Univ. of Alabama archaeologists wrap up dig at Hewitt-Trussville High School
Fox 6 (Birmingham) – July 24
A team from the University of Alabama’s Office of Archaeological Research is working a site which will eventually be home for the football stadium at Hewitt-Trussville High School. “We got stuff here in this site dating to eight or ten thousand years ago,” Matthew Gage, Director of the Office of Archaeological Research, said. Gage’s team has been working the site since June. The new Husky Stadium required a bridge and a diversion of water. Federal rules requires an archaeological investigation before the construction work can start. “We are doing data recovery. This site is going to be destroyed with the development of the sports complex. We are trying to get all of the available data out of the ground before they do that,” Gage said. So far researchers have found artifacts dating back a few thousand years. Gage said they are learning about the people who migrated to the area more than 1,000 years ago. “That is the component we are exceptionally interested in. It’s a time when people are moving out of the Black Warrior Valley east to the Cahaba drainage, displacing the people already here,” Gage said.
University of Alabama to create nation’s first collegiate adapted golf program this fall
Al.com – July 24
The University of Alabama Adapted Athletics program, home to national champion men’s and women’s wheelchair basketball teams, is creating the nation’s first collegiate adapted golf program. Head coach Ford Burttram, a former UA wheelchair basketball player, said feedback from athletes and student veterans encouraged the program’s creation. “We decided it was good to add because that was the feedback we were getting, especially from our (military) veterans, a growing population on campus,” said Hardin. “We’re excited about growing the team to, hopefully, five to 10 members.” According to a UA press release, Burttram competed in the program’s first competitive event earlier this month, the Ray Rice Memorial Golf Tournament in Milledgeville, Ga. Three players will make up the team for the 2013-14 school year and will compete in Amputee Golf Association events. Burttram said he hopes interest will pick up on the campus and elsewhere in the fall as word spreads through students and social media.
WVUA (Tuscaloosa) – July 24
WSFA-NBC (Montgomery) – July 24
Stadium will soon house new digital media center
Tuscaloosa News – July 25
Beginning early next year, Bryant-Denny Stadium will be home to a $14.6 million, 50,000-square-foot, state-of-the-art media center. The center, which is under construction, will house three of the University of Alabama’s media properties — WVUA-TV, the Center for Public Television and Radio, and Crimson Tide Productions. Cathy Andreen, a school spokeswoman, said the decision to move into the stadium came down to the best use of the space for UA. “The space in the stadium will allow all the university’s professional media assets to be together in one facility, resulting in operational efficiencies and greater marketing potential for all three entities,” she said. The two-story facility will feature studios, offices and control rooms for each organization along with multiuse spaces, such as editing suites and a conference room, that all three will have access to. The Center for Public Television and Radio and WVUA-TV operate in collaboration with the College of Communication and Information Sciences and offer internship programs…Elizabeth Brock, executive director for the Center for Public Television and Radio said operating inside the stadium should bring even more interest from potential students and faculty and provide an “unparalleled opportunity” for multimedia collaboration. “In our current facilities, the professional production and broadcast assets offered by the university have helped attract outstanding students and faculty,” Brock said. “Our hope is that in its new, highly visible location, the Digital Media Center will play an even greater role in recruiting students and faculty who are interested in adding ‘real world’ experience to classroom studies.”
‘Ghostbusters’ movie inspires University of Alabama Web series
Tuscaloosa News – July 25
Who ya gonna call? The correct answer is still “Ghostbusters.” When a group of University of Alabama students had to scramble to salvage an advanced TV production project last fall, that was the call they made. They decided to create “Alabama Ghostbusters: A Web Series,” which on Monday debuted its third episode online. For UA professor Adam Schwartz, who writes and directs the episodes, and the other devotees of the 1984 science-fiction comedy who strapped on homemade proton-packs to play parts, the series is their contribution to a supernatural universe that has captivated their imaginations since childhood. Brock Parker plays one of the paranormal detectives in the Web series and is head of the state fan group Alabama Ghostbusters. He said he has been hooked since he saw the movie in theaters as a child. “It was just funny,” he said. “It was one of those movies that has been able to come across generations.”
Psychopathic criminals have empathy switch
BBC News – July 24
Psychopaths do not lack empathy, rather they can switch it on at will, according to new research. Placed in a brain scanner, psychopathic criminals watched videos of one person hurting another and were asked to empathise with the individual in pain. Only when asked to imagine how the pain receiver felt did the area of the brain related to pain light up. Scientists, reporting in Brain, say their research explains how psychopaths can be both callous and charming. The team proposes that with the right training, it could be possible to help psychopaths activate their “empathy switch”, which could bring them a step closer to rehabilitation … Randall Salekin, from the University of Alabama, US, who works with youth offenders said: “These findings fit with much of the treatment I am doing using a mental model program, whereby youth are informed about how the brain works and then asked to make specific plans for improving their lives. “This study is impressive because it actually shows the brain mechanisms or neural networks involved in activating the inmates’ empathy.”
Willie Louis, Who Named the Killers of Emmett Till at Their Trial, Dies at 76
New York Times – July 24
The truck was going “real fast,” Willie Reed testified, as it came down the main road near Drew, Miss., on an August morning. A green and white 1955 Chevrolet — that year’s model — it passed Mr. Reed as he was walking to the store, turned into a nearby plantation and parked in front of a barn. In the cab, Mr. Reed said, were four white men. In the rear were three black men, plus a fourth — a black youth hunkered down in the very back of the truck … After Mr. Bryant and Mr. Milam were arrested and charged with Till’s kidnapping and murder, a group of black civil rights workers and white journalists prevailed on Mr. Reed to testify. “He was really the best eyewitness that they found,” David T. Beito, a historian at the University of Alabama who has written about the Till case, said Wednesday. “I don’t want to diminish the role played by the other witnesses, but his act in some sense was the bravest act of them all. He had nothing to gain: he had no family ties to Emmett Till; he didn’t know him. He was this 18-year-old kid who goes into this very hostile atmosphere.”
Local students participate in health studies program
Demopolis Times – July 24
Two select groups of students from across the state were recently on campus for the Rural Health Scholars and Rural Minority Health Scholars programs in The University of Alabama College of Community Health Sciences. Two Marengo County students, Brionna Merriweather of Demopolis and Jasmine Mack of Linden, participated in the Rural Minority Health Scholars program. These two five–week programs introduce students from rural areas to college life and give them an orientation to the need for health and medical professionals in communities like their own. Statistics show that rural students are more likely to live and practice in rural areas. The concept of the Rural Health Leaders Pipeline, which was recognized earlier this year with an Outstanding Rural Health Program Award from the National Rural Health Association, was developed as part of a strategy to recruit rural students into medical school. The Rural Health Scholars, who are rising high school seniors, live on campus, take college courses in English and chemistry, learn about health careers and make field trips to rural health care facilities and a medical school.
UA students take part in prestigious Alessi Seminar
Crimson White – July 24
Joseph Alessi, the New York Philharmonic’s principal trombonist, will be coming to the University for a nine-day seminar July 27 through August 3. The seminar began in 1999 and is held bi-annually in the U.S. This year will be the second consecutive time for the seminar to be hosted at The University of Alabama. Although he is a great trombonist, it is not just Alessi’s music that will draw attendees to the seminar. It is essentially his person, said UA trombone professor Jonathan Whitaker. “It’s more him than his music,” Whitaker said. “He is sort of the leading celebrity in what we do. He is the Michael Jordan of the trombone, so to speak. That is why it is such a unique seminar.” The seminar draws musicians from around the world and will be a great opportunity for students of Whitaker. Whitaker said his students will audit the seminar free of charge because they will be helping with setup.