China Economic Review
Top tips for cracking the MBA admissions process this year
March 2011
The global economic downturn caused a spike in business school applications, but students now seem to be critically examining the cost-benefit of MBA programs. With EMBA programs in particular, relevant and constructive work experience often takes precedence over the importance of GMAT scores. Melissa Mao, a student of the joint EMBA program offered by Fudan University and Washington University in St Louis, said about 80% of her application focused on her professional experience and why she was choosing the course. Link to Article
Chicago Tribune
Head injuries: Reduce concussion risk
03/02/2011
Stronger neck muscles may help reduce the risk of damage from concussions or mild traumatic brain injuries, says a West Virginia University expert on head injuries in professional football players. In theory, a stronger neck makes sense, but more research is needed before firm conclusions can be drawn, said Mark Halstead, an assistant professor in the department of pediatrics and orthopedics at Washington University in St Louis, who studies the long-term effects of concussions in young athletes. Link to Article
Chicago Tribune
What berries can do for you
03/03/2011
Berries are nutritional powerhouses, but can they really protect our memory, melt fat and prevent urinary infections? Scientists know less about a berry’s health benefits than you might think, but new research is promising. The resveratrol found in blueberries may help prevent a disease of the retina that’s the leading cause of blindness in people older than 65, according to vision researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. Link to Article
Campus Progress
The Friday List-Down: 10 of America’s most daring young black activists
2/25/2011
Black history month usually focuses on civil rights leaders like Martin Luther King Jr., but you should also know about young black activists making a difference today, including Charlene Carruthers, a Washington University social work graduate. Carruthers grew up on the South Side of Chicago and is a writer, organizer and activist who tweets under the name @nvrcomfortable. She managed to use a combination of social media and in-person fundraising to gather more than $1,400 worth of donations to send herself to Haiti following the earthquake last August. She blogs at
The Freedom Pages. Link to Article
The Denver Post
Green business lessons: A visit to the Leopold Bros. Distillery
03/03/2011
Jialan Wang, an assistant professor of finance at Washington University in St Louis, describes her visit to the Leopold Bros. distillery last January while in Denver for the American Economics Association’s annual meeting. She invites readers to learn from the distillery’s green business practices. “I think academics can play a crucial role to bridge the knowledge gap between industry leaders who are identifying and implementing environmental practices, and those who lack the awareness and expertise to do so.” Wang writes about economics, food and the environment on her blog, Studies in Everyday Life. Link to Article
The OpenHelix Blog
Clint the chimp’s genome goes online
03/02/2011
Sure, you’ve seen Watson’s, Venter’s, and now there is one more individual genome available. But this one is different. Clint is a chimp, a male chimpanzee from the Yerkes Primate Research Center in Atlanta, whose sequence data were assembled and organized by the Washington University Genome Center from underlying whole genome shotgun data generated at the Washington University St. Louis School of Medicine and the Broad Institute. Link to Article
The Sag Harbor Express
Return of the campus
03/02/2011
Stony Brook Southampton was all but shuttered last spring by Stony Brook University’s new president, Dr. Samuel Stanley, who served previously as vice chancellor for research at Washington University in St. Louis. Stanley claimed funding was the issue, but others said the real reason was that he didn’t appreciate a small teaching institution dedicated to the environment. “He is all about science and research,” said one state assemblyman. “He failed to have a ‘broad view’ of education.” Link to Article
STLtoday.com
Related: Slay stumps on earnings tax; will visit neighborhoods, businesses
03/02/2011
Mayor Francis Slay is on the stump this month. Not for his own reelection — he’s fighting to save the city earnings tax. City voters hold its fate in their hands this April, when a “no” vote could cost the city’s annual budget about $140 million. Slay’s campaign, Citizens for a Stronger St. Louis, has since raised nearly $400,000 through January, including new $10,000 contributions from Washington University and the BJC Health System. Link to Article
St. Louis American
Editorial: Census results show need for forward thinking leadership
3/2/2011
St. Louis lost nearly 29,000 people since the 2000 Census, a stunning 8.3 percent of the population. But, St. Louis has many diverse, underutilized resources. The region is home to four research universities, one of them (Washington University) a global elite institution. Year after year, St. Louis graduates an educated group of workers and potential leaders. We have a truly enviable capacity to train people, but when we have trained them, this has not been, with a few notable exceptions, a viable place for many of them to capitalize on their education and ideas. We must change this. Link to Article
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
British ambassador’s guest column: Collaboration between U.S. and U.K.
3/3/2011
British ambassador Sir Nigel Sheinwald discusses his visit to Missouri to mark the 65th anniversary of Winston Churchill’s landmark Iron Curtain speech at Westminster College in Fulton and to visit businesses and universities with strong links to Britain. “On Friday,” he writes, “I’ll be at Washington University, one of the world’s top institutions. In fact, all of the world’s top 10 universities and 26 of the top 30 either are in the United States or the United Kingdom. Between us, we do 50 percent of the world’s science with only 5 percent of its population, and we’ve won half of all Nobel Prizes ever awarded.” Link to Article
Related news release
Fox 2 News (St. Louis)
2/2/2011
Look around the grocery store these days and you’ll find an increasing number of products that come straight from the farm, but not raw milk. Raw milk drinkers claim pasteurization also weakens or destroys the “good” bacteria, digestive enzymes and vitamins, but there are plenty of skeptics. “I would just say no to raw milk,” said Marilyn Tanner-Blasiar, a registered dietician from Washington University who finds claims about raw milk hard to swallow. “The difference between the pasteurized milk and the raw milk — v ry minimal,” she said. Link to Article / Online video
News in Higher Education
Wall Street Journal
Students struggle for words
03/11/2011
While employers prize MBA students’ quantitative skills, their writing and presentation skills have been a perennial complaint. At employers’ urging, many business schools are taking steps to try to improve their students’ writing. Link to Article
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
The opportunity costs of college
03/03/2011
As students leave high school, they face the stark reality that nearly half of them will need financial aid to make the dream of college a reality. But Missouri’s ever-shrinking pot of financial aid puts college out of reach for many families. Link to Article
For additional higher education news (subscription may be required):
The Chronicle of Higher Education
Inside Higher Ed
University Business
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