Mississippi Today
Ole Miss to close diversity division
The University of Mississippi plans to shutter its Division of Diversity and Community Engagement following a yearlong internal review, the chancellor announced in a campus-wide email Friday.
In its place, the state’s flagship university will create a Division of Access, Opportunity and Community Engagement to redouble its efforts to help more students attend and graduate college amid the looming enrollment cliff facing Mississippi’s institutions of higher learning.
“We are steadfast in our commitment to the transformative power of higher education, and now is the time to prioritize our efforts to broaden access to higher education,” Chancellor Glenn Boyce wrote in the campus-wide email. “However, access alone is not enough. We must be committed to providing opportunities that cultivate academic attainment which leads to meaningful lives and careers.”
The changes come without a ban in Mississippi, as has occurred elsewhere, on state spending on diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives and just three years after the university announced an ambitious plan for diversity on campus called “Pathways to Equity.”
In higher education, DEI traditionally refers to a range of administrative efforts to comply with civil rights laws and foster a sense of on-campus belonging among those populations. But in Mississippi and across the country, some Republicans and influential conservative think tanks have argued that DEI is more nefarious.
In particular, State Auditor Shad White has repeatedly warned about what he sees as the dangers of DEI in speeches, interviews and on social media.
“We’re glad universities are responding to public pressure to end these controversial, racist programs,” White’s communications director, Jacob Walters, wrote in a text message. “But a university saying they’re doing this is like Mississippi Today saying they’re a legitimate news organization; just because you say it doesn’t mean it’s true. We’ll continue to keep Mississippi taxpayers informed on whether their money is spent on controversial programming.”
Boyce’s statement did not make reference to potential anti-DEI legislation in Mississippi. A bill that would have done so died in committee this past session.
Most universities across Mississippi have already implemented changes to their diversity offices, Mississippi Today reported earlier this month.
But unlike its counterparts, Ole Miss says it will submit its proposal to the governing board of all eight universities in Mississippi, the Institutions of Higher Learning Board of Trustees.
Neither the University of Southern Mississippi nor Mississippi State University submitted the changes made to their diversity offices to IHL.
“We did not have to seek IHL for the change, as it was simply a change in the office name,” Nicole Ruhnke, USM’s chief communications officer, wrote in an email.
Mississippi State University did not request approval from IHL for its internal reorganization of the Division of Access, Opportunity and Success because it typically only submits name changes for academic units or the naming of colleges in honor of major donors, according to an email from the university’s vice president for strategic communications.
“That said, our leadership maintains a robust dialogue with IHL’s leadership on almost all matters,” Sid Salter wrote in an email.
At Ole Miss, the new division will oversee three areas, according to Boyce’s email and a press release that he linked to: “Access and Community Engagement,” “Access and Opportunity” and “Access and Compliance.”
Several university offices and functions will be brought under its aegis, including Equal Opportunity and Regulatory Compliance, Student Disability Services, Digital Accessibility, the Bonner Leaders Program and Ole Miss Opportunity, which is a last-dollar scholarship for low-income students from Mississippi.
“The mission for our division will enable us to better address the unique needs of our community and ensure that every individual has the support they need to thrive,” the division’s vice chancellor, Shawnboda Mead, said in the release. “This will enhance pathways for success, opportunity and achievement.”
The press release also mentioned the statewide Ascent to 55% initiative, which seeks to grow the number of Mississippians with a college degree or equivalent credential.
A major challenge for this initiative is the enrollment cliff facing Mississippi, a trend in which the state will have less high school graduates going to college. The press release notes that from the 2017 to 2022 school years, the number of Mississippians graduating from high school and attending college in-state dropped by nearly 7%.
This has partly fueled enrollment declines at universities across Mississippi, particularly at the regional institutions like Delta State University and Mississippi University for Women.
But not so much at Ole Miss. Though the university’s enrollment has stayed roughly the same since 2014, it has recently seen a record-sized freshmen class, largely due to increasing enrollment of mostly white, out-of-state students, according to IHL data.
In his email, Boyce thanked members of the campus community who contributed to a yearlong organizational and program review of the division. It’s not clear who he consulted.
“I appreciate the members of our campus community who provided invaluable feedback and guidance,” Boyce wrote.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Mississippi Today
Late and missed Medicaid rides triple the contractual limit in July
Six percent of rides provided by the company that coordinates Medicaid recipients’ transportation to medical appointments โ or three times the allowable limit โ were late or missed in July.
The company’s first report to the Division of Medicaid since assuming the contract for transportation services indicated that five percent of scheduled rides were late, and one percent was missed, said Medicaid spokesperson Matt Westerfield.
The company’s contract states that no more than two percent of scheduled rides should be late or missed each day.
For-profit, Denver-based Modivcare is working to lower the percentage of rides that are late or missed, said company spokesperson Melody Lai in an email.
โWe utilize data and close partnerships with healthcare facilities, transportation providers, and members across the state to continuously improve service,โ she said.
Modivcare, which began its three-year, $96.5 million contract with the state on June 8 of this year, scheduled over 52,000 trips with beneficiaries in July.
About 3,000 of the rides were late or missed.
Nearly 40,000 rides were completed after cancellations made by both Medicaid recipients and drivers in July. Thirty-seven trips took 45 minutes longer than average.
Modivcare’s contract mandates it submit monthly reports detailing late or missed trips, along with other information.
Despite filing a public records request, Mississippi Today did not obtain a copy of the company’s first monthly report. The Division of Medicaid indicated that the reports could contain proprietary, third-party trade secrets and that Modivcare had the right to obtain a protective order prohibiting the release of the records.
State Medicaid programs are required to provide rides to doctor appointments to health plan recipients. States can manage the benefit directly, provide the service through Medicaid managed care contracts or contract with a third-party broker, like Mississippi.
Modivcare subcontracts with local transportation companies to provide rides to beneficiaries. Late or missed trips are considered the fault of the transportation companies that provide rides to beneficiaries, Westerfield said.
Mississippi Today last month reported that a woman who uses a wheelchair missed four doctors appointments after Modivcare assumed responsibility for the service in June. She said drivers refused to give her a ride on two occasions because they did not feel comfortable securing her mobility device. On another occasion, Modivcare told her there were no available drivers with the capacity to transport a wheelchair. Another time, the driver did not show up to the location she indicated.
Modivcare’s contract with the Division of Medicaid requires that each wheelchair vehicle have a wheelchair securement device that meets American with Disabilities Act guidelines.
People with disabilities are some of the most frequent users of the service.
Modivcare has been penalized for a high volume of late or missed rides in other states.
The New Jersey Department of Human Services fined Modivcare $1.7 million between 2017 and 2022 for failing to meet its contractual obligations, including missing scheduled pickups, reported the Bergen Record. The New Jersey Legislature considered a bill in 2023 to establish performance and reporting standards for Medicaid transportation services, but the legislation died in committee.
This month, The Maine Monitor wrote that patients have reported missing appointments and being refused rides by the company, which provides transportation services to 16 counties in Maine.
In Georgia, Modivcare and Southeasttrans, another non-emergency medical transportation company, were fined over $1 million from 2018 to 2020 for picking up patients late, KFF reported.
Modivcare was the lowest bidder during the contract selection process in Mississippi. The agency chose it over Medical Transportation Management, Inc., the previous contractor, and Verida, Inc.
Westerfield said that when the number of late or missed trips exceeds the two percent threshold, the division works with the company to correct the issue. If the issue persists, the company will receive official warning letters and the division could choose to seek damages.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Mississippi Today
On this day in 1968
Sept. 17, 1968
Diahann Carroll starred in the title role in โJuliaโ โ the first Black actress to star in a non-stereotypical role in her own television series.
She grew up loving singing, dancing and performing in the theater, and she began modeling for Ebony magazine at 15. Three years later, she appeared on the TV show, โChance of a Lifetime,โ taking home the top prize for her performance of the song, โWhy Was I Born?โ That same year, she acted in the film, โCarmen Jonesโ, and appeared in the Broadway musical โHouse of Flowersโ.
In her TV show โJuliaโ, her performance garnered an Emmy nomination for her, and she won a Golden Globe for Best Actress in a Television Series. Mattel even created a Barbie in her image.
After โJuliaโ ended, she returned to Broadway and Hollywood, earning an Academy Award nomination for her performance in the 1974 film โClaudineโ. She went on to portray Dominique Deveraux in the primetime soap opera โDynastyโ. In 1996, she became the first African American to play the role of Norma Desmond in the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical, โSunset Boulevardโ.
Carroll devoted much of her time to the Celebrity Action Council, which works with women in rehabilitation from problems with drugs, alcohol or prostitution. Eight years before she died in 2019, she was inducted into the Television Academy Hall of Fame.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Mississippi Today
Favre loses another round in lawsuit agaisnt ex-talk show host
Former โUndisputedโ host Shannon Sharpe remains undefeated in his defense of critical remarks toward fellow NFL Hall of Famer Brett Favre.
On Monday, the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals rejected a request by Favre to resurrect a defamation lawsuit against Sharpe, who said on his Sept. 14, 2023, show that the former Southern Miss and Green Bay Packers quarterback stole funds from the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families government program meant for those living in poverty.
Favre hasn’t been charged in the scandal in which six people have been convicted of state and federal charges involving $77 million in federal TANF funds.
In 2022, the state Department of Human Services sued Favre and many others to try and recoup the $77 million that was illegally diverted between 2016 and 2019. A year earlier, the department had sought to recover $1.1 million in TANF funds that Favre received for speeches he never delivered. (The speaking fees had come through the nonprofit Mississippi Community Education Center.)
After a Sept. 13, 2022, article appeared in Mississippi Today, Sharpe said on the Fox Sports show, โSkip and Shannon: Undisputed,โ that โBretty Favre is taking money from the underservedโ and that he โstole money from people that really needed that money.โ
Favre sent Sharpe a letter, demanding a retraction and asking him to stop making any โfurther defamatory falsehoods against Favre.โ
Sharpe refused, and Favre sued for defamation, saying that Sharpe had falsely accused him of serious crimes and hurt his reputation. Sharpe responded that his remarks are โa classic example of the king of rhetorical hyperbole and loose, figurative languageโ protected by the First Amendment.
A federal judge ruled in Sharpe’s favor, and so did the 5th Circuit. โNothing in life or our law guarantees a person immunity from occasional sharp criticism,โ 5th Circuit District Judge Leslie H. Southwick wrote.
Favre has paid back the $1.1 million, but State Auditor Shad White said in February that Favre still owed more than $700,000 in interest.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
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