Nation Digest: University of Texas Quits National Merit Scholarship Program

TEXAS

UT Turns Away From Merit Scholarships

The University of Texas at Austin is pulling out of the National Merit Scholarship Program to focus on needs-based financial assistance.

The 50,000-student university said budget pressures were forcing an end to its participation in the merit-based program, which awards scholarships to top high school achievers. The university emphasized that it will still honor all existing commitments to National Merit Scholars, including those who entered as freshmen this year.

Starting in the fall semester of 2010, the university will begin redirecting the scholarship money to financial assistance programs designed to help students who have a hard time paying for tuition and fees. UT had 281 National Merit Scholars enroll as freshmen last year, second only to Harvard's 285.

Over the last decade, nearly every state has started or expanded politically popular "merit aid" programs that reward students with high SAT scores or GPAs. But the economic downturn and the surge in demand for need-based aid have caused a number of institutions to rethink that trend.

-- Associated Press

DIPLOMACY

U.S., Cuba to Talk About Mail Service

The United States and Cuba will start talks this month on resuming direct mail service for the first time in nearly half a century, U.S. officials said Tuesday.

The negotiations, set for Sept. 17, follow talks in July on the legal immigration of Cubans to the United States, according to the officials. The two sides agreed on the two sets of discussions in late May, a month after President Obama eased travel and financial restrictions on Americans with family members in Cuba.

The officials spoke on the condition of anonymity because details of the negotiations are still being decided.

Direct postal service between the United States and Cuba was ended in 1963, and since then mail has had to go through third countries.

-- Associated Press

Kuwaiti Denied Release From Guantanamo: A judge has ruled that the U.S. government does not have to release a Kuwaiti man held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, saying that evidence suggests the man was part of a terrorist force. Fawzi al-Odah, 32, said he traveled to Afghanistan a month before the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States not to join the Taliban and al-Qaeda but to teach Islam to the poor. U.S. government attorneys argued at an Aug. 11 hearing that Odah had a "consuming interest" in Islamist terrorism and trained at a Taliban-operated camp.

-- Associated Press