with Jennifer Wadsworth | Assistant metro editorGood morning. By the end of last week, LSU said more than 1,000 students risked expulsion for failing to comply with the school's pandemic rules. When the university president met with the U.S. president Wednesday, he said that number had dropped to about 400. Of those, LSU President William F. Tate said he felt pretty confident the vast majority would fall in line and stay in school. “The reality is that 99.999% of our population is compliant,” he said. Though LSU fielded criticism for waiting until FDA approval to mandate COVID vaccines or regular testing, Tate said the school managed to far surpass Louisiana's and the national inoculation rate by getting more than 80% of its student population to get the shot. "That's why I'm standing here talking from the White House," he told The Advocate. Hours after the meeting, an LSU spokesman said that number had dropped from 400 to fewer than 80 — and that's out of a total student body of 34,000. "The goal from the start has been to get everyone in compliance," the university rep said, "but while the number has shrunk, those 78 are being contacted that they are being unenrolled from the university." Here's the story. While LSU officials wrapped up their excursion to the nation's capital, Baton Rouge's Hayley Arceneaux geared up for an excursion of her own. Our feature writer, George Morris, covered the SpaceX launch, in which 29-year-old Arceneaux boarded a rocket for the first all-civilian mission of its kind. Click here to see the video. And here to read the story. Back on Earth, and Baton Rouge in particular, we're keeping an eye on the flash-flooding brought by the remnants of Hurricane Nicholas, which even in its weaker iteration as a tropical depression was causing some pretty serious flooding in the capital region. You'll want to keep refreshing our home page for the latest updates on this wet weather, which roads to avoid and other news you should know.
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