UO E-Clips is a daily report prepared by the Office of Communications (http://comm.uoregon.edu) summarizing current news coverage of the University of Oregon.
Media mentions for May 22
Register-Guard: A University of Oregon summer college prep program for underprivileged middle schoolers ally-ooped a Springfield teenager into the loving arms of Bill and Melinda Gates -- who will pay for her college education from freshman year to doctoral degree. And that's a good thing, too, because the girl, Springfield High School senior Hayley Pratt-Stibich, is aiming for the higher reaches of science. ... She was following her mother's directive to work hard. But she couldn't see how college would pan out -- until "Bill and Bruce" turned up at one of her middle school math classes. The visitors were UO economics professors Bill Harbaugh and Bruce Blonigen, who were playing out their plan to boost diversity at the university by focusing on helping students solely based on low socioeconomic status. In 2006, the pair created the Summer Academy to Inspire Learning, a free, weeklong summer camp for bright eighth-graders from low-income families who were identified by their math teachers as promising.
Awards remind us that good journalism is alive and well
Register-Guard (guest viewpoint by Tim Gleason, dean of the UO School of Journalism and Communication): Doing good journalism every day is challenging. Being an ethical journalist under pressure is even harder. Last Thursday, the Ancil Payne Awards at the University of Oregon School of Journalism and Communication honored four journalists who have showed us how it's done -- journalists who made tough decisions despite significant obstacles and produced important, game-changing journalism.
Duck Store boss goes out on top
Register-Guard: It was late 2001 and, with Oregon playing in the Fiesta Bowl on New Year's Day, McKenzie by Sew On was running a hurry-up offense to meet the high demand for Ducks sportswear. Suddenly, owner Ted Norman got word that Duck Store General Manager Jim Williams was on the phone ... Four hours later, Williams shows up ... with a check for $30,000. "He knew we were working hard and wanted to show The Duck Store's appreciation right then instead of waiting three weeks," Norman says. Such are the stories that likely will be shared when folks gather at the campus Duck Store from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. May 31 to celebrate Williams' retirement after 40 years as a manager. "He cares about people, cares about the store, cares about his family and is just hip and cool, even for an old guy," says Natalie Eggert, the store's human resources team leader.
Which is the real company town, Salem or Corvallis?
Statesman Journal: Despite being the home of the state Capitol, a warren of agency offices, four prisons and the state hospital, Salem is not the Oregon metro area with the highest percentage of state jobs. That title goes to Corvallis. Economists say Corvallis can fall back on steady employment provided by the university, as well as high-paying jobs provided by several private companies. Hewlett-Packard has jobs in research and development. CH2M Hill has work for engineers. "There is a very specific set of conditions that hold in Corvallis," said Tim Duy, a University of Oregon economist, who produces the U of O Index of Economic Indicators.
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Media mentions for May 21
University of Oregon 2012 School of Law class graduates
KMTR: Representing the Oregon Ducks, graduation for the next generation of legal professionals was Saturday, May 19. The University of Oregon School of Law graduated its 2012 class of more than 160 people at the Hult Center in downtown Eugene ... Former UO Law Professor Garrett Epps addressed the matriculates, saying law school grads have the opportunity to give back to the community with their unique knowledge ... "Like Spiderman, lawyers stand between ordinary people and social catastrophe and you are now part of that," says Garrett Epps, now a professor at the University of Baltimore.
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Media mentions for May 20
Oregon must cherish its art and artists by keeping the Ken Kesey papers in the state
Oregonian: When Ken Kesey died in 2001, he left behind letters, manuscripts and diaries, now temporarily housed in the University of Oregon's Special Collections Library ... As James Fox, the head of Special Collections at UO, says: "The opportunity to acquire this archive will not be available again. The collection may well leave the state of Oregon, or be divided and sold into private hands, if UO does not make it part of the library's permanent collections at this time. The Kesey family has generously given UO the opportunity to purchase the collection. Your gift will help the University of Oregon acquire the Ken Kesey Collection and ensure that it remains where it belongs: at home at the University of Oregon."
Salps force California nuclear plant to shut down
Toronto Star: A swarm of jellyfish-like creatures called salps forced a California nuclear plant to shut down one of its reactors last month after the odd organisms clogged up the plant's water intake system. But do salps -- mostly transparent creatures rarely seen by people -- pose any real threat? And what are they exactly? "Most people have never heard of salps. Most people have never seen one," says oceanographer Kelly Sutherland at the University of Oregon. "Whenever they do come in close to shore people are kind of like 'what are these things,'" Sutherland says, with a laugh. "People often describe them as looking like strings of bead. Not so much when they wash up on shore because they just look like piles of snot."
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Media mentions for May 19
New York Times: When and how did the first people arrive in the Americas? For many decades, archaeologists have agreed on an explanation known as the Clovis model. The theory holds that about 13,500 years ago, bands of big-game hunters in Asia followed their prey across an exposed ribbon of land linking Siberia and Alaska and found themselves on a vast, unexplored continent ... But in 2008, that began to change. That year, researchers from the University of Oregon and the University of Copenhagen recovered human DNA from coprolites -- preserved human feces -- found in a dry cave in eastern Oregon. The coprolites had been deposited 14,000 years ago
How National Belt-Tightening Goes Awry
New York Times: Why is there such strong political support for fiscal austerity, for government cuts and layoffs, at a time of widespread unemployment? Maybe it's because we have the wrong metaphor stuck in our minds, and it's framing policy choices in a misleading way. Clearly, metaphors and other symbols carry real weight in our thinking, as has been shown by George Lakoff, a cognitive linguist at the University of California, Berkeley, and Mark Johnson, a philosopher at the University of Oregon. In their 1980 book, "Metaphors We Live By," they argue, "Our ordinary conceptual system, in terms of which we both think and act, is fundamentally metaphorical in nature."
DEAR READER: Superstars, research support premise of Show Me the Errors
Columbia Missourian: Craig Silverman and Roy Peter Clark ... were both superstars at the American Copy Editors Society's annual conference in New Orleans in April. It was a little love fest for copy editors to spend time with cohorts from across the United States and to hear the latest and greatest ideas for improving the profession ... Joining this illustrious duo is Erin McNeill Jorgensen ... Her master's research was titled "Making Corrections in a Digital Age: How News Organizations Handle Errors Online" ... She also cited Scott Maier, an associate professor at the University of Oregon's School of Journalism and Communication, who found in a 2009 study that about 97 percent of factual errors go uncorrected.
Afghan war veteran takes rambling route to UO law degree
Register-Guard: It was Thanksgiving Day, 2007, and Bryan Boender had a transportation problem. Boender, now 36, would ultimately get into the University of Oregon School of Law, complete his degree as a Tillman Military Scholar, and get elected by his classmates to speak at today's graduation. But first Boender had to take his LSAT -- an entrance exam for law school. Taking such a test is no easy task for a U.S. Army paratrooper stationed in rural Afghanistan. The Seattle native had studied for the test by reading an "LSAT for Dummies" book as he lay on a cot in his tent. He'd tracked down a civilian lawyer, working at Bagram Airfield, who was willing to administer Boender's exam.
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Late mentions for May 18
Mixed reaction to decision to remove Native American mascots
KVAL: Everywhere you look around Lebanon High School, you see it ... "I've been here 31 years and so it's been something that's been a part of me for a really long time," said high school athletic director Rob Allen ... Teachers including Kevin Johnson, a member of the Choctaw Nation, said he's upset that the mascot has to go ... Gordon Bettle, a Klamath tribal member and head of the Long House at the University of Oregon, said a weight has been lifted.