Your daily dose of news, notes and links from around Kansas University.

• Thanks to an eagle-eyed tipster, who thought she spotted Chancellor Bernadette Gray-Little on television news coverage of an airplane flight from Washington to Kansas City that had to turn back around to the nation’s capital after the smell of smoke permeated the cabin.

Yep, confirmed a KU spokesman, Gray-Little and her husband, Shade Little, were on the U.S. Airways Flight on Sunday night.

Both were unhurt, he said. According to the Kansas City Star, she got to use one of those inflatable airplane slides to exit the plane. I admit, I’ve always wanted to do that, but I always figured that the situation would have been too dire for me to enjoy it. In this case, though, it might have been worthwhile.

• I enjoyed the discussion on Monday’s story about student debt, and particularly the question of debt forgiveness for student loans.

When I started out on the story, I meant to get more into that particular angle than I actually did, but it’s still an interesting question, and one I might revisit later.

Mainly, is this generation “too big to fail?”

Several commenters had some good thoughts on the issue, and one even linked to a Facebook group that links to a website that seeks to a website devoted to the cause.

That’s an interesting side issue to think about as we continue to deal with all the rest of the issues that go along with student loans.

Then there’s this, too, as another commenter pointed out:

“If a loan-forgiveness program does happen sometime in the future, I can’t imagine how angry that will make the people who struggled for years to pay theirs off.”

• Student Union Activities is sponsoring an event featuring Donald Glover, a comedian and actor who stars as Troy Barnes on the NBC comedy series “Community.” He’s also written for “The Daily Show” and “30 Rock.”

He will visit the Lied Center at 7 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 24.

Tickets are available now at the Lied Center’s box office for students for $5 for Student Saver Cardholders and $10 for students with a KU ID.

Tickets will go on sale for the general public for $20 on Friday, Sept. 2.

• The end of the long summer is nearly here. It felt longer perhaps, to me, because I’m always stretching to find people who always seem to be away either on vacations or at conferences.

Soon, we’ll all be back to normal. Jayhawker Towers apartments actually open today, but most students will move into residence and scholarship halls on Friday.

But, anyway, just as each KU academic year ends with a bunch of folks walking down the hill at commencement, each one begins with a smaller number of them walking up the hill in a nice bit of symbolism.

The freshmen in the Mount Oread Scholars Program, a group of freshmen selected on their academic merit, will march up the hill on Sunday with their parents.

In the past, the walk has involved some stops to hear from KU faculty and administrators about traditions and other information to help them succeed.

Good luck, not only to them, but to all the other freshmen spending the next four years of their lives at KU.

At least the chancellor is hoping that you’re here for only four years…

• Though you can’t contribute to your student loan debt with tips for Heard on the Hill sent to ahyland@ljworld.com, you can contribute to the general awesomeness of society. Or something like that, anyway.