Matthew Costigan is young, single and a recent college graduate. He has a good-paying job and a bright future with a big accounting firm. So what does he do? He gives up his nice pad in the trendy Shadyside neighborhood of Pittsburgh and moves in with mom and dad.
When the U.S. Supreme Court handed down its landmark decision in 2003 backing the use of race in college admissions, the University of Texas at Austin and the University of Georgia took particular interest in the mechanics of the ruling.
At the time, both public universities were operating under federal-court orders prohibiting them from considering a student’s race in making admissions offers. With those decisions supplanted by the Supreme Court ruling, the institutions were free to return to race-conscious policies.
The end of 2004 brought plenty of news to make college officials uneasy at institutions that treat their students and applicants differently on account of their skin color or what country their ancestors came from.
At the end of November, the Office for Civil Rights at the Education Department pressured the state of Wisconsin into changing a minorities-only scholarship program to one that allows participation by students of all races
By modern fraternity standards, Phi Delta Theta’s tailgate party was a real rager. For one thing, there were kegs. I couldn’t see them just then, but proof of their existence was everywhere. Packed into a backyard near the campus of Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill., were some 100 drunken college students, beer spilling from plastic cups, industrial-size ketchup bottles overturned on the grass near the grill and gaggles of hard-drinking sorority girls (including one self-described Phi Delt groupie) keeping pace with the boys.
A UW Pharmacy School student was charged Thursday in connection with fires she allegedly set two years ago at a residence hall to get attention.
Kelly L. Fausek, 22, faces two charges of negligent handling of burning material. Fausek also faces a stalking charge for delivering threatening letters last month to a university official, and to herself, also allegedly done to get attention.
After the terrorist attacks of 2001, many believed the government’s more stringent visa policy would complicate life for international students….Numbers of international students at UW-Madison and at other U.S. universities have been declining recently. But, at least at UW, it isn’t because of bureacratic holdups. (1/5/05 Capital Times)
The Christmas Eve news that the Bush administration is going to cut back on Pell grants for low-income students this year underscored just how out of kilter this country has become.
We’re spending billions upon billions fighting a war that should never have been started and lavishing billions upon billions on giving the least needy people in America breaks on their income taxes. As is almost always the case, the people who can afford it least wind up bearing the burden.
The stereotypically cutthroat, competitive world of law school is largely fiction, a study suggests, with most first-year law students saying faculty members are helpful and sympathetic.
CHICAGO ââ?¬â?? One education publication dubbed it the “December surprise”: Two days before Christmas, the Bush administration announced it was revising the formulas for its Pell Grants – the federal government’s primary aid vehicle for America’s neediest college students – in a way that may leave 1.3 million students receiving a smaller amount, and 90,000 off the rolls altogether.
Students at the University of Wisconsin-Madison received their grades online for the first time in December. An electronic grading system was developed and implemented by a team of staff members from the University�s Division of Information Technology and the Office of the Registrar.
MADISON, Wis. – What better way to make a mother proud than by following in her footsteps at the University of Wisconsin? (Athletic Communications)
Dear Editor: The AP story by Justin Pope, “Thunder from the campus right,” published in the Capital Times Dec. 28, cites the case of Columbia University, where our film, “Columbia Unbecoming,” documented the harassment and intimidation of students by professors hostile to Israel.
But this is not…a case of “liberal vs. conservative (writes Charles Jacobs, president of The David Project in Boston)…. It has to do with the dominance in many of our country’s Middle East studies departments by Arabists and radicals, and the indifference of university administrators.
Cheri Dlugosinski talked to her 22-year-old son Matt by phone late Saturday night.
A student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Matt has been studying in Maduari, India, since August.
For the holiday, though, he decided to travel to the coast.
In its most recent annual study of UW-Madison students, the university ‘s department of information technology found that students were online an average of 26.5 hours per week in the 2003-04 school year…
University of Wisconsin officials expressed sorrow over the devastation in Asia, but said there was little more they can do to reach out to members of the university community overseas.
The UW was able to track down all 25 students from this country that were studying in Thailand and India. But it has proved much more difficult to find the approximately 700 UW international students from the affected areas.
STATE COLLEGE, PA-January 3, 2005 ââ?¬â? In an attempt to fight identity theft, Penn State University is ending a long-standing practice of using Social Security numbers to identify students.
MADISON ââ?¬â? All 25 University of Wisconsin-Madison students studying abroad in parts of Asia devastated by last weekendââ?¬â?¢s deadly tsunami are safe.
School officials, however, might not know the fate of hundreds of international students for weeks.
As many as 90,000 students could be disqualified from receiving Pell Grants and other forms of federal and state financial assistance under a change that the Bush administration has made in the formula the government uses to calculate a student’s need for aid.
Two days before Christmas, the U.S. Education Department announced in the Federal Register that it had, for the first time in a decade, updated the amount it allows families to deduct for state and local tax payments when applying for financial aid. (Subscription required.)
College life has long provided young people with a smorgasbord of late-night diversions. But now students have been flocking to bars, nightclubs and campus parties for a new kind of social event: tobacco-industry-sponsored parties, complete with complimentary cigarettes. A new study suggests these parties are a powerful marketing tool that encourages some to start smoking.
Jennifer de Silva of Racine has spoken with her husband by phone five times since he was swept up in the earthquake-driven waves of death that hit the coast of Sri Lanka on Sunday morning. …
On Tuesday, a day when the death toll soared above 58,000, the University of Wisconsin-Madison had not yet confirmed the whereabouts of 19 students who were studying in India.
TAMPA, Fla. – There’s no shortage of numbers that stand out when reviewing the storybook tale that is Jim Leonhard’s run at the University of Wisconsin.
…Leonhard is not alone in his ability to put things in their proper perspective, but he’s certainly in the minority in the world of major college athletics. Leonhard and others have managed to remain student-athletes in a landscape dominated by athlete-students.
Wage too low, even for students Mac VerStanding claims raising the minimum wage would ruin State Street, which he describes as “lined with locally owned stores staffed largely by college students doing homework behind the counter.” He goes on to suggest that these college students are well taken care of with financial aid and pre-paid room and board: Even paid a mere $5.15 an hour, these students greatly appreciate the wage, which goes to textbooks or walking-around money.
Interested college students no longer have to coyly ask friends whether a particularly attractive classmate is single. The information might well be available at thefacebook.com. The site is the latest craze to hit college campuses.
….There are 293 schools on the site, including UW-Madison and Milwaukee, and more than 1 million members. (from the 12/28/04 Capital Times print edition, reprinted from the Harford Courant)
A new electronic grading system at UW-Madison means most students will get their final grades within a few days of the end of the semester, rather than a few weeks, officials said
At the University of North Carolina, three incoming freshmen sue over a reading assignment they say offends their Christian beliefs. In Colorado and Indiana, a national conservative group publicizes student allegations of left-wing bias by professors. Faculty get hate mail and are pictured in mock “wanted” posters; at least one college says a teacher received a death threat. The episodes…all touch on an issue of growing prominence on college campuses.
Athula and Renuka Gunawardena had a difficult couple of hours on Sunday as word broke of a tidal wave hitting the coast of their native Sri Lanka. They waited two hours before finally hearing from her brother.
“My parents’ house is OK. But most of our friends have died,” said Renuka Gunawardena. She lives in the Eagle Heights apartments with her husband, a doctoral student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
BOSTON, MASSACHUSSETTS A student at a vocational training school has died from injuries he suffered when he fell from a third-floor balcony during a party at his apartment, authorities said.
There are several hundred U-W students who came to campus from countries like India and Thailand…..which were struck by the disaster in South Asia that has claimed the lives of an estimated 40,000 people. (First item)
A legal confrontation is playing out here as a student organization seeks official recognition and money from a state-run university even though the students plan to exclude non-Christians and gays.
MADISON, Wis. — Last weekend’s deadly earthquake-powered tsunamis in southern Asia have sent shockwaves through the University of Wisconsin’s international community.
This week in our Foreign Student Series, we examine support services for students who come to the United States to study. We will use a major university in the Midwest for our example.
More than three thousand foreign students attend the University of Wisconsin at its campus in Madison. Most are in graduate programs; twenty-eight percent are undergraduates.
Celine on Halloween and UW tuition cuts are just two of the topics addressed in Zaleski’s list of tongue-in-cheek predictions for 2004.
University of Wisconsin officials said today that there have been no reports of students abroad getting caught up in the turmoil wrought by Sunday’s tidal wave in southern Asia.
….Once, it was liberal campus activists who cited the importance of “diversity” in pressing their agendas for curriculum change. Now, conservatives have adopted much of the same language in calling for a greater openness to their viewpoints.
Next Halloween, the elected guardians of Madison might try to eliminate rowdy crowds by closing off interstate access to the city or putting up gates on State Street.
The Department of Education yesterday announced a new formula for calculating eligibility for college financial aid, a move that will eliminate federal Pell Grant scholarships for an estimated 80,000 to 90,000 low-income students and force a modest scaling back of other types of state and federal assistance to broader categories of undergraduates.
Federal changes in the financial aid formula for low-income college students will result in bigger cuts in Wisconsin than in 43 other states, an analysis by the U.S. Department of Education shows. Steve Van Ess, University of Wisconsin-Madison director of student financial services, estimated that about 2,000 low-income students at UW-Madison will lose an average of 13% of their Pell Grant, or about $250 to $300 a year, as a result of the new formula.
The University of Wisconsin-Madison administration and students are worried that government cutbacks in the Pell Grants program will further erode the ability of the average citizen to afford a college education.
MADISON, Wis. – The University of Wisconsin athletic teams donated their time and money to the less fortunate this holiday season through a series of three organized efforts by the Student-Athlete Advisory Committee (SAAC). (Athletic Communications)
College students in virtually every state will be required to shoulder more of the cost of their education under new federal rules that govern most of the nation’s financial aid.
Because of the changes, which take effect next fall and are expected to save the government $300 million in the 2005-6 academic year, at least 1.3 million students will receive smaller Pell Grants, the nation’s primary scholarship for those of low income, according to two analyses of the new rules.
…He leaves with one regret: the unresolved problem of alcohol-related violence Downtown. He said it will only change if city leaders are willing to make some “brave decisions” about changing the drinking culture near campus.
College students in virtually every state will be required to shoulder more of the cost of their education under new federal rules that govern most of the nation’s financial aid.
Because of the changes, which take effect next fall and are expected to save the government $300 million in the 2005-6 academic year, at least 1.3 million students will receive smaller Pell Grants, the nation’s primary scholarship for those of low income, according to two analyses of the new rules.
Junior point guard Boo Wade’s return from a leave of absence lasting almost two months returned the University of Wisconsin men’s basketball roster to its full complement of 15 players Wednesday.
Dear parents,
In August, I wrote some advice about sending your children off to college. Now, I’d like to offer my thoughts about welcoming them home for the holidays. First, I offer my apologies. They’re not quite in the same condition as when you sent them to us.
If the students in my feature writing class at UW-Madison are the norm, your student is tired. Very, very tired.
And possibly a little sick, too.
A new electronic grading system at UW-Madison means most students will get their final grades within a few days of the end of the semester today, rather than a few weeks, officials said.
“It’s a huge efficiency improvement,” said Registrar Joanne Berg, who developed the Web-based system in the past year with campus computing experts in the Department of Information Technology and a committee of faculty and staff.
Wall off the city! Barbarians at the gates!
Next Halloween, the elected guardians of Madison might try to eliminate rowdy crowds by closing off interstate access to the city or putting up gates on State Street.
These measures seem a little extreme, and ultimately, running a blockade would prove pointless. Imagine the ruffians swimming across Lake Mendota, emerging from the surf at the north end of Lake Street wearing dripping t-shirts emblazoned: “I infiltrated Madison on Halloween!” Curses, foiled again.
Madison police have arrested a suspect in at least one of three sexual assaults by a stranger that took place Downtown over the Dec. 3 weekend.
After her divorce in August 2002, Diana Schramer decided it was time to fulfill a lifelong dream. In the spring semester of 2003, the stay-at-home mom enrolled at UW-Madison in the legal studies program.
Now Schramer, 43, has what she’s always dreamed of: a college diploma.
Wisconsin�s public universities need more money from the state to keep their tuition rates down, UW System President Kevin Reilly said Saturday.
Reilly was in Eau Claire to speak to the 661 graduates at commencement ceremonies. (Subscription required.)
MADISON (NBC15)Ã? Madison police say they have a suspect in custody in connection with at least one sexual assault that’s taken place downtown recently.
MADISON, Wis. — Edgewood College will review policies after fallout from two campus sexual assaults, although the college maintains it didn’t mishandle anything
In an unusual disclosure, the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater’s student health center is telling patients that, because of the USA Patriot Act, if government officials ask for their medical records, they’ll get to see them, and the patients will never know. Quotes Anuj Desai, UW-Madison law professor.
City officials, anxious to head off another Halloween disaster, considered options Thursday ranging from closing off the entire isthmus to moving the bash away from its State Street home.
…The pack of about 40 caroling University of Wisconsin students had a message for the governor: Give the UW more state funding, and decrease or freeze tuition. In Doyle’s last budget, the university took a $250 million cut, and raised tuition by 37.5 percent over two years to help cover that cut.
MADISON, Wis. — Besides minor traffic tickets, Nick Limbeck, 19, says he hasn’t had many run-ins with the law.
But last month he skipped his philosophy class at the University of Wisconsin-Madison to intentionally get arrested with three other students during a sit-in at a military recruiter’s office near campus. (login required.)
MADISON, Wis. – The Intercollegiate Athletic Department at Wisconsin wants your on-line votes now! And we want them next week, too! Thereââ?¬â?¢s nearly $100,000 at stake! (Athletic Communications)
Edgewood College failed until recently to keep a public log of crime on campus, in violation of federal law. In addition, the college chose not to issue written alerts to the campus community after two women reported to campus security that they were sexually assaulted in separate incidents earlier this year.
Jeff Erlanger writes, “Dear Editor: Recently I attended a forum where police and students discussed what might have gone wrong on State Street this past Halloween. I chose to attend because as president of the State-Langdon Neighborhood Association I am committed to helping find the right prescription for Halloween. While the forum was interesting, its focus wasn’t on what I thought it should be….”
Edgewood College officials promised Wednesday to better warn the public about crimes on campus and change other safety procedures after student complaints about the handling of two reports on forcible sexual offenses in a dorm earlier this year.
Mind-numbing comprehensive tests and term papers.
Long essays in blue exam books.
Hordes of pale, bleary-eyed students locked in library study carrels.
There’s still some of that at UW-Madison as finals week begins today. But increasingly, student achievement is being assessed in other, less Draconian ways.
