Thousands of dollars each semester. Luncheons with esteemed faculty. Throw in a free trip to Europe and you've got the life of a Jefferson scholar at the University.
The Educational Testing Service announced Monday that it has canceled plans for overhauling the Graduate Record Examination.
Major players of the international diplomacy scene traveled to the University last weekend to engage in a conference on the current situation in Iraq and ongoing threats of terrorism. The three-day conference "Root, Stem, and Branch: Homegrown Radicals and the Limits of Terrorism," was sponsored by the Critical Incident Analysis Group and the Miller Center of Public Affairs, and began Sunday with a roundtable discussion among 10 panelists. George Gilliam, director of Forum Programs at the Miller Center, said the conversation aimed to discuss why terrorists "engage in acts of terrorism, what level of anger and humiliation makes them engage in acts of terror." This event marked the 10th year that CIAG has held a conference in Charlottesville and the second year that the Miller Center has co-sponsored the event. "It's one network getting together with another and the synergy that comes from those right entities working together," CIAG Executive Director Gregory Saathoff said. Panelists included Chuck Robb, former Virginia governor and U.S.
The outgoing Honor Committee finished its term last night by passing two amendments to its bylaws.
Sen. John Warner, R-Va., defended the use of certain surveillance measures in protecting national security and discussed topics such as the state of the military during his visit to Grounds yesterday. Warner, serving his fifth consecutive term in the U.S.
University police arrested a Greene County man on charges of phoning in a bomb threat to John Paul Jones Arena. Jarrett Dean Payne of Ruckersville, 22, was arrested for calling the Greene County Dispatch Center twice Feb.
Charlottesville City Council held the second of its public hearings yesterday to address more of the public's concerns about the city's new budget proposal. Since the first public budget forum on March 19, Council decreased its original figure for the city's real estate tax revenue.
While some of the University's professional schools received higher standings, others saw a drop in the rankings released Friday by U.S.
A University fraternity has admitted to stealing a $10,000 "Hokie Bird" statue from Virginia Tech this past weekend. The statue, a large-scale fiberglass construction sponsored by the Blacksburg Partnership, was stolen by a fraternity pledge class, according to University spokesperson Carol Wood. "We learned about it from folks in Blacksburg that suspected that it could have been some of our students so we obviously cooperated with the folks in Blacksburg to see if it was true and discovered it was," she said. The students have come forward and are currently working with University officials to rectify the situation, according to Wood. "Our students are working with one of our deans," she said.
Last Friday more than 92 percent of the University's 18,068 applicants clicked a button online to see if they were offered a spot in the University's class of 2011 -- 5,095 were greeted by the coveted message of "Congratulations." With a 10.5 percent increase in applicants over last year, the University saw the largest applicant pool in its history this year, Dean of Admissions John Blackburn said. He said it is difficult to know the true reasons behind the increase, but it is possible that the press the University received in past months concerning the abolishment of its early decision policy could be a factor in the influx. "We were in a lot of newspapers about this [decision], which increased visibility," Blackburn said. He added that he saw interest in this decision from European and Asian newspapers, which could be a factor in the 23 percent increase of international applicants. Other notable trends were increases in the number of minority applicants.
Charlottesville City Council tentatively approved a real estate tax rate of 97 cents for every $100 at Wednesday's meeting.
More than 30 Lawn residents put "For Sale" signs on their doors yesterday in response to the possibility that Bob Sweeney, senior vice president for development and public affairs, is being considered by the Board of Visitors for Lawn pavilion residency. Lawn resident A-J Aronstein said the signs are the expression of many Lawn residents' concerns about both the pavilion selection process and Sweeney as a potential resident.
Gov. Tim Kaine proposed an amendment yesterday which would ban smoking in commonwealth restaurants.
Environmental Sciences Prof. Todd Scanlon recently received a research grant from the National Science Foundation that will allow him to further his research on the problem of toxic emissions in Virginia. Elizabeth VanderPutten, chair of the National Science Foundation's CAREER Coordinating Committee, said the $449,000 award is meant to encourage younger faculty to pursue research and community education. "We consider this award to be the most prestigious award to young faculty by NSF [and] we expect the awardees to be the leading teacher-scholars over the next generation," VanderPutten said. Scanlon said he will use the grant money to research nitrous oxide emissions as part of the Long-Term Ecological Research project at the University's Virginia Coast Reserve research station on the Eastern Shore. Scanlon said nitrous oxide damages the ozone layer and is more potent as a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide. "Where we're taking these measurements is in an agricultural watershed where there are fertilizer applications that result in elevated nitrogen levels and when the nitrogen gets broken down, this is where we get nitrous oxide emissions occurring," Scanlon said. Scanlon said he will also research methyl mercury accumulation in the ecosystem at Shenandoah National Park. "In areas where we wouldn't expect to see too much mercury, scientists have found elevated concentrations of mercury due to atmospheric deposition," Scanlon said.
University Law Prof. Robert Turner and former Sen. Mike Gravel, D-Alaska, participated in a debate about the parallels between the war inIraq and the war in Vietnam.
Statistics profiling the 47 students chosen to live in non-endowed Lawn rooms and the 287 Lawn applicants were recently released by the University Housing Division.
Recent reports of attacks on two openly gay law students at Washington & Lee University, one of whom is a University graduate, have resulted in criticism of Washington & Lee's response to the incident. Diane Meier, a second-year Washington & Lee law student and one of the openly gay students who said she was verbally and physically abused, described attacks against a fellow law student, who has chosen to remain anonymous. Meier said last Saturday her friend was walking home from a party where he had been verbally attacked.
