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Judge issues rulings in lawsuit
Federal District Court Judge B. Avant Edenfield issued several rulings Feb. 10 in connection with a lawsuit challenging the university’s admissions policies.
Edenfield ruled that the case is no longer certified as a class action, denied the plaintiffs’ motion for an injunction that would have halted the current admissions process, and affirmed a previous ruling that the plaintiffs cannot pursue damages from UGA President Michael F. Adams and Chancellor Stephen Portch personally. Edenfield also denied a motion for a change of venue.
The judge kept intact the individual reverse- discrimination claims raised by four white female plaintiffs, all of whom were denied admission to the fall 1999 freshman class.
The majority of UGA applicants are admitted solely on academic criteria (SAT or ACT scores and high school grade point averages). But several additional factors, including race, are used for a small percentage of admissions decisions involving students with similar academic credentials.
‘Chemistry Community’ opens
Charles H. Atwood and Joel A. Caughran, two UGA chemistry professors are working with WebCT--considered a leader in the e-learning marketplace--to create the WebCT Chemistry Community.
The community, located on the company’s e-learning hub, www.webct.com, provides chemistry-related content, communication and support opportunities for students and faculty and is freely available to anyone on the Internet.
“This community presents exciting possibilities for innovation, discussion and interaction to chemists and students around the world,” says Caughran, director of UGA’s chemistry learning center. “We feel that instructional technology represents a new and challenging method to improve learning and teaching in schools and universities.”
The community contains tools to help professors and students quickly find what they need. These include discussion forums to share and build upon ideas, pose questions and learn about new developments in the field of chemistry; directories offering links to chemistry-related Web sites; and libraries providing community specific teaching and learning resources, as well
as access to WebCT-ready course materials from major textbook publishers.
“We are making tools available to university communities worldwide that will improve and enhance the teaching and learning process,” says Atwood, who is the general chemistry coordinator in UGA’s chemistry department. “For example, we are developing online tutorials that will help students increase their level of their understanding of organic chemistry nomenclature.
“We also want to provide for teachers a variety of resources which can be incorporated into their classrooms,” Atwood also says.
Academic achievement honored
Kyle Wingfield, a junior from Dalton, will be honored by the Georgia General Assembly for his academic accomplishments at UGA.
Each year, one student is selected from each of the 34 public institutions of higher learning in the state to be honored by a special resolution passed by both the Georgia House and Senate, recognizing these students for their achievement. The event is coordinated by the board of regents.
“I was surprised and humbled when I heard the news,” says Wingfield. “Being selected to represent the university is a great honor.”
Wingfield is studying publication management in the Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication and is a UGA Foundation Fellow.
He is a member of several student organizations and honor societies, including Phi Beta Kappa, Phi Kappa Phi, the Dean Tate and ARCH societies, Mortar Board, and the Leadership Resource and Georgia Recruitment teams. He is also the executive secretary the Office of Judicial Programs Student Judiciary.
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