate Provost Shirley Ort, UNC-Chapel Hill guarantees debt-free university education for students from low-income families. This was not done in previous times of stunningly low tuition and fees, because it could not be done. Paul Hardin is a former Carolina Chancellor.

School boards buck UNC tuition change
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
The N.C. School Boards Association sent letters to all legislators last week, asking them to repeal the budget provision that reclassifies out-of-state full-time scholarship recipients at UNC campuses as in-state students. The controversial provision will save money for private foundations and athletic booster clubs that pay for scholarships on the public university campuses. It will also allow UNC-Chapel Hill and other campuses to exceed the limit on out-of-state freshmen, which is currently 18 percent.

UNC's departing president earned respect, scars, critics
The Herald-Sun (Durham)
Not long ago, Molly Broad joined a book club -- one of those fun neighborhood groups where people read books and get together to chat about them over dinner or a glass of wine. For eight years, Broad has had none of the down time required to be part of a book club. But she's trying, really trying, to ease off the pedal now as her run as president of the UNC system comes to a close.
Related Link: http://www.herald-sun.com/orange/10-672485.html

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/news/clips/index.shtml.

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