Saban: BCS National Championship parade set for Jan. 19
Tuscaloosa News – Jan. 12
This time there will be a parade. The University of Alabama’s 2012 national championship football team will be honored next Saturday with celebration that will include a parade and a ceremony at the Walk of Champions at Bryant-Denny Stadium. UA’s last national championship parade came after the 1992 season. Alabama held a celebration inside Bryant-Denny Stadium after its 2009 and 2011 Bowl Championship Series national titles. “This is a pretty quick turnaround to do something like this, but our fans have always been great about coming out and showing their appreciation for the hard work and sacrifices these young men made throughout their careers here to develop and play at the standard they’ve had to play at to have the opportunity to be in a national championship game, and to win a national championship,” Alabama coach Nick Saban said…”We’re really excited about having a great turnout to honor this team, who I think I’m as proud of as any team we’ve ever had. I know our fans will come out and support and make a real concerted effort to show their appreciation for all these guys have accomplished.”
Crimson White – Jan. 12
ABC 33/40 (Birmingham) – Jan. 11
WSFA-NBC (Montgomery) – Jan. 12
WVUA (Tuscaloosa) – Jan. 12
Obama congratulates Saban on national title
Tuscaloosa News – Jan. 11
President Obama called University of Alabama head football coach Nick Saban on Thursday to congratulate Saban and the Crimson Tide for once again winning the Bowl Championship Series national title. The president noted that this was the third time that he has made the call to Saban and joked that the Alabama team is beginning to make this a habit. President Obama commended Saban on the incredible organization he has built at UA and told him that he looks forward to congratulating the team in person at the White House. No date has yet been set for the 2012 Alabama football team to visit the White House. The Crimson Tide visited the White House after winning the 2009 and 2011 national championships.
Sports Illustrated – Jan. 11
Fox Sports – Jan. 11
ESPN – Jan. 11
Florence Times Daily – Jan. 11
WVUA (Tuscaloosa) – Jan. 11
UA fans get to see National Championship trophy
WHIO-CBS (Dayton, Ohio) – Jan. 13
Take a look at this: this weekend, University of Alabama fans got to see the school’s BCS National Championship trophy on display at two super-stores. The Waterford crystal football trophy, valued at $30,000 dollars, paid visits to a Wal-Mart and an Academy Sports and Outdoor shop this weekend. Each winning school gets to keep the coaches’ trophy for permanent display on campus.
KTNV-ABC (Las Vegas, NV) – Jan. 12
WSFA-NBC (Montgomery) – Jan. 12
KTRK-ABC (Houston, TX) – Jan. 12
WESH-NBC (Orlando, Fla.) – Jan. 12
WKRN-ABC (Nashville, Tenn.) – Jan. 12
WVUA (Tuscaloosa) – Jan. 12
UA geography professor to be honored nationally
Crimson White – Jan. 14
It was the coming-of-age experience during the turmoil of the civil rights movement in the 1960s that inspired University of Alabama professor of geography Bobby Wilson to pursue a career of social justice and anti-racist scholarship in his field. After more than forty years of service, Wilson will be awarded the American Association of Geographers Presidential Achievement Award by the Association of American Geographers at their annual meeting in Los Angeles in April. “Wilson was very active during the civil rights movement and laid some of the groundwork for some of the initiatives that we are using today,” said Patricia Solis, director of outreach and strategic initiatives for the AAG. “He’s been a fixture in our community for so many years, and I think there was just a thought among the association that he needed to be recognized.” He was born in a small town in North Carolina – a town he said was brimming 50 years ago with regular demonstrations of anti-segregationist sentiment from the local black community. Wilson’s grandfather was an active member of the NAACP at the time and encouraged him to become involved. “[My grandfather] would come around and take all the grandchildren to the demonstrations,” Wilson said. “I was actually arrested one time for demonstrating at a local drugstore.”
City seeks recycling grants
Tuscaloosa News – Jan. 14
The city’s Environmental Services Department is seeking an annual grant to help fund improvements to its recycling program. But for this year’s $347,000 request, the city is teaming up with Tuscaloosa County, the Tuscaloosa County Park and Recreation Authority, the University of Alabama and others to expand recycling efforts in areas of the county that have yet to receive the service. This partnership, which has the potential to benefit 65,000 households across Tuscaloosa County, is the result of new requirements related to the Alabama Department of Environmental Management’s recycling grant program … For the University of Alabama, which has its own recycling processing plant, the grant is seeking about $92,000 for portable recycling containers for special events, some indoor containers for residence halls and academic buildings, and large metal bins for outdoor areas, such as Manderson Landing and university bus stops. “Us partnering with the city is really going to help us out,” said Tony Johnson, the university’s executive director of logistics and support services. “This is really going to move our recycling efforts forward.”
2,960 students lose Pell Grant eligibility
Biloxi Sun Herald (Miss.) – Jan. 11
New regulations enacted by Congress in June have stripped Pell Grant eligibility from nearly 3,000 Mississippi students. According to a recently completed study of the impact of the new Pell Grant regulations on Mississippi two-year colleges, the changes led to lower enrollments for the fall 2012 semester at 14 of the state’s 15 community colleges. Without a strong statewide college tuition program, University of Alabama Education Policy Center Director Stephen Katsinas said the Pell Grant program serves as the de facto student aid program, making Pell a key economic development driver for the state’s future workforce. In addition to the 2,960 students who lost eligibility for Pell Grants last fall, Katsinas said 7,154 more will lose eligibility in the next several semesters because of new requirements. Losing the opportunity to attend a community college is especially troubling in more rural states like Mississippi, Katsinas said Tuesday, since the job market is relying less and less on agriculturally based jobs and more on skilled workers in today’s Information Age. “Learning skills is going to become more important,” he said. “That’s what rural community colleges do.” The change stripping most students of eligibility is a reduction in the number of semesters for which students are eligible for Pell Grants from 12 to eight. Katsinas said this change will hurt community college students, especially, since 65 percent of them also have jobs and often attend college part time over an extended time period.
The 10 Most Bizarre Biofuels Stories of 2012
Chem.info – Jan. 11
OK, we’re lucky to be here in so many ways. December 19th came and went, the Mayan calendar ended, and planet Earth is still here. But lucky we are to have been here throughout 2012, to witness 10 of the most unusual biofuels schemes and technology dreams ever devised … In Alabama, Inventure’s chemical engineers, based at the University of Alabama’s business incubator, are exploring the use of kudzu as a feedstock for ethanol production. The vines, which are spreading across the South, can be turned into a sugary syrupy-like substance that then can be distilled into ethanol. The syrup can also be produced from algae, wood chips, and other organic waste.
Doctoral student helps others discover potential
Crimson White – Jan. 14
“The trumpet is an impact instrument,” said Brittany Hendricks, a doctorate student of musical arts in trumpet performance at The University of Alabama. Hendricks is a performer out to make an impact and not just with her instrument. “I think Brittany is incredibly versatile,” Paul Houghtaling, director of the UA Opera Theatre, said. “Her ability to communicate as an artist in so many medias – music, painting, writing – is impressive and speaks to the power of art to transcend any media. Art is simply communicating, and Brittany is a master communicator.”…Hendricks holds a Master of Music degree as well as a Bachelor of Music degree in performance from Arizona State University and Northwestern University. Balancing editing her dissertation and performing, she is nearing the end of her degree. She is a student of Eric Yates and teaches private students and sections of MUS 121.
AT LARGE: Cutting-edge artist returns to Capstone
Tuscaloosa News – Jan. 13
You probably would have needed eagle eyes to have spotted it, but at one point during the national championship football game last Monday night, a television shot of cheering students at the Ferguson Center on the University of Alabama campus caught the fleeting image of a hand-scribbled sign that said, “Who is The Rev. Fred Lane?” Well, it’s a long story, to be answered in a moment, but suffice to say the sign was displayed for all the nation to see by Lee Shook, the curator of the historical art exhibit/retrospective for Tuscaloosa’s Raudelunas art collective, which is on display at the Ferguson Center. The collective of like-minded students, heavily influenced by previous surrealistic and dada movements, flourished in the early 1970s on the UA campus and included writers, poets, visual artists and loosely constructive musical groups. Shook is producing the show, which runs through Feb. 2 in conjunction with Trans/Productions. The university says members of the Raudelunas collective, named (or maybe not) after a legendary moon god, were “purveyors of some of the most cutting-edge art, music, literature and theater to ever come from the Deep South.” The show, which will conclude with a concert in the Ferguson Center Theater, is designed “to re-introduce a new generation of Alabamians to the radically expansive creativity of some of these unique artists, who stand as some of the most challenging the United States has ever produced,” he said.
Ad for Alabama Football Museum reveals downside to all those trophies: Where do you keep them?
Ad Week – Jan. 11
Here in Alabama, our unshakable dominance over college football has become practically ridiculous. And while the clip below is supposed to be a farce, there’s a certain amount of believability to it. The University of Alabama’s Paul W. Bryant Museum created the video, “So Many Trophies, So Little Space,” last year to celebrate the state’s long legacy of pigskin prowess. But it’s is even more true to life this week, as the Crimson Tide celebrate their third national football championship in the four years—a streak broken only by in-state rival Auburn’s 2010 title. That said, the best part of the spot refers to a different sport: basketball. In a cameo at the end, Alabama student Jack Blankenship shows off “The Face” that quickly made him a fan favorite and opponents’ pet peeve at last season’s games.
Should Congress end ethanol subsidies? Yes
Arizona Daily Star – Jan. 14
For more than two decades, special interests have persuaded Congress to mandate Americans buy ethanol whether they want to or not. As a result, 40 percent of the U.S. corn crop is now used for ethanol rather than food. The ethanol mandate means that ordinary Americans pay more for a poorer quality automobile fuel and more for groceries. Ethanol proponents claim these costs will bring us environmental benefits and energy security. They are wrong…Ethanol is vastly inferior to gasoline…It attracts water, so it cannot be transported in regular gas and oil pipelines, reduces lubricants’ effectiveness and shortens engine lives. It is caustic, corroding engine parts and dislodging contaminants from fuel tanks. While ethanol doesn’t make gasoline cleaner, the more intensive farming and water needs of ethanol-refining harm the environment. Moreover, mandates for ethanol don’t enhance national security because production of corn-based ethanol – the main type of ethanol in use in America – requires roughly as much energy as the ethanol contains…The ethanol mandate just burns money to turn oil and natural gas into corn. (Andrew Morriss holds the D. Paul Jones Jr. and Charlene A. Jones chair in law and is a professor of business at the University of Alabama.)
Merced Sun-Star (Calif.) – Jan. 11
Green Bay (Wisc.) Press-Gazette – Jan. 11
U.W. Clemmon discusses employment discrimination law (filmed at UA Law School)
CSPAN – Jan. 11
Now to the University of Alabama law school in Tuscaloosa for a discussion of labor and employment law. Civil rights leaders and retired federal judge U.W. Clemon spoke to students about the history of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act.
Coke Zero launches commercial featuring Coach Saban and voiced by Terry Saban
WVUA (Tuscaloosa) – Jan. 11
Nick Saban is no stranger to advertising campaigns … And now more companies are recruiting Saban to help them win over more customers. “Well Coke is the (No.) 1 selling soft drink in the world.” Coke Zero has launched a commercial that features Nick Saban.