High-status teenagers, research suggests, tend to behave in ways adults find inappropriate, but other teenagers find exhilarating. “They are on the fast track socially,” UVA psychologist Joseph Allen said. “That means they’re the kids getting involved in romantic relationships earlier than their peers, they are getting involved in minor forms of delinquency.”
The Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon board game, which appeared in 1997, featured 20-sided dice. But the true great leap forward came a year earlier, when Brett Tjaden, a UVA computer science graduate student who sometimes played the parlor game, created The Oracle of Bacon, a website that generated authoritative “Bacon numbers” based on data from the Internet Movie Database. “I did it mainly for myself and my friends,” Tjaden, now a professor at James Madison University, said in a phone interview. “They sent the link to their friends, who sent it to a couple of their friends, and before too long it...
“Just because we haven’t seen a Republican Senate incumbent go down in a primary in the last couple cycles doesn’t mean Republican primary voters will all of a sudden love the party’s leadership,” said Kyle Kondik, an analyst at UVA’s Center for Politics.
Justices also referenced a recent change to Missouri's public grant policy. The governor announced Friday that churches will now be eligible for programs like the scrap tire grant, so the Supreme Court will have to consider whether a ruling in Trinity Lutheran Church v. Comer is still necessary. It's pretty safe to say this case won't solve ongoing disagreements over Blaine Amendments and religious discrimination, said Douglas Laycock, a law and religious freedom expert at UVA.
As her final concerts with the Charlottesville Symphony at the University of Virginia draw near, Kate Tamarkin isn’t counting the minutes. She’s counting the moments.
With his election in 2014, Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf, a Democrat, broke a nearly 60-year tradition of the two parties trading control of the governor's office every eight years. With approvals only in the high 30s, Republicans are looking to take out Wolf, who's up for re-election next year. But according to UVA political analysts Geoffrey Skelley and Kyle Kondik, it's still too early make a call on whether Wolf will re-establish the so-called "Eight-Year Rule" as he launches his campaign.
(Commentary by Geoffrey Skelley and Kyle Kondik of UVA’s Center for Politics) Those looking for electoral drama in the 2018 cycle should pay attention to the 38 gubernatorial races being held this year and next.
Formerly Waynesboro-based Sigora Solar opened its new headquarters in Charlottesville on Wednesday and announced plans to expand its Waynesboro operation, a $3.5 million capital investment estimated to create 50 new jobs. Sigora also announced that it will partner with the UVA Athletic Department to become the department’s sole source of solar power.
At the “Speaking of Injustice” fundraiser for the Virginia Innocence Project Pro Bono Clinic at the UVA School of Law on Wednesday, four men and one woman spoke about their experiences with being falsely accused of heinous crimes, imprisoned and – eventually – freed.
The UVA School of Law hosted a discussion Wednesday among five Virginians who were wrongfully convicted of serious crimes.
There’s a lot of radio going on at University of Virginia and the newest station is WXTJ-LP, a student-run low power FM college radio station. Although its studio is in the same facility as WTJU, WXTJ-LP has its own identity and air sound.
There have been plenty of Trials of the Century in American history, but the prosecution of Jefferson Davis for treason would surely have taken the 19th-century title – if it had happened. “Everybody thought it was going to be the test case on the legality of secession,” says Cynthia Nicoletti, a UVA legal scholar whose book “Secession on Trial” is due out in August. Serious people believed he had a chance of winning.
Seated in a conference room at the Charlottesville Symphony at the University of Virginia’s office on West Main Street, the charismatic Kate Tamarkin ponders her retirement as conductor this spring, following 11 years at UVA.
It’s become more than a little challenging to oversee a state university these days. You have a fiduciary responsibility to act in the best interests of the institution. You have to match resources to costs and do some careful balancing. You have to make tough decisions. You also have to watch your back.
First-quarter fundraising numbers show the Democratic primary for governor is the hottest statewide race on the ballot. Geoff Skelley at UVA’s Center for Politics says that race is becoming a top-dollar attraction.
Democrats “face an over-extended map,” said Kyle Kondik, who analyzes federal races at UVA’s Center for Politics. “But midterm forces often break against the president’s party.”
Thirty-eight states have amendments prohibiting state money from going to religious organizations. A Supreme Court case Wednesday, about whether a religious private school is eligible for state grant money, could change that. “If the church wins in Trinity Lutheran, Douglas County [the Colorado case] will probably be vacated and remanded to the Supreme Court of Colorado,” UVA law professor Douglas Laycock wrote.
Democrats are almost certainly going to have to peel off a lot of seats that Clinton lost by more than just a point if they want to take back the House, says UVA’s Kyle Kondik.
UVA researchers are using exercise and special research cigarettes to try and reduce nicotine dependency in smokers.
In honor of Earth Week, the University of Virginia hosted a dedication for its new solar panels. This was part of a week-long sustainability awareness initiative.