Sept. 13, 2006

Carolina in the News

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

International Coverage

Tailored medicines for rich and poor alike
The News Scientist (UK)
In rich nations, doctors are thinking about tailoring drug treatment to the individual by testing people for gene variants that make certain drugs fail or cause adverse reactions. Most countries, however, cannot afford to run genetic tests on every patient, says Howard McLeod of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. "We thought about these great advances, and said 'when is the rest of the world going to benefit?'"

Fitness vs. breast cancer
Health24.com
Abrahamson led the research while at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. The study is published in the Oct. 15 issue of Cancer. In the study, Abrahamson's team analyzed data on nearly 1 300 women ages 20 to 54 who were diagnosed with invasive breast cancer between 1990 and 1992. They asked the women about their average frequency of moderate and vigorous physical activity when they were age 13, 20 and during the year before their diagnosis.
UNC News Release: http://www.unc.edu/news/archives/sep06/exercise090806.htm

National Coverage

The Harvard Effect
Inside Higher Ed
Whether any of Harvard’s highly competitive brethren take action between now and next fall, when the college’s policy goes into effect, remains to be seen. James Moeser, chancellor of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, which actually beat Harvard to the punch four years ago in abandoning its own early decision policy, said Harvard’s decision will, at the very least, set an important precedent. “Now that the big rock has moved, will there be more? Yes, I think so,” Moeser said Tuesday at a conference at Chapel Hill about increasing access to higher education for low-income students
UNC News Release: http://www.unc.edu/news/archives/apr02/eardec042502.htm

Harvard U. Plans to Drop Its Early-Admissions Program, Rekindling National Debate
The Chronicle of Higher Education
Jerome A. Lucido, vice provost for enrollment policy and management at the University of Southern California, hailed Harvard's announcement, describing it as the latest in a gradual shift in admissions policies nationally...Mr. Lucido said the key in changing Chapel Hill's policy was institutional data revealing that early decision was not serving low-income and minority students. "Part of the ability for a college to make this move is to have folks in high leadership positions know that this is the right thing to do," Mr. Lucido said, "to move away from chasing a ranking to a position that is clearly more equitable."
Note: This article is available through subscription only.

Harvard dropping early admissions
The Washington Post
Harvard urged other schools to follow its lead. UNC-Chapel Hill ended its binding early admissions program in 2002, meaning that applicants did not have to commit to the school if accepted. Instead, applicants can seek "early action" admissions and find out in late January whether they are accepted without giving up the option to consider other universities. Steve Farmer, UNC-CH director of undergraduate admissions, said the change has worked well for admissions officers.
Related Links: http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2006/09/13/
harvard_move_stirs_rethinking_of_early_admission_policies/
http://www.northjersey.com/page.php?qstr=eXJpcnk3ZjczN2Y3dnFlZUVFeXkzJmZ
nYmVsN2Y3dnFlZUVFeXk2OTkxMzcxJnlyaXJ5N2Y3MTdmN3ZxZWVFRXl5Mg==

Colleges Should Give Preference to Students from Diverse High Schools, Speaker Suggests
The Chronicle of Higher Education
The lawyer, Julius Chambers, is a former director-counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund and is now the director of the Center for Civil Rights at the University of North Carolina School of Law. The conference -- "The Politics of Inclusion: Higher Education at a Crossroads," which concludes today at the University of North Carolina's flagship campus here -- is focusing on increasing access to higher education for disadvantaged students. Some 150 state and federal policy makers, educators, researchers, and foundation and business leaders from across the country were invited to attend.
Note: This article is available through subscription only.
UNC Media Advisory: http://www.unc.edu/news/media/2006/politicsinclusionadvisory082906.html

What Black Women Need to Know About Breast Cancer
Ebony Magazine
Lorie Williams almost became a breast cancer statistic. But she turned the tables on the statistics, not only surviving an aggressive form of the disease, but also participating in a major North Carolina study that identified a virulent breast cancer tumor most common in young Black women... "The present study adds an important peice to a large puzzle," says senior study author Dr. Robert M. Millikan, associate professor of epidemiology at the UNC School of Public Health.
UNC News Release: http://www.unc.edu/news/archives/jun06/breastcancerjama060206.htm
Note: This article is available through subscription only.

N.C. project aims to shorten wait times
American Medical News
A child in North Carolina typically has to wait nearly two months to see an endocrinologist, three months for a gastroenterologist and nearly a year for a rheumatologist, according to a recent survey that looked at the appointment calendars of pediatric sub specialists in the state's academic medical centers. That's longer than many children with special health care needs can afford, said Alan Stiles, MD, chair of the Pediatrics Dept. at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.
Note: This article is available through subscription only.

Please don’t feed the people (Opinion)
The Washington Post
Technologically, this is a triumph. In the early days of our species, even the rich starved. Barry Popkin, a nutritional epidemiologist at the University of North Carolina, divides history into several epochs. In the hunter-gatherer era, if we didn’t find food, we died. In the agricultural era, if our crops perished, we died. In the industrial era, famine receded, but infectious diseases killed us. Now we’ve achieved such control over nature that we’re dying not of starvation or infection, but of abundance. Nature isn’t killing us. We’re killing ourselves.
UNC News Release: http://www.unc.edu/news/archives/jan06/stevenspopkin013106.htm

State and Local Coverage

Hunt renews call to give immigrants tuition help
The Winston-Salem Journal
Hunt was one of many speakers at a national higher-education conference on college access and affordability held this week at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. About 150 admissions, financial-aid and other higher-education officials from private and public colleges talked about how to educate an increasingly diverse generation of American college-age students, at a time when other countries are outpacing the United States in the number of young adults who have a college degree.
UNC Media Advisory: http://www.unc.edu/news/media/2006/politicsinclusionadvisory082906.html

College access for kids of illegal immigrants pushed
The Herald-Sun (Durham) / The Chapel Hill Herald
Former North Carolina Governor Jim Hunt urged some of the nation's top higher-education experts Tuesday to take the lead in ensuring that college is affordable for children of illegal immigrants. Those children should be able to pay in-state, and not nonresident, tuition at public universities in the state where they live and have attended some K-12 school, Hunt said at "The Politics of Inclusion: Higher Education at a Crossroads," a conference that UNC is hosting.

Experts forecast admissions debate
The Daily Tar Heel
Pending affirmative action lawsuits could change the legal landscape of education access in both higher and secondary education nationwide..."We have to think about what we’re doing collectively," said Joshua Wyner, vice president of programs at the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation, which grants scholarships. Julius Chambers, director of UNC’s Center for Civil Rights, explained his vision for the use of affirmative action in America.

Panelists: Access to college is key
The Daily Tar Heel
When the University of Michigan appeared before the U.S. Supreme Court in defense of its affirmative action policies in 2003, Marvin Krislov was at the center of the controversy. As vice president and general counsel at the university, he led the school's legal defense of its admission policies. Krislov's speech came as part of a panel discussion on the challenges that threaten college access and inclusion. The discussion was part of a four-day conference hosted by UNC that concludes today.

'F' should fuel progress (Editorial)
The News and Record (Greensboro)
The result, the report argues, has far more serious implications than UNC schools, and other institutions, not being where they'd like to be. As college costs demand a larger share of family incomes than in the 1990s, schools here and in most of the nation drift further away from where they need to be: within reach of low-income students, without students overall incurring more debt each year.

Ashcroft defends the Patriot Act
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
Former U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft defended the Bush administration's anti-terrorism measures amid audience hecklers and a crowd protesting outside UNC-Chapel Hill's Memorial Hall on Tuesday night. Ashcroft said that despite questions about surveillance methods and criticism of the USA Patriot Act, a package of anti-terrorism measures, President Bush's security measures were "narrowly tailored."
Related Link: http://media.www.dailytarheel.com/media/storage/paper885/news/
2006/09/13/StateNational/Ashcroft.Spurs.Political.Debate-
268897.shtml?sourcedomain=www.dailytarheel.com&MIIHost=media.collegepublisher.com

Freshman Back At UNC After Surviving Dorm Fall
WRAL-TV (Raleigh)
Freshman Tyler Downey blends in with all the other students at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. And that's exactly the way the 19-year-old from Asheville wants it. "I don't really want to be known as the kid who fell out of the window last year," he says.

Active lifestyle can prevent breast cancer
WCHL-AM (Chapel Hill)
An active lifestyle can be one of the best ways for women to avoid getting breast cancer. UNC epidemiologist Marilie Gammon says that this is because excess fat causes the body to produce more estrogen, which in turn makes cells turnover at a faster rate. Gammon says the news is that women can still benefit from an active lifestyle after being diagnosed with breast cancer.
UNC News Release: http://www.unc.edu/news/archives/sep06/exercise090806.htm

RX FOR SOME Z's: Medical Park Hospital joins in treatment of sleep disorders with new sleep center
The Winston-Salem Journal
The center, which opened in May, is an example of the growing popularity of sleep medicine in hospitals, health-care experts said. As more patients complain of sleeplessness and sleep-related disorders, hospitals are adding therapies and programs to care for those patients. "You're watching a young discipline become a more mature discipline," said Dr. Bradley Vaughn, a professor of neurology at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine in Chapel Hill.

Try Indian recipes at home for healthy, tasty eating (Opinion)
The Charlotte Observer
I've always eaten out when I've had a hankering for Indian food, and I never considered making my own at home. Until now. It's my good fortune to have a new next-door neighbor, Anu Bhardwaj, born and raised in New Delhi, who moved to Chapel Hill this summer after 16 years in Canada and Southern California...Suzanne Havala Hobbs is a registered dietitian and a clinical assistant professor in the Department of Health Policy at UNC.

Issues and Trends

$200 million in debt OK'd for state facilities
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
The Council of State on Tuesday narrowly approved $200 million in borrowing for a variety of construction projects, but only after a debate that echoed ones in the legislature earlier this year...Among projects that will benefit from the new debt, issued with certificates of participation that do not require voter approval, are a cancer center at UNC-Chapel Hill, an expanded N.C. Museum of Art in Raleigh, two new psychiatric hospitals in the state and a downtown Raleigh parking deck.

Enrolling efficiency on campus (Opinion)
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
I'm glad Erskine Bowles isn't my U.S. senator. He's much more valuable to the state as the president of the University of North Carolina system. I never thought I'd have such a positive view of a former Clinton administration official. But so far Bowles -- he's had the gig for less than a year -- has used his sterling Democratic credentials and Carolina drawl to inject some common sense and business acumen into higher education, a realm where's it's rarely found.

Carolina Inn fears 11 percent of its workers might be illegal
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
They bus tables and change linens at Chapel Hill's signature hotel, the site of festive alumni gatherings and outdoor bluegrass concerts, and they might soon be out of their jobs. The Carolina Inn at UNC-Chapel Hill might have to fire 37 employees whose Social Security numbers don't match their names in federal records. The inn has been notifying these employees, who make up 11 percent of its work force, after receiving a no-match letter from the Social Security Administration.

Cup of java and a bike to go, please
The Chapel Hill News
Public transportation is supposed to be cheap. Now, in Chapel Hill and Carrboro, it can be good exercise, too. On Monday, 30 used mountain bikes were reborn as community-owned loaners...The project is expected to grow by 20 bikes each year. Adding more hubs -- one to Carrboro and one to East Franklin Street -- is already in the works, said Alison Carpenter with SURGE. Though negotiations haven't started, Carpenter also said SURGE and the ReCYCLEry will push for a location on UNC-Chapel Hill’s campus.

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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