MSU football head coach Mark Dantonio presented the senior linebacker Greg Jones with a plaque to be put on the wall of Skandalaris Football Center for being named a first-team All-American last season, when Jones recorded a Big Ten leading 154 tackles and nine sacks on his way to earning All-American honors.
A student recently ran into me breathless, asking if I had spent my weekend watching, cheering and going crazy over soccer. The way he talked, I imagined it was like the second coming of Christ, Buddha, Mohammed or King Benjamin.
The idea behind MSU’s newest social networking plan, SpartanConnect, is not bad. The online service seeks to deliver “numerous links to connect with other members, students’ blogs, a personal calendar, videos and discussion forums.” As Nicole Ellison, an assistant professor in the MSU Department of Telecommunication, Information Studies and Media, points out, the service can help reduce students’ uncertainties before the semester starts.
For 16 years, alumnus Craig Oster has lived with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, a neurodegenerative disease that typically claims patients’ lives within five years of a diagnosis. Oster is in the running for his own reality show under a contest put on by Oprah Winfrey, which he hopes to win in order to spread a message of hope to millions.
On Friday, the MSU Board of Trustees approved the university’s 2010-11 budget, including a 2.5 percent tuition increase for in-state students for the 2010-11 academic year. The board in June 2009 planned for a 4.9 percent increase as part of its 2010-11 preliminary budget. The 2.4 percent remaining from that original number was suspended until summer 2011.
The streets of downtown East Lansing were filled with the sounds of jazz music this weekend as the 14th annual Summer Solstice Jazz Festival took place. The festival began Friday afternoon, although severe storms in the area put the festival on hold until Saturday.
The MSU Board of Trustees on Friday approved an updated version of the bylaws that govern academic committee processes at the university. Although no major changes were implemented, the bylaws have been worked on throughout the last several years.
In celebration of the summer solstice, the Old Town Commercial Association, or OTCA, is holding a Festival of the Moon from 6-11 p.m. Friday, and a Festival of the Sun from 2-11 p.m. Saturday on the corner of Turner Street and Grand River Avenue, in Lansing. The Festival of the Moon, honoring the shortest night of the year, will feature live entertainment from rock groups JHD, Jet Set Drag and Cartel.
The Michigan 4-H Children’s Garden will sponsor “Wizards Day” from 10 a.m. to noon Tuesday at the gardens. The day will uncover the magic of the gardens, discovering flora and creating willow wands and herbal potions.
Harris Nature Center, 3998 Van Atta Road, in Okemos, will sponsor a guided tour through the woods from 9-10 p.m. Friday. The hike, called Howl at the Moon, takes place each month in the summer on the Friday nearest the full moon. Hikers are invited to bring dogs, as long as they are kept on non-retractable leashes.
The Juneteenth holiday is an annual, weekend-long celebration commemorating the ending of slavery in the U.S. hundreds of years ago. The festivities in Lansing are a small representation of what Juneteenth really means, where it is the community’s job to more thoroughly educate the public about the holiday.
About 160 children and parents gathered for the annual tea party from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m., which marked the first of five summer family events. Guests wore fairy and elf costumes for the three-course tea party and did a variety of crafts in the garden, such as making pixie-dust necklaces, constructing crowns out of vines and building small fairy houses.
Collectors gathered pinups, posters and pulps for the semi-annual Classicon 37 on Saturday at the Quality Inn University, 3121 E. Grand River Ave., in Lansing. Classicon 37 was hosted by the Curious Book Shop, 307 E. Grand River Ave., and collectors from East Lansing, Ann Arbor, Chicago, Lansing, Toledo and Grand Rapids gathered to sell and purchase material, including original movie posters, advertisements, pulps, paperbacks and artwork used for paperback covers.
The Abrams Planetarium, combined with the MSU Physics and Astronomy Department and Capital Area Astronomy Association, invited the public to come and look at the stars, moon and planets through a variety of telescopes Saturday, including one measuring about 24 inches. The 24-inch telescope was built by MSU in 1970 and cost about $125,000, said Horace Smith, a professor of physics and astronomy who said he had the biggest responsibility of the night.
Similar communities and common problems are why five city managers from Big Ten university towns got together Thursday and Friday for their semi-regular meeting. East Lansing hosted this year’s meeting of city managers and economic development experts from State College, Pa.; Evanston, Ill.; Champaign, Ill. and Ann Arbor. East Lansing City Manager Ted Staton led a tour of East Lansing and MSU, including a stop at the Cyclotron, and listened to several speakers about projects the city has coming in the future, including the integration of the Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum.
Due to its unemployment rates, Lansing finally qualified as an EB-5 Regional Center. Essentially, it is the worst way to have a chance to attract investors. EB-5 is a designation given by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, or USCIS, to immigrants “seeking to enter the United States in order to invest in a new commercial enterprise that will benefit the U.S. economy and create at least 10 full-time jobs,” according to the USCIS website.
The State News’ reaction to the MSU Board of Trustees increasing tuition by 2.5 percent: Meh. It’s less than the original 4.9 percent proposed increase, with the rest of the increase proposed for summer of 2011. We want to be angry about it — plenty of students and their families are unhappy.
Three future MSU football players participated in the 30th annual Michigan High School All-Star Football Game at Spartan Stadium, which featured 88 of the best senior players in the state.
Three East Lansing firefighters are recovering from minor injuries sustained while combating a house fire on the 900 block of Longfellow Drive at about 8:20 a.m. Friday morning, East Lansing fire marshall Bob Pratt said.
The MSU Board of Trustees approved the university’s 2010-11 budget at its meeting Friday. The budget included a 2.5 percent increase in tuition for in-state students for the fall semester. Nonresident and graduate students’ tuition will increase by about 5 percent.