| Tuesday, May 12, 2015 |
| Mississippi State wins competition to lead national UAV research effort | |
 | Mississippi State University has been selected to lead a consortium of 13 universities in operating a national center for research on unmanned aircraft systems (UAS), encompassing a wide range of applications, from agriculture to homeland security. The National Center of Excellence for Unmanned Aircraft Systems is expected to begin research in September, with a "fully operational, robust research agenda by January 2016," the university said in a statement following the announcement by the Federal Aviation Administration. The FAA announcement signaled the culmination of a "hard-fought competition to host the nation's premier civilian academic center focused on research and policies related to unmanned aerial systems," said U.S. Sen. Thad Cochran, R-Miss. |
| Thompson High salutatorian wants to take her theater passion to MSU, Broadway | |
 | Thompson High salutatorian Hannah Black has been in more theater productions at the Alabaster school than she can remember. Theater, specifically acting, has been a passion for Black while attending Thompson High School as she approaches graduation with a 3.98 GPA. Black is heading to Mississippi State University in the fall where she will continue her theater aspirations. "I actually hope to maybe do a double major in theater and broadcast because I love sports, so I'd love to maybe become a sports broadcaster, something in front of the camera," she said. |
| Two Police Lives Lost Are the Focus in Mississippi | |
 | By the time a single bagpiper marched to the front of Hattiesburg Hall on Monday afternoon, scores of law enforcement officers from across Mississippi had lined the walls of the room in a local convention center. They, along with hundreds of ordinary citizens, had come to remember two young police officers, to seek solace and, perhaps, to seek meaning. And at a time when police officers are under extraordinary scrutiny for their conduct in cities like Baltimore and Ferguson, Mo., the meaning many found in the deaths Saturday night of Officers Benjamin Deen and Liquori Tate was in what mourners described as the good work done by the nation's police officers in often dangerous conditions. |
| Journal editor to head education foundation | |
 | Lloyd Gray, executive editor of the Daily Journal for 23 years, will leave the newspaper this summer to become executive director of The Phil Hardin Foundation. Gray, 60, will assume his responsibilities in July at the Meridian-based foundation, which provides grants to support innovative educational programs and partnerships in Mississippi. He will remain at the Journal until then. Gray has close ties to Meridian, where he graduated from high school in 1972. The Phil Hardin Foundation was established in 1964 by the owner of the Meridian-based Hardin Bakeries Corp., with production facilities in Meridian, Jackson, Tupelo and Columbus, as a vehicle for improving the lives of Mississippians through better educational opportunities. The foundation has assets of $53 million and in 2014 made grants totaling $2.16 million. |
| 13 hopefuls go before 1st District voters today | |
| Today there are 13. Tomorrow there will be just two -- more than likely. The first round of the 1st Congressional District special election comes to an end today when voters across the 22-county district go to the polls to select a successor to the late U.S. Rep. Alan Nunnelee, who died in February. With so many candidates, the likelihood that one will win an outright majority appears slim. Today's vote will likely decide which two will advance to a June 2 runoff. It's a nonpartisan election, as are all special elections, meaning that party isn't listed beside a candidate's name and the top two finishers, regardless of party, will advance to the runoff. All except one of the candidates are Republicans, and their messages have been similar. |
| Mississippi Special Election for Nunnelee Successor is Anyone's Guess | |
 | The special election in Mississippi's 1st District is a political handicapper's nightmare. "If anyone tells you they know what to expect on Tuesday, they are lying to you," said Casey Phillips, a GOP ad maker who is working for Republican Greg Pirkle. Pirkle, an attorney from Tupelo, is just one of 13 candidates seeking the northeastern Mississippi-based seat, left vacant in February following the death of GOP Rep. Alan Nunnelee. What Magnolia State Republicans agree on is that no candidate is expected to capture the 50 percent necessary to win outright, meaning the race will head to a June 2 runoff with the two highest vote recipients. And no one is willing to predict which duo of candidates will clear that hurdle. "As soon as you find out, let me know, because I sure as heck don't," said Hayes Dent, a Mississippi GOP operative who is not working for any of the candidates. Multiple GOP operatives said State Transportation Commissioner Mike Tagert and Alcorn County Prosecuting District Attorney Trent Kelly are in the top tier. |
| Fitch out-raised by challenger, hires new manager | |
 | Incumbent Republican state Treasurer Lynn Fitch is having trouble raising cash and has again switched campaign managers. In a year where most statewide incumbents appear to be cruising, at least for the Aug. 4 primaries, Fitch appears to face the most serious challenge. The first campaign finance reports for 2015 state races show Fitch is the only statewide incumbent to be outraised by a primary challenger. Fitch is replacing Cole Hughes, her campaign manager since January. She last week hired Morgan Baldwin, former campaign manager for the late U.S. Rep. Alan Nunnelee. Fitch previously had a falling out with Hayes Dent, who ran her successful 2011 treasurer campaign. Dent and former Fitch fundraiser Sara Williams are now supporting McRae. "People have been saying ever since McRae got in the race that he may give her a run for her money," said longtime Mississippi political observer and professor Marty Wiseman. "This is the first evidence it's going to be a horse race." |
| Biloxi mayoral candidates insist they're Republicans | |
 | Gov. Phil Bryant said he wants to back the Republican in the Biloxi mayor's race. There are just two problems. The race is supposed to be nonpartisan and both candidates say they're Republicans. "Looking more at all of the facts and differences between the two candidates, it just became increasingly clear that there's only one Republican in the race, and that's Windy Swetman," said Bryant in an emailed statement. "And a few days ago, the local Democrat Party endorsed Windy's opponent, which made the political ideology differences even clearer." |
| US Cyber Commander: Hackers Will 'Pay a Price' | |
| US deterrents to cyber attacks could include a range of responses, including conventional force and economic sanctions, the chief of US Cyber Command said Monday. Navy Adm. Michael Rogers, who also heads the National Security Agency, spoke in support of the US' economic sanctions against North Korea in response to the hack on Sony Pictures. It was important for the US to acknowledge a "red line" had been crossed, he said. "The whole world was aware that Sony Corporation had suffered an offensive act that destroyed data as well as destroyed hardware," Rogers said in a cybersecurity forum at George Washington University. |
| State Legislatures Quarrel Over Whether To Expand Medicaid | |
 | Five years after the Affordable Care Act passed, the law's provision allowing the expansion of Medicaid coverage to more people is still causing huge fights in state legislatures. Twenty-four states and the District of Columbia said yes to Medicaid expansion when the law went into effect. Since then, just six more have signed on. States that say yes get billions of additional federal dollars, but many Republican lawmakers are loathe to say yes to the Obama administration. The expansion enables adults with incomes up to 138% of the poverty level to receive Medicaid. The federal government picks up the whole tab for their care through 2016, then tapers its support down to 90% of the costs. The fight's come to Florida and also out west, where four Republican-majority states took up Medicaid expansion this year. Wyoming said no. Alaska and Utah are still wrestling. Montana said yes. |
| Haley: South Carolina workforce 'won' Volvo | |
 | Volvo chose South Carolina to build its first U.S. auto plant because the state offered the best workforce and employee training, state and company officials said Monday. Among the incentives offered to bring the Swedish automaker to Berkeley County was training through South Carolina's technical colleges for the plant's expected 4,000 workers. South Carolina has offered similar job and recruitment training for other industrial projects, including the Boeing jet manufacturing plant in North Charleston and the Continental Tire factory in Sumter. The program, known as readySC, trained 4,700 workers last year. South Carolina sold Volvo on a customized employee-training program, Gov. Nikki Haley said Monday, and "the rest of it was all gravy." |
| Christianity faces sharp decline as Americans are becoming even less affiliated with religion | |
 | Christianity is on the decline in America, not just among younger generations or in certain regions of the country but across race, gender, education and geographic barriers. The percentage of adults who describe themselves as Christians dropped by nearly eight percentage points in just seven years to about 71 percent, according to a survey conducted by the Pew Research Center. "It's remarkably widespread," said Alan Cooperman, director of religion research for the Pew Research Center. "The country is becoming less religious as a whole, and it's happening across the board." |
| Nominations open for UM chancellor search committee | |
| The state College Board is asking for nominations for members who will serve on the University of Mississippi Campus Search Advisory Committee that will play a role in finding chancellor Dan Jones' successor. Representatives from all stakeholder groups -- students, alumni, faculty, staff and the university community -- are needed, a Mississippi Institutions of Higher Learning press release said. Nominations may be submitted via on online form. They will also be taken via mail. |
| UPS CEO Abney delivers commencement address to Delta State graduates | |
| David Abney, CEO of United Parcel Service, delivered the commencement address to over 400 Delta State University graduates along with friends and families who were on hand to celebrate this milestone at the Walter Sillers Coliseum Saturday. Abney, a native of Greenwood, graduated from Pillow Academy and received his bachelor's degree in business administration from Delta State University in 1974. Abney, who became UPS's CEO in 2014, is also the creator of Delta State's annual International Business Symposium in the College of Business. The IBS provides a unique look at current trends in the business world. |
| Toomer's Corner construction project kicks off Monday in Auburn | |
 | Aubie struck a pose for the media in the middle of the painted tiger paw on Toomer's Corner Monday morning, sporting a hard hat and showing off his skills with a jackhammer. The lovable Auburn University mascot was among several who gathered at the intersection of College Street and Magnolia Avenue in Auburn Monday morning to help kick off the Corner Construction project, which will involve a long list of aesthetic improvements to the intersection and in doing so make it a more attractive gateway to the city and university. "We had a tragedy that started here, but we're fixin' to turn it into a great thing...," Auburn Mayor Bill Ham said Monday morning. The tragedy Ham referred to was the poisoning of the iconic Toomer's Oaks that once stood on Auburn University's corner of the intersection and that have been traditionally rolled with toilet paper following Auburn University sports victories. |
| No cuts for Louisiana higher ed, but deep cuts for public health in new proposal | |
 | Louisiana's public colleges and universities secured a victory Monday when the House Appropriations Committee approved a budget proposal for next year that would give them the same amount of money they currently receive, thanks to $615 million in new tax revenue approved by the full House on Thursday. But while the higher education institutions have staved off potentially deep budget cuts at least for now, the proposal approved by the committee would leave a big shortfall for public health care. Legislative leaders have vowed to find enough money before the 2015 session ends in a month so that neither higher education nor health care suffers budget cuts next year. But that effort was thrown into question Monday by the specter of a legal challenge from the state's most powerful trade organization against several of the tax increases approved Thursday. |
| Louisiana Senate backs bill that could lead to college tuition hikes | |
 | The Louisiana Senate voted 33-4 for a constitutional amendment (SB 155) that would make it easier for Louisiana's public colleges and universities to raise tuition prices. Currently, the Louisiana Legislature has to sign off on any tuition change at the state's higher education institutions. Tuition hikes are unpopular, so lawmakers are reluctant to raise college costs, even when higher education leaders consider it appropriate. State Sen. Jack Donahue, R-Mandeville, has proposed turning over control over tuition to the higher education system's management boards. Only two states in the whole country give their Legislature's control over tuition, so Louisiana's current tuition-raising system is an outlier. |
| Enrollment Continues Post-Recession Slump at Top Universities, Colleges in Arkansas | |
 | College enrollment in Arkansas topped out in the 2011-12 academic year, the second year of lottery scholarships when the state's unemployment rate was near its post-recession peak. In the fall of 2011, enrollment at four-year and two-year colleges and universities, public and private, and two stand-alone nursing schools reached nearly 177,000. Total enrollment at four-year universities -- and particularly at the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville and Arkansas Tech University at Russellville -- continued to grow at a clip through the fall of 2014. But the mad crush of new students has subsided. Total enrollment last fall was down to 168,600, off almost 5 percent from the peak, and enrollment at community colleges had tumbled 14 percent. That, education officials have said, reflects an improvement in the job market. |
| Survey notes conditions of those seeking care at campus counseling centers | |
 | For the fifth year in a row, anxiety is the top condition of students seeking care at campus counseling centers, according to a survey released Monday night by the Association for University and College Counseling Center Directors. Before the last five years, depression was the top condition for which students sought treatment, but that now is a strong second. And many students of course come to counseling centers with multiple conditions. The survey (for 2014) provides a snapshot, through data provided by the centers, of the mental health of college students and the issues they (or at least those seeking help at the counseling centers) are facing. A major area of concern for many counseling center directors in recent years has been an increased demand for services, without increased staff. |
| At West Point, shaping future warriors through Plutarch and Shakespeare | |
 | So crisp in the morning light they were, nine cadets, dressed in fatigues and sand-colored boots, hearing the curious news that the poet would outlive the warrior. Shakespeare's rhyme lingered as if a sacrilege on a campus where soldiers have been mythologized for generations and graduates have been pressed into heroes and presidents. "The poet grants immortality," said literature professor Elizabeth D. Samet. "His power trumps any others." The students in her class on the second floor of Lincoln Hall are used to such insights. For nearly 20 years, Samet has been a popular and evocative voice at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. Samet, 45, is a polite provocateur, urging more intellectual openness in the military while admonishing the nation for not examining the consequences of what it asks its soldiers to endure. West Point has granted her academic freedom; she says the institution, whose key purpose is developing officers, has not sought to alter what she teaches. |
| Should 3rd Grade Be the Pivot Point for Early Reading? | |
 | It's become a truism in education policy that reading is the gatekeeper to later academic success. In hopes of ensuring that success, a rising number of states bar promotion for students who do not read proficiently by 3rd grade. In 2004, only Florida and Ohio used 3rd grade reading as a gatekeeper to promotion. Today, 16 states and the District of Columbia require -- and three others allow -- schools to retain 3rd graders based on reading performance. Yet even as retention gains traction among state policymakers, new research questions both the effectiveness of holding back students and the timing of reading development itself. |
SPORTS
| Coast gives Road Dawgs Tour 2015 ringing endorsement | |
| Coast Bulldog fans got a first-hand glimpse of arguably the most popular coach in Starkville on Monday as the Road Dawgs Tour 2015 rolled into town. In addition to road trip mainstays like athletic director Scott Stricklin, football coach Dan Mullen and women's basketball coach Vic Schaefer, the nearly 400 fans in attendance at the Beau Rivage Resort & Casino's pool deck rubbed elbows with the man who brought uber recruit Malik Newman to the Bulldogs -- new basketball coach Ben Howland. Howland credited former Rick Ray assistant George Brooks, who was retained on the new staff, for landing Newman, one of the top recruits in the country. |
| Mississippi State softball team going back to Lafayette, La. | |
 | Mississippi State senior softball player Julia Echols feels like her team will have a slight home-field advantage this weekend. "We are excited to be going back to ULL," Echols said. "I think we have played well down there. It's close enough that we can have a lot of our fans traveling down there. We are excited to still be playing. "It's a huge advantage. When you go somewhere you haven't been before, you have to get acclimated to the field. This year, we can step in right away and feel at home." MSU was chosen for its fourth-straight regional berth Sunday night when the NCAA tournament selection committee sent the squad to the Lafayette Regional, hosted by the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. |
| C Spire Ferriss Trophy finalists announced | |
| An Ole Miss pitcher, a Mississippi State slugger and a Millsaps player who can do both highlighted the 2015 C Spire Ferriss Trophy finalists that were announced on Monday. Ole Miss' Scott Weathersby, MSU's Wes Rea, Millsaps' Keith Shumaker, Southern Miss' James McMahon and Jackson State's Melvin Rodriguez were all named finalist. The Ferriss Trophy, named after MSU pitcher Boo Ferriss, goes annually to the most outstanding college baseball player in Mississippi. It will be awarded May 18 at a luncheon at the Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame and Museum. |
| What happened to Mississippi State baseball after 13-0 start? | |
| Mississippi State stood atop college baseball two months ago. The Bulldogs were the first team to 13 wins in the country. They earned a No. 7 ranking the USA Today Coaches Poll. MSU history suggested even better things would come. Mississippi State won 13 games to start a season in three previous seasons. It finished its season in the College World Series in two of those years. With one series remaining, MSU has no thoughts of Omaha, but instead is fighting for a spot in Hoover, Alabama and the Southeastern Conference Tournament. "It's completely different," MSU coach John Cohen said. "I don't think there is a team in the league that's the same after 13 games." |
| New U. of Florida men's basketball coach Mike White off and running | |
 | In his introductory news conference Monday, new Florida men's basketball coach Michael White laid out his vision for the program. "We're going to play hard," White said. "We're going to play fast to a certain extent. We've got to figure out what's in this roster's best interest. Off the floor, we've got to do the things we're supposed to do. We're going to act like men and represent this athletic department as well." White, 38, is already shaping the transition from icon coach Billy Donovan. |
| Former U. of Illinois football player alleges mistreatment by coach | |
| In a series of impassioned tweets, a former University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign football player said Sunday that the university's coaching staff has created "a culture of abuse and mistreatment" that pressures athletes into playing while injured. The tweets, written by Simon Cvijanovic, a former linebacker at Illinois, attracted much attention, prompting a response from the university on Monday. In a phone call with reporters, Mike Thomas, the university's athletic director, expressed surprise at the accusations. There will be a review of the claims, Thomas said, though he declined to describe the scope or timeline of such an investigation, and he said that the university does not plan on releasing its findings. He described the Twitter comments as a "personal attack" on Tim Beckman, the university's head football coach. Thomas backed Beckman on Monday, saying that the coach puts the welfare of his players "above anything else." |
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