Carolina Hurricanes give NC State marketing students an education in merchandise
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- NC State students worked with Hurricanes merchandise and marketing professionals.
- Winning student team proposed regular Hurricanes pop-up shops at local breweries.
- NC AAUP membership rose from 340 in April 2025 to nearly 830 by March 2026.
Hello reader! Welcome to Higher Stakes, your weekly update on what’s happening at colleges and universities in the Triangle. I’m Jane Winik Sartwell, higher education reporter at The News & Observer.
Let’s get into it.
Textile & marketing students at NC State pitched their merch ideas to Carolina Hurricanes
How about those Carolina Hurricanes?! I, for one, could not be more excited that we are Stanley Cup champions.
It’s a win that builds on months of anticipation and pride in Raleigh.
Students in a course called Textile Brand Communications and Promotions at NC State got a chance to be a part of the Stanley Cup fervor. In that course, under the tutelage of professor Delisia Matthews, students learn advertising strategies from a textiles perspective.
This semester, a group of students worked with merchandise and marketing professionals at the Carolina Hurricanes.
“The Hurricanes asked them to think about people who are Raleigh transplants, those not originally from the area, because it’s booming here,” Matthews said. “How can we get them interested in becoming fans of the Hurricanes, and also help them see how it could be a part of their welcome to the Raleigh-Durham area?”
Students pitched their marketing ideas to the Hurricanes. The winning group, led by fashion and textile management student Ava McRorie, recommended the Hurricanes implement regular pop-up shops for merchandise at local breweries, even into the off-season.
McRorie says she wants to go into sports merchandising, so the chance to connect with people like Natalie Gore, the senior marketing coordinator for the Carolina Hurricanes, was a dream come true.
“I don’t know how many professional sports teams exist in the same city as a premier public textiles university, but we obviously do, and that’s a fantastic resource,” Gore said.
‘Ready for Life: Adulting 101.’ UNC’s School of Civic Life dean wraps up course for high school students
Faculty and staff at UNC-Chapel Hill’s School of Civic Life and Leadership helped teach a course at J.F. Webb High School in Oxford, N.C., this spring.
The course — titled Ready for Life: Adulting 101 — educated 14 students on the real-world experience of being a citizen: voting, employment, financial literacy, jury duty, serving on a board or committee, getting a driver’s license.
The civics section was taught by faculty and students at the School of Civic Life and Leadership — including dean Jed Atkins. The course culminated in a field trip from Oxford to Chapel Hill.
“We’re taking civics away from the dry facts in a textbook and putting primary texts like the Constitution hand in glove with life skills and life knowledge,” Atkins said. “That’s a powerful part of this course. I think the time is right, honestly, to rethink the way we do civic education.”
Next year, the course will be offered at J.F. Webb and South Granville High School in both the fall and spring semesters.
NC president of American Association of University Professors recognized nationally
Belle Boggs, an English professor at NC State, is the president of North Carolina’s professors’ trade group: the NC Conference of the American Association of University Professors, or AAUP.
Boggs was recognized for her work this month with the national AAUP’s Georgina M. Smith Award, which recognizes “a person who has provided exceptional leadership in a given year in improving the status of academic women or in academic collective bargaining.”
Boggs’ colleagues that nominated her for the award enumerated her manifold efforts on behalf of the group, including helping to form a multi-campus committee focused on immigrant rights and working to establish a state-level academic freedom legal hotline.
Her colleagues credit her in part for the group’s substantial growth in recent times.
“The NC AAUP Conference went from 340 members in April 2025 when Belle was selected president to nearly 830 national due-paying members by March 2026,” the nomination letter reads. “That’s more than 200 percent growth. We’ve had an explosion of members of chapters, and four new chapters just in 2025. It’s our understanding that NC AAUP is the fastest-growing conference in the nation.”
Higher ed headlines from this week
- An NC university is eliminating the position of Gender Studies director by me
- Wake board opts for alternative to longtime early voting site on NC State’s campus by Kyle Ingram
- 5 things to know about lawsuits alleging former NC State trainer abused athletes by Jadyn Watson-Fisher
- A group formed to advise on Carolina North has some questions for UNC by me
- The kids of many first responders would get free community college under NC bill by me
- Did LSU violate state law when Will Wade left Raleigh? NC State is investigating by Jadyn Watson-Fisher
- LSU requested legal release over Will Wade. Records show why NC State refused by Jadyn Watson-Fisher
- Duke researcher claimed she was fired for reporting sexual assault. She lost in court. by me
- High schoolers start college for free in new Wake program — and get paid, too by me
What I’m reading
- UNC-Chapel Hill falling further behind peer schools in faculty salary pay by Brianna Atkinson at WUNC
- Jordon Hudson Celebrates Her ‘BANniversary’ With More UNC-CH Records Requests by Matt Hartman at The Assembly
- DukeEngage students were ready to spend the summer in Uganda. Then Ebola broke out by Mia Taubenblat at The Duke Chronicle
Thank you for reading. If you liked this newsletter, consider sharing it with a friend.
— Jane Winik Sartwell
Not a subscriber? Sign up on our website to receive Higher Stakes in your inbox each week: newsobserver.com/newsletters.
This story was originally published June 16, 2026 at 5:00 AM with the headline "Carolina Hurricanes give NC State marketing students an education in merchandise."
