The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Indian Health Service looked to Mercer School of Medicine professor Mike Smith to help develop a new program to help fight STDs, including HIV/AIDS, in Native American youth. Dr. Smith will implement the pilot project, called Native STAND, in a Native American school. The efforts led to the front page coverage in The Telegraph on Thursday, Aug. 28.
To read the Macon Telegraph story, click here.
To view the Mercer news release, click here.
WMGT-TV also carried a story Wednesday on the latest release of poverty statistics in Georgia. Sean Mulholland, assistant professor of economics, helped to provide perspective on the numbers for the story. To read the story, click here.
An emergency siren installed on the Macon campus was tested for the first time Wednesday. Fox 24 and WMGT-TV video cameras were on hand for the test.
WMGT’s Web site has a story on the test, click here to read it.
Fox 24’s Web site includes a story and video, click here to visit the site.
To read the Mercer news release about the test, click here.
The largest one-time grant in the School of Medicine’s history, $3.1 million, garnered media attention for its historic significance, and for its important purpose: reducing diabetes in the African-American community. The National Institutes of Health are giving Mercer the money to study diabetes prevention programs implemented through African-American churches, a new community-based approach that could yield big dividends in health improvements for African Americans - a group that suffers disproportionately from diabetes.
Dr. John Boltri will lead the study, and appeared in many Macon media outlets on the day of the announcement, Wednesday, Aug. 20.
The stories that are available online are linked: Mercer University news release, The Telegraph, WMAZ, Fox 24 and WMGT.
Gregory Domin, Ph.D., associate professor of political science, will be featured on the “Fox Files” on Fox 24 in Macon tonight, Tuesday, Aug. 19, at 10:30 p.m. Dr. Domin will be discussing the run-up to the Democratic and Republican National Conventions.
Mercer’s new chief academic officer, Provost Wallace Daniel, Ph.D., welcomed more new and returning students on the Macon campus to the 2008-2009 school year on Monday, Aug. 18. The Fall Convocation was covered by WMGT-TV, WMAZ-TV and Fox 24 TV on the Aug. 18 broadcasts, while the Macon Telegraph ran several photos its print edition on Aug. 19. To view the online edition, click here.
The first 30 first-year students to arrive on Mercer’s new Savannah Campus of the School of Medicine celebrated the beginning of their careers with the School’s traditional White Coat Ceremony on Sunday, Aug. 17. The students were presented with their white coats, which they will wear throughout their studies.
In addition to the capacity crowd at the Memorial University Medical Center, where the Savannah campus is located, the Savannah media was also well-represented, all four area TV stations, the Business Report and Journal and the Savannah Morning-News all had reporters in attendance. To view coverage of the Morning-News, click here.
Macon’s 11th Hour newspaper focused on the future of Macon, and the new leadership that is leading the way in redevelopment of Macon, including a feature on the College Hill Corridor Commission, a group established by Mercer University and the city of Macon. The article focused on the group’s leaders, including Sarah Gerwig-Moore, co-chair of the commission and a Mercer law professor, and Josh Rogers, a staff member with the city’s economic development department and a Mercer graduate.
To view the story, visit the newspaper’s Web site and click on the “Cover Story” tab.
The Christian-Science Monitor published a story on the rise of a broader evangelical agenda and the role of The Rev. Rick Warren, a Baptist pastor and author of the best-seller A Purpose-Driven Life. The article mentions Mercer’s David Gushee, Distinguished Professor of Christian Ethics, as one of the leaders of this new movement, especially on issues of torture. The story “A new-style evangelical pastor ascends the political stage” is available at csmonitor.com.
Gushee is also president of Evangelicals for Human Rights, which will be holding a national summit on torture Sept. 11-12 on Mercer’s Atlanta campus titled “Religious Faith, Torture, and Our National Soul.”
Reuters news service quoted Mercer’s David Gushee, Distinguished University Professor of Christian Ethics, in a story about the presidential debate to be held at the Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, Calif. The church, led by prominent evangelical Rick Warren, is part of a new battleground for Obama, Gushee said. “For Obama it is significant that he will be participating as an equal on the same stage as McCain in an evangelical church. This signals the shift in the evangelical political landscape since 2004,” he notes.
Several news sites and papers picked up the story, including the International Herald Tribune and Yahoo! News.
