The University of Wisconsin Foundation announced Tom Olson as the new chief investment officer Tuesday, who will be responsible for overseeing the allocation of over $2 billion in assets...

...The 15-year-old Menasha High School sophomore may well reach that goal, with help from a three-year-old federal program helping underprivileged Kaukauna and Menasha students get into college. "We have to motivate students to believe that it is a possibility for them," said Terri Holzman, director of Trio/Educational Talent Search, a program of the University of Wisconsin-Fox Valley that works with the public schools. "Coming from low-income families, I'm sure that they hear things like, 'College? Are you kidding? We can't afford college'"...

...The Virginia Tech team members had been busy with last-minute preparations for the opening of their project, called Lumenhaus, and of the Solar Decathlon, a federal Department of Energy competition to design and build an efficient and livable solar-powered dwelling...Students and faculty advisers from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, were in hard hats, sawing and hammering, and were still working long after the 1 p.m. opening ceremonies...

University of Wisconsin officials recently unveiled a plan to restructure the graduate school after significant growth in the institution’s research and graduate education programs. While Provost Paul DeLuca Jr.’s plan awaits reports and recommendations from two university committees, the proposed changes have come under fire from faculty and staff...

What appeared to be a suspicious package Tuesday morning on the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point campus turned out to be a prop for a class. Although the incident proved not to be serious, it did provide university officials a chance for a live-action implementation of the campus's emergency management plan...

The University Police Department Alcohol Diversion Program seeks to change behavior more than punish students in violation of drinking laws. The new program allows officers to use their own discretion when citing a person for alcohol related incidents including underage consumption and open intoxicants on campus and has the option to refer a student to the program in lieu of a citation...

This Friday the University of Wisconsin at Oshkosh will break ground on a $48-million academic center. At 191,000 square feet, the building brings the university back into construction mode in a big way: Oshkosh has not put up an academic building since 1971...

The announcement that Prodesse, a college spin-out that makes molecular flu tests, sold for more than $60 million is the perfect answer to the criticism from the cheap seats by Marc Levine, a University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee professor who recently belittled the idea that research universities can have an effective a role in technology transfer and economic development...

The first solid - if still incomplete - employment numbers for federal stimulus spending by Wisconsin state government show that retaining government positions was job one. Three-fourths of 8,284 stimulus-related jobs accounted for so far were public-sector posts protected by the federal infusion into state and local government coffers, Gov. Jim Doyle's office reported...They do not include money funneled directly to local municipalities or to the University of Wisconsin system; those reports are being made separately...

The state of Wisconsin is reporting to the federal government that it used nearly $680 million in stimulus funds to save or create 8,284 full-time jobs in Wisconsin, Gov. Jim Doyle said Tuesday...

...Although boards of trustees at colleges have become more racially diverse in recent years, the proportion of minority-group members on boards lags behind that of college students and the general population. The same is true of women. Efforts are under way to improve the situation, but the change in makeup tends to happens gradually. Board diversification requires new ways of seeking candidates—typically, board members are nominated by someone they already know on the board or in the administration—and a willingness to be creative during the search...

Candidates in the two states holding elections for governor this fall are focusing more on jobs, taxes, and the economy than on higher education in their closely contested races. Still, President Obama's goal for the nation to be atop the world by 2020 in measures of college completion has resonated in Virginia, where both contenders are calling on the state's institutions to award tens of thousands more two- and four-year degrees in the coming years...

The Senate Finance Committee approved its bill Tuesday to overhaul the American health care system, pushing Democrats’ reform efforts closer to reality, but still leaving plenty of ambiguity in the plan to be worked out by Congress and the White House. One issue still unresolved is what, if any, provisions the final legislation (which, it’s widely agreed, will end up looking a lot like the Finance Committee’s bill) will make for college students and campus-based health plans. As it exists after clearing committee, the Senate bill seems, perhaps inadvertently, to leave no room for college-provided student insurance plans...