Tagged: wayne state university

The Meijer Foundation is giving $500,000 to support the Made in Michigan writers’ series. Wayne State University Press started the series in 2006.

Senior Acquisitions Editor Annie Martin says it’s the biggest grant the organization has ever gotten. She says it's not every day a donor with deep pockets wants to invest in a small-scale university press.

“You can imagine we were dancing in our office,” Martin chuckled.

The annual budget for the Made in Michigan series is $75,000. Martin says the grant will help offset the costs of producing the books. They could publish more books each year, or do more marketing, “I have a million ideas,” she said.

The University Press will get the grant over five years. Martin says the bulk will go into an endowment fund so that it lasts for years.

Some of the main players and experts on Michigan’s emergency manager law weighed in at a Wayne State University law school event Friday.

The symposium looked at what it calls the “restructuring of government through privatization and corporatization” throughout the state, particularly in Detroit.

The topic was chosen as financial troubles continue to plague many municipalities—and the state is frequently intervening through Public Act 4, a more powerful emergency manager law.

One former emergency manager—Pontiac’s Michael Stampfler—talked about that law’s limitations to really fix cities long-term structural problems.

Wayne State University is changing its admissions standards and retention policies in an effort to boost graduation rates.

Wayne State used to admit students automatically based on a minimum gradepoint average or test scores.

Now, the university says it will take what it calls a more “holistic” approach to admissions, while expanding support systems for students.

Wayne State President Allan Gilmour says the university does want to boost its 31% six-year graduation rate.

Panelists offered a variety of perspectives on marijuana laws at the annual Wayne State University law review symposium Friday.

The largely civil conversation ranged widely, from the potential benefits of legalizing and taxing marijuana, to the perils of legalizing a drug that many think would be hard to regulate.

One symposium panelist was Kevin Sabet, a former advisor to the National Office of Drug Control Policy.

Lake Superior State University a few days ago issued its annual list of Banished Words and phrases for 2011.

Now Wayne State University has issued its own top 10 list of "remarkably useful and expressive words that deserve more chances to enrich our language."

Beaufort Cranford is with Wayne State, where he curates the university's Word Warriors Word of the Week. (The tagline on the Word Warriors page says "bringing back great words.) Cranford and other WSU staff vote on their favorite words of the week until they boil it down to a Top 10 list.

Here are the results:

If you are a football fan, you probably know that the Detroit Lions won a thrilling comeback victory yesterday, and are having their best season in something like a million years.

If you know a lot about University of Michigan athletics, you may know that the athletic department has a budget of $110 million, of which football takes the biggest share. Michigan State’s athletic budget is about $80 million.

And then there is Wayne State University, the smallest of Michigan‘s big three constitutional universities, the one that is in the middle of Detroit. They do have a football team, but until very recently, almost nobody paid attention. This year, the football team’s entire budget was less than $200,000.

One legal expert says only Congress—not the state—can authorize a new bridge connecting Detroit and Windsor.

Constitutional law professor Robert Sedler was one speaker at a Wayne State University law school panel discussion about the bridge’s future Tuesday.

Sedler says Congress, exercising its authority over international commerce, granted the company that owns the Ambassador Bridge a franchise—and would have to do so again in the case of a new crossing.

“The basic point is, you have to go back to Congress if you want a new bridge,” says Sedler, who consults on behalf of the Detroit International Bridge Company.