K-State in the news

Recent news highlights

Read some of today's top stories mentioning Kansas State University. Download an Excel file (xls) with all of the day's news stories.

See more K-State faculty, staff and students in the news in the clip archives.

Friday, Jan. 16, 2026

National/International

US farm economy shows widening cracks as costs rise, jobs vanish
1/15/26 Reuters
Many farmers are instead pushing older machinery to last longer. Terry Griffin, an agricultural economics professor at Kansas ‍State University, analyzed U.S. Fire Administration data and found that as farm incomes fell in recent years, the number of combine fires in Kansas surged. "It's like if you have an old car and don't have the money to keep it up, you stop changing the oil or keeping it clean," Griffin said. "You need money to maintain your equipment."

Phillips community members excited about 'transformation' of lumber mill site
1/15/26 WJFW-TV
An old lumber mill in Phillips, Wisconsin, hasn’t been in use since 2015, yet it remains in Philips to this day, taking up precious space along the beautiful shore. The nonprofit group Price County United Limited held a community meeting Wednesday night with a team from Kansas State University. The KSU team specializes in cleaning brownfields which are contaminated properties. “There are so many moving parts and different aspects that need to go into a project like this from infrastructure to financial to environmental aspects,” said Roxanne Anderson, regional director for K-State's Technical Assistance for Brownfields program.

State/Regional

Kansas State University nuclear reactor provides students with hands-on experiences
1/14/26 KWCH, WIBW
“The student interest in nuclear engineering has really taken off over the past five, seven years,” KSU Nuclear Engineering Program Director Amir Bahadori said. “We’re seeing very strong interest, probably as a result of a lot of the discussions that you hear with big tech companies, with the federal government.”

New aviation program headlines Spring Hill High School expansion
1/14/26 The Olathe Reporter
Williams said the idea came from board member Jon Chitwood, but took shape through visits to other programs in Gardner, Ottawa, Lee’s Summit and Kansas State - Salina — K-State Salina could partner up with the Spring Hill program for college credits... "...to be able to see the programs, the drone programs and what they utilize for drones right now, the opportunity for our students," Williams said. "Some of the jobs that are out there for our students that they probably don’t even know exist right now when it comes to aviation.”

Donations fund music and STEM opportunities
1/14/26 Abilene Reflector-Chronicle
Assistant Superintendent Rick Rivera said the district’s ABC after-school strings program partners with Kansas State University, where music students travel to Abilene to provide string lessons to local students. The program culminates in a student performance each December. “This is a great opportunity for our students and for the Kansas State students to get real-world experience providing instruction,” Rivera said, noting that much of the funding goes toward stipends for the college instructors’ travel and teaching time.

K-State partnership puts cutting-edge drone tech in farmers' hands
1/16/26 Precision Farming Dealer
In addition to K-State’s expertise in agriculture and unmanned aerial systems, K-State will play a big role in helping Kelly Hills work with the large data sets collected from farmers’ lands, said Ajay Sharda, professor of biological and agricultural engineering and an ID3A director. “We have a diverse range of skillsets, including remote sensing, data analytics, working with large and small machines, and economic responses,” said Sharda. “There’s a whole team of people, and they’re all directly or indirectly involved with ID3A. It’s an amazing opportunity for us to put a pin on the map.”

Local

K-State nuclear engineering program provides hands-on experience with reactor operation
1/15/26 KSNT
"Getting to take a student into the control room, show them this is what a nuclear reactor console looks like and when you move these buttons, this is what happens over in the bay," said Amir Bahadori, program director. "You're actually controlling the splitting of the nucleus of atoms."