University of Alabama summer graduation slated for August 1
Al.com – July 28
More than 1,500 University of Alabama students will graduate at the school’s summer commencement ceremony Saturday, Aug. 1. Though the ceremony officially begins at 9 a.m. in Coleman Coliseum, guests should be seated by 8:40 for the processional. For loved ones who can’t make it to Tuscaloosa, UA will host a live stream of the ceremony here. The footage will remain online for a month. The university typically hosts three graduation periods a year after each academic term, the largest of which is in the spring. More than 6,800 people graduated in the 2014-2015 academic year. All colleges and degrees will graduate together at Saturday’s ceremony.
Teaching the teachers: Graduate teaching assistants to attend workshop
Crimson White – July 29
They lead discussions in smaller class sections, teach laboratory courses and grade exams. They hold office hours every week and evaluate students’ participation in their classes, all while pursuing a degree of
their own. Behind every graduate teaching assistant is months of planning by teams of people culminating in an immersive two-day workshop designed to prepare the newest crop of GTAs for
the classroom. The University of Alabama Graduate School is hosting its 29th annual Graduate Teaching Assistant Workshop on Aug. 13 and 14. The workshop will take place in the Bryant Conference Center for roughly 300 new graduate teaching assistants. “The aim of the workshop is really a total immersion sort of thing, to give them a lot of tools that they can work with as they start off their careers now as GTAs,” said Cathy Pagani, associate dean of the Graduate School. “It’s an important assignment for them so we want to prepare them and make them successful in the classroom.” New GTAs in attendance will each receive a binder filled with printouts of every presentation given at the workshop, including discussions on legal issues, effective communication and syllabus creation, among other things. In addition, the new GTAs are broken down into smaller groups led by a GTA Fellow in which the new GTAs give three minute practice lessons to their peers.
How One Mississippi County Played Wall Street’s Fiddle
Yahoo! Finance – July 28
All signs pointed to a Mississippi county’s bet with Wall Street going south. Officials in Hinds County, where one in four residents live in poverty, didn’t know what they were getting into, according to an independent audit. They couldn’t explain the mechanics of the interest-rate swaps they negotiated with Rice Financial Products Co., a New York derivatives dealer. They couldn’t say how semi-annual payments on the leveraged bets were determined. Yet, in the decade since the contracts were first signed, Hinds County netted $6.7 million on the deal due to collapsing short-term rates in the municipal bond market. That bucks the trend of cities, states and localities exiting interest-rate swaps on much less favorable terms. More from Bloomberg.com: DeMark Sees 14% China Drop as Stocks Mirror 1929 U.S. Crash. “It’s like walking out of the casino with $6 million,” said Robert Brooks, a finance professor at the University of Alabama’s Culverhouse College of Commerce in Tuscaloosa. “It could’ve gone the other way.”
UA SITE camp hosts 150 high school students
Crimson White – July 29
The University of Alabama’s engineering department held the 25th annual SITE camp, or Student Introductory to Engineering Camp, from July 12-31. The camp has three one-week segments in which 150 high school students, who are rising juniors and seniors from all across the country, travel to Tuscaloosa to take part in the introductory engineering camp. The SITE camp is not like a typical summer camp for high school students. They do not sleep in tents and conduct daily outdoor excursions; instead the students are engaged within an academic environment where they are exposed to daily routines consisting of mathematics, engineering, science and technology. Greg Singleton, director of Engineering Services as well as the Multicultural Engineering Program, directs the camp. He has been involved with the camp since its beginning more than 25 years ago. The camp is run by six counselors who are engineering majors, each coming from a particular engineering department. “The purpose is to give students an idea of what engineering is all about,” Singleton said. “They take three academic courses: an English course, a pre-calculus course, and a computer science course. They also do a type of engineering project, in which they create some sort of catapult-type launchers out of house hold materials.”
The Majority Of GOP Voters Want Mass Deportation, But It’ll Cost Them
Think Progress – July 28
Sixty-three percent of Republican voters would support deporting the population of 11 million undocumented immigrants, according to a new CNN/ORC poll taken in the days following Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump’s controversial remarks about Mexican immigrants being drug dealers and rapists … When Alabama passed its own anti-immigrant law in 2011, work at some companies that require strenuous labor nearly stopped. A chicken factory found that the “turnover rate has gone through the roof,” while crops rotted on various farms. A University of Alabama report put the estimated economic damage at around $11 billion.
Young Cherokee (July 29, 2015)
The Cherokee Ledger-News (Woodstock, Ga.) – July 29
The following students were named to The University of Alabama dean’s list for the 2015 spring semester. Students had to have an academic record of 3.5 (or above). From Woodstock: Tabitha Amy Cruickshank, Jordan E. Eason, Allison Rose Guebert, Alexander J. Miller, Alexa Renee Morrison, Kayla Lynne Moon, Lauren E. Nickel, Laura J. Peace, Lucas Allen Read, Taylor M. Sasapan, Anna C. Smith, Samuel J. Smith, Savannah Linnea Porter, Brandon J. Stark and Caroline R. Tilton; from Canton: Sydney Elysa Anderson, Logan James Heyer, Gretchen Nicole Pierce, Hannah Elizabeth Rich, Emily Nicole Keran and Hazel L. Tuck; from Waleska: Karina I. Simonis; and from Acworth: Nathaniel Michael Erebia, Sarah Adelle Ezell, Caroline M. Ficken, Alyssa R. Gowin, Benjamin P. Heflin, Jason Scott Johnston, Connor A. Maggio, Ashley Ann May, Zachary Alan May, Morgan N .Sisco and Tishara U. Smith.
As troopers’ numbers fall, challenges grow
Montgomery Advertiser – July 28
One night stands out for Trooper Chuck Daniel. He worked the midnight shift — 8 p.m. to 4 a.m. — and he spent the evening driving from one accident to another. Starting his night in Blount County, he got a call to head to a wreck in Birmingham. While working that accident, dispatchers told him to respond to another one in Pell City. While working that scene, he got a call for an RV fire along Interstate 22, at the Marion County line. Daniel was the only officer who could respond. And the fire was 100 miles away. “When you’ve got an RV on fire at the side of the shoulder, that interstate is shut down,” he said in an interview last week. “And when a major highway is shut down, it creates all these other problems. And they don’t get fixed until I get there.” … A University of Alabama report released earlier this year estimated the state needs 1,016 state troopers. Before consolidation completed this year, there were just 289 state troopers on the roads. Transfers of personnel from other law enforcement agencies boosted those numbers to about 431 at the beginning of the year, but the state trooper ranks remain well below full staffing.
Miss Tuscaloosa and Miss Tuscaloosa’s Outstanding Teen named in pageant
Tuscaloosa News – July 28
Jessica Procter was crowned Miss Tuscaloosa, and Sydney Sims was crowned Miss Tuscaloosa’s Outstanding Teen on July 18. Procter, 20, is a sophomore at the University of Alabama. She received a $1,000 cash scholarship for UA and more than $8,000 in gifts and awards. A Tuscaloosa native, she volunteers her time gathering canned goods for the West Alabama Food Bank and promoting her fighting hunger platform, “Step Up to the Plate.” Sims, 16, is a sophomore at Springville High School in Springville. She received more than $6,000 in gifts and awards. She promotes her platform, “Know Your Worth,” as a motivational speaker to youth in Alabama schools, encouraging self-esteem.
University of Alabama student explores South African wildlife, culture
Crimson White – July 29
South Africa is known for its towering mountains, beautiful beaches and thriving wildlife, and during my six weeks here this summer I have been able to experience all of these things plus so much more. Admittedly, one of the main reasons I chose to study abroad in Cape Town is because of the opportunities for outdoor adventure and exploring, and I have been far from disappointed. I have climbed through caves and up waterfalls, canoed down a river and hiked up mountains that rewarded me with the most beautiful views I’ve ever seen. Exploring South Africa’s beautiful beaches, some remote and others tourist spots for surfing, has been another one of my favorite things to do here. My comfort zone has been breached and my adrenaline sparked by things like skydiving and cage diving with great white sharks, and I can’t forget my close encounters with much of the native wildlife, including petting a cheetah, riding an elephant and watching a lion walk past my vehicle in the famous Kruger National Park. All of these things are incredible, but I have found that there is a whole other side to South Africa I was not expecting, one that is not as widely advertised as the exhilarating adventure and beautiful views. Interacting with the culture and people of this country has been the greatest adventure of all.