TO CLIPS INDEX
Clips for March 19, 2009
Arizona Daily Star
3/19/09
PHOENIX — Gov. Jan Brewer said there is virtually
no way to balance next year's
budget without further
cuts in state funds for education. The governor told
a
group of community business leaders Wednes-
day that the size of the deficit,
coupled with the
amount of funding legally off-limits to budget cuts,
means
public schools, community colleges and
universities will have to share in the
financial pain
yet to come. That is on top of the $133 million
already taken
from K-12 schools and $150 million
from higher education.
The Arizona
Republic 3/19/09
Biosphere 2, the giant terrarium north of
Tucson,
plans to use the sun's energy to operate a portion
of the facility.
Solon Corp., a solar-panel
manufacturer with a factory in Tucson, is donating
more than $200,000 in solar panels to the research
center. Officials said the
gift will allow Biosphere to
move toward future investment in alternative energy
and research. "It will allow us to start to look at
energy management in a new way, to use Biosphere
as a mini-grid where we can
experiment with energy
use," said Travis Huxman, Biosphere 2 director.
Arizona Daily Star
3/19/09
It's almost enough to make teachers grind their teeth:
a classroom full of 35
students, each one fixated on
a hand-held gadget, thumbs flying. Unless it's
being
done on purpose. In a program sponsored by the
University of Arizona and
Arizona State University, 60
teachers across the state will receive training in
early
June on ways they can use technology, from pod-
casting to videoconferences
to text-messaging, to
better hook their young audiences from kindergarten
through high school.
Arizona Daily Star
3/19/09
ORACLE — Biosphere 2 never unplugged from Earth,
but the University of Arizona,
which now runs the giant
terrarium as a research center, will come closer to
making it self-sustaining with installation later this year
of 470 photovoltaic
panels. The panels were donated
by Solon America, the Tucson arm of a German
solar
company that also owns an interest in GlobalSolar, the
thin-film
manufacturing company on Tucson's East Side.
Arizona Daily Star
3/19/09
The city and University of Arizona choreographed the
suspension of work on a
science center for Rio Nuevo
— with the city asking the UA not to make requests
for
more money public to avoid potential fallout in the
media and from the
Legislature. E-mails obtained by
Arizona Daily Star show City Manager Mike Hein
and UA
Vice President Joel Valdez planned a meeting to figure
out what to do
about the $130 million science center
more than two weeks before the university
announced
it was suspending work on the project.
KOLD News 13
3/19/09
When the University of Arizona took over Biosphere 2
two years ago, the idea was
to enhance the university's
research capabilities. And that's what
scientists have
been doing here, studying climate change sustainable
living and
alternative forms of energy. Today, that trend
continues with the donation of
500 photovoltaic modules
--or solar panels--that will provide some 50 kilowatts
of
power to the facility.
Yuma Sun
3/19/09
Yuman Robert McLendon has been named to the
Governor's Sustainable State Parks
Task Force,
which will begin work immediately to seek solutions
on what is
needed to sustain the state's parks. The
task force was originally created in
2008 by executive
order, but no progress to date has been made. In an
effort to
work through recent budget reductions and
possible closures of various parks,
Brewer has re-
assembled a group of leaders from across the state
to examine and
provide recommendations for the
uture of Arizona State Parks.
Arizona Daily Sun
3/19/09
For a teenager who isn't sure what she wants to be
when she grows up, Mona Lauing has her head on
pretty straight. The soft-spoken Flagstaff High School
junior attends FHS by morning and Coconino
Community College by afternoon,
taking advantage
of a dual enrollment program that lets her take college
classes
for free as she explores careers in the medical
field. Through the Coconino
Association for Vocations,
Industry and Technology, or CAVIAT, Mona, 17, is
taking
allied health courses that could lead to a position as a
laboratory
assistant. It's a job she said she could put
her through school when she moves
on to Northern
Arizona University, where she might study sound
engineering,
English or physician's assisting.
The Arizona Republic
3/19/09
Arizona State University Alumni Association chapters
will be fanning out across
the country Saturday when
they volunteer with local community-improvement
events
in conjunction with ASU CARES Day. This will
mark the first time the alumni
association has spear-
headed ASU CARES. Christine K. Wilkinson,
president
of the ASU Alumni Association, noted that
the events had the potential to
further one of ASU's
goals as a New American University-"social
embeddedness."
Donations
sought for scholarship fund honoring
late journalist Emerine
The Tucson Citizen
3/19/09
The University of Arizona School of Journalism is
soliciting donations for a
scholarship the department
wants to start in memory of longtime Tucson
journalist
and former Tucson Citizen reporter Steve Emerine.
Emerine, who died
Feb. 13, was a fixture in Tucson
journalism and politics for more than four
decades.
He also taught journalism briefly at UA and worked in
the university's
News Services department.
ASU Web Devil
3/19/09
If you’re into massive transformations (and frankly,
who isn’t?), it seems like
June is the month for you.
The sixth month, already set to see the release of
the second “Transformers” movie, will likely also
see proposals for the
evolution of the Arizona
university system. As part of the Arizona Board
of
Regents’ strategic plan for developing the state
universities, the presidents
of the three schools
are being asked to outline their long-term ideas
for
transforming higher education. The board’s
aims include adding lower-cost
options for
tudents seeking bachelor’s degrees, boosting
research activity on
the main campuses, expanding
partnerships with community colleges and finding
a
new model for state funding, and they are hoping
the three presidents are up the
task, providing the
ideas to make the regents’ plans a reality.
ASU
Web Devil
3/19/09
Someone I know suggested the following logic
to
me the other day. I had not thought about the recent
cuts to higher education
in these terms before, and
could not think of any reason why the argument
should
not prevail: “The state allocation to the
universities is intended to bridge the
gap between
tuition and the total costs of higher education. When
the majority
leadership cut the budgets of the
universities so drastically, their actions
could not
have been intended to curtail research at the
universities, as those
activities are funded by other
sources. Their actions could not have been
intended
to curtail benefits for out-of-state students, for they
pay higher
tuition, which is not subsidized by the
state. It follows therefore, that the
intent of the
Legislature could not have been anything but to
curtail benefits
for in-state students, and in-state
students alone. Therefore, the universities
should
make reductions in services that affect only in-state
students.
Therefore, the AIMS scholarship should
be one of the first things the Board of
Regents
should terminate.”
ASU Web Devil
3/19/09
As part of a strategic plan to further develop the
university system, the
Arizona Board of Regents
is calling on university presidents to transform
higher
education to better serve the people of
Arizona. Regents outlined the main goals
of the
transformation during their board meeting last
week. The goals include
lower cost options for
students seeking baccalaureate degrees, major
research
activities at the universities’ main
campuses, expanded partnerships with
community colleges and a new state funding
model to fit the revised university
system.
ASU Web Devil
3/19/09
ASU police are working on a project to share safety
tips and spread
public-safety awareness to students,
and officers want to take it to a whole new
level — the
student level. Officer Brian Kiefling is working with
several
others to launch a Facebook page for the ASU
Police Department, a project he
wants students to be
able to relate to. “We want to get information out to
students on a medium they already use regularly,”
Kiefling said. “We want to put
things on their level.”
ASU police has begun using the TV screens in the
Memorial
Union and Student Services building on
the Tempe campus to share safety tips and
relevant
information, but Kiefling said he doubts students stop
to watch the
slides cycle through.
CNNMoney.com
3/19/09
While there's no denying times are tough, you have
more options to help pay for
that BA than you think.
From targeting the right schools to taking advantage
of
new financial aid rules and tax breaks, you can
get the price to a manageable
level. The rush to
public colleges comes at a tough time. In addition
to hiking
tuition, some public schools are making
even deeper budget cuts than private
schools. At
Arizona State University, for one, plans are being
drawn to shut 40
academic programs, close two
campuses, and eliminate a merit scholarship
program.