In the news

BizGrid hosting startup assistance conference at Wayne State

The Detroit Business Support Network is sponsoring a real-world event to help companies get off the ground. Called BizGrid Live!, it's scheduled for 1 to 4 p.m. Nov. 19 at Wayne State University's McGregor Memorial Conference Center. Accomplished, novice and aspiring entrepreneurs are invited to the free event, where they will have an opportunity to meet representatives from the 54 BizGrid organizations. "We want people to know that they can do business in Detroit, and that there are organizations to support them," said Stephanie Fries, BizGrid Live organizer and relationship manager for The Front Door, Wayne State University's one-stop business assistance center. "Whatever stage they're in and whatever help they need, they can find it here."
News outlet logo for favicons/chronicle.com.png

WSU President weighs in on health care job training during Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities panel

The changes coming to American health care through the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act and other forcesĀ¬ - with a greater focus on preventive care - will require universities to rethink what they teach and how they interact with their communities, said several college and health-care experts who spoke on Sunday on a panel at the Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities' meeting here. As universities think about the new jobs coming to health care, "we have to stop talking about primary-care physicians and start talking about primary-care services," said M. Roy Wilson, president of Wayne State University.
News outlet logo for favicons/crainsdetroit.com.png

Michigan universities announce offer for in-state tuition to all U.S. veterans

Michigan's public universities will provide in-state tuition for all veterans, regardless of state of residency or active duty status, the Presidents Council State Universities of Michigan announced Friday in a news release. Previously, the state's universities have provided in-state tuition for all active duty military members and their dependents. Additionally, the public universities and community colleges throughout Michigan have established the Consortium of Michigan Veteran Educators, with an aim to improve support and services for military members and veterans in the state.
News outlet logo for favicons/detroitnews.com.png

Detroit News' policy forum at Wayne State to feature Mike Duggan

Detroit Mayor-elect Mike Duggan will keynote a Detroit News Public Policy Forum exploring how to lead the city back to democracy. The forum is Nov. 19 from 6-8 p.m. in the Wayne State University Community Arts Auditorium. Duggan's speech will be followed by a panel discussion featuring City Council President Saunteel Jenkins, former Councilwoman Sheila Cockrel, Brandon Jessup of Michigan Forward and Daniel Howes, columnist and associate business editor of The Detroit News. The panel will be moderated by Nolan Finley, editorial page editor of The News.
News outlet logo for favicons/freep.com.png

Michigan governor, university presidents and biz leaders tout state's strengths in NYC

Michigan took its A-team of political and corporate power brokers to the Big Apple on Thursday to make a an aggressive sales pitch to some skeptical audiences. The visitors proclaimed that Michigan is now a state on the mend, a great place to invest and work and visit. Gov. Rick Snyder led the pitch team, flanked by Bill Ford, Chris Ilitch and DTE Energy CEO Gerry Anderson, backed by university presidents M. Roy Wilson of Wayne State and Lou Anna Simon of Michigan State. The Michigan group faced pointed questions on topics ranging from its stubborn image problem to the impact of becoming a right-to-work state, to why its electric power costs to commercial customers are higher than southern states. An evening reception and dinner was to follow for successful New York businesspeople who are alumni of Michigan universities. The idea, which took the form of the Michigan Ambassadors program launched in 2011 by Business Leaders for Michigan, is to engage far-flung alumni to invest in, move back to, or talk up the state to their peers at other companies.
News outlet logo for favicons/dailytribune.com.png

WSU College of Nursing, OCC sign agreement

Graduates of Oakland Community College's associate's degree program in nursing have a new route to advance their credentials. An agreement with the Wayne State University College of Nursing will ease the transition of OCC alumni into Wayne State's program, allowing them to receive a bachelor's degree in five semesters with classes taken in Oakland County. The recently signed agreement allows graduates with an Associate's Degree in Nursing from OCC to transition to a Bachelor of Science in Nursing program at Wayne State with minimal duplication of courses. The agreement is in effect now through June 30, 2016, and subject to review for continuance after three years.
News outlet logo for favicons/legalnews.com.png

Wayne Law student turns adversity into enterprise

Paul Alonzo Turner III grew from being a child living in a homeless shelter to being executive director of a homeless shelter. He grew from being an African-American boy without a male role model in his life to being an African-American man who actively seeks mentors and tries to be one for others in need. And he grew from working in Washington, D.C., fresh out of college, to being a part of Detroit's comeback through his continuing education at Wayne State University Law School, his seemingly unbounded personal enterprise and his own startup company. Turner is a full-time, second-year law student and a part-time consultant through his Pontiac-based marketing business, GPS Community Consulting Inc. He's also readying a new company's entry into Accelerate Michigan Innovation Competition's collegiate division. His startup idea, Mygotonumber Inc., is for an app that will manage all those stored contacts in your smartphone and back them up in the cloud for easy access, even if you don't have your phone with you.

Wayne State, University of Toledo to offer four-year programs at Schoolcraft

The University of Toledo (UT) will begin offering four-year degrees in Livonia in the fall of 2014, part of a new partnership to be announced today with Schoolcraft College. The partnership, which will be announced today at 2 p.m., also involves Wayne State University. Both WSU and U-T will offer four-year programs at Schoolcraft, which will make money from renting them the facilities. Under the partnership, Wayne State and U-T will hold classes in a recently purchased building on the edge of Schoolcraft's campus in northwest Livonia. Degrees in business, nursing, engineering and criminal justice will be offered at the start. Students taking WSU and U-T classes at Schoolcraft will be charged in-state tuition at the schools and be counted as regular students, meaning they will have all the rights as a student living on either WSU's or U-T's campuses. "Many of our students are transfer students," said Wayne State President M. Roy Wilson. "We try to make it pretty convenient for them to come to Wayne State. This partnership will really help with this. As we go forward, this will really help students who want to dual enroll." The partnership will coordinate more closely a student's track through Schoolcraft and on to WSU or U-T, lining up classes and making transferring seamless.

WSU student group participates in Salvation Army's Online Red Kettle College Competition

The Salvation Army of Metro Detroit is teaming up with Michigan colleges and universities for its inaugural Online Red Kettle College Competition. Students, staff and alumni of Eastern Michigan University, University of Michigan Dearborn, Walsh College and Wayne State University can participate in a friendly fundraising competition during the nonprofit's annual Red Kettle Campaign. The college or university that raises the most money will earn bragging rights as champion of the Online Red Kettle College Competition. The winner will be announced during The Salvation Army's Red Kettle reveal event in February 2014.

Center for Urban Studies director comments in Governing Magazine about Mike Duggan election

Lyke Thompson, director of Wayne State University's Center for Urban Studies, says Duggan is known for his direct, to-the-point style, and he isn't someone who's very interested in symbolic politics. In the end, it appears Detroit residents cared less about whether Duggan was an outsider and instead responded to his reputation as someone who gets things done. Voters, Thompson says, "want their street lights and police." Thompson also says it's smart that Duggan has signaled a focus on public safety. Home prices and employment levels have started to rebound in recent years, and finding a way to cut crime is critical to keeping that momentum going. If the city gets the bankruptcy protection it's seeking, Duggan could find himself in the unpopular and politically dangerous position of presiding over a city where thousands of employees could see their pensions slashed. Thomspon says Duggan will likely distance himself from those decisions if they occur.

Dr. Joel Kahn shares little known heart disease risk factors in Fox 2 health report

Dr. Joel K. Kahn, clinical professor of medicine at Wayne State University School of Medicine, shares five little known factors that can contribute to your heart health during a segment with Fox 2 health reporter Deena Centofanti. Kahn cited too little sleep, too little happiness, too much air pollution, too many heavy metal toxins and too much stress as important factors contributing to heart problems.

$1.1 million, 3-year AmeriCorps crime prevention initiative announced

Gov. Rick Snyder on Monday announced a partnership with the city of Detroit to attack crime and blight in five neighborhoods. The program will spend $1.1 million in federal grant money from the Corporation for National and Community Service to analyze crime, devise a plan of attack in select neighborhoods and pay 36 AmeriCorps volunteers for their work over 10-12 months. Lyke Thompson, director for the Center of Urban Studies at Wayne State University, will oversee the program. Once the "hot spots," pockets of high-crime are identified, law enforcement and security forces in the area will convene. "We're already doing this in several Detroit neighborhoods," Thompson said. "We identify the hot spots and we get all of the agencies to focus their resources on particular hot spots. All the money here goes into AmeriCorps volunteers and crime analysis." Thompson said residents can expect to see AmeriCorps members doing things such as leaflet distribution to raise awareness of common crimes, board up homes and clean blight, analyze at-home safety, distribute locks and auto-theft prevention devises, hold VIN etching sessions, participate in bike patrols, advise businesses on safety improvements, and organize block clubs and Neighborhood Watch groups.
News outlet logo for favicons/dbusiness.com.png

OCC and WSU College of Nursing sign agreement

Graduates of Oakland Community College's associate's degree program in nursing have a new route to advance their credentials. An agreement with the Wayne State University College of Nursing will ease the transition of OCC alumni into Wayne State's program, allowing them to receive a bachelor's degree in five semesters with classes taken in Oakland County. The agreement allows graduates with an Associate Degree in Nursing from OCC to transition to a Bachelor of Science in Nursing program at Wayne State with minimal duplication of courses. Nancy T. Artinian, interim dean of the Wayne State University College of Nursing, said the college hopes to start enrolling OCC nursing graduates now to start the program in January. "Wayne State University nursing graduates are prized for their leadership, case management and practitioner skills in all areas of the healthcare system," Artinian said. "We are excited to see what this partnership leads to."
News outlet logo for favicons/csmonitor.com.png

WSU Urban Studies chair comments about Detroit mayoral race in Christian Science Monitor report

On Tuesday, Detroit voters may give the city what it hasn't had in 40 years: a white mayor. The shift away from racial politics in Detroit "is a reflection of change in the city," says Robin Boyle, chair of the urban studies and planning department at Wayne State University. "The hostility that has been toward white candidates has increasingly moved to the fringe," Boyle says. "There is clearly a deep concern from the neighborhoods that whoever is going to be running this city post-bankruptcy has got to have a clear sense of how the business of a city works." Stepping into office if and when the city lapses into a federal bankruptcy restructuring could be ideal, Boyle says: It means that the legacy issues of past administrations - the looming debt, pushback from labor unions - would be largely dealt with outside the mayor's office. "By the time he assumes power, he'll be running a city that's had a cleaner balance than any Detroit mayor had since the Second World War," Boyle says. "That does not mean there won't be fundamental problems, but it does mean that many of the red-ink problems will be less than they were. There's an opportunity here."
News outlet logo for favicons/crainsdetroit.com.png

Longtime WSU supporters, philanthropists honored with Max Fisher Award

Health. The arts. Education. These are just three of the giving areas close to the hearts of Mort and Brigitte Harris. David Ripple, Wayne State University's vice president of development and alumni affairs, cites the couple's acts of giving, the types of programs they support and the impact of their generosity on the daily lives of individuals in the community as just a few reasons they fit the very definition of the word "philanthropist." "They give to and support initiatives that are close to their heart that have a direct impact on the lives of individuals in our community," Ripple said. "They also have inspired numerous others to follow their lead in growing and strengthening our community through charitable giving." They have had an impact on daily life at Wayne State. For starters, the school's Mort Harris Recreation and Fitness Center bears the patriarch's name. The couple also give to scholarships, lectureships and community programs. Mort Harris is a lifetime member of the Wayne State University Alumni Association, a charter member of the Wayne State University Foundation board, one of the founding members of the Anthony Wayne Society and a member of the WSU Fund board in the mid-1980s. "For more than 40 years," Ripple said, Mort Harris "has been one of the university's best and most dedicated supporters."
News outlet logo for favicons/freep.com.png

WSU dancers chosen to perform at renowned NYC contemporary ballet gala

Before a high-profile Big Apple audience, 10 Wayne State University dance majors will be throwing "Hissy Fits" - a 22-minute routine choreographed by acclaimed dancer Dwight Rhoden - at the gala season opener of the Complexions Contemporary Ballet on Nov. 21 in New York City. But metro Detroiters can get a sneak peek of "Hissy Fits" on Wednesday, when the WSU dancers perform the routine at a fund-raiser to help offset the students' trip to New York. Rhoden, who has choreographed dances for Fox TV's "So You Think You Can Dance" show, has conducted summer intensive workshops at Wayne State University's Maggie Allesee Theatre and Dance department for three years. WSU is the first university dance program invited to perform with Complexions, one of the nation's preeminent companies for contemporary dance, said Meg Paul, a WSU ballet lecturer and program director of its Complexions Detroit Summer Intensive, which draws about 120 dancers from around the country each year.

Officials to announce Detroit public safety initiative led by Wayne State's Urban Safety Corps

Gov. Rick Snyder and Detroit Mayor Dave Bing will make an announcement Monday about a new public safety initiative. At an event to be held in Osborn High School's library, they'll discuss the AmeriCorps Urban Safety Corps program, which is aimed at reducing crime in Detroit. The Urban Safety Corps is operated by Wayne State University and has been active in parts of Detroit for three years. It uses a crime-mapping system and relies on collaboration between residents, neighborhood nonprofits, faith-based organizations, law enforcement, existing neighborhood associations and block clubs to improve public safety.
News outlet logo for favicons/legalnews.com.png

Law student remembered as bright, outgoing and optimistic

The Wayne State University campus community and coworkers at a prominent local law firm are mourning the death of third-year Law School student Tiane Brown, reported missing early in the week and found dead Wednesday morning. In a statement, Wayne State University President M. Roy Wilson described Brown as "an exceptional and active student" and said her loss was "devastating" to the campus community. He said that the school would offer psychological counseling to those who needed it.