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For the second consecutive year, the University of Georgia exceeded half a billion dollars in research and development expenditures. Its $570.9 million total in fiscal year 2023 represented another record high in R&D activity and marks the fifth consecutive year of growth for the university. Expenditures have increased, in fact, in all but one year since 2013. During that 10-year period, the university has seen an overall 63% increase in total R&D expenditures.

As students return to campus fresh from holiday break, one building is welcoming students for the very first time. Situated on University of Georgia’s South Campus, the 70,000-plus square-foot Poultry Science Building is the new home for the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences Department of Poultry Science. The new building provides nearly double the space per student in each classroom, growing from roughly 17 square feet to 28 to 30 square feet per student.

The face of Ag Hill is changing, with millions of dollars in capital improvements and new facilities in the works, and both the University of Georgia and the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences are committed to supporting the mission and the tradition the hill represents. Now known as Science and Ag Hill to recognize the location as a hub for a variety of related disciplines on South Campus — including agricultural, poultry and food sciences as well as chemistry, biology, physics, statistics, geography and geology — the area holds both academic and historic significance.

Poultry has grown to become the top commodity in Georgia’s No. 1 industry, agriculture. Acquainting school-aged students with potential career paths in avian science is critical to staffing the state's poultry sector. Building on the foundation set by Avian Academy, the University of Georgia College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences worked with the Georgia Department of Education to create middle- and high-school poultry science curricula.

University of Georgia College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences students hailing from Hall County, Georgia, will soon be eligible for scholarship support thanks to the generosity of Gainesville natives Doug and Kay Ivester. A $200,000 endowment to fund the newly established Abit Massey/Ivester Foundation Scholarship Fund will support CAES students who either graduated from a high school located in Gainesville, Georgia, or Hall County, Georgia, or who are Hall County residents.

The 2023 cohort of Rural Scholars brings a wide range of interests and ambitions with them as they complete their first semester at the University of Georgia’s College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences. The third round of students recruited through the CAES Rural Scholars Program includes Jay Lavender of Statham, Georgia; Ashley Rowell of Douglas, Georgia; and Willow Waldrep of Forsyth, Georgia.