Alabama among 16 schools picked for Camaro competition
Tuscaloosa News – April 25
The University of Alabama is among 16 universities selected nationwide for a four-year contest co-sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy and General Motors to redesign a Chevrolet Camaro into a high-performance hybrid-electric car, with goals of reducing its environmental impact while maintaining its muscle-car performance. The EcoCAR3 teams and the car were announced Thursday in Washington, D.C. The program will conclude in the summer of 2018. “We had all been waiting and guessing,” Kaylie Crosby said of the announcement of the car. “We are excited to be working with the Camaro.” The contest is set to officially begin in September, and Crosby said the UA team will get its Camaro in 2015. Ahead of the arrival of the Camaro, the UA team, which is still being recruited, will be working on preliminary designs, Crosby said. Crosby and Jim Krafcik, a junior in electrical engineering from St. Louis, were on-hand for the announcement. Crosby, who is participating in the STEM Path to MBA program in UA’s Culverhouse College of Commerce, is the student project manager.
Florence Times Daily – April 27
CBS 12 (Chattanooga, Tenn.) – April 26
The Republic (Columbus, Ind.) – April 27
Lakeland Ledger (Fla.) – April 26
WVUA broadcasts from its new media center on Monday
Tuscaloosa News – April 27
WVUA is set to begin is first broadcast from the new Digital Media Center in the University of Alabama’s Bryant-Denny Stadium on Monday. “Parting with our current location is going to be incredibly bittersweet,” said longtime WVUA News Anchor Lynn Brooks in a released statement. “We have definitely had some great years here and this has become home, but I look forward to seeing all of the things WVUA News can accomplish in our new state of the art facility.” The commercial television station operated by UA’s College of Communication and Information Sciences broadcast its last program from its longtime home in Reese Phifer Hall next door to the stadium on Friday night, according to a release from the station. The news team will temporarily broadcast from its newsroom in the center while construction of their studio set is completed. The new $14.6-million, 46,000-square-foot center on the third and fourth floors of the north endzone of Bryant-Denny Stadium houses the College of Communication and Information Sciences’ professional media operations, including the Center for Public Television and Radio, WVUA-TV and WUOA-TV, and Alabama Public Radio.
As University of Alabama students move on, many hope campus will remember April 27 tornado
Al.com – April 28
On April 27, 2011, University of Alabama freshman Daniel Roth hunkered in the basement of the Office of Student Media as a devastating tornado ripped through Tuscaloosa. “I felt a clear shift in our responsibilities,” Roth, now a senior, said. “We all felt like more like a community. It stinks that it took tragedy for that to happen, but I felt a more united UA. The most impactful experiences of your life will happen in an instant. You can’t plan for it. It changed everything.” A year later, Roth released a documentary on the storm’s aftermath that went on to win a Pacemaker, the highest honor in collegiate journalism. Today, three years later, Roth is winding down his college career with his peers, the last complete class to have experienced the devastating April 27 storms. Unlike other communities, where families live and work in the same neighborhoods for generations, the University of Alabama will eventually be home to students who have no first hand memories of the tragedy that united the campus and town. While Roth and his fellow student journalists hit the streets, documenting victims’ stories and the devastation surrounding campus, the University of Alabama canceled final exams and many students left town to be with family.
UA Student create website to remember deadly Tuscaloosa tornado
NBC 12 (Montgomery) – April 27
Sunday marks three years since a tornado swept across parts of northwest Alabama, and caused major damage to Tuscaloosa. At the University of Alabama, this year’s class of seniors is the last undergraduate class who were at the university when the tornado hit. So as a remembrance of that day for incoming students who do not know much about what happened, a group of journalism students have created a website. The website is fully interactive and has video, audio, mapping and personal stories of what happened on April 27, 2011. “Incoming students, they see some of the damage and they see the reconstruction, but they don’t remember how it was originally,” said Alex Rice, a University of Alabama student. “We want the students who are coming up to also know what happened, and know what such a big impact happened on the students and the city,” said Casey Voyles, a University of Alabama student. The website went live on Sunday, on the three year anniversary of the deadly tornado.
NBC 13 (Birmingham) – April 27
Glencoe native helps tornado-stricken area revive
Gadsden Times – April 26
Glencoe native Leah Bradford was a freshman at the University of Alabama when a tornado struck near the campus on April 27, 2011. Now, as a senior, she is involved in an award-winning project that rebrands one of the communities destroyed that day. “This is a nice bookend for me,” Bradford, the student producer for the project, said. Bradford, a telecommunications and film-broadcast news major, is involved in a project working with residents of Alberta City to rebrand the community. Bradford said the city was destroyed, but has a lot on its horizon. The Tuscaloosa Parks and Recreation Authority has built a new tennis complex that will have numerous courts and have the ability to host tournaments from around the country. A new school, Alberta School, is expected to open by the end of the year and will specialize in fine arts education. Bradford said Councilman Kip Tyner is working with the team to construct new websites and social media sites to bring Alberta to the forefront of the Tuscaloosa area. “We are working to give the community of Alberta an outlet to use for updates and information about the area using videos on the website. Using Instagram and Vine, we are able to promote upcoming events such as business openings and ground-breakings,” Bradford said.
PODCAST: Room for Improvement – UA senior shares memories of April 27th, 2011
CBS 42 (Birmingham) – April 27
In this week’s Room for Improvement podcast, Josh and Sebastian sit down with Drew Bryant, a University of Alabama student who was just a freshman when the April 27th tornado hit Tuscaloosa. Drew shares his memories of the day, and how he has seen Tuscaloosa work to get back on it’s feet over the last three years.
Slidell’s Nicole Kernahan earns Ernest F. Hollings Undergraducate Scholarship at University of Alabama
New Orleans Times-Picayune – April 28
Five University of Alabama students have received the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Ernest F. Hollings Undergraduate Scholarship for 2014-16. Among that number is Nicole Kernahan, a sophomore marine science-biology major from Slidell. The scholarship provides $8,000 a year for full-time study during the junior and senior years and $6,500 for a 10-week internship at NOAA or an NOAA-approved facility during the summer between the junior and senior years. The Hollings Scholarship is given in addition to existing awards the student may already receive. UA ranks among the top four universities in the United States this year in terms of the number of Hollings Scholarships awarded. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration selected 106 students in 2014 for the highly competitive scholarships.
Cleveland.com – April 25
COLLEGE NEWS: April 27
Tuscaloosa News – April 26
University of Alabama: Collegiate 100 – Robert Stevenson, a sophomore at the University of Alabama majoring in early childhood education from Birmingham, was one of 11 young men who received pins signifying their membership in the Collegiate 100, an affiliate of the 100 Black Men of West Alabama Inc.; Phi Sigma Theta – Phi Sigma Theta announced that Ashley Carlisle, daughter of Annette Carlisle of Tuscaloosa, has recently become a member of Phi Sigma Theta National Honor Society at the University of Alabama. Phi Sigma Theta is a national honor society dedicated to recognizing and rewarding academic achievement in undergraduates at institutions of higher learning; Coca-Cola First Generation Scholars – The University of Alabama hosted a celebration of the Coca-Cola First Generation Scholars program on April 10, at the north end zone of Bryant-Denny Stadium.
LEND A HAND: Girl Scouts honor 13 women for service to community
Tuscaloosa News – April 26
The Girl Scouts of North-Central Alabama recognized 13 women at the Women of Distinction luncheon on April 25 at Hotel Capstone in Tuscaloosa. Women recognized at the event represent Bibb, Fayette, Greene, Hale, Hamilton, Lamar, Marengo, Perry, Pickens, Sumter and Tuscaloosa counties. The Women of Distinction program pays tribute to women who have made special contributions to their community through civic, academic and/or professional involvement. … The Women of Distinction are: Judy Bonner of Tuscaloosa, president of the University of Alabama…
Barbara Jane Brickman lectures on new book “New American Teenagers”
The Parthenon (Marshall University student newspaper) – April 25
As part of a new joint initiative of several departments on campus to create a film studies program, Barbara Jane Brickman, assistant professor of media and gender studies at the University of Alabama, presented research on her new book, “New American Teenagers”, Thursday in the John Spotts Room of the Memorial Student Center to a group of students and faculty. The Department of English, the Department of Sexuality Studies and the Department of Women’s Studies all sponsored the event in light of the upcoming plans for the creation of the new film studies program. … Brickman was brought in to provide insight and direction as Marshall moves forward with its plans to create a program very similar to the one established at the University of Alabama.