Testosterone Replacement Therapy in George Mason, VA

AMHERST, Mass. - The University of Massachusetts softball team is off to Virginia for the final three-game series of the regular season against the George Mason Patriots on Friday, May 5 and Saturday, May 6.

Last Time Out Massachusetts dropped their final home contest of the season to the Merrimack Warriors by a score of 6-1. The lone Minutewoman run of the contest belongs to Chloe Whittier, who was plated by Bella Pantoja. Jessie DiPasquale put in 4.0 innings of work, logging nine strikeouts and allowing six hits before Jenna Bradley took over, tallying a strikeout and allowing three hits in the remaining 3.0 innings in the circle.

Scouting The Patriots George Mason currently sits at 29-20 on the season and 14-9 in Atlantic 10 play. Nicole Bechtel leads the team at the plate with a .351 average, followed closely behind by Haley Taormina at .349 and Elyssa DeRosa at .347. Taormina leads the squad in RBI on the season with 40 alongside in hits with 53, multiple base hits with 20 and home runs with 6. In the circle, Aly Rayle has posted a 2.40 ERA in 154.1 innings pitched. With a 13-8 record on the season, she has logged 182 strikeouts and allowed 53 earned runs in 28 appearances and 26 games started. Carly Cooper has gotten the nod in 13 game and seen action in 21, posting a 3.39 ERA in 76.1 innings pitched. Cooper has tallied 39 strikeouts and allowed 37 earned runs throughout the season, having gone 5-5 so far.

Looking Ahead The Atlantic 10 Tournament is set for Wednesday, May 10 to Saturday, May 15 and will be hosted by Fordham University at Bahoshy Field in Bronx, N.Y.

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PJ Maddox, EdD, MSN, RN

Caroline Sutter, DNP

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During the past several years, industry demand for a skilled life science workforce has been surging. In Virginia, while there are currently shortages in almost all health-related professions, little is known about whether there is an adequate supply of life science workers to meet the needs of employers. Now George Mason University is working toward a solution.

In partnership with Phoenix Advantage, a Virginia-based economic development and business consulting firm, Caroline Sutter of Mason’s College of Public Health; Amy Adams, executive director of the Institute for Biohealth Innovation; and their team have received a life science talent pathway planning grant from GO Virginia, a state-funded initiative administered by the Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development.

With the assistance of the award, they will be assessing life science employer needs, employment trends, workforce supply, and demand projections in Northern Virginia. Provided that future funding is secured, they intend to use their findings to facilitate the expansion of the life science worker pipeline.

“A robust workforce is a vital component of a thriving life science industry,” said Susan Baker, managing director of GO Virginia. "GO Virginia is proud to support an effort to establish Northern Virginia as an area that is able to respond to the needs of a steadily growing market."

According to Adams, the first step of the project will be to create a comprehensive list of companies who hire individuals in the life science sector, such as digital health firms and biomanufacturers. From there, Phoenix Advantage will schedule interviews with the identified employers in order to better understand their priorities and what they consider to be the ideal skillset in the future workforce.

In tandem, the Mason Center for Health Workforce (MCHW), directed by Sutter and P. J. Maddox, will leverage data from the Commonwealth of Virginia to assess the future pipeline of workers, including secondary school and higher education students. Established in 2022, the MCHW plays a leading role in health workforce planning and development across Virginia. The center has collected extensive data related to health workers and will expand to include life science personnel with this project.

“The health care workforce is in flux; demand is high just as burnout, turnover, and rising labor costs are diminishing the supply of qualified staff,” said Sutter, who is also an associate professor in Mason’s School of Nursing. “The Mason Center for Health Workforce helps organizations, communities, and the commonwealth use data for decision-making to create short-term solutions and long-term strategies.”

Seeing tremendous value in the team’s effort to optimize life science workforce preparedness, the Claude Moore Foundation, a nonprofit organization in Virginia and a key funder of the MCHW, provided matching funds for the planning grant.

“The vibrancy and growth of the life science ecosystem in Northern Virginia depends in part on our ability to understand workforce needs and to attract and train talent,” said Bill Hazel, the senior deputy director of the Claude Moore Foundation. “This grant will allow us to inventory those needs and to strengthen our talent pipeline.”

The next step of the project will be to identify existing education and training programs so that redundancies can be avoided and potential gaps can be addressed. Finally, an analysis will be performed on how workers and employers are currently matched in the life sciences industry.

Adams said she believes the Northern Virginia region has immense potential to be the destination for life science companies to reside and prosper. She added that she hopes the team’s work will result in the formation of programs that motivate students to pursue careers in the life sciences.

“We want to reach students at early stages and show them that the life science career path is one that is extremely rewarding; you are able to touch many lives around the world by developing innovative solutions to advance health,” said Adams. “By sparking inspiration, we can also help companies in our region flourish by ensuring access to a well-prepared and sufficiently sized workforce—both are what drive us.”

George Mason University will graduate its largest class in history this week, and perhaps its most traveled as well—the nearly 11,000 honorees hail from 111 countries, 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and military installations.

Spring Commencement is set for 10 a.m. Thursday, May 18, at EagleBank Arena on the Fairfax Campus, with doors opening at 8:30 a.m. Tickets are required for guests to enter the arena, and wristbands are required for students.

Mason, the largest and most diverse public university in Virginia, will award 10,220 degrees for graduates who have filed an intent to graduate from Summer 2022, Fall 2022, and Spring 2023. The university also will award 721 certificates.

Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin is the featured speaker, continuing a long tradition of the state’s chief executive addressing Mason graduates. Galilea Sejas-Machado, graduating with a bachelor’s degree in sociology and another in criminology, law and society, is the student speaker.

The university will present its highest honor, the Mason Medal, to Kimmy Duong, a Northern Virginia tech entrepreneur who supports Mason in many ways, including by awarding scholarships through her foundation.

The Class of 2023 reflects the university’s mission of access as well as its leading role in supplying tech talent to the region. About one in four graduates reports that they are first-generation degree earners and one in three bachelor’s degree recipients are in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields. Two of the top three master’s programs with the most 2023 graduates are data analytics engineering and computer science, and two of the top five doctorate majors are information technology and computer science.

The new graduates might find encouragement in the success of their predecessors. According to a Mason Career Plans Survey, 87% of Class of 2022 graduates report a positive career outcome with a median salary of $72,000.

Some Commencement day procedures for graduates and their guests have been changed. Graduates participating in Spring Commencement must check in with their Mason ID or G# at Wilkins Plaza no later than 9 a.m. Thursday to receive a wristband, then line up for the procession to the arena.

Non-ticketed guests and students without wristbands will be directed to the Concert Hall at the Center for the Arts on Mason Pond Drive where they can watch the ceremony live on screen. The livestream will be available on Mason’s mainYouTube channel and on the Mason homepage.

As in previous ceremonies, doctoral candidates will be individually recognized and hooded. Graduates receiving bachelor’s and master’s degrees will be recognized as a group at their seats.

The top five undergraduate majors among the 6,265 undergraduates in the Class of 2023 are business; information technology; psychology; criminology, law and society; and computer science.

For the 3,478 students earning master’s degrees, the top five majors are data analytics engineering, curriculum and instruction, computer science, special education, and business administration.

The top majors for the 337 students earning doctoral degrees are education, psychology, economics, information technology, and computer science.

There also are 140 law school graduates. The Scalia Law School will hold a convocation Friday at the Center for the Arts.

Speed and power, respectively, have propelled the George Mason and Virginia baseball teams into the NCAA Tournament.

The Patriots, making their first NCAA Tournament appearance in nearly a decade, have set a program record and are fourth nationally in stolen bases — paced by infielder South Trimble, a former standout for Cox High in Virginia Beach.

UVA has pounded opposing pitchers into submission with an offense that includes ACC Player of the Year Kyle Teel and Jake Gelof, who have combined for 34 home runs and 144 RBIs.

George Mason plays overall No. 1 seed Wake Forest in a tournament opener at 7 p.m. Friday in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, after the Cavaliers host Army at noon. Double-elimination regionals continue through the weekend.

George Mason (35-24) is making its eighth NCAA Tournament appearance and its first since 2014. The Patriots’ 35 victories under first-year coach Shawn Camp are their most since that 2014 team’s.

Trimble, a senior, is tied for 25th nationally with 30 stolen bases; Derek Wood, a junior, has 29 swipes; Jordan Smith, a junior outfielder from Kellam High in Virginia Beach, has 22 steals.

George Mason won 13 of its final 19 regular-season games — six by one run — and has won 18 of its past 24 games.

The Patriots then won the Atlantic 10 Tournament with three elimination-game victories en route to the program’s second conference title in program history. George Mason played its way through the elimination bracket and won back-to-back games against Saint Louis at The Diamond in Richmond to claim the A-10 tourney title.

Trimble leads the Patriots with a .322 batting average and has 16 doubles, three home runs and 37 RBIs. Smith is batting .293 with 13 doubles, seven home runs and 38 RBIs.

“We just bit down on the mouth guard and kept punching and punching and punching and it ended up working out,” Trimble said after the championship game on gomason.com. “Great win, great win.

“It means everything,” Trimble added. “This is why we put in so much work in the offseason.”

George Mason and Wake Forest are joined in their four-team regional by Maryland and Northeastern, who play at 1 p.m. Friday in an opener.

Virginia, meanwhile, hosts an NCAA regional in Charlottesville for the 10th time in coach Brian O’Connor’s 20 seasons. UVA, the national champion in 2015, is hosting a regional for the first time since 2016.

“It’s a great feather in our cap,” O’Connor said during an interview posted at virginiasports.com. “It says what the NCAA committee thinks of our team, and we’re proud of that. That said, the slate is wiped clean now. We’ve played the whole year to earn this host site and top-eight national seed. But the teams we’re playing this weekend don’t care about that.”

Virginia’s offense includes four players batting .369 or better, led by Teel at .414. Teel has 12 home runs and 60 RBIs, and Gelof has 22 homers and 84 RBIs. Griff O’Ferrall (.393), former Cox High standout Ethan Anderson (.377) and Ethan O’Donnell (.369) are among the other lineup stalwarts. Oklahoma and ECU play in Charlottesville at 7 p.m. Friday in an opener in UVA’s four-team regional.

Josh Grosz, a junior right-hander and another Cox High grad, has started 15 games for ECU, compiling a 4-2 record and 3.65 ERA with 79 strikeouts over 74 innings.

Charlottesville Regional Friday’s games Army (38-16) vs. Virginia (45-12), noon, ESPN+ Oklahoma (31-26) vs. East Carolina (45-17), 7 p.m., ESPN2

Winston-Salem Regional Friday’s games Maryland (41-19) vs. Northeastern (44-14), 1 p.m., ESPN+ George Mason (34-25) vs. Wake Forest (47-10), 7 p.m., ESPN

Kara Durrette/AP

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Virginia catcher Ethan Anderson, a Cox High graduate, is a key part of a Cavaliers team that gained the No. 7 national seed in the NCAA baseball tournament. KARA DURRETTE/AP

George Mason University is providing a new resource to help local communities deal with current and potential problems prompted by climate change.

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TRANSCRIPT OF VIDEO

ANGIE MILES: Penny Matthews says she and her husband have labored with love to restore and maintain their Accomack County home of nearly 50 years. But now there are problems like more backyard flooding and...

PENNY MATTHEWS (Accomack resident): The hard surface road 48 years ago was fine. Now in the last number of years continually it has flooded to the point I can't even drive down and I can't have company. I get to church some days and can't get back home.

ANGIE MILES: She wants the county to address it.

PENNY MATTHEWS: I stay in, upset over it, all the time. When I hear a storm's coming, or we're going to have high tides. And people can't come to visit me. I feel locked in, back here.

JESSICA STEELMAN (Accomack-Northampton Planning District Commission): Miss Matthew's situation is very common on the shore. As a matter of fact, there's about 33 miles of roads just like that. So, hers is just a small snippet of a very much larger regional problem.

ANGIE MILES: Jessica Steelman is the coastal planner for the quasi-governmental Accomack-Northampton Planning District Commission. She has her eye on what residents need to safeguard against the effects of climate change.

JESSICA STEELMAN: My goal is to develop the community resilience and sustainability plan to be project focused and identify critical needs for the shore.

ANGIE MILES: Eastern Shore residents have long worked with nonprofits like the Nature Conservancy, and with various university partners, Virginia Tech, the University of Virginia, William and Mary, to create workable solutions for sea level rise, flooding, erosion, and habitat protection. Now they have another academic resource available in George Mason's new Virginia Climate Center, a set of faculty from across disciplines working together to offer protections for the whole state.

JIM KINTER (Researcher, Virginia Climate Center at GMU): People have become accustomed to the climate that we've had for the many decades that we've been alive. And the problem is that that's not the climate we're going to have. In fact, it's not the climate we have today. We're trying to help people prepare for what we're calling the inevitable changes associated with global warming. And that means building resilience to more severe weather. It means understanding what the threats are, where the most vulnerable communities are, and helping them understand their threats, as well as come up with solutions.

ANGIE MILES: Kinter says all of Virginia is vulnerable because of climate change, but that the threats vary by region.

JIM KINTER: So, for example, if you look at Eastern Shore, if you look at Norfolk and Virginia Beach, the Tidewater area of the Potomac, James and York Rivers, those are all being threatened by sea level rise. Sea level rise is a consequence of global warming.

ANGIE MILES: This center exists to assist professionals like Steelman, as they create and implement climate resilience plans. The Northern Virginia Regional Commission is already partnering with GMU's new center as northern localities deal with issues like flash flooding.

JIM KINTER: The rainfall in this area has already become considerably more intense than it was even 30 or 40 years ago, and we project that it's going to continue to get more intense for the next 30 or 40 years. So that the flash floods that we might have considered to be a hundred-year event back in the 1960s, will now be a 20-year event or even maybe a 10-year event.

ANGIE MILES: Urban areas of the state also contend with trapped heat that intensifies as the world gets hotter.

JIM KINTER: As the whole planet warms up as a result of carbon dioxide concentration, the cities are warming up even faster. We have elderly populations and disadvantaged communities where heat is a big issue, not to mention the fact that people who have to work outdoors are susceptible to heat. In the more rural parts, the western part of the state, there the issue is drought, where we, even though it's going to be raining more intensely when it rains, we will have more prolonged periods without rainfall and that will lead to drought. And in our agricultural areas, that's a very serious threat.

ANGIE MILES: For local governments in coastal, urban, and rural areas of the commonwealth, The Virginia Climate Center intends over time to become a useful partner for as many communities as possible.