University of Alabama had $2 billion economic impact, report says
Birmingham News – Dec. 6
The University of Alabama had an economic impact of more than $2 billion during the 2009-2010 school year, when it generated 10,346 jobs statewide, according to a report released by the university today. The study by Samuel Addy andAhmad Ijaz of UA’s Center for Business and Economic Research said that the University of Alabama football team’s seven home games last year had a total impact of $162.7 million for the state — an average of $23.2 million per game. In the three-county Tuscaloosa metro area alone, the average impact per Crimson Tide home football game was $16.3 million, or $113.9 million for all seven games combined.
Tuscaloosa News – Dec. 6
ABC 33/40 (Birmingham) – Dec. 5
Student to play tennis in 2012 Para-Olympics
Crimson White – Dec. 6
Mackenzie Soldan, a sophomore majoring in advertising, took home the gold medals for singles and doubles tennis at the 2011 ParaPan American games and was offered a bid to compete in the Para-Olympics in London next summer. It was a tournament she did not expect to play in, but when Soldan received a phone call in late October telling her a girl had dropped from the roster of the games, and she discovered she was next in line to compete. Soldan was a member of the U.S. Junior Para-Olympic tennis team until she was 18, but when she accepted a scholarship to play wheelchair basketball for the University of Alabama over a year ago, she thought her days of playing tennis were over.
T-town dancers team up for Nutcracker ballet
Crimson White – Dec. 6
For the first time, the Tuscaloosa Community Dancers will collaborate with The University of Alabama Department of Theatre and Dance to perform The Nutcracker ballet at the Bama Theatre this December. Over 20 UA dancers will perform. . . . More than 20 UA dancers will perform in TCD’s production as the Nutcracker and the Mouse King, Flowers, Snow Queen and King and various variations, alongside the community cast. “The Nutcracker is TCD’s first true collaboration with the University,” said Milla Green, a member of the board of directors of TCD. “UA has a phenomenal dance program. It is so exciting for TCD’s dancers to get to work alongside talented dancers from the University to put on a true community production. This Nutcracker is going to be our best yet.”
Paintings depicting Tuscaloosa’s history moved into courthouse
Tuscaloosa News – Dec. 6
It’s been two and a half years since artist Caleb O’Connor was hired to create 13 paintings depicting the history of West Alabama. He spent months researching and even longer creating scenes that will hang on the wall of the new Tuscaloosa Federal Courthouse for years to come. On Monday, O’Connor, an assistant and U.S. District Judge Scott Coogler worked to hang the paintings — the final touch to the building that opened in October. . . . Others show soldiers returning from an overseas war, Bear Bryant on the UA campus and a historic Tannehill scene. One painting is of a traditional fire-lighting ceremony at Moundville, and depicts models whom O’Connor met on a visit to the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma tribe whose ancestors were forced from the area in the 1800s.
Commentary: Keystone tar sands project will go on with or without U.S.: Andrew P. Morriss
Cleveland Plain Dealer – Dec. 4
The Obama administration’s decision that it would not decide until after the 2012 election whether to allow construction of the Keystone Canada-U.S. pipeline is a cynical effort to preserve support by environmentalists for the president’s re-election — even at the price of killing jobs. The president had a clear choice between two parts of his coalition — organized labor and environmentalists. Organized labor lost. . . . Morriss is a chairholder in law and professor of business at the University of Alabama. This essay was distributed by McClatchy-Tribune.
What a simple flame can tell us about supernovae
Discovery News – Dec. 5
In 1860, British physicist Michael Faraday gave the last in a series of Christmas lectures at the Royal Institution, on the chemistry and physics of flames, eventually published as a popular book, The Chemical History of a Candle. It seems like such a simple thing, but even today, over 150 years later, scientists understand very little about the complex processes taking place within even a simple flame. In fact, it’s a very active area of research, as evidenced by papers presented at a recent meeting of the American Physical Society’s Division of Fluid Dynamics, held November 20-22 in Baltimore, Md.. . . . Along with Alan Calder of Stony Brook and Dean Townsley of the University of Alabama-Tuscaloosa, Aaron Jackson — now a research associate at the Naval Research Laboratory — devised 3D simulations of a slow-burning flaming subjected to extremely intense turbulence, to see what conditions result in a DDT. One hypothesis among astrophysicists is that the interior of a white dwarf is also subject to intense turbulence. When the DDT occurs, the white dwarf goes supernova.
Humble Bragg: Best-selling author to talk writing, growing up in Alabama and more at Princess Theatre
Decatur Daily – Dec. 6
He doesn’t remember the number of books sold — somewhere in the hundreds of thousands he guesses — or the number of awards he won — probably more than 50, some of them, he claims, he lucked into. To Rick Bragg, nothing, not the numbers nor the awards, compares to the stories. The Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and best-selling author will discuss his writing at the Princess Theatre Center for the Performing Arts on Thursday at 7:30 p.m. during “An Evening with Rick Bragg.” … Along with memoirs, Bragg authored “I Am a Soldier Too: The Jessica Lynch Story” and “The Most They Ever Had.” He is working on a book about rock-and-roller Jerry Lee Lewis, writing stories for Southern Living and teaching at the University of Alabama.
Rec Center gears up for increased January traffic
Crimson White – Dec. 6
Students may be waiting to get one more shot at the pecan pie before starting on the spring break beach-bod chiseling, but the Student Recreation Center is already getting in shape to handle the increased traffic that accompanies the return to campus in January. According to data compiled by the Rec Center for 2011, the first two months back from winter break are its busiest. Computers logged 68,722 and 79,441 visits, measured by Action Card swipes, during January and February of 2011, respectively. These tallies substantially outpace 2011’s monthly average of 52,574.