Lauren Ratcliffe

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UNC basketball ticket sign-ups altered

By Lauren Ratcliffe | April 26

The days of signing up for an entire month’s worth of basketball tickets are over. Instead of signing up during the last 10 days of a month for the following month’s games, students will sign up for each game individually next year under the new ticket policy. Students will have a 72-hour window, beginning 10 days before each game, to sign up. “I think it will put more responsibility on the students to register during that 72 hours,” said Caitlin Goforth, president of the Carolina Athletic Association.

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UNC’s basketball ticket policy to change little

By Lauren Ratcliffe | April 12

By the time incoming freshmen step foot on campus for orientation, any changes to the basketball ticket policy should be set in stone. But students hoping for big changes to the ticket policy are likely to be disappointed. Caitlin Goforth, president of the Carolina Athletic Association, said her objective is to set up next year’s policy early so that the CAA can better communicate with students “My goal is to get this policy fast tracked so that we have it done by C-TOPS,” Goforth said.

Mary Koenig

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UNC librarians among “movers and shakers” in library science field

By Lauren Ratcliffe | March 29

Librarians Chad Haefele and Emily King insist libraries are more than buildings with books. And last year they set out to show it with a single game. In January 2010, they combined gaming and education when they created and held a one-time, two-week long alternate reality game called “Should Brandon and Nicole get Engaged,” or ShBANGE. Because of their efforts, Library Journal named them two of 50 “movers and shakers” in the field of library science for 2011, bringing recognition to the innovative ways UNC Libraries are connecting people to information. “The original idea came from a couple of alternate reality games I’d played in a having fun kind of way,” said Haefele, the emerging technologies librarian for Davis Library in the research and instructional services department. “And being that I think of information management so often, I began to think that maybe there could be an education component to this,” he said. Rather than focusing on topics traditionally included in lectures or seminars, Haefele and King, the coordinator for eLearning services for University libraries, explored ways to teach topics that classrooms don’t address. After consulting with Counseling and Wellness Services, the Campus Y and the Residence Hall Association, they said they realized relationship issues would make a good focus. “When you go to class, you learn about things like biology, history or English, but you’re having to learn on the fly how to negotiate relationships,” said Laura Christopherson, a doctoral student in the School of Information and Library Science and project manager for ShBANGE. The volunteer group Haefele and King assembled to run the game kick-started it with an elaborate marriage proposal in the Pit. Volunteers then passed out fortune cookies with websites students could visit if they wished to get involved.

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UNC’s Innovate@Carolina sees funds trickle in

By Lauren Ratcliffe | March 17

Five months after its launch, Innovate@Carolina is not quite a fifth of the way to its fundraising goal for the year. Since its launch in October, the program has raised $23.3 million, about 18.6 percent of its goal of $125 million for this year.

Katie Sweeney

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Carter wins prestigious Rhodes scholarship

By Lauren Ratcliffe | February 24

This May, Carter will become the first in his family to graduate from college. His scholarship will allow him to pursue a fully-funded master’s degree in Latin American studies at Cambridge University.

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Students get fewer tickets to UNC basketball games

By Lauren Ratcliffe | February 24

Citing chronically low student attendance, the athletic department has reduced the number of student tickets by 34 percent from last year. Though rate of attendance has been low for decades, athletic department officials said they decided to reduce the amount of student tickets after particularly poor attendance last year. The office distributes an average of 2,798 tickets per game this year.

Lauren Ratcliffe

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Friday Night Friends provides childcare to special needs children

By Lauren Ratcliffe | February 13

Friday Night Friends is a respite care program for families with a special needs child at Newhope Church in Durham. Parents said it gives them a blessing — a night without worry.

Mary Koenig

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Marion Jones shares life lessons with athletes

By Lauren Ratcliffe | February 8

When former women’s basketball player Tonya Cooper Williams introduced Marion Jones to student athletes Tuesday, she didn’t mention any of her accomplishments on the court or track.

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University considers remedial course plan

By Lauren Ratcliffe | February 3

With more students placing out of entry-level English courses, the University is looking to restructure a bedrock of its general requirements: 101 and 102 classes.

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Parking services fees to increase

By Lauren Ratcliffe | February 2

Parking and transportation costs affecting the University are set to rise by $6.1 million by the 2015 academic year and to account for that increase, the University is looking to its students and faculty regardless of whether they own a vehicle.

Lauren Ratcliffe

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