Barack Obama’s involvement could help drive turnout for Stacey Abrams, who is running in Georgia to become the nation’s first African-American female governor, said Geoffrey Skelley, associate editor of Sabato’s Crystal Ball at the University of Virginia Center for Politics.
Fredericksburg City Public Schools Superintendent David Melton oversees the region’s smallest school system, but collects a larger paycheck than his counterparts in surrounding counties. University of Virginia law professor J.H. Verkerke said the insurance benefit in Melton’s contract is not “incredibly common,” but that employees—typically executives—do have it.
Jalane Schmidt, a local activist and associate professor of religious studies at the University of Virginia, said she had also seen an uptick in everyday civic engagement over the past year, with more people showing up to city meetings on issues like housing.
Jalane Schmidt is a University of Virginia professor who went on the pilgrimage to Montgomery. She said the trip has revealed a lot to her. "By making this pilgrimage we've engaged on a journey of truth-telling," said Schmidt. One of those truths is that the violence of August 12 last year is not unique in Charlottesville.
Ninety-eight community members took a nearly weeklong trip in July to the Equal Justice Initiative’s Legacy Museum and National Memorial for Peace and Justice in Montgomery, Alabama, to deliver soil from the Albemarle County site where John Henry James was murdered in 1898. Jalane Schmidt, a local Black Lives Matter activist and University of Virginia professor who also organized the trip, and UVA staff members DeTeasa Gathers and Patsy Goolsby, spoke on behalf of the 21 UVA staff and faculty who went on the pilgrimage.
“I’ll just say the Minnesota eye bank has been hands down the easiest to work with,” said University of Virginia professor Brad Gelfand, who is studying age-related macular degeneration.
The number of births in Virginia continues declining, reaching the lowest level in years in 2017 — only 100,248. A decade before, births had numbered 108,884. Demographers Savannah Quick and Shonel Sen at the Demographics Research Group at the University of Virginia attribute the overall dip in fertility decline to a dramatic decline for 15- to 19-year-olds and 20- to 24-year-olds and a slight increase for 30- to 34-year-olds and 35- to 39-year-olds. In other words, many women are postponing childbirth, not choosing not to have children.
Anne Verbiscer, a UVA astronomy professor and part of the New Horizons team, said she valued working with Senegalese students and could relate to overcoming hurdles in pursuing a career in astronomy. Verbiscer was 5 when a human first walked on the moon in 1969. Transfixed by the Apollo mission, she wanted to be an astronaut for Halloween. So she shopped for a costume with her mother and finally found one: It was in the boys’ section.
Facebook “can’t win at this game,” said Siva Vaidhyanathan, a University of Virginia professor of media studies whose 2018 book “Antisocial Media” critiques Facebook’s effect on democracy and society. Because it’s so huge — 2.2 billion global users and counting — and so difficult to police, he said, “it will always be vulnerable to hijacking and will never completely clean up its content.”
Five years after the UVA Medical Center’s Hospital to Home program launched, a team of researchers began analyzing the program. In a recent study, they found the program helped to reduce patient death rates and hospital readmissions and also saved the hospital money.
Another study, conducted by researchers at Utah State University and the University of Virginia for the Journal of Marriage and Family, revealed that generosity is linked to happier, longer marriages, and a lack of generosity can increase the likelihood of divorce.
Researchers at the University of Virginia are now able to explain why obesity causes harmful inflammation, which often leads to diabetes, clogged arteries, and other health problems. Their findings may eventually lead to a medical treatment for the inflammation, which so often causes other health problems for obese Americans.
Emerging evidence suggests that a “potent” drug could prevent the development of Alzheimer’s disease — but only if a person takes the medication long before symptoms of this condition make an appearance.
The new research from the University of Virginia demonstrates that one of the key mechanisms preceding specific neuron cell death in the disease involves the movement of calcium through channels on cell surfaces. The scientists hypothesized that cell death could be prevented by closing a certain receptor that allows calcium to flow and ultimately cause neuronal destruction.
The Innocence Project at the University of Virginia School of Law filed a pardon request last year with the governor’s office and last week sent a letter to Gov. Ralph Northam warning that unless Trudy Eliana Munoz Rueda, 53, is pardoned, she will be deported when she leaves the Fluvanna Correctional Center for Women.
In 2019, the University of Virginia will have two women in top executive roles for the first time. In one of his first actions since taking office Wednesday, President Jim Ryan on Friday announced the appointments of Liz Magill as executive vice president and provost and J.J. Davis as executive vice president and chief operating officer. The Board of Visitors approved their appointments, as well as that of Alex Hernandez as dean of the School of Continuing and Professional Studies, at its retreat in Northern Virginia.
The University of Virginia’s President’s Commission on Slavery began in 2013 after a trickle of universities began digging up old stories of founders and professors who had owned slaves. UVA’s commission also has been a model for other schools, in both the North and South, to begin studying their own history.
It wasn’t the first time the 31-year-old Doolittle directly offered his opinion on a matter few high-profile professional athletes would touch. Last May, Doolittle and Dolan wrote an op-ed about veterans’ issues. Later in the year, Doolittle, who attended the University of Virginia, spoke out against what happened in Charlottesville.
Siva Vaidhyanathan is the Robertson Professor of Media Studies and director of the Center for Media and Citizenship at the University of Virginia. He is also the author of a new book, “Antisocial Media: How Facebook Disconnects Us and Undermines Democracy.” [Henry Farrell] asked him questions about the book.
If the data on the effects of workplace abuse are so clear, why do so many companies hire and promote manipulative and selfish people? UVA business school professor Peter Belmi and the author carried out a series of experiments involving more than 900 participants.