Daily Lumina News 080923

Inside California’s oldest prison, a $380 million plan to ‘reimagine’ incarceration is sparking a mix of hope and fear. Governor Gavin Newsom's initiative aims to transform San Quentin prison, emphasizing education, rehabilitation, and prisoner re-entry.
To do that, San Quentin is building on some of its existing programming, including a media center where incarcerated people produce award-winning podcasts, films, and the San Quentin newspaper. But on the minds of many is who will be left behind by the reforms and whether a system so deeply rooted in punishment can actually transform its culture.

The dust was still settling from the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling against affirmative action when, less than a week later, around 300 students of color at Western Illinois University got an unexpected email from the university: a $1,000 scholarship they’d been promised just months early would no longer be available.
WIU ultimately reversed the decision. But the move has equity advocates worried. Colleges are going over race-conscious practices with a fine-toothed comb, anticipating future legal challenges. And many fear they’re sacrificing values at the altar of prudence.

Since generative-artificial intelligence models like ChatGPT surfaced last November, they’ve caused a frenzy in college classrooms. Professors report that students are using ChatGPT to write essays or complete math homework. Many instructors are leveraging anti-plagiarism software or tweaking assignments to try to prevent cheating.
To computer scientists, however, the rise of AI is no different than the advent of the pocket calculator or the Google search engine: It’s a tool that, if used correctly, can help people learn faster and think on a deeper level.

For more than a million students each year, the college process starts with logging on to the Common App, the online application that can submitted to 1,000-plus colleges and universities.
But for about a quarter of those students, the process stops there: Although they set up a student profile and begin working on at least one application, they ultimately don’t complete or submit any. Now, for the first time, this population of almost 300,000 is being studied, as researchers look for clues about how to get these students on to campuses.

The University of Virginia is the latest school to change its legacy admissions policies since a civil rights group's federal complaint challenging the process was filed days after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down affirmative action.
The University of Virginia is not the only school to change its policies recently. Here's what to know about legacy admissions and a look at schools that are altering their stances.

More than half of higher education institutions targeted in ransomware attacks paid a ransom to get their data back, according to a new report from U.K.-based cybersecurity firm Sophos.
The report sheds light on how colleges respond to ransomware attacks, in which cybercriminals encrypt data or threaten to sell it unless an institution pays a ransom for its return. Although colleges are usually tight-lipped about whether they have paid ransoms, the survey results suggest this recovery method is commonplace.