A legal battle could be in store for a new admissions policy adopted by the UW System. The Board of Regents voted unanimously on Friday to adopt the new policy, which looks at factors beyond academics, such as race and ethnicity, when determining admissions.
The University of Wisconsin-Stout will require athletes to undergo random drug testing, a response to December police searches that netted steroids and other drugs from the homes of two football players.
School officials said Thursday that the football team’s 100 players will be tested this spring for commonly abused drugs such as cocaine and marijuana, and a quarter will be randomly tested for steroids. Players in other sports at Wisconsin-Stout will undergo random drug testing starting in the fall.
A controversial University of Wisconsin System admissions policy that includes the consideration of race was approved by the Board of Regents today on a 16-0 vote, but a legal challenge is likely to follow.
The policy says freshman applicants should be judged according to a long list of criteria including academic records, test scores and leadership qualities, but the item on the list that has riled conservatives is the one that looks at membership in a historically underrepresented racial or ethnic group.
Wisconsin hospitals are preparing to fight a new tax that Gov. Jim Doyle is expected to unveil on Tuesday when he releases his new two-year budget.
The tax would be used to pay for health care costs and other expenses, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and Wisconsin State Journal reported in Friday’s editions. Doyle spokesman Matt Canter said Friday he could not confirm that the tax would be proposed in the governor’s budget, but that all sources of federal money were being looked at.
Slightly fewer babies are born with autism in Wisconsin than in the rest of the nation, but the reason for the difference remains unclear.
A study released Thursday by U.S. health officials found evidence of autism in 5.2 per 1,000 Wisconsin children born in 1994, compared to an average of 6.6 cases per 1,000 children born in 13 other states tracked for the study.
Scientists also found that autism rates in Dane County were more than twice those in Milwaukee County, according to Maureen Durkin, an epidemiologist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
A new state law forcing sexual predators to wear tracking devices for the rest of their lives is unconstitutional, according to three University of Wisconsin-Madison law professors.
The measure violates privacy rights and amounts to punishment and warrantless surveillance when applied to offenders who aren’t on parole or government supervision, the professors said in a letter sent to Corrections Secretary Matthew Frank on Feb. 3.
“A clearer example of governmental intrusion into personal privacy is difficult to imagine,” wrote law professors Walter Dickey, Byron Lichstein and Meredith Ross.
Some Wisconsin families could save $400 on college tuition next year if a tax cut proposed by Democratic Gov. Jim Doyle Thursday passes through the state budget.
Gov. Jim Doyle called for tax breaks for health care, child care, tuition and Social Security on Thursday, pushing forward proposals he first made late in his campaign.
“Far too many families across the state are getting squeezed,” Doyle said from an Appleton home. “That’s why we’ve worked hard to make the right, responsible choices to keep life affordable for middle-class families.”
A new state law forcing sexual predators to wear tracking devices for the rest of their lives is unconstitutional, according to three University of Wisconsin-Madison law professors.
Three University of Wisconsin professors in Madison say a new state law forcing sexual predators to wear tracking devices for the rest of their lives is unconstitutional.
The professors — Walter Dickey, Byron Lichstein and Meredith Ross — say that the measure violates privacy rights and amounts to punishment and warrantless surveillance when applied to offenders who aren’t on parole or government supervision.
The professors sent a letter to Corrections Secretary Matthew Frank on February 3rd to outline their beliefs.
Members of a committee of the University of Wisconsin Board of Regents have approved expansion of a freshman admissions policy on UW campuses which includes race as a factor.
Admissions decisions factoring in an applicant’s race already take place at the system’s flagship school, UW-Madison. The practice’s critics include State Senator Glenn Grothman (R-West Bend). Grothman criticized the decision by the Regents’ education committee, but also said he might propose a compromise where only applicants of one racial minority would receive special consideration in admissions decisions.
In his Tuesday budget message, Gov. Jim Doyle is expected to propose a tax on hospitals to leverage hundreds of millions of dollars in additional federal Medicaid cash to help pay for health care reforms.
MADISON, Wis. — University of Wisconsin System leaders said that their plan for an admissions policy that considers applicants’ skin color is legal despite state laws saying that race cannot be an admissions test.
Any guarantee of admission to the University of Wisconsin System is likely to disappear today, when the Board of Regents is to vote on a policy that would require every campus to change the way it reviews applicants.
MADISON, Wis. — Three University of Wisconsin professors in Madison said a new state law forcing sexual predators to wear tracking devices for the rest of their lives is unconstitutional.
The professors — Walter Dickey, Byron Lichstein and Meredith Ross — said that the measure violates privacy rights and amounts to punishment and warrantless surveillance when applied to offenders who aren’t on parole or government supervision.
It is said that a black panther is able to hunt and kill animals up to 15 times its weight. Conversely, an animal found on the other side of the globe, the timid badger, does not usually seek to attack, but its great muscular power and tough hide render it a formidable opponent.
Faced with these facts, the UW-Milwaukee Panthers should make veritable colleagues for the UW-Madison Badgers in the future, as UW-Milwaukee grows into Wisconsin�s second major research university. The universities� chancellors and state representatives concur.
Gov. Jim Doyle said today his proposed state budget will contain nearly $200 million in tax cuts.
The governor’s proposal, which he will unveil in full next week, includes tax cuts he promised as part of his re-election campaign last fall, including:
….An expanded deduction for families with children in college. The plan would raise the amount that families can deduct for tuition, books and other supplies from $4,536 to $6,000. Doyle’s campaign estimated the costs at about $10 million to $15 million annually.
Aruna Biomedical, a Georgia-based maker of neural stem cell kits for researchers, will relocate to Wisconsin if it can raise sufficient amounts of angel capital, the Wisconsin Technology Network reported.
….Aruna is a licensee of the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation for its human embryonic stem cell technology, and (management team member Jim) Stice told WTN the company would like to relocate to Wisconsin to take advantage of stem cell research synergies offered by the UW.
A growing number of students in Wisconsin and the nation are taking AP courses and exams, which can help them earn college credit for class work done in high school.
According to the third annual Advanced Placement Report to the Nation, released this week by the College Board:
� The percentage of U.S. public high school graduates who took an AP Exam in high school increased from 15.9% in 2000 to 24.2% in 2006. In Wisconsin, that percentage grew from 15.2% to 23%.
ââ?¬Â¢ Wisconsin’s passing rate – the percentage of public school graduates who earned a score of 3 or higher on the 5-point scale of at least one AP Exam – was 15.8% in 2006, higher than the national rate of 14.8%.
PEWAUKEE (AP) – Ody Fish, an activist in the Wisconsin Republican Party and longtime member of the University of Wisconsin Board of Regents, died Tuesday, his family said. He was 81.
Wisconsin needs more residents with bachelor’s degrees to be competitive in the knowledge economy, but a turf battle could be looming as to the roles the UW’s two-year colleges, four-year universities and the Wisconsin Technical College System will play in meeting that need.
The largely internal debate has been brewing for some time, but this week is significant on two fronts. The University of Wisconsin System Board of Regents will vote on policies that technical colleges say unfairly restrict their ability to add pre-professional and liberal arts transfer programs. And today, David Wilson, the chancellor of the University of Wisconsin’s two-year colleges and extension programs, was scheduled to make a public push for broadened programs that could include offering four-year liberal arts degrees.
Gov. Jim Doyle announced Tuesday he will increase financial aid by $44 million in the state budget next week to support his Wisconsin Covenant program.
Gov. Jim Doyle today promised to increase funding for financial aid for college students and boost shared revenues for counties and other local governments as part of his next state budget.
State Rep. Steve Nass maintains that the UW System’s proposed freshman admissions policy would violate a state statute that says no tests “based upon race, religion, national origin of U.S. citizens or sex shall be allowed in the admission of students” to the University of Wisconsin.
Threatening legal or legislative intervention, Rep. Steve Nass, R-Whitewater, is calling on the University of Wisconsin System Board of Regents to cut the consideration of race from its revised admissions policy.
The state Legislature should quickly approve Gov. Jim Doyle’s request to expand tax credits for angel investors.
As the UW Board of Regents prepares to vote on a new freshman admissions policy this week, state Rep. Stephen Nass, R- Whitewater, said the policy’s inclusion of race and ethnicity among its admission criteria is “ill-advised and possibly illegal.”
Although Wisconsin’s total net farm income dropped by more than 40 percent last year, dairy farmers suffered most of the pain, with some sectors doing well, according to the annual Status of Wisconsin Agriculture report from UW-Madison.
In the wake of criticism surrounding the accumulated sick leave credit Wisconsin politicians have stacked up, several pieces of legislation have been drafted to remedy the problem and will be debated in the next session.
A recent report noted that Wisconsin lost five percent of its farmland from 2000 to 2005 and that the loss was at a faster rate than any other state in the region.
State Agriculture Secretary Rodney Nilsestuen worries that this loss of crop production threatens our future in the biofuels industry, which he characterized as “ââ?¬Â¦the biggest opportunity for rural development I’ve ever seen.
What is reciprocity?
It’s an agreement under which students who cross the Minnesota-Wisconsin border to attend college pay basically what it would cost to go to a comparable school in their home state. The states settle any costs at the end of the year. Despite some bumps, it has worked well for 40 years.
Bucky Badger, that candy-striped fellow from Madison, and Goldy Gopher, the dentally challenged pet from the Twin Cities, have a problem.
If Bucky and Goldy were to enroll in, let’s say, a Medieval Mascot History course at the University of Minnesota’s Twin Cities campus, the Wisconsin-bred Bucky would pay less than the Minnesota-born Goldy, even though they are sitting in the same class in Folwell Hall in Goldy’s maroon-and-gold home state.
An animal disease expert with 12 years of experience in dealing with the implications of livestock diseases nationally and internationally has been chosen to head the Wisconsin Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory.
Thomas McKenna is director of the Foreign Animal Disease Diagnostic Laboratory in Plum Island, N.Y., where he has worked since 1995.
The morning after putting research expansion at the forefront of his State of the State address, Gov. Jim Doyle jetted to Washington to urge the U.S. Senate to increase federal funding for embryonic stem cell research Wednesday.
Lt. Gov. Barbara Lawton is telling middle school students that the state of Wisconsin will reward their accomplishments and ensure their access to a college education through a new program called the Wisconsin Covenant.
But Pam Nash, Madison’s assistant superintendent for middle and high schools, said today she would not dangle the carrot of financial aid to students until it is absolutely clear that the money will be available to them.
A cornerstone of the University of Wisconsinââ?¬â?¢s diversity efforts since 1999, the Pre-College Enrichment Opportunity Program for Learning Excellence ââ?¬â? also known as PEOPLE ââ?¬â? has long been known for helping attract a diverse group of students to the university.
A group of Blackhawk Middle School eighth graders got the opportunity Wednesday to speak one-on-one with Lt. Gov. Barbara Lawton about subjects touched on during Gov. Jim Doyle�s State of the State address Tuesday.
Already achieving an international reputation for extensive and groundbreaking scientific research, the University of Wisconsin decided to take further strides last year by approving a multi-million dollar project to build a new research facility on University Avenue.
For the United Council of University of Wisconsin Students, Gov. Jim Doyleââ?¬â?¢s annual State of the State Address Tuesday showed promise for the UW System ââ?¬â? but no guarantees.
Depending on which way you cross the Minnesota-Wisconsin border to attend a state college, you could stand to gain or lose anywhere from $1000 to $3000 in yearly tuition payments, thanks to a widening tuition gap between the states.
Live from the State Capitol Tuesday night, Gov. Jim Doyle flexed his muscles and articulated lofty plans in his annual State of the State address. As the keystone of his education platform, Doyle reaffirmed his commitment to the Wisconsin Covenant.
Gov. Jim Doyle stressed bipartisan efforts to push an agenda packed with new reforms Tuesday night at his fifth State of the State address, but some lawmakers questioned the practicality of such ambitious plans.
(AP) – The prepared text of Gov. Jim Doyle’s State of the State address to the Wisconsin Legislature Tuesday night:
Even the Legislature’s most vocal critic of the University of Wisconsin praised Gov. Jim Doyle’s plan for a “Wisconsin Covenant” to give eighth-graders a state-funded college education if they maintain a B average in high school and stay out of trouble.
“I think there is some merit in the covenant,” said Rep. Steve Nass, R-Whitewater, “but it clashes with the UW admissions proposal that would lessen academic requirements.”
Moreover, proposals in the governor’s State of the State speech Tuesday to increase graduates in fields such as nursing and engineering will depend on the money available in a budget faced with a $1.6 billion deficit, said Nass, who chairs the Assembly’s Colleges and Universities Committee.
Architect Rodolfo Machado likes what he sees of the University of Wisconsin’s Chazen Museum of Art.
What he sees in his architectural dreams will determine the shape of the museum’s new expansion.
That structure will double the size of the state’s second-largest art museum. And it may turn what was considered a crown jewel building on the UW-Madison campus into something far more magnificent.
After calling education and health care his top priorities, Gov. Jim Doyle urged legislators in his State of the State Address Tuesday also to improve Wisconsin�s economy and environment this year.
Quoted: Gary Sandefur, dean of letters and sciences.
The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Aurora Health Care and the City of Milwaukee are discussing Aurora Sinai Medical Center in downtown Milwaukee as the site for a school of public health.
Gov. Jim Doyle on Tuesday called for reforms to provide affordable access to health care to nearly every Wisconsin resident and to retool the state’s public colleges and universities with new investments.
State Sen. Ted Kanavas unveiled a new batch of economic development incentives last week that included tax credits for investors in start-up companies and in companies springing from nanotechnology research in the Chippewa Valley. Noticeably absent: the Biomedical Technology Alliance.
The alliance, a consortium of five universities, has been a catalyst for collaborative research since it was launched more than two years ago, and Kanavas (R-Brookfield) has been a key supporter in the past.
MADISON ââ?¬â? Gov. Jim Doyle says voters last fall sent a message.
“They wanted us to end the divisiveness and partisan fighting, and focus instead on making progress for middle-class families,” Doyle said Tuesday as he delivered his fifth State of the State address to the Legislature. “Democrats, Republicans, let us pledge tonight: We will come together to get things done.”
Randy McElhose said his son Adam has good grades, took advanced placement courses, has an ACT score of 27, is in the National Honor Society, is an Eagle Scout, has led backpacking expeditions, delivers 400 newspapers every day – and is wait-listed at UW-Madison.
“Whatever the secret sauce it is … he ain’t got it,” McElhose added, though his son, a senior at Edgewood High School, has been accepted at three other universities – the University of Hawaii, the University of Colorado and UW-La Crosse.
Quoted: Judd Aiken, a prion researcher at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
As the University of Wisconsin system held a statewide forum by teleconference on Monday night on a plan to have each of its campuses consider race in admissions, it was clear that residents of the state were divided on the proposed move.
The proposal to consider applicants’ race and ethnicity is just one element of a broad overhaul of the system’s admissions policies that the University of Wisconsin Board of Regents plans to vote on next week. Yet it was almost the sole focus of discussion among those who gathered at five sites around the state for the forum.
http://chronicle.com/daily/2007/01/2007013001n.htm
As the University of Wisconsin system held a statewide forum by teleconference on Monday night on a plan to have each of its campuses consider race in admissions, it was clear that residents of the state were divided on the proposed move.
The proposal to consider applicants’ race and ethnicity is just one element of a broad overhaul of the system’s admissions policies that the University of Wisconsin Board of Regents plans to vote on next week. Yet it was almost the sole focus of discussion among those who gathered at five sites around the state for the forum.
The university system’s president, Kevin P. Reilly, described the proposed overhaul of the system’s admissions policies as necessary to update a systemwide policy that was adopted in 1972 and since then has been revised on a piecemeal basis.
MADISON, Wis. (AP) – University of Wisconsin System leaders tried to sell changes to their freshman admissions policy to the public Monday, saying race and other factors must be considered to ensure a diverse student body.
UW System President Kevin Reilly said academic factors including test scores, the quality of high school classes and grade-point average would remain the most important. But he said the policy would allow admissions officers to look beyond those factors to ensure diversity in race, income and talent among the system�s 160,000 students.
The Board of Regents are in the process of updating the decades old policy. Mitch Weber was at the state-wide teleconference where diversity was a re-occurring theme. Not just diverse in the way we think of race and race based admissions, but other factors.
One mother spoke out about how the system seems to already be working because her son, who is African-American was not accepted even with a stellar GPA. Riley also stressed all UW campuses are doing considering other factors besides grades and race. (Video.)
MADISON, Wis. — A public hearing on proposed new standards for admission into the University of Wisconsin is getting plenty of feedback.
Race and admissions has long been a controversial topic in the UW system. On Monday the Board of Regents heard from the public at five Wisconsin university sites via satellite, reported WISC-TV.
The debate was over how much non-academic background should play in selecting freshman students, and whether the revised policy will help build a more diverse campus.
UW senior Jennifer Knox said sheââ?¬â?¢s a living example of a ââ?¬Å?racially consciousââ?¬Â admissions policy, and sheââ?¬â?¢s proved she belongs there.
(UNDATED) Five University of Wisconsin campuses will host a forum today (1/29) on the UW System�s proposed enrollment policy. The plan emphasizes an applicant�s academic performance, but also looks at factors including a student�s race and extracurricular activities.
UW System Spokesman David Giroux says the policy is similar to those already in place at most UW campuses, as well as at leading colleges nationwide. He says the campuses have come to the same conclusion that no person is a number and that to ascertain whether or not someone will succeed at the University, itââ?¬â?¢s important to look at every bit of information available. He says to understand what a student will bring to the University and how they will enrich the learning environment, officials have to look at the whole person, and ââ?¬Å?go beyond the numbers.ââ?¬Â
WISCONSIN SPORTS fans have a couple of reasons to salute Rick Reilly this month.
First is the celebrated Sports Illustrated columnist’s early valentine to UW basketball coach Bo Ryan, whom Reilly calls “my new favorite coach” in the Jan. 29 issue of SI.
Reilly on Ryan: “I swear, you’ve never met anyone like him. He could talk the freckles off Opie. He once persuaded an engaged woman into calling off her wedding and marrying him instead. Thirty-two years later she’s still convinced. And he can flat coach. With his patented Swing offense and his obsession with detail, he could win 20 games a year with five large parking meters. He’s the most unheralded winning machine in the country and headmaster of the No. 2-ranked Badgers.”
