News highlights for March 7, 2010

CisionPoint news monitoring provides this small sampling of the university's daily news coverage. Click headline to read full text via Cision or link directly to the online article where available. For questions or comments about this service, or to add or delete a name from the mailing list, please contact Gerry Everding.

Los Angeles Times

The debate over prostate cancer tests
03/05/2011

Do PSAs (screening tests for prostate cancer) save lives? A 2009 study followed more than 76,000 American men ages 55 through 74 for 10 years. Half the men were offered yearly PSA tests and the other half received “usual care,” which sometimes included the test. From a statistical point of view, screening didn’t seem to make any difference. The study, while imperfect, should have been able to detect any lifesaving benefits had they existed, says lead researcher Dr. Gerald Andriole, a professor of surgery at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. Link to Article See also Chicago Tribune, The Morning Call, Orlando Sentinel, Sun Sentinel and numerous daily newspapers and local televisions stations.

Bloomberg Businessweek

The MBA marketing machine
03/06/2011

At U.S. business schools, the way administrators are selling the MBA degree to applicants is shifting, as B-schools and the MBA degree itself face unprecedented challenges in the wake of the global economic crisis. “We’re a stodgy group of academics, and at the end of the day we’re slow to change,” says Joseph Fox, associate dean for MBA programs at the Olin Business School (Olin full-time MBA program) at Washington University in St. Louis. But change is indeed in the air. Link to Article

Chronicle of Higher Education

Beyond financial aid: Why we should help students and families save for college

03/06/2011

Giving low-income students an opportunity to save early on could decrease the need to pay off loans upon graduation and could help keep in college students who might otherwise drop out for financial reasons. Research by the Center for Social Development at Washington University in St. Louis indicates that among students who expect to attend college, those who have a savings account are about seven times more likely to attend college than similar youths who do not have an account. 
Link to Article

e! Science News

Multiple sclerosis blocked in mouse model
03/07/2011

Scientists have blocked harmful immune cells from entering the brain in mice with a condition similar to multiple sclerosis (MS). “The effect of immune cell entry into the brain depends on context,” says Robyn Klein, MD, PhD, associate professor of pathology and immunology, of medicine and of neurobiology at Washington University School of Medicine. “In the case of viral infection, immune cell entry is required to clear the virus. But in autoimmune diseases like multiple sclerosis, their entry is associated with damage so we need to find ways to keep them out.” Link to Article

TMCnet.com

In Snyder v. Phelps, high court avoided Internet speech issue
03/07/2011

The U.S. Supreme Court added a muscular ruling last week to its canon shielding fringe speech, while skipping a stickier First Amendment issue the case presented: What can you say about someone on the Internet? Neil Richards, a law professor at Washington University in St. Louis, said the court’s note about “distinct issues” arising from Internet postings suggests they might create a legal category of cyber-harassment in the future. “Given the overall tenor of the opinion, I think this possibility is unlikely to occur in practice,” he wrote on the blog ConcurringOpinions.com. Link to Article


 See also York Daily Record (York, PA),

Related News Release

St. Louis Post-Dispatch

Do the rich deserve what they get?
03/06/2011

It was late morning at the coffee shop, and the professor wanted to talk about rich people. Mark Rank usually focuses his attention on the low end of the income charts, on poverty. As a professor of social welfare at Washington University, he’s considered a top academic expert on that topic and social justice. But he was moved to talk with this reporter about income inequality. Link to Article

St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Boxing anthology is a knockout
03/06/2011

Boxing once held a stronghold on the American psyche, representing not just the Darwinian struggle at its simplest, but confronting issues of race, class, ethnicity and even international relations and war. Boxing’s golden age is encapsulated in “At the Fights,” a superb book of stories, essays and memoirs by many good and some truly great writers. Ambiguity runs through many of the pieces in the book — nowhere more strikingly than in an essay called “Ringworld” by Gerald Early, a professor of English and African-American studies at Washington University and a boxing fan. 
Link to Article

News in Higher Education

New York Times

College the easy way
03/07/2011

The cost of college has skyrocketed and a four-year degree has become an ever more essential cornerstone to a middle-class standard of living. But what are America’s kids actually learning in college? Link to Article

Boston Globe

Kerry urges Yale to welcome ROTC back to campus
03/04/2011

Sen. John Kerry called on Yale University to follow Harvard’s lead Friday and welcome the ROTC back to the Ivy League campus. 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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