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(03/28/08 4:00am)
When the UNC Tomorrow Commission released its final report in December, calling on UNC-system schools to engage in finding solutions to the state's problems, Mike Smith was already ahead of the game.
The UNC vice chancellor for engagement and public service spent nine months researching the viability of a resource center, the Center for Public Policy, that would tap the brains of the system's faculty for policy suggestions to send to the capitol.
"There are faculty on all of our campuses, including Carolina, that would like to do more of this work but don't really know how to do it. What we see this center doing is funding what would be used to support faculty," Smith said.
But at its March 6 meeting, the Committee on Budget and Finance expressed concern about the center's neutrality and delayed including its $1.2 million budget in the 2008-09 budget proposal to go before the N.C. General Assembly in May.
Dealing directly with policy as a publicly funded institution is a delicate balance to strike, but Smith assures critics that an advisory board will review research for neutrality before its submission to lawmakers.
He now must submit a detailed report for committee members to review before they vote May 9 on whether to add the center's funds to the budget proposal.
"I don't have any doubt about Mike's commitment to what he's been saying about neutrality," Board of Governors Chairman Jim Phillips said at the March meeting.
"If you've got faculty that want to do it non-neutrally, that'll be a disqualifier; those won't be the people who will participate."
Other system universities also are responding to the UNC Tomorrow's mandate for statewide engagement.
UNC-Greensboro is launching an Institute for Community and Economic Engagement, approved by its Board of Trustees in February, that will integrate both campus and community groups to combat local and regional issues.
"If the partners identify an effort that the institute needs to be involved with, then it's going to be like working with interdisciplinary research," said Rosemary Wander, an associate provost and director of the institute.
The organization will provide a center where the government, the private sector and the university can work together on solutions.
"We are definitely addressing issues in the community," Wanders said. "Because the Triad has lost 40,000 jobs since 2002 and we are part of the state that depended so heavily on furniture, tobacco, textiles, and that's gone. So what do we do next? And UNC-G can have a role in that."
Smith cited part of the UNC Tomorrow report to explain the mission the Center on Public Policy and similar institutions must serve: "UNC should create a mechanism for applying research and scholarship to address significant regional and statewide issues."
Smith said N.C. leaders have long been asking presidents and faculty of the UNC system to utilize the "existing expertise in the university to help us look at public policy questions facing North Carolina."
Contact the State & National Editor at stntdesk@unc.edu.
(03/27/08 4:00am)
They must understand a university's academic mission, be committed to community engagement and promote the university's values.
Those who exhibit these qualities are chancellor applicants not only at UNC-Chapel Hill but at universities systemwide and nationwide.
In the last year alone, seven UNC-system schools have conducted or are conducting chancellor searches. Fayetteville State University ended its six-month search March 7 by offering the job to James Anderson.
With so many chancellor searches happening at once, both within the system and across the nation, overlapping applicant pools are a possibility.
All UNC-system searches are conducted nationwide and confidentially, with most of the applicants coming from dean, provost, chancellor and president backgrounds.
Although search processes are similar and applicant pools might overlap, the individual mission of each school attracts different candidates, said Ann Lemmon, the General Administration liaison for search committees.
"The universities have very different visions," Lemmon said, citing the difference between an undergraduate liberal arts college like UNC-Asheville and a research and graduate institution like UNC-CH.
"The campuses the candidates will be looking at will be different in that regard."
John Brown, chairman of the FSU Board of Trustees and a member of that school's search committee, said that realistically, candidate pools might overlap.
"We wanted the best available out there - we didn't care where they came from," he said. "We've gotta move beyond any other thing than going for the best."
The chancellor search committee at UNC-Greensboro began accepting applications in December, allowing for the possibility that rejected candidates from the UNC-CH search that began in September could end up in that applicant pool.
"The Chapel Hill search is much closer to a conclusion than are we, and I personally would not consider it an issue to have a candidate that had been in the Chapel Hill search," said Linda Carlisle, vice chairwoman of the UNC-G Board of Trustees.
But the UNC-CH search committee faces competition more from peer institutions also looking for chancellors and presidents.
Like Chapel Hill, the University of Wisconsin-Madison is the flagship of its state system. The university is currently soliciting a chancellor with qualities similar to those being sought by UNC-CH, such as expertise in global outreach and fundraising.
"We're always cognizant of other searches," said Nelson Schwab, chairman of the UNC-CH chancellor search committee.
"That's why we moved quickly in the fall - to get ahead of other searches. We'd rather have first choice than second choice," he said.
"We're very pleased at the response we've been getting from the quality standpoint."
Contact the State & National Editor at stntdesk@unc.edu.
(03/20/08 4:00am)
Slideshow: Students rally against the Iraq War
For those 200 students who came to the Pit on Wednesday to call for immediate troop withdrawal from Iraq, solidarity meant hope that their dream could become reality.
(03/19/08 4:00am)
Sixty-three years ago, Estelle Leighton asked a World War II soldier recovering from shell shock to dance with her in the rec room of a veteran's hospital. Forty years ago, she marched in the streets in protest of an undeclared and protracted war in Vietnam.
At 80 years old, Leighton is protesting again as the Iraq War reaches the close of its fifth year.
"I could say that I have seen war," she said. "Kids today, they don't see anything."
(02/29/08 5:00am)
Tax credits are one form of financial aid that often goes unnoticed, showing up in a tax return long after tuition has been paid.
But for Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, tuition tax credits are part of their multifaceted plans to meet the mutual goal of making college more affordable.
Two aspects of their higher education priorities have recently been addressed by the U.S. Congress.
Increases to Federal Pell Grants became law in September, and a simplification of FAFSA is part of a bill that passed the House Feb. 7.
Increases in tax credits have not been revisited since 1997.
"Generally tax cuts and tax credits are targeted toward that middle-income family that actually filed a tax return," said Kimrey Rhinehardt, UNC-system vice president for federal affairs.
"When you're running on a national platform, you're trying to appeal to a broad array of constituencies, and I think this is their attempt to appeal to the middle-class voter."
The Hope Scholarship and Lifetime Learning Tax Credits, signed into law in 1997 by President Bill Clinton, allows for an income-conditional tax credit of up to $1,650 that cannot be refunded or advanced.
"I haven't liked it a whole lot," UNC-Chapel Hill Director of Scholarships and Financial Aid Shirley Ort said.
"Families never consider those tax credits as aid because they paid the bill already," she said. "They see it as something that can help their tax bill but not their financial aid."
In the 2006-07 fiscal year 8.5 million people received tuition tax credits, according to economist Sandy Baum, a senior policy analyst for the College Board.
Hillary Clinton pledges to increase the Hope credit to $3,500 and to allow refunds and advances.
"Ten years worth of experience has told us that we need to make it a refundable credit to really help lower-income students," said Karen Regan, UNC-CH director of federal affairs. "Sen. Clinton's proposal directly addresses this concern."
Both Obama's proposal for a new tax credit program, the American Opportunity Tax Credit and Hillary Clinton's expansion of the Hope tax credit will allow for advances so families can have the money in hand while paying tuition bills.
Obama's proposal, available to all families with children in college, includes a refundable $4,000 credit. He plans to fund student aid, in part, by cutting a private federal loan program that he called inefficient compared to direct loans.
"What he's saying is he doesn't think that, for example, the N.C. College Foundation program is a worthwhile investment, which I argue is one of the single greatest investments our state has," Rhinehardt said.
While they might not agree with all the details of the candidates' plans, experts said they were happy to see equal access as a priority.
"We in higher education have learned over the last decade, you work with them to achieve their political objectives, even if it might not be your preferred approach," Ort said.
Contact the State & National Editor at stntdesk@unc.edu.
(02/27/08 5:00am)
North Carolina's Democratic primary on May 6 will determine more than just the presidential nomination, and students have started to pay attention to the possibility that Sen. Elizabeth Dole, R-N.C., could leave her seat to a Democrat.
Tuesday night Democrat Jim Neal spoke at the first meeting of his student campaign group, Heels for Neal. On Monday night Sen. Kay Hagan, D-Guilford, spoke on campus at a Young Democrats meeting.
George Drometer, co-president of Young Democrats, said young voters are becoming increasingly relevant.
"It translates to campus with them coming to get us involved. And no matter the outcome, it will be good for students in general since candidates are recognizing that students are becoming a huge demographic all of a sudden."
Both candidates asked students to get behind them, whether by voting in May's primary or dormstorming.
"I ask you to personally get involved. Register to vote if you haven't. Be sure to vote, and vote for Kay Hagan," Kay Hagan said Monday.
Neal has said his campaign is "riding on the backs and the efforts of young people," and students like Heels for Neal founder sophomore Z. Chase Carter are stepping into that role.
"We've got Heels for Hillary and Barack Obama groups on campus," Carter said of his motive for starting the group. "Let's go ahead and get college people involved and informed for this election season because the stakes are high."
Tuesday was Neal's second visit to UNC in about a month. He has visited 17 N.C. college campuses and will visit six more before the primary.
While Neal's campaign has established a campus group, Kay Hagan has only just introduced her platform to Democrats on campus.
Kay Hagan's daughter, senior Carrie Hagan, is a member of Young Democrats, who's brought other students to her mother's events.
"We want to take her enthusiasm and dedication to the United States Senate, where she can help all North Carolinians and finally provide our state with a senator who is in touch with the people of North Carolina," Carrie Hagan said Monday.
Carrie Hagan and fellow Young Democrats plan to found a group for Kay Hagan, but the Young Democrats as a whole must follow the lead of the N.C. Democratic Party when endorsing a candidate.
Although some students got involved just after meeting Neal in his January visit to campus, several faces overlapped between the two campaign events as students began to decide who to support.
"I did think there was a good bit of difference between the two," said freshman Rob Matsick. "It seemed like Hagan was a lot more moderate about the war in Iraq and conservative issues."
Matsick said he hasn't decided who to support. "I'm just looking for a candidate who shares my values."
Contact the State & National Editor at stntdesk@unc.edu.
(02/18/08 5:00am)
Their curriculum calls for specially trained teachers, challenging material and unique classroom supplies.
But the strained budget covering the needs of the state's Academically or Intellectually Gifted students might have been partially diverted elsewhere in the past few years.
After receiving complaints from AIG parents, the N.C. Office of the State Auditor released a report last week that shed light on a lack of state oversight of AIG funding, revealing four unnamed school districts that spent a large percentage of their AIG budgets on non-AIG expenses.
"I think it was not mal-intent," said Elissa Brown, AIG consultant for the N.C. Department of Public Instruction. "I think those districts served their students in regular classrooms."
But for State Auditor Leslie Merritt, the fact that AIG-allocated funds are not utilized for their specific purpose is a cause for concern.
"I believe that taxpayers' money should be used to educate students on every skill-level, and for some AIG students this just isn't happening as it was intended," Merritt stated in a press release.
Merritt found that fund distribution is overseen only at the county level, according to a 1996 state statute that hasn't been revised.
Although DPI reviews local allocation plans, it has no authority to enforce its own recommendations.
"I think the audit will help the state in terms of moving toward more monitoring of funding and of programming," Brown said.
"I think it's a good thing, 'cause I think it will benefit the students it's intending to benefit."
Brown said that she had been concerned about DPI's lack of oversight before the audit report and that the department is planning to respond to the findings.
"We are looking internally at a reorganization, and I think it's a good time for this audit to come out and for DPI to be reflective on how it can best respond," she said.
The report also noted that the state provides AIG funding only for up to 4 percent of N.C. students.
Brown said many districts have to allocate their own funding for AIG programs that serve more students than the state's set ratio.
"(Orange County) spends every penny that the state gives them on gifted students, and they added quite a bit of additional local funding from their local budget," said Holly Clark, the AIG lead teacher for Orange County Schools.
"I think if they did that they would want to make sure certainly that districts would be responsible for that money."
Contact the State & National Editor at stntdesk@unc.edu.
(02/18/08 5:00am)
Their curriculum calls for specially trained teachers challenging material and unique classroom supplies.But the strained budget covering the needs of the state's Academically or Intellectually Gifted students might have been partially diverted elsewhere in the past few years.After receiving complaints from AIG parents the N.C. Office of the State Auditor released a report last week that shed light on a lack of state oversight of AIG funding" revealing four unnamed school districts that spent a large percentage of their AIG budgets on non-AIG expenses.""I think it was not mal-intent"" said Elissa Brown, AIG consultant for the N.C. Department of Public Instruction. I think those districts served their students in regular classrooms.""But for State Auditor Leslie Merritt"" the fact that AIG-allocated funds are not utilized for their specific purpose is a cause for concern.""I believe that taxpayers' money should be used to educate students on every skill-level" and for some AIG students this just isn't happening as it was intended" Merritt stated in a press release.Merritt found that fund distribution is overseen only at the county level, according to a 1996 state statute that hasn't been revised. Although DPI reviews local allocation plans, it has no authority to enforce its own recommendations.I think the audit will help the state in terms of moving toward more monitoring of funding and of programming" Brown said.I think it's a good thing" 'cause I think it will benefit the students it's intending to benefit.""Brown said that she had been concerned about DPI's lack of oversight before the audit report and that the department is planning to respond to the findings.""We are looking internally at a reorganization" and I think it's a good time for this audit to come out and for DPI to be reflective on how it can best respond she said.The report also noted that the state provides AIG funding only for up to 4 percent of N.C. students.Brown said many districts have to allocate their own funding for AIG programs that serve more students than the state's set ratio.(Orange County) spends every penny that the state gives them on gifted students and they added quite a bit of additional local funding from their local budget" said Holly Clark, the AIG lead teacher for Orange County Schools.I think if they did that they would want to make sure certainly that districts would be responsible for that money.""Contact the State & National Editor at stntdesk@unc.edu.
(02/14/08 5:00am)
N.C. Central University will review university policies in the aftermath of dismissing its assistant provost for reportedly embezzling funds and engaging in an amorous relationship with a student.
Former NCCU Assistant Provost Franklin Carver was implicated Tuesday when a report by the Office of the State Auditor revealed that the assistant provost at NCCU had inappropriately authorized $36,041 worth of payments.
According to the report, the NCCU assistant provost kept a majority of the funds for himself, charging them to a university credit card. Money also went to various undergraduates, including his nephew and a student with whom the assistant provost was having an affair.
While the university engages in an internal review, the incident will be further investigated by the N.C. State Bureau of Investigation, the U.S. Attorney's Office and the Durham County District Attorney's Office.
In reviewing the root causes of the incident, NCCU Chancellor Charlie Nelms, who took office in August 2007, is dealing with questionable activity that did not occur under the watch of his own administration.
"Without question the chancellor worked very closely with the state auditor's office. The incident occurred prior to the current chancellor's arrival," said Joni Worthington, UNC-system vice president for communications.
The audit report recommended that NCCU review its grant authorization procedures, cooperate with the district attorney's investigation and consider the highest level of disciplinary action for the assistant provost.
While the university has already dismissed Carver from his administrative position, UNC-system policy allows tenured faculty to remain on staff until due process determines them unfit for employment.
"We are now in the process of reviewing all associated policies and procedures to ensure compliance with state law and best financial practices. Where changes are appropriate, they will be made immediately," an NCCU press release stated Tuesday.
Carver could face stiff consequences for his actions. Sanctions against improper relationships include suspension, diminishment in rank and discharge from employment.
The audit report states that the assistant provost authorized grants for graduate assistant contracts that went to the student with whom he was involved - jobs that the student admitted never having held.
The UNC system has a strict policy against faculty-student sexual relationships to guard against the risk of university faculty abusing their power.
"(The policy) was put in place in an effort to ensure that employees avoided relationships that could harm affected students and damage the integrity of the university," Worthington said.
NCCU intends to recover the embezzled funds and to cooperate with all legal proceedings.
Contact the State & National Editor at stntdesk@unc.edu.
(01/30/08 5:00am)
On Saturday Richard Johanson might be flying home to Birmingham, Ala., for the last time on ExpressJet.
The airline, which began operating low-cost flights out of Raleigh-Durham International Airport just last May, will put a stop to their Birmingham route on April 1.
Johanson, a UNC senior, said that he normally flies Southwest Airlines and that ExpressJet is only nominally less expensive.
ExpressJet decided to cancel their Birmingham to New Orleans route after Southwest opened up three new 737s on the same route, making it economically inefficient to operate its remaining Birmingham route out of RDU.
"It didn't make sense for us long-term to keep that route open because demands for overall industry travel is weakening," said ExpressJet spokeswoman Kristy Nicholas.
Nicholas explained that the slowing of the economy affects the industry as a whole, along with normal trends that divide the year into high volume and low volume time periods.
She said the peak season is not enough to a make the Birmingham route's maintenance worthwhile.
"When there's not enough capacity to support the route, or when there's too much capacity for the people to travel, the supply and demand equation is out of whack," Nicholas said.
Though Johanson rarely utilized ExpressJet, he said it was good to have a fallback airline during peak travel times.
"Having another option would be good for those times," Johanson said.
But the loss that the decision poses for ExpressJet as well as to RDU will be miniscule.
Joe Milazzo, executive director of the Regional Transportation Alliance, a business group that works to solve congestion and mobility issues in the Triangle, said that the loss of the Birmingham route isn't ideal, but that it won't hurt RDU or the economy.
"The airline has not even been here for even a year yet, so it's not as though these were routes we were accustomed to for decades and all of a sudden they are going away," he said.
Milazzo said that ExpressJet's decision to leave RDU was probably a response to market conditions more than to a problem with the airport or the Triangle itself.
"(RDU is the) first airport in the U.S. where United left after 9-11 and came back," Milazzo said. "So clearly there's still a lot of demand here, people do travel well here, we have a very wide footprint for this airport."
Nicholas expressed similar confidence in ExpressJet's overall economic performance.
"It's a very small part of the overall whole."
Contact the State & National Editor at stntdesk@unc.edu.
(01/29/08 5:00am)
President Bush used his last scheduled opportunity to address the State of the Union to call for the country to continue on paths he forged during his term.
"We have unfinished business before us, and the American people expect us to get it done," Bush said at the top of his address.
The speech addressed the economic problems of the last month and unsolved issues from Bush's term ranging from immigration to Social Security to the war in Iraq.
Urging bipartisanship, Bush began by asking Congress to pass a $150 billion economic growth package as quickly as possible to stimulate the economy in the face of the recent downturn that he deemed a slowing within a characteristically strong economy.
"If the economy were fundamentally strong, we wouldn't be talking about a stimulus package," said John Quinterno, who works with economic policy at the N.C. Justice Center. "The past six years have not been all that particularly positive for working families."
David Kusnet, a former speech writer for President Bill Clinton and a fellow at the Economic Policy Institute in Washington, D.C., said that the speech lacked necessary details and that Bush's evaluation of the economy was "sketchy."
"Not only didn't he show any real understanding of the insecurity or anxiety that Americans are going through, but he didn't offer any explanation of how it came about or an explanation of what he had agreed to would solve any problem," Kusnet said.
Beyond the economy, the president focused on messages that have become familiar throughout his administration, including maintaining national security and winning the war in Iraq.
Kusnet said he was impressed with Bush's direct statements condemning the genocide in Darfur.
And UNC public policy professor Hodding Carter said he was pleased to see Bush address immigration as a matter of humanity and not just a legal issue.
"(Illegal immigration) must be resolved in a way that upholds both our laws and our highest ideals," Bush said.
However, Carter said the speech overall was no more than a list of aspirations.
Carter gave the president credit for the recent upturn of circumstances in Iraq, but said Bush did not tell the full truth about the troop surge.
"What he certainly didn't talk about was that any military man in his right mind always knew that we couldn't succeed in Iraq without far more troops than he was willing to put in originally."
Bush said in the address that the U.S. troop surge should be judged a success in part because it triggered a similar effort from Iraqis.
"The grassroots surge includes more than 80,000 Iraqi citizens who are fighting the terrorists," he said.
Kusnet said he was disappointed in the speech, given that it was the last State of the Union address of Bush's term.
"This is his valedictory to the American people," he said. "Especially with all that the country has been through in the last seven years, they might have expected that he say something bigger than this."
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Editor at stntdesk@unc.edu.
(01/28/08 5:00am)
Students at Colorado State University are up in arms in defense of their First Amendment rights.
The prospect of their student-run newspaper becoming part of an international media conglomerate was discussed behind closed doors last week - triggered by overtures made by the university's president.
The deal on the table would merge CSU's The Rocky Mountain Collegian with The Coloradoan, a local paper owned by the media giant Gannett.
"This (paper) has been completely student run for 117 years - we intend to keep it that way," said Jeremy Trujillo, The Rocky Mountain Collegian newsroom manager and a senior at CSU.
He said all 70 news staffers support protests that began at Tuesday's meeting after they were tipped off to the possible deal.
"A lot of the discussion taking place is behind closed doors with no student input or oversight, so that alone raises serious alarm bells," said Mike Hiestand, an attorney at the Student Press Law Center, which advocates for student free-press rights.
The possible merger comes in the aftermath of a questionable editorial published in September by the student paper.
The editorial was in response to the Tasing of a Florida University student that read only: "Taser this . F--- Bush."
Hiestand said the university president, displeased with some editorial decisions, appears to be considering a buyout in the face of laws protecting student press from censorship.
"They're bending around to get someone else who wouldn't be restrained by the First Amendment," Hiestand said. "Have them take the paper over so that the things that they thought weren't appropriate won't be in the paper."
Although student staffers are exploring their legal options, they want to convince the president to abandon the buyout.
"We are hoping that the letter-writing campaign that we've started and any demonstrations or protests that we have will be well received by his office," Trujillo said.
If they go to court, Hiestand said, the students have a case if they claim First Amendment rights.
Philip Meyer, a UNC journalism professor, said students could gain from partnering with a professional news company.
"The downside is less control by the students and the upside is professional mentoring," Meyer said.
But Trujillo is not so sure that the merger would work in their favor.
"When they talked to our president, one of the things they called it was a cooperation, which in reality you and I both know that's not what it would be; it would be a takeover," Trujillo said.
Gannett owns two student newspapers in Florida, including Florida State University's newspaper.
"The Colorado situation is different from ours, so it'll be interesting to see how it turns out," said Mallory Schneider, editor-in-chief of FSU's newspaper, The FSView.
Schneider said that students still control editorial content and that the merger allows them to work closely with the Tallahassee Democrat, a local paper also owned by Gannett.
While the FSView was bought separately from the Tallahassee Democrat, the CSU paper would become a branch of The Coloradoan, causing concern that students would lose their jobs and content control.
"I don't think it's gonna do student media any good to have student newspapers or any other student publications taken over on a wholesale basis by private media companies," Hiestand said.
"That will cease to make student newspapers student newspapers."
Contact the State & National Editor at stntdesk@unc.edu.
(01/25/08 5:00am)
As a local businessman and UNC alumnus, Jim Neal was familiar with 105 Gardner Hall, having spent two lecture courses inside its walls. On Thursday he returned to gather student support for his campaign for the U.S. Senate.
Students from Young Democrats and UNC's Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender-Straight Alliance sponsored the opportunity for students to question the man hoping to replace Sen. Elizabeth Dole, the incumbent Republican.
"I think it's important that those of us running for office listen," Neal said as he embarked on a five-minute lecture followed by about an hour's worth of student questions.
Neal is running as a "real-world" candidate, someone who has no history in politics and thinks that he can do better for North Carolina and the country as someone outside the Washington, D.C. circle.
"It's our democracy," he emphasized. "And the problem that I see with our democracy is that we keep sending to Washington too many politicians."
Most of the students were Democrats who knew little about Neal or supporters of the LGBT community who wanted to familiarize themselves with the platform of this openly gay candidate.
"I just came with some friends," freshman Lydia Lewallan said. "I historically have not been very interested or informed about politics, but now that I can vote in '08 I'm informing myself."
Sarah Smith, an executive board member for Young Democrats, said she was not yet aware of the differences between the two Democratic candidates vying for Dole's seat.
Kay Hagan, Neal's Democratic rival, is expected to speak at a Feb. 25 Young Democrats' meeting.
Student Body President Eve Carson introduced Neal to the crowd, saying it was people like Neal who could re-establish the relationship between people and politicians.
In a room filled mostly with Democratic supporters, the anticipation of change was reminiscent of an Obama rally.
"If hope has always been a metaphor in elections, the metaphor for the 2008 election is change," Neal said.
Fighting global warming, creating accessible health care for every American, ending the war in Iraq and stabilizing the economy were chief among Neal's and students' concerns.
But the first question of the evening was how exactly Neal, who is relying on grassroots efforts and student volunteers, could possibly compete against the very well-financed Dole as an openly gay man.
"I don't hold it against Sen. Dole that she's heterosexual," he joked.
Neal's homosexuality was a vein that ran through the bulk of the evening, as students posed curious questions about his position on gay rights and how "open" he would be about fighting for them on the Senate floor.
"We're a country of inclusion," he answered. "The state should not discriminate against people on any basis."
Neal ended the evening by asking students to join his grassroots effort.
"I want to have leaders in this room stand up," Neal said.
"I need you, we need you, your country needs you, your state needs you. And there's a seat at the table for everybody."
Contact the State & National Editor at stntdesk@unc.edu.
(01/16/08 5:00am)
The deadline for a federal overhaul of state driver's licenses that had a number of states protesting privacy rights has been extended in the midst of over-complicated and delayed requirements.
The REAL ID Act, passed in 2005, gave the Department of Homeland Security authority to implement nationwide regulations for identification - with universal readability and secure holograms.
The latest regulations, released Friday, give states a three-year grace period to become compliant with the act while maintaining their current driver's licenses.
"It won't require us to reissue three million driver's licenses," said Rep. Joe Boylan, R-Moore. "What we need to do is just show that we are working toward compliance."
The 9/11 Commission report called for more secure forms of identification - concern arose because all but one of the hijackers carried a driver's license.
"(The hijackers) had 300 pieces of identification, different names - and so to that end, there's a common sense application against terrorism," said Amy Kudwa, a Homeland Security spokeswoman.
The intention of REAL ID is to make it harder to obtain licenses and prohibit those without valid licenses from boarding commercial aircraft or entering federal buildings.
While many other states have objected to the act as a violation of privacy rights, Boylan proposed legislation last March to make North Carolina compliant.
However, the state would not have been ready to implement the new licensing system by May 11, the original deadline.
"We're going to need to make some changes on new issuance of driver's licenses," Boylan said.
REAL ID requires compliant licenses to be renewed at least every eight years, and as of now N.C. licenses are issued for a longer period.
The N.C. Division of Motor Vehicles has taken on the intensive job of combing through the 300 or so pages of the latest regulations in order to bring the state's driver's licensing system into compliance.
"Somewhere mid-to-late February we'll have to decide whether we want to ask for an extension," said Marge Howell, communications officer for the N.C. DMV. "We're not quite sure yet."
The 60-day period to apply for an extension began Jan. 11.
"We understand, of course, that states aren't going to be able to be fully compliant in the next four months," Kudwa said.
The department has also lightened the financial burden for states - reducing the estimated cost of compliance by 73 percent.
"We feel that we've balanced the security needs and the practical realties of making this happen," Kudwa said.
Citizens of states that don't apply for the extension by mid-March won't be able to enter federal buildings or board airplanes come May.
Contact the State & National Editor at stntdesk@unc.edu.
(01/14/08 5:00am)
The narrow street winds past abandoned warehouses and empty parking lots before bending at a nameless auto mechanic's shop adorned with three "Ron Paul for President" campaign signs.
Home to Ron Paul's Charleston campaign headquarters, the shop features grim steel walls covered in a collage of Ron Paul posters and libertarian paraphernalia.
On Saturday the shop also played host to Paige Michael-Shetley and about a dozen other UNC students who drove five hours to South Carolina to spend their second consecutive weekend stumping for Paul.
(01/11/08 5:00am)
RALEIGH - When 32 students and faculty were murdered at Va. Tech last April, colleges nationwide recognized how gaps in their campus safety plans could yield tragic results.
In North Carolina, state Attorney General Roy Cooper mobilized a task force in June to evaluate how campuses could better prepare for critical incidents, such as having a shooter on campus.
"In one context, these might be viewed as simple things, but they become very important in the context of crisis management," said Brad Wilson, chairman of the state task force and a member of the UNC system's Board of Governors, regarding the report's 11 recommendations.
Cooper's recommendations closely mirror the campus security report released by the UNC system in November, reflecting a high level of collaboration between the state's review and the UNC system's internal task force.
"(Cooper's) report supplements (the UNC-system report) and complements the work that has already been done," Wilson said.
The N.C. attorney general's 11 recommendations for the improvement of campus safety were the result of three months of research, conferences and surveys, and were presented to the public Thursday during a ceremony at Peace College.
The recommendations are meant for all 110 colleges in North Carolina, including public, private and community campuses.
The most actionable recommendation is to establish a Center for Campus Safety as a hub of across-the-state safety coordination.
The idea for such a center encompasses the main goal of the state task force, as well as the UNC-system task force, which completed its own campus security report in November.
Both task forces focused on making improving security a continuous effort rather than a knee-jerk reaction to tragedy.
Leslie Winner, former UNC-system vice president for legal affairs, expressed that need for consistency in November.
"We need to a way to lead this effort on a continuous basis," she said. "We've responded to tragedies, but in the past we have offered inconsistent messages and inconsistent help to campuses."
The state task force collected the testimony of those involved with Virginia's own task force and people who witnessed the tragedy to fully comprehend what kind of mistakes could have been prevented by way of precautionary planning.
Many of the report's recommendations are direct solutions to specific preventable mistakes from the Va. Tech shootings, such as the incident in which a professor reported the shooter's bomb threat to the dean's office instead of to the police.
In response to that and other similar anecdotes, the report calls for faculty, students and staff to be trained in emergency response.
After re-evaluating what went wrong in Virginia, members of the N.C. task force focused heavily on the role that serious mental illness had to play in the shootings.
The report urges the N.C. General Assembly to amend background checks for gun purchasers to include whether a person has been involuntarily committed - a similar regulation became federal law Tuesday - as well as training campus faculty in mental health privacy laws.
Cooper was adamant that the recommendations become actionable. He said he would send the report to the chiefs of campus security, as well as to each campus president.
"I want to make certain that this isn't a stack of papers that collects dust."
Senior writer Eric Johnson contributed reporting.
Contact the State & National Editor at stntdesk@unc.edu.
(11/29/07 5:00am)
When third-generation Holocaust survivor Shai Tamari joined the Israeli military in 1994, he believed that the Jews had a right to control the land of Israel and that the Palestinians had none.
Tamari's once-nationalist views are at the heart of the debate about who should live in the holy land of Israel, but his ideas changed when he studied the other side's history.
Now a rotary world peace scholar and a history graduate student at UNC, Tamari touts a two-state solution that he says should respect the history of suffering in both groups.
(11/26/07 5:00am)
The passion that keeps senior David Hamilton working year-round in a student-managed, co-op organic garden is the same passion that is bringing UNC an entire week of food grown locally and sustainably, just like the peppers in his garden.
Hamilton, garden manager of Carolina Garden Co-Op, off Battle Lane, is working with other campus groups to host Sustainable Food Week, which organizers hope will garner support for local and sustainable agriculture.
"The University could make a big impact as a state institution in leading the way to supporting a more sustainable food system," Hamilton said. "In this way, we're supporting the livelihood of farmers and farm workers, as well as our environment and our local community."
Agribusiness has driven many small, family and organic farms out of the area, but a growing movement aims to bring local food back into restaurants and grocery stores.
Portia McKnight is a local farmer who will be speaking at the Local Food Forum on Wednesday. She runs a dairy called Chapel Hill Creamery, where she raises and milks a small herd of Jersey cows to make cheese that is sold to local farmers' markets and a few stores and restaurants.
McKnight said it's difficult for small farms to compete with larger corporations whose farms offer lower prices and have a higher demand among the local population.
"What we're doing feels sometimes like a strong movement, but you have to realize that it's a tiny part of our food supply," she said. "Until most of the local food is produced locally, it's a huge challenge."
Alianza, an on-campus student organization that advocates on behalf of farm workers, is hosting Monday's Fair Food Fair, which will focus on workers' rights such as unfair wages and job safety.
"I think in general this issue and the issues with farm workers are not well-known," said sophomore Sam Wurzelmann, an Alianza organizer.
He said that farm worker wages can be as low as $11,000 a year and that exposure to pesticides, extreme heat and heavy machinery can be dangerous for workers who are not properly cared for or who don't speak English well enough to understand necessary precautions.
While this week is meant to raise campus awareness, Wurzelmann said he hopes to see more direct action next semester. Hamilton said he hopes that Carolina Dining Services will engage in a dialogue to bring in more local foods.
"I think it's really important for students and the University as a whole to realize how interconnected farm workers' rights, freshness of food, local economy, and environmental protection are," Hamilton said. "How they're all connected to the food choices that we make."
Contact the State & National Editor at stntdesk@unc.edu.
(11/16/07 5:00am)
After a 10-hour session, the U.S. House education committee unanimously approved a comprehensive 747-page bill bent on assuaging rising concerns about the skyrocketing cost and inaccessibility of college.
The legislation was hotly contested as committee members produced more than 30 amendments that addressed concerns ranging from tuition hikes to student privacy.
With the Higher Education Act of 1965 up for renewal, congressmen chose to tackle the nation's fears that college is becoming a business that is ultimately hurting the consumer - the student.
Before the legislation was finalized Thursday in committee, the UNC system voiced concerns that such an across-the-board education bill could harm public institutions.
"It sounds like a lot of federal government intrusion to me," said Kimrey Rhinehardt, vice president for federal relations at UNC-system General Administration.
Many of the concerns raised by bill opponents were addressed in the marathon committee hearing.
One provision of the legislation - which would place on a watch list universities that hike their tuition at a high rate past the national average - has been modified so that public and low-cost institutions won't bear the brunt of reduced state funding outside of their control.
Tuition hikes instead would be compared to a three-year, rather than one-year, average so that minor adjustments won't be punishable.
Karen Regan, director of federal affairs at UNC-Chapel Hill, expressed relief that the watch list's negative aspects had been addressed.
"Although the amendment does not resolve all of the concerns related to the cost provisions in the legislation, it does open the door to further discussions and additional improvements during the legislative process," she said.
An N.C. congresswoman introduced an important amendment concerning student information privacy. The provision, introduced by U.S. Rep. Virginia Foxx, R-Forsyth, would prohibit the creation of a federal database of information on students who receive federal aid.
Alice Poehls, university assistant provost and university registrar at UNC-CH, is a member of the American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers, which has always been opposed to reporting student information.
"The reporting about individuals is really, really hotly debated," she said. "Part of it is a very practical concern, and the burden would be borne by the institution. But then there's the other type of concern about just disseminating information for purposes other than which we gathered it."
Rebecca Thompson, legislative director for advocacy group U.S. Students Association, worked on these priorities with the UNC Association of Student Governments, composed of student representatives from all 17 system campuses.
One of their major priorities was to simplify the Free Application for Federal Student Aid, a form that has been criticized as too complicated for students to complete. One provision of the bill would provide for a simpler, two-page EZ FAFSA.
"It's not just about making the form shorter, but about access and making sure that students, whether first generation or low-income who rely on FAFSA the most, can fill out this complicated form," Thompson said, adding that Congress could see the bill as soon as December.
"We really want to mobilize students around this bill in the next weeks since this is the first time in awhile since it's been up for reauthorization."
Contact the State & National Editor at stntdesk@unc.edu.
(11/15/07 5:00am)
In response to the escalating cost of college, the 110th U.S. Congress has made the accessibility of higher education a legislative priority.
The 747-page College Opportunity and Affordability Act, a renewal of the Higher Education Act of 1965, has raised the ire of stakeholders who claim that many of its mandates lack funding and might be too standardized to have a positive impact on unique institutions.
UNC-system officials are among the critics who are concerned about top-down education administration.
"The University of North Carolina is leading a lot of the thoughtful policy," said Kimrey Rhinehardt, UNC-system vice president for federal relations, in reference to already established system tuition and loan policies.
"When you lead, sometimes you get caught or swept up into this across-the-board mandate, and we may see from our vantage point that that's not the right way to do it," she explained.
Opponents cite one of the main tuition provisions as a concern - it would place colleges that hike their tuition past a national average on a watch list, withholding federal funds from states that cut their education budgets.
The watch list is of special concern to the UNC system, since public institutions that have little control over their tuition can be held accountable and be punished.
"If state support were diminished and we had to increase our tuition by even a couple of hundred dollars, we would be put on a tuition watch list," said Karen Regan, director of federal affairs at UNC-Chapel Hill.
"We would be disproportionately affected as public institutions."
The legislation was released Veterans Day weekend, giving lobbyists one day to negotiate such concerns. The markup session on Wednesday was drawn out, and the final version is difficult to foresee.
"There are amendments dealing with the issue of what the penalties would be and who would bear the penalties," said Rebecca Thompson, legislative director at the U.S. Student Association. "What the actual policy will be is yet to be determined."
The bill also puts together a code of conduct to govern the relationships between federal and private lenders and universities, in the wake of scandals involving alleged conflicts of interest harming students.
"Students need to be in the position to make a quick decision with unbiased information," Rhinehardt said, adding that the UNC system already has a lending code of conduct that could be unnecessarily complicated by the legislation.
Minority grants, loan forgiveness for certain careers, Pell Grant maximum increases, and simplification of the Free Application for Federal Student Aid are also included in the act.
"This bill is a comprehensive reauthorization of our nation's higher education programs to ensure that families can encounter an easy-to-navigate and fair higher education system," said Rachel Racusen, spokeswoman for the House Education and Labor Committee, which spearheaded the legislation.
The bill follows several legislative efforts at higher education overhaul, including the September passage of an act that raised the Pell Grant maximum and increased funding to minority-serving institutions.
Rhinehardt said she hopes the latest measure, which she called "the single most important bill that affects higher education," won't be mishandled.
"Our goal is to make sure that students get the best deal possible. We are just disagreeing over how to do that."
Contact the State & National Editor at stntdesk@unc.edu.