Education | Higher Learning

Tennessee State University announces major shakeup of administration
By Marshall Latimore -- Black College Wire

Several top Tennessee State University officials, including those connected to a recent security breach, have been reassigned or dismissed.

TSU President Melvin N. Johnson announced the actions in an Oct. 7 letter to faculty and staff. Johnson said in the past he has "emphasized and reiterated the importance of serving students in an effective and customer-focused manner."

The letter, initially distributed to faculty and staff in e-mail form, announced the reassignment of Provost/Executive Vice President Robert L. Hampton, who will now be on special assignment until January, though he is to assume a tenured faculty position in the sociology department effective Nov. 1. Hampton's role as provost/executive vice president was the chief academic officer and responsible for overseeing all academic processes.

Additionally, the unidentified financial aid employee who lost a flash drive containing 9,000 students' personal information, also has been dismissed from the university. Human resource officials said the employee's name would not be released.

Johnson also announced $10.5 million in budget cuts this fiscal year, with more than half coming from an approximately $6 million budget shortfall, largely the result in a decline in out-of-state enrollment.

Other administrative changes included John Cade, who was associate vice president for Enrollment Management. He is to remain at TSU as academic protocol officer. He also will remain responsible for planning and logistics for the university's three annual commencement ceremonies and fall Convocation.

National searches for these vacated positions, as well as the Director of Financial Aid, are to begin as early as January. Mary Chambliss, who was Financial Aid director, has been dismissed from the university. An interim director will be appointed, the letter said.

Taking over a portion of Hampton's duties is Kathleen McErney, dean of the College of Health Services, who will now serve as interim vice president for Academic Affairs, effective Oct. 7, the letter explained.


The letter also stated that the duties of overseeing the Division of Enrollment Management have been transferred to Michael A. Freeman, vice president for student affairs. The registrar's office, which had been in Enrollment Management, will remain a unit of Academic Affairs.

Additionally, the university's call center, which was a part of Academic Affairs, has been reassigned to Dennis Gendron, vice president for Communication and Information Technologies, the letter stated.

"All employees must be willing to be held accountable for their performance and contributions, and especially for decisions that directly impact the quality of services we provide to our students," Johnson said in the letter.

Cheryl Bates-Lee, director of TSU Public Relations, said in a phone conversation with The Meter that Johnson was unavailable for comment but more details would follow.

The letter also explained that the university would have to give approximately $1.37 million back to the State of Tennessee, in addition to the $3.16 million appropriation cut approved by the Tennessee General Assembly in June.

Universities across the state are feeling the effects of budget cuts and state reversions. In Knoxville, University of Tennessee President John Peterson said the state has told his university to cut an additional $17 million in spending, on top of what had been an earlier announced $21.1 million spending cut. The University of Tennessee is the state's largest public university.

Marshall Latimore writes for the TSU Meter, the Tennessee State University student newspaper, which originally published a version of this article.

Graduation Rates, Gender Disparity Causing Concern
By Eboni Farmer -- Black College Wire
 

According to the Journal of Blacks in Higher Education, in 2007 Howard University had a graduation rate of 60 percent, up two points from the rate the journal reported in 2006.

That rate, for those graduating within six years, is 16 points above the national average graduation rate of 44 percent for blacks nationally.

The Journal for Blacks in Higher Education calls the 44 percent graduation rate "dismally low."  More....

Morehouse Student’s iReport Scores Grand Prize, All-Access Pass to Essence Music Festival

Morehouse Student’s iReport Scores Grand Prize, All-Access Pass to Essence Music Festival

CNN, together with the National Association of Black Journalists (NABJ), announced that Travers Johnson, a senior from Morehouse College in Atlanta, is the grand prize winner of CNN’s “Campus iReporter” contest.

The contest ran in association with a tour of eight historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) to promote CNN’s Black in America multiplatform programming initiative. More....

Most Ga. students promoted despite failing tests
By DORIE TURNER - Associated Press Writer

ATLANTA --Very few of the students who fail a state exam required for promotion to the next grade are held back by schools, according to data released by the state Friday.

Detailed data from the Georgia Department of Education show about one in every 13 eighth-graders who failed the math portion of the Criterion-Referenced Competency Tests last year were barred from advancing to high school. One in 12 fifth-graders who didn't pass the math test in 2007 were prevented from moving on to sixth grade.

Students in first through eighth grade take the CRCT every year, but third-graders must pass the reading test and fifth- and eighth-graders must pass the reading and math tests to be promoted.

Students who don't pass the test the first time have one shot at retaking it but can appeal to a school-based committee to be promoted even if they fail the retest.

Last year thousands of students were promoted by committee - which consists of one of the child's parents, the teacher and the principal - despite failing the CRCT twice, state data show.

State education officials say students should be given every opportunity to be promoted to the next grade.

"We should look at students holistically," said state education department spokesman Dana Tofig. "The decision to hold a student back is a very serious decision, and it should not be based on one test."

The fates of last year's test takers offer a glimpse of what parents can expect as thousands of Georgia students head to summer school to brush up on math and reading before taking the retest at the end of the summer. The state's eighth-grade math scores plummeted this year, which state officials have blamed on a more rigorous curriculum and a tougher test.

Preliminary data released by the state late last month show nearly 50,000 eighth-graders - nearly 40 percent - failed the math CRCT. That's about double the rate of last year, when 19 percent of the state's 126,000 eighth-graders - roughly 24,000 children - failed.

Preliminary data also show that 70 to 80 percent of sixth- and seventh-graders failed the social studies CRCT, which led state Schools Superintendent Kathy Cox to throw the scores out because she said the test was not an accurate measure of what children were taught. Social studies tests are not used for promotion.

The state is expected to release final CRCT data next week. Math and reading CRCT scores are among the measurements Georgia uses to meet federal No Child Left Behind standards.
 

Ga. students improve reading, math scores; still lag nationally

By DORIE TURNER - Associated Press Writer

ATLANTA --Georgia's fourth and eighth graders have nearly caught up with the nation in reading but still lag in mathematics.

Georgia students performed better than they ever have on the National Assessment of Educational Progress - a federal test considered the best state-to-state measure of classroom progress.

State education officials heralded the NAEP scores as proof that Georgia's new curriculum is working. The students who took the NAEP test last year had been using new reading curriculum for two years, but the state did not implement its new mathematics curriculum for grades 4 and 8 until this school year. More...

School board approves more math, science in new HS requirements

ATLANTA --Students will take more math and science and no longer choose between an emphasis on college-prep or job skills under new graduation requirements approved by the state Board of Education.

Education officials say the new guidelines, which will go into effect for freshmen starting next year, are geared toward giving all students a strong grounding in core areas like reading and math while offering them flexibility in choosing elective classes.

"We are no longer setting high expectations for just some students," state school Superintendent Kathy Cox said. "As a state, we are saying that all students can learn at a high level." More...

SAT scores drop for Georgia students and nationwide
Georgia's 2007 high school graduating class performed worse on the SAT college-entrance exam than the class before them, even as the state's rank remained the same compared to other states.

The report on the slip in scores comes a year after Gov. Sonny Perdue and state schools Superintendent Kathy Cox - both of whom were running for re-election at the time - touted Georgia's improvement on the test.

Overall, the nearly 60,000 students who took the standardized test in Georgia scored an average of 1,472 out of a possible 2,400, a five-point drop from last year. The nation's average score fell seven points to 1,511. More...

Six high school student athletes got some help with college expenses. After Elaine and David Lucas' son, Al, died on the football field, they created the Al Lucas Memorial Scholarship for kids who are exceptional on and off the field.

During a ceremony at the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame, six students from across Bibb County received a $1,000 scholarships.

The 2007 recipients of the award are:

Rachel K. Adams, Westside High School
Kyerra C. Jelks, Northeast High School
Brandon Thomas, Northeast High School
Jessica L. McLaughlin, Central High School
Takisha Williams, Southwest High School
Lauren A. Windham, Rutland High School

If you'd like to make a donation to the Al Lucas Memorial Fund, contributions can be mailed to:

Community Foundation of Central Georgia
227 Martin Luther King, Jr. Blvd.
Suite 303
Macon, Georgia 31201

New Orleans Writer Spoke at Macon State College..
Nationally known author Tom Piazza, whose latest book, Why New Orleans Matters, is an intriguing look at his experiences as a New Orleans resident in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, spoke  at Macon State College  on Thursday, September 6, in the theater on the Macon campus. His appearance was  sponsored by the Macon State College Honors Program. Honors Program students will use Piazza’s appearance to kick off a yearlong project to provide books to various organizations in New Orleans, especially elementary schools. 

Macon State College Announces Major Reorganization

In the first major reorganization in its history, Macon State College has announced the creation of a new academic structure that sheds one of the last remaining vestiges of the junior college chartered in 1967.

Macon State has eliminated the organizational structure that called for divisions headed by chairs and has implemented one that creates schools headed by deans. The changes are effective immediately. More...

Georgia Tech : Top Producer of African-American Engineers

ATLANTA — The Georgia Institute of Technology is the top overall producer of African-American engineers in the United States, according to Diverse: Issues in Higher Education magazine’s annual college rankings report.

For the 2005-2006 academic year, Georgia Tech was ranked No. 1 in undergraduate degrees in engineering awarded to African-American students with 120 degrees, up from 117 during the 2004-2005 academic year. ting undergraduate and graduate statistics. Graduate and professional degree statistics appear in the July 12 edition of Diverse. Undergraduate statistics were released in the magazine’s June 1 edition. More...

 Dr. Randy Braswell Named Associate VP for Institutional Research at Macon State College
Dr. Randy Braswell has joined Macon State College as associate vice president for institutional research and planning. Previously vice president for academic affairs at South Georgia College in Douglas, Braswell brings an impressive record in research, analysis and assessment to the position, as well as extensive experience in higher education administration. His other previous positions include director of admissions at South Georgia College and director of institutional research at Gordon College in Barnesville. Braswell holds a doctorate in higher education from Georgia State University, a master's degree from the University of Georgia and a bachelor's degree from Georgia Southwestern State University.

Segregation in schools is increasing: report

ATLANTA (Reuters) - Public schools in the United States are becoming more racially segregated and the trend is likely to accelerate because of a Supreme Court decision in June, according to report published on Wednesday.

The rise in segregation threatens the quality of education received by non-white students, who now make up 43 percent of the total U.S. student body, said the report by the Civil Rights Project of the University of California in Los Angeles.

Many segregated schools struggle to attract highly qualified teachers and administrators, do not prepare students well for college and fail to graduate more than half their students. More...

Clark Atlanta president plans to stay where he is..

ATLANTA --Even though dozens of faculty members and hundreds of students at Clark Atlanta University want him gone, school president Walter Broadnax expects to lead the historically black college for years to come.

Speaking in his office, Broadnax spoke candidly to The Associated Press in an exclusive interview about the tough decisions his administration has made since he took over the school in 2002, and optimistically about his hopes for the future of Clark Atlanta despite the demands for him to step aside. More...

FAMU leads nation in number of African-American grads

Savannah State University's Brown to join Clark Atlanta ....

ATLANTA --Carlton Brown, who served as president of Savannah State University for nine years, will join Clark Atlanta University as an executive vice president, Clark Atlanta President Walter Broadnax said .

Brown will start his newly created position on July 15. The senior staff member will oversee day-to-day operations on campus, allowing the president to focus on the $104 million fundraising campaign expected to launch this fall.

Brown stepped down at Savannah State last year and has served as special assistant to the chancellor of the Board of Regents for system-wide projects.

More Georgia students pass state-mandated tests

ATLANTA --Two years after Georgia toughened state-mandated tests based on beefed up reading and math curricula, thousands more students are passing the exams, according to data released by the state Department of Education .

That means fewer students will head to summer school this year in hopes of retaking the Criterion Referenced Competency Tests and advancing a grade.

"These are real gains," state schools Superintendent Kathy Cox said in a telephone interview. "The work we've done with our curriculum directors and teachers really shows." More...

Model inner-city school to open in Atlanta

ATLANTA --A teacher whose work with inner-city children inspired a movie is opening a private school for low-income students this fall.

Ron Clark, who was portrayed last year by Matthew Perry in TNT's "The Ron Clark Story," has worked for two and a half years to build the Ron Clark Academy near Turner Field in southeast Atlanta. The school will weave art, dance, music and business leadership classes into its curriculum, as well as international trips for students.

"It's all about empowering these kids," Clark said during a tour of the school on Thursday. "Whatever they want to do, whatever they want to become, they can do it and we want to give them the skills to do so."

Students attending the school will pay heavily discounted tuition - an average of $30 per month - on a sliding scale based on their parents' income, and parents must volunteer 40 hours a year at the school. Donations will pay the rest of the $14,000 annual tuition. More...

The Central Georgian, 2007,  Disclaimer..