October 15, 2003

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

National News Coverage

Billion-dollar campaigns (Editorial)
Florida Sun-Sentinel
The private University of Miami appears to be the first Florida college or university to embark on a campaign to raise $1 billion, but at least 36 other institutions around the country have done likewise....Not to be outdone, the nearby, state-supported University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill has raised $1 billion toward a $1.8 billion goal, with another four years to go.

PlayMakers Rep Has U.S. Premiere of Owen Meany Oct. 15-Nov. 30;
Tandy Cronyn is Mrs. Meany
Playbill (N.Y.)
PlayMakers Repertory Company, the professional company in residence at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill, launches its 2003-04 season Oct. 15 with the American premiere of A Prayer for Owen Meany, adapted from the novel by John Irving.

State and Local Coverage

N.C. to perform statewide kids dental survey
N.C. Associated Press
Health officials will perform their first statewide children's dental survey in 16 years to help determine better ways to reduce cavities and other dental problems....The state Division of Public Health and School of Public Health at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill will conduct dental examinations of children in 400 classrooms this school year.

TransPark originator says GTP 'experiment' will lead to aerotropolis
Kinston Free Press
The academic mind that gave birth in 1999 to the idea of global transparks today
says that the GTP experiment near Kinston will reach fruition, acting as a catalyst to transform this area into an aerotropolis....Actually, it will, said Jack Kasarda, director of the Kenan Institute of Private Enterprise at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill. Once the (N.C.) Global TransPark develops, it will attract all the kinds of business that make up the aerotropolis. It's an experiment, but an experiment that's being replicated with good success elsewhere around the world.

Autumn's muscadines, like candy on the vine
The Charlotte Observer
Autumn's muscadines, like candy on the vine Follow your nose to a childhood
memory We've loved the taste of `swamp grapes' for hundreds of years This time of year, just after our first blush of autumnal cold, Carson Blue knows where to look for candy-on-the-vine -- the sunny, south facing banks of the Catawba River .....UNC Chapel Hill School of Medicine researchers have found that muscadines contain reservatrol, a phenolic compound that is a natural cholesterol reducer.

New drug therapies offer hope to multiple myeloma patients
News 14 (Time Warner, Raleigh)
In media coverage of cancer, one rarely hears about multiple myeloma. However, this form of cancer, which attacks plasma cells, is the second most common cancer that arises from blood cells, after non-Hodgkin's lymphoma....Robert Orlowski, MD, PhD, is an assistant professorof hematology-oncology in the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Medicine and a member of the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center's leukemia, lymphoma and myeloma program.

Drinking on Campus (Editorial)
Winston Salem Journal
Here's some good news: Positive peer pressure might help keep college students from drinking too much. A new study from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill found that publicizing results of informal polls showing that many students were not drinking or drinking only a little on the weekends resulted in an apparent drop in the number of students who drank.

Absentee voting stirs debate
The News & Observer
Rep. Martin Nesbitt, a Buncombe Democrat, said he didn't know who did it. Across the political aisle, Rep. Paul Stam, a Wake Republican, said he had no idea how the change made it into an unrelated bill on the last day of the 2002 General Assembly. Same for the State Board of Elections, the Republican Party and local elections officials.... Ferrel Guillory , director of the Program on Southern Politics, Media and Public Life at UNC-Chapel Hill, said the battle over the mechanics of absentee ballots is part of a greater fight over voter turnout between the two major parties.

Roses & raspberries
The Chapel Hill News
Roses and raspberries to the Atlantic Coast Conference for reaching out to grab Boston College into the conference....All that said, it does make sense as Chancellor James Moeser rationalizes that if you're going to expand to 11 schools, you might as well make it an even dozen and thereby quality for a conference championship game, which generates lots of revenue.  Roses to the Tar Heels for claiming their first football victory of the season last week.

Faith and serendipity
The Chapel Hill News
It was the final day of David Hammond's visit to London, and he had saved, he thought, the best for last....The trip had been a feast of the theater; Hammond, the artistic director for UNC's PlayMakers Repertory Company, had taken in a different play every night.

Issues and Trends

The Idea of a University (Opinion Editorial Column)
The Wall Street Journal
This week, Columbia University begins a year-long celebration of its 250th anniversary....Universities remain meaningful because they respond to the deepest of human needs, to the desire to understand and to explain that understanding to others....The fundamental purposes and structure will not change, for they are enduring. But the problems to be solved and the pool of talent to solve them will broaden. This is our way to ensure we remain vigorous, and relevant, in a mercurial world.

UNC system sells projects as job creation
The Charlotte Observer
UNC Chapel Hill officials asked the General Assembly this year to back $180 million in loans for a new cancer hospital, putting as much emphasis on the potential for 2,400 new jobs as the hope for saving lives.

UNC better wise up (Column/Commentary)
The News & Observer
I once heard a burly construction worker tell a rat-faced little drunk who was bothering him, "Son, you're cruisin' for a bruisin'."...Listen up, University of North Carolina administrators. A state legislator says you could be cruisin', too.

Second lawsuit filed
The News & Observer
Another log was thrown on the ACC expansion fire Tuesday when four Big East football-playing schools filed a second lawsuit, adding Boston College, its athletics director and four ACC officials to the list of defendants.

University's pledge to help bolster downtown is noble (Column/Commentary)
The Daily Tar Heel
It's still to soon to tell, but I'm beginning to believe that real solutions to downtown Chapel Hill's business woes are on the horizon...And with UNC Chancellor James Moeser's recent State of the University address, campus administration finally is emerging as the major player it should be in downtown economic development.

Candidates cite experience in crowded town race
The Chapel Hill News
With an uncontested mayoral race, nearly all of the attention this campaign season has been focused on the 12 candidates who are vying for four seats on the Chapel Hill Town Council....But this council race is a critical one. Those elected will join a council that must make decisions of major consequence to the town and the university as they lay the groundwork for the town's dealings with UNC on the development of Carolina North.

Note: If you have any questions about Carolina in the News, please call Russell Campbell at News Services, (919) 962-2091, russell_campbell@unc.edu, or Mike McFarland in University Communications, mike_mcfarland@unc.edu

Note: Web links on this page are time-sensitive, so stories might not be available after the day they first appeared.