Alabama Sorority Trick or Treat draws large crowd of costumed kids and parents (photos)
Al.com – Oct. 29
Hundreds of parents and children walked from one sorority house to another to collect candy and play games during the annual University of Alabama Sorority Trick or Treat event on campus on Tuesday evening. Sorority row was absolutely packed on a beautiful fall night, as children from the Tuscaloosa area ages 12 and younger were invited to dress up in Halloween costumes and visit the lawns of the sorority houses on Magnolia and Colonial drives for candy and all sorts of games. UA sorority members from the Alabama Panhellenic Association and National Pan-Hellenic Council also wore costumes and handed out candy. Check out our photo gallery of the Alabama Sorority Trick or Treat above.
University of Alabama studying whether butterflies can improve air travel
Tuscaloosa News – Oct. 29
A University of Alabama study is looking at whether butterfly wings might hold a key for improving flight for aircraft. The National Science Foundation has awarded a grant of about $280,000 to study the tiny scales that butterflies have on their wings. The scales help the insects stay aloft despite flying so slowly. An associate professor of aerospace engineering and mechanics at Alabama, Amy Lang, says the arrangement of the scales leads to an aerodynamic benefit for butterflies. She says studies indicate a Monarch butterfly is able to fly long distances partly because of the scales, which help reduce the energy needed for flight. Lang says understanding butterfly wings may help lead to improving flight for miniature aircraft that can be used for military reconnaissance and surveillance.
ABC 33/40 (Birmingham) – Oct. 29
North Georgia Times-Free Press – Oct. 29
DeKalb Times-Journal – Oct. 29
University of Alabama to host symposium on racial issues
Tuscaloosa News – Oct. 30
The University of Alabama will host a symposium about historical and contemporary race relations on campus at Gorgas Library next month. UA’s College of Arts and Sciences, the Institute for Social Science Research, the department of gender and race studies, the department of political science and the School of Social Work will co-host “Student Perceptions of Race Relations at the University of Alabama: Historical and Contemporary Perspectives.” The event will be 1-4 p.m. on Nov. 6 in Room 205 of the Gorgas Library. It will feature presentations of research on several dimensions of campus race relations by UA faculty, as well as several distinguished researchers across the disciplines of psychology, sociology and political science, according to a release from UA.
Campus ghost tour reveals haunted history
Crimson White – Oct. 30
As children in ghoul costumes hold their parents’ hands and University of Alabama students glance sidelong at the sites by Gorgas Library they thought they knew so well, Todd Hester, a naturalist for the Alabama Museum of Natural History, holds a flickering lantern out to his audience. It lights ruins of what little is left on campus after most was burned by Union solders in 1865, a few days before the Civil War was over. Hester tells stories that have been known to spook the campus over the years. “They can make their own decision on whether or not it’s real,” said Hester, who has manned the Haunting at the Museum tour alone for the last two years. On Tuesday night from 6-8 p.m., three 30-minute candlelit tours of campus landmarks with ghost stories began at Smith Hall and rounded the Quad, ending between Gorgas Library and the Gorgas House. The free event for all ages was sponsored by the University’s Museum of Natural History in order to give UA students, alumni and Tuscaloosa community members the opportunity to learn the history and a few of the haunted tales floating around the Quad.
Bragg delights readers
Jackson Sun (Tenn.) – Oct. 30
Writers and readers alike found their own kind in Madison County Tuesday, in a kind of celebration of the written word. The Jackson-Madison County Library Foundation held its first “The Books of Madison County” fundraiser, which included events focused on the world of books and the process of reading and writing them. The fundraiser included such sessions as “How to Publish a Book,” an author question and answer panel and a keynote presentation by Pulitzer prize-winning author Rick Bragg, a man from rural Alabama who wrote his way to The New York Times, where he won journalism’s most prestigious award for feature writing in 1996…Bragg now teaches magazine writing at the University of Alabama at Tuscaloosa and writes for “Southern Living” magazine.
Students use community service to reflect on past
Crimson White – Oct. 30
Throughout the gray, drizzly Sunday afternoon, around 100 University of Alabama students explored the past and how it shapes the present while picking up trash, raking and pulling weeds at Holt Cemetery for the Stand in the Schoolhouse Door Service Project. “A lot of us don’t know what happened in our history and what happened in 1963, so sometimes we need to look deeper and try to uncover those things so we can bring to light problems and issues and better resolve them,” said Kate Bonner, a senior majoring in communication studies and one of the organizers of the event. “A lot of times people think that pushing down issues or bringing them to light negatively is a way to fix a problem, and I think that sometimes bringing them to light and trying to discuss them positively is actually the way for social change.” The cemetery is a resting place to people of all walks of life, including many veterans, that has been neglected over the years, said Courtney Chapman Thomas, director of the UA Community Service Center. “So we thought that was a good place – a common ground – for people to be in because we were serving all types of people that day. And not just serving them, but we were there to remember and unearth their stories, which is what we’re trying to do with the 50th anniversary of the Stand in the Schoolhouse Door,” Thomas said.
Use of anti-depressants on the rise on university campuses
WVUA (Tuscaloosa) – Oct. 29
With the use of anti-depressants on the rise around college campuses, many are questioning whether students are doing too much. Jesse Turner, UA student: “My average day probably goes from about 7 a.m. to about 12 a.m. To many college students, this is the norm. But anti-depressant medication use is on the rise. So, are today’s students too stressed? I sat down with Dr. Clayton Shealy to find out what role stress plays in being depressed. Dr. Clayton Shealy/UA psychology: “Yes, stress definitely plays a role. What we see in college students a lot is particularly with freshmen, is being away from home for the first time, being away from their family, their friends, the people that you know they’ve grown up with.”
Director of UA’s Domestic Violence Law Clinic Talks About Services They Provide to Victims
WVUA (Tuscaloosa) – Oct. 29 (Live Interview)
The consequences of domestic violence can cross generations and last a lifetime. October is Domestic Violence Awareness month, and all month we have had special guests from Tuscaloosa’s Turning Point, to share how you can find help, or make a difference. Joining us now is Tanya Cooper, director of the University of Alabama Domestic Violence Law Clinic.