Pigskin Pre-Game, Business Barometer, girls rock on WGNS

MTSU faculty, alumni and staff shared the latest campus happenings during the July 20 “Action Line” program with veteran host Bart Walker.

The live program was broadcast on FM 100.5, 101.9 and AM 1450 from the WGNS studio in downtown Murfreesboro. If you missed it, you can listen to a podcast of the show here.

Guests included:

• Paul Wydra, assistant director of the Office of Alumni Relations, discussed the upcoming annual Pigskin Pre-Game to kickoff the MTSU football season.

Set for 6 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 8, this year’s event will be a fundraiser for the Alumni Legacy Scholarship and also will help serve as the grand opening for The Grove at Williamson Place. The site is located at 3250 Wilkinson Pike in Murfreesboro, just off Medical Center Parkway across from Embassy Suites Hilton and near Interstate 24 adjacent to the strawberry picking patch.

MTSU guests on the July 20 WGNS “Action Line” program included above, left to right: Paul Wydra, assistant director in the Office of Alumni Relations, and Dr. Tim Graeff, director of the MTSU Office of Consumer Research, and below, Jason Manley, alumnus and volunteer at the 13th annual Southern Girls Rock & Roll Camp. (MTSU photo illustration)

Tickets for the event are $35 each. Attendees must prepay and make reservations by 4:30 p.m. Wednesday, Aug. 5, to secure tickets.

Read the full story and find contact information at www.mtsunews.com/2015-pigskin-pregame.

• Dr. Tim Graeff, marketing professor and director of the MTSU Office of Consumer Research, discussed the statewide Tennessee Business Barometer recently launched by MTSU and the Tennessee Chamber of Commerce & Industry.

The Tennessee Business Barometer is a new quarterly index capturing the mood and outlook of business leaders statewide through online surveys.

Conducted July 1-8, the inaugural survey indicates Tennessee business leaders are optimistic about the future growth of their businesses. And the current survey highlights some of the top challenges shared among business leaders, what Graeff describes as a “big five” — staffing, health care costs, regulation, political uncertainty and economic uncertainty.

• MTSU alumnus Jason Manley, a volunteer at the upcoming Southern Girls Rock & Roll Camp at MTSU, discussed what campers will be doing at the 13th annual event on campus.

Manley, now an eighth grade English teacher at Siegel Middle School, is a music lover who has volunteered at the camp the past six years

Registration remains open and scholarships are still available for a fun-filled week of rock, rhythm and recording information at the camp, set July 27-31 at MTSU. The camp is open to girls ages 10 to 17.

Read the full story and find contact information at www.mtsunews.com/sgrrc-2015-registration.

Students, faculty and staff who are interested in guesting on WGNS to promote their MTSU-related activities should contact Jimmy Hart, director of news and media relations, at 615-898-5131 or via email at jimmy.hart@mtsu.edu.