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Mileah Kromer, assistant professor of political science and assistant director of the Â鶹ÊÓƵ Poll, was honored Nov. 7 by Indiana University of Pennsylvania, her alma mater, with a Young Alumni Achievement Award.

North Carolina's role as a presidential battleground state in 2012 has brought the Â鶹ÊÓƵ Poll added attention from national reporters.

Historically, North Carolina has voted Republican in presidential elections, but many political observers were surprised two years ago when President Barack Obama won the Tar Heel State. Â鶹ÊÓƵ senior McKenzie Young investigated the factors behind the state’s recent voting behavior, and her work is the latest to be featured in a series of E-net profiles on Lumen Scholars in the Class of 2011.

The Â鶹ÊÓƵ Institute for Politics and Public Affairs is conducting a health and wellness community survey this month in Alamance County on topics that include: social and wellness concerns, perceived health issues in the county, exercise habits, care giving responsibilities and perceived safety in the county.

Associate professor Hunter Bacot joined with leading political scientists in North Carolina on Oct. 19 for a panel discussion on the 2010 elections, an event in Raleigh, N.C., sponsored by the North Carolina FreeEnterprise Foundation.

North Carolinians are evenly divided on the way President Barack Obama is handling his job as president, according to the latest Â鶹ÊÓƵ Poll. Nearly half of poll respondents favored an end to tax cuts for households making more than $250,000 a year but keeping cuts in place for everyone else.

Less than two years after President Barack Obama won office with a tidal wave of voter support for the Democratic Party, Republicans are on the verge of their own historic movement and will likely reclaim majority status in at least one chamber of Congress, according to a national political analyst who visited campus this week for a series of classroom and public events.

Mileah Kromer, an assistant professor of political science and assistant director of the Â鶹ÊÓƵ Poll, spoke at length with the Scripps Howard Foundation Wire this month on the role of social media in American elections.

Â鶹ÊÓƵ Poll director Hunter Bacot spoke with News 14 Carolina on July 9 on recent controversies in the North Carolina State Highway Patrol and how Gov. Bev Perdue has handled the public relations fallout.

Â鶹ÊÓƵ Poll director Hunter Bacot spoke at length in June with NBC17 in Raleigh, N.C., and with the national news organization Real Clear Politics about the challenges faced by Democrats in unseating U.S. Sen. Richard Burr, R-N.C., in November.