Two federal courts will soon hear preliminary arguments in lawsuits filed by states that are challenging the Trump administration’s religious and moral exemptions from the federal government’s contraceptive mandate. Douglas Laycock, a professor at the UVA School of Law who writes about religious-liberty cases, said he does not believe the lawsuits’ constitutional and discrimination claims are going anywhere.
(By W. Bradford Wilcox, a sociologist, and Vijay Menon, graduate student in the Frank Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy) Conservatives are family values hypocrites, Nick Kristof recently argued at The New York Times. They talk about marriage, family, and traditional values, but, in reality, they have difficulty living up to their professed values. Certainly, Kristof is onto something when it comes to members of the political class, such as Newt Gingrich, Roy Moore and Donald Trump. But the story is rather different when one looks at ordinary families across America.
The Forbes magazine results are out and the report confirms what many already knew: alumni of Darden School of Business, University of Virginia are most satisfied when it comes to MBA education in the United States.
More than 20,000 visitors descended on Charlottesville on this day in 1928 to witness the football rivalry between UVA and the University of North Carolina. Many also hoped to catch a glimpse of outgoing president, Calvin Coolidge. The president and Mrs. Coolidge had journeyed to Charlottesville for a Thanksgiving vacation and made Swannanoa Palace near Afton, the temporary White House.
Khizr Khan talked about his memoir, “An American Family,” to a full house at the St. Louis County Library headquarters. Proceeds from the sale of Khan’s memoir will go to fund scholarships at the University of Virginia, his son’s alma mater.
(By Rachel Augustine Potter, assistant professor of politics) From presidential tweets to online grocery shopping, the Internet has revolutionized many aspects of modern life, including the way that the public engages with the federal government’s rulemaking process.
UVA’s Curry School of Education and the Contemplative Sciences Center have teamed with the Louisville public schools on a randomized control study of a compassion, mindfulness and movement curriculum. In addition to being the largest and most innovative study of its kind, the curriculum will be free when it’s completed for any school that wants to use it.
State Sen. R. Creigh Deeds, D-Bath, visited a group of students at Monticello High School on Wednesday to discuss mental health. The students outlining reasons why they believe attention to mental health issues an essential part of the education experience and offered ways services and resources can be improved statewide. The students started working on policy to address mental health issues during the Sorensen Institute for Political Leadership’s high school program at the University of Virginia.
Study co-author and UVA allergy researcher Dr. Thomas Platts-Mills first discovered the connection between the alpha-gal syndrome and exposure to Lone Star tick bites in 2002. He recognized that patients who had unusual allergic reactions to the cancer drug cetuximab, which contains alpha-gal molecules, also shared a history of Lone Star tick bites. Researchers are still unsure how Lone Star tick bites lead to alpha-gal allergies.
An industrial hemp research program kicked in 2015 in Virginia. About 80 acres have been planted on farms in 12 counties so several universities, such as UVA and Virginia Tech, can study best cultivation practices and marketability for the crop, a process that’s ongoing.
Civility and politics aren't words found together too often these days, but a conference for high school students held at UVA aims to change that. The Common Grounds Initiative brought hundreds of high school seniors from around the state to UVA on Tuesday to learn about civic engagement.
Civil rights leader Ruby Sales is participating in a public conversation in Charlottesville Wednesday. Sales was among those who marched from Selma to Montgomery in 1965. The conversation is being hosted by Virginia Foundation for the Humanities, and is open to the public.
On Tuesday, UVA hosted a discussion with students to see what it can do better to help students feel safer.
Population projections from UVA’s Weldon Cooper Center for Public Service offer a slightly lower distribution: By 2040, the 15 most populous states will be home to 67 percent of the U.S. population and represented by 30 percent of the Senate. But, then, that’s already about the distribution – and it has been for a long time.
Siva Vaidhyanathan, professor of media studies and director of UVA’s Center for Media and Citizenship, gives a net neutrality refresher, and talks about what's at stake in the FCC's proposal to end it.
The UVA men’s basketball team is starting to get some national recognition. The Cavaliers were ranked No. 18 in the latest Associated Press poll, released Monday afternoon.
(Commentary) Are we moving forward or backward? That appeared to be one implicit question during the Women’s Global Leadership Forum, an event organized by the University of Virginia for its bicentennial commemoration. The two-day conference, held earlier this month in Charlottesville, obviously centered on the achievements of women and did so with good cause. It was an impressive event.
Thomas Jefferson’s “sanctum sanctorum” was where he read books in six different languages, corresponded with hundreds of people around the globe, puzzled over scientific mysteries and relaxed in solitude. With his greenhouse right outside and huge windows to let in sunlight, the space offered him a quiet retreat in an often bustling home to think, write and reflect. Now, when visitors come to Monticello and walk through the third president’s private quarters, they will see what Jefferson saw — a neatly arranged mix of carefully collected curiosities, books, papers and scientific instruments.
Though UVA and Virginia Tech are rivals, students from both schools are uniting in the name of fighting cancer. Members of the Phi Gamma Delta fraternity from both schools took part in the FIJI Run last week.
“Any Office of Legal Counsel, in any administration, would have given the same answer with respect to this issue,” said Aditya Bamzai, a law professor at the University of Virginia. “But if we see a legal challenge, the executive branch’s positions don’t always prevail in court.”