UA museum unveils portrait of Heisman winner
Anniston Star (via Associated Press) – July 8
The University of Alabama is unveiling a portrait of the school’s first Heisman Trophy winner, Mark Ingram. Ingram and football coach Nick Saban will participate in the ceremony Friday night at the Paul W. Bryant Museum on campus in Tuscaloosa. The portrait was painted by sports artist Steve Skipper of Birmingham. It’s titled “Take It By Force.” The portrait will hang in the museum beside Ingram’s Heisman Trophy. The former Alabama running back from Michigan was drafted by the NFL’s New Orleans Saints in April. The unveiling is being sponsored with the Mark Ingram Foundation, which works with children whose parents are in prison.
Courting Valedictorians
Inside Higher Ed – July 8
Ivy Tech Community College announced last month that it was awarding every high school valedictorian in Indiana a scholarship valued at 15 credit hours, or about $1,500…Stephen G. Katsinas, professor of higher education and director of the Education Policy Center at the University of Alabama at Tuscaloosa, said what Ivy Tech is doing with merit scholarships is not entirely unheard-of in the sector. “Community colleges have been offering scholarships to talented high school students, like valedictorians and salutatorians, for decades,” said Katsinas, noting that the practice is especially prevalent among rural community colleges with flat populations to encourage students to stay in the area. “Still, I think community college people, at least philosophically, always favor need-based aid over merit-based aid because community colleges are about access, and need-based aid is one way to propel access forward.” Still, Katsinas said it was easy to understand why Ivy Tech would embrace such a move to promote itself. In one of his surveys of community college state directors, Katsinas found that most officials discovered that their respective states’ merit- and need-based student aid wasn’t “funded well enough so that low-income students can work through college without debt.” “Recognizing that there isn’t money there to cover all that they want, the state is simply using this to promote a very important recent initiative, which is transfer statewide,” Katsinas said. “It’s a marketing tool for them. Transfer is a recent phenomenon for the Ivy Tech system, and they’re making great strides to expand that function, so this program is just a way for their colleges to let the general public know that Ivy Tech offers general education for baccalaureate transfer.”…
Storm briefs
Birmingham Weekly – July 8
Isobel Thompson of Corsicana, Texas, was a senior getting ready for finals at the University of Alabama when the tornado struck Tuscaloosa April 27. After the storm, according to Janet Jacobs of The Corsicana Daily, Thompson stayed in Tuscaloosa and volunteered to help clear debris, carry supplies and do other tasks…she was impressed by the speed at which help arrived, including tents, food and water. “I was thoroughly impressed with how many people came out,” she said. “It was just amazing.” When Thompson returned to Corsicana, according to Jacobs, people from her church and neighbors donated wheelbarrows, shovels, rakes and other items, and her brother loaned her a pickup so she could take it to Alabama. Thompson, who majored in psychology and criminal justice, plans to attend the University’s spring graduation ceremony that has been rescheduled for August. She is to graduate with honors…
New Tool Could Help Researchers Make Better Use of Oral Histories
Chronicle of Higher Education –July 8
…Boyd, who previously worked at the University of Alabama as its library’s head of digitization, recently consulted on a project at the Bear Bryant Museum helping to preserve film footage back to the 1930s.