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washingtonpost.com > Technology > Washtech > Companies > XM Satellite Radio
At XM, Boldly Going
Under Hugh Panero, Satellite Radio Is a Hit. Just Ask Howard Stern And Mel Karmazin.
By Annys Shin
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, November 29, 2004; Page E01
Hugh Panero has never had much patience for naysayers.
As a young man, after being turned down for a job reporting on the cable industry for a trade journal, Panero created his own version of the publication, complete with original stories and a mock cover. He sent it in and was hired, said Doug Panero, one of three younger brothers.
XM Satellite Radio chief executive Hugh Panero, who joined the company in 1998, keeps his office door open, shouting over to Chairman Gary M. Parsons during the work day. (Katherine Frey -- The Washington Post)
_____Post 200 Profile_____
XM Satellite Radio Holdings Inc.
_____XM Satellite Radio_____
Stock Quote and News
Historical Chart
Company Description
Analyst Ratings
_____Related Articles_____
Radio Veteran To Head Sirius (The Washington Post, Nov 19, 2004)
Delphi, XM Unveil Handheld Satellite Radio Receiver (The Washington Post, Oct 27, 2004)
Baseball's Move to XM Set Up by ESPN Deal (The Washington Post, Oct 21, 2004)
XM Satellite Radio Signs Baseball Deal (The Washington Post, Oct 20, 2004)
More Company News
As one of the early pioneers in pay-per-view TV, Panero overcame doubts that consumers would ever pick pay-per-view over the video store.
Six and a half years ago, he believed in subscription radio service when few others did. Secure in that belief, Panero turned a staff of fewer than a dozen working out of a windowless basement office in downtown Washington into the leading satellite radio service, with more than 500 employees and 2.5 million subscribers. Its only direct competitor, Sirius Satellite Radio Inc. of New York, has 800,000 subscribers.
Satellite radio has now come into its own, and competition is sizzling.
XM Satellite Radio Inc. offers more than 100 channels for a $9.95 monthly fee, with highlights that include popular newscaster Bob Edwards from National Public Radio. In the works for the spring is a 24-hour baseball channel -- the result of a broadcasting and marketing deal worth up to $650 million over 11 years that XM signed with Major League Baseball in October. The District-based company last month introduced the first wearable satellite radio receiver, called the MyFi, expanding its service to outside of the car and home.
Sirius this fall lured shock jock Howard Stern away from FM radio with a $500 million, five-year deal. That was after it agreed in December 2003 to pay $220 million in cash and stock to the National Football League to broadcast its games and related content on a new, 24-hour channel. Sirius, which offers listeners more than 100 channels for $12.95 a month, capped its headline-making announcements on Nov. 18 with the news that former Viacom Inc. chief operating officer Mel Karmazin was joining as chief executive, effective immediately.
Analysts called Karmazin's jump to Sirius a blessing for satellite radio. "We believe this news is good for the satellite radio industry overall because it involves the hiring of one of the most respected managers in the entire media industry," Legg Mason media analyst Sean P. Butson wrote in a Nov. 19 research note.
Following the announcement, Sirius's share price rose 38 percent, to $6.51. XM's stock closed Friday at $37.61, up 8.5 percent over the same period.
Panero's reaction to his new official nemesis was more sanguine.
"A short time ago, [Karmazin] was telling anyone who would listen that satellite radio would never amount to anything. All I can say is [Karmazin's appointment] an interesting confirmation of the validity of satellite radio," he said. "We set the groundwork for people realizing this is the new platform for entertainment. I'm glad we could provide Mr. Karmazin with gainful employment."
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washingtonpost.com > Print Edition > Sunday Sections > Sunday Arts
Sunday Arts
Season Start Dates: A Beginners' Guide
Sunday, September 5, 2004; Page N01
CBS declared the summer rerun season over in mid-August. But NBC said the fall season didn't start until last week, the day after its Athens Olympics coverage concluded. Fox, on the other hand, said its new season began in early June because television is a year-round business. ABC isn't committing (not surprising, given that ABC suits know a low profile can buy them an extra year or two in their jobs before the Big Cheeses at parent Disney cut off their heads to serve angry shareholders).
Is it any wonder viewers have been confused and anxious, not knowing when they need to return to their TV sets in earnest?
Nielsen has declared Sept. 20 to be the official start of the 2004-05 television season. And believe it or not, each of the broadcast networks signed off on that.
"The networks sit down in the spring, and generally they will agree on a start date," Nielsen spokesman Jack Loftus explained, though he acknowledged that sometimes there is discord.
"Traditionally, it's roughly the third Monday in September," he added.
There have been notable exceptions in recent years. In 2000, the start of the season was pushed back to Oct. 2 because the other networks did not want to let NBC include in its season average its coverage of the Summer Olympics from Sydney, which ran from Sept. 15 to Oct. 1.
(Ironically, given how poorly those Olympics did for NBC, it was hardly worth the argument.)
More recently, the networks agreed to delay the start of the 2001-02 season by a week when they dumped their lineups and all their ad breaks -- including promos for new series debuts -- for days after the Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.
The start of the season has not always been Nielsen's decision. For years, right up to the early '90s, a reporter named Bob Knight, who covered the television industry for the trade paper Variety, made the call.
Loftus, who was Knight's editor at Variety in the '80s, says he does not know how Knight became the last word on the subject.
"It was a lot of phone calls and, 'Okay, Variety is going to announce the start on that date' and . . . Nielsen wasn't really a part of it.
"He was the guru. I remember sitting there at my desk and saying, 'Bob, when are you going to start the TV season?' And I'd say, 'How firm is that?' And we would build a New Season Start section in the paper."
But here's a little-known fact: Knight is not the only reporter who got to determine a season's official launch date. For one brief shining moment, in 1992, that responsibility fell to Brian Lowry, then a twentysomething rookie TV reporter at Variety. Knight had left the paper, and the networks were having trouble agreeing on a date.
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Tiny Village Android Game App
Many mobile gamers are increasingly finding casual game apps more and more appealing. The reason may be because such game apps do not depend in players actually having to finish certain levels for a certain period of time before they can achieve anything significant. But with casual games, players can pause the game at anytime and get back to it whenever they feel like playing without having to lose out on their progress. A casual game like Tiny Village for Android actually offers the same thing.
The Tiny Village Android game app is a fun and interesting casual game where players need to build their own village and watch it grow. It is set during the pre-historic times when cavemen and dinosaurs rule. Players need to build a village for its band of cavemen to live in as well as take care of certain dinosaurs and make them grow to use around for certain tasks. The village may also have certain tasks that it requires players to build in order to progress. There are coins to collect as well as crystals that can be used to purchase things for the village. Quests also help players gain coins as well as find ways to unlock new buildings and shops to build on the village.
Tiny Village is also built around a community of other players where everyone can share, buy things and simply just make acquaintances. It comes with fun yet detailed graphics that makes the game even more enjoyable to play. With many options to do something while in the game, Tiny Village will be something that people will enjoy playing for hours and hours. But then again, they need not feel guilty of not being able to progress further in the game whenever they stop and put the game away for a considerable time. Tiny Village Android game app is available for free download at Google Play. It is also important to note that Internet connection is needed in order to play the game.
Image Source: Google Play
Tags: Android, Game, Tiny, Village
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Madrid: stately boulevards, baroque palaces, history, mystery and more
A fine place to start your tour of Madrid is at the Royal Palace,where nearby is an 8th Century Arab wall.
Madrid is an interesting blend of the practical and fanciful.
Here luncheon diners enjoy a snack in the presence of an artful bull.
STEP INTO history in Madrid, where the narrow alleys and streets of this stately medieval city wind back into a rich history, originally as an Arab fortress.
Madrid is known worldwide for its elegant boulevards and expansive, manicured parks such as the Buen Retiro. It’s renowned for its rich repositories of European art, including the Prado Museum’s works by Goya, Velázquez and other Spanish masters. The heart of old Hapsburg Madrid is the portico-lined Plaza Mayor, a delightful place to while away an hour or two with a wonderful variety of shops and eateries.
THE ARAB influence permeates old Madrid. The city was founded on Calle Cuesta de la Vega, where a wall protected a fortress built in the 8th century by Emir Mohammed I.
Madrid is famous for ham and here at a corner kiosk
it is possible to buy a quick ham sandwich, fruit and drink.
The city's name comes from the Arabic word, "mayrit," which means "water source".
You'll want to take in the Royal Palace, at the Arab Wall, a stunning design with baroque touches and a gorgeous square. It is now used mainly for ceremonial and public functions, and is open to the public as a museum of the building’s and the country’s history.
The reigning King Felipe VI and the Royal Family do not reside in the palace, choosing instead the more modest Palacio de la Zarzuela on the outskirts of Madrid.
Madrid's plazas and squares flow seamlessly from one
street to another. Madreinos love to stroll.
The Palace is fairly new by European standards, built in the 18th century by Philip V on the site of the old Alcázar fortress, another Moorish castle.
The palace has 135,000 square meters (1,450,000 square feet) of floorspace and contains a whopping 3,418 rooms. It is the largest royal palace in Europe.
Madrid is one of Europe's most elegant and lively cities. Dinner is usually taken after 10 p.m., and Madrilenos love to linger. A meal typically takes two or three hours. Impressively, the native folks don't seem to need much sleep. They don't seem to mind partying at night and still arising in time for work at 9 a.m. No problema.
THE CITY'S cultural offerings are vast and varied and there are cafes and bars for every budget. We based at the lovely Villa Real, in the Plaza de las Cortes, an upscale Derby hotel decorated with ancient art pieces and modern paintings. Throughout the city are art galleries with world class fare.
The Circle of Fine Arts at Alcala Street is known for its graceful design.
The stately Prado Museum, one of Europe's most famous cultural treasures, was putting the finishing touches on a major renovation during our recent visit.
Museo del Prado was founded in 1819 as a public showcase for Spain’s royal art collection. Since then, the national institution has far surpassed, in both world renown and collection size, the walls of its exquisite 17th-century home. Like many old Madrid buildings, it was built as a palace 200 years before it became a museum.
In an effort to preserve its authentic architecture and modernize its gallery spaces, the Pardo undertook a major renovation. The Hall of Realms was just finishing its "redo" when we were there a few weeks ago. A huge competition four years ago determined the architectural firm.
This ice cream and dessert cafe has an easy view of lines
for lotto tickets. The crowds near the back are in line too.
But the Prado is not the only arts museum worthy of your time. There are several dozen, and many have free admission on certain days.
Remember to make your dinner reservations early if you're dining after 9 p.m. We remember the time we booked an "early" dinner-dance show -- for 11 p.m. (The late show seating began at 12:45 a.m!)
MADRID is lively, vibrant, changing. Ladies dress smartly, with tight jeans and form fitting blouses and plenty of decolletage. The men dress more stylishly than many other Europeans. Especially in an early cool spring, and throughout winter and autumn, you'll rarely see a woman without a nattily tied scarf.
A fine production of "Smokey Joe's Cafe features three dozen rock 'n' roll,
blues and other classic pop tunes, at New Village Arts in Carlsbad.
UP NEXT: Curtain going up on an exciting spring arts season in southern California. From Hershey Felder's masterpiece, on the life of Beethoven, to a snappy rock-n-rollin' "Smokey Joe's Cafe" and other engaging musical and dramatic picks, we'll explore the best of our lively arts scene. San Diego Musical Theater offers a fine "Crazy for You" with Gershwin's magic, and ambitious Cygnet tackles "Angels in America." Theatrical treasures await. Remember to explore, learn and live and catch us each Friday for a fresh approach to travel, nature, family and the arts.
Labels: Adventure, Architecture, Art, Famous Cities, Hotels, Road tripping, Travel
Spain Devotees February 24, 2019 at 12:47 PM
Fun piece, lots of information and lovely photos. Qe are staying near the Royal Palace right now.
Oregon Admirers February 25, 2019 at 2:00 PM
This column always brings a smile to my face. What fun these two fellow travelers have on the road, and how well the photos and prose fit. Lucky you two. Enjoy, enjoy, and keep sharing please!
Carolina Cruisers February 26, 2019 at 11:18 AM
We visit Spain every other year. This is the year. Thanks for the memories of one of the world's great cities. We are staying at "your" hotel, too. Love the Derby properttoo. Know you enjoy the Claris in Barcelona. Do you know their London ones? Spectacular, tio.
Madrid: stately boulevards, baroque palaces, hist...
Whale bonanza as great grays head south to give bi...
Eurail maintains its reputation for an excellent w...
Flamenco feast: Spain visit features performances ...
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West Virginia Code
CHAPTER 1. THE STATE AND ITS SUBDIVISIONS. CHAPTER 2. COMMON LAW, STATUTES, LEGAL HOLIDAYS, DEFINITIONS AND LEGAL CAPACITY. CHAPTER 3. ELECTIONS. CHAPTER 4. THE LEGISLATURE. CHAPTER 5. GENERAL POWERS AND AUTHORITY OF THE GOVERNOR, SECRETARY OF STATE AND ATTORNEY GENERAL; BOARD OF PUBLIC WORKS; MISCELLANEOUS AGENCIES, COMMISSIONS, OFFICES, PROGRAMS, ETC. CHAPTER 5A. DEPARTMENT OF ADMINISTRATION. CHAPTER 5B. ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT ACT OF 1985. CHAPTER 5C. BASIC ASSISTANCE FOR INDUSTRY AND TRADE. CHAPTER 5D. PUBLIC ENERGY AUTHORITY ACT. CHAPTER 5E. VENTURE CAPITAL COMPANY. CHAPTER 5F. REORGANIZATION OF THE EXECUTIVE BRANCH OF STATE GOVERNMENT. CHAPTER 5G. PROCUREMENT OF ARCHITECT-ENGINEER SERVICES BY STATE AND ITS SUBDIVISIONS. CHAPTER 5H. SURVIVOR BENEFITS. CHAPTER 6. GENERAL PROVISIONS RESPECTING OFFICERS. CHAPTER 6A. EXECUTIVE AND JUDICIAL SUCCESSION. CHAPTER 6B. PUBLIC OFFICERS AND EMPLOYEES; ETHICS; CONFLICTS OF INTEREST; FINANCIAL DISCLOSURE. CHAPTER 6C. PUBLIC EMPLOYEES. CHAPTER 6D. PUBLIC CONTRACTS. CHAPTER 7. COUNTY COMMISSIONS AND OFFICERS. CHAPTER 7A. CONSOLIDATED LOCAL GOVERNMENT. CHAPTER 8. MUNICIPAL CORPORATIONS. CHAPTER 8A. LAND USE PLANNING. CHAPTER 9. HUMAN SERVICES. CHAPTER 9A. VETERANS' AFFAIRS. CHAPTER 10. PUBLIC LIBRARIES; PUBLIC RECREATION; ATHLETIC ESTABLISHMENTS; MONUMENTS AND MEMORIALS; ROSTER OF SERVICEMEN; EDUCATIONAL BROADCASTING AUTHORITY. CHAPTER 11. TAXATION. CHAPTER 11A. COLLECTION AND ENFORCEMENT OF PROPERTY TAXES. CHAPTER 11B. DEPARTMENT OF REVENUE. CHAPTER 12. PUBLIC MONEYS AND SECURITIES. CHAPTER 13. PUBLIC BONDED INDEBTEDNESS. CHAPTER 13A. PUBLIC INDEBTEDNESS NOT BONDED (REPEALED). CHAPTER 14. CLAIMS DUE AND AGAINST THE STATE. CHAPTER 15. PUBLIC SAFETY. CHAPTER 15A. DEPARTMENT OF MILITARY AFFAIRS AND PUBLIC SAFETY. CHAPTER 16. PUBLIC HEALTH. CHAPTER 16A. MEDICAL CANNABIS ACT. CHAPTER 17. ROADS AND HIGHWAYS. CHAPTER 17A. MOTOR VEHICLE ADMINISTRATION, REGISTRATION, CERTIFICATE OF TITLE, AND ANTITHEFT PROVISIONS. CHAPTER 17B. MOTOR VEHICLE DRIVER'S LICENSES. CHAPTER 17C. TRAFFIC REGULATIONS AND LAWS OF THE ROAD. CHAPTER 17D. MOTOR VEHICLE SAFETY RESPONSIBILITY LAW. CHAPTER 17E. UNIFORM COMMERCIAL DRIVER'S LICENSE ACT. CHAPTER 17F. ALL-TERRAIN VEHICLES. CHAPTER 17G. RACIAL PROFILING DATA COLLECTION ACT. CHAPTER 18. EDUCATION. CHAPTER 18A. SCHOOL PERSONNEL. CHAPTER 18B. HIGHER EDUCATION. CHAPTER 18C. STUDENT LOANS; SCHOLARSHIPS AND STATE AID. CHAPTER 19. AGRICULTURE. CHAPTER 20. NATURAL RESOURCES. CHAPTER 20A. WATER RESOURCES (REPEALED). CHAPTER 21. LABOR CHAPTER 21A. UNEMPLOYMENT COMPENSATION. CHAPTER 22. ENVIRONMENTAL RESOURCES. CHAPTER 22A. MINERS' HEALTH, SAFETY AND TRAINING. CHAPTER 22B. ENVIRONMENTAL BOARDS. CHAPTER 22C. ENVIRONMENTAL RESOURCES; BOARDS, AUTHORITIES, COMMISSIONS AND COMPACTS. CHAPTER 23. WORKERS' COMPENSATION. CHAPTER 24. PUBLIC SERVICE COMMISSION. CHAPTER 24A. COMMERCIAL MOTOR CARRIERS. CHAPTER 24B. GAS PIPELINE SAFETY. CHAPTER 24C. UNDERGROUND FACILITIES DAMAGE PREVENTION. CHAPTER 24D. CABLE TELEVISION. CHAPTER 24E. STATEWIDE ADDRESSING AND MAPPING. CHAPTER 24F. VETERANS' GRAVE MARKERS. CHAPTER 25. DIVISION OF CORRECTIONS. CHAPTER 26. STATE BENEVOLENT INSTITUTIONS. CHAPTER 27. MENTALLY ILL PERSONS. CHAPTER 28. STATE CORRECTIONAL AND PENAL INSTITUTIONS. CHAPTER 29. MISCELLANEOUS BOARDS AND OFFICERS. CHAPTER 29A. STATE ADMINISTRATIVE PROCEDURES ACT. CHAPTER 29B. FREEDOM OF INFORMATION. CHAPTER 29C. UNIFORM NOTARY ACT. CHAPTER 30. PROFESSIONS AND OCCUPATIONS. CHAPTER 31. CORPORATIONS. CHAPTER 31A. BANKS AND BANKING. CHAPTER 31B. UNIFORM LIMITED LIABILITY COMPANY ACT. CHAPTER 31C. CREDIT UNIONS. CHAPTER 31D. WEST VIRGINIA BUSINESS CORPORATION ACT. CHAPTER 31E. WEST VIRGINIA NONPROFIT CORPORATION ACT. CHAPTER 31F. WEST VIRGINIA BENEFIT CORPORATION ACT. CHAPTER 31G. BROADBAND ENHANCEMENT AND EXPANSION POLICIES. CHAPTER 31H. SMALL WIRELESS FACILITIES DEPLOYMENT ACT. CHAPTER 32. UNIFORM SECURITIES ACT. CHAPTER 32A. LAND SALES; FALSE ADVERTISING; ISSUANCE AND SALE OF CHECKS, DRAFTS, MONEY ORDERS, ETC. CHAPTER 32B. THE WEST VIRGINIA COMMODITIES ACT. CHAPTER 33. INSURANCE. CHAPTER 34. ESTRAYS, DRIFT AND DERELICT PROPERTY. CHAPTER 35. PROPERTY OF RELIGIOUS, EDUCATIONAL AND CHARITABLE ORGANIZATIONS. CHAPTER 35A. NAMES, EMBLEMS, ETC., OF ASSOCIATIONS, LODGES, ETC. CHAPTER 36. ESTATES AND PROPERTY. CHAPTER 36A. CONDOMINIUMS AND UNIT PROPERTY. CHAPTER 36B. UNIFORM COMMON INTEREST OWNERSHIP ACT. CHAPTER 37. REAL PROPERTY. CHAPTER 37A. ZONING. CHAPTER 37B. MINERAL DEVELOPMENT. CHAPTER 37C. MINERAL DEVELOPMENT. CHAPTER 38. LIENS. CHAPTER 39. RECORDS AND PAPERS. CHAPTER 39A. ELECTRONIC COMMERCE. CHAPTER 39B. UNIFORM POWER OF ATTORNEY ACT. CHAPTER 40. ACTS VOID AS TO CREDITORS AND PURCHASERS. CHAPTER 41. WILLS. CHAPTER 42. DESCENT AND DISTRIBUTION. CHAPTER 43. DOWER AND VALUATION OF LIFE ESTATES. CHAPTER 44. ADMINISTRATION OF ESTATES AND TRUSTS. CHAPTER 44A. WEST VIRGINIA GUARDIANSHIP AND CONSERVATORSHIP ACT. CHAPTER 44B. UNIFORM PRINCIPAL AND INCOME ACT. CHAPTER 44C. UNIFORM ADULT GUARDIANSHIP AND PROTECTIVE PROCEEDINGS JURISDICTION ACT. CHAPTER 44D. UNIFORM TRUST CODE. CHAPTER 45. SURETYSHIP AND GUARANTY. CHAPTER 46. UNIFORM COMMERCIAL CODE. CHAPTER 46A. WEST VIRGINIA CONSUMER CREDIT AND PROTECTION ACT. CHAPTER 46B. REGULATION OF THE RENTAL OF CONSUMER GOODS UNDER RENT-TO-OWN AGREEMENTS. CHAPTER 47. REGULATION OF TRADE. CHAPTER 47A. WEST VIRGINIA LENDING AND CREDIT RATE BOARD. CHAPTER 47B. UNIFORM PARTNERSHIP ACT. CHAPTER 48. DOMESTIC RELATIONS. CHAPTER 49. CHILD WELFARE. CHAPTER 50. MAGISTRATE COURTS. CHAPTER 51. COURTS AND THEIR OFFICERS. CHAPTER 52. JURIES. CHAPTER 53. EXTRAORDINARY REMEDIES. CHAPTER 54. EMINENT DOMAIN. CHAPTER 55. ACTIONS, SUITS AND ARBITRATION; JUDICIAL SALE. CHAPTER 56. PLEADING AND PRACTICE. CHAPTER 57. EVIDENCE AND WITNESSES. CHAPTER 58. APPEAL AND ERROR. CHAPTER 59. FEES, ALLOWANCES AND COSTS; NEWSPAPERS; LEGAL ADVERTISEMENTS. CHAPTER 60. STATE CONTROL OF ALCOHOLIC LIQUORS. CHAPTER 60A. UNIFORM CONTROLLED SUBSTANCES ACT. CHAPTER 61. CRIMES AND THEIR PUNISHMENT. CHAPTER 62. CRIMINAL PROCEDURE. CHAPTER 63. REPEAL OF STATUTES. CHAPTER 64. LEGISLATIVE RULES.
Chapter 18 B Entire Code
ARTICLE 1. GOVERNANCE.
ARTICLE 1A. COMPACT WITH HIGHER EDUCATION FOR THE FUTURE OF WEST VIRGINIA.
ARTICLE 1B. HIGHER EDUCATION POLICY COMMISSION.
ARTICLE 1C. WEST VIRGINIA UNIVERSITY INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY.
ARTICLE 1D. HIGHER EDUCATION ACCOUNTABILITY.
ARTICLE 1E. WEST VIRGINIA UNIVERSITY INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY REVITALIZATION PROJECT.
ARTICLE 1F. MANAGEMENT AGREEMENTS FOR THE HIGHER EDUCATION POLICY COMMISSION.
ARTICLE 2. UNIVERSITY OF WEST VIRGINIA BOARD OF TRUSTEES.
ARTICLE 2A. INSTITUTIONAL BOARDS OF GOVERNORS.
ARTICLE 2B. WEST VIRGINIA COUNCIL FOR COMMUNITY AND TECHNICAL COLLEGE EDUCATION.
ARTICLE 2C. WEST VIRGINIA COMMUNITY AND TECHNICAL COLLEGE.
ARTICLE 3. ADDITIONAL POWERS AND DUTIES OF RESEARCH DOCTORAL-GRANTING PUBLIC UNIVERSITIES.
ARTICLE 3A. WEST VIRGINIA JOINT COMMISSION FOR VOCATIONAL-TECHNICAL-OCCUPATIONAL EDUCATION.
ARTICLE 3B. COLLABORATIVE DEGREE COMPLETION PROGRAM.
ARTICLE 3C. COMMUNITY AND TECHNICAL COLLEGE SYSTEM.
ARTICLE 3D. WORKFORCE DEVELOPMENT INITIATIVE.
ARTICLE 3E. EASTERN WEST VIRGINIA COMMUNITY AND TECHNICAL COLLEGE.
ARTICLE 3F. REORGANIZATION OF COMMUNITY AND TECHNICAL COLLEGES.
ARTICLE 4. GENERAL ADMINISTRATION.
ARTICLE 5. HIGHER EDUCATION BUDGETS AND EXPENDITURES.
ARTICLE 6. ADVISORY COUNCILS.
§18B-6-1.
§18B-6-1a. Definitions.
§18B-6-2. State advisory council of faculty.
§18B-6-2a.
§18B-6-3. Institutional faculty Senate.
§18B-6-4. State advisory council of students.
§18B-6-4b.
§18B-6-5. State advisory councils of classified employees.
§18B-6-6. Institutional classified employee council.
ARTICLE 7. PERSONNEL GENERALLY.
ARTICLE 8. HIGHER EDUCATION FULL-TIME FACULTY SALARIES.
ARTICLE 9. CLASSIFIED EMPLOYEE SALARY SCHEDULE AND CLASSIFICATION SYSTEM.
ARTICLE 9A. CLASSIFICATION AND COMPENSATION SYSTEM.
ARTICLE 9B. ORGANIZATION PERSONNEL RULES.
ARTICLE 10. FEES AND OTHER MONEY COLLECTED AT STATE INSTITUTIONS OF HIGHER EDUCATION.
ARTICLE 11. MISCELLANEOUS INSTITUTES AND CENTERS.
ARTICLE 11A. STATE AUTISM TRAINING CENTER.
ARTICLE 11B. WEST VIRGINIA POISON CENTER.
ARTICLE 12. RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT AGREEMENTS FOR STATE INSTITUTIONS OF HIGHER EDUCATION.
ARTICLE 12A. CENTERS FOR ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT AND TECHNOLOGY ADVANCEMENT.
ARTICLE 13. HIGHER EDUCATION -- INDUSTRY PARTNERSHIPS.
ARTICLE 14. MISCELLANEOUS.
ARTICLE 15. SEVERABILITY.
ARTICLE 16. HEALTH CARE EDUCATION.
ARTICLE 17. LEGISLATIVE RULES.
ARTICLE 18. EMINENT SCHOLARS ENDOWMENT TRUST FUND ACT.
ARTICLE 18A. DIRECTED RESEARCH ENDOWMENTS.
ARTICLE 18B. SCIENCE AND RESEARCH COUNCIL.
ARTICLE 19. CAPITAL PROJECTS AND FACILITIES NEEDS.
Acts, 2008 Reg. Sess., Ch. 87.
For the purposes of this article, the following words have the meanings specified unless the context clearly indicates a different meaning:
(a) "Advisory Council of Classified Employees" or "classified council" means the state advisory organization of classified employees created pursuant to section five of this article.
(b) "Advisory Council of Faculty" or "faculty council" means the state advisory organization of faculty created pursuant to section two of this article.
(c) "Advisory Council of Students" or "student advisory council" means the state advisory organization of students created pursuant to section four of this article.
(d) "Classified employee", in the singular or plural, means any regular full-time or regular part-time employee of a governing board, the commission, the council or the West Virginia Network for Educational Telecomputing who holds a position that is assigned a particular job title and pay grade in accordance with the personnel classification system established by law.
(e) "Community and technical college" means Eastern West Virginia Community and Technical College, Marshall Community and Technical College, New River Community and Technical College, West Virginia Northern Community and Technical College, Blue Ridge Community and Technical College, Southern West Virginia Community and Technical College, West Virginia State Community and Technical College, the Community and Technical College at West Virginia University Institute of Technology, West Virginia University at Parkersburg and any other community and technical college so designated by the Legislature.
(f) "Council" means the West Virginia Council for Community and Technical College Education created pursuant to section three, article two-b of this chapter.
(g) "Institutional Classified Employee Council" or "staff council" means the advisory group of classified employees formed at a state institution of higher education pursuant to section six of this article.
(h) "Institutional faculty Senate", "faculty Senate" or "faculty assembly" means the advisory group of faculty formed at a state institution of higher education pursuant to section three of this article.
(i) "State institution of higher education", in the singular or plural, means the institutions as defined in section two, article one of this chapter and, additionally, Pierpont Community and Technical College, a division of Fairmont State University, Marshall Community and Technical College, New River Community and Technical College, Potomac State College of West Virginia University, Robert C. Byrd Health Sciences Charleston Division of West Virginia University, Blue Ridge Community and Technical College, West Virginia State Community and Technical College, West Virginia University at Parkersburg, West Virginia University Institute of Technology, the Community and Technical College at West Virginia University Institute of Technology, the Higher Education Policy Commission, the West Virginia Council for Community and Technical College Education, the West Virginia Network for Educational Telecomputing and any other institution so designated by the Legislature.
(a) There is continued the state advisory council of faculty.
(b) Election of members and terms of office. --
(1) During the month of April of each odd-numbered year, each president of a state institution of higher education, at the direction of the faculty council and in accordance with procedures established by the faculty council, shall convene a meeting or otherwise institute a balloting process to elect one faculty member from each institution of higher education to serve on the faculty council.
(2) Terms of the members are for two years and begin on July 1, of each odd-numbered year. Members are eligible to succeed themselves.
(3) For the year two thousand four only, each president of an administratively linked community and technical college shall consult with the faculty council during the month of July to establish procedures and convene a meeting or otherwise institute a balloting process to elect one faculty member from that institution to serve on the faculty council. Members so elected shall take office upon election and serve until the next regularly scheduled election held pursuant to this section; thereafter, faculty members elected to represent administratively linked community and technical colleges serve a regular two-year term.
(c) The faculty council shall meet at least once each quarter and may meet at such other times as called by the chairperson or by a majority of its members. One of the quarterly meetings shall be during the month of July, at which meeting the faculty council shall elect a chairperson from among its members. The chairperson may serve no more than two consecutive terms as chair. A member may not vote by proxy at the election. In the event of a tie in the last vote taken for such election, a member authorized by the faculty council shall select the chairperson by lot from the names of those persons tied. Immediately following the election of a chairperson, and in the manner prescribed by this section for the election of a chairperson, the faculty council shall elect a member to preside over meetings in the absence of the chairperson. If the chairperson vacates the position, the faculty council shall meet and elect a new chairperson to fill the unexpired term within thirty days following the vacancy.
(d) The faculty council, through its chairperson and in any appropriate manner, shall communicate to the commission or the council, as appropriate, matters of higher education in which the faculty members have an interest.
(e) The commission and council each shall meet annually between the months of October and December with the faculty council to discuss matters of higher education in which the faculty members or the commission or council may have an interest.
(f) Members of the faculty council serve without compensation. Members are entitled to reimbursement for actual and necessary expenses, including travel expenses, incurred in the performance of their official duties. Expenses are paid from funds allocated to the state institution of higher education which the member serves.
(g) The faculty council shall prepare minutes of its meetings, which minutes shall be available, upon request, to any faculty member of a state institution of higher education represented on the faculty council.
(a) Effective July 1, 2004, a faculty Senate is established at each institution of higher education, except for those institutions which choose to establish a faculty assembly. In the latter case, all faculty participate in the faculty assembly and the requirements of subsections (b) and (c) of this section do not apply. Members and officers of an organized, campus-level advisory group of faculty who are serving prior to the effective date of this section may continue to serve with all the rights, privileges and responsibilities prescribed herein until the time that members elected as set forth in subsection (b) of this section assume office.
(b) Members of each faculty Senate are elected as follows:
(1) During the month of April of each even-numbered year, each president of a state institution of higher education, at the direction of the faculty and in accordance with procedures established by the faculty, shall convene a meeting or otherwise institute a balloting process to elect the members of the faculty Senates, except that for 2004 only, the election shall take place in July.
(2) Selection procedures shall provide for appropriate representation of all academic units within the institution.
(3) The faculty member who is elected to serve on the faculty council is an ex officio, voting member of the faculty Senate and reports to the faculty Senate on meetings of the faculty council and the board of Governors.
(c) Members serve a term of two years, which term begins on July 1, of each even-numbered year, except for the year 2004 when terms begin upon election. Members of the faculty Senate are eligible to succeed themselves.
(d) Each faculty Senate shall elect a chairperson from among its members. The chairperson serves a term of two years, and may serve no more than two consecutive terms as chairperson.
(e) The faculty Senate meets quarterly and may meet at such other times as called by the chairperson or by a majority of the members. With appropriate notification to the president of the institution, the chairperson may convene a faculty Senate meeting for the purpose of sharing information and discussing issues affecting faculty and the effective and efficient management of the institution.
(f) The president of the institution shall meet at least quarterly with the faculty Senate to discuss matters affecting faculty and the effective and efficient management of the institution.
(g) The governing board of the institution shall meet at least annually with the faculty Senate to discuss matters affecting faculty and the effective and efficient management of the institution.
(a) There is continued the state advisory council of students.
(b) During the month of April of each year, each student government organization at each institution of higher education shall elect a student to serve on the student advisory council. Terms of the members of the student advisory council are for one year and begin on September 1, of each year. A duly elected member currently serving on the advisory council of students may continue to serve until a new member from that institution is elected pursuant to the provisions of this section. Members of the student advisory council are eligible to succeed themselves.
(c) The student advisory council shall meet at least once each quarter. One of the quarterly meetings shall be during the month of September, at which meeting the student advisory council shall elect a chairperson. A member may not vote by proxy at the election. In the event of a tie in the last vote taken for the election, a member authorized by the student advisory council shall select the chairperson by lot from the names of those persons tied. Immediately following the election of a chairperson, the student advisory council shall elect, in the manner prescribed by this section for the election of a chairperson, a member of the council to preside over meetings in the absence of the chairperson. If the chairperson vacates the position, the student advisory council shall meet and elect a new chairperson to fill the unexpired term within thirty days following the vacancy.
(d) The student advisory council, through its chairperson and in any appropriate manner, shall communicate to the commission or the council, as appropriate, matters of higher education in which the student members have an interest.
(e) At the request of the chairperson of the student advisory council, the commission and council each shall meet annually, between the months of October and December, with the student advisory council to discuss matters of higher education in which the student members or the commission or council have an interest.
(f) Members of the student advisory council serve without compensation, but are entitled to reimbursement for actual and necessary expenses, including travel expenses, incurred in the performance of their official duties. Expenses are paid from funds allocated to the state institution of higher education in which the student is enrolled.
(g) The student advisory council shall prepare minutes of its meetings. The minutes shall be available, upon request, to any student of a state institution of higher education represented on the council.
(a) There is hereby continued the state advisory council of classified employees.
(1) During the month of April of each odd-numbered year, each president of a state institution of higher education, at the direction of the classified council and in accordance with procedures established by the classified council, shall convene a meeting or otherwise institute a balloting process to elect one classified employee from each institution of higher education to serve on the classified council.
(3) For the year two thousand four only, each president of an administratively linked community and technical college shall consult with the classified council during the month of July to establish procedures and convene a meeting or otherwise institute a balloting process to elect one classified employee from that institution to serve on the classified council. Members so elected take office upon election and serve until the next regularly scheduled election held pursuant to this section; thereafter, classified employees elected to represent administratively linked community and technical colleges serve a regular two-year term.
(c) The classified council shall meet at least once each quarter and may meet at such other times as called by the chairperson or by a majority of its members. One of the quarterly meetings shall be during the month of July, at which meeting the classified council shall elect a chairperson from among its members. The chairperson may serve no more than two consecutive terms as chairperson. A member may not vote by proxy at the election. In the event of a tie in the last vote taken for the election, a member authorized by the classified council shall select the chairperson by lot from the names of those persons tied. Immediately following the election of a chairperson, the classified council shall elect, in the manner prescribed by this section for the election of a chairperson, a member of the classified council to preside over meetings in the absence of the chairperson. If the chairperson vacates the position, the classified council shall meet and elect a new chairperson to fill the unexpired term within thirty days following the vacancy.
(d) The classified council, through its chairperson and in any appropriate manner, shall communicate to the commission or the council, as appropriate, matters of higher education in which the classified employees have an interest.
(e) The commission and council each shall meet annually, between the months of October and December, with the classified council to discuss matters of higher education in which the classified employees or the commission or council have an interest.
(f) Members of the classified council serve without compensation, but are entitled to reimbursement for actual and necessary expenses, including travel expenses, incurred in the performance of their official duties. Expenses are paid from funds allocated to the state institution of higher education which the member serves.
(g) The classified council shall prepare minutes of its meetings. The minutes shall be available, upon request, to any classified employee of a state institution of higher education represented on the classified council.
(a) There is continued at each institution of higher education an institutional classified employee advisory council to be known as the staff council.
(b) During the month of April of each odd-numbered year, each president of a state institution of higher education, at the direction of the staff council and in accordance with procedures established by the staff council, shall convene a meeting or otherwise institute a balloting process to elect members of the staff council, except that for two thousand four only, the election shall take place in July. Members are elected as follows:
(1) Two classified employees from the administrative/ managerial sector;
(2) Two classified employees from the professional/nonteaching sector;
(3) Two classified employees from the paraprofessional sector;
(4) Two classified employees from the secretarial/clerical sector;
(5) Two classified employees from the physical plant/ maintenance sector;
(6) The classified employee who is elected to serve on the advisory council of classified employees serves as an ex officio, voting member of the staff council. This member shall report to the staff council on meetings of the classified council and the board of Governors; and
(7) Classified employees at Marshall university and West Virginia University may elect five classified employees from each of the five sectors to serve on the staff council.
(c) Members serve a term of two years, which term begins on July 1, of each odd-numbered year. Members of the staff council are eligible to succeed themselves.
(d) Classified employees shall select one of their members to serve as chairperson. All classified employees at the institution are eligible to vote for the chairperson by any method approved by a majority of their members. The chairperson is eligible to succeed himself or herself.
(e) The staff council shall meet at least monthly or at the call of the chairperson. With appropriate notification to the president of the institution, the chairperson may convene staff council meetings for the purpose of sharing information and discussing issues affecting the classified employees or the efficient and effective operations of the institution.
(f) The president of the institution shall meet at least quarterly with the staff council to discuss matters affecting classified employees.
(g) The governing board of the institution shall meet at least annually with the staff council to discuss matters affecting classified employees and the effective and efficient management of the institution.
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Chris Daughtry
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2019 NBA All-Star Celebrity Game - Inside
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2017 Billboard Music Awards Presented by Virginia Black - Red Carpet
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Remember When Carrie Underwood Clucked Like a Chicken at Her 'American Idol' Audition?
By Deena Bustillo on
Getty ImagesCan you believe it's been over a decade since Kelly Clarkson won her ticket to Hollywood on American Idol? She was just 20 years old when she wore a top made of jean pants to her audition. But that wasn't too bad — Carrie Underwood gave the judges her best chicken impression after she sang. The point? Pretty much everyone's American Idol audition was embarrassing (therefore really fun to watch now). Let's go back in time and review the audition tapes for seven stars who made it...Read Full Story
Ever Wonder What Celebrities Looked Like Before They Were Bald?
By Darrick Thomas on
(Photos: Getty Images)Hair is a prized commodity when you're constantly in the public eye, but some celebrities aren't as follicle-ly blessed as the Zac Efrons and Chris Hemsworths of the world. A handful of famous dudes said goodbye to their 'dos early on and have now embraced their shiny domes. As you'll see, for some of them it was the right call (even if, ultimately, they didn't have a choice in the matter).Bruce WillisPatrick StewartVin DieselWoody HarrelsonSean ConneryMobyThe RockLouis...Read Full Story
'American Idol' Alum Chris Daughtry and Wife Expecting Twins
Chris Daughtry's gonna be a dad again -- times two! The season 5 American Idol 4th place finisher and his wife Deanna are expecting twins in the fall, according to Us magazine. The singer couldn't be happier. "Deanna and I are overjoyed about this double blessing," the 30-year-old wrote on his site. "Thank you for your expressions of love and support and for respecting for our privacy during this special time." BULLET BOX TITLE Chris DaughtryDaughtry Pictures Chris Daughtry Welcomes...Read Full Story
Chris Daughtry Celebrates 'Leave This Town'
By Livingly Staff on
Chris Daughtry has come a long way since his 4th place finish on the fifth season of American Idol. He is the lead vocalist and guitarist of the alternative rock band Daughtry.The band's second album, Leave This Town, was released two weeks ago, on July 14th, 2009 and shot straight to #1. Chris has been telling press that he aims to use this second release to promote the band, instead of himself.For more on Chris Daughtry:Read Full Story
Chris Daughtry (born December 26, 1979) is a rock guitarist, singer and songwriter. He was the fourth-place finalist on the highly publicized fifth season of American Idol, eliminated from the competition on May 10, 2006. He is the lead vocalist and guitarist of the alternative rock band Daughtry.
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Directorate of Immigration
Refusal of residence permit
When an application for a residence permit does not meet the requirements for such a permit, cf. the Act on Foreigners no. 80/2016, the application may be refused. This means that an applicant does not receive the permit applied for. Refusals of applications for residence permit are written executive decisions that may be appealed to the Immigration and Asylum Appeals Board within 15 days from the date the decision is made known, i.e. from the date the applicant receives the notice of refusal. The reasons for refusal may be based on evaluation. The consequences of refusal are that a residence permit is not issued to the applicant, who has to leave the country if he/she is in Iceland.
Main reasons for refusal
The applicant is not authorized to stay
Requirements for a residence permit are not met
Procedure and consequences of refusal
Suspension of Implementation
If an applicant is not authorized to stay in Iceland when submitting an application, cf. Art. 51 of the Act on Foreigners, the Directorate of Immigration is obligated to refuse the application. In such an instance no evaluation is made as to whether other requirements for a residence permit are met.
Requirements for a residence permit not met
The requirements for a residence permit are divided into basic requirements which all residence permits must meet and detailed requirements that are made in each category of residence permits.
If an applicant does not meet the basic requirements (for example, the requirement of reliable income) the application is refused unless an authorization for an exemption is provided for by the Act on Foreigners. Exemptions are evaluated in every case.
Detailed requirements
If an applicant does not meet the detailed requirements (for example, an applicant for a student residence permit is not enrolled in full study at university level or if an applicant for a spouse residence permit does not submit a marriage certificate), the Directorate of Immigration is authorized, and obligated in some instances, to refuse an application. Some detailed requirements are subject to evaluation by the Directorate of Immigration. An example of an evaluated requirement is when an applicant for a residence permit on grounds of au pair placement is suspected of not intending to leave the country when the residence permit expires. The Act on Foreigners allows consideration being made to the general experience of applicants in the same or similar situation.
If an applicant does not meet the requirements for a residence permit, the application will be processed by the Directorate of Immigration’s lawyers who make a written decision on refusal. The applicant is informed of the decision in a notice sent by registered mail. The general processing time by the Directorate of Immigration is about 90 days. If it is deemed clear that an application will be refused, the processing time may be longer, or up to 90 days from the date of receipt of the last documents.
The refusal of an application for a residence permit may result in an applicant who is in Iceland having to leave the country as his/her stay in this country is illegal. The applicant is always allowed a deadline for leaving Iceland at his/her own accord. In most cases, such a deadline is 30 days. If the applicant does not leave Iceland within the deadline he/she may be subject to expulsion and a refusal of re-entry.
If an applicant is not in Iceland when his/her application for a residence permit is refused, the applicant has not obtained a residence permit and is therefore not authorized to come to Iceland on such grounds.
If an applicant applying for an extension is authorized to work during the processing of his/her application is refused the authorization til work becomes invalid.
According to the Act on Foreigners, an applicant has a 15 day deadline from the date a decision is made known to him/her to appeal the refusal by the Directorate of Immigration to the Immigration and Asylum Appeals Board. The deadline for appealing does not start until the applicant receives the decision in his/her case. The day the applicant receives the decision is considered as being the date of disclosure of a decision.
A decision by the Directorate of Immigration that has been made known to the applicant results in certain implementation. This means that the applicant must abide by the instructions stated in the formal notice of decision. In some instances the implementation of the decision by the Directorate of Immigration may be postponed if the decision is appealed to the Immigration and Asylum Appeals Board.
The suspension of implementation entails that the conclusion of a decision will not be implemented until the case has undergone an appeals process by the Immigration and Asylum Appeals Board.
Appealing a decision made by the Directorate of Immigration does not suspend its implementation except in circumstances where an appeal directly suspends implementation. That applies to refusals of permanent residence permits and refusal of renewal of a residence permit that was submitted before the deadline.
In any other instance the suspension of implementation of a refused decision is in accordance with Article 29 of the Administrative Procedures Act. The applicant may appeal the decision to the Immigration and Asylum Appeals Board.
In the cases where an appeal automatically suspends implementation, the applicant will not be required to leave the country while his case is being processed and he/she has the same legal status as if the application had not been refused.
If an appeal does not suspend implementation, an applicant who has been refused a residence permit must leave the country within the timeframe given, or when a permission to stay on grounds of a non-visa requirement expires. If the applicant does not abide by the aforementioned requirement his/her stay in Iceland will be illegal, which can result in expulsion and refusal of re-entry.
If a decision by the Directorate of Immigration is not appealed to the Immigration and Asylum Appeals Board or if an appeal is received after the expiry of the deadline to appeal, it is deemed that the applicant accepts the refusal by the Directorate of Immigration in which case the applicant should abide by the legal impact of the decision.
When a decision by the Directorate of Immigration has been appealed to the Immigration and Asylum Appeals Board, the case has been concluded by the Directorate of Immigration and is totally in the hands of the Immigration and Asylum Appeals Board.
Processing time and applications being processed
- Spouse or cohabiting partner
- Parent 67 years of age and older
- Parent of a child under the age of 18
Permits based on work
Expedited processing
Permits for students
Renewal and student enrollment
Legitimate and special purpose
Special ties to Iceland
EEA/EFTA citizens and their relatives
EEA/EFTA member countries
Documentation requirements
FBI criminal record check
Permission to stay while application is being processed by the Icelandic Directorate of Immigration and during renewal of residence permit
Revocation of a residence permit and cancellation of the right to stay
Expulsion and re-entry ban
Immigration and Asylum Appeals Board
The Icelandic Red Cross
Multicultural and Information Center
The UN Refugee Agency
Icelandic Human Rights Center
The Directorate of Labour
Registers Iceland
The Data Protection Authority
Icelandic Citizenship
Monday to Thursday 9 - 14
Fridays 9 - 12
The Directorate of Immigration | Dalvegur 18 | 201 Kópavogur | Tel: +354 444 0900 | Email: utl@utl.is
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Setting Up Your Organisation
Funding Advice
Employment & Payroll
Account Preparation
Saltire Awards
Volunteer Friendly Awards
Highland Third Sector Interface
VABS is part of the Highland Third Sector Interface (HTSI) funded by the Scottish Government to support Badenoch and Strathspey communities in the following four areas:
Support for the Third Sector
We are on Facebook too
The VABS Team
Karen Derrick
Chief Officer
Karen has an extensive training background spanning over 30 years in languages, business and project management, but still enjoys the ‘people’ side of the job most of all.
Karen has been working for VABS since 2007, first as Community Development Officer overseeing community-led action planning throughout the strath, then creating and managing the Strengthening Communities capacity-building programme from 2012-2015. She took on her current role as Chief Officer in 2015. She has lived in Badenoch and Strathspey since 2005 and before that in Dumfries and Galloway, so has some experience of life and community challenges in rural Scotland. Karen has an extensive training background spanning over 30 years in languages, business and project management, but still enjoys the ‘people’ side of the job most of all. She currently lives in Grantown on Spey with her daughter.
Ann Traill
Finance and Development Officer
Originally from Edinburgh, Ann started her working life in the hospitality industry which saw her travelling all over the UK before finally settling in Aviemore in 1978.
Originally from Edinburgh, Ann started her working life in the hospitality industry which saw her travelling all over the UK before finally settling in Aviemore in 1978. She moved to Nethy Bridge in 1990, where she became heavily involved as a volunteer, with both the toddlers group and what was the primary school PTA at that time. Ann started working for VABS in 2004, initially as secretary to the Chief Officer. Since then she has continued to develop her personal and professional skills to fit the changing needs of the Third Sector. Ann’s current position is Finance and Development Officer, a role which involves providing support to a wide range of organisations in Badenoch and Strathspey, as well as working alongside the Chief Officer to deliver outcomes for the communities and funders and strengthen VABS’ profile in this ever changing sector.
Mairi Brown
Community Development Officer (Freelance)
She enjoys working with people at grassroots level and brings a wealth of knowledge and interest in supporting community groups to thrive and flourish.
Mairi’s working career has mostly been within the third sector, initially with vulnerable children and young people in Edinburgh, before moving into a community development role as a VSO volunteer in Malawi. On her return to Scotland and the Highlands, she took up the position of Community Development Officer with VABS before leaving to start a family.
From these experiences, Mairi has built up a good understanding of how communities operate. She enjoys working with people at grassroots level and brings a wealth of knowledge and interest in supporting community groups to thrive and flourish.
Mairi is currently actively involved in activities for the under 5s community in Carrbridge and has been a director on the VABS board since 2014.
Voluntary Action in Badenoch and Strathspey is a charitable company limited by guarantee.
Regd. in Scotland No. SC134689
The above body is recognised by the Inland Revenue as a Scottish Charity No. SC006932
Registered Office: The Town House, The Square, Grantown on Spey, PH26 3HF
01479 873445 enquiries@vabs.org.uk
Copyright © 2016 Voluntary Action in Badenoch & Strathspey (VABS) | privacy & cookie policy | site map | site development – twofentons
Voluntary Action in Badenoch & Strathspey
This website uses cookies to improve your experience. We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish: Read More
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Home•Taylor Bloxham Group – The...
Taylor Bloxham Group – The secret to 80 years of success in the print industry
2018 marks the 80th birthday of print company the Taylor Bloxham Group. CEO Robert Lockwood shares his thoughts on why the company has been so successful and how the print industry has changed over the last eight decades.
The print sector is one of the world’s earliest industries which for many decades used the same equipment and processes. However, the 21st century has brought about a significant change in the form of digitalisation as well as new kinds of media and technology which have presented serious challenges for many print businesses.
Some companies have not survived these changes. In fact, in the past five years, around one-fifth of printing firms have closed down. At Taylor Bloxham, we have gone from strength to strength over the last 80 years for two main reasons: a commitment to innovation and investment. These two elements have been part of the company’s ethos from the very start.
A history of investment
The company had fairly humble beginnings. Set up in 1938 by Herbert Taylor, a compositor and Harold Bloxham, a machine minder, Taylor & Bloxham (as it was then), was immediately presented with its first challenge: dealing with the impact of a catastrophic world war. However, while, many printers closed during this time as work dried up, Taylor Bloxham obtained some useful contracts, including printing Army Pay Corp books.
2018 marks Taylor Bloxham Groups 80th birthday / Picture: Taylor Bloxham
The set-up during the 1940s and 50s was fairly standard for a small printing company of that time, with a guillotine, an old hand fed cylinder for poster work, a Printamatic Crown stop, an old automatic Victoria platen, and a hand fed medium folio Heidelberg. A far cry from what you’d expect to find in a modern day printing house.
The future is litho
The company’s first major industry-leading investment came in 1970 when the company embarked on the ambitious step for the time of converting their presses from letterpress to B1 litho, an innovation introduced by then Managing Director Bruce Sharpless. Bruce had worked his way up the company from errand boy in 1938 to a visionary managing director in the 1970s. The move to litho made it possible to print larger quantities more efficiently and cost-effectively – and as Bruce had predicted, proved to be the future of printing.
A commitment to innovation and investment – two elements that have been part of the company’s ethos from the very start / Picture: Taylor Bloxham
Other investments followed, including the purchase of two four-colour Heidelberg Speedmasters. The fact that each machine cost the equivalent of five year’s average profits demonstrates the company’s belief in a programme of continuous investment to ensure they remained at the forefront of the industry – Bruce even remortgaged the family home!
Bruce could see that these costs were insignificant when compared to the price of trailing the competition. If these investments hadn’t been made, it’s possible that Taylor Bloxham might have suffered a similar fate to many other printing companies at the time and gone to the wall. Such investments demonstrate an understanding of our industry’s future. It’s vital to be aware of trends, the latest technologies and what’s affecting the industry as a whole to stay ahead of the competition and these are still key drivers for our business today.
The digital revolution
The latest change to hit the industry is digital print. Digital magazines, books, e-tickets, e-mails, paperless billing, online catalogues – the list goes on. So, true to the early pioneering spirit, Taylor Bloxham has embraced the possibilities that new technology offers, including exploring how technology such as augmented reality that can bring print to life.
Always investing in the future – the firm invests millions of pounds each year to maintain its edge / Picture: Taylor Bloxham
Ultimately, the story of Taylor Bloxham’s eight decades of growth and success is similar to Darwin’s theory of evolution – those who adapt to change and improve are ultimately the ones who survive. The later we react to change or refrain from investing in new technologies, the likelier it is that the competition will have everything in place to eclipse service in terms of speed and quality. To stay ahead of the competition, having access to the latest technology and equipment is essential. Clinging to old and outdated equipment is costly both in maintenance and in terms of lost efficiency.
In the print industry, where faster turnaround times and quality are of ever-growing importance, Taylor Bloxham invests millions of pounds every year in new machinery to maintain their edge. In the last ten months alone, the company has invested £3 million into new premises and equipment.
Taylor Bloxham Group is made up of 4 brands: Taylor Bloxham, FastAnt, Mailbox & Instore / Picture: Taylor Bloxham
The group has also adapted and diversified by morphing into a set of brands that services customers in far more ways than their original print beginnings. Instore, Mailbox, FastAnt and Taylor Bloxham itself now offer a fully integrated communications service from design through to print, manufacturing, distribution, POP display, e-commerce, and direct mail fulfilment. We like to think that instead of fighting a battle against change and new technologies, Taylor Bloxham is showing how and why businesses can use innovation and change to thrive and grow.
Group CEO, Robert Lockwood / Picture: Taylor Bloxham
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Published by Kim Nelson
Website: www.thepicturehousegallery.webs.com
Enquiries: (02) 4845 1889
Max Cullen is a leading Australian actor with a long career in the visual and performing arts.
Starting out as a painter and sculptor, Max studied acting under Hayes Gordon at The Ensemble Theatre which led to performances in over a dozen plays. Since then he has had a prolific acting career on stage, in film and on television. He has performed in plays such as Emerald City, Summer of the Seventeenth Doll, The Cheery Soul, Hamlet, A Street Car Named Desire, As You Like It, Death Of A Salesman, Small Poppies, The Great Man, Scenes From A Separation and The Daylight Atheist
Max’s most recent film credits include Australia, Spider & Rose, Billy’s Holiday, Kiss or Kill, Nugget and Jindabyne. He has also featured in some 50 television programmes such as Skippy, Matlock, Bodyline, Cowra Breakout, The Flying Doctors, A Country Practice, Police Rescue, G.P., The Damnation of Harvey McHugh, McLeod’s Daughters, All Saints, Love My Way and Black Jack.
For his work Max received the 1984 Logie Award for Best Supporting Actor in The Last Bastion, the 1986 Penguin Award for Best Performance by an Actor in The Flying Doctors, the 1990 Sydney Theatre Critics Award for Best Supporting Actor in The Tempest, the 1994 Film Critics Circle Award for Best Supporting Actor in Spider and Rose and the 1994 AFI Award for the same, the 1999 Green Room Award for Best Actor in a Featured Role in Cloudstreet, 2004 Icon Award for Cinema Owners Association of Australia. 2005 nominated AFI award, best supporting actor, Love My Way.
Max Cullen and his wife, artist Margarita Georgiadis, have gradually renovated the old Coronation Theatre in Gunning and it is now known as The Picture House Gallery featuring exhibitions and performances.
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On The Road To Sarajevo. Part III
Bill Carter beamed a warzone into the Zoo TV Tour and produced 'The Road To Sarajevo', a classic cut on the 'Best Of 1990 - 2000' DVD. Third and final part of our U2.Com interview.
In this brief final part of our interview with Bill, he discusses the origins of the Miss Sarajevo documentary, plus his writing and photography since.
It was in 1997, working with an eccentric cabal of artists and activists - The Serious Road Trip - that Carter decided U2 could help spotlight what was happening in the Balkans to their European tour audiences.
Read what happened next in the first part of the interview with Bill Carter here
And the second part here
Check out the Best of DVD here
And the latest extracts from Carter's book are all here
And this is the final part of the interview.
* How did the Miss Sarajevo documentary come about?
After the satellites U2 invited me to Dublin for a rest. Contrary to some floating stories it wasn't because I was in danger. Well, I was, but no more than usual. They just invited me to take a break. Which I accepted. And back in Verona Edge and Bono had promised me edit time to make the film. But of course things don't always go as planned.
The short story is that it came about by showing Edge a ten minute demo I had cut with my editor Stephen O'Connell of Windmill Lane. The truth is there were some who didn't think there was a movie to be made out of the footage. I thought there was. Edge saw the demo at Bono's house and said I needed to do something with this. The next night Bono saw it and with his backing I was able to stay in Ireland and edit the film. The title came from him. I had told him about the Miss Sarajevo beauty contest in the war and he said, "Call it Miss Sarajevo and I will write you a song." At first I didn't like the title. It seemed too light. But of course there could really be no other title. And the song, it's perfect. In the lyrics Bono nailed the sense of surrealism, of beauty that comes from living with such grace under pressure. And the music, partly rock, partly opera seems to fit the juxtaposition of what war was everyday in that city. Something that was happening but yet a part of your brain knows this was a not a normal way to live.
The movie, like the satellites, was not intended to inform people of the history or hard-core facts of the war. It was intended to shine a light on some people. To show that they are just trying to live and were dying because of that.
* What have you been doing in the years since ?
Well, I went back and forth to the war until it was over. After it ended I spent time trying to find steady ground again. War has a way of messing with your nervous system. And your survival skills are too revved up. So finding a balance is important. I find that in nature.
I just finished a book, Where Water Comes Together, which includes the themes of your questions and much much more. The story begins long before the war in Sarajevo and ends well after it ends. The story of U2's involvement, seen from my angle, and from inside Sarajevo, and the satellites and Miss Sarajevo are all in the book, but they are just a piece of the puzzle. I will be posting chapters from the middle of the book, events relating to U2, on the web site for the next few months.
Since the war, and due in large part to the success of Miss Sarajevo, I have had the good fortune of being able to travel the world and write articles for magazines and do my photography. I have written stories on Algeria, Morocco, the Middle East and beyond. I also was in Florida the day after the 2000 elections and spent a month there trying to understand the belly of the beast we call America. I went to the Sierra Madres in Mexico to investigate the killings of Tarahumara Indians by drug traffickers. And I did a story of walking 300 miles in the Utah desert in 30 days. I am currently the reporter-at-large for GEAR magazine, not that I have any idea what that actually means.
Also, with Bono, I have been working on a feature length script, which we hope one day will make it to the big screens. I also filmed the making of Emmylou Harris' Grammy winning record Red Dirt Girl. And I am currently making a short film on a band from Tucson called Calexico, which is an offshoot of Giant Sand, another band which I have been filming for more than two years.
And of course there's everyday. This summer I started off picking tomatoes in Northern California and then went to work as a crew member on a salmon fishing boat in Bristol Bay, Alaska. It was the hardest work I had ever done. Then I landed in Prague, by chance, during the floods. From there I was invited to a festival in Kosovo to show Miss Sarajevo, which had an overwhelming response.
It seems to have worked out that when I am not traveling I am involved in music. It strikes a good balance in life. And it is probably why the connection with U2 made sense in the first place. Music, besides, our sense of smell, is one of the only things in this life that defies borders and more importantly time. With music, such an intensely personal experience, we can transport ourselves into the past, the future, or just sit tight right here in the present.
When in America I spend it mostly in either northern California or in southern Arizona. Currently I am in Bisbee, Arizona, a mountain town six miles from the Mexican border, where I have a photo show going up soon. And occasionally, when in town, I have been known to tend bar at the Copper Queen hotel.
Hearts + Minds, Interviews, Other
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Flavorful Origins
You can watch "Flavorful Origins" series for free from 123Movies on this page, We have listed all available seasons above , you can choose and play any episode of your choice. Delve into the delectable world of Chaoshan cuisine, explore its unique ingredients and hear the stories of the people behind its creation.
Networks: Netflix
Dr. Daniel Pierce, a neuroscientist and professor, is recruited to help the federal government crack difficult cases. His intimate knowledge of human behavior and masterful understanding of the mind give…
A young boy takes his mother’s place in a group of gemstone-based beings, and must learn to control his powers.
Genre: Action & Adventure, Animation, Comedy, Family, Sci-Fi & Fantasy
A couple goes through a long, drawn-out divorce.
Brickleberry National Park is facing closure, but not if the park’s dysfunctional park rangers can help it! “Brickleberry,” an animated half-hour series, follows the crazy bunch of park rangers as…
Set against the backdrop of the Wars of the Roses, the series is the story of the women caught up in the protracted conflict for the throne of England.
Country: France, UK
Genre: Drama, History, Romance
Colognian commissioner Gereon Rath moves to Berlin, the epicenter of political and social changes in the Golden Twenties.
Genre: Crime, Drama, History
This mockumentary series follows the peculiar lives of six eccentric — and sometimes obscene — misfits who march to their own beat.
Set against the backdrop of the greatest clandestine race against time in the history of science with the mission to build the world’s first atomic bomb in Los Alamos, New…
Genre: Drama, History, War
Whose Line is it Anyway? is a short-form improvisational comedy TV show. Originally a British radio programme, it moved to television in 1988 as a series made for the UK’s…
Texicanas
A stylish group of San Antonio sophisticates with Mexican heritage try to balance their social lives and the demands of raising a family. But, it’s their shared experience of facing…
The series follows John Porter, a former British Special Forces soldier, who is drafted back into service by Section 20, a fictional branch of the Secret Intelligence Service.
Cassie Nightingale, Middleton’s favorite enchantress, and her young-teenage daughter Grace, who shares that same special intuition as her mom, welcome Dr. Sam Radford and his son to town. When the…
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By your command…
Some days are all about coffee.
The 13th Colony’s motto, “We found Earth, now where can we find coffee?!” was originally born out of 1) my personal addiction, and 2) my quandry as an organizer about what a good location would be for our group to meet for the first time. This is Vancouver after all, so coffee places are the most likely venues just for the sheer number and variety of them. Our first meet-up was at a Tim Horton’s location. A very popular chain in Canada, not surprising considering its hockey connection. Plus, they have timbits! Very quickly, however, it became apparent that I needed to find, not just good coffee, but a shop with enough space to fit all of us. Twenty people showed up that first day. We had to re-locate.
We’ve tried another chain since, and had a couple events at a local diner. But our quest for the perfect coffee shop we can call “home” continues.
Perhaps I should ask the Cylons what they prefer?
Posted in Battlestar Galactica, Coffee, Cylons, Vancouver | Leave a Comment »
Recently, a generous friend gave me a copy of the original Battlestar Galactica movie, starring Lorne Greene. I had a chance to unwind last night and popped it into the VCR. Having been so absorbed in the new series lately, it was interesting to take a look back to where it all began. Just as Star Wars delved into mythology to achieve a more satisfying journey for its hero, the original BSG was steeped in ancient history to give it a sense of dramatic scope. Of course, Greene himself added a great deal of the gravitas just through his performance, but the references to gods and heroes of history and myth were deliberate. The Council of the Twelve wore robes that looked like Roman togas. Apollo, Athena and Cassiopeia had names from Greek mythology. The Colonies were named for the signs of the zodiac. The viper pilot’s helmets echoed the sarcophagi of ancient Egypt.
Yet clearly the show was trying to be as modern as it could be. Centons, microns and cubits gave a futuristic sense to it all. Rather than an occupation, you had a designation and those could include a socialator or a travelator. The atmosphere of the casino on Carillon captured the excess of the real Studio 54, right down to the disco music.
I had forgotten how much humour there was. When Colonel Tigh gets caught going through lockers to grab extra uniforms, his reaction is wonderful.
Obviously, some bits don’t age well. The characterization of Athena doesn’t improve over time and I’m not surprised there wasn’t a place for her in the new version. She had no purpose except to react to events and balance a love triangle. Muffitt II is still a chimp in a suit, but no worse a cuteness infraction than the Ewoks from ROTJ. The repeat of special effects shots within a two hour movie seems an unforgiveable lapse. The shot of a computer screen showing the advancing Cylon fleet at Carillon, still showing the two viper icons fleeing ahead from the opening sequence, seems more an error than a cost-saving.
I had a huge crush on Starbuck when I first saw the show. Now I’m glad they made the character a woman. He’s a relic of the 70s and I can’t see how a modern character with his attitudes could be made either charming or likeable.
Despite all its flaws, I was hooked. I wanted to follow the rag-tag fleet on its quest for Earth. And nearly thirty years later, I’m still watching eagerly.
Posted in Battlestar Galactica, Cylons | 2 Comments »
Caprica Scouting Mission
One of the coolest things about being in Vancouver has got to be that we are “Hollywood North.” In general, Vancouverites are pretty cool about it. We see film sets every day, we occasionally spot movie stars in our midst and yet rarely do we bother them. Canadians are notoriously polite. We would not dream of imposing ourselves on anyone.
But that doesn’t mean we can’t totally geek out when the stars aren’t around! The 13th Colony recently undertook the first of several “Caprica Scouting” missions planned for this summer. Seeing as Vancouver is where Battlestar Galactica is shot, Vancouver serves as Caprica, New Caprica, Kobol and other locations within the fleet. We started with Season One, checking out a number of locations in downtown that were featured in the first season episode “Litmus.” A bunch of us studied a collection of screen shots from Season One and tried to identify where the episodes were shot. A dozen of us started the day at Vancouver’s Central Library, which is where the banner photograph for this blog was taken. The Library was an easy place to start since it is a popular landmark in our city. Those two Cylons are actually “mini-mate” toys, readily available at your local comic book store.
Another easy to spot location was the roof of the old Woodwards building. The giant W sign in the background marks the spot where No. 6 beats the frak out of Sharon just to make it look convincing. Woodwards is gone now, a hole in the ground currently being rebuilt into trendy condos. We had also narrowed down a restaurant called The Alibi Room as the place where Helo and Sharon hide out from the Cylons. The storefront was digitally altered, but still recognizable.
But clearly our triumph of the day was finding what I call “Helo’s Fire Escape.” Vancouver’s downtown east side is filled with alleys that are covered in vibrant and colourful graffiti. With a little help, we found a promising location and headed off. Now if you don’t know Vancouver, you might not know that the east side of our downtown is decidedly rough. It’s been in the news recently for its drug problems and the trial of a particularly notorious serial killer. It is an area most people stay away from if they can. Needless to say, the members of the 13th Colony had to be convinced to enter this particular alley to check it out, even during the day and even in the company of eleven other geeks and two cylon toys. But I was on a mission to find the place, and I think the result was worth it.
Here’s a picture we took. The building is behind a fence since it is the last building that remains in that alley, before the great hole the will soon be the Woodwards condos begins. The graffiti is beautiful. But the coolest thing is knowing that the cast and crew of our favourite show lingered at this spot and used it to create a scene which transports us to a different world. A world without the broken glass and discarded needles of a downtown alley. Granted, Caprica has its own problems. Nuclear proliferation and Cylon invasion are no picnic, I’m sure. But it’s fiction. And we love it.
Our group is planning more Caprica Location Scouting missions during the summer. The campus of the University of British Columbia in Vancouver served as several locations aboard Cloud Nine. And Simon Fraser University in Burnaby has been featured as locations on Caprica and Kobol. The interior of the Orpheum Theatre on Granville Street is where D’Eanna got her first glimpse of the “Final Five”, and has been featured in the dreams of Gaius Baltar and Laura Roslin. It is a beautiful theatre in it’s own right and this year marks its 80th anniversary, so we’re signing up for a tour.
A few months ago, when our club first started, we chose as our motto, “We found Earth, but where can we find coffee?!” Now I’m thinking a better motto might be, “We’re here, and you’re not.” Not to rub it in…too much.
Posted in Battlestar Galactica, Caprica, Cylons, Locations, Vancouver | 2 Comments »
You are currently browsing the The 13th Colony blog archives for June, 2007.
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Most Drivers Say 0 Stars to Rideshare. So, Who’s in the Backseat?
You're traveling home after a night out. Do you take an Uber, Lyft, or taxi? For most American drivers, the go-to answer is “none of the above.”
In a survey of American drivers regarding on-demand transportation preferences, nearly sixty percent of respondents did not express having a favorite service
Currently employed respondents, and the more highly educated, were statistically more likely to prefer using Uber and Lyft
There was a demonstrated gender gap in rideshare, with men overrepresented among respondents preferring Uber, and females overrepresented among those saying “none”
Those saying “no thanks” to taxi or rideshare were 10 percent more likely to be married
It could be that most active drivers out there simply never use on-demand transport networks to get around. That’s not only understandable; it’s completely logical. Why pay for a stranger to schlep you about when you’ve got a ride of your own?
At the same time, we don’t have a way to gauge how these “none” respondents necessarily feel about having rideshare options at their fingertips, or their relative access to taxi service. Is there a war on rideshare, and if so, why don’t all Americans fall into the same camps? The data team at Insurify found a handful of fascinating insights into who’s riding in the backseat, and who’s opting out.
The data scientists at Insurify, an auto insurance quotes comparison website, collected information from their database of over 1.6 million car insurance applications, which ask questions about users’ past seven years of driving history, vehicle type, and other relevant information. A random sample of shoppers was also surveyed about their rideshare or transportation network company (TNC) preferences; specifically: When you aren’t driving, which form of on-demand transportation do you prefer? From the response data, Insurify’s data team was able to determine the significant differences between categories of respondents.
Results: The war on rideshare?
While a vast majority of respondents gave a resounding “no,” Uber reigned supreme among the rest of the pack. And while the small showing for taxi might not necessarily be the death knell for the cab industry, it may speak to the paucity of this service in many regions of the country.
Here are some other intriguing (dare we say, Uber-interesting?) demographic insights the data team found:
Ridesharin’ on the job.
Ever need to rush to work in an Uber?
There appears to be a significant correlation between rideshare or taxi usership and employment. Respondents who reported using any type of on-demand transportation were about 7 percent more likely to be currently employed than those who did not.
For prestige services, the chances of rider employment increased. Those who prefer Lyft were about 14 percent more likely to be employed than those who typically do not use an on-demand transportation service. For those who Uber, that figure was around 9 percent higher likelihood.
Rideshare apps: a gendered divide?
There’s a reason the Germans have a word for the “Over-Man”: Übermensch. But it’s not necessarily because of this stat: Uber had the highest percentage of male respondents of any category this survey.
Those preferring Uber were around 15 percent more likely to be male than all other respondents. Is Uber a boys’ club? It was the only option in this survey that ended up being majority-male.
When assessing the gender breakdown of the results, it’s also notable that those choosing “None” were 11 percent more likely to be female. Is this evidence of a rideshare gender gap, or simply noise?
One thing’s for sure: the industry’s taken notice of how rideshare experiences can vary across genders. Startups like Safr are disrupting gendered notions of rideshare safety by empowering users to select the gender of their driver.
GEDs or PhDs in TNCs?
Those with a higher level of schooling are more likely to prefer rideshare services to a statistically significant degree.
Respondents who reported that they don’t typically use rideshare services were around 38 percent more likely to have only a high school-level education when compared to all other respondents.
Industry behemoths Uber and Lyft were the most likely to be enjoyed by those who have reached a higher level of educational attainment. Less than a quarter of both Uber and Lyft respondents had a high school education only. That amounts to a 21 percent higher likelihood that Uber riders made it past high school or a GED when compared to all other respondents. That same figure amounted to 17 percent higher likelihood for Lyft riders.
As for college degrees and beyond? Uber riders were over twice as likely to have at least a bachelor’s degree as all other respondents. Lyft riders were 1.6 times as likely.
Dearly Beloved, we are gathered here today in this uberPOOL…
It’s more of a one-off stat, but an interesting insight nonetheless: rideshare and taxi avoiders were 10% more likely to be married than all other respondents. When it came to overall share of wedded respondents, however, Uber took the (wedding) cake; 26.2 percent of Uber respondents were hitched.
Despite Uber’s taking the lead here, this could be a sign that rideshare is, overall, more common among singles. But, hey, captains of ships can marry people off, right? So why can’t rideshare drivers officiate? That’s got to be worth five stars and a hefty tip.
If you have questions or comments about this article, please contact insights@insurify.com.
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Book Review-Till Dawn With The Devil
Till Dawn with the Devil by Alexandra Hawkins
Also in this series: All Night with a Rogue, After Dark with a Scoundrel
Series: Lords of Vice #2
Published by St. Martin's Paperbacks on August 3rd 2010
Few women can resist a man like Gabriel "Reign" Housely, the Earl of Rainecourt. With divine good looks, delectable charms, and delicious wealth, he would seem to be every marriage-minded mother's dream match for their daughters. But not so, given the mysterious death of his first wife. Fortunately for Gabriel, he has no plans to seriously court any of the London ladies ever again. That is, until he shares one unforgettable dance with a mysterious stranger…
Exquisitely beautiful though decidedly modest, Lady Sophia usually shuns the festive ballrooms of London society. But when a man who calls himself "Reign" enters her life—seemingly from out of nowhere—and shows her true kindness, her wary young heart begins to melt. Of course, Sophia would be shocked to learn the truth about Reign's past. But when scandal strikes, this devilish stranger may be her only salvation…
Reign Housely, is a man of charm and wealth, and he enjoys the pleasures of London, but there is a scandal attached to his name. Reign once fell in love with his first wife, who broke his heart, betrayed him, and was killed in a accident, but the Ton believes him to be involved somehow. Lady Sophia, is beautiful, and has finally been able to make it to London, despite the protests from her brothers. Sophia suffered from a accident as a child, when her parents were killed, and has suffered from partial blindness, and blurred vision. While at a ballroom, she meets Reign, who treats her differently than others with her certain struggles. He treats her as a real human being, and shows her kindness and desire. But when they are involved in a scandal ,they marry, but Reign may be the key to saving Sophia from a horrible fate.
Till Dawn With The Devil is a wildly entertaining read that sucked me into the story from the first page. Not many authors can pull me in like Alexandra Hawkins. This is a newer author for me, and when I read the first book in the series a few months ago, I fell in love with her writing. Her style is very compelling and endearing, and you can’t help but admire the sizzling chemistry she implements in her stories.
In Till Dawn With The Devil, the second book of Lords Of Vice, we have Reign’s story. This story encompasses a variety of issues. In the beginning of the story, we see how strong our heroine is. She is beautiful and passionate, and stubborn, she is determined to make her own way and fight her battles. She isn’t afraid of what others think of her, especially Reign. Reign is addicted to Sophia, he can’t resist her, and for the first time since his first wife’s betrayal, he feels desire and can’t stay away from her. I loved how these two came together, and their story was sweet and romantic, and such a lovely story of true love and how one night of desire and passion can change your life forever.
I found that Till Dawn With The Devil a stunning romance set in the regency period, a time of balls and parties, of scandal and formal parties, of a love found in a ballroom…a tale of intrigue and mystery, a romance that is sexy and smart….EXCEPTIONAL!!!
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Click to copyhttps://apnews.com/6eaf2bf0027d4470ae49bcbfc6b07569
Matt Lauer is fired at NBC, accused of crude misconduct
By DAVID BAUDERNovember 30, 2017
FILE - In this Oct. 15, 2013, file photo, Matt Lauer arrives at an event in New York. NBC News announced Wednesday, Nov. 29, 2017, that Lauer was fired for "inappropriate sexual behavior." (Photo by Carlo Allegri/Invision/AP, File)
NEW YORK (AP) — “Today” show host Matt Lauer was fired for what NBC on Wednesday called “inappropriate sexual behavior” with a colleague and was promptly confronted with a published report accusing him of crude and habitual misconduct with other women around the office.
With his easygoing charm, Lauer has long been a lucrative and highly visible part of NBC News and one of the highest-paid figures in the industry, and his downfall shook the network and stunned many of the roughly 4 million viewers who start their day with him.
He is easily one of the biggest names brought down in recent weeks by the wave of sexual misconduct allegations that have swept through Hollywood, the media and politics.
Network news chief Andrew Lack said in a memo to the staff that NBC received a complaint about Lauer’s behavior on Monday and determined he violated company standards. NBC said the misconduct started when Lauer and a network employee were at the Sochi Olympics in 2014 and continued beyond that assignment.
Lack said it was the first complaint lodged against Lauer in his 20 years at NBC, but “we were also presented with reason to believe this may not have been an isolated incident.”
NBC News received two new complaints against Lauer on Wednesday, “NBC Nightly News” reported. The network didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Earlier Wednesday, it was left to Lauer’s shaken “Today” colleagues, Savannah Guthrie and Hoda Kotb, to break the news to viewers at the top of the morning’s show.
Word of Lauer’s abrupt exit came on the day of NBC’s “Christmas in Rockefeller Center” special featuring the annual Manhattan tree-lighting ceremony. Lauer was to have co-hosted the Wednesday night program with Guthrie, Kotb and Al Roker.
Hours after the firing, the trade publication Variety posted what it said was a two-month investigation that included dozens of interviews with current and former staffers who asked to remain anonymous.
Among other things, Variety reported allegations that Lauer once gave a colleague a sex toy with an explicit note about how he wanted to use it on her; that he exposed himself to another female co-worker; that he would question female producers about their sex lives; and that he would talk about which co-hosts he would like to sleep with.
Messages to Lauer and his agent were not immediately returned, and NBC would not say whether he denied or admitted to any wrongdoing. He is married with three children.
Lauer becomes the second morning host in a week to lose his job over sexual misconduct allegations. CBS fired Charlie Rose after several women who worked for him complained about his behavior.
In other developments, former “Prairie Home Companion” host Garrison Keillor was cut loose by Minnesota Public Radio over an allegation of “inappropriate behavior.” MPR gave no details, but the 75-year-old Keillor said he inadvertently put his hand on a woman’s bare back in an attempt to console her.
Lauer, 59, has essentially been the king of television morning news since first being paired with Katie Couric on “Today” in 1997.
For many years, “Today” was the unquestioned ratings leader, until it was eclipsed by ABC’s “Good Morning America” following the ugly 2012 firing of Lauer’s co-host Ann Curry. The show had stabilized in recent years with Lauer’s pairing with Guthrie.
Lauer’s “Where in the world is Matt Lauer?” segments were popular for years, and he regularly played a lead role at the Olympics and other major news events.
He joins a lengthening list of media figures felled by sexual misconduct accusations this year. Besides Rose, they include Lauer’s NBC News colleague Mark Halperin, Fox News prime-time host Bill O’Reilly and National Public Radio newsroom chief Michael Oreskes. The New York Times suspended White House correspondent Glenn Thrush last week.
The flood of allegations was set off in large part by the downfall of Hollywood studio boss Harvey Weinstein, who has been accused of sexually assaulting or harassing numerous women.
Ari Wilkenfeld, the attorney for Lauer’s accuser, praised NBC for acting “quickly and responsibly” in response to the morning host’s “egregious acts of sexual harassment and misconduct.” The lawyer did not identify his client.
Lack, in his memo, said, “We are deeply saddened by this turn of events. But we will face it together as a news organization — and do it in as transparent a manner as we can.”
An immediate challenge is filling a giant hole on a show that has long been the most lucrative for NBC News. One potential replacement, Willie Geist, on Wednesday called Lauer someone “I have always looked up to in the business, and he taught me a lot.”
As for Keillor, Minnesota Public Radio said it will end distribution of the radio program “The Writer’s Almanac,” Keillor’s daily reading of a poem and telling of literary events, and end rebroadcasts of old “Prairie Home Companion” episodes.
“I meant to pat her back after she told me about her unhappiness and her shirt was open and my hand went up it about six inches. She recoiled. I apologized. I sent her an email of apology later and she replied that she had forgiven me and not to think about it,” Keillor said in an email to the Minneapolis Star Tribune. “We were friends. We continued to be friendly right up until her lawyer called.”
On Wednesday’s show, Guthrie appeared to fight back tears as she called Lauer her friend who is beloved by many at NBC. She said she was “heartbroken for my colleague who came forward to tell her story and any other women who have their own stories to tell.”
“How do you reconcile your love for someone with the revelation that they have behaved badly? I don’t know the answer to that,” she said. “But I do know that this reckoning that so many organizations have been going through is important, it’s long overdue, and it must result in workplaces where all women, all people, feel safe and respected.”
Later in the show, NBC’s Megyn Kelly, who has written about being sexually harassed by former boss Roger Ailes at Fox News Channel, noted the anguish on the faces of her colleagues but said, “What we don’t see is the pain on the faces of those who found the courage to come forward, and it is still a terrifying thing to do.”
On Twitter, President Donald Trump said, “Wow, Matt Lauer was just fired from NBC for ‘inappropriate sexual behavior in the workplace.’ But when will the top executives at NBC & Comcast be fired for putting out so much Fake News.”
Trump also alluded to potential misconduct by three other NBC News figures, while offering no details.
Natalie Morales, a former “Today” show colleague who left the show for “Access Hollywood” last year, said she was in shock about the story. She referred to stories that said she and Lauer had an affair, which they both denied.
“I have personally dealt with rumors in the past few years that were hurtful to me and to my family,” she said. “They diminished my hard work. I’ve addressed these rumors head-on in the past. It’s not the story today.”
Another former “Today” host, Deborah Norville, said she was stunned by the news.
“As a journalist, it’s upsetting to see another from our ranks caught up in these kinds of scandals. But as we’ve seen, no profession is immune,” she said. “Sadly, I doubt if anyone will be surprised if there are similar headlines to come.”
Associated Press writer Patrick Mairs in Philadelphia and Television writers Frazier Moore in New York and Lynn Elber in Los Angeles contributed to this report.
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Tag: Apocalypse
Dystopian novels and real life Preppers
I love a good dystopian novel. I enjoy a good story where I can’t afterward pick the story to pieces, highlighting the glaring errors and the “no way would they react like that” events.
I’m actually surprised, reading other WordPress blogs, at the number of female fans of this genre. I had assumed, obviously incorrectly, that this was the domain of males…..Survivalists and Preppers.
If I may just mention a couple of novels in this genre I enjoyed reading…
James Herbert’s “48” –
set in London in 1948 after Hitler won the war by bombing the UK with a biological weapon designed to kill people of certain blood groups – keeping the Arian race pure. Naturally, things don’t go quite as expected…..I won’t spoil it for you. London is eerily empty and abandoned as we follow the struggle to survive of “our hero”. It certainly makes one think about how different things would have turned out, had Hitler had this weapon at his disposal and had the chance to deploy it. I really enjoyed this book.
John Marsden wrote a series of 7 books for young adults which are still worth a read for adults too. The first book in the series is “Tomorrow when the War began”.
Set in Australia, follows a group of teenage friends who go camping, at the end of the school year, in the outback. One night while camping they hear a large number of military aircraft flying overhead. They return to their small town a few days later to discover the entire town’s residents have been coralled into a makeshift prison camp by Chinese troops. They don’t know at this stage if it is a localized or national invasion. It’s not just a book about surviving and trying to fight back against a foreign foe, but also about the relationships that develop with in the group and who among them step up to lead.
As I mentioned earlier it is the first of 7 books in this series AND there is also a spin off trilogy called “The Ellie Chronicles” – which continues to follow the life of one of the lead characters from the “Tomorrow” book.
There are several events in the series of books that are of the “no way would they do that” or “no way would that happen” – but they don’t detract from the story which barrels along from start to finish. I can see why teens would enjoy reading this series of books.
A movie was made of the “Tomorrow” book with an option to do one of the second book. Unfortunately the first movie failed to meet the financial targets so the second was never made.
I must admit that when I read dystopian type novels or watch apocalyptic movies I do tend to analyse the characters and events – and whether or not what they do, or the way they react to a situation, is within the realms of realism.
I live in New Zealand – known as the “shaky isles” as we are sitting on the edge of two techtonic plates and numerous fault lines and just to add interest, have active volcanoes. All of which combine to also make us a Tsunami risk. Many of us here wouldn’t label ourselves as “Preppers” as in the American National Geo Series “Doomsday Preppers” – we’re not prepping for the Zombie outbreak, but we do take steps to prepare for natural disasters. We have emergency supplies (food, water, medical supplies, emergency shelter etc.) just in case something major happens. I believe that the direction that the world is currently heading – with extreme weather phenomina, the predictions of a major pandemic (similar to the Spanish Flu of 1918 – which infected 500 million people around the world – without the assistance of passenger jets, including people on remote Pacific islands and in the Arctic, and resulted in the deaths of 50 to 100 million), the possibility of natural disasters and the danger of political leaders with “balls bigger than their brains” being in charge of nuclear, chemical and biological arsenals – it pays to take precautions. As one who does – I feel qualified – to a point – to pull apart bad dystopian novels.
New Zealand’s earth quake and tsunami risk doesn’t put off rich – mainly American – businessmen and celebrities from buying up land here (and building underground bunkers) for their emergency bolt holes when things go belly up in the northern hemisphere. NZ has been named as one of THE best places to be should a major world wide disaster occur.
Fellow blogger wishvintage has a post on her favourite list of dystopian novels. It’s a really good list. See link below.
My Dyspotipian and Apocalyptic Literature recommendations.
If anyone has other recommendations, please let me know.
aliterarybent Books, Reviews, Uncategorized, writing Leave a comment November 7, 2018 November 8, 2018 3 Minutes
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C.L. Bohannon, assistant professor and director of the Community Engagement Lab in Landscape Architecture in the College of Architecture and Urban Studies at Virginia Tech. Photo by Christina Franusich
Dr. C.L. Bohannon, ASLA, has been elected to serve as President of the VA ASLA
Dr. C.L. Bohannon, ASLA, has been elected to serve as President of the Virginia Chapter of the American Society of Landscape Architects (VA ASLA). As president, Dr. Bohannon is committed to increasing the chapter’s efforts to recruitment prospective students into landscape architecture degree programs, raise awareness of the profession and continue to advance continuing education programs within the chapter. He follows in the steps of several of his colleagues who also served as chapter president: Dr. Patrick Miller (1993), Prof. Terry Clements (1995), Prof. Benjamin Johnson (1999) and Prof. Brian Katen (2000).
VA ASLA website: http://www.vaasla.org.
landscape architecture program
121 Burruss Hall (MC 0190)
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Masked men kill radio commentator in Philippines
Source: Agencies | February 23, 2009, Monday | Online Edition
Two masked men on a motorbike shot dead a radio commentator in the restive southern Philippines today, police said, the second journalist murdered in the country this year.
Ernie Rollin was parking his motorcycle at a petrol station in Oroquieta City on the southern island of Mindanao when the two men wearing masks shot him at close range, police said.
The Philippines is one of the most dangerous places in the world for journalists -- five were murdered last year while 59 have been killed since 2001, based on records from the National Union of Journalists in the Philippines.
"We're still looking at all probable motives behind this killing," Danilo Empedrad, regional police chief in northern Mindanao, told reporters. "We're not ruling out any angles, including the possibility it could be work-related."
He said investigators four spent shells from a calibre .45 pistol were found near Rollin's body. Rollin had been leaving his motorcycle at the petrol station every morning to take public transportation to work in nearby Ozamis City.
Empedrad said Rollin's girlfriend was a few yards (metres) from the spot where the broadcaster was killed when she heard gunshots. She tried to help Rollin, but one of the gunmen stopped her and fired another shot at the back of his head, he added.
She told local radio that the journalist, known for his hard-hitting commentaries against corruption and criminal activities in the local community, had no known enemies.
Investigative stories about drug trafficking, gambling, corruption and other illegal activities involving officials in the Philippines often put reporters at risk.
Corruption in the media, with underpaid journalists sometimes taking bribes to report stories, also places reporters in danger from disgruntled paymasters or their rivals.
Under fire from local and international human rights groups for its failure to protect hundreds of journalists and left-wing activists killed over the past seven years, the government has vowed to track down killers of reporters but there have been few convictions.
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Posts tagged with "HNTB":
“Rock Day L.A.” turns Sixth Street Bridge rubble into memorabilia
Celebrating a peculiar form preservation, Los Angeles City Councilmember José Huizar and the Los Angeles Bureau of Engineering will be teaming up on August 13th to host “Rock Day L.A.,” an event focused around handing out roughly 1,000 pieces of the iconic Sixth Street Bridge, currently under demolition. The event, held as part of the City's effort to keep the public engaged with the $449 million project, will feature live music and food as officials hand out free chunks of the structure on a first-come, first-served basis. Each piece will be accompanied by a certificate of authenticity. The event, hosted on a Saturday morning to ensure public access, will mark another milestone in the Sixth Street Bridge’s replacement, as crews have spent the last six months methodically deconstructing one of L.A.’s most iconic structures. Built in 1932 using an innovative-for-the-time, on-site concrete manufacturing plant, the Sixth Street Bridge was eventually found to be suffering from Alkali-Silica Reaction (ASR), commonly referred to as "concrete cancer." ASR is a malady that occurs when concrete is made with too much alkali content, setting off a chemical reaction between that alkali content and the concrete’s aggregate, resulting in a gel-like substance that weakens the structure. This chemical byproduct creates stress within the concrete itself, resulting in a brittle material that, given L.A.’s seismically active history, has the potential to cause catastrophic failure. The bridge was designated as a public safety hazard in 2011 when the Bureau of Engineering estimated that there was a 70% chance the bridge could collapse in a major earthquake over the next 50 years. The following year, an international design competition was held afterward to design a replacement. The Sixth Street Bridge will be replaced by a HNTB and Michael Maltzan Architecture-designed structure that evokes the Art Deco original with its cascade of swoopy, cable-stayed supports. The new structure, due to be finished in 2019, will feature an array of public parks, plazas, and connections to the city’s Los Angeles River, which is also currently undergoing radical change and restoration.
Sacramento’s Union Pacific Railyards to be redeveloped into mixed-use entertainment district
The City of Sacramento is moving along with the redevelopment of the Sacramento Railyards, what was once the largest rail yard west of the Mississippi River. At 244-acres, the proposed mixed-used, adaptive-reuse project is just north of the city’s downtown. The original scope of the project was approved by the Sacramento City Council in 2007 and included the development of a maximum of 12,100 dwelling units, 1.4 million square feet of retail, 1,100 hotel rooms, 2.4 million square feet of office, 485,390 square feet of historic/cultural space, and 491,000 square feet of mixed use. In June 2015, the master plan for the site was altered to include a new, HNTB Corporation-designed Major League Soccer team stadium as well as a hospital complex in exchange for fewer residential units. New guidelines for the redevelopment also include up to 10,000 dwelling units, 405,741 square feet of retail, up to 3.8 million square feet of offices, 771,405 square feet of flexible mixed use, a 1,100 room hotel, and 33 acres of open space. At the heart of the project lies the San Francisco-based BCV Architects’ proposal for the redevelopment and adaptive reuse of the site’s landmarked depot structures, known as the “central shops historic district.” BCV’s 500,000 square foot retail district is to include restaurants, entertainment venues, public art, and commercial space surrounded by open space. The firm’s proposal takes the existing red brick depot structures and surrounds them with tree-lined, hardscaped pedestrian zones and a mix of simply-articulated new construction. Kansas City-based HNTB Corporation will design the 25,000 seat soccer stadium will be built in the hopes of converting Sacramento’s minor league FC Republic team into a professional one. The stadium’s design is to include a steeply-pitched rake to amplify the crowd’s cheers. Work on the soccer stadium is expected to be completed as soon as 2018, while the long term redevelopment schedule for the remainder of the site is still in the works.
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The end of the Los Angeles' Sixth Street bridge brings a subdued HNTB-Maltzan design
So long, Sixth Street Bridge. We knew it was coming, but Wednesday marked the last day the iconic Art Deco span would be open to the public. Built in 1932, the iconic double-loop overpass over the L.A. River will live on in movies, videos, and photos. A victim of age, the bridge was declared unsalvageable due to irreversible decay in 2012 and the Bureau of Engineering launched a competition to design a new, $400 million, cable stayed structure. HNTB with Michael Maltzan Architecture came out the winners in that infrastructural bout and with the demise of the old bridge their loop-de-loop ten-arch span is one step closer to realization. The mayor’s office released new renderings of the bridge that look decidedly toned down from the 2012 winning boards. While older images depicted stairways built into the arches so that pedestrians could get an elevated view and the concrete embankments planted with wildflowers, updated renderings depict a staid park in the shade of the roadbed. that with the Developer Leonard Hill (a founding partner of Linear City Development) recently gave a $1.9 million gift to the Mayor’s Fund for Los Angeles. Those moneys were earmarked to fund the design, construction, and programming of an arts plaza beneath the new Sixth Street Bridge. With such a contribution, one might hope that the park space slated to open in 2019 will be more fully realized than the uninspired placeholder suggested in the renderings.
Brooklyn Bridge Park's overly bouncy pedestrian bridge remains overly bouncy, off limits
When it opened in 2013, the Squibb Park Bridge that zigzagged between Brooklyn Heights and Brooklyn Bridge Park instantly became one of the most thrilling pieces of the waterfront retreat. The HNTB-designed pedestrian bridge was designed to have some bounce in it, so getting to the park was more than a typical pedestrian experience, it was a fun little adventure. At least for the humans voyaging across it—dogs hated it. The petrified, why-are-you-doing-this-to-me looks on their faces as the wood structure ebbed and flowed were haunting. But while the Squibb Park bridge may have seemed a little precarious, everything was surely fine. The movement was just part of the fun. The Brooklyn Bridge Park said so right on its website: "Walk across the award-winning Squibb Park Bridge and you may notice a little spring in your step. That’s because it was designed to be lightweight and flexible like the trail bridges in our state and national parks." See, totally stable. Well, maybe not. By last summer, the bridge wasn't just springing, it was swaying. So in August, the bridge was closed. That was supposed to be temporary, but the bridge is still off limits today. Back in February, the Brooklyn Paper reported that the structure needed $700,000 in repairs—nearly a quarter of the bridge's initial cost. Those repairs were supposed to wrap up in the Spring. So now Spring has arrived—almost peak Brooklyn Bridge Park season—and the bouncy bridge is still inaccessible. “At this point, because of the movement we notice, it would be overly optimistic to say we could solve this in two to three weeks," Regina Myer, president of the Brooklyn Bridge Park Corporation told the New York Times. Engineers are apparently studying the structure's movements. The bridge is still expected to open later this spring, but no exact date has been given. And there has not been a full accounting of exactly what caused the problems. A spokesperson has said the issue could come down to a "misalignment." Park officials told the Times that the solution will include installing cross braces, which a park spokesperson said would make the bridge "a little less bouncy than it was before." One would hope.
Here are the winners of the AIA's 2015 Institute Honor Awards in architecture
The American Institute of Architects (AIA) has announced the 2015 recipients of its Institute Honor Awards, which it describes as “the profession’s highest recognition of works that exemplify excellence in architecture, interior architecture and urban design.” This year’s 23 recipients were selected from out of about 500 submissions and will be honored at the AIA’s upcoming National Convention and Design Exposition in Atlanta. That event will be keynoted by former President Bill Clinton. Now onto the winners in the architecture category. 28th Street Apartments; Los Angeles Koning Eizenberg Architecture
From the AIA: The historic YMCA (1926) had been a focus of African-American life in the era of segregation but had fallen into severe disrepair. The design re-establishes the building’s role as a community focus, restores principal spaces for youth training programs, brings existing living quarters in compliance with contemporary standards and adds new housing units. Inventive integration of new building systems released the existing rooftop for outdoor social space that connects and anchors old and new. The new addition is thin and cross-ventilated. It is shaded to the south by a vertical photovoltaic panel array and wrapped to the north with lightweight perforated metal screens that contrast with the heft of the original masonry building.
Brockman Hall for Physics, Rice University; Houston KieranTimberlake
From the AIA:The campus of Rice University is a continuously studied and managed “canvas” that represents an intensive ongoing collaboration between architects, planners, and administrators. Its park-like environment—with live oaks, lawns, walkways, arcades, courtyards, and buildings—comprises a clear and timeless vision. The Brockman Hall for Physics needed to fit within this distinctive setting, to gather together a faculty of physicists and engineers working in as many as five separate buildings, and to house highly sophisticated research facilities carefully isolated from the noise, vibrations, and temperature fluctuations that could destroy experiments.
California Memorial Stadium & Simpson Training Center; Berkeley, California HNTB Architecture; Associate Architect: STUDIOS Architecture
From the AIA: The historic stadium is one of the most beloved and iconic structures on the UC Berkeley campus. The key goals for this project were to restore the stadium’s historic and civic prominence, integrate modern training and amenity spaces, and address severe seismic concerns. By setting the new athlete training facility into the landscape, a new grand 2-acre public plaza for the stadium was created on the roof. A new press box/club crowns the historic wall; its truss-like design acts as a counterpoint to the historic facade.
Cambridge Public Library; Cambridge, Massachusetts William Rawn Associates; Associate Architect: Ann Beha Architects
From the AIA: The Cambridge Public Library has become the civic “Town Common” for a city that celebrates and welcomes its highly diverse community (with over 50 languages spoken in its schools). With its all-glass double-skin curtain wall front facade, the library opens seamlessly out to a major public park. This double-skin curtain wall uses fixed and adjustable technologies to ensure that daylight is infused throughout the interiors and to maximize thermal comfort for the most active patron spaces looking out to the park.
Danish Maritime Museum; Elsinore, Denmark Bjarke Ingels Group
From the AIA: The design solution to the site’s inherent dilemmas was to wrap a subterranean museum around a dry dock like a doughnut, where the hole was the dry dock itself and the centerpiece of the museum’s collection. Three two-level bridges span the dry dock, serving as shortcuts to various sections of the museum. All floors slope gently, so that a visitor continually descends further below the water’s edge to learn about Danish maritime lore. The civil engineering and construction work for the museum were among the most complicated ever undertaken in Denmark.
John Jay College of Criminal Justice; New York City Skidmore, Owings & Merrill
From the AIA: Located in Manhattan, John Jay College of Criminal Justice’s new building provides all the functions of a traditional college campus within the confines of a single city block. SOM’s 625,000-square-foot addition doubles the size of the college’s existing facilities by adding classrooms, laboratories, auditoriums, faculty offices, and social spaces. These functions are arranged within a new 14-story tower and four-story podium topped with an expansive landscaped terrace that serves as an elevated campus commons. A 500-foot-long cascade runs the length of the podium and functions as the social spine of the campus. SOM’s design places a premium on communal and interactive space so that students may enjoy the experiences of a traditional college setting.
Krishna P. Singh Center for Nanotechnology at the University of Pennsylvania; Philadelphia WEISS/MANFREDI
From the AIA: Challenging the established model of laboratory buildings, the Krishna P. Singh Center for Nanotechnology is organized around an ascending spiral that hybridizes the tradition of the campus quadrangle with the public promenade. The Center for Nanotechnology twists its laboratories around a central campus green, opening the sciences to the University of Pennsylvania’s landscape while providing a suite of public spaces within the building for cross-disciplinary collaboration amongst scientists. Here, multiple types—courtyard, laboratory loft, ascending gallery—each with their own distinct histories, are grafted together to create a new, but recognizable hybrid.
LeFrak Center at Lakeside Prospect Park; Brooklyn, New York Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects
From the AIA: This project restored 26 acres of Brooklyn’s Prospect Park, designed by Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux in the 19th century and added a new 75,000-square-foot, year-round skating and recreational facility. In the winter, the facility’s two rinks are open for ice skating, and in the summer one rink converts to roller skating and the other to a large water-play fountain. Clad in rough-hewn gray granite, the new LeFrak Center appears to be large stone retaining walls set in the landscape. Much of the structure is tucked into the land. The L-shaped plan consists of the east and north block, both one-story structures with roof terraces connected by a bridge.
Sant Lespwa, Center of Hope; Outside of Hinche, Haiti Rothschild Doyno Collaborative
From the AIA: The Center of Hope, commissioned by World Vision, is located in a rural region in Haiti and provides support, education, and skill building opportunities. The design process involved the entire community from children to elders. Construction included on-the-job skills training for over 100 residents. The courtyard scheme and breezeway capture prevailing winds while opening expansive views to the mountains beyond. Careful planning for natural ventilation, daylighting, water collection, sewage treatment, and electricity generation resulted in a completely self-sufficient building. The participatory and empathetic process created an uplifting environment that inspires hope.
United States Courthouse, Salt Lake City, Utah Thomas Phifer and Partners; Naylor Wentworth Lund Architects
From the AIA: The design of the new United States Courthouse in Salt Lake City emanates from a search for a strong, iconic, transparent, and metaphorically egalitarian form to symbolize the American judiciary system. The primary nature of the courthouse’s cubic mass projects grounded dignity, immovable order, and an equal face to all sides. The 400,000-square-foot, 10-story courthouse resides on a landscaped terrace that spans an entire city block, uniting the new and existing federal courthouses as a public-access amenity while fulfilling a required federal security setback from the street.
Wild Turkey Bourbon Visitor Center; Lawrenceburg, Kentucky De Leon & Primmer Architecture Workshop
From the AIA: Located on a bluff overlooking the Kentucky River, the visitor center is the newest component of recent additions and expansions to the Wild Turkey Distillery Complex, one of seven original member distilleries of the Kentucky Bourbon Trail. The 9,140-square-foot facility houses interactive exhibits, a gift shop, event venues, a tasting room, and ancillary support spaces. Utilizing a simple barn silhouette (an interpretation of Kentucky tobacco barns common to the area), the building, clad in a custom chevron pattern of stained wood siding, presents a clear and recognizable marker in the landscape.
Pictorial> Dramatic new pedestrian bridge design chosen for Palo Alto
A team made up of HNTB (which is also leading the 6th Street Viaduct in Los Angeles), 64North, Bionic Landscape Architecture, and Ned Kahn have won a competition to design a new pedestrian and bicycle bridge spanning the 101 Freeway in Palo Alto at Adobe Creek. The winning proposal for the Adobe Creek Overcrossing, called Confluence, is highlighted by a multi-story, leaning steel arch integrated with an intricate web of cables and floating steel disks. The bridge's sinuous form was "drawn from the trajectories of the cyclists moving along it and the sinuous waterways of the Bay," according to the team's proposal. Storm water will be captured from the crossing and re-routed to a new basin, designed to adapt to changing seawater rise. The team beat out shortlisted teams led by Moffatt and Nichol and Endrestudio in a competition that elicited 20 responses. The plan will go before City Council in February for review and possible approval.
Observers sound off on San Francisco's 49ers Stadium, the house that tech built
San Jose Mercury News columnist (and frequent AN contributor) Alan Hess took on HNTB's Levi's Stadium, the new $1.3 billion home of the San Francisco 49ers. Hess compares the "starkly utilitarian," 68,500 seat stadium to Silicon Valley's high tech environments, and even to its high-end gadgets. The building "translates the high-def experience of a game we see on TV—the roaring crowd, the superhuman action of the players, the intense color of the grass under the TV-studio lighting, the camaraderie of loyal 49ers fans celebrating (or commiserating) en masse—into an enormous three-dimensional architectural spectacle," Hess wrote. Innovations include club seats (including 170 luxury suites) separated from the rest of the stadium bowl (and a lacy steel skeleton) to bring everybody closer to the field; food service via every smartphone; and a variety of viewing environments, including nine clubs. Of course it's all located inside Santa Clara's Great America Parkway, a "multiuse city of workplaces, entertainment, theme parks, convention center, schools and hotels, stitched together with light rail and cars." Other outlets seem to be equally impressed, at least with the stadium's novelty and gizmos. Time magazine called the stadium the "most high tech sports stadium yet," illustrating partnerships with tech companies like Sony, giant LED displays in both end zones, and wifi and 4G access for all fans. USA Today called it "massive and luxurious," a shiny new antidote to "grungy" Candlestick Park, the Niners' former home, with its "wide concourses and expansive views of the South Bay." And SFist, a little bothered by the lack of shade, liked the solar panels that will power the stadium for all of its home games. But the same reporter, Daisy Barringer, had an interesting comment. Unlike Candlestick Park, which had a decidedly unique mid-century character (and flaws), the new stadium feels a little more, well, normal. "It's just another NFL stadium," said Barringer. Click here for a live view of the stadium.
First Doggy Doo-Doo in Flight: HNTB Designs a Pet Potty at San Diego Airport
Are you afraid of taking Rover with you on your next flight because he might have to go potty in the airport? Well, pet-packing passengers flying through San Diego’s Lindbergh Field can rest easy. The airport’s recent $1 billion “Green Build” Terminal 2 expansion includes the nation’s first and only “pet relief” comfort station. Located between gates 46 and 47, the 75-square-foot rest room is decked out with features to get your four-legged friend in the mood to go, including ersatz grass and a fire hydrant. This may be the first, but it won’t be the last. Tom Rossbach, director of aviation architecture at HNTB, told the San Diego Union-Tribune that the firm is offering the amenity to its other airport clients.
Slideshow> Squibb Pedestrian Bridge Bounces Into Brooklyn Bridge Park
HNTB's Squibb Park Pedestrian Bridge connecting the Brooklyn Heights Promenade with Brooklyn Bridge Park opened to the public last Thursday. The $4.9 million bridge was built using "trail bridge technology" with galvanized steel cables and cylindrical black locust timbers, providing an efficient and lightweight structure that, as a sign at the entrance to the bridge warns, quite literally puts a bounce in visitors' steps. "The bridge is very light weight. You will feel yourself walking across the bridge," HNTB's Chief Engineer Ted Zoli said at a construction tour in December. On AN's visit to the bridge Friday morning, traversing the spans did in fact provide a bouncy effect. The 400-foot-long Squibb Park Pedestrian Bridge zig-zags through Brooklyn Bridge Park, moving through what will one day be a mixed-use development on the park's edge designed by Rogers Marvel Architects and providing a crucial connection to the Brooklyn Heights neighborhood which sits largely cut off from the waterfront by the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway. Concrete piers support the main bridge spans across Furman Street and through the park, which gently decline from a height of 50 feet to the waterfront park. LED lights are incorporated into the handrails that will wash the pathway with light in the evening.
Construction Progresses on Brooklyn's Squibb Park Pedestrian Bridge
Before the end of this year, the Squibb Park Pedestrian Bridge will be completed connecting Brooklyn Heights with the Brooklyn Bridge Park on the waterfront. This windy path over the BQE and through the treetops will quite literally bridge the divide and substantial grade shift between the neighborhood and the park. Construction of this $4.9 million pedestrian bridge, made of black locust timber and galvanized steel, is already underway, and on December 14th and 15th, the spans will be hoisted into place over Furman Street. HNTB's chief engineer Ted Zoli chose materials that were consistent with the landscape design of Brooklyn Bridge Park designed by Michael Van Valkenburgh. “The bridge is very light weight. You will feel yourself walking across the bridge,” Zoli said at a hard hat tour of Squibb Pedestrian Bridge at Brooklyn Park this afternoon. While the pedestrian bridge represents a contemporary solution, it is also a throwback to a pre-Robert Moses era when there was direct access to the water before the highway was built. “It is like a gangway,” said Zoli. “It is like how you used to walk to vessels on the water.”
Separated At Birth? Meet the Sixth Street Viaduct's Mission Impossible Cousin
We could't help noticing that LA's new Sixth Street Viaduct, which is being designed by a team led by HNTB, bears a striking resemblance to Dubai's Meydan Bridge, the royal VIP entrance to the Meydan racetrack where the prestigious Dubai World Cup is held annually. The bridge was featured in the recent film, Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol, but sits empty for most of the year. Of course there are differences between the two: Meydan's arches are made of steel, not concrete, it's not cable-stayed, and its upper arches don't touch the ground, but they're still very close in all their wavy glory. Judge for yourself below. HNTB's Sixth Street Viaduct in Los Angeles:
VS The Meydan Bridge in Dubai.
Videos> Three Proposals for LA's Sixth Street Viaduct Animated
In September, AN reported on the three proposals to replace Los Angeles' iconic but crumbling Sixth Street Viaduct by HNTB, AECOM, and Parsons Brinckerhoff. The three teams have notably added pedestrian amenities and adjacent lush landscaping to the 3,500-foot-long cable-stayed span. While the renderings were compelling for each design, these video renderings fly the viewer in and around each proposal for a more detail view of what might soon be built in LA. Take a look.
Courtesy AECOM
Courtesy Parsons Brinckerhoff
Courtesy HNTB [Via Curbed LA.]
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Home Bollywood BIG INTERVIEW Irrfan Khan actively promoting ‘Karwaan’: Producer
Irrfan Khan actively promoting ‘Karwaan’: Producer
“Karwaan” producer Priti Rathi Gupta says ailing actor Irrfan Khan, despite his condition, is quite actively promoting the film on social media and that his loyal fans are waiting for the movie to be released…reports Asian Lite News
Irrfan Khan’s ‘Karwaan’ to release on August 10.
Irrfan, who is undergoing treatment in London for a neuroendocrine tumour, is unable to be physically present to participate in the promotion of the film.
“Irrfan is very much actively supporting and promoting the film. I know he is going through a journey and we are missing him around, we are missing his physical presence. But in the digital era, we all can be involved in things on social media. That is exactly what he is doing by promoting the film on social media. So I do not think his absence from the promotional activity will affect the film in anyway,” Gupta told.
Irrfan is not only a known name in the Bollywood world, but also in the international film circuit for having worked in films like “The Namesake”, “A Mighty Heart”, “Slumdog Millionaire”, “The Amazing Spider-Man” and “Life of Pi”.
“I know for a fact that he has his loyal fans across the world and everyone is looking forward to watching the film. We were more than glad to know that he agreed to do the film in the beginning. He has done a fantastic job as always,” Gupta added.
The producer, who also backed the film “Waiting” with her banner Ishka Films alongside Drishyam Films, said she nurtured the idea of making “Karwaan” for a long time because the story is “so fabulous”.
“I loved the story and decided to give it a life. After dealing with a few obstacles, production houses started pursuing the script and Ronnie Screwvala’s production house RSVP was among them. I always wanted to partner with him because he is an institution by himself and being a newcomer, I wanted a learning experience from him,” she said.
Then, why did she not make “Karwaan” her debut film as a producer?
“Yes, this could have been my first film as a producer but when I was facing difficulties, the film ‘Waiting’ came on my way. It was the same time I lost my mother, so I thought making that film at that point in time could be cathartic for me. So I just kept this story (‘Karwaan’) in the back knowing that very soon I will start working on it. Now, we are here,” she said.
Directed by Akarsh Khurana, “Karwaan” is releasing on August 3. It revolves around three oddballs from different walks of life who are thrown together on a somewhat bizarre journey which helps them find normalcy in their lives.
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Neha Kakkar Live in concert in Manchester on 19th July
SPECIAL: BK Shivani at Wembley
SPECIAL: The Asian Restaurant Awards 2019
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New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update
Blessedness of Forgiveness and of Trust in God.
A Psalm of David. A †Maskil.
1 aHow blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven,
Whose sin is covered!
2 How blessed is the man to whom the Lord adoes not impute iniquity,
And in whose spirit there is bno deceit!
3 When aI kept silent about my sin, bmy 1body wasted away
Through my 2cgroaning all day long.
4 For day and night aYour hand was heavy upon me;
My 1bvitality was drained away as with the fever heat of summer.
2Selah.
5 I aacknowledged my sin to You,
And my iniquity I bdid not hide;
I said, “cI will confess my transgressions to the Lord”;
And You dforgave the 1guilt of my sin.
6 Therefore, let everyone who is godly pray to You 1ain a time when You may be found;
Surely bin a flood of great waters they will not reach him.
7 You are amy hiding place; You bpreserve me from trouble;
You surround me with 1csongs of deliverance.
8 I will ainstruct you and teach you in the way which you should go;
I will counsel you bwith My eye upon you.
9 Do not be aas the horse or as the mule which have no understanding,
Whose trappings include bit and bridle to hold them in check,
Otherwise they will not come near to you.
10 Many are the asorrows of the wicked,
But bhe who trusts in the Lord, lovingkindness shall surround him.
11 Be aglad in the Lord and rejoice, you righteous ones;
And shout for joy, all you who are bupright in heart.
About New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update
The New American Standard Bible, long considered a favorite study Bible by serious students of the Scriptures, has been completely revised and updated in this new 1995 translation. Preserving the Lockman Foundation's standard of creating a literal translation of the original Greek, Hebrew, and Aramaic manuscripts, the 1995 NASB provides a literal translation that is very readable. Formalized language and outdated words and phrases have been replaced with their contemporary counterparts. In short, the 1995 NASB is a Bible translation that is very conducive to word-by-word study and is also able to be read (and understood) by the whole family.
Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. All rights reserved. http://www.lockman.org
NAS Cross References and Translator's Notes
Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1971, 1973, 1975, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. All rights reserved. http://www.lockman.org
NAS Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible
Copyright © 1981, 1998 by The Lockman Foundation. All rights reserved.
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PERMISSION TO QUOTE
The text of the New American Standard Bible® may be quoted and/or reprinted up to and inclusive of five hundred (500) verses without express written permission of The Lockman Foundation, providing that the verses do not amount to a complete book of the Bible nor do the verses quoted account for more than 25% of the total work in which they are quoted.
Notice of Copyright must appear on the title or copyright page of the work as follows:
"Scripture taken from the NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE, © Copyright The Lockman Foundation 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995. Used by permission."
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Quotations and/or reprints in excess of the above limitations, or other permission requests, must be directed to and approved in writing by The Lockman Foundation, PO Box 2279, La Habra, CA 90632-2279, (714) 879-3055. http://www.lockman.org
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Starsports.com to ride with McLaren Mercedes Formula 1 team
Starsports.com will be streaming the Indian Grand Prix race live on October 26 and 27, 2013. The website will develop special F1 programming including interactions with team driver Jenson Button
BestMediaInfo Bureau | Delhi | October 23, 2013
Starsports.com has entered into a unique partnership with the Vodafone McLaren Mercedes Formula 1 team for the 2013 Indian Grand Prix to be held on October 25-27. The 200 mph-plus Vodafone McLaren Mercedes F1 cars, driven by 2009 world champion Jenson Button of Great Britain and his young teammate Sergio Perez of Mexico, will carry Starsports.com logos on their rear wings. This will be the first time that an Indian digital brand will become part of a F1 team’s livery.
Starsports.com will be streaming the Indian Grand Prix race live on October 26 and 27, 2013. In addition, Starsports.com will be working closely with the Vodafone McLaren team in the run-up to the Grand Prix. The website will develop interesting F1 programming including interactions with the team drivers, Button and Perez, as well as senior management of the team including Martin Whitmarsh, Team Principal, and Sam Michael, Sporting Director.
Starsports.com will take its viewers on a virtual behind-the-scenes tour of Vodafone McLaren Mercedes’ ultra-high-tech garage, including highly revealing interviews with the team’s engineers who will explain exactly what it takes to run a top Formula 1 team. Not only this, a few lucky spectators can win a money-can’t-buy Vodafone McLaren Mercedes pit-and-paddock tour on the practice and qualifying days scheduled for October 25 and 26, respectively. Starsports.com will also showcase Vodafone McLaren Mercedes’ award-winning ‘Tooned’ cartoons which depict the team’s glorious 50-year history in a clever, amusing and counter-intuitive way. If you have not seen ‘Tooned’ before, you should not miss it!
Vijay Rajput, Chief Operating Officer, ESPN Software India, said, “We are delighted to work closely with the Vodafone McLaren Mercedes team. We believe this partnership will help in promoting starsports.com as the definitive destination for sports on digital. We will present an unrivalled live video experience as well as a place for replays and catch-up. The service will feature original content not screened on television, including outstanding video stories and insightful contributions from experts.”
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Multiple primary cancers can afflict one patient
News & Articles Cancer
Like Selma Blair, I’m a mom with multiple sclerosis (MS)
Disability Often Precedes Rheumatoid Arthritis Diagnosis
Published by Team BioPlus Health at May 15, 2019
Multiple primary versions can arise by themselves, experts say. Researchers look into past treatments, environments and genetics as the culprits.
Noelle Johnson, 42, was diagnosed with her first cancer — a soft tissue sarcoma under her right arm — in 1999 when she was 21. In 2013, her physicians found six different cancers in her breasts. In the years that followed, surgeons discovered and removed numerous masses they deemed “premalignant” from her ovary, her uterus, her leg, arm and chest wall, aiming to get them out before they turned cancerous.
Each tumor was distinct, that is, none resulted from the spread of any of the others. For Johnson, having multiple primary tumors diagnosed at an unusually young age was both scary and baffling. “It was crazy,” recalls Johnson, who lives in Windsor, Col., where she operates a day-care center in her home. “My world started to spin. It was a huge red flag.”
Many people assume that when cancer shows up following an earlier tumor, it is a metastasis from the first. But this is not always the case. Multiple primary cancers can arise by themselves, and researchers in recent years have begun to unravel some of the reasons.
“Cancer therapies have improved dramatically in the modern era, resulting in a growing population of cancer survivors — over 15 million,” says Stephen J. Chanock, director of the division of cancer epidemiology and genetics at the National Cancer Institute (NCI). “As these individuals live longer lives, some of them go on to develop second cancers, tumors unrelated to their original cancer. There likely are multiple factors involved, and we are still learning about their causes.”
Experts believe that many of these additional primary tumors are the result of earlier treatments for initial cancers that often occur in childhood. Radiation and chemotherapy, while successful in knocking out the first disease, also cause DNA damage. This can prompt new cancers to develop later, among them lymphomas, leukemias, and those of the breast, thyroid or soft tissues.
From infections to chance
Other factors that can encourage new tumors probably include environmental exposures, such as tobacco or alcohol use, hormonal influences, viral infections — especially HIV — and genetics, which appears to be a major player. Also, experts believe that a combination of these is involved. “There are emerging data that suggest common inherited factors together with treatment can influence the risk of developing a second cancer,” Chanock says.
Read on: Multiple primary cancers can afflict one patient
There Will Be Over 22 Million Cancer Survivors In The U.S. By 2030, Says New Report
Sustained Virologic Response in Patients With Chronic Hepatitis C and Liver Cancer
Firefighters battle occupational cancer
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Post Malone Dethrones Beatles and J Cole With Billboard Record
May 15, 2018 Penny
Post Malone’s Incredible Success Billboard recently reported that Post Malone’s chart-topping new album Beerbongs & Bentleys has continued its monstrous success, with nine top 20 tracks on the Billboard Hot 100. The previous record was a tie between The Beatles and rapper J. Cole. Each previously had six top 20 records. As if one record…
Quicktip for correct processing
May 10, 2018 miscinc
Processing takes place at all stages of your production. Whether it’s sound design, mixing or mastering, you’ll at some point throw an EQ or a compressor on your track. While the following tip is pretty basic it’s overseen by many producers. Keep the input leveled with the output When you process your sound just keep…
Humanize Chord Progessions in Ableton
May 3, 2018 miscinc
With a digital audio workstation (DAW) it’s never been easier to write melodies and chord progessions. But with more and more time spent on creating such harmonies, you realize that it’s not sounding quite as human as if it would sound like if you played it by hand. You either can choose to record it…
New Lil Uzi Vert Track Rich Forever Leaks Courtesy Of An Instagram Hacker
May 2, 2018 Penny
New Lil Uzi Vert track “Rich Forever” leaks after the rapper’s Instagram account is suspiciously hacked, and it contains a possible shot at Rich The Kid. Lil Uzi Vert’s Instagram Account Seemingly Taken Over There’s been some strange happenings on social media for Lil Uzi Vert over the past couple weeks. On April 8, the…
How Did You Get Your Placement Yung Rich Ep. 1
April 28, 2018 traktrain
Yung Rich, producer of the song “Drive My Car” by Landon Cube tells us the story on how he got that instrumental to him. Where are you from and current location? Born and raised in Sacramento, CA. Still staying here in the 916. Who have you worked with? Iv’e worked with a lot of various…
Time management for producers
April 26, 2018 miscinc
Are you sometimes feel that you don’t use the time you have efficient enough? Or do you struggle to find time at all to make music? I was at this point as well and want to help you find a way to organize yourself and squeeze the most out of it. Find your big things…
Did Gucci Mane Invent Trap Music? He thinks so.
April 25, 2018 Penny
Who invented Trap Music? It’s fair to say that trap music is arguably the hottest form of hip hop music around today. Since its birth in the South, trap has emerged as strong force that appeals to hip hop fans from all walks of life. But who invented trap music? It’s a question that draws…
How to use analyzers
Mixing your own music can be a challenge. After countless hours of tweaking and arranging it’s easy to lose perspective on your track. Therefore receiving visual feedback can be helpful to achieving a clean and powerful mix. Get things started Choose an analyzer and stick to it! You need to know how it responds to…
Tupac Is Back To Take Shots At Biggie, JAY-Z, Dr. Dre, And More In Original Makaveli Liner Notes
The Legendary West Coast Rapper Left Some Unflattering Words For Some Of His Fellow Rappers Tupac Shakur, the hip-hop legend also known by his stage name 2Pac, was no stranger to beefing with other rappers. Though he was originally born in East Harlem, he became the head representative of the West Coast during the monumental East Coast-West Coast…
How to layer hip hop drums
Drums are arguably the most important element to consider when creating a hip hop track. While the groove is essential, the sound of your drums can separate you strongly from the sea of producers. To achieve your very own sound, you won’t get far without layering. Layering is the technique of stacking sounds to create…
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Tag Archives: trader
HTFP: Burton Trader relaunched under independent owner
A local businessman has bought former Trinity Mirror title the Burton Trader, which was closed in July.
The title, now under Chris Clark’s ownership, will be renamed as the Independent Trader.
The relaunch will also see the return of several Burton Trader staff, including reporters who were made redundant as part of the July cutbacks.
Full story at this link…
This entry was posted in Editors' pick, Newspapers and tagged Burton, Burton Trader, Chris Clark, Independent Trader, local businessman, trader, Trinity Mirror on September 15, 2009 by Laura Oliver.
Innovations in Journalism – Everyblock
We give developers the opportunity to tell us journalists why we should sit up and pay attention to the sites and devices they are working on. Today it’s aggregated news laid out across interactive city maps with Everyblock.
1) Who are you and what’s it all about?
I’m Adrian Holovaty. EveryBlock is an experiment in aggregating news at the block level in selected cities. Our site, which currently covers Chicago, New York City and San Francisco, allows you to view recent news for any address in the city.
We offer three broad types of news:
Public records, such as crimes, restaurant inspections, building permits, zoning changes
Links to news reports, such as newspaper articles and blog entries
Fun from the web, such as nearby Flickr photos or Craigslist ‘missed connection’ postings
The idea is that we collect all of this information from across the web (and directly from city governments themselves) and slice it geographically, so you can stay updated with what’s happening near you.
2) Why would this be useful to a journalist?
EveryBlock is useful to journalists in two ways.
First, it’s an experiment in a new form of news dissemination – that is, news filtered at the block level – and journalists can look to us for inspiration in new forms of publishing information. We’re funded by a grant from the Knight Foundation, whose goal it is to promote innovation in the journalism industry, and we’re a test-bed for this idea.
Second, we unearth a lot of government data that journalists might be interested in researching further. We only launched a few weeks ago, and already a few journalists have used our site to find trends and break stories on their own. This happens particularly because we make it so easy to browse government databases. Here are two examples:
http://chicagoist.com/2008/03/05/trader_vics_is.php
http://cbs5.com/investigates/SF.hotel.safety.2.671667.html
3) Is this it, or is there more to come?
There is much, much more to come. As I mentioned above, we’ve only been around since late January. We plan to add more cities, more data and more features.
4) Why are you doing this?
This is an experiment. We’re doing it because it’s interesting, because it’s fun and because it’s an exciting new idea.
5) What does it cost to use it?
The service is entirely free. Unlike some newspaper sites, you don’t even have to submit an evil registration form!
6) How will you make it pay?
We have the luxury of not having to worry about that for a while. We’re funded by a grant for two years, and we’ve only been working on this project for about seven months at this point.
This entry was posted in Journalism, Multimedia, Online Journalism and tagged Adrian Holovaty, Chicago, Craigslist, Data journalism, EveryBlock, Geotagging, Innovations in Journalism, journalist, Knight Foundation, Mapping, New York City, San Francisco, trader, USA on March 14, 2008 by Oliver Luft.
Citizen journalist ’sells’ video for €100,000
A video from French citizen journalism website Citizenside is expected to generate €100,000 (£75,285) of revenue after being sold to Paris Match, the Editors Weblog reports, with a commission rate of between 50 and 75 per cent going to the amateur creator.
The footage from Citizenside, which recently signed a partnership with Agence France-Presse, was of the newsworthy former Société Générale trader Jérôme Kerviel signing a statement at a police station, according to the report.
This entry was posted in Citizen journalism and tagged Agence France-Presse, amateur creator, EUR, Europe, GBP, Jérôme Kervie, journalist, Paris Match, Société Générale trader, trader on February 1, 2008 by Laura Oliver.
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Research article | Open | Open Peer Review | Published: 05 December 2013
Health examination utilization in the visually disabled population in Taiwan: a nationwide population-based study
Yueh-Han Hsu1,2,3,
Wen-Chen Tsai1 &
Pei-Tseng Kung4
People with visual disabilities have increased health needs but face worse inequity to preventive health examinations. To date, only a few nationwide studies have analyzed the utilization of preventive adult health examinations by the visually disabled population. The aim of this study was to investigate the utilization of health examinations by the visually disabled population, and analyze the factors associated with the utilization.
Visual disability was certified by ophthalmologists and authenticated by the Ministry of the Interior (MOI), Taiwan. We linked data from three different nationwide datasets (from the MOI, Bureau of Health Promotion, and National Health Research Institutes) between 2006 and 2008 as the data sources. Independent variables included demographic characteristics, income status, health status, and severity of disability; health examination utilization status was the dependent variable. The chi-square test was used to check statistical differences between variables, and a multivariate logistic regression model was used to examine the associated factors with health examination utilization.
In total, 47,812 visually disabled subjects aged 40 years and over were included in this study, only 16.6% of whom received a health examination. Lower utilization was more likely in male subjects, in those aged 65 years and above, insured dependents and those with a top-ranked premium-based salary, catastrophic illness/injury, chronic diseases of the genitourinary system, and severe or very severe disabilities.
The overall health examination utilization in the visually disabled population was very low. Lower utilization occurred mainly in males, the elderly, and those with severe disabilities.
People with disabilities have distinct healthcare needs, and they tend to experience chronic health problems earlier than the general population [1]. The prevalence of chronic disease is two to three times higher in people with disabilities [2], and the risk of co-morbidities such as cardiovascular disease and stroke is also increased [1, 3]. However, previous research has demonstrated that the health service needs of people with disabilities are not currently being met [4–6]. The visually disabled population, as with individuals with other disabilities, have less access to appropriate healthcare services [1, 7] and are less likely to receive screening examinations [8]. They face enormous barriers in accessing proper preventive healthcare, including informational barriers, lack of services, lack of transport, inadequate resources or financial considerations, lack of social awareness, and lack of education and training of healthcare providers [9–11]. In terms of equity, we hypothesized that the visually disabled are being doubly marginalized.
Visual impairment is one of the major causes of disability in the United States and in Taiwan [12, 13]. It has been estimated that the prevalence of visual disabilities will increase markedly during the next several decades, with an estimated 70% increase in blindness and low vision by 2020 [14]. Vision loss contributes significantly to falls, fractures and restrictions in mobility [15], and to increased hospital length of stay and post-discharge requirements for rehabilitative care [16]. Severe bilateral visual impairments are associated with an increased risk of all-cause mortality and cardiovascular disease-related mortality [17], and are regarded as an independent predictor of mortality [17, 18].
Preventive health examinations are an important health promotion strategy [19–22]. They can help to identify diseases at an early stage, postpone the development of subsequent adverse outcomes, and significantly save healthcare resources and lives [19]. Recent research from the United States suggests that greater use of clinical preventive services can save more than two million life-years annually [20]. In Japan, Hozawa et al. reported that mortality rates are at least 26% lower among those undergoing health check-ups than those who do not [21]. In Taiwan, Deng et al. reported that for hypertension patients who attended a health examination program, over NT$34,570 in healthcare costs were saved, and life-spans were increased by 128 days [22].
Equity of access to health care is an important factor in priority setting of a health care system [23, 24]. Inequity in access to preventive health services has been shown to be closely related to differences in age, family income, gender, race/ethnicity, urban/rural residence, severity of disability, and education level [25–29].
In Taiwan, the government inaugurated the National Health Insurance (NHI) program in March 1995 to provide compulsory universal health care coverage including medical care services and preventive health services. To date, the NHI enrolls over 99.9% of the Taiwanese population [30] and has contracts with over 92% of all medical providers [31]. Since the launch of the NHI, investigations have reported there to be significant improvements in terms of equity of access to health care, greater financial risk protection, and the geographical distributions of physicians [32–35].
The overall utilization rate of adult health examinations in Taiwan has been reported to be 33.3% to 40.72% [36, 37], and 46.8% in the elderly [19]. For the whole disabled population, the utilization rate has been reported to be 15.8% [13]. Although the utilization rate in the disabled population is much lower, disabilities are usually not factored into most studies on equity. To reduce the barriers to preventive health services and encourage health checks for the visually disabled population, it is necessary to obtain evidence from large-scale investigations regarding the associated factors of utilization of the preventive health services. Accordingly, the aim of this study was to examine the factors related to the utilization of health examinations by the visually disabled population. Identifying the barriers that prevent visually disabled people from participating in health examinations may help the authorities to conceive feasible strategies for this marginalized population.
Preventive health services in Taiwan
To promote the health of all people in Taiwan, the government has provided free preventive health services since 1995. These services are provided free (only a registration fee is required) to: (1) those aged 40–64 years once every three years; (2) those aged 65 years and over once a year; and (3) those with poliomyelitis aged 35 and over once a year. A registration fee of up to US$3 may be required for people with no disabilities, although this is waived for people with disabilities. The health examination includes a physical examination, health education guidance, blood tests, and urinalysis.
This study focused on adults aged over 40 years with visual disabilities. Visual disability, like all other formally issued disabilities in Taiwan, was authenticated via a strict administrative process. Patients with poor vision were examined and certified at ophthalmology clinics, and then approved by the Ministry of the Interior (MOI), Taiwan.
Three different nationwide datasets were used including the Disability Registration from the MOI 2008 (with access to demographic characteristics and severity of disabilities), the Health Insurance Medical Claims from the National Health Research Institutes 2008 (with access to income status and health status), and the Health Prevention Services File from the Bureau of Health Promotion from 2006 to 2008 (with access to health examination utilization status). This study has been approved by the research ethics committee in China Medical University and Hospital (IRB No. CMU-REC-101-012).
Relevant variables
The demographic characteristics including gender, age, education level, marital status, aboriginal status (yes vs. no), and level of urbanization of residential area (district or township) were recorded. The definition of level of urbanization was designed by Liu et al. [38] and has been broadly utilized in relevant research. Urbanization was classified into 8 levels for all residential townships in Taiwan, with level 1 being the most urbanized areas and level 8 being the least urbanized areas. The severity of disability was classified as mild, moderate, severe and very severe.
Income status included a low-income household status (yes vs. no) and levels of premium-based monthly salary (PBMS). The low-income household status was defined as a household per capita income of below the minimum cost of living for that residential area. The levels of PBMS were the monthly income levels reported to the Bureau of National Health Insurance as the basis for insurance premium collection and are often used as the index for personal income. Those who are members of a family but without employment are enrolled as insured dependents in the National Health Insurance program.
Health status included catastrophic illness/injury (yes vs. no) and the presence of relevant chronic illnesses (including cancer, endocrine and metabolic diseases, mental disorders, diseases of the nervous system, diseases of the circulatory system, diseases of the respiratory system, diseases of the digestive system, diseases of the genitourinary system, diseases of the musculoskeletal system and connective tissue, disorders of the eye and adnexa, infectious diseases, congenital anomalies, diseases of the skin and subcutaneous tissue, diseases of the blood and blood-forming organs, and diseases of the ear and mastoid process). Whether or not each subject had utilized a health examination was also recorded (yes vs. no).
The chi-square test was used for descriptive analysis of the variables, with a p value of less than 0.05 being considered statistically significant. Multivariate logistic regression analysis was subsequently used to examine the influencing factors on the utilization of health examinations. The independent variables included demographic characteristics, income status, health status, and severity of disability, and the use of health examinations (yes vs. no) was the dependent variable.
All analyses were performed using SAS statistical software (version 9.1 for Windows; SAS Institute, Inc., Cary, NC, USA).
In total, 47,812 (23,450 female, 49.05%; 24,362 male, 50.95%) visually disabled people were enrolled. The overall health examination utilization rate was 16.16% (females 17.12% vs. males 15.25%, p < 0.001), while the benchmark data for the general population during the study period was 33.3% to 40.72% [36, 37]. In terms of age, over 70% of the cohort was over 60 years of age (Table 1). With regards to urbanization level, less visually disabled people lived in Level 4 and Level 8 areas (< 10%). Those who lived in Level 1 areas had a relatively lower utilization rate. In terms of PBMS, most subjects were in the insured dependent group (38.68%), followed by those with a PBMS of 16500–22800 (29.96%) and < 15840 (20.26%) New Taiwan dollars (NTD), respectively. These three subgroups constituted 88.9% of the whole population, showing that the majority of the cohort either had limited income or were unemployed. The insured dependent subgroup and the subgroup with the highest PBMS (PBMS NTD 48200–57800) reported lower utilization rates (around 13%) than the overall utilization rate (Table 1).
Table 1 Characteristics and Chi-square analysis of the health examination utilization in the visually disabled population
Around three percent (3.07%) of the population were classified as belonging to low-income households, however the health examination utilization rate in this subgroup was higher than for those who were not classified as being in low income households (17.41% versus 16.12%). With regards to aboriginal status, 1.36% of the population was classified as being aborigines, and this group had a higher utilization rate than non-aboriginal people. In terms of education level, 61.64% of the population had a level of primary school or below and they had a significantly lower utilization rate. In terms of marital status, most of the population was married (60.16%), and this subgroup had a higher utilization rate than the other subgroups. Those who had any catastrophic illness/injury (8.87%) had a significantly lower utilization rate (12.71%). Similarly, those who suffered from cancer also had a significantly lower utilization rate (12.64%). Those with chronic diseases had a higher utilization rate than those without chronic diseases (Table 1). In terms of disability severity, those with severe and very severe disabilities had significantly lower utilization rates.
Factors associated with the utilization of preventive health services
Multivariate logistic regression analysis revealed the likelihood of utilization to be significantly lower in males compared to females after controlling for other variables (Table 2). Compared with the 40–44 years subgroup, the utilization probability in the 65–69 and ≥ 70 years subgroups were 39% and 52% lower, respectively (OR = 0.61 and 0.48, both p < 0.001). In comparison to Level 1 urbanization areas, the probabilities of utilization by residents in all other levels were significantly higher. In comparison to the PBMS NTD < 15840 subgroup, the probability of utilization in the insured dependent subgroup was significantly lower (OR = 0.92, 95% CI: 0.85-0.99, p = 0.035), and that of the top level subgroup (NTD 48200–57800) was even lower (OR = 0.63, 95% CI: 0.48-0.81, p = 0.001). Those with catastrophic illness/injury had a much lower utilization probability (OR = 0.64, 95% CI: 0.56-0.74, p < 0.001). In terms of chronic diseases, after controlling for other variables, only the subgroup with diseases of the genitourinary system had a significantly lower probability of utilization (OR = 0.83, 95% CI: 0.75-0.92, p < 0.001), whereas those with most other chronic diseases had either comparable or higher probabilities of utilization. In comparison to those with mild disabilities, the probability of utilization in those with moderate disabilities was 8% lower, and 21% lower in those with severe and very severe disabilities (OR = 0.79, 95% CI: 0.74-0.84, p < 0.001).
Table 2 Logistic regression analysis of the health examination utilization probability in the visually disabled population
Further, those with a low-income household status, aboriginal status, and lower education level, which are traditionally regarded as being disadvantaged subgroups, were found to have no significant differences in the probabilities of utilizing health examinations.
This is the first comprehensive nationwide study to report the preventive health examination usage status in the visually disabled population in Taiwan. The findings show that the rate of using preventive health examinations in this cohort is extremely low (16.16%) compared to the general population who were not visually impaired (33.3% to 40.72%) [36, 37]. In terms of age, over 60% of the cohort were aged 65 years or over. Chang et al. reported that the preventive health service utilization rate in the elderly in Taiwan is 46.8% [19], and another study reported that in aging Chinese Canadians, the rate is 76% [39]. These data suggest that most visually disabled people are elderly, and that the rate of using preventive health examinations in this population is very low. As indicated previously by evidence from different countries, an increased usage of preventive health examinations may improve health, reduce mortality and lower health care costs [20–22]. Therefore, it is imperative to enhance the utilization of preventive health examinations and improve the health status of this population.
Male gender, regardless of age, was significantly associated with a lower health examination usage, which is similar to previous reports [13, 21, 26]. In Taiwan, men still play the traditional role of familial financial support even if they have visual disabilities [40]. This could be ameliorated by advocating on-site health checks in companies through proper planning. In addition, men tend to pay less attention to their own healthcare in Taiwan [41]. Further health education and encouraging couples to attend examinations may be helpful in this regard.
Of those who were found to have lower preventive health examination utilization, certain subgroups could be considered to be disadvantaged with regards to healthcare resources, possibly due to lower access. They included the insured dependent subgroup, the elderly population, and those with a moderate or worse severity of disability. These subgroups share certain common characteristics. First, they are typical disadvantaged groups who are unemployed, with illnesses or senility, and need financial or transportation assistance. Second, they lack the personal ability to seek health services. Third, they may be reluctant to become a burden on their family. Several recommendations to enhance health examination utilization in these marginalized subgroups have been reported. For the disabled, transportation is an important barrier to access to health services in addition to financial constraints and communication difficulties [42, 43]. Free transportation is widely available in Taiwan [44], however it is used less frequently by people with disabilities. In addition, patient-family support groups have been developed for patients with cancer or disabilities, and have been shown to be helpful in improving adjustment and self-reliance [45, 46]. To boost the utilization rate in this subgroup, healthcare authorities may need to address these points by providing more resources and initiative services.
People dwelling in the least urbanized regions such as the offshore islands and remote areas, aborigines, those with a low income, and those with lower education levels are traditionally considered to be disadvantaged groups and are expected to experience worse healthcare equity. However, the utilization rates in these groups were not lower in this study. Mobile health services and special programs initiated by the government to provide healthcare services to the remote and mountainous areas provide good healthcare access and may be the reason for the comparable utilization rates. In addition, the costs for the low-income households are covered by the Taiwan welfare system for co-payments per visit and National Health Insurance monthly premiums, and this may have played a role in enhancing preventive health service utilization in this disadvantaged group. Finally, those with a lower education level unexpectedly had a comparable utilization, which implies that, in Taiwan, other demographic factors such as age, income, or health status may be more closely associated with inequity.
Other subgroups that were found to have lower utilization rates were not considered to be disadvantaged groups, and may have had more health service alternatives. This includes the subgroup dwelling in the most urbanized region (Level 1), and the subgroup reporting the highest income (the subgroup with the top-ranked PBMS). These results seem to be in contrast to other published reports; however they represent the subjects with a higher socio-economic status who may have more options for better self-paid preventive health services. In addition, these subjects might belong to health clubs which provide top-level health check programs, and therefore forego the free lower level preventive health checks provided by the National Health Insurance program.
Those with catastrophic illnesses and those with chronic systemic diseases of the genitourinary system were the two subgroups that had the lowest usage. However, these subjects would already have their preventive health service needs satisfied by scheduled regular check-ups at specialist clinics due to the underlying illness. All co-payments for such health services are exempt due to the status of having a catastrophic illness, and thus these patients would most likely not require the free standard preventive health checks provided by the National Health Insurance program.
There are some limitations to this study. First, utilization of healthcare services is closely related to understanding the health service and social welfare systems, and this can be challenging for those who are unfamiliar with these systems. Second, this is a secondary dataset research based on three different data files. Factors such as health beliefs and family history of illnesses may influence the utilization of health examinations, however these factors were not included in the datasets. In addition, PBMS but not true income data was used for analysis, which may not represent the true income levels. Third, only those aged 40 or above were included in this study and extrapolation of the results to younger age groups would be inappropriate.
The overall preventive health examination utilization rate in the visually disabled population is very low in Taiwan. The subgroups with lower utilization included male gender, elderly subjects aged 65 years and above, subjects living in the most urbanized regions, dependent subjects, subjects with a higher income level, subjects with catastrophic illnesses and genitourinary system diseases, and subjects with moderate or more severe disabilities. These findings have important implications for the healthcare policy makers who seek to reduce health disparity and enhance equity of healthcare for the visually disabled population. More resources should be allocated to address the issue of inequity in accessing healthcare in Taiwan.
MOI:
The Ministry of the Interior
PBMS:
Premium-based monthly salary.
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Kung PT, Tsai WC, Li YH: Determining factors for utilization of preventive health services among adults with disabilities in Taiwan. Res Dev Disabil. 2012, 33 (1): 205-213. 10.1016/j.ridd.2011.09.006.
Congdon N, O'Colmain B, Klaver CC, Klein R, Munoz B, Friedman DS, Kempen J, Taylor HR, Mitchell P, Eye Diseases Prevalence Research Group: Causes and prevalence of visual impairment among adults in the United States. Arch Ophthalmol. 2004, 122 (4): 477-485.
Cacciatore F, Abete P, Maggi S, Luchetti G, Calabrese C, Viati L, Leosco D, Ferrara N, Vitale DF, Rengo F: Disability and 6-year mortality in elderly population. Role of visual impairment. Aging Clin Exp Res. 2004, 16 (5): 382-388. 10.1007/BF03324568.
Morse AR, Yatzkan E, Berberich B, Arons RR: Acute care hospital utilization by patients with visual impairment. Arch Ophthalmol. 1999, 117 (7): 943-949. 10.1001/archopht.117.7.943.
Lee DJ, Gomez-Marin O, Lam BL, Zheng DD: Visual acuity impairment and mortality in US adults. Arch Ophthalmol. 2002, 120 (11): 1544-1550. 10.1001/archopht.120.11.1544.
McCarty CA, Nanjan MB, Taylor HR: Vision impairment predicts 5 year mortality. Brit J Opthalmol. 2001, 85 (3): 322-326. 10.1136/bjo.85.3.322.
Chang WC, Lan TH, Ho WC, Lan TY: Factors affecting the use of health examinations by the elderly in Taiwan. Arch Gerontol Geriatr. 2010, 50 (Suppl 1): S11-16.
Maciosek MV, Coffield AB, Flottemesch TJ, Edwards NM, Solberg LI: Greater use of preventive services in U.S. health care could save lives at little or no cost. Health Affair. 2010, 29 (9): 1656-1660. 10.1377/hlthaff.2008.0701.
Hozawa A, Kuriyama S, Watanabe I, Kakizaki M, Ohmori-Matsuda K, Sone T, Nagai M, Sugawara Y, Nitta A, Li Q, et al: Participation in health check-ups and mortality using propensity score matched cohort analyses. Prev Med. 2010, 51 (5): 397-402. 10.1016/j.ypmed.2010.08.017.
Deng BH, Liu HW, Pan PC, Mau LW, Chiu HC: Cost-effectiveness of elderly health examination program: the example of hypertension screening. Kaohsiung J Med Sci. 2007, 23 (1): 17-24. 10.1016/S1607-551X(09)70369-9.
Rudan I, Gibson J, Kapiriri L, Lansang MA, Hyder AA, Lawn J, Darmstadt GL, Cousens S, Bhutta ZA, Brown KH, et al: Setting priorities in global child health research investments: assessment of principles and practice. Croat Med J. 2007, 48 (5): 595-604.
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Smith RA, Cokkinides V, Eyre HJ: Cancer screening in the United States, 2007: a review of current guidelines, practices, and prospects. CA Cancer J Clin. 2007, 57 (2): 90-104. 10.3322/canjclin.57.2.90.
Owens GM: Gender differences in health care expenditures, resource utilization, and quality of care. J Manag Care Pharm. 2008, 14 (3 Suppl): 2-6.
Chan L, Doctor JN, MacLehose RF, Lawson H, Rosenblatt RA, Baldwin LM, Jha A: Do Medicare patients with disabilities receive preventive services? A population-based study. Arch Phys Med Rehabil. 1999, 80 (6): 642-646. 10.1016/S0003-9993(99)90166-1.
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Vaidya V, Partha G, Howe J: Utilization of preventive care services and their effect on cardiovascular outcomes in the United States. Risk Manag Healthc Policy. 2011, 4: 1-7. (doi):10.2147/RMHP.S15777. Epub 12011 Jan 15719
Bureau of National Health Insurance Department of Health, Executive Yuan: Universal Health Coverage in Taiwan. 2012, Taipei, Taiwan: Bureau of National Health Insurance, Department of Health, Executive Yuan, 2
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Lu JF, Hsiao WC: Does universal health insurance make health care unaffordable? Lessons from Taiwan. Health Aff (Millwood). 2003, 22 (3): 77-88. 10.1377/hlthaff.22.3.77.
Yang CH, Huang YT, Hsueh YS: Redistributive effects of the National Health Insurance on physicians in Taiwan: a natural experiment time series study. Int J Equity Health. 2013, 12: 13-10.1186/1475-9276-12-13. (doi):10.1186/1475-9276-1112-1113
Lu JF, Leung GM, Kwon S, Tin KY, Van doorslaer E, O'Donnell O: Horizontal equity in health care utilization evidence from three high-income Asian economies. Soc Sci Med. 2007, 64 (1): 199-212. 10.1016/j.socscimed.2006.08.033. Epub 2006 Oct 2002
Huang N, Yip W, Chou YJ, Wang PJ: The distribution of net benefits under the National Health Insurance programme in Taiwan. Health Policy Plan. 2007, 22 (1): 49-59. Epub 2006 Dec 2019
Ministry of Health and Welfare Taiwan: The statistics of preventive health services utilization. 2012, Taipei, Last access date: 2012 Aug 24. Available from URL:http://www.mohw.gov.tw/cht/DOS/Statistic.aspx?f_list_no=312&fod_list_no=2643 (in Chinese)
Tsai W-C, Kung P-T: Disabled people's utilization of prevention examinations and associated factors. 2010, Taichung: China Medical University, 1-241.
Liu CYHY, Chuang YL, Chen YJ, Weng WS, Liu JS, Liang KY: Incorporating Development Stratification of Taiwan Townships into Sampling Design of Large Scale Health Interview Survey. J Health Manag. 2006, 4 (1): 1-22.
Lai DW, Kalyniak S: Use of annual physical examinations by aging Chinese Canadians. J Aging Health. 2005, 17 (5): 573-591. 10.1177/0898264305279778.
Wang C: Parenthood Beliefs and Work Values. Res Appl Psychol. 2004, 22: 201-216.
Chang LY, Yang ML, Jhao JY: Latent Healthcare Utilization Classification and Objective Health Measures. Tai J Soc. 2011, 46: 207-247.
Morrison EH, George V, Mosqueda L: British adults with chronic health conditions or impairments face significant barriers to accessing health services. Public Health. 2012, 126 (11): 920-927. 10.1016/j.puhe.2012.08.003. doi: 910.1016/j.puhe.2012.1008.1003. Epub 2012 Sep 1015
Morrison EH, George V, Mosaueda L: Primary care for adults with physical disabilities: perceptions from consumer and provider focus groups. Fam Med. 2008, 40 (9): 645-651.
Cheng TM: Taiwan's new national health insurance program: genesis and experience so far. Health Affair. 2003, 22 (3): 61-76. 10.1377/hlthaff.22.3.61.
Lobato DJ, Kao BT: Integrated sibling-parent group intervention to improve sibling knowledge and adjustment to chronic illness and disability. J Pediatr Psychol. 2002, 27 (8): 711-716. 10.1093/jpepsy/27.8.711.
Stewart R, Bhagwanjee A: Promoting group empowerment and self-reliance through participatory research: a case study of people with physical disability. Disabil Rehabil. 1999, 21 (7): 338-345. 10.1080/096382899297585.
This study was supported by a grant (CMU99-ASIA-19) from China Medical University and Asia University. The health examination files were obtained from the Bureau of Health Promotion, Taiwan. We are also grateful for use of the National Health Insurance Research Database provided by the Department of Health, Taiwan, R.O.C. The interpretations and conclusions contained herein do not represent those of the Bureau of Health Promotion in Taiwan.
Department of Health Services Administration, China Medical University, Taichung, 40402, R.O.C., Taiwan
Yueh-Han Hsu
& Wen-Chen Tsai
Department of Internal Medicine, Ditmanson Medical Foundation Chia-Yi Christian Hospital, Chia-Yi, 60002, R.O.C., Taiwan
Department of Nursing, Min-Hwei Junior College of Health Care Management, Tainan, 73658, R.O.C., Taiwan
Department of Healthcare Administration, Asia University, No. 500 Lioufeng Road, Wufeng, Taichung, 41354, R.O.C., Taiwan
Pei-Tseng Kung
Search for Yueh-Han Hsu in:
Search for Wen-Chen Tsai in:
Search for Pei-Tseng Kung in:
Correspondence to Pei-Tseng Kung.
WCT and PTK contributed to the conception and design of the study and to statistical analysis. YHH and WCT wrote the first draft of the manuscript. All authors participated in the interpretation of data for important intellectual content, and revised and approved the final version of the manuscript.
Wen-Chen Tsai and Pei-Tseng Kung contributed equally to this work.
Health examination utilization
Health disparity
Healthcare needs and demand
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← Jonathan Edwards Center
Rehearing/Rereading Joseph Smith: Brigham and Brigham. →
Joseph Smith’s Sermon of February 5, 1840
A recent broadcast from lds radio featured Ron Barney and Jeff Cannon of the Joseph Smith Papers Project, on Joseph Smith’s visit to Washington, D.C. in late 1839, early 1840.[1] While no diary was kept during the journey, there were letters sent from Washington by Joseph Smith and Elias Higbee, and an account of meeting(s) with President Martin Van Buren survive in the memoirs of Illinois democrat John Reynolds who introduced Smith and Higbee to Van Buren. Van Buren, the epitome of political savvy at the time, held a states rights view of US politics and excused himself from intervention in the Mormon question on that basis. As Reynolds put it, Joseph left Washington a “red hot Whig.” While Joseph was in the East, he did take the opportunity to deliver several sermons to both Latter-day Saint congregations and to other interested parties.
On February 5th, Joseph delivered a speech to a group of Washingtonians, one of whom was Aaron Burr biographer Matthew Livingston Davis. Davis penned a letter to his wife in New York regarding the discourse, which was may have been intended for publication in one of the several newspapers for which Davis was a correspondent.[But see the comment below!] Whatever the purpose, the original ended up was in the hands of the Mormons and came west with them to Utah. It’s first imprint was in the Deseret News of 27 July 1854, based on a copy of the letter from the manuscript history of the Church as provided by historian’s staff.
The account is remarkable for several reasons, being a report by an experienced writer/reporter it probably it contains a number of verbatim statements. We also find in it a fairly early example of Joseph’s maturing cosmology/ontology. The hallmark of Nauvoo theological tension: the place of the individual in the cosmos and the role of the individual in the corporate “sealed” kingdom is illustrated in its beginnings.[2]
Davis reports Joseph as saying:
I believe that God is eternal. That He had no beginning, and can have no end. Eternity means that which is without beginning or End. I believe that the Soul is Eternal. It had no beginning; it can have no end . . .
Davis added the following interesting remark after his quotation: “Here he entered into some explanations, which were so brief that I could not perfectly comprehend him. But the idea seemed to be that the soul of man, the Spirit, had existed from Eternity in the bosom of Divinity; and so far as he was intelligible to me, must ultimately return from whence it came-”
To reinforce this unique idea, Davis adds: “He said very little of rewards and punishments, but one conclusion, from what he did say was irresistible. He contended throughout, that every thing which had a beginning must have an ending; and consequently if the punishment of man commenced in the next world, it must, according to his logic and belief have an end.”
While Joseph would make some refinements from these ideas, mainly in the suggestion that God was not always God, but progressed to that point, he was uniform in his support of the idea that the individual has necessary permanence.
The Washington speech is remarkable in several ways, first that Joseph was quite forthright in this his ultimate heresy. Man was the ontological equal of God. He could have hardly placed a bigger religious target on his back than that. The interesting bit about this is that while he repeats this quite a number of times before his death, it never did find a prominent place in the litany of offenses offered by Mormonism in the 19th century. Why? I think the reason is found here. (For the full account of Davis, see here.)
Be that as it may, I find Joseph’s ideas a refreshing departure from most of religious history, however uncomfortable they may have been to those inside and outside the Church.[3] A situation which remains today. Talk about current events. With the publication of the Encyclopedia of Mormonism, the issue of man’s ontological position came up in discussions in prominent circles in Salt Lake. The fact that a division of opinion still exists is a tribute to the conservatism present in LDS leadership (and that division is represented in the Encyclopedia if you look carefully). A deeply embedded ethic in that exclusive group, it has been both an advantage to Mormonism as well as a heavy inertia that makes appropriate change wait its turn.
My prejudice in favor of Smith’s ideas is motivated less by history than by testimony, but nevertheless, I have a deep interest in how Mormon theology has shaken out over the centuries (ok, we are coming up on 200 years of Mormonism). I wonder what issues the future Church will find compelling in another century. Anybody got a seer stone?
[1] As Barney and Cannon observe, the town was pretty unimpressive. On Washington, D.C., see Howe, What Hath God Wrought.
[2] One wonders if the topics addressed were in any way motivated by the political purposes of the trip, and if so, how would they have been received in that sense.
[3] Joseph is rather unique even among believers in human preexistence. Few theologies of the past have allowed that the individual soul is uncreate.
Filed under 19th Century American History, Book of Abraham, Joseph Smith Tagged with D.C., nature of man, politics, Theology, Van Buren, Washington
13 Responses to Joseph Smith’s Sermon of February 5, 1840
Ben Park says:
It is indeed a fascinating letter, WVS, but even for more than just the content.
I did some research on this letter while I worked for the JSP, working with Ron Barney and Steve Harper, and came to find its provenance as problematic, to say the least. The text in the HC identifies him as both Matthew S Davis and Matthew L Davis. As you state in the post, Matthew Livingston Davis would be the only plausible guess, because the only Matthew S Davis who resided in Washington and was a senator–as the HC claims–was only 10 years old in 1840.
The problem with Matthe Linvingston Davis–who otherwise would be very plausible since he wrote numerous correspondences with the Washington newspapers–is twofold. First, he wasn’t married at the time of this letter, nor was he ever married to a “Mary.” Second, it is highly unlikely that the Church could have somewhat ended up with this personal letter, because no evidence exists that it was ever published.
Thus, it seems more likely that the letter was a “plant.” JS had a number of these types of letters published in the press, written as if they were from a non-Mormon observer, but in reality were written by one of JS’s scribes. This was a common occurrence during the Nauvoo period. (A topic that deserves more attention–could easily be an article.) The question is why it was never printed–perhaps it was refused by whatever newspaper they submitted it to.
This makes the letter even more important, IMHO, because it then reveals a specific message JS and his circle wanted the general public to hear.
Anyways, just an amusing sidenote. Enjoyed the post.
Ben, that is fantastic. Thanks for the background. I’ve wondered about this thing for years. Ha! Ghostwriting in the extreme. Given an in house job, the “Here he entered into some explanations, which were so brief that I could not perfectly comprehend him” bit is worthy of Parley Parker Pratt himself. Cool. (It also suggests that dating the document should get a fresh look. I have not seen the “letter” itself. Do you know whose handwriting is involved?)
J. Stapley says:
Thanks for the post, WVS; and thanks for that comment, Ben. Extraordinary, and fascinating.
This is great–hands down the best aspect of this is where “Matthew” describes Joseph as “what you ladies would call a very good looking man”–if this is a plant, at least Joseph planted with gusto.
Right on, Bryan.
Ha! Hadn’t thought of that. Brilliant.
smb says:
Is the handwriting recognizable? My memory from Viator is that they were in the hand of Richards or Phelps. Who else was involved in the public ghostwriting letters? If I end up tucking this into a footnote (in the next day or two), how shall I cite you boys? s
Viator was Richards (mostly). But this would have been before Richards was involved. Phelps was not back at that point either, assuming the letter was written near the Feb. date. Too late for Mullholland, too early for Thompson. That means Elias Higbee? Or George Robinson? Don’t know. Have to go look at it, too swamped right now.
Thanks, Bill. There are at least a couple of the Viator letters that are in Phelps’s hand and bear his mark as I recall, but you’re right that the initiation of Viator was Richards. Would be nice to hear from a handwriting expert, which could lay the matter to rest. Could be a nice wee piece for JMH or IJMS that could be a significant contribution to our understanding of the outward face of early Mormonism. And I suspect you’re right that the fake letter would have been written close to the time of the tour, perhaps by someone who was traveling with JSJ?
Just a note, I had a look at what is apparently the original. The handwriting does not match any of the usual suspects. It looks like a letter in all respects I think. How it came to be in the Church Historian’s collection is anybody’s guess. But one theory is that it came from John M. Bernhisel who was in NY. The HC’s confusion over the name of the writer is interesting. The 1850 census shows a Matthew Davis and Mary Davis in Manhattan. This would probably not have been Matthew L. Davis above, since he was dead several months before the time the census papers were filled out. The address indicated on the letter, 107 High Street is a lower Manhattan address. I’m going to look into this at some point I guess.
Isn’t the note in the JS Journal about the Bernhisel sealings written by Bernhisel (going from memory). Might be a point for comparison.
I checked out Bernhisel among others, it’s not his writing.
Joseph was apparently pretty expansive during his Washington trip. Parley Pratt notes that he first heard of eternal (not plural) marriage on the trip. Samuel Bennett’s 16 page tract of 1840 (Bennett became a Mormon in 1839 and JS made him branch president in Philadelphia in December) hints at the same thing and Bennett notes that “God the Father has a body exactly in shape like that of a man.” And that that bodily presence had “been manifested, his voice sounded in the ear of mortal man without consuming him” – probably a reference to the first vision. Anti-Mormon tracts published after the trip suggest the same thing, charging that Mormons believed in “a carnal Paradise, unrestrained sexual indulgence, and promiscuous intercourse between the sexes.”
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Three Cups of Tea: One Man's Mission to Promote Peace . . . One School at a Time (MP3 CD)
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In 1993 Greg Mortenson was the exhausted survivor of a failed attempt to ascend K2, an American climbing bum wandering emaciated and lost through Pakistan's Karakoram Himalaya. After he was taken in and nursed back to health by the people of an impoverished Pakistani village, Mortenson promised to return one day and build them a school. From that rash, earnest promise grew one of the most incredible humanitarian campaigns of our time-Greg Mortenson's one-man mission to counteract extremism by building schools, especially for girls, throughout the breeding ground of the Taliban. Award-winning journalist David Oliver Relin has collaborated on this spellbinding account of Mortenson's incredible accomplishments in a region where Americans are often feared and hated. In pursuit of his goal, Mortenson has survived kidnapping, fatwas issued by enraged mullahs, repeated death threats, and wrenching separations from his wife and children. But his success speaks for itself. At last count, his Central Asia Institute had built fifty-five schools. Three Cups of Tea is at once an unforgettable adventure and the inspiring true story of how one man really is changing the world-one school at a time.
Greg Mortenson is the director of the Central Asia Institute. A resident of Montana, he spends several months of the year in Pakistan and Afghanistan. David Oliver Relin is a contributing editor for "Parade Magazine" and "Skiing Magazine." He has won more than forty national awards for his work as a writer and editor.
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10 Games That Will Make You Nostalgic For The ’90s
In today’s fast-paced world where technology has become synonymous with everyday life, there’s nothing quite like thinking back on simpler times—reminiscing about consoles with cables, blowing into game cartridges to make them “work” again, bandaging blistered thumbs, and spending way too much on batteries.
It’s hard to say if these iconic games would still spark the same joy they did in the 1990s or if hours would be lost to playing them each day as was the case 20 years ago. However, one thing is certain. There are still some seriously diehard fans out there who refuse to live a life without blocky graphics, dinosaur eggs, and the sweet sound of Mario Bros. theme music.
10 Super Mario World
Photo credit: Nintendo via Wikia
Mario and Luigi worked hard in their quest to save the Mushroom Kingdom from Bowser, but alas, their work was not done! The pair was destined for even more greatness with help from their dinosaur pal, Yoshi. So the three set off to rescue the recently kidnapped Princess Toadstool and once again bring peace and order to Dinosaur Land. Sound familiar? Chances are you or someone you know was majorly into this game in the ’90s.
From the iconic music to the kick-ass 2-D graphics, Super Mario World hooked fans almost immediately. The power-ups like Super Mushrooms, Fire Flowers, and Cape Feathers had players mad with excitement, and the constant acquisition of coins left many with sore thumbs.
It’s no surprise that this beloved game sold over 20 million copies. The game grew so much in popularity that an animated TV show called The New Super Mario World was created based on the plot of the game. Unlike the video game, which left a long legacy, the show only ran for one season.
9 GoldenEye 007
Everyone wants to be the suave and debonair James Bond or at least some version of him. For many in the late ’90s, that wish came true, sort of. GoldenEye 007 for the Nintendo 64 console gave players the opportunity to do what Bond does best, shoot things with a lot of different kinds of weapons. The main objective of the game was to lead Agent 007 through 20 different missions with a large cache of weapons from grenades to submachine guns, all requiring reloading once their ammo had been depleted.
The game allowed for multiplayers (four max) to play simultaneously, and gamers could set the level of difficulty they wanted from “Agent” to “00-Agent.” The first-person shooter technology that GoldenEye used was quite ahead of its time, and the game stayed very true to the film it was based on. The game was a huge commercial success and sold over eight million copies worldwide. As of mid-2016, the game goes for about $275 on Amazon.
8 Pokemon Red And Blue
To say Pokemon was an international sensation is an understatement. This tour de force had kids and many adults going absolutely insane for many years. Whether it was the television series, the trading cards, or the many generations of video games that spanned Pokemon’s life thus far, these little Japanese creatures have left a very strong impression on fans. Pokemon Red and Blue were the first two releases in Nintendo’s Pokemon franchise. The player must go on a journey to collect, train, trade, and master as many of the creatures as possible.
The world of Pokemon is soon explored by the player as he or she travels to various places like Cerulean City and Lavender Town, growing your Pokedex, defeating leaders, and becoming a Pokemon Master. All with Pikachu at your side. Although the games were a huge hit, a few glitches were discovered and exploited by users, making some matches less than fair. Red and Blue sold millions of copies worldwide, and the creators have recently rereleased the Red, Blue, and Yellow games this year to celebrate 20 years of Pokemania.
Photo credit: GT Interactive via Wikia
This science fiction and horror-themed video game made a huge splash in the gaming community for paving the way for first-person shooter games. The first version was released for PC users and heralded as a great feat in software engineering. The player could choose between one of four off-duty soldiers embroiled in a multidimensional war. As demonic creatures close in on the soldiers, the player’s character must keep the monsters from invading Earth and destroying the planet.
The game was very well received and scored an 86 percent on GameRankings.com. To some, DOOM was simply a video game where you could shoot evil creatures from the netherworlds, but to others, it is considered one of the most influential games to date.
DOOM coined the term “deathmatch,” allowing multiple players to slaughter each other at the same time. DOOM was so widely played that many companies were forced to ban play during working hours because of clogged networks and many hours of lost productivity.
6 Sonic The Hedgehog 2
Photo credit: Sega via Wikia
Sonic and Miles “Tails” Prower are living their lives peacefully until one day when Sonic’s friends begin to disappear and it’s up to a little, blue, lightning-fast hedgehog and his trusty, two-tailed fox sidekick to save the day. As evil metal robots began appearing (formerly the animals of the forest) everywhere, Sonic and Tails realize that crazy scientist Dr. Robotnik is responsible. The two pals must stop the mad scientist from completing the Death Egg and taking over the world by getting to the seven Chaos Emeralds first and freeing the animals from Robotnik for good.
Gamers would push the game cartridge in, fire up their Genesis system, and the adventure would begin. Players were able to perform multiple Sonic stunts such as “super spin attack,” “super twist,” and “pinball attack” and traveled from zone to zone trying not to lose their three lives.
Sega, the maker of Sonic the Hedgehog 2, and Nintendo had an intense rivalry in the ’90s. As a result, Sega spent $10 million on the ad campaign to launch the new Sonic game, a hefty chunk of cash for 1992. The game ended up selling more than six million copies and helped Sega catch up to Nintendo in the “console wars.”
5 Kirby’s Dream Land
The first video game in the Kirby series hit the shelves in the early ’90s for Nintendo Game Boy. Kirby—a small but mighty roly-poly creature—was on its cover welcoming gamers of all ages and skill levels to explore Dream Land with the lovable, little cloud ball.
Kirby is more powerful than his marshmallow appearance lets on. He had the ability to suck up his enemies like a vacuum and spit them out at other foes. He could also inflate himself, which gave him the power to fly. To complete all four stages of the game, Kirby used his talents to take on King Dedede, the despot of the story, who has stolen all of Dream Land’s food.
The game takes players through different settings in Dream Land, including castles, forests, caves, and dungeons. While Kirby trudges forward on his quest to battle Dedede, he comes into contact with different items such as tomatoes, candy, and curry and battles baddies who are bent on stopping him.
The music in the game was extremely upbeat and cheery, matching the different game scenes perfectly. Unlike the other games in the Kirby series, the original Dream Land did not offer Kirby’s copying power, an ability that later became a trademark move.
4 Mortal Kombat
Photo credit: Midway via Wikia
Otherworldly creatures with supernatural fighting powers and exceptional martial arts skills face off against each other in a deadly brawl on a remote island in this epic arcade game. A powerful sorcerer known as Shang Tsung has held the tournaments for 500 years and delights in watching contestants destroy one another and deliver the final, fatal blow known as the finishing move.
Gamers got the chance to feel like expert fighters against opponents by using martial arts moves like roundhouse kicks, crouching blocks, flying punches, and high punches. Players will face many combatants on their way to the final match against Shang Tsung.
Players were able to choose between seven characters, all with unique abilities as well as basic fighting skills. The realistic graphics (for the time) and the loads of violence caused quite a bit of controversy among parents. Many felt the game was glorifying murder and encouraging violence, an argument that persists today regarding much of what is displayed on television and in the gaming world.
Some of the most notably violent moves in the game were the abilities to rip out an opponent’s heart and decapitate them with bare hands, displaying the severed head as a trophy. Not exactly the kind of stuff that Mario and Luigi’s dream are made of.
3 NBA Jam
Remember stuffing quarters into the machines at arcades for hours? Despite weighted-down pockets and constantly pleading with parents for more quarters, there never seemed to be enough coins to satiate the desire to play certain games.
Enter NBA Jam. This basketball arcade game brought many sports game firsts into the world, such as playing with real licensed NBA teams and players that actually resembled their real-life selves. With four joysticks, friends could go at it, dunking on one another and shooting multiple buckets in a row to earn the power-up known as “on fire.”
Rather than having 5-on-5 games, NBA Jam was designed to play 2-on-2 basketball. Although the rosters were real, the rules were not. The game allowed players to basically do whatever they wanted with no fouls called and no free throws. The only two rules that the game maintained were shot clocks and goaltending.
NBA Jam quickly became popular among arcade goers and non-sports fans alike and is considered one of the highest-earning arcade games of all time. The world of basketball shall be forever grateful for the addition of NBA Jam phrases like “He’s heating up,” “He’s on fire,” and “Boomshakalaka!”
2 The Legend Of Zelda: Ocarina Of Time
Although many came before it and several have come after it, the fifth installment of the Zelda series, Ocarina of Time, was truly visionary. Once the Nintendo 64 was powered up and ready to go, players would begin the game as a child in the forest but would later wear many hats—becoming a fisherman, errand boy, and a traveling mask salesman.
Ocarina of Time was the first game in the series with 3-D graphics, a feat for game designers at the time. As Link travels through Hyrule with the Spiritual Stone of the Forest and his companion, Navi, players are led through dark dungeons, fiery volcanoes, haunted deserts, and even through time on a quest to rescue Princess Zelda.
Zelda fans went absolutely nuts for the game. The video game was released in November 1998, and before the year was through, Nintendo had sold over 2.5 million copies and raked in $150 million.
Ocarina of Time even managed to gross more than the blockbuster film A Bug’s Life, which hit theaters that same year. Even though Ocarina of Time was released just 39 days before the year came to a close, it still managed to be the biggest-selling video game of 1998 and the fastest-selling game of all time.
1 Mario Kart 64
This go-kart racing game was released in Japan in 1996 and in North America and Europe in 1997, and to say that it made a splash in the video game scene is a colossal understatement. One of the most memorable aspects of the game was the epic sound track composed by Kenta Nagata. Whether it was slipping on a banana peel, driving through item boxes, or just cruising down the Rainbow Road in the Special Cup course, the music does not disappoint.
Players have the option to choose from eight different characters to race with, and each has their pros and cons. Some found Bowser and Wario too heavy to accelerate quickly while many felt their size came in handy for ramming other characters’ karts. In addition to selecting a character, gamers could also choose the size of their kart engine (50cc, 100cc, or 150cc), the game mode (Mario Grand Prix, Versus, Battle, and Time Trials), and the course.
As players zip through courses dodging the shells, the walking bombs, and the big, chained, barking ball things, they can also activate some pretty cool tricks like turbo drifting, shortcuts, and drafting. In this version, the addition of the blue spiny shell meant to hit the character in first place caused quite a stir among players. Many found it to be unfair, and no doubt lots of obscenities came pouring out of gamers’ mouths after impact.
Although the game did not gross as much as many other video games in the 1990s, the addictive quality of Mario Kart has never really faded. It is still enjoyed today by both older and younger generations and, of course, stoners.
Lee is a freelance writer with an inquiring mind. She is stoked the ’90s are making a comeback.
10 Fascinating Real-World Inspirations Behind Pokemon Characters
Top 10 Fascinating Facts About Pokemon Go
Reputable Historical Gamblers
Format Wars and Who Won
Nightmare Visions of New York
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Harry Shum Jr. joins 'Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon' sequel
Martial arts drama also stars Michelle Yeoh and Donnie Yen
Harry Shum Jr., whose moves (and abs) you know and love from Glee, has been cast as one of the leads in the sequel to Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon which started production this week.
'Glee's' Harry Shum Jr. Joins 'Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon' Sequel
Yes, there is Crouching Tiger sequel in the works. Directed by master action choreographer Yuen Wo-Ping, the movie is set twenty years after the events of Ang Lee's award-winning martial arts drama. The sequel's cast includes Donnie Yen and Michelle Yeoh, reprising her role Yu Shu-lien.
Harry will play Tie-Fang, a kung fu hero who must fight to keep a legendary sword out of the wrong hands:
Written by John Fusco (The Forbidden Kingdom), the movie is set 20 years after the events of Crouching Tiger and revolves around four heroes of the martial arts world -- Silent Wolf, Yu Shu-lien, Tie-Fang and Snow Vase -- who must use their courage and skills to keep the legendary sword Green Destiny from the hands of the villainous Hades Dai.
Donnie Yen already is cast as Silent Wolf, and Michelle Yeoh is on board as Yu Shu-lien.
Shum will play Tie-Fang.
Good for Harry. He's definitely got some moves -- looking forward to see them used for some cinematic asskicking. Alongside legends like Donnie Yen and Michelle Yeoh, no less.
The sequel, reportedly titled Crouching Tiger 2: The Green Destiny, is being produced by The Weinstein Company and will shoot in New Zealand and China. Am I the only one who is concerned that script is written by the guy whose credits include that craptastic Jet Li/Jackie Chan movie The Forbidden Kingdom?
FILE UNDER: casting, crouching tiger hidden dragon, harry shum jr., kung fu, martial arts, movies
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Jun 18, 2013 • By Sung Lee
Fueling new ways to get breakfast to students
Breakfast is said to be the most important meal of the day. One place this is increasingly apparent is in our nation’s schools where research shows a positive correlation between kids who eat breakfast and improved academic achievement, attendance and behavior.
For the past five years, General Mills Foodservice has helped schools boost breakfast participation through the National Dairy Council Fuel Up Breakfast grant program, which has awarded $325,000 to more than 100 schools since 2009.
Many of the schools have used the funds to add alternative ways to serve breakfast to kids outside of the cafeteria, which gives more kids access to a healthy breakfast at a hectic time of day.
Giving kids a second chance to eat
At Ardrey Kell High School in Charlotte, N.C., students arrive at school between 6:45 a.m. and 7:15 a.m. Many kids are not hungry yet or are in a rush to get to class so eating is not a priority.
“Students are not always awake and ready for breakfast at this time,” said Marilyn Johnson, child nutrition manager at the school.
After getting reports of students sent to the nurse’s office with headaches and stomachaches because they had not eaten breakfast, Johnson recognized changes needed to be made.
Armed with a Fuel Up grant, Johnson purchased a computer with wireless Internet access that allows students to retrieve their lunch accounts from different areas of the building where breakfast is now served throughout the morning.
Johnson credits the “second chance breakfast” for helping to bridge the time until lunch is served to keep students fueled so they can focus on learning.
Breakfast earns extra credit at schools
While there is ample research supporting the healthful benefits of breakfast for people of all ages, the first meal of the day is earning extra credit at schools that see the impact it has on students’ behavior and concentration levels throughout the morning.
In addition, kids who eat breakfast tend to have fewer disciplinary issues and reduced absenteeism.
“We have been pleasantly surprised that students are behaving better since we expanded our breakfast in the classroom program,” said David Gutierrez, director of Child Nutrition Services at Ennis school district in Texas, which used the school’s breakfast grant to purchase insulated bags and coolers to get breakfast to students who are served and eat in their classrooms.
Schools may apply for up to $2,000
Now through July 26, schools in the U.S. may apply to receive up to $2,000 to help put their breakfast plan into action for the 2013-14 school year. The grants are available to schools participating in the National School Breakfast and enrolled in the National Dairy Council “Fuel Up to Play 60” program.
A total of $50,000 will be distributed for schools to use to enhance their breakfast programs and increase participation through programs such as Breakfast in the Classroom, Second Chance Breakfast or Grab & Go.
Schools must have the support of their school principal, district school nutrition director and school nutrition manager, have school enrollment of at least 500 and breakfast participation of less than 40 percent.
If you know of a school that could benefit from a grant to grow it’s breakfast program, please share the link to the National Dairy Council Fuel Up grant application today.
Sung Lee is an associate channel manager for the K-12 team at General Mills Foodservice, based in Minneapolis, Minn. He is responsible for developing strategies to grow the company’s business in school foodservice. He began his career at General Mills in 2011. More posts by this author
Categories: Responsibility
Post Tags: breakfast, general mills foodservice, nutrition, pillsbury
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Yearning for Art as a Career: How to Make Money as an Artist
How to make money as an artist
One of the ironies of life is that on the one hand we feel most called to art, and on the other hand we believe our chances of making money as an artist are inestimably small. We are often told that medical school, law school, and business school are safer and more prudent paths to a lucrative career. Many of us have bought into the conception of the “starving artist.” Frankly, this conception is complete garbage.
Our art is our highest expression of ourselves, our reason to exist. Many self-identified artists are under the impression that to be a true artist, there is just one medium in which to do it and just one way to make money from it. If that were the case, Steve Jobs and Apple wouldn’t have existed. Neither would have Elon Musk, Leonardo Da Vinci, Rembrandt, or so many other influential people throughout history. Medium confusion and inflexibility kill more artists than any other human fallacy.
Let’s say you love to make cartoons. You can really make cartoons. When you make them, you are in bliss. Then the so-called “wise people” tell you that your chances of being a rich and famous cartoonist are less than one in a billion and you give up. Instead you become a doctor or lawyer or CEO. You no longer spend time drawing your cartoons. Rather, you spend time reading patient charts or litigation briefs or financial reports. With all of your personal and professional responsibilities and commitments, life seems to be as good as it will get for you.
Yet you still feel a yearning to continue your art. You think about it sometimes. You light up when you talk to others about it. You still want to do it. To show it. To learn and hone it. To teach it.
So why aren’t you spending some time doing exactly that? If you join Konversai, you could be doing exactly that. Konversai is a great new platform where you can engage in “art” with others in the world—talking art, teaching art, learning art, sharing art. Your art. You can always continue to play with your art while being a doctor, lawyer, homemaker, or whatever your “day job” might be.
If you want to go further and pursue a career in art, then there are also plenty of viable options for making a living. As an artist in the widely connected world, it is wise to be present in a variety of venues, physical and digital. You can build your unique presence on social media sites such as Facebook, Konversai, LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter, Etsy, and Pinterest by creating a profile, posting your work, and following other artists.
If you’re interested in freelancing or taking on temporary gigs, you can create an account on websites such as Konversai, Thumbtack, Craigslist, Elance, and Upwork. Invite your friends, family members, and colleagues to endorse you in whatever way you can be endorsed—they can be your best advocates and allies in helping you get the word out about your art.
Or maybe you don’t need the money. Perhaps you want to donate to charity or give your art away for free. You can do that through Konversai as well.
Making it big as an artist is no easy task. Rejection and discouragement are very real aspects of the life of an artist, but they are also part of any calling. Get out of the self-adopted limitation of medium. Passion, perseverance, and a flexible attitude will get you out of the yearning and into being the artist you are, the artist you were born to be. What are you waiting for? Join Konversai today and make money as an artist.
#earn, #share, art, Art & Culture, artist, artist work, culture, draw, earn artist, expression, instrument, jobs, make money, money, money as an artist, music, paint, starving artist
2 Replies to “Yearning for Art as a Career: How to Make Money as an Artist”
kelly verstraete says:
this is beautifully written! <3
konversaiblog says:
Why You Must Make Money as a College Student
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The FDA Continues to Affirm Antidepressant Risks
First Identified in my 1991 Book Toxic Psychiatry
By Peter R. Breggin, M.D.
www.breggin.com
In 2004 the FDA issued a black box warning about the increased risk of suicidality in children taking the newer antidepressants, including the SSRIs (Prozac, Zoloft, Paxil, Luvox, Celexa, and Lexapro) and also Effexor and Wellbutrin (also marketed as Zyban). On June 30, 2005 the FDA published a Public Health Advisory warning of the possibility of increased suicidality in adults treated with antidepressants. The FDA followed this on July 1, 2005 with a Talk Paper elaborating on the potential risk and the agency’s plans to study the problem further. All of these documents are available on www.fda.gov.
The FDA should have issued these warnings at least a decade ago. I first began writing about antidepressant-induced suicidality in 1991. At that time I identified drug-induced suicidality as part of a much larger problem—antidepressant-induced activation or stimulation similar to that caused by amphetamine, methamphetamine and cocaine. Antidepressant stimulation can lead to violence as well as suicide and a wide variety of abnormal and even psychotic behaviors.
Prozac was introduced to the American public in January 1988. Three years later in my book Toxic Psychiatry (St. Martin’s Press, New York, 1991) was published. In that book, as well as in many later books and scientific articles, I made the following points:
All of the newer antidepressants can stimulate the brain. The results of stimulation are similar to the effects of amphetamine, methamphetamine, methylphenidate, and cocaine. Stimulating the brain leads to anxiety, agitation, irritability, insomnia, disinhibition (loss of self-control), emotional lability (instability), akathisia (agitation with hyperactivity), hostility, aggression, and mania.
Especially in people who are already depressed, these over-stimulated reactions can lead to a severe worsening of depression or to transformation of the depression into mania. These effects can cause suicide and violence toward others.
After I described the risk of antidepressant-induced stimulation in 1991, I further developed the concept in subsequent books, including Talking Back to Prozac (1994), Brain-Disabling Treatments in Psychiatry (1997), Your Drug May Be Your Problem (1999, with David Cohen) and the Antidepressant Fact Book (2001). I have also testified to the same principles in numerous malpractice, product liability, and criminal cases involving antidepressant-caused suicidality, violence, and varied severe abnormal behaviors. Long before the FDA came around to agreeing with me, the courts have found sufficient scientific merit to my arguments to allow them to be expressed at trials, including product liability cases against the manufacturers of these drugs. The vast majority of these cases against drug companies were settled before going to trial.
Shortly before the FDA met in 2004 to consider antidepressant-induced suicidality in children, I wrote a peer-reviewed scientific article that was simultaneously published in Ethical Human Sciences and Services and the International Journal of Risk and Safety in Medicine (available on www.breggin.com). My paper drew together all of the available scientific evidence that the newer antidepressants cause a stimulant or activation syndrome that can drive a person toward suicide or murder. I used scientific concepts and language in this paper that were subsequently adopted by the FDA:
Mania with psychosis is the extreme end of a stimulant continuum that often begins with lesser degrees of insomnia, nervousness, anxiety, hyperactivity and irritability and then progresses toward more severe agitation, aggression, and varying degrees of mania. (Breggin 2003/4, p. 32; obtainable on www.breggin.com).
I also discussed in detail the risk of akathisia (agitation with hyperactivity) as a cause of violence and suicide.
On March 22, 2004 the FDA published a Talk Paper entitled, "FDA Issues Public Health Advisory on Cautions for the Use of Antidepressants in Adults and Children." The advisory focused on adults as well as children and stated:
The agency is also advising that that these patients be observed for certain behaviors that are known to be associated with these drugs, such as anxiety, agitation, panic attacks, insomnia, irritability, hostility, impulsivity, akathisia (severe restlessness), hypomania, and mania.
This FDA statement is interchangeable with many that I have made in the literature and in the courtroom.
The FDA describes these adverse reactions as "known"—that is, scientifically demonstrated or established. The list confirms the existence of the antidepressant-induced stimulant effect or activation syndrome in adults and children with its potential to cause hostility and related behaviors. The FDA has gone on to require drug manufacturers to include these antidepressant-induced adverse effects in their FDA-approved labels for the drugs. The FDA label for antidepressants (revised January 26, 2005) requires the following statement about activation or stimulation in children and adults:
The following symptoms, anxiety, agitation, panic attacks, insomnia, irritability, hostility, aggressiveness, impulsivity, akathisia (psychomotor restlessness), hypomania, and mania have been reported in adult and pediatric patients being treated with antidepressants for major depressive disorder as well as other indications.
Simultaneously, the FDA compelled the drug companies to include a specific warning about the increased risk of suicidality in children taking antidepressants. This warning has received the most attention in the media and the medical profession. However, FDA recognition of the stimulant or activation syndrome, including the production of increased agitation, irritability, impulsivity, hostility, aggressiveness, and mania is in many ways more important. Over-stimulation is far more common than suicidality and causes not only suicidality but also violence and an endless variety of destructive, impulsive behaviors.
The adverse effects described by the FDA are almost identical to mine, suggesting that they paid attention to my publications and to my testimony before the agency on two occasions in 2004 (obtainable on www.breggin.com). Also, the FDA’s has followed my method of organizing these specific adverse effects into one group that can be viewed as stimulation or activation. I have written in some detail about the implications of recent regulatory changes in regard to antidepressants that have occurred in the U.S., Canada and Great Britain.
The FDA has continued to affirm the points I first made in 1991 in Toxic Psychiatry. On June 30, 2005, the FDA issued another Public Health Advisory, this time aimed more specifically at adults, entitled, "Suicidality in Adults Being Treated with Antidepressant Medications." The FDA announced the beginning of a lengthy review of the subjected and in the meanwhile warned:
Adults being treated with antidepressant medications, particularly those being treated for depression, should be watched closely for worsening of depression and for increased suicidal thinking or behavior.
On July 1, 2005 the FDA issued an FDA Talk Paper on the same subject. It emphasized another point that I have been making in my books and articles, and in court, for many years:
Close observation of adults may be especially important when antidepressant medications are started for the first time or when doses for the specific drugs prescribed have been changed.
I have been consulted in dozens of malpractice and product liability cases in which patients have committed suicide or perpetrated violence against others shortly after starting antidepressants or shortly after dose changes.
Naturally, it is gratifying to have the scientific literature and the FDA confirm observations that I have made, at some professional cost, for many years. It is satisfying to see views once labeled radical and controversial become centerpieces of establishment drug regulation. On the other hand, it is frustrating and even tragic that there has been such a long delay in coming to grips with drug-induced problems that have resulted in innumerable acts of suicide and violence. Furthermore, medical professionals, especially my colleagues in psychiatry, continue to resist and even to ignore the scientific evidence and the warnings from the FDA. The FDA itself has shown no willingness to take the next step—to ban these largely ineffective and highly dangerous agents.
June 24, 2008 Peter R. Breggin M.D. Legal
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Tag Archives: Grim Sleeper
Grim Sleeper to be Put to Sleep
One of the few times the Death Penalty is justified in my view…
Jurors vote for death sentence for ‘Grim Sleeper’ serial killer
A Los Angeles County jury decided Monday that the man known as the “Grim Sleeper” serial killer should be put to death, closing an important legal chapter in the grisly slayings of at least nine women and one teenage girl that terrorized South L.A. for more than two decades.
The verdict against Lonnie David Franklin Jr., a 63-year-old former sanitation worker, drew muted sighs of relief in the downtown courtroom from victims’ relatives who were passing tissues back and forth, letting slight sobs go as each victim’s name was read aloud. Franklin, wearing a yellow dress shirt and neck tie that he put on as he entered the courtroom, appeared to remain stoic as he has the entire trial.
He was convicted last month of 10 murders between 1985 and 2007 but authorities believe he is responsible for more. Jurors rejected defense arguments that he should spend the rest of his life in prison rather than face execution.
The victims’ bodies were often dumped naked on roadsides or among trash in humiliating fashion, and the victims were all initially listed as Jane Does, leaving the killings unconnected for decades.
During the penalty phase of the trial, prosecutors connected Franklin to an additional five killings. The district attorney’s office decided not to charge Franklin with those crimes because he was already facing the death penalty and prosecutors did not want to further stall a trial that had already been beset by delays.
In all, investigators think Franklin may have killed as many as 25 women during the years he spent stalking one of the city’s most vulnerable populations.
In her closing argument to the jury, Deputy Dist. Atty. Beth Silverman gave a blistering recounting of each victim’s final moments, speaking with a palpable disdain for Franklin. The defendant, seated underneath a projector that displayed pictures of his victims’ battered and bloody bodies, never looked up.
“They were so vicious, they were so calculated, and they were so demeaning,” Silverman said of the killings. “The way that these women ended up, half of them naked … all of them in filthy alleys.”
Defense attorney Dale Atherton countered by appealing to the jury’s conscience in a plea for mercy. Executing Franklin, he said, would only “delay the healing process” for the victims’ families.
“Every time they think of the approaching execution date, it will be like opening the wounds again,” he said.
Posted by btx3 on June 6, 2016 in Domestic terrorism
Tags: death penalty, Grim Sleeper, sentencing, serial killer
The “Grim Sleeper”
Lonnie David Franklin Jr., Who Police Believe Committed at Least 11 Murders
Black serial killers are a rarity. The most infamous being the Atlanta child murderer, Wayne Williams. Perhaps they are not as rare as police profiles indicate, and it is just that their victims tend to get ignored.
Grim Sleeper serial killer suspect known as nice, funny ‘fix-it’ man
For more than 20 years an elusive killer dubbed the Grim Sleeper walked the streets of south Los Angeles, California.
The killer targeted black women, some of them working as prostitutes, shooting most of them with the same small-caliber gun.
Police combed the neighborhood where the killings occurred — a low-income area.
But some have said that because of the low-income profile of the area and the victims, the slayings were pushed aside as unrelated incidents.
Police eventually got the killer’s DNA and ballistics evidence, which allowed them to link at least 10 murders. But for years they could not match the DNA.
Then on Wednesday, police announced they believed they finally had their man, Lonnie David Franklin Jr.
Franklin, 57, is a former city trash collector who at one time worked as a garage attendant at an LAPD station and used his mechanical skills to help out around the neighborhood.
The same neighborhood was littered with composite sketches of the suspect. But police say nobody said anything about noticing the resemblance to Franklin who lived just eight blocks from one the sketches.
His arrest came as a shock to neighbors who said they knew him as a guy who helped fix their cars — on the same street near where police say he allegedly dumped his victims’ bodies.
Vehicles were a focus for detectives during their investigation. His only surviving victim told police after her escape that the suspect was driving an orange Ford Pinto when he picked her up.
One of Franklin’s neighbors said he was seen driving an orange Pinto once or twice. But the neighbor thought nothing of it, not knowing about the vehicle’s relationship to the case and not suspecting anything because Franklin was known as a “fix-it” man who always drove different cars he was working on.
Posted by btx3 on July 8, 2010 in Giant Negros
Tags: Grim Sleeper, LA, Los Angeles, murder, Police, serial killer
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Inspired By the Lowercase King
Today we celebrate the legacy of the foremost leader of the Civil Rights movement, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. The Lord used this man to inspire a nation, and move a people towards equality. There is still work to be done, but his contribution was invaluable. No hero is perfect, and Dr. King was no exception, but I admire him in many ways and I’m inspired by his legacy. Here are three things about his life that inspire me.
1. Passion for Justice
Dr. King was disgusted by the injustice that was rampant in our world, and dedicated his life to fighting against it. In the Bible, he saw God’s vision for His world, He saw the prophets call for the end of oppression, and He was passionate to see that justice come to pass. I admire this passion for justice, and pray God would continue to work it in my own heart. I want to fight for the oppressed and preach Good News to the hopeless.
Despite his youthfulness, Dr. King’s prophetic speeches and crystal clear vision led him to emerge as the leader of the movement. He didn’t sit back and complain, he stepped up and led. He was clear on what he thought would help black people move forward, and he led others in that direction. This resulted in the non-violent resistance that helped change the United States forever. We can all learn from this kind of leadership. Vision is only valuable when it’s married to leadership. His leadership helped the vision come to pass.
Of course, his fight was not met with smiles and embraces. He risked his life every time he marched, spoke, or protested. He knew what he was doing was dangerous, yet he had the courage to put his life on the line for his people. The opposition he faced did not cloud his vision, or dampen his leadership. It only reminded him why he was fighting. I pray that the Lord would work in me an unshakeable courage that stands for His kingdom and fights for His glory.
I hope you’re inspired by his example as well, and I hope you’ll join me in praising God for what He accomplished through Dr. King.
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Pstan26 • August 19, 2013 at 8:28 am • Reply
Many people have lost his message, glad it is not lost on you Super Duper
for the love of Nigeria • August 19, 2013 at 8:29 am • Reply
His life has definitely been a standard, I used this oppurtunity to ask for us to pray for Nigeria, even as we make our input towards fighting for the Nigeria of our dreams, it shall soon be a reality
Tamiehicks • August 19, 2013 at 8:30 am • Reply
Thanks for share’n Trip
Dan Smith • August 19, 2013 at 8:30 am • Reply
I agree that vision without leadership is wasted. It’s too bad, because I’m sure there were several people who foresaw the need for civil rights, and even how it could come about, but because they lacked leadership qualities, they are not remembered today. The same goes for the church. For every strong and visionary leader there are undoubtedly thousands who are merely visionary.
Sweet Victory Video
Check out the video for Sweet Victory from Trip’s latest album, Rise
Millennials and Racial Reconciliation
This is Trip’s talk from the ERLC Summit on the Gospel and Racial Reconciliation. Below is the manuscript from that message. This evening, I’ve been asked to speak about millennials and racial reconciliation. And I feel privileged to stand here and serve as part of this amazing effort towards unity in God’s church. As a
What Topics Does the Book Discuss?
In Trip’s new book, Rise, he tried to write about things that are relevant to this generation. Watch as he walks through some of the chapters and gives a sneak peak at the content.
Rise Endorsements
“Trip’s written a book that I think every young person needs to read. His passion for Jesus and this generation comes through loud and clear on every page. I can’t wait to see the impact this message has on a generation that’s hungry for purpose.” — Lecrae, Grammy awarding- winning artist @lecrae “Rise is a
Piper’s Rise Foreword
Trip’s new book, Rise, is out now! Read John Piper‘s foreword to the book below. You can pre-order the book and find out more at Risebook.tv One of the main things I like about Trip Lee and his book, Rise, is the interplay of reverence and relevance. The aim at relevance in American culture is common.
Trip Lee Facebook
Trip Lee Twitter
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RESOLUTION #2621
Whereas, the Board of Education is committed to the creation and preservation of equal opportunities for all people to participate in the delivery of goods and services through the contracting processes of the Denver Public Schools; and
Whereas, the Board of Education intends and expects that the contracting processes of the school district provide equal opportunity without regard to gender, race, ethnicity, religion, age or disability; and
Whereas, the Board of Education intends and expects that those who contract directly with the school district shall in turn make available equal opportunities to the extent third parties are engaged to provide goods and services to the school district as subcontractors, vendors, or otherwise.
NOW THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED,
1. That in all respects the processes by which the school district contracts for goods and services be designed and implemented to further the foregoing principals.
2. That, consistent with the foregoing principals, Denver Public Schools contracting policies and practices conform to the following parameters:
a) No person shall be excluded from participation in, denied the benefits of, or otherwise discriminated against in connection with the award and performance of any contract on the grounds of gender, race, ethnicity, religion, age or disability.
b) Neither the gender, race, ethnicity, religion, age nor disability of any contractor or subcontractor shall be a factor in the evaluation of any proposal or award of any contract.
c) Any party contracting with Denver Public Schools for the provision of goods or services shall be required to agree as a condition of the contract not to discriminate on any of the foregoing grounds in the performance of the contract.
d) Information regarding contracting opportunities with the school district shall be disseminated in a manner calculated to reach all persons qualified to provide pertinent goods and services.
e) The criteria to be used in evaluating contract proposals shall be based on the school district’s interest in securing cost-effective, quality goods and services and shall not exclude or disadvantage parties for reasons that are not closely related to those interests.
f) In determining contract requirements, including the type and quantity of goods and services to be provided, bonding and insurance requirements and other specific details over which the school district may have discretion, care shall be taken to encourage submission of quotes or proposals from as wide a base of potential vendors as is reasonably possible.
g) School district contracts for the provision of goods or services shall require that the contracting party disseminate information regarding any third-party contracting opportunities in a manner reasonably calculated to reach all persons qualified and willing to participate and that the contracting party retain and make available to the school district records regarding its dissemination of information and responses thereto.
3. That the Denver Public Schools Purchasing Department collect and maintain information necessary to permit the school district to determine the effectiveness of school district contracting policies and practices in ensuring equal opportunity.
4. That the school district implement and maintain a procedure for the review and resolution of complaints from potential vendors, contractors, or subcontractors regarding intentional discrimination or discriminatory practices, procedures, or requirements in the award or performance of contracts, and that such procedure provide for appropriate remedies and sanctions where discrimination is found to have occurred.
5. That the school district provide information and assistance regarding school district opportunities and contracting processes to interested persons and groups, in a manner and to the extent consistent with available resources.
6. That this resolution supersede all prior resolutions, policies, and practices to the extent inconsistent herewith.
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Over $2B pledged to BVI, hurricane-struck countries
in All News / By: BVI News on November 24, 2017 at 6:20 AM /
Scene of destruction on Tortola caused by hurricane Irma. (Photo Credit: Ve-Anna Thomas).
The British Virgin Islands is slated to get a share of more than US$2 billion that was offered in loans and pledges to countries affected by hurricanes Irma and Maria.
The offers were made at a CARICOM-United Nations high-level pledging conference held at the UN headquarters in New York this week.
Support came from nearly 400 representatives from governments, multilateral and civil society organizations, and the private sector.
The UN said the funds will assist hurricane-struck countries to “build back better” as the first climate-resilient countries in the world.
It is estimated that recovery costs for affected countries are well over $5 billion.
While giving remarks at the conference this week, Premier Dr D Orlando Smith said the estimated damage in the BVI alone is roughly $3.6 billion. He said that cost did not include all sectors.
Other countries severely impacted by the September hurricanes include Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, Anguilla, St Martin, Turks & Caicos Islands, and Puerto Rico.
Below is a breakdown of the loans and pledges offered:
The Inter-American Development Bank pledged US$1 billion in loans while Italy pledged $30 million in soft loans. Venezuela forgave $1 million in debt to affected countries that had borrowed.
$702 million from The Netherlands
$352 million from the European Union
$140 million from the World Bank
$100 million from Canada
$30million from China
$27 million from Mexico
$12 million from Italy
$4.3 million from the United States
$4 million from Japan
$1 million from Kuwait
$2 million from India
$1 million from Venezuela
$1.2 million from Belgium
$1 million from Chile
$500,000 from Denmark
$300,000 from Colombia
$250,000 from Haiti
US$250,000 from New Zealand
$200,000 from Brazil
$150,000 from Kazakhstan
$100,000 from Romania
$100,000 from Portugal
$20,000 from Serbia
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Ernest Moniz receives inaugural Carnegie Science award for public service
Washington, DC—Former-Energy Secretary and nuclear physicist Ernest Moniz received Carnegie’s inaugural Richard A. Meserve Public Service award Thursday in recognition of his “exemplary leadership and accomplishment in furthering public understanding of science.”
Named after Carnegie's president emeritus, the honor was created to recognize science educators, policymakers, philanthropists, and outreach-oriented research scientists who make exceptional contributions to the scientific enterprise through advancing the public’s understanding of science and its role in the betterment of humankind.
“Ernest Moniz is more than just a fine physicist, he’s also a dedicated public servant, and an effective science communicator,” said Carnegie Trustee Rush Holt, who is the Chief Executive Officer of AAAS the and Executive Publisher of Science. “He’s what they call a triple threat, so he was the perfect choice to honor with this inaugural public service award.”
Moniz headed the Department of Energy from 2013 through January 2017, during which time he led the fight against climate change, advanced nuclear security, and promoted technological innovation. He previously served as DOE Under Secretary between 1997 and January 2001, and on MIT’s faculty between 1973 and 2013. Today, he is Chief Executive Officer and Co-Chair of the Board of the Nuclear Threat Initiative and Chief Executive Officer of the Energy Futures Initiative, as well as a Special Advisor to the MIT President.
Moniz received a bachelor’s degree in physics from Boston College and a doctorate in theoretical physics from Stanford University. He is a Fellow of the American Physical Society, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Humboldt Foundation, and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
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US 9th Cir.
Balanced Value Fund; Tach One, on behalf of Montrose Nationwide Limited Partnership; Wayne M. Rogers; Jack M. Gertino, Plaintiffs, v. ESTATE OF BISHOP 10
United States Court of Appeals,Ninth Circuit.
KONA ENTERPRISES, INC., individually and derivatively on behalf of Hanford's, Inc., Nationwide Industries, Inc., Plaintiff-Appellant, Balanced Value Fund; Tach One, on behalf of Montrose Nationwide Limited Partnership; Wayne M. Rogers; Jack M. Gertino, Plaintiffs, v. ESTATE OF Bernice Pauahi BISHOP, by and through its trustees, Henry H. Peters, Myron B. Thompson, Oswald K. Stender, Richard S.H. Wong, and Lokelani Lindsey; Matsuo Takabuki, individually; William S. Richardson, individually; Myron B. Thompson, individually; Henry H. Peters, Jr., individually; Hanford's Inc.; Nationwide Industries, Inc.; Montrose Nationwide Limited Partnership; Snap Products, Inc.; Hanford's Creations, Inc.; John Does 1-10, Defendants-Appellees.
No. 98-16197.
Decided: June 04, 1999
Before: FARRIS, NOONAN and GRABER, Circuit Judges. Russell S. Walker,Woodbury & Kesler, Salt Lake City, Utah, for the plaintiff-appellant. David Schulmeister, C. Michael Hare, Kelly G. LaPorte, Cades Schutte Fleming & Wright, Honolulu, Hawaii, for the defendants-appellees.
Kona Enterprises was used as a vehicle for several investors, including Defendants, to gain control of Hanford's, Inc., a seasonal decorations company, and Nationwide, an automobile products manufacturer. We refer to Hanford's and Nationwide collectively as the “Companies.” The Bishop Estate provided several letters of credit to avoid foreclosure by the Companies' creditor. After allegedly rejecting alternative financing arrangements, the Bishop Estate bought the Companies' loans. It eventually foreclosed when the loans went unpaid, taking all of the stock and assets of the Companies under the stock pledge agreement.
Kona and its other shareholders 1 sued Defendants, alleging breaches of fiduciary duties as well as breaches of the covenant of good faith and fair dealing. Kona also alleged interference with corporate opportunity and corporate governance.2 The district court held that Kona had not asserted any direct claims against Defendants and that it lacked standing to pursue any derivative claims.
Kona asserts two arguments in this appeal: (1) that the district court erroneously held that it had not asserted a direct claim for damages against Defendants, and (2) that to the extent it is required to pursue its claims derivatively, it has standing to do so. If it does not have standing in the traditional sense, it contends the district court erred in not allowing equitable standing under the facts of this case.
Whether Kona can assert a direct claim based on the allegedly wrongful foreclosure of its shares in the Companies is a question of law reviewed de novo. See Pareto v. FDIC, 139 F.3d 696, 699 (9th Cir.1998). Likewise, whether Kona had derivative standing to assert claims on behalf of the Companies is reviewed de novo. See Cohen v. Stratosphere Corp., 115 F.3d 695, 700 (9th Cir.1997).
We conclude that Kona has not asserted any direct claims against Defendants. Kona made clear at oral argument that it seeks only damages equal to its investment in the Companies. The damages Kona seeks represent a diminution in value of the Companies, allegedly resulting from wrongful acts by Defendants. Kona thus seeks recovery for wrongs to the Companies that resulted in a decline in the value of its stock. Kona alleges no disproportionate injury sufficient to make out a direct claim. Further, Kona does not contend the process of foreclosure by Defendants was unlawful and does not seek return of its shares. Therefore, no direct claim has been asserted.
Kona argues it nonetheless has standing to assert derivative claims. It asserts it need not meet the continuous share ownership requirement of Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23.1 for two reasons. First, it contends that the standing requirements of Rule 23.1 are substantive in nature and under Erie Railroad Co. v. Tompkins, 304 U.S. 64, 58 S.Ct. 817, 82 L.Ed. 1188 (1938), state law should apply to this derivative suit. Second, Kona contends that an equitable exception to Rule 23.1 is appropriate where “a claimant has lost its shares involuntarily through the same wrongful conduct which is the subject of the derivative claims.”
Whether Rule 23.1's continuous share ownership requirement is applicable in diversity cases is an issue of first impression in this Circuit. We have discussed the issue in previous decisions, but none of our holdings has required us to resolve it. See, e.g., Sax v. World Wide Press, 809 F.2d 610, 613 (9th Cir.1987) (making the statement, in dictum, that “[i]n federal courts, derivative suits are subject to the procedural requirements of Fed.R.Civ.P. 23.1.”). Likewise, “the controversy has not been laid to rest by the [Supreme] Court, although once, speaking generally about former Rule 23(b), the Court suggested that the provision may be given effect in a federal court even though state law contains no comparable requirement.” 7C Charles Alan Wright, Arthur R. Miller & Mary Kay Kane, Federal Practice and Procedure § 1829, at 78 (2d ed.1986) (citing Cohen v. Beneficial Indus. Loan Corp., 337 U.S. 541, 69 S.Ct. 1221, 93 L.Ed. 1528 (1949)).
We agree with our own statement in Sax that Rule 23.1's continuous share ownership requirement is procedural in nature and thus applicable in diversity actions. Cf. id. at 77 (“the contemporaneous ownership requirement [of Rule 23.1] has generally been given effect by the federal courts in the face of inconsistent state law on the subject.”). Accordingly, Kona's failure to own stock in the Companies contemporaneously with bringing suit deprives them of standing to pursue their claims derivatively.
Even if Rule 23.1 were inapplicable in diversity actions, state law would likely cause us to reach the same result. Although the continuous share ownership requirement has been adopted in many jurisdictions, some states, including North Carolina and Pennsylvania, whose law we are urged to apply by Kona, have less demanding standards. Those standards, however, still require share ownership at the time of the transaction(s) complained of and at the time the suit is filed. See, e.g., Alford v. Shaw, 327 N.C. 526, 398 S.E.2d 445, 449 (1990) (holding that a plaintiff who is “a shareholder at the time of the transaction about which he is complaining and at the time the action is filed ” need not continue share ownership throughout litigation) (emphasis added); Drain v. Covenant Life Ins. Co., 454 Pa.Super. 143, 685 A.2d 119, 125 (1996) (citing the explanatory comment to its applicable rule and stating that share ownership is not required “subsequent to the commencement of the action.”). The same conclusion would thus be reached regardless of the analysis applied.
Kona next argues it need not meet the continuous share ownership requirement because it is entitled to equitable standing under the facts of this case. Kona identifies two situations in which equitable standing to non-shareholders has been granted.
The first situation is found in Eastwood v. National Bank of Commerce, Altus, Okla., 673 F.Supp. 1068 (W.D.Okla.1987). Similar to the instant case, Eastwood involved a bank that foreclosed on stock pledged to it as collateral for providing loans that ultimately were not repaid. The court determined that, consistent with the purpose of Rule 23.1, the plaintiff “has an adequate interest in vigorously litigating the corporate claim” where the success of the claim is inextricably linked to whether the plaintiff is successful in setting aside or rescinding the sale (or foreclosure) of the stock. Id. at 1077.
The second situation in which equitable standing has been granted is the “merger cases.” In these cases, equitable standing has been granted where the plaintiffs contended they had lost their stock due to the same wrongful conduct that was the subject of the derivative suit they were trying to bring. The courts have focused on the fact that, because a merger had occurred, the company on whose behalf the plaintiffs were suing had disappeared. An exception to the continuous share ownership requirement of Rule 23.1 was thus deemed appropriate. See, e.g., Keyser v. Commonwealth Nat'l Fin. Corp., 120 F.R.D. 489 (M.D.Pa.1988); Miller v. Steinbach, 268 F.Supp. 255 (S.D.N.Y.1967).
Kona fits into neither of these exceptions. It has not sought recovery of its shares in the Companies, which could potentially provide it standing to pursue derivative claims. Kona did not even seek a recission of the stock pledge agreement or challenge the foreclosure. As such, the Eastwood exception is unhelpful to Kona.
Also, since no merger occurred and the Companies still exist, the “merger” exception does not apply:
In the merger situation, the disappearing corporation's shareholders still retained some interest, even though it was in the surviving corporation, and since the disappearing corporation no longer existed, such shareholders were the only ones who could bring an action to protect their interests in the disappearing corporation. Here, plaintiffs have not only lost their interest in [the corporation], but [the corporation] still exists and either it or its present shareholders suing derivatively under Fed.R.Civ.P. 23.1 may seek recovery for any harm suffered by [the corporation] ․
Bosse v. Crowell Collier and Macmillan, 565 F.2d 602, 613 (9th Cir.1977).
1. For simplicity in nomenclature, we use Kona as a proxy for the plaintiffs.
2. Although it never proceeded beyond the early stages of discovery, this case has been litigated in North Carolina state court, in the District of Utah, and now here. The North Carolina suit was voluntarily dismissed and the Utah suit was dismissed for improper venue.
FARRIS, Circuit Judge:
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Ross, Charlotte P., and Motto, Jerome A., “Implementation of Standards for Suicide Prevention/Crisis Centers,” Bulletin of Suicidology, No. 8, Fall 1971.
Motto, Jerome A.; Ross, Charlotte P.; Brooks, Richard; and Allen, Nancy, Standards for Suicide Prevention/Crisis Centers, Behavioral Publications, Inc., NY, 1974.
Ross, Charlotte P., “A Survey of Hospital Services for Suicidal Personnel,” Suicide, Vol. 5(3), Behavioral Publications, New York, Fall 1975.
Ross, Charlotte P., Book Review: Addicted to Suicide, by Mary Savage, Suicide and Life Threatening Behavior, Vol. 6(1), Spring 1976.
Ross, Charlotte P., et al., Evaluation Criteria for Certification of Suicide Prevention and Crisis Intervention Programs, An Official Publication of the American Association of Suicidology, 1976.
Ross, Charlotte P. and Lee, A. Russell, Suicide in Youth and What You Can Do About It, A Guide for Students; A Guide for School Personnel, Merck, Sharp & Dohme, PA,1977.
Ross, Charlotte P., “School Suicide: Education of Life and Death,” Suicide in Adolescence, Rene F. W. Diekstra and Keith E. Hawton, Eds; Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 1987.
Ross, Charlotte P., “Mobilizing Schools for Suicide Prevention,” Suicide and Life Threatening Behavior, Vol. 10(4), Human Sciences, New York, Winter, 1980.
Ross, Charlotte P., “The Need to Educate Adolescents About Suicide,” Problems of Death: Opposing Viewpoints, Greenhaven Press, St. Paul, MN, 1981.
Ross, Charlotte P., Book Review: A Cry for Help, by Mary Griffin, M.D. and Carol Felsenthal, Juvenile and Family Court Newsletter, Volume XIII, No. 7, Nov., 1983.
Ross, Charlotte P. and Motto, J., “Group Counseling for Suicidal Adolescents”, Suicide in the Young, Howard Sudak, Ed; PGS Publishing Co., Inc., 1984.
Ross, Charlotte P., “Teaching Children the Facts of Life and Death,” Youth Suicide, Michael Peck, Ed; Springer Publishing Co., Inc., New York, 1985.
Ross, Charlotte P., Carraker, Blue, and King, Mary. Report of the National Conference on Youth Suicide: Community Response to a National Tragedy., June 19-20, 1985, Washington, D.C., Dept. of Health and Human Services; Administration of Children, Youth and Families and The Youth Suicide National Center.
Ross, Charlotte P., and Peck, Michael. Suicide Prevention Program for California Public Schools: Implementation and Resource Guide, California State Department of Education, Sacramento, 1987.
Ross, Charlotte P., Contemporary Perspectives on Rational Suicide, “Conclusion;” JamesWerth, Jr., Editor; Taylor & Francis Publishers; Washington, D.C., 1998.
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Citationsy
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Colloids and Surfaces B: Biointerfaces Referencing Guide
Citationsy › Style Guides › Colloids and Surfaces B: Biointerfaces
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How do you cite a book in the Colloids and Surfaces B: Biointerfaces referencing style?
Here’s an example book citation in Colloids and Surfaces B: Biointerfaces using placeholders:
F.N. Last Name, Title, Edition, Publisher, City, 2000.
So if we want to cite, for example, “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone” by Joanne K. Rowling we’d do so like this:
J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, 1st ed., Bloomsbury Publishing Inc, London, 1997.
And an in-text citation book citation in Colloids and Surfaces B: Biointerfaces looks like this: [1]
How to reference a journal article in the Colloids and Surfaces B: Biointerfaces citation style?
Here’s a Colloids and Surfaces B: Biointerfaces journal citation example using placeholders:
Author1 LastnameA.F., Author3 LastnameA.F., Title, Container. Volume (2000) pages Used. doi:DOI.
So if we want to reference this scientific article: “Testing consumer preferences for iced-coffee: Does the drinking environment have any influence?” by C. Petit and J.M. Sieffermann in Colloids and Surfaces B: Biointerfaces:
C. Petit, J. Sieffermann, Testing consumer preferences for iced-coffee: Does the drinking environment have any influence?, 18 (2007) 161-172. doi:10.1016/j.foodqual.2006.05.008.
And an in-text citation would look like this: [1]
Citing a website in Colloids and Surfaces B: Biointerfaces reference style
Here’s an Colloids and Surfaces B: Biointerfaces example website reference:
Author1 LastnameA.F., Author2 LastnameA.F., Title, (2000). https://www.example.com (accessed July 17, 2019).
To reference the article located at this link:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2008/nov/05/uselections20083
on The Guardian website:
M. Tran, Barack Obama To Be America’s First Black President, (2008). https://www.theguardian.com/world/2008/nov/05/uselections20083 (accessed July 17, 2019).
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ChannelName, Title, YouTube. (2000). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XXXXXX (accessed July 17, 2019).
So how to cite a video Colloids and Surfaces B: Biointerfaces?
Pixar, Pizza Clip — Inside Out, YouTube. (2015). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8W6rntBADUQ (accessed July 17, 2019).
And an in-text video citation would look like this: [1]
How to cite a podcast using Colloids and Surfaces B: Biointerfaces referencing style
It is becoming more and more common to reference podcasts in essays or other school work.
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F. Lastname, Title, (2000). http://www.example.com (accessed July 17, 2019).
Podcast referencing example in Colloids and Surfaces B: Biointerfaces using “This American Life” episode 640:
This American Life, 640: Five Women, (2018). https://thisamericanlife.org/640/five-women (accessed July 17, 2019).
How to cite a piece of music or a song using Colloids and Surfaces B: Biointerfaces referencing style?
An example song citation in Colloids and Surfaces B: Biointerfaces.
F. Lastname, Song Title, 2000. http://www.example.com (accessed July 17, 2019).
Let‘s say we want to reference “Here Comes the Sun” off The Beatles “Abbey Road” album in Colloids and Surfaces B: Biointerfaces:
The Beatles, Here Comes the Sun, 1969. https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/here-comes-the-sun/401186200?i=401187150 (accessed July 17, 2019).
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DUKE ENERGY eGRID
WIND TURBINE TEST BEDS
Thank you for your interest in employment with Clemson University. Below are links / information regarding open positions at the Clemson University Restoration Institute in North Charleston, SC.
Senior Test Bench Operator
The Senior Test Bench Operator is part of a team responsible for the operation of the 15MW wind turbine test bench on a 24/7 basis. Executes the tests, improves the operational efficiency of the test bench, and assists with scheduled maintenance on the test bench. Requires shift work to support the operations. Performs other duties as assigned.
Minimum Requirements: Bachelor’s degree in engineering, architecture or engineering technology
Test Bench Operator
The Test Bench Operator provides support as part of a team responsible for the operation of the 15MW wind turbine test bench on a 24/7 basis. Executes the tests, improves the operational efficiency of the test bench, and assists with scheduled maintenance on the test bench. Requires shift work to support the operations. Performs other duties as assigned.
Minimum Requirements: A high school diploma and experience or additional technical training in the repair and maintenance of electronic or electromechanical equipment.
Preferred Requirements: Associate’s Degree
FOR MORE INFORMATION AND APPLICATION MATERIALS, VISIT:https://www.clemson.edu/careers/index.php
Summer Internships at SCE&G Energy Innovation Center for Undergraduates
Summary: The Clemson University Restoration Institute (CURI) is interviewing for undergraduate internship positions. Up to eight intern will be hired for a 10-week summer internship located at the SCE&G Energy Innovation Center in North Charleston, SC. Interns will have the opportunity to work with state-of-the-art testing equipment used to test full scale wind turbine nacelles and utility scale power electronic equipment. Each intern will be assigned specific deliverables and will be expected to give multiple oral presentations on their work. The positions are open to both Clemson and non-Clemson students. Interested applicants should email an application package (cover letter and resume) to Ramtin Hadidi, Ph.D. at rhadidi(at)clemson(dot)edu.
Description: Clemson University has built and commissioned two state-of-the-art, world class testing facilities at the SCE&G Energy Innovation Center (EIC), part of the Clemson University Restoration Institute (CURI) located at the Charleston Naval Complex in North Charleston, SC.
The first is the Wind Turbine Drivetrain Testing Facility (WTDTF), consisting of two mechanical test dynamometers (7.5 and 15 megawatt) designed to test the next generation of wind turbine prototypes with the goal of improving reliability and reducing the cost of energy delivered. The facility has been testing wind turbines for over two years, with additional prototypes to be tested in the coming year.
The second is the Duke Energy Electric Grid Research Innovation and Development center (eGRID), designed to help develop and test the next generation multi-megawatt technology including wind turbines, energy storage, and smart inverters with the overall goal of improving reliability, increasing security, and reducing the cost of energy delivered.
The mission of the EIC is to provide high quality research and testing services to the energy industry. Both facility strives to establish long term partnerships with industry, government agencies, and other partners to further research and educational opportunities.
Interns will be involved in equipment installation, test preparation, data collection, data analysis, and modeling activities. These internships require individuals who have a strong interest in working with large, full scale mechanical and electrical devices. This is an industrial research facility where safety is the number one priority and all interns will be required to undergo extensive safety training and adhere to safety rules at all times.
We are seeking up to eight (8) individuals for a ten (10) week summer period (at average 35 hr/wk). Interns will be part of the operations team at the WTDTF or eGRID, working alongside Clemson University research professors, engineers, and industry partners. Each intern will be assigned specific deliverables that they must complete during their 10-week internship. Each intern will give multiple oral presentations and reports to the CURI team throughout the internship. All internships will be at the Clemson University Restoration Institute in North Charleston, SC.
If interested, submit a cover letter and resume to Ramtin Hadidi, Ph.D. at rhadidi(at)clemson(dot)edu outlining your interest and qualifications.
Application Deadline: March 1, 2019
Anticipated Start Date: May 20, 2019
Salary: $14/hr
GPA: 3 or above
Major: Mechanical Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, Industrial Engineering, Mathematical Science
Class Standing: Junior or senior standing is preferred but strong sophomore candidates will also be considered.
Clemson University is an AA/EEO employer and does not discriminate against any person or group on the basis of age, color, disability, gender, pregnancy, national origin, race, religion, sexual orientation, veteran status or genetic information. Clemson University is building a culturally diverse faculty and staff committed to working in a multicultural environment and encourages applications from minorities and women.
Copyright © 2019 Clemson University Restoration Institute
1250 Supply Street, North Charleston, SC 29405 | P: 843-730-5060
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Musings on all things typography and design.
The Meatball vs. The Worm
In spring of 1974, a request for proposals for the NASA redesign had landed at the office of Danne & Blackburn, a firm that Richard Danne had started with another designer, Bruce Blackburn. For a small, young firm, it was an opportunity for attention, and NASA was still basking in the glow of the Apollo moon landings. Since 1959, the year after its founding, NASA had used what was affectionately called “the meatball” — a blue circle filled with stars, a red swoosh that represents an airplane wing and a spacecraft orbiting the wing. “The meatball was something that was contrived by jet pilots, and it went all the way back to Buck Rogers in terms of its sophistication,” Mr. Blackburn said. “It didn’t look like a modern space agency.” So the designers tried pictorial approaches, but concluded that the best embodiment of NASA was its recognizable acronym. The linear treatment that would become the worm. However, in 1992, during a visit by Daniel S. Goldin, newly confirmed as NASA administrator, to NASA’s Langley Research Center in Virginia, the worm turned. Mr. Goldin recalled flying down to Langley with NASA and White House officials. Paul Holloway, Langley’s director, greeted him, and pointed to a hangar. “He said, ‘If you want to really excite NASA employees about changes coming, why don’t you tell them we’re going to deworm NASA and bring back the meatball?’ ” Mr. Goldin said. He turned to a White House official and asked if he was allowed to do that. He was, and in an address to Langley employees, Mr. Goldin announced that he was bringing back the meatball. ~ nytimes.com #typography #design #nasa #nasalogo#nowyouknow #design
cody dennison October 15, 2017
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Phil Simms: What We Saw Monday Night Was An Anomaly
Filed Under:Inside The NFL, NFL, Phil Simms, Ryan Mayer
Ryan Mayer
Hope you had the over. Monday night’s game between the Kansas City Chiefs and Los Angeles Rams was exactly the display of offensive firepower that was expected heading into the game, and then some. The two teams combined for a cavalcade of Monday Night Football records as they lit up the scoreboard in a way reminiscent of the Monstars in the first half of Space Jam.
However, as much fun as the game was, Inside the NFL and NFL on CBS analyst Phil Simms doesn’t think it’s the start of a new trend in the League. Yes, offense has been on the rise, but Simms doesn’t believe we’ll begin to see scores like this on a weekly basis. We caught up with Simms to ask about Monday night’s game and a variety of other big topics of conversation this week in the NFL, as he prepared for Tuesday night’s episode of Inside the NFL. You can watch Phil along with fellow analysts Ray Lewis, Boomer Esiason and host James Brown on Inside the NFL every Tuesday night at 9 p.m. Eastern Time on Showtime.
CBS Local Sports: We’ll start off with the game between the Rams and the Chiefs. Do you like those kinds of shootouts and the way the league is trending right now?
Phil Simms: I did like the game, and it was entertaining. But there was a point in either the late third quarter or early fourth that I thought, ‘Wow, I would really like to see this settle down a little bit and see more defensive plays, so I could see more strategy for the end of the game.’ Well, it turned out strategy was a really big part of the end of the game.
Sean McVay stayed aggressive and tried to catch the other team off-guard, and that’s what you’re supposed to do. But, when it doesn’t work, everybody criticizes you. That’s just the way it works.
I think what we saw was an anomaly. I don’t think we’re going to see a ton of these games in the future, just because there are too many good athletes out on the field.
CBS Local Sports: Over the past couple of years, we have seen running backs de-emphasized in terms of their importance. That trend seems to have reversed this year. What running back is most important to his team?
Phil Simms: That is a tough one, because the importance of the running back doesn’t always show in the stats. Todd Gurley in last night’s game didn’t really show his impact in the numbers running the football. But, what do you think the threat of him running in play action did to the defense?
We can’t quantify that, and we can’t give him credit for that. But, I promise you, the Kansas City Chiefs, when they saw that offensive line moving left with Gurley also going that way, they are flying to stop Todd Gurley. That’s just one reason why we see great protection and guys wide open down the field. Todd Gurley has great impact, but the other duo that sticks out is Alvin Kamara and Mark Ingram in New Orleans.
They do it differently, it’s more of an old-school feel, not trying to fool you with misdirection as much as run straight at you. I would say that there are five guys that are franchise running backs and are the centerpiece of the team.
CBS Local Sports: Besides the injuries, what is the biggest reason the Eagles are struggling this year?
Phil Simms: Injuries are always part of it, but the biggest thing is they have lost key people and a lot of depth. Nick Foles came in and won the Super Bowl last year, sure and Carson Wentz got them to that point. But, they won the Super Bowl and did well in the playoffs because they had the best and deepest defensive line in the NFL. It’s not even close to that now. They lost some really key backups.
Tim Jernigan hasn’t played all year, and Derek Barnett was also lost to injury. When you deplete your defensive line, you have weakened your whole team.
The loss of coaches is the second reason for their struggles.
CBS Local Sports: Khalil Mack has single-handedly altered the NFC North race. What impresses you the most about him and the Bears defense?
Phil Simms: He is technically, physically gifted. He loves the game of football and does it all the right way. He has a really good defensive coach in Vic Fangio, and he has good players around him. Akiem Hicks, Leonard Floyd, those guys help him, and, in turn, of course, he is helping them greatly. It just goes to show you that when you get one great player, there is a cascading effect throughout the team, and it changes the whole dynamic of your football team. Khalil Mack absolutely has done that for the Chicago Bears.
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Chick Lit Goddess
...because every author wants to feel like a goddess!
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Better Than Your Dreams
“Better Than Your Dreams” by Dee Ernst
Blurb: In this follow-up to “Better Off Without Him”, Mona Quincy once again faces life’s tough moments with good friends, lots of laughs, and a cold, dry martini. For the past eighteen months, Mona has had a long-distance relationship with the man of her dreams, Ben Cutler. She’s been in LA working on a screenplay, while he’s been keeping the NJ home fires burning. But now she’s back, and she needs to answer a very serious question – will she marry Ben?
Mona doesn’t think she ever wants to get married again – not even to someone as practically perfect as Ben Cutler. But before she can think about her own marriage plans, she’s got a few other weddings to deal with. Her Aunt Lily doesn’t think that being almost eighty should deter her future happiness, and has met her perfect partner in Vinnie DeMatriano, who just happens to be the uncle of a slightly notorious crime boss. True, they’ve only known each other three months, but they want to tie the knot – in Mona’s back yard. Then Miranda, Mona’s oldest daughter, announces that she’s ready to get married after a three month long courtship of her own – to Ben’s son, David.
Ben believes in love at first sight, and is thrilled for Miranda and David. Mona – not so much. She doesn’t want her daughter to marry anyone after such a short time. As they find themselves at odds for the very first time, Ben thinks they should step back and take some time away from each other. Mona is still unwilling to commit fully to Ben, and can only stand by as Carmella Ciavaglia, Vinnie’s wedding-planner daughter, circles Ben like a great white shark. Will Mona finally get her Happily Ever After? Or has she learned her hardest lesson just a little too late?
In the eighteen months that I had been flying back and forth between LAX in California and EWR in Newark, New Jersey, I had never quite gotten the hang of it. I didn’t mind the flight out to LA. For some reason it seemed shorter and easier. But coming back—very tough. Maybe it was because I always took the first flight out at six in the morning. Which meant being at the airport by five in the morning, which meant I had to leave my house at—never mind. It’s too depressing to think about.
Then there was the time difference. I was actually flying forward in time. Now, maybe a sci-fi aficionado might find that exciting, but to me it just meant I’d lost a few hours of my life that I would never get back. I’d leave before breakfast and land midafternoon. Where did lunch go?
The flight itself was long. Very long. Five and a half hours. After being in a plane for that amount of time, I wanted to land in an exotic locale where people spoke a different language—or at least had a cool accent—and there were lots of fruity drinks with umbrellas sitting around. It was a bummer getting off the plane and everyone spoke English, and the most exotic thing I could look forward to was Stewart’s root beer.
But every time I got off the plane at Newark airport, at the end of the seemingly endless walk from the gate, was Ben Cutler.
I had known Ben for a very long time. He had been my plumber. Four years ago he became something more. Much more. And as long as I’d known him, my first glimpse of him always took my breath away. He was by far the handsomest man I’d ever known. Usually that was all people saw, which was a shame, because he was so much more than that. He was kind. He thought about things beyond his own small circle. He cared about other people, and what they thought or felt. I had found that, by and large, kindness had always been very underrated.
He was also funny and charming and smart as a whip. He loved me. I loved him. And I always ran those last few yards through security just so he could sweep me up into his arms.
This last flight, in the cold and gray of November, was no different. I threw my arms around his neck, and he lifted me off my feet in a hug, then kissed me long and hard before setting me back down.
“Welcome home, Mona. And this is it, right? No more commuting?”
I shook my head. “Nope. I’m done. I’m home. And I’m all yours.”
He grinned as he picked up my tote bag and carry-on. “Good. Let’s get you out of here.”
We walked down toward the luggage carousel. When I had flown home in the past, I’d just carried on some makeup and my laptop and wore what I’d left in my Westfield, New Jersey, closets. But this trip, this last trip, required the purchase of two more pieces of luggage to accommodate my expanded wardrobe. The new pieces were initialed MQ, for Mona Quincy. The older suitcases still bore MB, even though I had legally ceased being Mona Berman four years ago.
“I hope you brought your truck,” I said to Ben. “I bought a few things in California.”
He laughed. “Of course you did. I have the pickup. Or should we get a U-Haul?”
“Ha, ha. Very funny. Well, maybe.”
We stood and waited. I leaned against him, partly because I loved the feel of him—lean and strong—and partly because I liked letting all the other women waiting for their luggage know that this particular man was all mine.
He put his arm around me and kissed my hair. “So, how did you leave things?”
I had published the book four years earlier, after my then-husband Brian left me. For another woman, of course—younger, blond, and French. I was a writer of historical romance, and a very successful one at that, but I found my happily-ever-after switch had frozen in the off position. I ended up writing a very non-historical, nonromantic book about a woman of a certain age—like me—who got dumped by her lousy husband—also like me—but found herself much happier. It was called Better Off Without Him, and it not only became a best seller, it also won a few awards and got optioned by a Very Famous Hollywood Personage for film development.
It took a while for the whole option thing to go anywhere. After the papers were signed and the first check arrived, my assistant, Anthony, and I churned out a terrific screenplay in record time and sent it off to the Very Famous Hollywood Personage. Who read it, loved it, and promptly went on to another project. So I returned to writing, concentrated on raising my three daughters, and had generally gone about my life pretty much as I had done before.
Then, eighteen months ago, I got the Call. From Hollywood. Was I interested in working on a new screenplay for Better Off Without Him? Would I be willing to move out there for at least six months and work with “the team”?
Well . . . yeah.
The Very Famous Hollywood Personage had found a producer, director, and two experienced screenwriters who wanted me to work with them. My original screenplay had been looked over several times, and was now found wanting, but they wanted me “on board.” Was I willing to get “on board?”
That’s how I ended up in the land of the Beautiful People.
I rubbed my head against his shoulder. “I won’t know a thing for at least a few months. There’s this strange phenomenon out there called development hell where all screenplays seem to land. If it can work its way up to the top of the pile, then maybe it will be a movie after all.”
He laughed. “That’s a very odd business.”
“Oh, Ben, you have no idea.”
My suitcases began to appear. Ben, because he was such a sweet man, did not even flinch as he hauled them all off the belt. He just rounded up a skycap, who neatly arranged all the pieces on a long cart and followed us out into the parking lot, where the luggage was then thrown into the back of the truck, and money discreetly changed hands.
The last time I’d been home was three months ago, when I’d flown in for the twenty-fourth birthday party of Ben’s son David. I’d managed to drag two of my three daughters with me, and we all had a great time. Ben flew out to LA three weeks ago, and we spent the weekend skinny-dipping in full view of the entire downtown Los Angeles area. We hadn’t been together since then.
“So,” I said as we pulled onto the parkway, “should we stop somewhere for a bite, or just go right to my house and get naked?”
He laughed. His teeth were slightly crooked. Thank God, because I couldn’t stand it if he were perfect. As it was, the dark hair, amazing blue eyes, and dimples were almost too much to take. Almost.
“I think,” Ben said, “there are some other people who are also eager to welcome you home.”
Probably true. Not my children, who were scattered up and down the East Coast in various colleges. Although any of them were close enough to come home at any time, even just for a day in the middle of the week to see their beloved mother, all three of them had declined my invitation, saying they’d see me on the weekend. Fair enough. They were in college. They were all grown-up, with lives and things.
But still.
“Patricia?” I asked.
Ben nodded. “And Anthony. He really missed you. And there’s something up with Lily.”
That was not good.
Lily Martel was seventy-eight, my father’s only sister and my beloved aunt and godmother. She had been living with me since she sold her Park Slope co-op—luckily before a planned alien invasion that would have caused the bottom to drop out of the Brooklyn real estate market. Aliens never actually invaded, by the way, and she ended up very rich. She had, coincidentally, arrived on my doorstep the same day that Brian announced that he was leaving me. Lily’s arrival seemed to be a sign, and she never quite left. Her position in my home was vague and ever changing. The past several months she’d kept things running smoothly during my long stretches in California, keeping the house for when the girls came home, and making sure the dog and various cats were well cared for. It was a situation that worked well for all of us. But Lily had also managed to involve herself in a few of the more, shall we say, questionable political organizations around the town of Westfield. One, I knew, supported the idea of no central government at all, but rather a series of city-states. Another had something to do with redistribution of corporate wealth. I was always afraid she’d end up in jail, or at least on a watch list somewhere.
I sighed. “Hmm. Well, okay. We’ll say hello to everyone, hear what Lily has to say, then get naked?”
He glanced over at me. “Why, Ms. Quincy, are you suggesting that perhaps you missed me?”
“Ben, for the past year and a half, we’ve spent a small fortune flying back and forth to see each other. Before I left, we were together every other night.”
“I knew it.” He sighed, shaking his head. “You only love me for my body.”
I laughed. “Yes. And your heart. And your soul.”
“Ah, now, that’s more like it. So . . . I was thinking. . . .”
“Oh, Ben, you know that only gets you into trouble.”
“Yeah. I do know. But I think you and I should, maybe, you know, talk about getting married.”
Something hit me in the stomach, and I couldn’t breathe for a second. “To each other?” I finally asked.
He swore softly. He usually didn’t do that. “I’m sorry. I should have waited. I should have gotten down on one knee or something.”
“No. I mean, don’t be sorry. It’s just . . .”
Just what?
“Ben, you and I have been getting along just fine.”
“I know. But it’s time, don’t you think? We should take the next step. Listen, this really wasn’t fair to you. I know how you are after these flights. Just think about it, okay? We’ll talk later.” He shot me a look, the kind of look that made my knees turn to water. “Maybe after we get naked?”
I nodded. That immediately put me back in my happy place.
But married? Not so much. I had been married. For twenty years. And I never, ever wanted to repeat that experience again.
**NOTE: While this book is a follow-up to Better Off Without Him, it is a stand-alone novel.
**Contact Dee Ernst:
Email Website Facebook Twitter
Filed Under: Isabella Tagged With: Better Than Your Dreams, Book, Chick-Lit, Dee Ernst, Romance
AUTHOR INTERVIEW: Liz McKeown
COVER REVEAL: “Alessio” by Bethany-Kris
BOOK FEATURE: “I Will Follow Him” by Holly Tierney-Bedord
BOOK FEATURE: “The Wedding Planner” by Eve Devon
RELEASE BLITZ: “Just Love” by Prescott Lane
For inquiries
Click HERE to email us now!
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The Jehovah’s Witnesses
False prophecy gone to seed.
By Dr. David R. Reagan
The Jehovah’s Witnesses are the undisputed world champions of false prophecy.
Formally known as The Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, the organization was founded by Charles Taze Russell in 1879. Its doctrines were originally based on some bizarre teachings which Russell revealed in his six volume series of books called Studies in Scripture.
Russell denied the doctrine of the Trinity and argued that Jesus was a created being who was, in fact, the archangel Michael. He also denied that the Holy Spirit was a person, arguing instead that He is an “impersonal, invisible, active force.”
A Series of Strong Leaders
When Russell died in 1916, he was succeeded by Joseph F. Rutherford who proved to be a strong leader and a prolific author. The result was phenomenal growth. In 1928 the organization had 44,000 members. When Rutherford died in 1942, the membership had more than doubled to 115,000.
Nathan H. Knorr took over in 1942. He streamlined the organization and developed a worldwide outreach strategy. It was also under his leadership that the New World Translation of the Bible was published. This translation, which was issued in six volumes between 1950 and 1960, ignores all accepted rules of translation. Basically, it constitutes a re-wording of all passages that contradict Watchtower doctrines.
When Knorr died in 1977, the Watchtower had over 2.2 million members. Under the leadership of Frederick W. Franz, the fourth president, the Watchtower reached a total membership of over 4 million members. With the death of Franz in 1992, the current president, Milton G. Henschel, took the helm.
A Dismal History of False Prophecies
From its inception, the organization has been characterized by false prophecy. Originally, the prophecies were issued in the name of the president — first, Charles Taze Russell and then Joseph F. Rutherford. But since Rutherford’s death in 1942, the prophecies have been issued in the name of the organization’s governing body which is headquartered in Brooklyn, New York.
The first date the organization set for the Lord’s Second Coming was for the year 1914. It was later narrowed down to October of that year. Listed below are just a few of the prophecies that were issued over the years pointing to the date of October 1914.
1880 — “We need not here repeat the evidences that the seventh trump began its sounding in 1840 and will continue until the end of the time of trouble, and the end of the times of the Gentiles in 1914.” (Zion’s Watchtower, November 1880, page 1)
1888 — “… the full end of the times of the Gentiles, i.e., the full end of their lease of dominion, will be reached in 1914… at that date the Kingdom of God… will obtain full, universal control… and it will then be set up, or firmly established, in the earth on the ruins of the present institutions.” (The Time is at Hand, 1888, pp. 76-77)
1889 — “… the setting up of the Kingdom of God has already begun… and the battle of the great day of God Almighty (Revelation 16:14) which will end in 1914 with the complete overthrow of earth’s present rulership, is already commenced. Remember that… the Gospel age harvest will end October, 1914, and that likewise the overthrow of ‘Christendom,’ so-called, must be expected to immediately follow.” (Studies in the Scriptures, vol. 2, 1889, pp. 101 and 245)
1894 — “We see no reason for changing the figures — nor would we change them if we could. They are, we believe, God’s dates, not ours. But bear in mind that the end of 1914 is not the date of the beginning, but for the end of the time of trouble.” (Watchtower, July 15, 1894, p. 266)
1897 — “Complete destruction of ‘the powers that be’ of ‘this present evil world’ — political, financial, ecclesiastical — [will occur] about the close of the ‘time of the Gentiles’ in October 1914.” (Studies in the Scriptures, vol. 4, 1897, p. 622)
1902 — “In view of this strong Bible evidence concerning the Times of the Gentiles, we consider it an established truth that the final end of the kingdoms of this world, and the full establishment of the Kingdom of God, will be accomplished by the end of 1914.” (The Time is at Hand, 1902 edition, p. 99) Note: this same statement was contained in the 1908 edition of the same book.
1904 — “According to our expectations, the stress of the great time of trouble will be on us soon, somewhere between 1910 and 1912, culminating with the end of the ‘Times of the Gentiles’ in 1914.” (Studies in the Scriptures, vol. 6, 1904, p. 579)
Covering Their Tracks
As you can readily see from the statements quoted above, the date of October 1914 was no casual slip of the tongue. Furthermore, the date was declared to be “God’s date, not ours.” When October 1914 came and passed without anything of consequence taking place, the Watchtower leaders issued an incredible statement denying that they had ever “positively” stated that 1914 would be the year! Here’s how they put it:
“Studying God’s Word we [predicted] October 1914 as nearly as we were able to reckon. We did not say positively that this would be the year.” (Watchtower, November 1, 1914, p. 325)
Resuming the Charade
The next year, the Society’s president, Charles Taze Russell, issued a bold prophecy about World War I. He stated:
“The present great war in Europe is the beginning of the Armageddon of the Scriptures (Revelation 19:16-20). It will eventuate in the complete overthrow of all the systems of error which have so long oppressed the people of God and deluded the world.” (Pastor Russell’s Sermons, 1915, p. 676)
In the same year (1915), the Watchtower boldly proclaimed a new date for the Lord’s return:
“In view of this strong Bible evidence concerning the Times of the Gentiles, we consider it an established truth that the final end of the kingdoms of this world and the full establishment of the Kingdom of God will be accomplished near the end of 1915.” (The Time is at Hand, 1915 edition, p. 99)
A year later in 1916, the 1915 date had been forgotten and an attempt was being made to salvage the original date of 1914:
“We see no reason for doubting therefore that the Times of the Gentiles ended in October 1914; and that a few more years will witness their utter collapse and the full establishment of God’s Kingdom in the hands of Messiah.” (Watchtower Reprints, vol, 6, p. 5950, September 1, 1916)
Setting a New Date
A year later in 1917, undeterred by all their failures, the Society issued a new date for the Lord’s return — namely, 1925: “There will be no slip-up… Abraham should enter upon the actual possession of his promised inheritance in the year 1925” (Watchtower, October 15, 1917, p. 6157). Before he died in 1916, Russell personally stated: “… there is evidence that the establishment of the Kingdom in Palestine will probably be in 1925, ten years later than we once calculated” (Studies in the Scriptures, vol. 7, p. 128).
In the years following, the 1925 date was reconfirmed over and over again — in 1922, 1923, and 1924. Again, there were no “ifs, ands, or buts.” The date was firmly established:
“The period must end in 1925… [This date] is definitely fixed in the Scriptures. Every thinking person can see that a great climax is at hand. The scriptures clearly indicate that the climax is the fall of Satan’s empire and the full establishment of the Messianic kingdom… Therefore, it can be confidently said at this time that millions now living will never die.” (Golden Age, January 4, 1922, p. 217)
Once again, as with the 1914 date, the revelation was attributed to God:
“This chronology is not of man, but of God. Being of divine origin and divinely corroborated, present-truth chronology stands in a class by itself, absolutely and unqualifiedly correct…” (Watchtower, July 15, 1922, p. 217)
Yet, despite such absolute predictions, when 1925 came and passed without the return of the Lord, the Watchtower leaders had the audacity to blame the error on their over-zealous followers:
“Some anticipated that the work would end in 1925, but the Lord did not state so. The difficulty was that friends inflated their imaginations beyond reason…” (Watchtower, 1926, p. 232)
Focusing on Armageddon
Following the disappointing failure of the 1925 prophecies, the Watchtower shifted its prophetic focus to predictions about the timing of the battle of Armageddon, the battle that would usher in the Messianic Age.
1940 — “The year 1940 is certain to be the most important year yet because Armageddon is very near.” (Informant, April 1940, p. 1)
1941 — “Armageddon is surely near…” (Children, 1941, p. 366)
1942 — “Now, with Armageddon immediately before us…” (Watchtower, April 1, 1942, p. 139)
1946 — “The disaster of Armageddon… is at the door.” (Let God be True, 1946, p. 194)
1955 — “In the light of the fulfillment of Bible prophecy, it is becoming clear that the war of Armageddon is nearing its breaking-out point.” (You May Survive in God’s New World, 1955, p. 331)
1966 — “Armageddon is, in fact, very close indeed.” (Watchtower, October 15, 1966, p. 629)
As you can see, for twenty-six years Jehovah’s Witnesses were told repeatedly that they were living on the threshold of the Tribulation. All the prophecies proved false.
Then, in the mid-Sixties, the focus of Watchtower prophecies shifted again. All the organization’s publications began to teach that the six thousand years of Man’s existence since the time of Creation would end in the fall of 1975, and that the Seventh Millennium, marking the beginning of the reign of Jesus, would begin at that time. (See All Scripture is Inspired of God and Beneficial, 1963, p. 286, and Life Everlasting in Freedom of the Sons of God, 1966, pp. 29-30.)
In July of 1969, President Nathan H. Knorr addressed 81,000 Witnesses at Dodger Field in Los Angeles. “Why are we looking forward to 1975?” he asked. And then he answered his question by stating, “It is firmly maintained that by the autumn of the year 1975, the battle of Armageddon will have been fought and God’s new world will have been established” (Los Angeles Herald Examiner, July 21, 1969).
When 1975 came and passed, the faithful were once again berated by the Watchtower leaders for “thinking that Bible chronology reveals the specific date of the Lord’s return” (Watchtower, July 15, 1976, p. 440).
Rutherford’s Great Scam
In 1929, during the Great Depression, the president of the Jehovah’s Witnesses, Joseph F. Rutherford, built himself a beautiful villa in San Diego which he used as his winter palace.
While most people were suffering greatly from the economic devastation of the Depression, Rutherford lived like royalty. He drank imported liquor, smoked big cigars, and drove a Cadillac.
Rutherford conned his Witness followers into believing that he had built the house for the soon returning patriarchs, judges, and kings named in Hebrews 11. He named the mansion “Beth Sarim,” which in Hebrew means the House of Princes. In an interview with Time magazine in March of 1930, Rutherford said, “I have purposely landscaped the place with palm and olive trees so that these princes of the universe will feel at home.”
At the time he built the house, Rutherford was predicting that any moment God would kill every man, woman and child on planet earth except faithful Jehovah’s Witnesses. The biblical heroes of Hebrews 11 would then return to earth, and under the leadership of King David, they would use Beth Sarim as their headquarters to rule the world.
Most Jehovah’s Witnesses today know nothing about this scam. The property was quietly sold in 1948, and the teaching that David and the patriarchs would soon return was dropped in 1950. Since that time, the Watchtower leaders have gone to great lengths to cover up this hoax.
In the deed it specifies that Joseph F. Rutherford is entitled to use the property as he sees fit until “the appearing of David or some of the other men mentioned in the Eleventh Chapter of Hebrews…” The deed goes on to specify that when King David appears, he must “prove or identify” himself to the officers of the Watchtower Society before he can take possession of the property!
The Inevitable Conclusion
I could continue ad nauseam, but I think the point is clear: the “prophets” of the Watchtower are false prophets. They fail the biblical test of accuracy (Deuteronomy 18:22), and they fail to pass the test which they themselves have established in their own words:
“True, there have been those in times past who predicted an “end” to the world, even announcing a specific date. Yet, nothing happened. The “end” did not come. They were guilty of false prophesying. Why? What was missing? Missing from such people were God’s truths and the evidence that He was using and guiding them.” (Awake, October 8, 1968)
So, how do the Watchtower leaders justify their many false prophecies? Incredibly, they argue that because they admit they have been wrong, they cannot be false prophets because “false prophets do not admit to making mistakes” (Watchtower, November 1972, p. 644).
The continuing growth of the Jehovah’s Witnesses despite their long and sordid history of false prophecies is a testimony to the gullibility of fallen Man. Let us pray for the eyes of their very sincere but deceived followers to be opened to the truth of the Gospel.
Good Internet sources about the Jehovah’s Witnesses
Watchers of the Watch Tower World: www.freeminds.org.
The Watchman Fellowship, Inc.: www.watchman.org.
Let Us Reason Ministries: www.letusreason.org.
Christian Apologetics and Research Ministry: www.carm.org.
Beacon Light for Former JW’s: www.xjw.com.
Why I Left the Jehovah’s Witnesses
The Seventh-Day Adventists
The Tangled Web of Mormonism
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Lamb & Lion Ministries was established for the purpose of proclaiming the soon return of Jesus. We do not believe it is possible to know the date when Jesus will return. But we do believe it is possible to know the season of the Lord's return, and it is our conviction that we are living in that season...
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The Smartphone Wall
by Eddie Hold on February 7, 2018 at 9:42 am
Huawei is a giant among most smartphone players with an impressive presence in most parts of the world. In the European market, the handset manufacturer’s latest phones are well promoted by the carriers, both in store and through advertising; and, as a result, the OEM is enjoying consumer acceptance that other smartphone makers should be quite envious of. At Vodafone NL, for example, there are two Huawei devices (the P10 and P10 Lite) featured on the Top Ten table, which is where most consumers look first - the other devices are all Apple or Samsung. Not bad. So if there was one manufacturer poised the break the duopoly of Samsung and Apple, as most carriers would like, it is Huawei.
Except, of course, in the U.S.
At CES, Richard Yu, CEO of Huawei’s consumer division spoke his mind after his company was left standing at the metaphorical altar by AT&T, which backed out of selling Huawei’s Mate 10 at the very last minute. And this week the news appears to have gotten worse, with Verizon declaring that it has no plans to add Huawei’s Mate 10 - or any other Huawei device - to its portfolio in the foreseeable future. This is not good news for Huawei, obviously, and it’s not really great news for the carriers either, which are always looking for a third compelling smartphone brand in order to reduce their reliance on the Big Two smartphone companies. And matters will get worse with the advent of 5G networks, as the carriers desperately need 5G capable smartphones to make use of the new network; Huawei looked like a strong early option that is now off the table.
So why has Huawei faced so many challenges in the U.S. market, despite its popularity in Europe and other parts of the world? It appears that the Department of Justice has concerns that Chinese smartphone brands will act as a conduit for the Chinese Government, meaning that these devices could be used to spy on consumers, as well as feeding useful information about the wireless networks back to China.
Call me cynical, but I assume all devices ‘spy’ on me a little and the history of smartphones is chock full of examples… most of which are not from Chinese brands. But let’s not get bogged down in the theory of what could be done, nor why the European market, which in general takes consumer privacy far more seriously than the U.S., doesn’t seem to be concerned. Rather, let’s consider what this means for the U.S. mobile market.
As any smaller OEM will tell you, getting your device into a carrier’s portfolio is not easy, or inexpensive. And if the DoJ is truly pushing back on Chinese brands, then other manufacturers, such as ZTE and TCL (which owns the Alcatel brand), are also at risk of being removed from carrier portfolios. That’s terrible news for them, and great news for other (non-Chinese) manufacturers who may see an opportunity for their smartphones. But it’s not necessarily great news for consumers, as the Huawei smartphones are rather good Android devices, at a reasonable price point.
This brings us to the unlocked market, which accounts for roughly 13 percent of U.S smartphone ownership*. If OEMs such as Huawei are blocked from carrier retail, they need to focus their energies on alternative retailers, which will be good news for consumer electronics retailers looking for a unique device proposition that the carriers cannot offer. By throwing even more cash into marketing, and partnering with these retailers, Huawei could be exactly the catalyst that the unlocked market needs to break the carrier control of the smartphone market in the U.S. That is hardly good news for the carriers, and not what the DoJ is apparently hoping for, but it could be the best news yet for consumers looking for a broader range of smartphone choice. As the DoJ may discover, it’s hard to keep a strong product down.
*NPD Connected Intelligence, Unlocked Phone Demand Report 2.0
Understand the evolving connected world. Stay current on market conditions, technologies and more.
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Upload My Heart
FDA approves device to send heart information over Internet
TUESDAY, Jan. 8, 2002 (HealthDayNews) -- Long-distance relationships have reached new heights: Heart patients can now communicate with their doctors without having to open their mouths.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) last week approved the CareLink Monitor, made by Minneapolis-based Medtronic Inc. Heart patients who have implanted defibrillators will, for the first time, be able to send information to their doctors over the Internet, completely bypassing cumbersome office visits.
"Up until now, the only way we could get the information was to have the patient come into the office, which is often a problem because these patients have frequent issues and have to come back and forth to the hospital," says Dr. Larry Chinitz, director of Cardiac Electrophysiology at New York University Medical Center. "This is really a natural progression. It's really a very, very positive move forward."
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"This will open up an entirely new way for physicians to treat patients with chronic disease, and it's a great option for patients who want and need to stay connected with their doctors," Steve Mahle, president of Medtronic Cardiac Rhythm Management, says in a statement. "This is a true marriage of medicine and technology."
Some 1 million heart patients around the world work, play, and sleep with implanted defibrillators, not to be confused with pacemakers. The devices are generally given to patients who have very fast heartbeats, have survived sudden cardiac arrest, are at risk for life-threatening arrhythmias or have an arrhythmia that causes them to pass out. When they were introduced in the early 1990s, implantable defibrillators gave doctors sudden access to a wealth of information about patients' conditions. Before that, such data was available only with costly, time-consuming and laborious in-patient testing.
With the implanted defibrillators, explains Chinitz, "patients come to the doctor's office, put a magnet on and download a tremendous amount of information about their hearts -- rhythm disturbances, how well the device is functioning, the battery's end-of-life, events that have to be treated."
The new system goes one step better.
"Now if someone has a funny feeling, they can call the doctor and just do it on the phone," says Chinitz. "Patients have to be followed every three or four months, and the new system will give you a complete data set since the last interrogation."
The CareLink system consists of a portable monitor equipped with an antenna, which will download information from the implanted defibrillator and send it to a secure server via a toll-free telephone number. The procedure is much like the one most of us use to access our e-mail using a modem. The secure server receiving the data is also connected to the Internet, and doctors and other health-care professionals can access the information from any computer. For a small fee, patients can have their own Web site where doctors can access patient information. All Internet access will require passwords.
For now, CareLink will serve only patients who have Medtronic GEM II DR/VR implantable cardioverter-defibrillators, but the application will soon extend to pacemakers, heart-failure devices and monitoring diagnostic devices. The CareLink system will be rolled out to 10 clinical centers around the country this month, and is expected to be available nationwide in February. Company officials are still negotiating with insurance companies, but they say the service should be covered much like an office visit.
What To Do: The American Heart Association has more information on implantable defibrillators. You can also try the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute to learn about arrhythmias.
SOURCES: Interview with Larry Chinitz, M.D, director, cardiac electrophysiology, New York University Medical Center, New York City; Medtronic Inc. news release
Last Updated: Jan 8, 2002
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Anti-Inflammatory Helps Treat Bacterial Meningitis: Study
Dutch researchers report that dexamethasone, along with antibiotics, increases survival rates
By Steven Reinberg
WEDNESDAY, Sept. 29, 2010 (HealthDay News) -- Using the anti-inflammatory drug dexamethasone along with antibiotics increases the chance of surviving a bout with bacterial meningitis, Dutch researchers report.
"Dexamethasone therapy reduces mortality from bacterial meningitis by one-third," said lead researcher Dr. Diederik van de Beek, a clinical neurologist from the Academic Medical Center at the University of Amsterdam.
"That's a huge effect," he added. "Normally, the death rate of bacterial meningitis is 30 percent; if you use dexamethasone, it decreases to 20 percent."
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The report is published in the Sept. 29 online edition and the Oct. 26 print issue of Neurology.
For the study, van de Beek's team collected data on 357 people 16 and older who had bacterial meningitis between 2006 and 2009. Of these patients, 84 percent were given a dose of dexamethasone, a corticosteroid, before antibiotic treatment was started.
The researchers compared the outcomes of these patients with 352 patients treated for bacterial meningitis between 1998 and 2002, before dexamethasone was routinely given for the infection. Among these patients, only 3 percent had been given dexamethasone, the researchers noted.
Deaths among those given dexamethasone in the 2006-2009 study group were 10 percent lower than for those in the early study group. In addition, hearing loss was almost 10 percent lower for people in the 2006-2009 study group compared with the earlier group, the investigators found.
"If you extrapolate these findings to the U.S., if you treat all patients with bacterial meningitis with dexamethasone, that would save one life every day," van de Beek said.
Guidelines in the United States recommend the use of dexamethasone for suspected cases of bacterial meningitis, he added.
Jeffrey Cirillo, an associate professor of microbial and molecular pathogenesis at Texas A&M Health Science Center College of Medicine, said that the study's results confirmed previous findings in clinical trials and laboratory models that dexamethasone treatment in combination with antibiotics can reduce mortality in patients.
"These results strongly support the use of dexamethasone in cases of pneumococcal meningitis and offer promise to improve the chances of survival from meningitis, a frequently deadly illness," Cirillo added.
Since 2000, a vaccine against bacterial meningitis has been available. A study last year confirmed that the vaccine has significantly cut the number of cases of the disease.
Overall, the number of cases of the disease dropped 30 percent in that time, but the effect on the very youngest and oldest was even more pronounced: Incidence decreased by 64 percent in those younger than 2 and by 54 percent in those older than 65, according to the report, published in the Jan. 15, 2009 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.
The vaccine, known as Prevnar and made by Wyeth Pharmaceuticals, is part of the standard vaccination recommendation for children in the United States ages 2 to 23 months, as well as for children 24 to 59 months old who are at high risk for pneumococcal disease.
Meningitis causes inflammation to the membranes in the brain and spinal cord. Bacterial meningitis, unlike viral meningitis, can be deadly and can also cause hearing loss, brain damage and learning disabilities. The most common and severe form of bacterial meningitis is pneumococcal meningitis. About 30 percent of people with bacterial meningitis die from it, according to background information provided in a news release from the American Academy of Neurology.
For more information on bacterial meningitis, visit the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
SOURCES: Diederik van de Beek, M.D., Ph.D., clinical neurologist, Academic Medical Center, University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands; Jeffrey Cirillo, Ph.D., associate professor, microbial and molecular pathogenesis, Texas A&M Health Science Center College of Medicine, College Station, Texas; Sept. 29, 2010, Neurology, online
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New titles from Dartmouth writers (January/February 2019)
Bruce Sherman ’53 offers advice and reflections on the role of grandparents in raising children with How Grandparents Can Handle Grandkids’ Issues…from Cults to Visitation (Outskirts Press).
Litigator Wayne Beyer ’67 provides a guide on the law of police liability under the civil rights statute for lawyers who sue or defend cases against police and sheriff departments and judges in Police Misconduct: A Practitioner’s Guide to Section 1983 (Juris Publishing).
Colgate University music professor Joseph Swain ’77 considers why two German composers—born less than one month and 100 miles apart—could each achieve universal acclaim despite their differences in Listening to Bach and Handel: A Comparative Critique (Pendragon Press).
Mark Graber ’78, a professor at the University of Maryland law school, examines whether recent global events portend a move away from international constitutional democracies as coauthor of Constitutional Democracy in Crisis? (Oxford University Press). In a second book by the same publisher, The Complete American Constitutionalism: The Constitution of the Confederate States, Graber offers a comprehensive analysis of the Confederate constitution during the American Civil War.
In her first children’s book, longtime outdoor writer Lisa Densmore Ballard ’83 tells the story of a legendary pirate who terrorized the west coast of Florida during the 1800s in Gasparilla: A Pirate’s Tale (Richter Publishing).
Matthew Bagger ’86, Adv’90, who teaches religious studies at the University of Alabama, offers a collection of scholars’ essays that consider pragmatism’s merits for the study of religion and democratic theory and as a general philosophical orientation as editor of Pragmatism and Naturalism: Scientific and Social Inquiry After Representationalism (Columbia University Press).
Buyouts Insider executive editor and cartoonist David Toll ’87 combines his experience with the private equity industry and his talent for drawing in his first book, A Cartoon Lover’s Guide to Private Equity (self-published).
Eastern Illinois University English professor Marjorie Worthington ’90 charts the development and implications of a genre in which an author appears as a fictionalized character in The Story of “Me”: Contemporary American Autofiction (University of Nebraska Press).
Jeff Strabone ’92, an English professor at Connecticut College, explores how poets and antiquarian editors repurposed archaic poetic texts as the foundation of a new concept of nation in Poetry and British Nationalisms in the Bardic Eighteenth Century: Imagined Antiquities (Palgrave Macmillan).
Jonathan Eburne ’93, a comparative literature professor at Pennsylvania State University, considers the role of outlandish ideas in contemporary intellectual history and argues for taking seriously ideas that might otherwise be regarded as errant or unreasonable in Outsider Theory: Intellectual Histories of Unorthodox Ideas (University of Minnesota Press).
Elementary school teacher and librarian Sara Leach ’93 offers a second book on second-grader Lauren, who has autism, this time as she takes on the challenges of extended family and the role of flower girl, in Penguin Days (Pajama Press).
Former criminal investigator Seth Abramson ’98 pulls together the threads of the complicated Trump-Russia story to make the case for a quid pro quo between President Trump and the Kremlin in Proof of Collusion: How Trump Betrayed America (Simon & Schuster).
Dartmouth photographer and avid hiker Eli Burakian ’00 informs adventurers—from the freshly booted novice to the grizzled mountaineer—about 48 iconic mountains in his latest outdoor guide, Climbing New Hampshire’s 48 4,000 Footers (Falcon Guides).
Anne Merritt ’05, M.D., an emergency medicine professor of emergency medicine at the Stanford University School of Medicine, shares a close-up view of life, illness, and death in her first book of poetry, Light Through Marble Veins (Kelsay Books).
Queens College media studies professor Noah Tsika ’05 traces the development of psychiatric and psychotherapeutic approaches to wartime trauma by the U.S. military in Traumatic Imprints: Cinema, Military Psychiatry, and the Aftermath of War (University of California Press).
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Enniskillen Castle, Enniskillen, County Fermanagh 1480-1810
Fought over by The Maguires, The O’Donnells, The O’Neills and The British
Enniskillen Castle in co. Fermanagh is situated at a strategic location on Lough Erne on a site that commands one of the few passes into Ulster. It was built in the late 1400s by Hugh ‘The Hospitable’ Maguire. The Maguires were a ruling Gaelic family who over a period of 600 years were in constant warfare around this area with the O’Donnells, the O’Neills and the English. The building has continuously morphed over the years as each successive ruler added and changed different parts of the castle. The circular tourelles date from 1609 and have a Scottish influence, the Watergate Tower was added in the 1700s and British army barracks were built in the early 1800s. It is now a State Care Historic Monument and houses the Fermanagh County Museum. The name Enniskillen (Inis-Ceithleann) means the Island of Kathleen, a mythical queen of ancient lore who was reputedly drowned here.
Staigue Fort, Sneem. County Kerry c.300-400AD
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More Than Missing: Why China’s Child Trafficking Problem Isn’t Going Away
REUTERS/China Daily
Ryan Pickrell China/Asia Pacific Reporter
August 13, 2016 2:29 PM ET
China has cracked down on child trafficking in recent years, but the problem remains a serious challenge the country has yet to overcome.
Children in China are sometimes seen as goods or products that can be traded or sold. Each year, the country has thousands of child trafficking cases, many of which go unsolved, and even if they are solved, reuniting children with their parents is often difficult.
Nan’an Business News reported Friday on a woman who organized a team of five child traffickers after hearing the “business was booming” in Fujian, a province in Southern China. She sold two Chinese boys for roughly $30,000 in December 2015, an excellent payout given the limited cost of acquiring and caring for the two young children during the search for a suitable buyer. It wasn’t until the woman tried to sell her sister-in-law’s son that she was caught — and that was only because the buyer got spooked.
In another recent example, a woman in Tianjin reportedly spotted an advertisement with the words “mai mai er tong” (child trading) and a phone number scribbled on a bridge while she was out for a walk on August 5. She reported it to a local news agency, and reporters called the number. When someone in another city answered the call, the reporters pretended to be criminals interested in trafficking and asked about the going rate. The unidentified trafficker responded, “Eight children are worth RMB 3 million.” That means one child is worth around $50,000.
In a case that was recently tried in court, a young man’s parents attempted to sell their grandchild for around $10,000 after the man’s wife died during childbirth. The grandparents felt the child would be a burden to their 21-year-old son, who would likely remarry later, so they decided to sell the kid and use the money to buy a house.
The number of children who are abducted and trafficked in China each year is unknown. Conservative estimates put the number at around 20,000, but some media reports have indicated that the figure could be as high as 200,000, according to a recent China Policy Institute (CPI) report by Quanbao Jiang, a professor of Demography in the Institute of Population and Development Studies at Xi’an Jiaotong University.
While child trafficking is a major problem the world over, the problem persists in China for a number of troubling reasons.
For starters, parents are often directly involved in the trafficking of their children. According to Jiang’s recent CPI report, out of 363 cases released by lower courts since 2014, the birth parents were involved in roughly 40 percent of the cases.
At the end of the day, it all comes down to money. Some parents try to skirt the fines associated with the one-child policy, which has been adjusted but still puts a strain on certain parts of the country — rural areas in particular. Sometimes parents view selling their children as a way to overcome economic hardships. In other cases, some people see kids as a renewable resource for a fairly decent payday.
Even some orphanages in China are corrupted by the potential profits. When foreigners adopt Chinese children, they are regularly required to pay extravagant fees, including a donation of several thousand dollars to the orphanage. Orphanages don’t often kidnap children, but they have been known to obtain kids through questionable sources.
In other instances, if authorities are unable to find a child’s parents, the child will be placed in an orphanage, which may put the kid up for adoption before the parents ever have the chance to find them. Jiang indicated in his CPI report that the number of children who are reunited with their parents could be as low as 0.1 percent.
Police indifference is also a critical problem. Not only are local police sometimes unwilling to put in the effort to find missing children, but a kid can’t be reported missing until 24 hours pass. This rule gives child traffickers a head start and the ability to cross several provincial borders before police even start looking.
Male children are the primary targets due to the cultural desire to have male descendants to carry on a family name. Families who are unable to conceive sometimes see “purchasing” children as a more attractive option than adoption, which is often quite expensive.
Furthermore, gangs of professional beggars often purchase children and force them to beg on the streets. In some cases, buyers will intentionally maim children to increase sympathy and the amount of money they bring in each day. In other circumstances, criminals will buy children and use them as pickpockets.
While 86 percent of all child trafficking cases involve children under the age of six, with infants making up the vast majority, child trafficking doesn’t strictly apply to young kids. Teenage boys are regularly kidnapped, sold to work groups in rural communities, and used as slave labor. Teenage girls, on the other hand, are sold into prostitution.
Meanwhile, many traffickers, particularly those who sell children to families who can’t have children, believe they are providing a public service.
While China struggles to control the child trafficking problem, it does take a strong stance against the crime.
People who participate at the most basic level may be given five to 10 years in prison, but serious involvement can result in imprisonment for anywhere between 10 years and life and the seizure of all financial assets. In certain situations, China will give child traffickers, individuals who have sold numerous children, moved children beyond China’s borders, or intentionally or inadvertently killed the child, the death penalty.
Between February 2008 and April 2013, a group of traffickers in Henan sold a total of 22 children and were sentenced to death. Those who purchased the children were also punished, but their sentences were lighter.
In 2009, China’s Ministry of Public Security created a DNA database for homeless children and parents with missing children to help combat the country’s growing crisis. But many parents are unaware such a system exists and have yet to provide blood samples.
Still, this system has had several successes.
A Chinese boy named Zhu Yuhu was reunited in July with his parents 17 years after being abducted and sold to child traffickers. The little boy was eight months old when he was kidnapped by one of his father’s co-workers after an argument over a card game. The parents worked with a number of organizations and used DNA tracking to find their son.
China has also established state-level anti-kidnapping taskforces. A report on the implementation of the “National Program for the Development of Children (2011-2020)” showed that 1,460 child trafficking cases were solved in 2014, but the number of cases that occur each year far outweighs the number of solved abductions.
Send tips to ryan@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.
Tags : china
Ryan Pickrell
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Ocasio-Cortez Spox Refuses To Divulge Where She Stands On BDS Movement
Video screenshot/YouTube
Mike Brest Reporter
December 09, 2018 12:23 PM ET
A spokesperson for Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez refused to share the incoming congresswoman’s stance on the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement when asked on Friday.
The official BDS website describes the movement as one trying to uphold “the simple principle that Palestinians are entitled to the same rights as the rest of humanity.”
Conversely, many Jewish organizations view the movement through a lens of anti-Semitism. The Anti-Defamation League says that the BDS movement “rejects Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state” and “is the most prominent effort to undermine Israel’s existence.”
The Daily Caller asked Corbin Trent, a spokesperson for Ocasio-Cortez, to share her stance on the movement.
Trent responded, “No, sorry.”
The movement has garnered support from two of Ocasio-Cortez’s fellow incoming congresswomen. Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib, the first two Muslim women in Congress, are also the first two members of Congress to publicly support the movement, The Intercept reported.
Democratic Representative-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York talks with reporters as she arrives for a class photo with incoming newly-elected members of the U.S. House of Representatives on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S., November 14, 2018. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque
Last month, Omar’s campaign told Muslim Girl, “Ilhan believes in and supports the BDS movement, and has fought to make sure people’s right to support it isn’t criminalized. She does however, have reservations on the effectiveness of the movement in accomplishing a lasting solution.”
Tlaib more recently came out in favor of the movement in an interview with The Intercept. In the interview, Tlaib also shared her rejection of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s (AIPAC) invitation to visit Israel. Newly elected members of Congress have traveled to Israel with AIPAC for decades. Instead, she is choosing to visit the West Bank. Her stated goal is to “humanize Palestinians.” (RELATED: America’s First Two Muslim Congresswoman Officially Endorse Anti-Israel Legislation)
Students for Justice in Palestine at George Washington University (@gwusjp) have just kicked off Israeli Apartheid Week by building this wall on campus. pic.twitter.com/NT1ekiz1Gc
— Aya Isleem #Gaza (@AyaIsleemEn) March 21, 2018
Ron Halber, the executive director of the Jewish Community Relations Council, told The Daily Caller, “There’s no doubt that BDS is an exclusionary anti-Semitic movement whose goals are the eventual destruction of the state of Israel. It’s just the latest fad that has been used since the beginning of Israel’s existence to try to delegitimize it and the whole idea of the BDS movement is to make Israel a pariah among the nations and easier culturally to scapegoat and blame for all the world’s ills, which is nothing more than frankly old fashioned anti-Semitism.”
Halber did specify that he doesn’t believe every BDS supporter is anti-Semitic, but called the congresswoman-elect’s support for the movement “disappointing and scary,” while adding that he believes it needs to be “combatted.”
A man paints a wall at the north beach in Durban on March 10, 2013 ahead of the Israeli Apartheid Week (IAW) from March 11 to 17, 2013 in South Africa. (RAJESH JANTILAL/AFP/Getty Images)
In July, Ocasio-Cortez appeared on “Firing Line” and received backlash after saying, “I also think that what people are starting to see in the occupation of Palestine is just an increasing crisis of humanitarian conditions, and that, to me, is just where I tend to come from on this issue.”
Host Margaret Hoover asked her to elaborate on “the occupation of Palestine” part of her response. Following Ocasio-Cortez’s response, Hoover pushed back again until the congresswoman-elect admitted that she is “not the expert on geopolitics on this issue.”
Tags : alexandria ocasio cortez bds israel israel boycott
Mike Brest
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Flashback 1985: Gov’t Scientists Predicted NYC Would Resemble Daytona Beach
03.05.2015 | Daily Surge |
There’s a winter storm afoot, and places like New York City are expected to get hit with several inches of snow Thursday.
It’s hard to imagine that just 30 years ago, government scientists were predicting that global warming would make New York City resemble Daytona Beach, Florida — which does not get snow.
In 1985, the New York Times reported that ‘[f]ederal climate experts have suggested that within a century the greenhouse effect could turn New York City into something with the climate of Daytona Beach, Fla.”
“Beginning in a decade or two, scientists expect the warming of the atmosphere to melt the polar icecaps, raising the level of the seas, flooding coastal areas, eroding the shores and sending salt water far into fresh-water estuaries,” the Times reported. “Storm patterns will change, drying out some areas, swamping others and generally throwing agriculture into turmoil.”
Three decades later, and New York City does not remotely resemble Daytona Beach — even if some resident wished it did on winter days like this. On Thursday, New York City’s temperature stood at 28 degrees Fahrenheit, according to the Weather Channel, while Daytona Beach was a balmy 75 degrees Fahrenheit. This winter, in fact, New York City experienced its coldest recorded temperature ever for Feb. 2nd just this year when thermometers in Central Park dipped below 7 degrees Fahrenheit — shattering a previous 65-year record for the coldest Feb. 2nd set in 1950.
It may be that Daytona Beach is becoming more like New York City, as Daytona did get a light dusting of snow in Jan. 2008 and again in Jan. 2010. Snow flurries were also reported in Daytona in 1989 and in 1977. Ok, so maybe not like New York City, which gets a lot more snow.
But federal scientists in the 1980s predicted that trace greenhouse gases, and not just carbon dioxide, were causing the world to warm rapidly, though at the time there was little to no evidence of rapid warming.
TRENDING ON DAILY SURGE
Since the Times report, however, temperature did climb, according to federal climate data. Global average surface temperatures climbed until 1998, but have since flattened and showed little to no warming trend since.
“In an October 1983 report, the Environmental Protection Agency estimated that the sea level could rise as much as 11 feet by the end of the next century – or as little as 2 feet,” the New York Times reported. “It settled on 5 to 7 feet as the likely range. The higher figure would put substantial pieces of Florida and Louisiana under the waves and flood parts of some coastal cities.”
“Even the lower figure would cut away chunks of shoreline. Experts estimate that a one-foot rise in the ocean could erode 100 to 1,000 feet of sand beach all along the Atlantic and Gulf Coasts,” the Times reported.
Sea level rise, of course, has not been as dramatic as EPA predicted in 1983. According to the U.S. National Climate Assessment, global sea level rise from 1992 to 2010 was only 3.2 millimeters per year — meaning sea level only increased 0.19 feet over this period.
Extrapolate that out and sea level rise by 2100 will only be 1.18 feet above 1992 levels — far less than the 5 to 7 feet predicted by EPA in 1983.
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Horrifying: Video Of ISIS Militants Executing 1500 Iraqi Army POWs
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Home > Music > Singers
160 cm (5 ft 3 in)
Compare your height to Cyndi Lauper
Cyndi Lauper is 160 cm (5 ft 3 in) tall
The difference in height is 160 cm or 5 ft 3 inches
Who is Cyndi Lauper?
The pop icon of the 80s Cyndi Lauper worked as a topless dancer under the stage name Carrot to scratch a living before fame.
Her way to dream was very difficult and she suffered a lot. At the age of 17, she was to become an adult because of the stepfather’s behavior. “I had no television, no stereo, nothing. I was still a kid and I was alone” – the star remembered.
She was a leading member of the band “Blue Angel” before turning to solo career in the 1980s.
Her hit song “Girls Just Want To Have Fun” are for all the times and generations.
She inspired Lady Gaga on her looks and performances. Barack Obama, the US president, talking to Cyndi mentioned that Lady Gaga took all her moves. “You’re the original.” – He exclaimed.
Religion Beliefs
There is no information about her religion. The singer did not share anything about the religion she supported (if any). However, she mentioned some religious views in the interview to the “Newsbusters”: “...you can’t blame God for all the sh*t that goes on in this world. It’s people. And people don’t own heaven ... Don’t tell me you’re not the devil in the name of your God. Cus it ain’t your God.”
Lauper is straight. In the interview to Mirror (8 Sep 2012), Cyndi shared the information about her dark past. The star got pregnant by a boyfriend Richie when she was 23 but her financial status did not allow her to leave the baby.
David Thornton became her husband in 1991 and they welcomed a son Dex.
Worth To Known
Has a sister Ellen.
She is a supporter of LGBT movement because her sister is lesbian and the singer is for equality.
Rolling Stone put her first album on the list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.
Cuba Gooding Sr.
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Home > Movie > Actors
Johnny Messner
181.6 cm (5 ft 11.5 in)
Compare your height to Johnny Messner
Johnny Messner is 181.6 cm (5 ft 11.5 in) tall
The difference in height is 181.6 cm or 5 ft 11.5 inches
Who is Johnny Messner?
Johnny Messner is an incredible American actor that has graced our screens for 2 decades and counting.
Johnny's acting career officially kicked off in 1998 with a role in the soap opera Guiding Light. 2 years later, he branched into the movie industry playing Officer Jenkins in Dancing In September.
His career got its first boost through the 2003 war drama Tears of the Sun.
His most recent role was in the 2017 movie, American Violence.
In the famous police series Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, he impeccably portrays the Officer Lowell character.
Johnny is straight. He seems to have always had a preference for celebrities as he has been romantically linked with a couple of them. For a while in 2004, he dated the television personality Bridgetta Tomarchio and then moved on to the actress Selma Blair in 2006.
Right from 2010, he has been in a committed relationship with yet another actress Kathryn Morris.
As a result of his relationship with Kathryn, Johnny welcomed 2 adorable twin boys named Jameson and Rocco into the world in 2013.
Regarding this aspect of his life, Johnny prefers to maintain his privacy making it difficult to determine what religious association he was exposed to in his childhood or what faith he has leaned towards as an adult.
Johnny has done a bit of voice acting as he portrayed the Flint character in the action animated series G.I.Joe: Renegades.
For over a decade of his life, Johnny lived in Europe.
Jeremy Irvine
Ahmet Zappa
Logan Marshall-Green
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February 23, 2017 Documentaries
Extremis (2016)
Directed by Dan Krauss
The end-of-life decisions in an ICU can be harrowing. The challenges face not only the families of the patients, but also the professionals working with them.
This film was nominated for and Academy Award for Best Documentary (Short Subject). Dan Krauss directed, filmed, and produced this film. He was also nominated in 2006 for his short documentary The Life of Kevin Carter.
This is a powerful documentary that follows doctors, patients, and family members as they make tough choices. The emotion is raw as the camera captures these moments in the lives of the subjects. Much of the film feels like it was done by an unseen observer. This really helps the focus to stay in the moment. Overall, this is one of the better short documentaries I’ve seen in a long time.
This is a good one for fans of documentaries. I think fans of Allan King might enjoy this one. There’s something to be said for a documentary that isn’t bent on finding an answer. Like the subject, there isn’t always a clear path to take. I give this one 5 out of 5 stars.
2016Best DocumentaryDan KraussExtremisFilmMovienominatedOscarReviewShort Subject
The White Helmets
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EEAS homepage > EEAS > Speech of the HR/VP Federica Mogherini at the Culture Forum in Brussels
Speech of the HR/VP Federica Mogherini at the Culture Forum in Brussels
Bruxelles, 20/04/2016 - 00:00, UNIQUE ID: 160420_03
First of all I would like to thank you for having invited me to this great event, and for giving me the opportunity to reflect on something bigger, and deeper, than the everyday crisis agenda of the current Foreign policy.
Putting culture at the heart of Europe's external action
I. CULTURE AND FOREIGN RELATIONS
Almost 25 years ago we were told we were entering the era of a clash of civilisations. We were told that wars would be fought because of religion and culture. You probably know where I stand on this: I believe there is no clash of civilisations. Wars are still being fought for the same, old reasons. Economic interests, natural resources, spheres of influence, power. And yet, there are indeed cultural clashes to fight. These clashes do not occur between civilisations, but inside each of our civilisations.
Culture can be a battlefield. It has been a battlefield in Europe for centuries. Today, some global and regional players believe that culture can be “weaponised”. But culture can also be the place where people meet and make the most out of their diversity. This is the choice we have made when our Union was founded.
We realized that our culture is Greek and Jewish, Roman and Anglo-Saxon, Christian and Arab, Latin and Slavic, French and German, Mediterranean and Scandinavian, religious and secular.
It was not isolation, but openness what made Europe such an incredible place and project. A project of integration that the world considers- still- as a model.
Exchanges made us richer, not weaker. Culture in Europe is always plural – because so many different cultures belong in this continent. European culture is diversity. European culture is distinction, and it is at the same time common ground.
This is not always easy to understand, especially in these times. The so-called “multiculturalism” has not always worked. In some cases it has led to segregation. In other cases, it has led to confusion – people don’t know who they are and where they belong. Uncertainty has created fear, fear is creating hatred. Strong identities are the basis for openess. Which also means that, too often, those who are afraid of multiculturalism do not have a strong identity but rather a very weak one.
Yes, in today’s world it is crucial to make sense of our identities and our differences. Fear originates when we don’t recognise each other, because we perceive diversity as a threat, or when we don’t know or understand each other. Our differences can lay the ground for dialogue. Our diversity can be, should be our strength as we face common threats.
And this leads me to the main topic of this conversation today. When Europe engages with the world, culture has to be at the core of our foreign policy. Culture can help us fight and prevent radicalisation. But it can also foster economic growth. It can strengthen diplomatic relations and mutual understanding. It can help us stand together to common threats and build partnerhips and alliances among institutions and - what counts even more- among people.
This is why Tibor [Navracsics] and I will present to the Council and Parliament next month a strategy for culture in the EU external relations. A strategy, because it is not the time for improvising. This is one of the great issues in our foreign policy, and it deserves to be treated as such.
II. INTER-CULTURAL DIALOGUE
It is probably clear by now that when I say culture I don’t just mean literature and science. Culture can be made by the street artist making the face of a building anew. Or by the artisan whose technique has been refined through the centuries. Culture does not necessarily need a master’s degree.
Dialogue among cultures is not simply about teaching our culture to the whole world. We need to learn before we teach, to listen before we talk.
And dialogue among cultures is not just a matter for governments. Weeks ago a great artist of our age passed away. Zaha Hadid was born in Baghdad, educated in Beirut, and became a world-class architect in London. Such mix of influences has made her art great.
Exchanges among cultures make us richer. This idea has shaped our new Neighbourhood Policy in depth. So we decided to give cultural and audio-visual operators from our region the opportunity to take part in the Creative Europe programme. We have strengthened the Eastern Partnership Culture Programme II, as well as cooperation with the Anna Lindh Foundation, which plays an important role in promoting intercultural dialogue in the Mediterranean.
But this approach goes beyond our region. Ten days ago I was in Indonesia meeting civil society and religious leaders. Indonesia is a nation of 250 million, a Muslim majority country hosting the most amazing variety of cultures and stories and languages. It’s at the other side of the world, but there is so much we can learn from each other, if we meet with each other and work together.
Our foreign policy has to focus constantly on this kind of exchanges, particularly for the young generations. That’s when we all learn how to cope with our world: understanding diversity and complexity is vital.
More than half the young people who studied abroad with Erasmus Mundus say the program has helped them understand diversity and dialogue among cultures. I can confirm this from my own Erasmus experience.
Together with Tibor Navracsics and Carlos Moedas we are planning to further invest on the Marie Curie-Sklodowska Actions: the EU will finance 11,000 researchers a year to work outside Europe; and 15,000 researchers from outside Europe to join us by 2020.
The EU will finance over 25,000 scholarships per year and some 170 joint projects between EU and non-EU universities – this is to promote student and staff exchanges. This sector can only be expanded – we have a strong economic interest to do so. When young Africans come to Europe to study, they are getting skills and expertise that will stay with them for the rest of their lives. Back home they might set up a business, or work in a hospital, or get into politics and institutions. From our side, it is an investment in the future of Africa – that is, an investment in our own future and present.
Young girls and boys who study in Europe bring back to their countries not just knowledge, but personal ties and a better understanding of who we are. It is our interest to keep in touch with them, and to create networks among them – and this is also part of our strategy. They can be our informal ambassadors in the world.
For the same reason, I will launch in the coming months a new initiative to bring together young people and youth organisations from Europe and the Mediterranean. Mutual understanding is so much easier when you can relate to a real face, a real friendship.
This is also the great thing of culture: it makes it impossible to consider people as numbers; it links every single person to a story, and every single story is worth to be told, and listened to. We are not numbers, but persons.
III. CULTURE FOR DEVELOPMENT (AND SECURITY)
But let us also be clear on something. This is not just about identities and mutual understanding. Culture matters to our economies and to our growth. The economic benefits of cultural exchanges are too often ignored, although the statistics are clear. Global trade in creative products has more than doubled over the last decade, despite the global recession. Cultural and creative industries represent around three per cent of the world GDP and 30 million jobs.
In the EU alone these industries account for more than 7 million jobs. Culture makes a greater contribution to our economy than traditional flagship sectors such as the automotive industry in Germany, or the chemical industry in France.
But this is also true in our region and for developing countries. Over the past few months I visited the Sahel twice, and our friends there have told me this story a number of times.
War, terrorism and desertification have dealt a huge blow to tourism in those lands. Places like Timbuktu or Agadez have seen their economy decay. And with higher unemployment, a number of people turned to the criminal economy, strengthening all kinds of illegal trafficking, terrorist organisations, and the smuggling of human beings.
Cultural diplomacy is also about jobs, social cohesion, and security. A relatively limited investment from Europe can make a huge difference. And it can support our own interest: the resilience of our neighbourhood and of Africa is crucial for our own security and prosperity.
IV. CULTURAL HERITAGE
We had two good news yesterday: first, the fact that 2018 will be the Cultural Heritage year; second, the presentation of the first "Blue Helmet" TF that Italy has put at the disposal of UNESCO. I hope other countries will follow and we are ready to facilitate this work. The protection of cultural heritage holds a special place in this work. The EU is already at the front line. We work with UNESCO all over the world, with a contribution of one hundred million euros. This money is going to the restoration of the Timbuktu manuscripts in Mali, and into Project Mosul, in Iraq – where we are preserving the memory of destroyed cultural heritage thanks to virtual models.
The images of destroyed temples and headless statues in Palmyra where painful to watch. This has to do with the terrorists’ ideology, but it’s not just that. I shall repeat it once again: let us not fall into the “clash of civilisations” trap.
The same terrorists are very often engaged in smuggling antiquities to finance their wars. Again, this is about money and power.
So we are working with UNESCO to set up a rapid reaction mechanism for the protection of cultural heritage. But we will also propose to the Council and the European Parliament new legislation to regulate the import into the EU of cultural goods – and close this channel for terrorist financing.
We also need to plan for the reconstruction of many destroyed wonders. We will share satellite imagery to take stock of damage and plan reconstruction. We will provide finance and expertise to assess damage and think for the day after.
In many civil wars a church, or a bridge can have a huge symbolic power. Their protection and reconstruction is at times linked to reconciliation, the rebuilding of trust and the respect for different identities.
When discussing with the leaders of Serbia and Kosovo I witnessed that cultural heritage is above all about respecting history and protecting cultural and religious identity. This is what the dialogue I facilitate between Belgrade and Pristina is all about: to help them reach a shared understanding and build a common future together, respecting each other.
V. IMPLEMENTATION – WORKING TOGETHER
The task ahead is huge. Cultural diplomacy is about conservation, but it is also about innovation and new ideas. It is about education, security, human development. If we truly want to put culture at the core of our foreign policy – then we need the whole of Europe to get on-board, with all our expertise, our history and our full potential.
All Member States have their own strong cultural heritage. We all have deep and vibrant cultural relations with third countries. This diversity is our strength.
But we need all European actors to share the same sense of direction – governments, regions and cities, but also cultural institutes, civil society organisations, artists, scientists and performers. Last month we launched a Cultural Diplomacy Platform to gather all these actors and engage them on a continuous basis, receive feedback, policy advice and support.
Local authorities are particularly important: the World Cities Culture Report 2015 shows the excellent return – in terms of growth and poverty reduction – for cities that invest in culture. So cities can be a crucial player in our cultural diplomacy. But this is also true for national governments and parliaments, for foundations and for any citizens. Culture belongs to all of us, and all can contribute.
Probably no other place in the world has the same cultural “density” as Europe. So much history, so many stories and cultures. We preserve millennial traditions, and we are among the engines of global innovation.
We should not be afraid to say we are a cultural super-power. And it is our openness that made us great, our freedom that made culture a European excellence. We did not invent the Arabic numerals, and we became the home to the greatest mathematicians in history. Some believe we didn’t even inventspaghetti, although no Italian would buy this story…(and by the way food is also an important part of our culture...).
Our culture inspired the world because it was itself inspired by the world. The way to the future is this. Proud of our heritage, open to the world. There is not other way to navigate a globalised world. If you don’t know where you come from, you get lost very easily. We know where we come from. We know who we are, and what we believe in. A dialogue with different cultures cannot, and must not, scare us.
In the era of social media and shrinking distances, our cultures are bound to meet. We have a duty to make the most out of this encounter.
Put culture at the very heart of Europe's external action. Refuse any clash of civilisations, and work for an alliance of civilisations. Cultural diplomacy is not just a hobby for intellectuals. It is a cornerstone in our relationship with today’s world. It is vital for Europe, to promote our interests and advance our values.
Link to the video:http://ec.europa.eu/avservices/video/player.cfm?ref=I119797
Remarks by HR/VP Federica Mogherini at the joint press conference following the EU and North Macedonia Stabilisation and Association Council Remarks by High Representative/Vice-President Federica Mogherini at the joint press conference following the EU and North Macedonia Stabilisation and Association Council
Closing speech by High Representative/Vice-President Federica Mogherini at the 1st EU-Central Asia Forum This is, for me, maybe one of the most important moments of the two day visit to Bishkek, bringing the recommendations that we have just heard [from the Forum Rapporteur, Professor Fabienne Bossuyt] to our [EU-Central Asia] Ministerial Meeting tomorrow, and then me bringing the recommendations
Joint statement by HR/VP Mogherini and Iraqi Foreign Minister Alhakim on the EU-Iraq relations and regional cooperationJoint statement on the EU-Iraq relations and regional cooperation
Remarks by High Representative/Vice-President Federica Mogherini at the unveiling of a new street art mural in the framework of the EU – Western Balkans Cultural week
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Browse more posts in: General
Posted on 20 July, 2018 18 July, 2018 by Sara Felix
By Pádraig Ó Méalóid
Once upon a time we would have written ‘Once upon a time’ as ONCEUPONATIME. But, because Ireland was never invaded by the Romans, we invented the space between words instead. And copyright. Sort of.
This is not as crazy as it sounds.
Saint Patrick by Jim Fitzpatrick
Christianity first reached Ireland in and around the year 400 AD ˗ predating Saint Patrick, the primary patron saint of Ireland (along with Saint Brigit of Kildare and Saint Colmcille – of who more later), who is wrongly credited with bringing the one true faith over here. The timing of this would have very closely coincided with end of direct Roman rule in Britain, that large island directly to our east.
Interpunct
Although Greek had been the language of the first Popes, Latin became the language of Christianity between the first and third centuries AD, as the religion spread throughout the Roman Empire. And, whilst Classical Latin had used a vertically centred dot, known as an interpunct (or, as they would have written it, an INTERPVNCTVS) to separate words, this had died out by the end of the second century AD. Latin thereafter was written in a style known as Scripta Continua,
meaning Continuous Script, as demonstrated in the first line, above. (More correctly, of course, that would be SCRIPTACONTINUA…)
Scripta Continua
A large part of the reason for this is that Latin text was written, not for private reading, but as an aide-mémoire. When documents like the Bible were spoken aloud in public, the person speaking already knew the work off by heart, and only needed the physical document as a support. This was, as far as it went, an excellent idea, if Latin was your spoken language, and you knew what it was all meant to sound like. But this all fell apart when the desire to have a prompting text clashed with the fact that that prompting text was in a language you’d never used as your lingua franca, nor probably even heard spoken by a native, and you didn’t know where the words started or stopped.
This is exactly what happened in Ireland. Whereas Christianity took hold here with great rapidity, leading to the founding of numerous monasteries, it came without the Roman occupation that went with it in pretty much all of the rest of Europe. And, along with that, the speaking of Latin started receding at almost exactly the same time. So, to help the better understanding of their sacred texts, in about the seventh century an unnamed Irish monk inserted spaces between those words. As Shane Angland says on his excellent ANGLANDICUS blog,
As Ireland was never part of the Roman Empire, Latin was a foreign language to the Irish. Their desire to learn and master Latin was driven by primarily theological and pastoral motives. Latin was the language of the western church, in her liturgy, theology, creeds, and scripture. The public reading of scripture in the early Irish church was an important part of theological training and also for the spiritual life of a monastic community.
Angland also quotes this from American librarian Frederick G. Kilgour’s The Evolution of the Book (OUP, 1998),
For the Irish monk who did not have Latin as a native tongue and was not intimately familiar with its varying forms of declension, conjugation, and inflection, reading an unbroken string of Latin words out loud to others was a formidable task. To facilitate oral reading the Irish scribes used space between words to make them more readily visible. Irish monasteries introduced word separation to continental monasteries, but it was not until the eleventh century that the practice was generally accepted on the continent.
How the Irish Saved Civilization
The practice didn’t spread to continental Europe until some centuries later, however, because the decline of the Western Roman Empire resulted in, more or less, the historic period popularly known as the Dark Ages. While literary and cultural output in Northwestern Europe diminished, Ireland was sending out missionary monks to, and establishing monasteries in, Great Britain and Continental Europe. In many ways the Irish became the saviours of European civilisation after the depredations of the Scythian Huns and Germanic tribes like the Visigoths, Ostrogoths, and other forms of Goths – some of which are still with us today…
Eagle from the Book of Kells
One of the big players in all of this was Saint Columba, also known as Saint Colmcille (but definitely not the same Saint as Saint Columbanus), who is regarded, as previously mentioned, as one of the three chief saints of Ireland. He founded several monasteries, including one on the Scottish island of Iona, one of the likely places for the creation of parts of the Book of Kells. But that’s not all he did.
Cathach
When he was a younger man Columba studied under Saint Finnian of Movilla (not to be confused with Saint Finnian of Clonard, of course). Finnian had a copy of Vulgate Psalter of Saint Jerome, the first translation of the Old Testament Book of Psalms into Latin, and a very prestigious thing to own. Later on, in 560AD, when he had a monastery of his own, Columba borrowed Finnian’s psalter and one night – with the help a miraculous light, according to legend – quickly made a copy for himself, specifically against the wishes of Finnian. Finnian then complained to the High King of Ireland, Diarmait mac Cerbaill (known nowadays as Dermot the Gerbil). The King handed down a judgement that said ‘Le gach boin a boinin, le gach lebhur a leabrán,’ meaning ‘To every cow her calf, and to every book its booklet.’ This is the earliest known recorded historical case-law on copyright, and therefore hugely historically significant.
Unfortunately, historically significant though it is, there are a few problems inherent to it, at least from a modern copyright perspective. As far as our understanding of copyright goes the rights to the Vulgate would belong to Saint Jerome, not to Saint Finnian. And even then there was room for argument, because Jerome was only translating the work of earlier writers, probably dating to the fourth or fifth century BC. In fairness, they would have been out of copyright by the time Jerome got around to them, as indeed would his own work have been, by the time Columba got around to copying – by 560 Jerome had been dead for a hundred and twenty years… In the end, though, what they were arguing about was which of them would get to produce more copies, and sell them, rather than anything godlier.
Having said all that, I doubt the expiration of even Disneyesque lengths of copyright protection was what drove Columba, who didn’t like the Dermot the Gerbil’s decision, and refused to accept it. Instead he gathered his allies in the Uí Néill clan and went to war with the High King’s forces, and beat them, at that, at the Battle of Cúl Dreimhne in what is now Sligo. Traditionally, 3000 warriors were killed on one side, as opposed to only one casualty on the other. After a few more transgressions against the king, leading to at least one more battle, Columba went into exile, promising to convert as many souls to Christ as he had been responsible for the deaths of.
Cumdach- Decorated book shrine
Columba’s copy of Finnian’s psalter is now in the Royal Irish Academy in Dublin, and its Cumdach, or decorated book shrine, is on permanent display in the National Museum of Ireland on Kildare Street, just beside the National Library.
(*There is one deliberate fabrication in this, but the rest is ethically obtained from highly reliable online sources…)
More about spaces between words in Paul Saenger’s Space Between Words: The Origins of Silent Reading
Thomas Cahill’s How the Irish Saved Civilisation
Touring Tuesdays: Through Streets Broad and Narrow with Ruth Frances Long
Touring Tuesdays: The Largest Norman Castle in Ireland by Oisín McGann
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Tag: sexual
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Utah State University employees failed to report what they knew about football player’s alleged sexual misconduct, internal investigation found
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She was raped at Utah State University. Now the school will pay her $250K and she’ll help improve its response to campus sexual assault.
A former Utah State University student who was raped at a fraternity house has agreed to a $ 250,000 settlement that will also require the school to increase its oversight of its Greek system. The agre…
Police: Utah man ‘confessed to multiple counts of sexual abuse on multiple children’
SALT LAKE, Utah — A Salt Lake man once charged with sexually abusing a 6-year-old girl he was baby-sitting has been arrested and accused of sexually abusing multiple children. James Gerald Crawford, 43, was arrested Wednesday for investigation of five …
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By Cee Cee
Once again, Donald Trump does the unthinkable as he walks off and leaves poor Melania in the rain to get wet while he protects himself and his coif from the rain.
After his wife joined him under the umbrella he was carrying, the president darted off to talk to a group of reporters about his wife’s ABC News interview and his 60 Minutes interview, leaving his wife out in the rain.
“She did a great job on television the other night,” Trump told reporters in footage captured by ABC News. “And I didn’t do so bad either. But she did a great job on television.”
This isn’t the first time Trump has been accused of monopolizing an umbrella. In January, Trump appeared to let his wife and their son Barron Trump, 12, take the brunt of a storm as the trio boarded Air Force One.
Twitter users on both sides of the aisle were quick to react to Trump’s most recent umbrella faux pas. One wrote, “Trump standing with the massive umbrella over him while his wife gets rained on just says so much.” Another wondered, “Why is no one talking about the fact that Trump literally LEFT HIS WIFE IN THE RAIN WHILE HE HAD THE UMBRELLA because he wanted to be on TV.”
In her ABC News interview, Mrs. Trump shot down speculation that her marriage was in trouble and confirmed that she loves her husband. “Yes, we are fine,” she said. “Yes. It’s what media speculate, and it’s gossip. It’s not always correct stuff.”
Source: Yahoo
Related Items:Donald Trump, Ear Hustle 411, Interview, Melania Trump, Rain, Umbrella
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How To: Play the Script's "Man Who Can't Be Moved" on guitar
By rawhy
Want to play "The Man Who Can't Be Moved" by the Script? See how it's done with this free video guitar lesson, which presents a complete breakdown of the song and it chords. While this tutorial is geared toward those who already have some knowledge of the guitar, players of all skill level should be able to follow along given adequate time and effort. For more information, and to get started playing "MWCBM" on your own guitar, take a look!
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Turkey Coordinates Actions on Syria With Russia
Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov has commented on the new Turkish operation in Idlib, which is the second Turkish military campaign in the Syrian territory.
“The Turkish side is responsible for ensuring security in the de-escalation zone. … Without a doubt, the member states to the Astana agreements coordinate their actions on the issue of establishment of de-escalation zones,” Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters when asked whether Turkey was coordinating its actions with Russia, Sputnik reported.
Commenting on reports regarding Turkey’s alleged attempts to come to a ceasefire agreement in the Idlib Province with terrorist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group affiliated with Jabhat Fatah al-Sham, Peskov said it was better to ask the Defense Ministry about that, as he had “no details.”
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced plans to deploy the country’s soldiers to Syria’s Idlib, where Free Syrian Army rebel fighters backed by Ankara have launched an operation against al-Nusra Front terrorists on October 7.
Commenting on the Idlib operation, the Turkish prime minister, Binali Yildirim, said that Ankara’s actions in Idlib are coordinated with Moscow. The Russian Defense Ministry hasn’t yet commented on Turkey’s operation, however, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said earlier that Russia is ready to support armed groups fighting al-Nusra Front in Syria’s Idlib de-escalation zone.
According to the Turkish General Staff, the Turkish Armed Forces, operating in the Idlib de-escalation zone to observe the cease-fire, ensure humanitarian aid deliveries and create conditions for the population to return to their homes. They began setting up their observation posts on October 12, within the framework of agreements reached during the Astana peace talks brokered by Iran, Russia, and Turkey.
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Turkish Military Vehicles Enter Syria’s Aleppo
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Exercise, Fitness
How and When to Use Foam Rollers and Myofascial Release in an Exercise Program
Walk through almost any health club or training studio and you are likely to see individuals lying on the floor rolling around on a tubular piece of foam. In the recent past, self-myofascial release (SMR) and the use of foam rollers has been promoted as a way to reduce tension and increase muscle length during either the warm-up or cool-down phases of a workout. As a result, most fitness facilities now provide a wide variety of rollers for members to use, which means your clients are probably using them, too. To be able to provide your clients with accurate information and effective exercise solutions, you must have a clear understanding of exactly how using a foam roller provides the necessary stimulus on muscle tissue to reduce tension and change muscle length.
How Muscle Tightness Affects the Body
There are two specific components of a muscle: (1) the striated skeletal muscle comprised of the contractile element responsible for producing movement; and (2) the elastic fascia and connective tissue that is interwoven between the various layers of skeletal muscle. It’s important to note that striated skeletal muscle is enveloped by fascia and other connective tissue. When healthy, the entire structure can be pliable, easily allowing surrounding joints to move unrestricted through their structural ranges of motion (Schleip, 2015; Myers, 2014). If a muscle is overused for repetitive motions or held in a specific position during extended periods of inactivity, however, collagen can form between the layers of skeletal muscle, creating adhesions or knots that restrict the ability of muscle sheaths to slide against one another (MacDonald et al., 2013).
Collagen is a protein molecule bound in a triple-helix formation to give it rigidity. It is a component of the fascia that is produced in response to an applied mechanical stress. Ground substance is a collection of individual collagen molecules that comprise the extracellular matrix (ECM) surrounding individual muscle fibers. The ECM is a viscous fluid that can reduce friction as individual muscle fibers slide against one another.
When tissue is warm and moved frequently, the ECM becomes more gel-like, reducing friction and allowing easier movement between individual fibers. However, if tissue experiences a combination of dehydration and lack of movement, the ECM can become stickier, limiting the ability of fibers to slide against one another. If fibers remain inactive for a period of time, the collagen molecules of the ECM will actually bind together for stability, which can create an adhesion between the various layers of muscle (Schleip, 2015). When adhesions form they can cause a muscle to remain in a shortened position, which restricts its ability to lengthen and allow movement at a joint. Scar tissue is an example of how collagen produced by the ECM binds together to help a tissue regain its structure after an injury. Once a scar is formed, it can limit the ability of the tissue move through its normal range of motion (ROM), which can then impact normal joint function.
During normal movement and activity, collagen is produced parallel to muscle fibers to provide structure and elasticity, helping the tissue to be more resilient and less susceptible to a strain injury. Performing strength-training exercises through multiple planes of motions can help produce collagen that makes fascia capable of withstanding multidirectional strains (Myers, 2014). In healthy, functional muscle, the fascia allows the layers of muscle to slide against one another with minimal restrictions. Adhesions formed by collagen binding between layers of muscle can limit tissue extensibility and significantly reduce joint motion. If a muscle on one side of a joint is held in a shortened position, it can send an inhibitory signal, causing tissue on the other side of the joint to lengthen. This creates an imbalance of forces around a particular joint, which can change both joint structure and function. Changes in muscle length and joint structure can restrict normal movement patterns and be a cause of injury for active individuals.
Traditional massage therapy works by manually manipulating muscle tissue to break up collagen adhesions and realign the tissue to allow the layers to slide against one another unimpeded. Breaking up adhesions can help reduce muscle tightness and improve joint ROM. Unless you are a properly accredited massage therapist, however, it is outside of the scope of practice for a health and fitness professional to apply manual pressure in an effort to break up adhesions. And, because it is not practical to have the average client spend the time or money to work with a massage therapist prior to a workout, foam rollers are a means of applying pressure to break up and realign muscle as a component of the warm-up for exercise.
The Science Behind Foam Rolling
The pressure and motion of a muscle moving on a foam roller can help break up adhesions and realign muscle tissue to be able to function normally (Mauntel, Clark and Padua, 2014). In general, foam rollers provide the greatest response when an individual places a body part directly on top of the roller and moves rhythmically to apply pressure to the underlying muscle and elastic connective tissue.
There are two theories on why foam rolling works to alleviate muscle tightness:
The first hypothesis on how foam rolling creates length change is based on the principle of autogenic inhibition, which happens when intrinsic sensory receptors—the Golgi tendon organ (GTO) and muscle spindle—identify changes within muscle tissue. The GTO senses tension placed on a muscle, while the spindle identifies length change and the rate of change within a particular muscle. Autogenic inhibition is the response that occurs as a muscle is placed under tension. The GTO senses the tension and sends a signal to the spindles to allow the muscle to lengthen. In the case of foam rolling, the pressure of the foam roller on the muscle increases tension on the muscle fibers, signaling the GTO to allow the muscle spindles and fibers to lengthen (Mauntel, Clark and Padua, 2014; Mohr, Long and Goad, 2014). (Note:This is also the basic physiological mechanism for how static stretching creates length change in muscles—an acute tension in the muscle leads to a neurological signal that allows the muscle to lengthen.)
The second hypothesis for how SMR with foam rolling works is that is causes an increase of internal muscle temperature. Rolling muscle and connective tissue on a foam roller creates friction between the roller and the involved muscle. This elevated heat causes the tissue to become more gel-like, allowing it to be more pliable. Once tissue has greater extensibility, it is easier to lengthen, allowing surrounding joints to achieve a complete ROM free from restrictions (Mauntel, Clark and Padua, 2014; Healey et al., 2013, MacDonald et al., 2013).
It’s not 100 percent clear which theory is responsible for the outcome, but it has been shown that using myofascial foam rolling can lead to an increased muscle length, which, in turn, allows for greater joint ROM without a loss of strength.
Foam rolling, says Kyle Stull, the Education Content Manager for Trigger Point Therapy, which makes the GRID foam rollers, “may increase blood flow and elevate heat in the involved tissue. We’re not sure which is more responsible for changing muscle length, but we do know that using foam rollers may help individuals increase range of motion immediately after use.”
Using a foam roller for myofascial release can reduce muscle tension, which can help lengthen a muscle, but this is a short-term change in the architecture of the tissue. For best results, it is important to move through a ROM to ensure that the involved tissue can adequately use the change in extensibility and length. Stull points out that while foam rolling can lengthen tissue, it does not help improve joint ROM, which occurs as the result of the tissue having the ability to successfully lengthen and shorten to articulate a joint without any restrictions.
The benefits of using foam rollers include its ease of use and ability to provide an acute response for improving muscle length and joint motion. By contrast, a drawback to foam rollers is that the amount of pressure required to break up an adhesion can be uncomfortable or even painful for some clients. As with any mode of exercise, it’s important to understand both the advantages and disadvantages, and to identify the best practices for how it can be used with your clients.
In addition to years of anecdotal evidence of clients claiming to feel better after foam rolling, the evidence observed in the scientific literature suggests that using a foam roller for myofascial release may provide the following benefits (Mauntel, Clark and Padua, 2014; MacDonald et al., 2013; Healey et al., 2013; Shah and Bhalara, 2012):
Reduce tissue tension, which allows muscles to experience an increase of joint range of motion.
Reduce the risk of developing adhesions as the result of collagen binding between layers of muscle tissue.
Help reduce soreness after an exercise session, which may enable individuals to recover in a shorter period of time.
Help promote a feeling of relaxation after a workout, which is an important psychological benefit.
When to Use Foam Rollers for SMR
The natural inflammation that occurs during the tissue-repair process, combined with a lack of movement after an exercise session, could be a cause of muscle adhesions. Exercise-induced muscle damage signals the repair process—this is when new collagen molecules are formed to help repair and strength tissue. If tissue is not moved, the collagen could bind between layers of muscle. Muscle damage can change both the firing patterns of the motor units responsible for muscle contractions and the sequence in which muscles are recruited and engaged to produce a movement (MacDonald et al., 2013). Using a foam roller can help minimize the risk of the new collagen-forming adhesions between layers and possibly increase the speed of post-exercise recovery.
Additionally, using a foam roller for myofascial release during a warm-up may help reduce tension while elevating temperature in muscle and fascia without the use of any exercises that could cause fatigue (Healey et al., 2013). During a warm-up, it is important to only use the foam roller for a brief period of time to elevate tissue temperature and reduce tension. Applying pressure from a foam roller for an extended period of time could desensitize the muscle and affect its ability to contract during the workout.
“Using a foam roller before a workout can increase temperature and reduce tension, allowing greater joint motion,” explains Jeff Alexander, an Orange County, Calif.-based personal trainer who developed the Alexander Method of SMR. “But it is important to use for only a brief amount of time. You would not want a deep tissue massage before a workout because it could change a muscle’s ability to produce force. The same is true with a foam roller—too much pressure could reduce the effectiveness of the warm-up.”
When using a foam roller for myofascial release, Stull recommends moving at a consistent tempo of approximately 1 inch per second while remaining on areas of tension for up to 90 seconds to allow the tissue to relax and lengthen. Because SMR can help elevate tissue temperature, Stull will often have clients use a foam roller for active recovery between strength-training exercises during a workout.
MacDonald and colleagues (2014) compared a group of participants that used a foam roller after exercise to help reduce muscle tension with a group of participants that did not. Their observation was that the foam-rolling group experienced peak muscle soreness 24 hours after a workout while the control group experienced muscle soreness up to 48 hours after a workout. If using a foam roller can help reduce soreness and shorten the recovery time after a workout, it could allow clients to increase their training volume to maximize results.
Healey and colleagues (2013) also conducted a study on the use of foam rolling for recovery and observed: “Post-exercise fatigue after foam rolling was significantly less…the reduced feeling of fatigue may allow participants to extend acute workout time and volume, which could lead to chronic performance enhancement.”
A review of the research literature on the use of foam rolling for SMR by Mauntel, Clark and Padua (2014) revealed that applying foam rolling as a component of a warm-up can help reduce muscle tension without limiting a muscle’s ability to produce force. A reduction in muscle tension can help improve joint function, allowing optimal movement efficiency and enhanced muscle performance, both of which can help reduce the risk of injury during exercise. Their conclusions support Alexander’s belief that using a foam roller should be limited during warm-up. Furthermore, they observed that gains in joint ROM occurred after only 20 seconds of treatment, with more consistent results being demonstrated after 90 seconds to three minutes of treatment.
Further Your Knowledge
Looking for more information on foam rolling and self-myofascial release? Check out these helpful ACE blogs to further your knowledge:
Recover Faster and More Effectively With These Foam Roller Moves
Foam Rolling Moves for the Lower Body
Why You Should Be Foam Rolling
Why Foam Rolling Doesn’t Eliminate Cellulite
Foam rolling can be an important component of a pre-exercise warm-up and, for best results, it is best to limit the application of pressure to two minutes or less per muscle group. Alexander recommends using a foam roller only for muscles that demonstrate restrictions that change joint motion. “The best practice for using a foam roller is to reduce tension in the tissue, and then immediately perform multiplanar movements to help the tissue adapt to the new length while controlling joint function,” explains Alexander
Foam rolling can also be used effectively at the end of a workout to reduce muscle tension and promote recovery. It is up to you to identify the best time to apply foam rolling for each client’s specific needs. If SMR from a foam roller can help reduce muscle tension while promoting a feeling of relaxation, it could be beneficial to teach clients how to safely perform foam rolling movements on their own and urge them to invest in a foam roller that they can use at home on a regular basis.
As is the case with any exercise technique, some clients will love using a foam roller while others will just not be interested in rolling on a piece of foam, regardless of the potential benefits. The true art of personal training is knowing how and when to apply the science of the exercise tools that can make a difference in a client’s life.
Healey, K. et al. (2013). The effects of myofascial release with foam rolling on performance. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research, 28, 1, 61-68.
MacDonald, G. et al. (2014). Foam rolling as a recovery tool after an intense bout of physical activity. Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise, 46, 1, 131-142.
MacDonald, G. et al. (2013). An acute bout of self-myofascial release increases range of motion without a subsequent decrease in muscle activation or force. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research, 27, 3, 812-821.
Mauntel, T., Clark, M. and Padua, D. (2014). Effectiveness of myofascial release therapies on physical performance measurements: A systematic review. Athletic Training & Sports Health Care. 6(4), 189-196.
Mohr, A., Long, B. and Goad, C. (2014). Effect of foam rolling and static stretching on passive hip-flexion range of motion. Journal of Sport Rehabilitation. 23, 296-299.
Myers, T. (2014). Anatomy Trains: Myofascial Meridians for Manual and Movement Therapists (3rd ed.). Elsevier, London.
Schleip, R. (2015). Fascia in Sport and Movement. Handspring, Scotland.
Shah, S. and Bhalara, A. (2012). Myofascial release. International Journal of Health Sciences and Research, 2, 2, 69-77.
July 4, 2018 /by Lianne Gamble
https://fitlab253.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/Roller_main-1.jpg 343 585 Lianne Gamble https://fitlab253.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/fitlab-logo.png Lianne Gamble2018-07-04 15:41:432018-07-04 15:44:04How and When to Use Foam Rollers and Myofascial Release in an Exercise Program
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Dimmesdale's Guilt essays
Reverend Dimmesdale's Internal Struggle Through His Guilt
The Struggle Within The Scarlet Letter offers extraordinary insight into the norms and behavior of 17th century puritan society. The basic characteristics and problems of its main characters, however, are familiar to readers in the present (Encarta 98). In The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne develops Reverend Dimmesdale's internal struggle through his guilt, his indecision regarding confession, and his final decision to confess. At the beginning of the novel, the Reverend Dimmesdale has comm...
Guilt Dimmesdale
The Conscience's Roll in Dealing with Guilt and Shame What power the conscience holds, as it can, will bring a person to his doom. Throughout the novel, The Scarlet Letter, by Nathaniel Hawthorne, one of the main characters, Reverend Dimmesdale, expresses his feeling of guilt best by his action. The story evolves around Hester Prynne, the Sinner of Adultery, and her everyday life with her daughter, Pearl. Hester Prynne was sent to live in Boston, by her husband, but has not been seen for two yea...
Poison Dimmesdale
ATROPINE POISONING: WAS IT THE CAUSE OF DIMMESDALE'S DEATH? In an article in the New England Journal of Medicine, Dr. Jem shed A. Khan claims that Roger Chillingworth poisoned Arthur Dimmesdale with the drug atropine in Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter. Certainly, Chillingworth was 'a man of skill in all Christian modes of physical science'; (Hawthorne 65) and was very knowledgeable about medicinal roots and herbs (Hawthorne 65). Undoubtedly, he could have been aware of how to poison Dimmesdale sl...
Feeling Of Guilt
Guilt and How It Is Handled Human beings have certain feelings. The person at fault may feel guilty after the incident happens. A feeling of guilt is the recognition of wrong doing, and the wish that the consequences of the action could be changed. In The Scarlet Letter, Red Badge of Courage, and The Crucible, the main characters all have feelings of guilt as a result of what they have done. Life on it's own can also bring such inner feeling from within a person. All people at one point or anoth...
Tragedy The Scarlet Letter
Tragedy, many people have defined it so many different ways. So, what is a tragedy? Arthur Miller has defined a tragedy by specifying certain characteristics that must be included in the story; there must be living and breathing characters, it must bring knowledge or enlightenment, there must be an internal conflict, and there must be a struggle for happiness. This definition does a really good job of defining what a tragedy is, but I think that there is more to it. I believe for a story to beco...
Used As A Primary Source Of Guilt
Scarlet Letter / Crucible Essay The presence of guilt has been felt by all human beings. As guilt grows in a person's life it eventually begins to have a deteriorating effect on the individual. In both The Scarlet Letter and The Crucible more than one of the characters are experiencing some form of guilt and the effects of the public's opinion on their own personal sins. Each character's guilt originates from a different personal problem and with each character's guilt comes a different reaction...
Dimmesdale S Guilt
Andrew Kim Period 1, AP English The Conscience of Reverend Dimmesdale Before the time of even the first psychologists, such as Sigmund Freud, or Karl Jung, Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote The Scarlet Letter. Today, it is well conceived that guilt drives such acts as sleepwalking, dreams, visions, and other paranormal events; however, Hawthorne was fairly ahead of his time. He explores the conscience thoroughly, as Shakespeare had done earlier in stories such as Macbeth. In The Scarlet Letter, Hawthorn...
Theme Of Guilt In The Scarlet Letter
The story is based on the results of guilt as an effect of sin. The first character who is exposed to this guilt is Hester, who struggles more openly with this problem. On the other hand the Reverend Dimmesdale suffers alone with a searing guilt which ultimately leads to his demise. Hester is the most immediately affected by guilt, which is openly shown to the public by the scarlet letter, that she bears on her clothing. Another visible sign of her guilt is the embodiment of it in Pearl, who is ...
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Why EUSD?: Awards & International Recognition
We don’t mean to brag, but our trophy case is getting crowded. EUSD has been recognized and lauded by numerous organizations and educators. Here are just a few of the honors:
In April 2015, EUSD was one of 11 school districts in California to be designated as a model of attendance improvement by the State School Attendance Review Board.
EUSD’s community collaborative partnership program (formally known as the CARE Youth Project) has made a tremendous impact on our students and schools. As a result, it has earned a Golden Bell Award from the California School Board Association, and a Public Health Champion Award from the County of San Diego Health and Human Services Agency.
Our Technology & Innovation department’s iREAD program has been modeled around the world with educators from Japan and New Zealand making repeat visits to EUSD to learn more and replicate the program’s success.
Also in the realm of Technology & Innovation, EUSD is a three-time recipient of the Apple Distinguished Program award that recognizes innovation, leadership, and educational excellence.
In 2015, Miller and Reidy Creek Elementary Schools were named Honor Roll Schools by the National Educational Results Partnership (ERP) and the Campaign for Business and Education Excellence (CBEE). In 2016, Miller Elementary and Quantum Academy were also named.
Our After School Education and Safety Program (ASES) was recognized in 2015-16 for the STEM Fridays program by the San Diego County Office of Education.
Last but not least: Our students are big winners, too! For example, did you know that the Nanobots of Bear Valley Middle School (pictured at top of page) have won awards in the realm of robotics? The students in the Mission Television (MTV) program at Mission Middle School have been honored as well — including the winner of the RedEye competition in the 2016 Innovative Video in Education (iVIE) awards! The work of our Mission students beat out competing entries from San Diego area high schools, and their winning commercial for San Diego County Credit Union actually aired on NBC 7:
Bottom line: In some ways, EUSD has been one of our community’s best kept secrets — but the secret is out. Educators and experts from around the nation and world are taking notice of our amazing people and programs, and we’re thrilled to share them with you as well.
Take the next step:
Explore Our Schools OnlineSchedule a Campus TourEnroll Your Child Online
Or explore our other strengths and signature programs:
Student Behavior and Safety
Support Services & Programs
Well-Rounded Curriculum & Activities
The EUSD Family
School Modernization
Awards & International Recognition
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Contractual Disclaimers Did Not Preclude a Fraudulent Inducement Claim Because They Did Not Specifically Address the Subject of the Alleged Misrepresentation
On March 14, 2019, the Appellate Division, First Department, unanimously affirmed the denial of a summary judgment motion seeking to dismiss a fraudulent inducement claim alleged in connection with the purchase of a mixed-use property on Union Avenue in the Bronx, New York (the “Subject Property”). Union Ave. Estates, LLC v. Garsan Realty Inc., 2019 N.Y. Slip Op. 01827 (1st Dept. Mar. 14, 2019) (here). The decision, though short and concise, addresses a couple of principles ripe for discussion in today’s post: whether contractual disclaimers can preclude a fraudulent inducement claim; and whether the plaintiff justifiably relied on the representations and warranties supporting the fraudulent inducement claim.
[Ed. Note: Since the First Department’s decision does not contain a factual recitation of the case, the factual background comes from the papers filed in connection with the motion for summary judgment.]
On February 18, 2015, YMY Acquisitions LLC (“YMY”) entered into a written contract of sale to purchase the Subject Property from Defendants (the “Contract” or “Contract of Sale”). In April 2015, YMY assigned the Contract to Plaintiff. On April 27, 2015, Defendants conveyed the Property to Plaintiff by a bargain and sale deed, thereby vesting Plaintiff with title to the Property.
Pursuant to various paragraphs of the rider to the Contract of Sale, Defendants provided a rent roll for the Subject Property and copies of all leases affecting the Subject Property. Defendants allegedly represented and warranted that the rent roll was true and accurate as of February 18, 2015, and correctly reflected the expiration dates of each of the leases affecting the Subject Property.
According to Plaintiff, Defendants represented and warranted that the leases of two commercial tenants (the “Commercial Tenants”) had expired and, therefore, the Commercial Tenants were occupying the Subject Property on a month-to-month basis.
The rider to the Contract also required Defendants to deliver all leases, files, and records affecting the Subject Property upon closing. Pursuant to the requirement, Defendants delivered leases in their possession demonstrating that the leases of the Commercial Tenants had expired in July 2014.
Also, at the closing, Defendants allegedly provided Plaintiff with a rent arrears report containing further representations that the leases of the Commercial Tenants had expired in July 2014 and that the Commercial Tenants were therefore month-to-month tenants.
Subsequent to the closing, Plaintiff sought to evict the Commercial Tenants from the Subject Property. Plaintiff learned, however, that the Commercial Tenants had extended their leases until 2024. As such, the Commercial Tenants were not month-to-month tenants.
Plaintiff commenced the action on October 23, 2015. During discovery, Defendants moved for summary judgment.
Among other things, Defendants argued that the fraudulent inducement claim was barred by a merger clause and “as is” disclaimer clauses in the Contract of Sale and related documents. The Motion Court denied the motion. Defendants appealed.
The First Department’s Decision
Whether Contractual Disclaimers Can Preclude A Fraudulent Inducement Claim
In New York, a party’s disclaimer of reliance cannot preclude a fraudulent inducement claim unless: (1) the disclaimer is specific to the fact alleged to be misrepresented or omitted; and (2) the alleged misrepresentation or omission does not concern facts peculiarly within the knowledge of the non-moving party. Basis Yield Alpha Fund [Master] v. Goldman Sachs Group, Inc., 115 A.D.3d 128, 137 (1st Dept. 2014). See also Danann Realty Corp. v Harris, 5 N.Y.2d 317, 323 (1959); MBIA Ins. Corp. v. Merrill Lynch, 81 A.D.3d 419 (1st Dept. 2011). “Accordingly, only where a written contract contains a specific disclaimer of responsibility for extraneous representations, that is, a provision that the parties are not bound by or relying upon representations or omissions as to the specific matter, is a plaintiff precluded from later claiming fraud on the ground of a prior misrepresentation as to the specific matter.” Basis Yield, 115 A.D.3d at 137.
In Union Ave., the disclaimer at issue pertained to a merger clause and “as is” provisions in various documents related to the purchase of the Subject Property. The Court held that these provisions were “not sufficiently specific to preclude the claim that defendants fraudulently induced plaintiff to purchase the property by misrepresenting the status of the commercial tenants’ leases.” Slip Op. at *1. The Court explained that “[n]one of the provisions relied upon by defendants specifically disclaim any warranties about the status of commercial tenants’ leases, or indeed of any leases.” Id.
Whether Union Ave. Justifiably Relied on the Alleged Representations and Warranties
As a general matter, the term “justifiable reliance” refers to the extent to which a person can be found to have properly relied on the representations of another. As this Blog has noted on several occasions, to determine whether the plaintiff justifiably relied on a representation, the courts look to whether the plaintiff exercised “ordinary intelligence” in ascertaining “the truth or the real quality of the subject of the representation.” Curran, Cooney, Penney v. Young & Koomans, 183 A.D.2d 742, 743) (2d Dept. 1992) (“if the facts represented are not matters peculiarly within the party’s knowledge, and the other party has the means available to him of knowing, by the exercise of ordinary intelligence, the truth or the real quality of the subject of the representation, he must make use of those means, or he will not be heard to complain that he was induced to enter into the transaction by misrepresentations.”) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted). See also Danann Realty, 5 N.Y.2d at 322; Gutkin v. Siegal, 85 A.D.3d 687, 688 (1st Dept. 2011) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted).
Determining whether a plaintiff justifiably relied on a misrepresentation, however, is “always nettlesome” because it is so fact-intensive. DDJ Mgt., LLC v. Rhone Group L.L.C., 15 NY3d 147, 155 (2010) (internal quotation marks omitted). The inquiry “involves a mixed question of law and fact, and, where it does not conclusively appear that a plaintiff had knowledge of facts from which the alleged fraud might be reasonably inferred, the cause of action should not be disposed of summarily….” Berman v. Holland & Knight, LLP, 156 AD3d 429, 430 (1st Dept. 2017). “Instead, the question is one for the trier of-fact.” Id. See also Sargiss v Magarelli, 12 N.Y.3d 527, 532 (2009).
Moreover, where “a plaintiff has taken reasonable steps to protect itself against deception, it should not be denied recovery merely because hindsight suggests that it might have been possible to detect the fraud when it occurred. In particular, where a plaintiff has gone to the trouble to insist on a written representation that certain facts are true, it will often be justified in accepting that representation rather than making its own inquiry.” DDJ Mgt., LLC, 15 N.Y.3d at 154); Lunal Realty, LLC v. DiSanto Realty, LLC, 88 A.D.3d 661, 664 (2d Dept. 2011).
In Union Ave., the Court found that it was an issue of fact “[w]hether plaintiff’s reliance on defendants’ alleged misrepresentations – that the commercial tenants were month-to-month tenants and that their respective leases expired on July 31, 2014 – was reasonable or whether due diligence would have revealed the truth….” Id.
Although brief in length, Union Ave. is notable for its reiteration of the law concerning contractual disclaimers and fraudulent inducement claims. As the Court observed, contractual disclaimers will not preclude a fraudulent inducement claim unless the disclaimers specifically address the subject of the alleged misrepresentation. In Union Ave., the disclaimers relied upon by the defendants were not specific enough to preclude the fraudulent inducement claim.
« Enforcement News: Retail Investors to Receive More Than $125 Million Under the SEC’s Share Class Selection Disclosure Initiative
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7.2 Overview on the traditional practices phenomenon
Children's Human Rights - An Interdisciplinary Introduction
Universidad de Ginebra
Drawing on the contributions of several academic disciplines including law, psychology, sociology, history, educational and health sciences, economy and anthropology, an interdisciplinary approach guides the student into a selection of critical issues concerning children’s rights. Participants will gain insight relative to the development of this specific human rights category, as well as to the evolution of the challenges faced by children over time and society’s efforts to respond. Successful international strategies and programs promoting children’s rights will be highlighted, as well as the role of key actors involved in international organizations working in this field. This open online course provides an overview of the most important features of children’s human rights. A central portion of the MOOC will consist of a presentation of the international and regional standards on children’s rights and the related international and regional judicial and quasi-judicial bodies designed to ensure their implementation. No prerequisites or specific background is required to register for this MOOC. The course is conceived as an introductory level program, but participants, who wish to deepen their knowledge in the field of children’s rights, or already have some prior knowledge, will have access to additional reading material on a weekly basis. Participants who successfully complete the class activities and final assessment may request for a paid certificate of accomplishment signed by the Instructor and the main professors responsible for the program. However, no credits are awarded. The course consists of seven topical modules distributed on 4 weeks. English is the only language of instruction.
Justice, Child Psychology, International Law, Humanitarian
A very interesting course, I learned a lot. Very helpful information. The quiz are quite difficult, you have to pay attention on every detail. Well done! Many thanks to everyone!
For me, all our professors had imparted to us a Significant Human Experience they had taught from Week 1 to Week 7. I have learned to value and protect CHILDREN'S HUMAN RIGHTS.
Children’s rights and global health
Health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity (Preamble to the Constitution of the World Health Organization 22 July 1946). Certain traditional practices committed on children compromise sometimes severely both their physical and moral development and thus affect their health. These practices while explicitly prohibited by the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) at. art. 24.3 CRC are widely committed in quasi total impunity. Even if some traditional harmful practices concern more specific regions of the globe, due to migratory movements, in fine every State is concerned. Global health is a universal concept of human rights and contributes to, the realization of many other children’s rights such as the right of non-discrimination (art. 2 CRC), the right to life, survival and development (art.6 CRC), the right to participation (art. 12 CRC) the right to privacy (art. 16 CRC) or the right to access to information (art. 17 CRC). Placing children’s rights in the context of traditional harmful practices and global health, adopting a child’s rights based approach, contributes to a better understanding of the problem and thus to a better care of the victims.
7.1 Introduction2:01
7.2 Overview on the traditional practices phenomenon6:19
Roberta Ruggiero
Philip D. Jaffé
Jean Zermatten
Dr. h. c.
Seleccionar un idiomaEslovacoInglés (English)Ruso (Russian)
What is a traditional harmful practice?
A traditional harmful practice if a fact to follow an action rule on a moral or
social level.
It is traditional because it is deeply rooted in the past,
actually, it's an inheritance of the past.
And of course it's harmful because it's damage,
sometime seriously the well being, the health, and the development of children.
These traditions include values, traditions,
beliefs which are specific to a community.
But what is important to remember is that they are traditional because of the past
and this is why people think they are compulsory.
Because due to the past, due to the long time that these customs are in practice,
people think they must obey and for many different reasons like social integration.
Millions of children are concerned all around the world,
mostly girls, but not only.
Boys also are concerned, for example, with scarification.
What kind of practices do we have?
The most well-known, unfortunately, is female genital cutting,
female genital mutilation, sexual mutilations.
You have forced marriage, child marriage.
You have honor crime.
You have breast ironing, lips placed, witchcraft,
ritual child murder, giraffe woman, dowry,
virginity testing, ritual and so on scarification.
Also food taboo, and so on.
There is no justification for these practices.
It's not a cultural practice.
So a question is why do these people perform these practices.
Well you have many different reasons.
Generally we can say that when girls are concerned it's the way for
man to control women in their sexuality.
For example, it's the case with female genital cuttings.
But it can be also the systematic son preference for
example with girls infanticide, food taboos,
superstition think in term of witchcraft, accusation of witchcraft.
Or sometimes, it's also an agreement between families.
Forced marriage, child marriage, for example.
Because these practices are harmful, they are prohibited.
At the international level by the Convention on the Rights of the Child,
Article 24, paragraph 3.
By the CEDAW the 1971 Convention on the Elimination
of Discrimination Against Women Article 5 and
especially Article 16 which targets forced marriage.
At the regional level you have different documents which prohibit these practices.
Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights,
Article 21 Of African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child.
The African Charter on Human and People's Rights, the famous Maputo Protocol
which is a protocol to the African Charter on Human Rights and People's Rights and
on the rights of women in Africa Article 5 and 6.
And the Inter-American Convention for
Prevention, Sanction, and Elimination of Violence Against Women.
Besides international and regional law,
we have also national law,which can prohibit these harmful practices,
especially the practices concerning FGM, and first marriage.
Important to say also but we have the soft glow.
The soft law groups are the recommendation of a different UN body which
are concerned by this issue.
That is to say, the UN body on the Committees of a Right of a Child and
the CEDAW Committee for the Discrimination Against Women.
They're also concerned by these topics.
They give advice about or to fight against them also.
So the question is how can we fight against that?
It's important first of all to know why they exist everywhere.
Even in sometimes certain region or states are concern,
due to migration everybody each state is concerned.
Of course communities, certain communities,
must be target by sensibilization and raising awareness.
To know the different communities which do practice
what kind of harmful traditional practices it's very important.
Afterwards we have to educate people who are in charge
of the children who may be affected by these practices.
School teacher, pediatricians, and so on.
The difficulty is to work all together.
Especially, in hosting countries, we, well,
we don't know these kind of harmful traditions, practices.
Why it is so important, because these issues are entirely.
Let's think about all the different issues which are concerned by this topic.
You have the anthropological field, sociology, politics, history,
religion, ethnology, of course, law, medicine, psychology,
psychiatry, migration, of course, is concerned, and mass media,
communication, How do you communicate without any discrimination?
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Home Video What Happens When Anti-Semitism Rises in France
What Happens When Anti-Semitism Rises in France
“In the suburbs of Paris… it’s a very special mix of social insecurity, social resentment, with the emotional trigger of what’s going on in the Middle East…”
That’s just one take on what exactly is going on with the recent increase in anti-Semitism in France, according to Sciences Po research professor Nonna Mayer. Anti-Semitic acts are up 74% from the last year, numbering at 541. This is a terrifying concept considering that France has the largest Jewish population in the world after the US and Israel. While much has been done to combat these incidents, including outlawing Holocaust denial, the occasionally fascist branches of the Yellow Vest movement, as well as heavily anti-Israeli groups on the outskirts of Paris, have made eliminating hate crimes against Jewish people seemingly impossible to do in its entirety.
In this video, PBS interviews researchers, university heads, and rabbis to uncover the truth about anti-Semitism in France, and what we can do when it rears its ugly head.
40 French Restaurants Are Offering Special Menus During New York’s Summer Restaurant Week
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Musée d’Orsay Shines a Spotlight on Female French Impressionist Berthe Morisot
Celebrate France with Over 250,000 People at Bastille Days Festival in Milwaukee
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One of the “the Dreamers”, Fernando is undocumented and unafraid. Born and raised in Cuautitlan Izcalli, Mexico, in 2001 he came to Idaho to attend Boise State University and worked with Idaho Community Action Network from 2004- 2009.
His status prevented him from taking a teaching position at the University of New Mexico but continued to stay politically involved. In his work in Idaho since 2011, Fernando has played multiple roles and has been a key catalyst for two major social change initiatives during the past couple of years.
Fernando helped build ICAN’s immigration reform campaign from the ground up, which received national attention in 2013 and coordinated and directed KBWE, the Spanish language community radio station that ICAN created for the community of Burley. He has also worked with the Alliance’s Health Rights Organizing Project’s Racial Justice Agenda; led ICAN’s Civic Engagement campaign in 2012; trained leaders and organizers on how to set up a Small Business canvass in NY, OR, and ID; and led a major direct action at John Boehner’s (Speaker of the US House) DC office.
In these campaigns, Fernando serves as a low key bridge for different elements of the community to realize their collective power to create change.
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Home › books › Knausgaard: which translation?
Knausgaard: which translation?
Posted on 15 July 2015 by Kate Sotejeff-Wilson — Leave a comment
http://oktober.no/Forfattere/Norske/Knausgaard-Karl-Ove
Knausgård’s Min Kamp/My Struggle series are a publishing sensation and I had to see what all the fuss was about. Not being able to read them in Norwegian, I had a choice of four translations to choose from: English, Polish, German and Finnish. All the translators are feeling the Harry-Potter-like pressure from fans to come up with the next edition, fast. By the time volume 1 was out in Finland in 2011, Norway had read the lot, but the first English translation wouldn’t be out for another 2 years.
The Finnish volume 5 came out last month in Katriina Huttunen’s translation, just a month after volume 2 appeared in Polish in Iwona Zimicka’s translation and two months after volume 4 appeared in English in Don Bartlett’s translation. The Germans will get Paul Berf’s volume 5 this September.
Bartlett made a conscious decision with his publisher to translate a book a year, as he told the Paris Review. His “addictive, lively” English translation of volume 2 was shortlisted for both the Best Translated Book Award and Independent Foreign Fiction Prize. Bartlett finds that Knausgård really captures what it’s like to be 13, or 25, or whatever: certainly my experience of reading volume 1 was “oh, so this is what it feels like to be a teenage BOY”.
Hattunen says herself in an interview on Finnish radio that she works fast, and has the advantage of being geographically close enough to visit the books’ locations. That’s why I read it in Finnish in the first place: there might be enough “words for snow” in the target language, and Knausgård has a love-hate, next-door-neighbour relationship Sweden that a Finns just “get”. It’s no coincidence that Andersen’s PhD on Knausgård was published by Helsinki University.
Zimnicka told Jakub Winiarski that the reader response has overwhelmed her. Knausgård told her he was inspired by the Diaries of Gombrowicz, who was also writing far from home and shocked his contemporaries. She’s the Norwegian specialist here: in 1980s Poznań, the only place to study Norwegian in Poland, she was told she’d end up teaching English or German, yet she received the Royal Norwegian Order of Merit and Silver Cross of Merit in Poland.
Berf’s description of translating volume 1 on Swiss Radio echoed my reading experience: It takes more than 60 pages for the 15-year-old Knausgård and his mates to find a New Years’ Eve party in the snow: “‘nothing happens’; normally you would say you have to cut this, but you can’t cut this out of life.” I’m glad he was honest about the frustrations of the text. And the German titles so far – Sterben/Dying etc. – are different for a reason. Mein Kampf was obviously not an option.
So I’m very tempted to read volume 2 in English, and maybe volume 3 in Polish. But I’ll stick to Finnish for that full love-hate, next-door neighbour attitude to Sweden, which Knausgård is fuelling himself, in his usually controversial style.
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Tagged with: Don Bartlett, Finnish, German, Gombrowicz, Iwona Zimicka, Karl Ove Knausgård, Katriina Huttunen, Norwegian, Paul Berf, Polish, Swedish
Posted in books, international, literature, translation
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August 30, 2016 By Mark 97 Comments
10/06/16 — The Real Legacy of University of Iowa Traitor Jean Robillard.
10/01/16 — Wrong Way Leath and the Microburst Lie. Updated.
09/27/16 — J. Bruce Harreld and the UI ‘Speak Out Iowa’ Campus Climate Survey.
09/23/16 — J. Bruce Harreld Injects His Poison into the UI Faculty Ranks.
09/20/16 — J. Bruce Harreld and the UI Office of the Ombudsperson.
09/17/16 — On 03/22/16 Regents President Bruce Rastetter Lied to the Des Moines Register.
09/14/16 — J. Bruce Harreld’s 20-Year-Old Failed and Fake Ranking Plan From Kentucky.
09/11/16 — J. Bruce Harreld Officially Welcomes His Excellency J. Bruce Harreld. Part 1. Part 2. Updated.
09/08/16 — It’s not just me. Bleeding Heartland chronicles a year of posts about the Harreld hire.
09/06/16 — On the Origins of J. Bruce Harreld’s U.S. News Ranking Obsession. Part 1. Part 2.
09/03/16 — Bruce Rastetter, Joe Murphy, and the Iowa Board of Regents’ Revolving Door.
08/30/16 — Your Most Important Right as a University of Northern Iowa Presidential Candidate.
« « Ongoing Harreld Hire Updates — 6 | Ongoing Harreld Hire Updates — 8 » »
If you intend to apply for the position of president at the University of Northern Iowa, or are only considering applying, you need to know about a critical right that you have regarding your due diligence process. Whether you are a declared or undeclared candidate, as long as you meet the minimum criteria as determined by the 2016 University of Northern Iowa Search and Screen Committee, you have the absolute right to face-to-face meetings with any or all of the nine members of the Iowa Board of Regents.
In order to receive your in-person meetings you do not have to declare your candidacy to anyone on the search committee or at the firm managing the search. All you have to do is contact the Iowa Board of Regents and request the minimum number of meetings you would like.
Once you request your meetings, they will be arranged for you depending on your availability, and within the constraints of Iowa’s Open Meeting law. Meetings will last a minimum of one hour, with one or two regents per meeting.
To schedule your meetings, and for information about reimbursement for travel expenses to and from those meetings, contact the Iowa Board of Regents:
Email: http://www.iowaregents.edu/contact-us/e-mail-the-board-of-regent/
Details and Strategy
Although every prospective candidate in the UNI search has the right to ask for face-to-face meetings with members of the Iowa Board of Regents, even before declaring their candidacy, the search committee, search firm, and board may elect not notify candidates of this right. As a result, any candidates who are aware of this right will have a considerable advantage during the search process, not only in terms of answering their own questions about the position, but in making an impression on the small group of individuals who will determine the winner among the final candidates selected by the committee.
As should be readily apparent, your ability to circumvent the constraints of both the search firm and committee, and to meet in person with any or all board members at your convenience, could give you a tremendous advantage compared to passive candidates who simply follow the dictates of the process. This right is also of particular advantage to candidates who may be concerned that the search firm or committee will pass over candidates who do not fit the traditional mold of past UNI presidents. By meeting in-person with members of the board you can make a direct and personal impression apart from any traits or descriptors in your documentation, thus also making sure the board really is open to candidates like you, and is not simply using your candidacy to demonstrate a plausible commitment to diversity.
Prospective candidates for the UNI presidency should pay particular attention to the specifics of the position description when it is released. Having met yesterday for the first time, however, the search committee has already indicated that it will remain open to non-traditional candidates, thus providing a much larger pool of potential applicants. Specifically, it has already been decided that a terminal degree will be listed as “strongly preferred” instead of required, and the board has “indicated they would not approve language of any such specific requirements.”
If you do not hold a doctorate, if you do not have any experience in academic administration, and even if you have little or no experience in education at all, as long as you meet the established criteria in any way you have the absolute right to request face-to-face meetings with as many members of the Iowa Board of Regents as you would like, even without officially declaring your candidacy. (Individuals with less than a sincere interest in the UNI presidency could use this right to secure face time with regents that they might not otherwise be able to meet with, but such behavior is obviously discouraged.)
One theory about why the Iowa Board of Regents does not publicize this right has to do with simple logistics. If every prospective candidate wanted to meet with every regent, there wouldn’t be enough time in the typical search schedule to accommodate all of those meetings. While that would seem to preclude offering such meetings to any prospective candidates on the grounds of simple fairness, there is an alternate theory which perhaps explains that inequity. Simply put, the Iowa Board of Regents may use the right to face-to-face meetings with members of the board as a means of winnowing candidates who are too timid to seize the initiative and exploit that right. (Based on the degree to which the board itself has worked to avoid regulatory and even statutory constraints in recent years, there is considerable merit to that argument.)
In any case, whether the search committee or board specifically acknowledges this right in the coming months, you can be assured — absent a specific public statement to the contrary — that it does exist. All you have to do to trigger the benefits conferred by this right is contact the Iowa Board of Regents and request your meetings. Whether other candidates do so or not, failure to do so could cost you the job.
To see how powerful this absolute right to face-to-face regent meetings can be, consider the 2015 University of Iowa presidential search, which concluded almost a year ago to this day. During the 2015 search at UI, the Board of Regents and search committee determined that they would cast a “wide net“, and as such listed the qualifications on the position description as “preferred” rather than required. One of the candidates who took advantage of that latitude was J. Bruce Harreld, a former IBM executive who had spent the preceding eight years as a senior lecturer at Harvard’s business school.
Shortly after Harreld’s unexpected appointment in early September of 2015, it was revealed that Harreld had met with four members of the Iowa Board of Regents on July 30th at the private place of business of Regents President Rastetter. Because two of the regents Harreld met with on that day were not even on the search committee, and because no other candidates had similar meetings, or were even apprised of their right to such meetings, accusations of preferential treatment and a ‘done-deal’ search were leveled against Rastetter and the board.
In response, President Rastetter made multiple references, on the record, about his official, unquestioned obligation to meet such requests. From Rastetter’s official board statement, released on 09/24/15:
I considered Mr. Harreld’s requests for these additional meetings on July 30 not only appropriate, but due diligence on his part. He wanted to gather as many facts as he could about the position. I appreciate the fact that he was interested enough to want to do his research on the job, and took his time gathering facts.
As you can see, there is no ambiguity in President Rastetter’s words. Simply because Harreld made the request for those meetings, Rastetter was obligated to respond to that request by arranging those meetings. J. Bruce Harreld himself corroborated Rastetter’s recitation of events on 11/01/15 — the day before taking office as president at Iowa:
[Harreld] said he wanted to meet with at least four regents, visit with members of the UI administration and speak with Iowa State University President Steven Leath, who he had heard was leading a successful change effort on the Ames campus.
“I actually put those in front of the search committee and said, ‘Here’s what I’d like to do,’” Harreld said. “They didn’t say yes to all those. They said yes to some of that.”
Harreld met with four regents and Leath on June 30 — the day before the application deadline.
For reasons that have never been made clear, somehow, among all the candidates considering the open presidency at Iowa, only J. Bruce Harreld knew he could compel face-to-face conversations with as many regents as he wanted to meet with simply by asking for those meetings. And that included any or all of the regents not already on the 2015 UI Presidential Search and Screen Committee. While it is also unclear why President Rastetter or search Chair Jean Robillard did not inform the other candidates of that right during the 2015 UI search, Rastetter specifically confirmed that any candidate could have met with any or all of the regents during the 2015 UI search in a videotaped interview with the Des Moines Register on 03/22/16:
On the specific issue of the search process, however, Lynn Hicks is not deterred, and immediately follows up at the 23:29 mark:
Hicks: “But…the process may have been the same, but there were…this trickle of news that, ‘Oh, Bruce Harreld got a meeting at this point, or he met with these people then, or….’ A lot of that information came out later, which just seemed to suggest, that, that there was a — you know, in some minds — that there was a fix in.”
Rastetter’s response begins at 23:52:
Rastetter: “Well, you know, and, and that’s just absolutely not true. There were other candidates who asked for dinners, who came to Iowa City — wanted to tour the campus — who wanted to do more diligence as well. Bruce Harreld asked for meetings with regents ’cause he wanted to do diligence before he applied. He wanted to make sure there was a commitment there to public education. He also asked to meet with Steve Leath, which…which has been noted. Because he wanted to know if he and Steve Leath could work together, in a comprehensive way, collectively, to make the whole system better. Because as we know there had been tension between the two presidents, and there typically is between the University of Iowa and Iowa State. I’m fine if they compete in sports, but we don’t need to compete academically, in the same manner. So, there were a variety of candidates to do that…um — I assume the faculty — some of the members they recruited, also came to campus. And we would have entertained any candidate who asked to meet with any regents, and try to sell them on why they should want to be president of the University of Iowa. That’s what we’re supposed to do — is be advocates for the university and the state, and encourage people to do their diligence before they apply, so they’re comfortable with, with the job, and know more about the job.”
Regarding the possibility that the regents or search committee could reneg on this right during the 2016 UNI search, note that Rastetter’s comments above came four days after UNI President William Ruud announced that he was resigning. So when President Rastetter said this —
….we would have entertained any candidate who asked to meet with any regents, and try to sell them on why they should want to be president of the University of Iowa.
— he was already aware that a presidential search would soon be undertaken at UNI, and that the regents would be responsible for honoring similar requests from UNI candidates who were determined to “research” the job, and take “time gathering facts”. While Rastetter’s emphatic comments to the DMR are less than six months old, the board recently reaffirmed the fairness of the 2015 UI search just over two months ago, after the University of Iowa was sanctioned by the AAUP for gross administrative violations during that search process. In doing so, the board underscored how important it can be to make a favorable impression with the individual members of the board as early as possible:
“The board ran a fair search for president at the University of Iowa,” regent Senior Communications Director Josh Lehman said. “The board disagrees with the AAUP report’s overall characterization of the search process.”
Lehman said the UI presidential hiring process involved “ample” shared governance. In the presidential search, a 21-person committee, with seven UI faculty, narrowed the candidates down to nine and then down to four.
“At that point, it is the Board of Regents that selects the president from the four,” Lehman said.
As already determined by the 2016 UNI search committee during its first meeting, that search will follow a process very close to the one used at UI in 2015 (scroll down for scheduling details). For that reason alone it behooves any UNI presidential candidate who truly wants to take the initiative to call the Iowa Board of Regents and request their face-to-face meetings as soon as possible, if only to ensure availability.
If you’re still hesitant to take advantage, remember that even though Bruce Rastetter was (and still is) the president of the board, and a multi-millionaire with ties to powerful business and political interests across the country and around the globe, relative to the 2015 UI search he was — in his own words — literally obligated to meet J. Bruce Harreld’s request for face-to-face regent meetings. Even if you are currently only negligibly curious about the position — as J. Bruce Harreld himself was at the time — do not miss out on this critical opportunity. (The current ranking board member on the 2016 UNI search committee is President Pro Tem Katie Mulholland. Along with being co-chair of the UNI committee, Mulholland was on the 2015 UI search committee, and was one of the four regents who eagerly agreed to sit down for an extended face-to-face meeting with J. Bruce Harreld on July 30th, 2015.)
Also remember that the current president of the University of Iowa, J. Bruce Harreld, was and still is unqualified for the job he now holds, and that the resume he submitted was not simply a joke, it contained actual lies which led to Harreld’s censure by Iowa faculty before he even took office. Despite those seemingly insurmountable obstacles, however, because J. Bruce Harreld was savvy enough to demand face-to-face meetings with “at least four regents”, he is now making $800K per year ($200K deferred), and can trigger tenure of approximately $300K any time he wants, despite not having a doctorate. (Harreld also receives free housing in the UI presidential mansion, free staff support, and all the usual perks afforded to someone in his position of authority.)
Again, you do not have to be a declared candidate for the UNI presidency in order to receive face-to-face meetings with as many regents as you would like. When J. Bruce Harreld met with four regents in late July of last year, he did so only two days before all candidate records were made available to the search committee by the search firm, and only five days before the first committee cut-down from more than 45 candidate to 9 semifinalists. Even at that late date, however, candidate Harreld had not submitted any official paperwork to the search firm overseeing the search, and had not officially declared himself to be a candidate — yet by his own admission the president of the Board of Regents was compelled to personally arrange four regent meetings for Harreld simply because Harreld knew he had a right to those meetings.
Jonathan Swift says
Hilarious parody!
Let’s hope credulous candidates take it seriously!
That’s the funny thing — it should be taken seriously because those are all verbatim quotes.
Rastetter’s sworn position after the 2015 UI search is that A) any/all candidates can meet with any/all regents, B) said candidates do not have to declare their intent, and C) those meetings can be requested apart from official contact with the committee or search firm.
That is Rastetter’s defense of the rank favoritism he showed to Harreld. All anyone has to do to confirm A, B and C — or, alternatively, to blow Rastetter’s claims to pieces — is contact the board and ask if any/all candidates are allowed in-person meetings with any/all regents as per Rastetter’s own on-camera, statement..
Unless Katie Mulholland is willing to renege on Rastetter’s promise, and is so doing expose her own hypocrisy and favoritism for having gladly met with Harreld, the nine members of the Iowa Board of Regents are going to be taking a lot of extra meetings in the coming months. (I’m also pretty sure nobody at the board informed the search firm of this looming obligation, so AGB isn’t going to want to handle the logistics.)
tv says
1. Could you receive accommodations for your bad back (which 99 % of Americans have)? Like private flights?
2. How about a VIP lunch? Any word of that right?
3. Considering Harreld’s dubious resume (or dishonest) are there any constraints on putting bogus achievements on a resume?
Could a candidate request face-to-face with anyone in the state system ala Leath? Might be an opportunity to meet Kirk Ferentz to ask about the 2016 Rose Bowl?
4. Considering Harreld’s ‘should be shot’ statement about bad teaching, does the successful candidate need to show marksmanship skill?
dsmrooster says
I might have a friend who is curious about applying. It’s nice to know she can have a sit-down with Bruce & the gang….
But how about a phone chat with the Gov? Just to make sure he’s in favor of higher ed, too.
You raise a very good point.
During the 2015 UI search, Harreld was the only candidate who received a private personal call from the governor, directly as a result of Rastetter’s passionate advocacy.
Because the regents are concerned about fairness, obviously all candidates for the UNI position now have the right to request a conversation with the governor as well.
Caretaker says
It is not hard to infer what Rastetter’s separate agendas are for ISU or UI but it is not clear to me if Rastetter has a specific agenda for UNI like he has for the other schools. Are we about to find out?
I think the best answer comes from an interview three years ago, which I only ran across in the past month or so. It featured Craig Lang and Rastetter on Iowa Press, and included this exchange:
Borg: Mr. Rastetter, you were chairing the Board of Regents when they picked William Ruud to be the next president of the University of Northern Iowa. What is unique about the University of Northern Iowa? And what qualities then do you see in William Ruud that is different than the other three state universities to make him president at UNI?
Rastetter: First of all, UNI is different than the other two universities. It is a comprehensive university, it’s not a research institution and it plays an important role in Iowa, that it is the only comprehensive university and we ought to embrace that. It also has 92.5% of its students Iowa students and that we think is a good thing. And 70% of them stay in Iowa ten years later.
The term ‘comprehensive university’ has a specific meaning (that I also did not know about until recently), and as Rastetter notes the key distinction is that such schools are not involved in research (or Ph.D programs). Instead, they focuses on bachelors’ degrees in various disciplines.
Rastetter is also on the record saying UNI should be able to keep its athletics programs, even though they’re a drain (as opposed to the currently self-sustaining programs at ISU and UI). And of course he loves all those Iowa kids (as long as they do what they’re told, and thank him as well), so I’m guessing he just intends to keep hacking away at UNI until whatever is left fits his anemic ideal of a ‘comprehensive university’.
If you’re wondering if this also has implications for UI (and even ISU), I think it does. Move more and more of the rank-and-file LA&S/non-STEM students to UNI, close down any redundant departments at the bigger schools, and you’re pretty much on your way to Rastetter/Harreld/Robillard/Branstad heaven. (Rastetter is already on the record in multiple interviews saying he wants each of the state’s three universities to specialize.)
‘comprehensive university’?
UNI has several research centers
UNI also has a graduate college, presumably offering EdDs.
Is this right?
Admittedly, I can only quote the noises Rastetter makes with his armpit. What they actually mean is often a mystery to me, but in this case maybe Rastetter was telling a future truth. He and Leath have already turned ISU into a higher-ed confinement operation for STEM students, so maybe the objective at UNI is getting rid of those grad programs and research centers and focusing solely on grinding out bachelors degrees by the carcass.
(That would also then remove any overlap with UI.)
Under the Iowa Board of Regents’ system of governance, each of the state’s three universities has a state relations officer embedded within its administration, but that individual — like the president of the school — works for the board. In that context, state relations officers act as official lobbyists for their respective schools, and as unofficial minders for the board, making sure board policy — stated, unstated or manifestly corrupt — is being followed. On 09/16/11 it was reported that the University of Northern Iowa’s state relations officer, Joe Murphy — who had three years on the job — was resigning to take a job in the private sector.
As suggested by the nature of the position, it is not uncommon for state relations officers to move between the state’s schools and the board offices. For example, Mark Braun, the current board COO, has been hired into multiple positions at UI and the board over the past twenty years — including three in 2015 alone — and was once the state relations officer for the board itself. (The board’s current state relations officer is Mary Braun.) Similarly, University of Iowa spokesperson Jeneane Beck was also a state relations officer at the University of Northern Iowa, serving after Murphy departed.
As for Murphy, one curiosity about his move to the private sector was that nowhere in the reporting of his departure did the Northern Iowan — the UNI school newspaper — mention where Murphy would be working. While that omission would have been trivial in any other situation, as it turned out Murphy was left UNI to take a job at Summit Agricultural Group, the company owned by current Regents President Bruce Rastetter. At the time, Rastetter himself had only just been appointed to the board in May of that year, yet had already risen to president pro tem following Governor Branstad’s unprecendented ousting of the prior board leadership.
So four months after Rastetter was named to the board, and only two months after Rastetter became president pro tem, Joe Murphy left his position as the state relations officer at UNI to work for Rastetter in the private sector. Why did Rastetter make that hire? Well, as noted in a prior post, there was that whole misunderstanding about how Rastetter was kicking refugees in Tanzania off their land in order to make a mint with industrial farms, which of course got some sensitive types all worked up. So much so that Rastetter needed a reliable spokesperson to help set the record straight:
[Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement] filed the complaint to the Iowa Ethics and Campaign Disclosure Board, claiming Rastetter abused his position as a regent in pursuing a partnership between Iowa State University and his agribusiness corporation, AgriSol Energy. Rastetter participated in discussions with the university about working with AgriSol to develop a commercial farming operation in Tanzania, a project critics call a land grab that could displace thousands of refugees.
Rastetter’s spokesman Joe Murphy said Iowa CCI continues to use bully tactics and a campaign of misinformation and intimidation to mislead Iowans on the issue. The group’s behavior is destructive and not representative of Iowa values, Murphy said in a statement. He noted that Rastetter is a native Iowan dedicated to agriculture, education and philanthropy.
“Bruce is passionate about lifting people out of hunger and poverty, which is the goal of the AgriSol project in Tanzania,” Murphy said.
Once Murphy made it clear that Rastetter was only interested in feeding the refugees in Tanzania, however, and not intent on making yet another fast buck off of someone else’s misfortune, there wasn’t much for Rastetter’s private-sector spokesperson to do. That in turn may be why — a little over a year after Murphy’s resignation from UNI — that the Board of Regents not only hired Murphy again, but did so without actually advertising the position Murphy filled:
The Iowa Board of Regents has hired the spokesman for a board member’s private business as the top lobbyist for Iowa State University without publicly advertising the position, the board’s executive director acknowledged this week.
Regents’ executive director Robert Donley announced this month that Joe Murphy has been appointed as ISU’s state relations officer to replace Ann McCarthy, who is moving into a new position overseeing the board’s economic development initiatives.
Murphy spent the past year working as director of public affairs for Summit Group, an Ames-based company that grew out of Regent Bruce Rastetter’s family farm and includes investment and operating companies’ in a range of agricultural sectors. Murphy acted as spokesman for Rastetter when the Republican Party powerbroker successfully fought a high-profile ethics complaint related to one of Summit’s projects: a plan to team up with ISU to develop a huge farm in Tanzania.
After Joe Murphy rejoined the board as Iowa State’s state relations officer he seems to have kept a low profile for four years — until three days ago, when Murphy was announced as the new Senior VP of Government Relations and Public Policy for the Greater Des Moines Partnership. (The GDMP is Des Moines’ version of the Chamber of Commerce.) Currently Murphy is still listed as the state relations officer at Iowa State, with his work at the GDMP set to begin on 09/26.
As has been noted in a number of other contexts, there is a revolving door between business, government and higher-education in the state of Iowa, and as often as not Bruce Rastetter is there in the background, giving that door a whirl. Interestingly, however, if you dig into the GDMP website — and I mean really dig — you will not find Rastetter’s name anywhere, which is odd in itself given that Bruce Rastetter is the nexus of all things business and politics in Iowa.
The closest you can come is a series of press releases or articles about a group called the Cultivation Corridor, which was launched in May of 2014, of which Rastetter is one of a number of directors. (ISU President Steven Leath is an officer of the Cultivation Corridor, as is Jason Andringa, the son of recently resigned regent Mary Andringa.)
So why would Bruce Rastetter want Joe Murphy working at the GDMP, when Rastetter himself is involved with the Cultivation Corridor? Well, one possible answer is the announcement four days ago — as in one day before Murphy was announced as a new hire at the GDMP — that two of the biggest players in agriculture will be backing a new ag-tech start-up accelerator:
The Greater Des Moines Partnership announced the investors during the Farm Progress Show Tuesday.
The Partnership is basing the ag-tech accelerator on the Global Insurance Accelerator, a similar program based in Des Moines that hosted its first cohort in 2015. Both accelerators are intended to feed off of two of the region’s core industries: agriculture and financial services.
“When you look at agricultural and ag-bioscience, and you look at insurance and financial services, they are our two powerhouse industries we think we can compete with anyone across the globe” in, said Jay Byers, CEO of the Greater Des Moines Partnership.
Still, from the reporting it’s not immediately obvious how the GDMP’s new venture fits with Rastetter’s work as one of the directors of the Cultivation Corridor, or how placing Murphy at the GDMP might be to Rastetter’s advantage. The Cultivation Corridor does have an office in Ames which is very close to Rastetter’s SummitAg office in the same town, but its main office is in Des Moines, so there doesn’t seem to be any overlap. At least until you notice that the street address for the Cultivation Corridor in Des Moines is the same as the street address for the Greater Des Moines Partnership.
Welcome to Louisiana or New York on the Mississippi.
Even with obvious ethics violations the Branstad/Rastetter mafia suppresses all opposition. An ethics complaint against Agrisol went nowhere http://www.oaklandinstitute.org/land-deals-africa/agrisol-energy-llc
http://iowacci.org/in-the-news/basu-on-agrisol-deal-and-rastetter-are-we-helping-or-hindering/
Like many other brazen violations of law (such as Branstad’s crony medicaid takeover) these blatant money/power/land grabs go on unabated.
Do Iowans possess any shame anymore? Any ethical values?
If you were to learn that a document on a particular subject was a ‘white paper’, what associations would that term bring to mind? Until recently — because I am nothing if not perpetually naive — I thought of white papers as dry, officious, rigorous reports designed to lay out the parameters of an argument or decision. White papers might be authored by an individual or a group, and particularly by a group riven with conflicting perspectives or dissent, yet they would present the merits of a subject not merely with a pretense to fairness, but actual fairness.
Recently my own ruminations about what a white paper is and is not were prompted by a document which did in fact proclaim itself to be exactly that. Despite being titled White Paper on Advancing the University of Iowa’s Status as a Top-Tier Public Research University, however, and having been saved to disk as Top-tier white paper – FINAL.pdf, after multiple reading that report called into question everything I thought I knew about white papers, which was admittedly not a great deal. [Note: sometime after this post, during the fall term in the 2016-2017 academic year, the FSWG report was scrubbed from the Faculty Senate website. The link above now leads to an archived copy on this site.]
Confusing matters further, that particular paper was not prepared by a biased think tank or a self-interested, for-profit ranking publication, but by a panel of University of Iowa scholars who were also esteemed members of the UI Faculty Senate. Specifically, the purported white paper was the output of a Faculty Senate Working Group (FSWG) chaired by Meenakshi Gigi Durham (College of Liberal Arts & Sciences) and Larry Weber (College of Engineering). Also in the working group were Charlotte Adams (CLAS), Carolyn Colvin (College of Education), Peter Damiano (College of Dentistry and Public Policy Center), Lena Hill (CLAS), Christopher Morphew (College of Education), Tom Rietz (College of Business), Aliasger Salem (College of Pharmacy and Carver College of Medicine), Michael Sauders (CLAS), and Eric Tate (CLAS).
All told that’s eleven members of the UI Faculty Senate, all of whom participated, to some unknown degree, in the crafting of the document in question — or, at the very least, who signed off on said document. No matter what anyone might think when confronted with the term ‘white paper’ in another context, then, in that academic environment the impetus for such a claim would seem, by default, to lean toward the pursuit of truth, and away from some weaselly administrative attempt to obscure or deceive. Which — as has often proved to be the case with the circumstances surrounding J. Bruce Harreld’s fraudulent hire as president of the University of Iowa — just goes to show how wrong a person can be.
What is a White Paper?
After my first read-through of the FSWG ‘white paper’ I found myself thinking about some of the issues raised by the working group. Over the next day or so, however, I realized that relevant factors I had previously encountered while looking into college rankings myself were not simply glossed over by the ‘white paper’, they were entirely omitted. Confused by the academic origins of the document and its apparent claim to be an objective work, I gave the entire document a second and third read, at which point I concluded that I must be confused about what the term ‘white paper’ actually meant. Because while the document I was reading was clearly the work of eleven members of the University of Iowa faculty, it was not an honest presentation of the benefits and costs associated with influencing or gaming a school’s national rank.
Turning to the internet for salvation I typed out a question that would have seemed ludicrous prior to encountering the FSWG’s work product: “What is a white paper?” Quickly filtering the returned links for a familiar source, I settled on the third hit, which was a Wikipedia page devoted to that subject. (Admittedly, Wikipedia is often a dubious source itself, particularly from the perspective of academia.)
In the introductory paragraph of that short Wikipedia page my confusion was immediately resolved:
A white paper is an authoritative report or guide that informs readers concisely about a complex issue and presents the issuing body’s philosophy on the matter. It is meant to help readers understand an issue, solve a problem, or make a decision. The initial British term concerning a type of government-issued document has proliferated—taking a somewhat new meaning in business. In business, a white paper is closer to a form of marketing presentation, a tool meant to persuade customers and partners and promote a product or viewpoint. White papers may be considered grey literature.
And then there was this, in the section devoted to the business use of ‘white papers’ for marketing purposes:
As a marketing tool, these papers use selected facts and logical arguments to build a case favorable to the company sponsoring the document. B2B white papers are often used to generate sales leads, establish thought leadership, make a business case, or inform and persuade prospective customers, channel partners, journalists, analysts, or investors.
Looking for confirmation, I followed the second link on my original page of search hits, and found this on the Purdue.edu website:
Originally, the term white paper was used as shorthand to refer to an official government report, indicating that the document is authoritative and informative in nature. Writers typically use this genre when they argue a specific position or propose a solution to a problem, addressing the audience outside of their organization. Today, white papers have become popular marketing tools for corporations especially on the Internet since many potential customers search for information on the Web. Corporations use white papers to sell information or new products as solutions that would serve their customers’ needs.
The Purpose of a White Paper
Typically, the purpose of a white paper is to advocate that a certain position is the best way to go or that a certain solution is best for a particular problem. When it is used for commercial purposes, it could influence the decision-making processes of current and prospective customers.
Following additional search hits I found the same answers again and again. Whatever credibility the term ‘white paper’ used to have, it had long since been exploited by business and industry as a means of generating sales. (Because white papers originally promised, or at least aspired to, credibility, marketing weasels realized they could exploit that credibility simply by appropriating the term — which is pretty much what marketing weasels do. Freshness is a chemical spray, happiness is a pill away, fitness is fashion.)
I cannot say I was surprised to learn that marketing weasels had poached the term ‘white paper’ in furtherance of deceiving others. What did concern me, however, was that the ‘white paper’ I was reading was not a product of business — or at least not acknowledged as such. It wasn’t even a function of government per se, but purportedly represented the higher ideals of scholarship. And yet with each successive reading the FSWG ‘white paper’ seemed less and less like an objective document and more and more like marketing trash.
On the other hand, that all fit perfectly with the fault line laid bare by the fraudulent hire of J. Bruce Harreld, and in particular the complicity of UI administration in his sham hire. Was higher education — and in particular, public higher education — an aspirational function of government premised on the concept of citizenship, or was it a state-funded pipeline for a specific class of quasi-educated and narrowly trained professionals? Philosophically, should higher education be treated as sacred, or as a profit-center at the expense of all else, including institutional and personal integrity? While it was true that Regents President Bruce Rastetter, UI VP for Medical Affairs Jean Robillard, and even J. Bruce Harreld himself had all shredded their own credibility and integrity during and after the 2015 UI presidential search, the idea that eleven members of the UI Faculty Senate might be eager to follow them down the drain was more than a little disturbing.
And yet, as regular readers know, there has been good reason to question the motives of members of the Faculty Senate on multiple occasions. Most recently not only did the current Faculty Senate president happily step forward and take the heat for J. Bruce Harreld in the aftermath of the AAUP sanction, but that same Faculty Senate president put out a statement which denied any complicity by UI administrators, when UI VP Robillard clearly betrayed the school during the 2015 presidential search. Because that debasement of the Senate was apparently insufficient, however, the former Faculty Senate president, who was also on the search committee during the 2015 search — and who was Vice President when the Faculty Senate Working Group was constituted — also stepped forward to deny that UI administration was deeply involved in Harreld’s fraudulent hire.
Why did a Faculty Senate Working Group put out a purported white paper that read like a marketing plan, instead of a scholarly or even quasi-governmental analysis of the question at hand? I did not know, but having read through their work product multiple I felt I knew where to look for the answer. Which once again proved just how wrong a person can be.
On The Origins of the FSWG Report
If you have not yet looked at the FSWG report — which I will no longer describe as a white paper for what should now be obvious reasons — you should at least look at the top right corner of the first page. Because there you will find, prominently displayed, the words “Fall|16”.
Now, whatever else I may get wrong in interpreting the FSWG report, I think we can all agree that the document itself is dated Fall of 2016, meaning — at least according to the academic seasons as I know them — right now, at the commencement of the 2016-2017 school year. Yet it is also obviously the case that the report had to be prepared at some prior point, which, as it turns out, is not revealed by any of the information contained in the document itself. Other than “Fall|16” on the first page, there are no other relevant dates in the FSWG paper.
The reason accurately dating the FSWG report is important is because of the following sentence in the introduction on page two:
Last December, Board of Regents President Bruce Rastetter urged the members of the Faculty Senate to consider what it would mean for the University of Iowa to become a Top 10 public university.
In response to that challenge, the Faculty Council created a working group to study this
prospect and to propose recommendations for achieving that goal. This report summarizes the group’s discussions and recommendations.
From the words “Fall|16” on the first page, then, and the words “Last December” on the second page, the sequence seems clear. In December of 2015, Bruce Rastetter urged the Faculty Senate to think big about UI’s national ranking as a public research university, after which the Senate put together a working group to prepare the report in question. And indeed if you look at the document properties for the .pdf file, they seem to confirm that sequence. The .pdf was originally created on 04/20/16, most likely from some prior document format, then modified for the last time on 05/17/16. That in turn also fits with the school year coming to a close at that time, followed by academic silence during the summer before picking up again at the beginning of 2016-2017 academic year.
All of that sequencing also fit perfectly with my long-held belief that J. Bruce Harreld auto-generated his obsessive quest to game Iowa’s U.S. News ranking — perhaps as early as his candidate forum on 09/01/15, but certainly no later than when he took office on 11/02/15. Searching the journalistic record yields example after example of Harreld talking up Iowa’s national college ranking, and specifically those numbers bestowed by the elves at U.S. News & World Report. So that’s what I was thinking each time I read through the FSWG report, which seemed to reveal that Bruce Rastetter himself had taken up Harreld’s rallying cry in December of 2015, which then led Rastetter to challenge the UI Faculty Senate, which in turn led to preparation of the FSWG report.
And yet as it turns out that timeline is completely wrong. I did not know that until a couple of days ago, however, when I tried to find press reports of Rastetter urging the UI Faculty Senate to aspire to top-ten status as a public research university. Because if you do a targeted search for the relevant keywords during December of 2015, you come up empty. Only if you open up the timeline will you discover that Rastetter’s prompt to the UI Faculty Senate occurred in December of 2014, not December of 2015. And that in turn means that the report as written — because it refers to “Last December” — was at least initially drafted at some point in 2015.
Except that’s also a problem, because right there on the first page it says “Fall|16”, and it is not possible that that is a simple typo. The reason we know that is because there are eleven faculty names attached to that report, and the words “Fall|16” are prominently displayed even as the .pdf opens, meaning all eleven people would have had to fail to notice that error in the original document. And of course the same holds true for the words “Last December”, if indeed “Fall|16” is correct. There is simply no chance that eleven pairs of eyes read that wording and failed to notice that the December being referenced was two years prior.
So what happened? Well, my guess is that the report was completed sometime in 2015, but more recently — perhaps last May, at the end of the 2015-2016 academic year — someone slapped a new date on the old report to make it seem current. Which, again, is perfectly fine if you’ve reduced yourself to nothing more than a marketing weasel in service of a lesser good, and not at all fine if you’re purporting to be scholars in service of the truth.
Rastetter’s Rank Appeal to Status
There was only one UI Faculty Senate meeting in December of 2014, and it was early in the month on 12/02/14. If you dig into the minutes from that meeting you will indeed find Regents President Rastetter — who was accompanied on that day by President Pro Tem Katie Mulholland — challenging the faculty to “help lift UI into the ranks of the top ten public universities”.
Given the timing of that meeting — only a month and a half before Sally Mason’s official retirement announcement in mid-January of 2015, and amid contentious debate about Rastetter’s performance-based funding plan — the idea of radically raising Iowa’s national rank seems odd. In fact, the reaction from various members of the Faculty Senate makes clear that the initial response was one of confusion about how that goal might be accomplished, particularly in light of Rastetter’s intent to strip tens of millions of dollars from University of Iowa.
As recorded in the meeting minutes, here is Rastetter’s initial pitch, prefaced by introductory remarks which will once again remind you that the president of the Iowa Board of Regents is an unrepentant liar:
President Rastetter began his remarks by noting that the university has a long and strong tradition of shared governance, including active engagement with the Board of Regents. He indicated his commitment to following in that tradition. He looked forward to today’s dialogue, as a way to continue to work together with faculty to build a stronger university, for the benefit of Iowans and people around the world. He stressed that he would like to thank each senator for the multi-faceted work they do to contribute to the university’s success. In spite of this success, President Rastetter expressed the opinion that the university could do better. He challenged the faculty to help lift UI into the ranks of the top ten public universities. He asked the faculty for their suggestions on how to achieve this goal.
As you might imagine, there were a number of responses to Rastetter’s lofty entreaty, including questions about how UI could accomplish that objective while simultaneously being stripped of funding by Rastetter’s performance-based funding plan. The first such question came from then-Vice President Christina Bohannnan, and occasioned a long, rambling, non-responsive answer from Rastetter, which concluded with this:
UI is projected to add 5,000 more students over the next few years. This enrollment growth will provide resources to help propel the university upward in the national rankings for public institutions.
Spoken like a true commodity baron, Rastetter’s solution was simply to warehouse as many students as possible, then soak them for the tuition necessary not only to make up for funds diverted to other state schools by his performance-based funding plan, but to fund the goal of becoming a top-ten public university. After additional Senate debate about the funding plan, the conversation returned to the question of dramatically raising Iowa’s national rank. Following a question about how Iowa might achieve that goal, Rastetter responded again with rambling free association that culminated in this:
The senator pressed for an explanation of how to reach top ten status based on the new funding model, which takes resources away from UI. President Rastetter responded that one way to reach that goal was to grow the university overall through increased enrollment.
Rastetter’s response is consistent. The University of Iowa can become great by becoming bigger. Not qualitatively better in any way, just bigger. (That also gives considerable credence to the idea — discussed in a prior post — that one of Rastetter’s long-term goals is crushing competition in Iowa’s educational ecosystem so as to herd more and more students into regents institutions. That fixation in turn goes a long way to explaining why “Practices for Transformative Growth” are now codified as “Core Values” in the most recent strategic plan for the Iowa Board of Regents, when the word ‘growth’ did not appear once in the prior plan.)
After more sparring over the performance-based funding model, which was eventually defeated in the legislature, and another brief exchange about rankings, we get this:
Professor Wilder asked by what rating system we would determine whether UI has entered the ranks of the top ten public research universities. President Rastetter responded that most likely it would be one of the rating systems, such as U.S. News & World Report or Bloomberg, which is routinely presented to the Board. Professor Storrs reiterated that faculty are not opposed to a performance-based funding model in general, but that they would want the model to reflect the priorities of UI as a research university. She asked if any states that have top ten research universities have performance-based funding models that so heavily emphasize undergraduate enrollment. President Pro-Tem Mulholland responded that the Board committee which looked at other states’ models did not focus specifically on those states with top ten research universities.
Whatever else might be said about the UI Faculty Senate, and particularly about its serial leadership failures during and after the Harreld hire, the questions put to Rastetter on 02/02/14 — in response to his impromptu charge to improve Iowa’s ranking — were perceptive. In stark contrast, both Rastetter and Mulholland demonstrated that other than having a flashy goal in mind, they had no idea about how to accomplish that objective other than adding more and more students.
Finally, there was a bit more back-and-forth about the funding plan, which included this gem:
[President Rastetter] reiterated that the Board is charged with being good stewards of Iowans’ tax dollars, not just with being fair to each institution.
This from the man responsible for pissing away $300K in taxpayer money on a sham presidential search, for showering office employees with exorbitant salaries in open defiance of state law, and for condoning if not orchestrating multiple crony job appointment and contracts — to say nothing of giving away the $15M-$20M naming rights to the new UIHC Children’s Hospital to a co-conspirator, for bupkis.
The UI Faculty Council Weighs In
The UI Faculty Senate consists of eighty senators representing the various factions of the university. The smaller Faculty Council, which gathers between Senate meetings and as needed, is described as follows:
The twenty-member Faculty Council, composed of elected Faculty Senators, meets frequently to discuss issues of current importance, and to prepare action suggestions for submission to the Faculty Senate.
The UI Faculty Council met on 01/27/15, between the previous Senate meeting in December and the meeting scheduled for February. By that time Sally Mason had indeed announced her impending retirement, Jean Robillard’s unveiling as the treasonous chair of the presidential search committee was only a week away, and less than a month later the entire search committee would be impaneled. (The Daily Iowan’s Brendan Magee posted a story on the meeting on 01/28/15, including push-back on Rastetter’s ranking goal.)
From the Faculty Council meeting minutes, here is the introduction to the agenda item concerning Rastetter’s charge:
Regent President Rastetter’s Challenge: How To Rise to Top Ten Status Among Public Research Universities (Christopher Morphew, Associate Dean, College of Education and Michael Sauder, Sociology)
As you can see, presenting on the issue are two members of the UI faculty. What is not specifically noted is that both men are guests of the Council, there to put the question of improving Iowa’s national rank into actionable context. The meeting minutes on the topic begin as follows:
President [Alexandra] Thomas reminded the Council that at the December 2 Faculty Senate meeting, Board of Regents President Bruce Rastetter had urged the faculty to think about what it would mean for the University of Iowa to become a top-ten public research university. President Thomas indicated that she wanted to take some time at this meeting to discuss the topic and hear from various faculty members with expertise in university ranking systems. She added that President Rastetter would like to receive a brief report containing the faculty’s thoughts on this matter.
Here we have clear linkage between Rastetter’s initial charge to the full Senate at the end of 2014, and the genesis of the Faculty Senate Working Group’s final report. It is equally clear that the genesis of the report predates the official 2015 UI presidential search, which is not to say that it also predates Harreld’s association with that search, or Rastetter’s awareness of Harreld as a potential candidate. As to who asked for the FSWG report to be prepared, however, the clear answer is Regents President Rastetter.
The minutes continue:
Professor Michael Sauder, from Sociology, indicated that he has been working on rankings research for about 15 years. Most of his research has involved interviews with administrators across the country regarding how they and their organizations perceive rankings. Turning to President Rastetter’s challenge to the faculty, Professor Sauder commented that he thought it unlikely that UI could rise into the top ten. He explained that most institutions are trying to raise their rankings by doing many of the things that we would do, and that sudden large jumps do not seem possible. Professor Gillan observed that those who produce the rankings pick specific criteria that they feel are important; those criteria may not be as important to faculty here. It is difficult to compare institutions that may have different values.
As regular readers know, this expert analysis comports perfectly with prior posts on the subject of college rankings. Even if a school throws everything it can at gaming its ranking, doing so is an incredibly costly and time-consuming vanity. Because schools higher in the rankings often have unconquerable advantages, there are also diminishing returns until schools reach their effective cap, which is often considerably below the top ten or twenty in their institutional category.
Next in the meeting minutes, Chemistry Professor Christopher Cheatham spoke about how the criteria for determining rankings have evolved to largely now favor undergraduate metrics. When questioned, Cheatham also noted that the evolution toward more data-driven metrics was initiated by the ranking publications themselves, in response to criticism about fuzzy criteria such as reputation. Then comes this exchange:
Given the shifts in criterion weight, Professor Udaykumar asked if there was any possibility of UI rising in the U.S. News rankings. Professor Cheatum commented that the university’s priorities had shifted somewhat, such as to an increased number of faculty lines. Graduation and retention rates would need to increase, however, and he expressed the opinion that smaller class sizes, living-learning communities, etc. cannot solve this problem; greater selectivity in admissions possibly could.
The problem with greater selectivity in admissions, of course, is that it not only runs headlong into Iowa’s obligation as a state school to educate resident students, it runs counter to Rastetter’s only suggestion about how to raise Iowa’s rank, which was to grow, grow, grow. (If you’re more selective, by definition your selectivity will shrink the available pool of students.) More discussion followed, including the fact that Rastetter left it open to the faculty to decide what “top ten status” actually meant. That led to the question of a ceiling for UI, and how others schools raised their rankings:
Professor Morphew commented that he was skeptical that UI could obtain top ten status merely based on the nature of the competition, for example, the University of California system, with a vast state population to draw from, or the state flagship universities in Virginia and North Carolina, with a long history of substantial funding as well as larger population bases. Professor Mallik stressed that the University of California system made a conscious effort to improve and therefore rose in the rankings over the years. While it may not be possible for UI to rise as high as the UC system, that should not be an excuse for complacency.
After a bit more conversation, the question of ethics arose:
[Past President Fumerton] observed that there are ways to increase graduation rates that may not be very ethical, and added that graduate programs are under great pressure to increase their graduation rates, even if that might lead to letting students through who are not qualified.
That in turn led to questions about the goals for the report that Rastetter had requested:
President Thomas called for a motion to establish a working group that would further discuss the issue of how UI could become a top public research institution, from the faculty perspective, and write a brief report for the Regents on how this could be achieved. Professor Muhly moved and Professor Mallik seconded that a working group be formed to study the possibility of the University of Iowa becoming a top public research institution and to prepare a brief report for the Board of Regents on how this could be achieved. The motion passed with one opposing vote.
The discussion concluded as follows:
Professor Morphew commented that this report could be an opportunity to illustrate for the Regents the tension between what the Board is asking of UI, particularly in light of the proposed performance-based funding model, and what criteria are important in national rankings. Aspects of the tension to highlight would include differential missions, differential tuition, the push towards admitting more in-state students, and admission selectivity, all of which would impact UI’s ranking among public research universities. Vice President Bohannan concurred and commented that this report would let the Regents see what trade-offs are being made.
If you read that section of the Faculty Council minutes, you will see that the discussion is robust and covers every aspect of the question at hand. The intent in creating the FSWG is equally clear, as are the instructions to that working group.
J. Bruce Harreld and the FSWG Report
After the authorization of the working group in late January of 2015, the next mention of Rastetter’s report in the Faculty Senate minutes — or even of UI achieving “top ten status” — occurs more than a full year later, during the 03/22/16 meeting:
President Bohannan announced that an additional Faculty Senate meeting has been planned for Monday, April 11. President Harreld, Provost Butler and other central administrators have been invited to attend. Senators will have the opportunity to engage these administrators over issues regarding how to move the university forward. She added that over a year ago, Regents President Bruce Rastetter had challenged the faculty to develop a plan for moving the university into the top tier ranks of public research universities. The Senate had put together a faculty working group, chaired by Professors Meenakshi Gigi Durham and Larry Weber, that had created a report, the findings of which will be shared with administrators and senators at the April 11 meeting.
Professor Gallanis requested that the report be distributed ahead of time. President Bohannan will look into this. Professor Tachau commented that she had attended President Harreld’s Town Hall forum last month and that she questioned the inferences made from some of the data he presented. She cautioned against accepting presuppositions that have a potential for ideological overtones. Professor Durham commented that it would be useful at the meeting to hear more about President Harreld’s vision for the university. President Bohannan noted that President Harreld has spoken about working with the university community to develop a shared vision for the institution; this is why the strategic planning committees were recently created.
During the fourteen months between authorization of the working group and completion of the report, a good deal changed. Six months after the report was authorized, J. Bruce Harreld was fraudulently appointed as president of the school, at the beginning of September, 2015. Two months after that, at the beginning of November, Harreld finally took office amid protests and even more revelations about his sham hire.
As noted above, the premise of the special Faculty Senate meeting on 04/11/16 was that the FSWG report would be shared for the first time, including with the illegitimate president. And yet as regular readers know there are considerable problems with that premise.
The first reported mention of Iowa’s national college rank by J. Bruce Harreld comes at the end of his candidate forum, on 09/01/15, after a contentious exchange about whether UI could ever become a “public Ivy”:
HARRELD: If we took the weighted average of the Ivy League schools, what would it be in terms of rankings?
QUESTIONER: What does that have to do with [cross-talk]?
HARRELD: Just answer the question. I don’t think it will be 70 yet. I think we can do better.
QUESTIONER: Of course it’s not 70, IVs are all in the top 15 but you said a public Ivy.
HARRELD: I think we can get into that league, do you?
QUESTIONER: Do I think that the University of Iowa is gonna pass Northwestern and Michigan and be a top 10 school? No.
Two days before he is fraudulently appointed, Harreld’s belief is that Iowa can get into the “top 15” in some ranking classification. Toward the end of September, in a letter to the editor in the Des Moines Register, Jacob Soll brings the conversation back to reality:
When Harreld talks about “taking the university from good to great,” we know he’s not being completely honest. Let’s be frank. The whole point of Iowa is that it won’t be an Ivy. It is ranked No. 82 in the country and it’s not going to make the top 20, or the top 40 for that matter. Harreld surely knows this.
On what to do to improve Iowa’s ranking, here Harreld is in a Press-Citizen report by Jeff Charis-Carlson, originally posted on 11/01/15, the day before Harreld took office:
Harreld said that the data provided to him by UI administrators and faculty members, especially the U.S. News and World Report rankings, highlight the importance of the faculty to the overall strength of the institution. He said he has noticed similar drops in the ranking of the institution as a whole and the ranking of UI in terms of faculty compensation.
“Are those correlated? I don’t know, but it seems interesting,” Harreld said. “… You see that in the data, and you kind of say, ‘Maybe there is a real tension here.’”
Harreld’s inference — that the best way to raise Iowa’s college rank is to raise faculty salaries — soon becomes a mantra, leading to Harreld’s incessant call for “world class” faculty hires. It’s also worth noting in passing that Harreld’s humility about correlating a drop in faculty pay with a drop in school rank is itself intentionally deceptive, because faculty pay is clearly stipulated as one of the criteria in the U.S. News rankings. (Once again, J. Bruce Harreld seems almost congenitally incapable of passing up an opportunity to lie.)
From less than two weeks later, on Iowa Public Radio:
CM: What do you think the biggest issues are?
BH: The biggest issues, we’ve actually dropped about 20 points in the overall rankings over in the last 12 years. A key drive of that is faculty salaries, and so we’re starting to really focus in on people picking off faculty members from us um, creating holes because of the salary levels and all the rest we haven’t been able to fill them. So we’re getting – we’ve got a lot of work to do. I’ve asked all the deans to actually go through uh layer by layer with the provost uh, how we rank relative to our peers. So I know faculty compensation and the entire package is a huge issue that we need to dig into.
CM: You recently told the Iowa City Press Citizen, you back a “faculty vitality” proposal, that is if lawmakers back, it would provide four and a half million-dollars for recruiting new faculty and also increasing salaries for tenured faculty. Why is this a good thing? Why are you supporting it?
BH: Well I just gave you a little bit of data that said that we’ve dropped quite a bit in overall rankings. Our ranking in terms of faculty salary and compensation package’s dropped, even a little bit more than the overall rankings. And so I actually equate it to if this inst- an institution like this is all about knowledge, creation, and dissemination. And if we don’t have the best in the world doing that, it’s like fighting a war with uh maybe one or two arms behind your back, so it’s critical.
Almost exactly four months before the purported unveiling of the FSWG report, Harreld has not only linked faculty salaries to the school’s ranking, he has made raising Iowa’s national ranking his rallying cry. In interview after interview, Harreld focuses on raising Iowa’s rank, and specifically on the rankings produced by U.S. News & World Report. That then leads to a Gazette story by Vanessa Miller on 03/24/16 — two and a half weeks before Harreld will reportedly be briefed on the FSWG report for the first time:
Instead of making spending decisions from the top down, as largely has been the practice in the past, Harreld on Thursday told The Gazette he’s charged 27 unit leaders — including college deans — with prioritizing their general education budgets for the 2017 fiscal year.
Harreld has asked those leaders to make funding decisions with three criteria in mind: advancing student outcomes, improving national rankings, and protecting core values.
Administrators then will convene around those recommendations with the larger vision of moving “to excellence in areas we already have and new ones we’re going to create.”
“I think we could be a top 10 public research institution during my tenure,” Harreld on Thursday told a packed Iowa City Noon Rotary Club.
While it will turn out that Harreld’s budgeting practices are even more autocratic than those of his predecessors, and Harreld will soon scrub the word “rankings” from his criteria for funding decisions, by some incredible miracle the ranking category that Harreld sees Iowa improving in evolves into exactly the category that Rastetter talked about in December of 2014. Even more amazingly, Harreld is not only hyping an unprecedented improvement in Iowa’s ranking, but the ranking he mentions ends up being the exact same numerical improvement that Rastetter asked for fifteen months earlier.
As to what actually transpired during the 04/11/16 Faculty Senate meeting, we do not know because the entire meeting took place in closed session. What we do know is that even before attending that meeting, and learning about the independent conclusions of the FSWG, J. Bruce Harreld was on fully on board with raising Iowa’s national college rank, and had been since before his appointment in early September of 2015.
For Part 2 of J. Bruce Harreld Officially Welcomes His Excellency J. Bruce Harreld, click here.
This is Part 2 of On the Origins of J. Bruce Harreld’s U.S. News Ranking Obsession. For Part 1, click here.
The FSWG Report in Detail
Why does the first page of the report say “Fall|16”, when that document was originally presented in April? Well, one answer might be that it has been updated, though the dates for the .pdf file would seem to contradict that. Instead of being modified a few weeks ago, it was last modified in May — meaning only a few weeks after being unveiled in April. If that’s the case, then “Fall|16” was slapped on the document back then, perhaps in advance of a public unveiling to come.
In any event, it’s now clear that when the FSWG report says “Last December” it is referring to December of 2014, not 2015. Which means, again, that the eleven members of the FSWG took more than a year to complete a document of eight pages, plus three additional pages of appendices. Among the many changes that took place during that intervening year, the most important relative to the report was the legislative defeat of the performance-based funding model, but that occurred in early 2015, only a few months after the FSWG was formed. As such, with that potential drain of funds off the table, the FSWG no longer had to highlight the tensions and trade-offs involved in increasing Iowa’s rank, but instead had free reign to tackle the ranking problem.
From the report’s Executive Summary, on page 2:
Rankings can influence universities’ ability to recruit and retain excellent students, staff, and faculty members; they also influence the economic impact of universities in their regions. Top-tier research universities serve as incubators for groundbreaking scientific, social, and artistic advances. High rankings bring substantial benefits to universities.
On a variety of metrics, the University of Iowa is a top-tier research institution. For many years, it was poised to move into the top 25 research universities in the nation. However, it dropped out of the top 30 for 2016, according to U.S. News & World Report rankings.
This report presents specific recommendations for how the University of Iowa could advance its status as a top public research university based on the criteria used to determine national rankings — always keeping in mind the University of Iowa’s mission to serve and educate citizens of the state of Iowa, especially rural populations and first-generation college students.
Earlier I said that while my first read-through of the FSWG report made sense, I soon began to notice that information important to a fair appraisal of the question at hand was missing. And it was not information that was hard to find. In that context, we will now look at not only what the reports says, but what it fails to say.
I. Where does the University of Iowa stand as a public research university?
The University of Iowa is one of the top ranked public research universities in the country. In 2015, the University of Iowa ranked 27th among public universities, according to the popular U.S. News & World Report rankings.[1] In 2016, it dropped to #34. A highly aspirational goal would be for the University of Iowa to move into the top 10 among all public universities.[2]
One of the first points that must made, if it is not already apparent, is that in talking about Iowa as a “public research university”, Harreld and others are already pulling a fast one because no such ranking exists — and that’s particularly true with regard to U.S. News & World Report. There are rankings for four-year colleges and universities, and rankings for public universities, but no specific ranking for “public research universities”. (While such rankings can be derived, the fact remains that aspiring to become a top-ten or top-twenty “public research university” requires inventing that category.)
In stating that it would be a “highly aspirational goal” to move Iowa into the “top ten among all public universities” — as opposed to public research universities — the FSWG report once again shifts the conversation. Still, the inclusion of the words “highly aspirational” makes clear that rising that high would be a long shot at best, and thus indirectly answers Rastetter’s original challenge from December of 2014, as well as Harreld’s claim of only a few weeks prior. Even in downplaying expectations, however, the FSWG report puts critical context in footnote 2:
[2] According to the U.S. News & World Report rankings, the top 10 are: the University of California at Berkeley, the University of California at Los Angeles, the University of Virginia, the University of Michigan, the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, the College of William & Mary, the Georgia Institute of Technology, the University of California at San Diego, the University of California at Davis, and the University of California at Santa Barbara.
Even a cursory review of those schools reveals that five of the ten are from the massive UC system, which is fed by what is now the sixth-largest economy in the world, while nine of the ten are in coastal states. Only the University of Michigan breaks that trend, yet Michigan’s population of almost ten million is more than three times that of Iowa. Ultimately, aspiring to a high national ranking is not sufficient because there are factors baked into the ranking cake that the University of Iowa simply cannot counter. Relative to many schools it is amazing that the University of Iowa has the prominence it has, but that’s perceived as defeatist talk by snobs who see only greatness and failure.
The next paragraph in the report contains a series of claims which culminate in a mathematical canard about the University of Iowa that will deservedly be destroyed:
High national rankings are seen as an indicator of quality, and as a result they bring many clear and substantial benefits to universities.
Note the words “seen” and “quality”, followed by the flat assertion that rankings bring “substantial benefits” to universities, because that’s all marketing speak. Also, nowhere is it pointed out that rankings may simply reflect advantages or benefits already accrued. Instead, the clear implication of that sentence is that an increase in rankings does more than change an abstract number — yet nowhere is that claim proven, because of course it can’t be.
Rankings influence a university’s reputation, providing branding and advertising value. Rankings attract students, who use them to shortlist their college choices.
Note the words “reputation”, “branding” and “advertising”. As to whether rankings below top-ten or top-twenty attract students in any numbers, no evidence is cited.
A good ranking would help keep the best Iowa students in state while also attracting high quality students from other states and nations.
As previously noted by the Faculty Senate itself, the problem is not in retaining more of the relatively rare high-quality students who leave the state, but Iowa’s obligation as a state university to accept many more students who will struggle or drop out. The only way to improve in the rankings on that score would be to tighten entrance requirements, but that’s not going to happen.
Studies have also shown that rankings are one of the factors that employers, especially large employers, pay attention to when considering whom to hire.
The point here seems to be that the prestige of the school will be a help to graduates, and that’s probably true. It’s also true that no matter how high Iowa rises in the rankings, no employer will ever equate Iowa with Harvard, Yale, Princeton or Standford.
One university president noted that doing well in the rankings “will directly affect an increase in revenue” from tuition as well as donors.[3]
I think we can all agree that cherry-picking anecdotal quotes is not a good sign in a scholarly work. The footnote points to the source, which is a publication from 2011 — when U.S. News’ rankings still placed significant emphasis on reputation. (One would think that after a year of research, the authors of the report would know that.)
Top-tier research universities serve as incubators for groundbreaking scientific, social, and artistic advances, which in turn attract highly qualified faculty and staff.
Again, while almost certainly true, this sentence not only omits any other contributing factor, it entirely avoids the question of how critical “highly qualified faculty and staff” are to incubating groundbreaking advances. Are rankings the chicken or the egg?
Finally, economic outputs are tied to rankings.
This sentence seems to lead into the next sentence, but doesn’t. In fact, they are both non sequiturs. Speaking of which, here is the piece de resistance:
The University of Iowa contributes $6 billion to Iowa’s economy annually (an <a href="http://research.uiowa.edu/ui-contributes-6-billion-annually-iowa-economy-creates-1-30-jobs“>ROI of 1500% for each dollar invested by the state).
Now, if you’ve been around the University of Iowa for any length of time, you’ve probably heard some version of this claim. That particular impressive example seems to come from a 2010 news story by — wait for it — the University of Iowa, but okay. (For good measure, and to show just how careful the FSWG was in choosing its stats, here’s Sally Mason in 2009, pegging the ROI at 680%.)
The problem with such claims, of course, is that the one thing everyone agrees on is that there isn’t enough money being spent on higher education in and by the state. Yet if the University of Iowa really did generate a guaranteed 1500% return (or 680%) on every dollar invested, all four lanes of Interstate 80 — in both directions — would be clogged with dump trucks full of cash, all of then headed to Iowa City. (After unloading they would just burn the dump trucks — or maybe make a big sculpture out of the parts, what with all the Liberal Arts students running around.)
In sum, if you read all of the above rationales in the original block paragraph, what you get is justification salad topped with insanity dressing. Which then leads to this:
Ultimately, these factors can increase the productivity, academic quality, and resources of a university, with corresponding benefits to the state and its population as well as to the nation and the world.
So there you go. In less than a page the FSWG conclusively proves that raising UI’s national ranking will produce a 1500% ROI, lots of branding, a sexy reputation and jobs for everyone.
In what can only be described as a welcome change of pace, the next page and a half, which comprises the remainder of the first section, involves an interesting discussion of organizations which rank schools based on research, as opposed to gimmicky education metrics which are used to sell magazines and ad copy. Prominent among them is the AAU, to which Iowa has belonged since 1909, but membership is not without its obligations:
The group currently includes 34 public universities. AAU institutions generate $23.4 billion in research expenditures yearly; they also produce approximately 3,000 patents and technology licenses every year. Recently, the AAU has added several new public and private members. But it has also discontinued the membership of the University of Nebraska – Lincoln and Syracuse University, noting that these institutions have failed to meet key performance indicators for membership.
And then there’s this:
In terms of its AAU membership and its standing on other rankings criteria, the University of Iowa is an elite research university. But it is not among the top universities in the nation — that is, it is not in the top 10, or even the top 20.
Were the University of Iowa to pursue a path to become more or less elite with regard to the criteria discussed here, changes at the University would likely have significant related consequences — positive or negative — for its students, faculty, and constituents, including the citizens of the State of Iowa.
For the moment, simply note the admission [italics mine] that changes could involve “significant related consequences — positive or negative“.
The next section is titled How are rankings determined? After breaking down the components of the U.S. News rankings — as well as committing the unpardonable sin of describing that for-profit company as a “disinterested party” — the FSWG gets to the point with regard to UI, which we have already covered twice:
One of the challenging aspects of attempting to improve a university’s ranking is that the criteria used by US News sometimes contradict the commitments of the schools, their governing boards, and constituents. For instance, Iowa’s universities could try to elevate their rankings by raising their entrance requirements and becoming more selective. Some of the public universities that have a higher ranking than Iowa’s universities are significantly more selective than Iowa or Iowa State.
Becoming more selective, however, would compromise the mission of Iowa’s public universities to serve a broad swathe of the state’s population, and would be inconsistent with the Board of Regents’ goals of reaching first-generation, working-class, rural, and ethnic minority students. Similarly, attempts to significantly raise the cost of tuition at Iowa’s public universities might result in improvements in the financial resources criterion, but might result in less access for Iowans from families with lower incomes.
Translation: it’s not gonna happen. Yes, if the regents allow J. Bruce Harreld to keep soaking the students with tuition hikes, then he’ll have more money to spend on faculty salaries, which may help in the margins. The bottom line, however, is that Rastetter’s goal of destroying Iowa’s higher-ed ecosystem and cornering the market on student bodies runs directly counter to the way that schools most effectively raise their rankings. Which of course leaves only one viable option, which the FSWG and Harreld and everyone else who is already on board with gaming UI’s ranking has already settled on, as indicated by the invention of the “public research university” category:
On other metrics such as extramural funding for research, the University of Iowa is poised to improve its performance and rise in the rankings. Securing federal grants, private support for research, patents, and licenses, would advance the university’s position in the rankings according to indicators used by the AAU, the Carnegie Foundation, and the Center for Measuring University Performance. Because one criterion for the U.S. News & World Report ranking is “reputation,” improving the University of Iowa’s status among these groups could impact its U.S. News rating.
In the entire FSWG report, this is the crux, and rightly so. Constrained by state obligations, sited in the grasslands and subject to sweltering summers and frigid winters, the University of Iowa profits most when it can attract outside dollars. How to do so effectively and efficiently from the point of view of the university is of course the question.
The third section is titled Future perspectives: The benefits of advancing the UI’s ranking, which is weird because it’s actually all about the benefits of increasing “research and creative activities”. In any case, by the time you finish reading the third section, which is a bullet-pointed list less that one page long, all problems in Iowa have been solved — meaning across the entire state, not just at UI.
As for footnote 5 in the FSWG report — which, again, took over an entire year to complete, and included the input of eleven different faculty members — it is noted here without comment:
[5] A recent news story noted that students’ dissatisfaction with entertainment options in Iowa contributes to its “brain drain” (Lauren Mills, “2015 college grads to continue exodus trend from Iowa,” Des Moines Register, May 10, 2015).
The fourth section, Recommendations, is one page long and concludes the report, save three pages of appendices. Here is the opening paragraph, which refers back to section three:
These positive potential outcomes of advancing the University of Iowa’s ranking as a public research university call for a plan of action to achieve that goal. The following recommendations identify steps the university and the Board of Regents can take to move forward in this area.
Of the eight Action items for the University of Iowa which follow, the first four and six total specifically mention research, and all eight relate to research. Of the two Action items for the Board of Regents, both are about research. So there you go. After eight grueling ‘white paper’ pages, the conclusion reached by the FSWG is that the best way for UI to increase its ranking among various groups that perform that noble service is research, research, research, and more research.
Writing a White Paper with a Brown Nose
As noted at the beginning of this post, there are two kinds of white papers. There are the kind of white papers that inform, and there are the kind of white papers that deceive. The white papers that inform are written by people who want to make sure that all sides of a question are presented. The white papers that deceive are written by people who want to sell you something.
Whether you had read the FSWG report in full or confined yourself to the liberal quotes reproduced here, it should be clear that the FSWG report falls distinctly in the deception camp. Yes, the conclusion that research is the best of a bunch of otherwise bad options for raising UI’s national college rank is right as far as it goes, but only if you buy into the premise that raising Iowa’s rank should be a consideration, let alone a priority. More tellingly, the only point in the entire report when that question was even obliquely broached was this:
….changes at the University would likely have significant related consequences — positive or negative….
What of the possible negative consequences? Well, because the FSWG report is a whitewash they aren’t mentioned. All the report presents is a set of facts in support of a foregone conclusion, which is the definition of a marketing ‘white paper’. Nowhere is there any mention of the cost of attempting to game UI’s rankings by any means, let alone the obvious risks and complexities associated with opening up a university to private-sector, for-profit dollars.
While focusing on research may enable UI to avoid some of the common pitfalls of gaming the U.S. News rankings, because it’s an indirect approach any consequent bump will likely be small, and only relevant to rankings which prioritize research to begin with. Meaning a full-out attempt to increase research in every conceivable way would probably only have a small effect on Iowa’s U.S. News rankings. Only by tackling the problem from multiple quarters could significant gains be made — albeit well short of top-ten or top-twenty status, and even lesser gains are conjectural. And yet where is any of that in the FSWG report?
Focusing the University of Iowa on research, and particularly on speculative, entrepreneurial-grade research, necessarily diverts resources from education. It is not possible to segregate dollars across the entire institution, particularly if faculty and staff are graded on their economic contribution to the school — as was recently proposed in an otherwise innocuous article on the UI website:
Among their suggestions for showing the relevance of scholarship to professional management:
* A new online publication and social media outreach aimed specifically at professionals, providing them with practical management advice in short, plain-language articles
* A greater willingness on the part of scholars to communicate the relevance of their work to management professionals
* Measuring a faculty member’s practical impact on business and society as a part of their evaluation
That’s right scholars, not only do you need to pay your own way, but you need a “greater willingness” to make it easy for businesspersons to profit from your work. It should also be obvious that businesses of every stripe would much rather play with state money than their own. Partner in a few start-ups where the state picks up most or all of the tab, along with providing plenty of free labor in the guise of student interns, and what’s not to love? Get your Research Activities Tax Credit here!
Having now settled the question of whether the FSWG report is a serious work of scholarship or marketing trash, one obvious remaining question is who wrote that marketing trash. While we know the names of the eleven people on the FSWG, it stands to reason that one or more individuals may have had a greater influence on the outcome than the others, but who?
In considering those eleven names, however, we notice a curiosity. While the FSGW was authorized on 01/27/15, we don’t know when it was staffed. What we do know, however, is when the 2015 University of Iowa Presidential Search and Screen Committee was named, and that was on 02/25/15. Oddly enough, on that committee were three individuals who would later be found among the authors of the FSGW report: Meenakshi Gigi Durham and Larry Weber, both co-chairs of the working group, and Lena Hill. (Also on the search committee was FS VP Christina Bohannan, who would later rise to president of the Senate during the search.)
While we haven’t run across Durham and Hill before, except insofar as they were on the search committee, Larry Weber is another matter. In fact, as noted by ‘TV’ in the comments to an earlier post, Weber played an important role on the committee by asking a question [see 7/30 meeting docx] which constrained the committee during the search:
Professor Weber wondered if we should only evaluate based upon the materials that were submitted.
Carroll Reasoner confirmed that the UI process is to review only the material submitted or rely on professional sites, not social media.
That constraint proved particularly useful to Harreld, whose paperwork consisted entirely of a bungled and deceptive three-page resume. In fact, a cynic might wonder if Weber asked that question precisely to constrain the committee from doing any extramural vetting of Harreld, at least until committee chair Jean Robillard could abruptly disband the committee to prevent same.
Proving his loyalist leanings, committee member Weber next pops up on the day of Harreld’s appointment — seven months or so before he and the rest of the FSWG actually get around to finishing Rastetter’s report. From a Press-Citizen story by Jeff Charis-Carlson, on 09/03/15:
Other members of the UI community said they appreciate the new perspective and focus on organizational strategy that Harreld offers. And with public universities facing a host of new competitors and challenges as higher education evolves, they argue, UI can’t afford to become trapped in projects and organizational structures that limit, rather than encourage, growth and adaptation.
“If we want to be able to ensure the University of Iowa is in a leadership position among our peers in 25 years, sometimes we have to think outside the box,” said Larry Weber, a member of the search committee and director of UI’s IIHR Hydroscience and Engineering.
Weber next pops up indirectly, when J. Bruce Harreld mentions in an interview that he’s planning on pushing hydraulics research at UI:
Mr. Harreld said he’s fielded inquiries about the university’s ‘big data’ studies, and specifically identified the Stanley Hydraulics Laboratory as one asset with noteworthy commercial potential, but declined to give details about any specific partnerships.
“I know a lot of people in corporate America, so I’ve asked them to come and take a look at what we’re doing, and see if it might play a role, and if they’re looking for a partner,” Mr. Harreld said. “This is going to lead to some pretty interesting potential relationships, so we’re launching some of those.”
Harreld’s comments come from a Corridor Business Journal article by Chase Castle, on 06/22/16, two months or so after Harreld purportedly first got a look at the FSWG report. In fact, the entire CBJ article was titled UI’s Harreld says private partnerships may supplant state funding, and repeatedly drove home the (only) conclusion of the FSWG document.
Finally, only a few days ago, the twitter account for Weber’s IIHR, if not Weber himself, announced the following gala event:
Why Harreld is being honored by Weber’s Flood Center has not been announced, though a cynic might wonder about the multiple convergences between the two men and their empires.
So — was Larry Weber the driving force behind the FSWG report? Well, who can say? It’s perhaps more concerning that ten other faculty members happily signed their name to what is, at best, a propaganda piece in service of the literal and figurative profit-motives of Rasetter and Harreld. Because once you signal that you’re willing to suck up to powerful interests by perverting your own values, you really don’t have much to offer anyone — particularly if you’re a scholar.
Readjusting the Ranking Obsession Narrative
On 02/02/14, almost nine months before J. Bruce Harreld’s fraudulent appointment, and almost two and a half months before then-UI President Sally Mason officially announced her retirement, Regents President Rastetter specifically challenged the UI Faculty Senate to improve UI’s standing in the U.S. News & World Report rankings. The most obvious question arising from that fact is why Rastetter made that appeal as president of the board, as opposed to the challenge coming from President Mason. As far as is known, Mason decided to retire after the “holiday break” at the end of 2014, meaning that when Rastetter spoke to the Faculty Senate she had not yet made her decision. On the other hand, if she made the decision earlier, or the “holiday break” that she herself referenced was Thanksgiving, then it’s possible that Rastetter knew Mason was leaving when he challenged the Senate.
One of many crackpot ideas which have floated up in these pages is the possibility that the sudden plunge in Iowa’s U.S. News Ranking in 2016 may have been rigged. After hovering at or near 70 for half a decade, in 2016 (meaning for the 2015-2106 academic year), Iowa’s ranking suddenly plunged to 82. What was never clear, however, was how anyone would have known to cripple Iowa’s ranking early in 2015, when J. Bruce Harreld himself only took to the stage (literally) at that same time. Now, however, knowing that Rastetter was seeking an increase in Iowa’s ranking nine months earlier, that timeline has changed.
I’m still not clear when the ranking data is compiled, but if it was sent to U.S. News in the six months or so prior to the rankings being released, that would mean a window from March of 2015 to the end of August. While Rastetter himself wouldn’t be in any position to directly fudge the data that was passed to U.S. News, he could appoint someone to the task, provided they had the access and authority. As it happens, we do know that one board employee — Mark Braun — was sent back to UI for a very short stint in 2015, before again returning to the board as the newly minted COO. Specifically, in early March of 2015 it was announced that Braun — who was Sally Mason’s longtime chief of staff — would return to UI after his TIER stint at the board offices, to become UI’s VP for Operational Efficiency and Regulatory Compliance. Four months later, however, at almost the exact time when Harreld was meeting secretly with four regents at Rastetter’s private place of business in Ames, it was announced that Braun would be headed back to the board.
Could Braun, in his UI VP position, have manipulated the information sent to U.S. News? Again, I have no idea, but that does fit with what we know about Rastetter, who tried a similar con just after Harreld was appointed. Instead of allowing UI’s budget request to be made for the coming legislative year, he ordered that no request be made so Harreld could then be credited with making that request. In that context, the idea that Rastetter might have primed UI for a ratings bounce-back under a new UI president — whether he had Harreld in mind in December of 2014 or not — doesn’t seem far-fetched. And if Braun had access to, or responsibility for, the data sent to U.S. News rankings data, that in itself would be concerning. (We’ll know soon enough whether Iowa’s 2017 U.S. News ranking does bounce back.)
Finally, with regard to Rastetter, there is a certain irony in the fact that he urged UI to raise its college rank to unprecedented heights, then turned around a few months later and precipitated a fraudulent presidential search leading to sanction by the AAUP. I’m not sure what other action Rastetter could have taken to more effectively undermine his own goal of seeing Iowa rise to “top ten status”, yet it seems likely than he simply blundered into that perfect calculus by virtue of his intrinsic drive to exploit every opportunity before him. (And in Rastetter’s defense, he obviously never thought he would get caught.)
As for J. Bruce Harreld, he has been consistent about advocating for the gaming of Iowa’s ranking since his candidate forum a year ago this month. There is also no question that subsequent to the closed-session Senate meeting in April of 2016, Harreld seems to be beating the drum of research funding as a key component of UI’s future success, while allowing his previous mania for “world class faculty” to fade. There is a big problem with assuming that the FSWG report changed Harreld’s mind about how to game UI’s U.S. News ranking, however, and that’s the fact that Harreld himself laid out the research argument in his candidate forum, over seven months before the FSWG paper was presented to the full Faculty Senate in closed session:
And so we need to be ambidextrous, we actually need to, actually take our core from great to greater, and take … and do some experimentation with new mo … business models, new technologies, hybrid learning opportunities — others I suspect we’ll get into.
So what is in the core — begs a question, what’s in the core? I believe, totally challengeable, I’m falling into this trap of, you know, what’s the vision? I think the vision is, all around excellence in teaching, scholarship, mentoring, on the one hand and on the other hand, research and scholarship. And those two things I think are what forms … that’s how you got so great.
And I’ve had discussions — and I’m sure questions will come up — that it would appear listening to you that there’s been some less than aggressive investments in those two areas. In fact maybe in fact some of the scope things have added more and more administrative staff, siphoning off resources from the core and re-investing in faculty, re-investing in research and well, I don’t think we’re gonna get through this without doubling down on what made us great and driving ourselves greater.
Had the FSWG report pre-dated Harreld’s candidate forum, it would be hard not to conclude that Harreld’s focus on research reflected the conclusions of that document — yet we know the report was not presented to the Faculty Senate until more than seven months later. On the other hand, the way that Harreld hangs on his words when he says, “…I’ve had discussions….” is interesting, because we also know about the secret meetings Harreld had with high-ranking members of the board and UI administration. Not only is it likely that Harreld was fully briefed on the direction Rastetter, Robillard and others wanted the school to take — including turning the university into a state-funded incubator for private-sector businesses — but in terms of abetting his own fraudulent hire, it’s particularly telling that Harreld knew not to mention his meetings with those men at any point during his candidate forum.
Later, on the subject of research, there’s this from the 26:34 mark:
I don’t have all the answers. Hopefully together we can get there. My guess is a lot of you have some of the answers. There a similar agenda I think on research which is … and I’ll speak about this from my experience particularly from IBM. Here’s my experience, IBM has major research capability. When … when we were in crisis mode we determined that part of the core for IBM was research and unlike a lot of other institutions, we didn’t cut research. We actually increased it and kept funding it, had to cut other things to maintain that and that’s still going on till today.
But one of the issues was as we did that, and started fixing our own hou … get our house in order, more and more research institutions like you, started knocking on our door and asking to engage with us — and my experience has been quite honestly it was a fairly ineffective process of the request. It was often — people would come at us for money and help fund us and I was searching for what’s in it for IBM? What problem are we trying to solve that you might help us solve?
And so there is a, is it a coaching and skill-building I think is required. I hope you’re doing it, but my suspicion is at least experience with some other institutions they’re not. And so there’s approach first for money.
The second issue is that we would often spend the next eight to nine months even if we said yes, dealing with the issues of intellectual property and who owns them. We haven’t started anything and yet we’re having this really complicated conversation that in fact doesn’t close for a long, long period of time and by then the enthusiasm to get going and start to study things starts to wane away. We got attorneys discussion … discussing things.
Several years ago when Dr. Jisky moved from Iowa state to Purdue, uhm, I started talking about some of these issues with him and some of the … and the real issues that IBM faces or other large organizations I suspect out here in the Midwest — Deere and Caterpillar and on and on and on — are actually not in … in the silos of your organization quite so neatly.
It actually turns out the bigger issues a lot of organizations are facing are interdisciplinary. And so now the next question is how do we in fact get faculty to come out of the — at Purdue — their departments, and actually work in a more collaborative way and that created this whole notion of Discovery Park, and I was on the early board of that. And as I got into these … these set of issues, a couple of things I noticed was that first of all we had built a series of buildings before we put in in place the appropriate programs and faculty support.
And so a lot of those buildings were interesting buildings with interesting names and really fantastic support but the programic side was really missing.
Second thing I noticed is this IP issue and the IP issues — we did some work and said, “How many things have we worked on collectively with corporate world that we’ve patented and have made a significant financial impact to Purdue?”
Then it was damn few, I mean, a lot of things were patented but in terms of the overall scheme of things, in terms of the budget, the notion that somehow we’re gonna strike it rich by having a long conversation to control intellectual property was in fact getting in the way our ability to collaborate with industry to solve first-of-a-kind problems and frankly they often put it back in the public domain. And I understand there’s issues on both sides of this.
So I actually think part of what I might be able to help do is work through some of those issues with you. I also might be able to open some doors. I also found actually a lot of the research issues at Harvard in the Harvard Business School, I could help people because I knew who to call and how — and get the dialogue going to actually know first we’re gonna listen to make sure we understand the problem before we actually propose what we wanna work on.
If you just follow Harreld’s rhetoric about gaming the U.S. News rankings from when he takes office until now, it may seem as if he switches from talking about faculty pay to talking about research after the release of the FSWG report. But if you go back to Harreld’s candidate forum, you actually find that both approaches are laid out together, like pincers in a battle plan. (While it might not be surprising to hear any president talk about faculty salaries and research, the key point is that Harreld ties them both to improvements in Iowa’s college rank.)
As you can see from the long transcript above, that’s almost exactly what Harreld says after he’s apprised of the FSWG report, when he’s quoted by the Corridor Business Journal — which obviously raises another interesting question. How is it that J. Bruce Harreld was delivering the same message to the UI community in September of 2015, when the FSWG final report was only delivered in April of 2016? Had Harreld’s views changed after the release of that paper — or perhaps as a result of seeing an early draft — that would be one thing, but that doesn’t seem to be the case. In fact, the opposite seems to be true.
Where the members of the Faculty Senate asked a lot of smart questions in December of 2014 in response to Rastetter’s impromptu challenge, and again in January of 2015 when the FSWG was constituted to produce a report, by the time that report was completed there were no challenges to the premise of raising Iowa’s national rank, and all of the important questions were left unanswered by that document. What should have been a scholarly white paper was instead reduced to marketing propaganda which somehow mirrored candidate Harreld’s rhetoric seven months earlier. Which means one possible reason why the FSWG report aligns so perfectly with J. Bruce Harreld’s emphasis on research — and one possible reason why it took the eleven authors of that report over a year to produce eight pages of sloppy argument, followed by three pages of appendices — is that J. Bruce Harreld himself helped write that report.
Setting all that aside, however, one thing is clear. Since I first began looking into the Harreld hire I assumed that Harreld auto-generated his ranking obsession soon after being appointed. My theory was that Harreld’s marketing mind latched onto the simplest metric that would make him look good regardless of the possible damage to the school, and that he has been pursuing that self-aggrandizing objective ever since. As we now know, however, it was Rastetter who got the ball rolling on intentionally trying to game UI’s college rank, way back in December of 2014, which means I was clearly wrong about Harreld’s motive.
In my own defense, I did look for precursors to Harreld’s ranking mania in the press, but it never occurred to me to dig into the meeting minutes of the Faculty Senate from before the commencement of the 2015 UI presidential search. Yet despite having learned of Rastetter’s initial challenge only a few days ago, I can’t say I’m surprised that he was the originator of Harreld’s self-proclaimed “top 10 public research institution” goal. What I now belatedly realize, and probably should have realized from the start, is that Harreld has been championing the gaming of Iowa’s national rank not because it will reflect well on him — although it will, and he clearly relishes that idea — but because J. Bruce Harreld is, and was no doubt hired to be, the consummate tool.
I’m just going to leave this here.
One of the very smartest, bestest and brightest, most-top-high professors I know recently moved from the top-ranked university in the world — not the US, the world — to the 60somethingth-ranked university. On purpose. After many many interviews. He did this because he thought his family would be happier there.
Here is who freaks about rankings: very, very dumb people.
Here is who considers ranking as minor in the scheme of things: people bright enough to be able to walk away voluntarily from #1.
Key to my friend’s decision, of course, is what he takes to be assurance that #60something will not **** with his research program, and will let him get on with his work in peace. Alas, I think he’s probably wrong about that, because that university is also vulnerable to statehouse ****ery. His previous university was unbelievably well-protected from small-time crooks in the state capital, and one of the things it did with its money was to build a very strong wall protecting its faculty, so that they could get on with their work in peace.
Moral: Research-university rankings are directly related to how much the state government and its cronies **** with the university’s workings. More ****ery = lower rankings.
There are two vectors here. Internally, I agree that everyone should be aware that ratings mean nothing. These are all smart people and they’re not going to make a decision based on a number put out by U.S. News.
Externally, however — and here I include the collective rah-rah consciousness of UI — appeals to rankings and “excellence” can have real appeal, which is of course why such appeals are a mainstay of college and university administrators. (Look into the rhetoric coming from any president’s office, and it’s the same blather, only differentiated by degree.)
The ease with which otherwise well-credentialed people were duped into writing that absurd ‘white paper’ shows just how easily those same people could be suckered into Harreld’s marketing rhetoric. And again — who’s ever against being better or excellent?
For me it always comes back to the kids, and the students are not served by this approach. If they want to root for a given sport, that’s great — there are rankings for all of those. Turning the school itself into a team that then spends time and money trying to game its own ranking is a waste, and the definition of failed leadership.
As has been documented in these virtual pages over the past year, and was just chronicled by DesMoinesDem at BleedHeartland, J. Bruce Harreld’s tenure in office as president of the University of Iowa has been dominated not by important policy debates or renewed attention to the needs of the students who are paying his bloated and indefensible salary, but by the machinations behind his fraudulent hire. For that reason, it is not surprising that Harreld is now engaged in a robust stage-managed public relations offensive at the beginning of his first full year on the job, in the vain hope that he can somehow wipe away the indelible stain of crony corruption After having repeatedly kept the press at arms length, and at times having gone into hiding, for the past two weeks Harreld and his media minders have been doing their best to slap a veneer of credibility over his invalid rise to power.
First there were reports that just after moving into the presidential mansion, J. Bruce Harreld was spotted jogging on campus. This was of course wonderful news, given that only six months earlier Harreld had confessed to a UI alum that he was afflicted with a “severe spinal problem” which forced him to only fly first class or on chartered jets. Harreld’s miraculous rejuvenation was subsequently confirmed when he was photographed toting boxes and hefting bags up stairs, while helping students move in to their dorms before the start of classes.
Moving on to bigger and better things, next came the J. Bruce Harreld Friend of Football tour, which included using a dying old football coach as a prop for publicity stills. That was quickly followed by news that Harreld had approved another ten-year deal for the current football coach, even though it contained a buyout clause just as onerous as the last contract. (So much for Harreld’s business experience giving UI the edge.)
Now, in just the past few days, we have learned that the coming week — meaning the entirety of the week, on a daily basis — will be devoted to “Inspiration”, which “will culminate in a presidential reception and program that officially welcomes
President Bruce Harreld to the UI.” Lest you think, however, that the only event actually focusing on J. Bruce Harreld is the final event, we have this from the IIHR —
— this from the College of Education —
— and this from the Office of Strategic Communication:
“Instead of focusing on a single event, President Harreld wanted to use the week as an opportunity to celebrate the UI in a larger sense by recognizing important milestones and moments while turning our attention to what it means to be a top-tier public research university today and into the future,” says Linda Snetselaar, associate provost for outreach and engagement and member of the Week of Inspiration planning committee. “We’re looking forward to a wonderful week filled with many moments of inspiration.”
That’s right. After arriving on campus in mid-semester last fall, and suffering the indignation of all those protests prompted by his illegitimate hire — which were in turn prompted by demonstrable abuses of power which eventually led to the University of Iowa being sanctioned by the AAUP — J. Bruce Harreld himself has arranged a week long celebration of J. Bruce Harreld. Truly, finally, an official welcome worthy of IBM’s former head of global marketing.
His Excellency J. Bruce Harreld in Context
Had J. Bruce Harreld been hired honestly, we could start the clock on his presidency in early November of 2015, when he took office. Because Harreld’s hire was an inside job, however, and because Harreld himself abetted the heist, we have to remind ourselves — despite whatever self-promotional marketing jag Harreld is on at the moment — that everything he says and does can only be understood in that context.
If you’re new to the Iowa campus, or you’re just wandering into the saga of the Harreld hire, the following three posts lay out the basics of the conspiracy behind Harreld’s fraudulent appointment. First, a point-by-point look at the lies told, in the press, by various co-conspirators. Second, a point-by-point look at Harreld’s own role in that conspiracy. Third, video evidence of Harreld lying to the press, the people of Iowa and the UI community only moments after being appointed.
The short version of the Harreld hire is that Regents President Bruce Rastetter and UI Vice President for Medical Affairs Jean Robillard engineered a sham search in which Harreld was the only candidate in the running long before the meat of the search took place. Had the exact same J. Bruce Harreld been hired after a fair search process, that legitimacy would have informed not only the response of the UI community to Harreld, but Harreld’s response to the UI community. What must always be remembered, however, is that it’s not just the UI community that knows Harreld is a fraud, it’s Harreld as well..
Every day, when J. Bruce Harreld wakes up, he knows he did not become president of the University of Iowa on the merits, but only as a result of conspiring with the two men who now dictate his every move. Although any UI president would answer to the Iowa Board of Regents, and in particular to the president of that body, the fact that Harreld is personally beholden to a subordinate on the UI campus only concentrates the toxicity of their mutual deceit. Because while J. Bruce Harreld does hold the title of president at Iowa, the real power behind his throne on the UI campus is VP Jean “Colonel Kurtz” Robillard, who is also dean of the college of medicine, the former interim president, and former chair of the search committee.
Precisely because of Harreld’s illegitimacy, in the regents’ system Robillard now functions not only as a de facto fourth university president in his overlapping roles as head of UI Healthcare, UIHC, and the College of Medicine, but he does so with impunity outside Harreld’s presidential influence. The reason for that — despite utterly embarrassing arguments to the contrary from the leadership of the UI Faculty Senate — is that Robillard was in on the conspiracy from the beginning. When Rastetter secretly met with Harreld in 2015, in a conference room on the Kirkwood campus on June 19th, Robillard was there. Several weeks later, it was Robillard who invited Harreld and his wife to the UI campus, so Harreld could give his dog and pony show to 40 bigwigs at UIHC. It was also Robillard who disbanded the search committee as soon as Harreld’s name was passed to the regents, so no vetting of Harreld could be done, as was traditionally the case.
Here’s Harreld himself describing how Robillard became fascinated with his smarts at the secret Kirkwood meeting, from a Press-Citizen story by Jeff Charis-Carlson, on 11/01/15:
Robillard, who has been one of Harreld’s strong supporters on campus since the regents voted Sept. 3 on his appointment, also noticed an affinity between Harreld’s theories and UIHC practices.
“(It) probably was a three- or four-hour meeting, and they spent a lot of time talking to me about organizational change,” Harreld said. “… I thought I was trying to help them figure out their search. But in the middle of this, Robillard said to me, ‘Wow. I didn’t realize that some of the things we’ve been doing at the hospital actually are just what you’ve been talking about.’”
About a week later, Robillard emailed Harreld and asked him if he would be willing to make a similar presentation to UIHC leadership. Details of that July 8 presentation, which included lunch with Rastetter and two additional search committee members, did not come out until two weeks after the regents voted to appoint Harreld as president.
Now here’s Robillard talking about how eager he was to have Harreld’s input, from a story by Eric Kelderman in the Chronicle of Higher Education, on 09/14/15:
Jean E. Robillard, Iowa’s interim president, its vice president for medical affairs, and the head of the 21-member search committee, was also familiar with Mr. Harreld. Earlier in the summer he invited the businessman to speak with some senior staff members at University of Iowa Health Care. Dr. Robillard did not recall how he had first heard of Mr. Harreld, but he brought him to the campus early in July to offer perspectives on improving health-service operations.
“We were looking for a different speaker — not a consultant — to come and tell us about what they did in a different enterprise, what they did to keep them at the top,” Dr. Robillard said. “When I heard his name, I said, This is the type of person that really I need to bring to give us a talk.”
Now here’s J. Bruce Harreld again, on the day before taking office, explaining just how involved he would be in Robillard’s medical empire:
The one area on campus that probably will see the least direct interference from Harreld is UI Health Care, which includes the UI Hospitals and Clinics, the Carver College of Medicine and the UI Physicians group practice .
“I think that’s in very good hands,” Harreld said of the leadership of Jean Robillard, UI’s vice president for medical affairs and a member of the presidential cabinet. “Not to say they don’t have issues. But what you find in healthy organizations is they always have issues that they’re working on.”
As you can see, the newly minted president of the University of Iowa — the top-ranking administrator on campus, who is supposedly beholden only to the Board of Regents — publicly announced that he would be taking a hands-off approach to Robillard’s empire on the west side of campus. And why wouldn’t he, given that Robillard actually did more than anyone to make sure Harreld got his job? Again, J. Bruce Harreld knows full well that Rastetter and Robillard hired him to be their tool, and right out of the gate he followed through on that promise, cutting Robillard loose to do whatever he wanted — including, months later, suddenly making himself dean of the College of Medicine.
Understandably, however, as the putative president at Iowa, Harreld might not want everyone to know he’s not actually the big man on campus, and one way to prove that would be orchestrating a week-long celebration of himself — after getting approval from Colonel Kurtz, of course. (To be clear, this week’s official installation of Harreld as president was on the books last November. It should be equally clear, however, that if Harreld himself did not want to be in the spotlight for the entire week, he would not be in the spotlight for the entire week.)
The Daily Iowan Interviews his Excellency
Going into this important, tightly-scripted week, then, J. Bruce Harreld finds himself wrestling with two related problems. First, he knows he’s a fraud, and second, he knows he’s a puppet. Unfortunately, there’s a third related problem which is that J. Bruce Harreld is being payed $800K a year ($200K deferred) to pretend he actually is a university president, in between doing whatever his minders tell him or permit him to do. While Harreld clearly enjoys having a crack media team to help massage his message and burnish his persona, his pesky presidential duties also include, invariably, sitting down with actual members of the press from time to time.
Fortunately for the UI community, not only does the mainstream press have great reporters covering higher-ed for the local papers, but the university’s own paper — the Daily Iowan — has been steadfast and unflinching in covering Harreld’s administration. Case in point, between last week’s photo-ops and this week’s upcoming coronation festivities, the Daily Iowan interviewed Harreld on a range of topics, producing the second extensive interview with the sham president in less than a year.
Excerpted from the 09/07/16 interview, as reported by the Daily Iowan staff:
DI: Now you’ve been in the job 10 months, so how has it been? What’s the biggest challenge you’ve seen?
Harreld: I think there have been several. I think getting our arms around the overall financial envelope to make sure we know not just from one month to the next but actually out over several years what we’re going to need. Of course, that’s guided by “what are we trying to get done,” and I think we’re starting to come to a pretty strong consensus around several things. The most important is the notion of excellence. We can’t do everything, but what we do needs to be really, really, really good.
If you’ve been following J. Bruce Harreld even peripherally since he took office, you know that his mantra about excellence is consistent and consistently insufferable. What you may not have noticed, however, is that Harreld’s harping on excellence is a scam in itself, blatantly hypocritical, and — worst of all — damaging to, if not outright dismissive of, the majority of students who will ever attend the University of Iowa.
Until quite recently I believed that Harreld’s consonant mania for gaming the U.S. News rankings was self-invented. I now know that Harreld’s obsession was commanded by Regents President Rastetter, who put that tired motivational ploy in play toward the end of 2014, and even talked the UI Faculty Senate into generating a propaganda paper toward that end. On the question of “excellence”, however, there is no question that what Harreld now purports to be a “consensus” was and is wholly his own invention, except insofar as it should be obvious that no one is against excellence.
When Jean Robillard invited Harreld to UIHC on July 8th, to dazzle the top administrators from the hospital and university, the title of his talk had a familiar theme:
The new emails add more detail about Harreld’s July 8 lecture to University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics leaders about “sustaining excellence” in organizations. Jean Robillard, the chair of the search committee and top hospital official, extended the invitation, met Harreld at the airport and called a “special leadership meeting” of his staff to hear the lecture. Search committee members Gardial, Rastetter, and Faculty Senate President Christina Bohannan had a university-catered “VIP lunch” with Harreld, whose wife was also given a tour of the campus. No other candidates or potential candidates received similar invitations.
After one month in office, at the beginning of December, 2015 — and with the advantage of knowing that Rastetter’s performance-based funding model had gone down to legislative defeat in the interim — — Harreld went to his go-to move of trashing former UI President Sally Mason, while once again emphasizing the same theme:
Last year, in the face [of] a proposed funding change that would have rewarded Iowa’s public universities for enrolling more residents, former University of Iowa President Sally Mason announced a goal of adding 5,000 students over the next five years.
Harreld’s claim that a consensus has now formed around excellence as an administrative strategy is a joke. Again, excellence is not a strategy in higher education, it is an omnipresent objective — just as it should be equally evident that not everyone and everything can be excellent. All of which means that what Harreld is touting is excellence as a marketing plan, which makes perfect sense given that Harreld is above all a marketing weasel. (Excellence in turn feeds right back into the idea of gaming Iowa’s college rankings, because rankings purport to signify excellence.)
As to the hypocrisy of Harreld focusing on excellence to the exclusion of all else, by his own definition Harreld should be fired on the spot and forced to return all the money he’s been given to-date. Other than among thieves, there is no definition of excellence which includes lying and cheating, and clearly Harreld did lie as part of the conspiracy to fraudulently appoint him to the presidency at Iowa. And yet this is the man who now presumes to speak to the students, faculty and staff at that school about excellence.
Even for jaded adults who have lived a good portion of their lives it may be hard to see past the veneer of Harreld’s accomplishments to his failings as a man. Unfortunately, for students just venturing into adulthood that sort of insight is all but impossible. Simply by virtue of having stolen his job, Harreld confers standing upon himself in the eyes of most students, who will never truly comprehend that a coup took place until elders of good conscience — and social and cultural standing — make that clear. Until that time, the 30,000+ students on the UI campus are hostage to Harreld’s hypocritical harping on excellence, and are unfortunately the most likely to fall for Harreld’s hype.
To see the danger in that, imagine you’re a freshman at Iowa, and you’re heading into the end of your first semester. Like a lot of students you find yourself struggling to fit in, struggling to keep up and struggling to meet the expectations of yourself and your family — who you will be returning to during winter break. Unfortunately, while you’re freaking out about your poor grades, and freaking out about all the money you’re wasting because of your poor grades, and freaking out about the fact that you’re responsible for yourself but there’s no owner’s manual for that, you notice that the president of your university spends all of his time saying things like this:
The most important is the notion of excellence. We can’t do everything, but what we do needs to be really, really, really good.
While you’re struggling, how are you going to feel when you hear that messaging, over and over? Are you going to feel like you’re excellent, or are you going to feel like maybe you’re not good enough to be at the University of Iowa? Because that is quite literally what Harreld is saying. If he can’t have excellence, he’s not interested in wasting time or resources on average or middling or normal or common — which, by definition, the great bulk of students in any class will necessarily be. (Unless Harreld also has plans for porting over blanket grade inflation from his stint at Harvard.)
This is why you do not hire a pugnacious business executive with no experience in academic administration to run a university. Because the odds are that such a person really will see the entire school as just another incubator for economic and professional success, as opposed to feeling any kind of sacred obligation to help those students who may have a hard time finding their academic footing. And of course once again we have to remind ourselves that this particular pugnacious business executive participated in a conspiracy of lies in order to acquire the academic pulpit from which he is now lecturing others about excellence.
Again, imagine you’re a freshman, the semester is coming to an end, and you know your grades are going to be a wreck. Maybe you’re isolated socially, and maybe the only lesson you’ve learned so far is that drinking takes your mind off your problems. If you don’t recognize the trouble you’re headed for, and someone else doesn’t step in, what might you do to avoid the embarrassment of not being excellent?
Even if you feel no stigma about reaching out for help — including asking for mental health support under what anyone would agree are appropriate circumstances — what are you going to do when you find out that the wait time is two or three weeks, right as finals are bearing down on you? Because despite Harreld’s incessant yammering about excellence, he himself is slow-walking the number of mental health hires necessary to keep up with student demand, which is particularly damning given that the incoming freshman class just set a record, by far.
Why is J. Bruce Harreld refusing to spend money when he could easily put those assets in place — particularly after jamming his egregious tuition hikes through only months before? Because J. Bruce Harreld only wants to spend money on people and projects that are excellent, not people who are struggling, or who may never be excellent in Harreld’s eyes. And if you think I’m joking, read his quote again from the point of view of a struggling student, who feels like they’re a failure, who’s trying to figure out what to do, and who’s looking for a sign from someone who supposedly knows:
Continuing, from the next paragraph in the DI interview:
Just getting that through, and a consensus on that and figuring out the implications on that. So I think the strategic plan and financial model have been a big step forward. I think calming everybody down as to who I am, and what my values are, and why I really am here. As much as I’ve said, I think it’s taken a while to settle in that I really do believe intently in institutions like this, and they really do have an important role to play going forward.
Here again Harreld claims success for “getting that through”, when he actually stuffed “excellence as a strategy” down the collective throats of the UI community. Without breaking stride Harreld then pivots to another of his favorite themes, which is that people on campus were somehow hysterical last year, as opposed to rightly incensed by the illegitimacy of his appointment — to say nothing of his pugnacious demeanor, of which trolling and taunting others has proven to be a cornerstone.
Whether Harreld is aware of it or not, his recurrent use of the word ‘calm’ originated with Governor Terry Branstad last year, who trotted out the same condescending tone in initially responding to the legitimate outrage on the UI campus. From the Gazette’s Rob Boshart, on 09/29/15 — less than a month after Harreld’s sham appointment, and following weeks of belated disclosures about the conspiracy behind Harreld’s fraudulent hire:
Gov. Terry Branstad advised faculty members at the University of Iowa Tuesday to “calm down” and give incoming President Bruce Harreld a chance to prove himself as the school’s 21st leader.
The Republican governor called it “outlandish” that dozens of UI faculty members representing the institution’s largest college recently called for the “immediate resignation and/or dismissal of the existing State of Iowa Board of Regents” for hiring Harreld as the new president.
Because Branstad is a politician, however, he recognized that he blew it, and came back a week later with a shocked tone reeking of faux disappointment. Because J. Bruce Harreld is a politically tone-deaf marketing weasel, he continued taunting the UI community with the word ‘calm’ last year, and as you can see from the quote above he continues to do so to this day. (If you’re wondering why Harreld’s use of the word ‘calm’ is inappropriate, imagine that Harreld punched you in the face, then told you to calm down when you reacted to being punched in the face. That’s why it’s inappropriate.)
Continuing, from the next paragraph of the DI interview:
On the other hand, a lot of funders have been disinvesting, and so we need to get our act together and start figuring out what Plan B is and what our other sources are on the revenue side. I think people largely calmed down and realized I really am committed to it and I’m willing to step up to some of the hard issues we’re facing. So I think all that’s a set of issues and then I think there’s a set of issues we’re facing in terms of campus safety and … getting ourselves to what’s beyond the six-point plan.
Again, because Harreld is at heart a bully, he comes back to almost the exact same “calm down” language Branstad used. As for stepping up to “some of the hard issues we’re facing”, this is the same man who crapped his pants, went into hiding, then vomited all over himself in response to the AAUP sanction.
After a lucid paragraph about student housing, Harreld berates the same point for a third time:
We can continue to complain about things and dial down, or we can start pick the things that we think are really important and celebrate our success and agree on how to make them better. I think we’ve gotten a lot done. And we have a lot more to go.
After an entire summer to get his mind right, or at least ‘on message’, and with the obvious goal of at least pretending to be a university president in order to do his minders proud, it only takes one direct question from the Daily Iowan staff before J. Bruce Harreld goes right back to being the small, petty man he has been since he was hired. Nobody put a gun to his head (metaphorically) and forced him to say any of that, but he couldn’t stop picking at what he perceives to be slights against him from last year. Instead, he had to harp again and again on the idea that people who oppose him are out of control, while he himself is a paragon of virtue and sincerity.
Even assuming for the moment that Harreld’s presidency was legitimate, such comments are beneath the dignity of anyone occupying the office of president of the University of Iowa. In fact, however — and there is no objective dispute about this fact — Harreld’s presidency is illegitimate, and he knows that. As the AAUP sanction clearly showed, Harreld and his co-conspirators were the abusers, yet here we have J. Bruce Harreld, in statement after statement, using his illegitimately gained office for blame the victims of that abuse for their outrage at that abuse.
Picking up on Harreld’s apparent unhappiness, the DI follows Harreld’s lead:
Harreld: It feels better. It feels better, but. It feels better because I think we’re now talking instead of screaming at one another. I have a good friend who’s a journalist who had a good phrase: “Protests are great, but when is the dialogue going to begin?” He said that a year ago, not about me but other things in the country, and I think it was a powerful phrase, because it’s one thing to protest, and protests do make a statement, but what’s next? And to get to what’s next, I think people need to trust one another and start having meaningful discussions of where their differences are, and why they have differences are, and sometimes they’re legitimate from different points of view, and sometimes they’re illegitimate because they don’t have the right data and so at any rate, starting to work at that.
How do you trust a liar? And no, that’s not a rhetorical question. J. Bruce Harreld is a liar. He will lie to your face, and yet he’s the one calling for trust.
As for meaningful discussions, where’s the meaningful discussion on how Harreld lied about the origins of his candidacy in order to cover up the conspiracy that hired him? Wouldn’t you think that would be an important topic — particularly if Harreld felt he was innocent? Instead, we got one story in early September, then another story in early November, yet Harreld never bothered to explain why the first story was suddenly false. (Or why Rastetter and Robillard said nothing at the time, even though they were in the room when that lie came out of Harreld’s mouth, and they both knew it was false.)
Continuing:
I think part of my joining the community was caught up in that long history of tension between the state and the regents, and I’m not so sure I had much to do with that, but yet I got caught up in it. And then, I think, having my background in terms of a business person, and clearly, business people must only be here to slash various activities and to resize and often business people “don’t have any values” or “don’t appreciate art” — give me a break.
Here we come to another recurrent Harreld theme over the past year, which is that people are confused about who the bad guys were regarding his sham hire. That is in fact the same lie he had his toadies on the Faculty Senate trot out when Harreld himself could do nothing more than gurgle in response to the AAUP sanction. From the UI Alumni Magazine, in December of 2015:
On Nov. 2, Bruce Harreld officially became the 21st president of the University of Iowa. In the weeks since his September hiring, he has met with faculty, staff, students, and alumni, and he has accommodated a packed schedule of events and meetings in an effort to introduce himself to the UI community—particularly those opposed to his hiring. While Harreld realizes much of that discontent was aimed at members of the state Board of Regents, whom faculty felt tossed aside public input during a controversial search for Sally Mason’s successor, he still felt the sting.
The message, nine months later, is once again that J. Bruce Harreld is the real victim in all this.
For Part 2 of J. Bruce Harreld Officially Welcomes His Excellency J. Bruce Harreld., click here.
Concerning Part 1:
1. It appears a little weird to have this scheduled on on the 15th anniversary of 9/11, which is the defining history event of the 21st Century (thus far):
Student kickoff event
Sunday, Sept. 11, 4–6:30 p.m., Pentacrest
Enjoy performances by the UI’s Intersection, Hawkapellas, Iowa Agni, and UI Old Gold Acappella, as well as spoken word by B.A.R.S. (Black Art; Real Stories). There will be free burritos and ice cream while supplies last.
Not to get all unctuous and overly sentimental, but maybe this could have been scheduled Monday???
Maybe no one outside of New York or Washington feels that 9/11 is that important anymore, although arguably the event of the 3rd largest loss of life on US soil — and largest non-natural disaster– since the civil war dominates recent history.
2. It seems accurate that Harreld is celebrating Harreld for being Harreld as well as pimping the university about Harreld. The past year has been devoid of any great academic move forward, or great university accomplishment — perhaps the new Hancher or remodeled campus count although started years ago.
Harreld has done really nothing other than hang around and calm everyone down about Harreld. Harreld wants to be the center of all attention, despite Harreld being the center of no particular accomplishment.
And this I believe is how the Harreld years will go nothing monumental will occur, there will be no accomplishments of substance moving academics at the UIowa forward, as a result of Harreld.
We will see press releases, and bluster, and general marketing weaseling, but nothing really of any true importance.
Wonder if this is happening at UArkansas where the tOSU guy Steinmetz landed? Looks like Iowa got the self-indulgent marketing genius and Arkansas got the man with the plan.
http://www.uatrav.com/news/article_3ddd8cfa-6f01-11e6-8855-bfd649cc0cbc.html
http://www.uatrav.com/opinion/article_0062598e-63ec-11e6-a3cc-675dd55fffc7.html
http://news.uark.edu/articles/35000/ua-system-chancellor-steinmetz-endorse-new-state-higher-education-funding-formula
If I’ve been surprised by anything over the past year, it’s the degree to which Harreld is just incredibly thin on understanding the media. Whatever else he did at IBM, he really was head of global marketing for years, and yet his bandwidth seems to be as narrow now as it must have been then. Yes, he’ll stay on message, but that’s true even if it’s the wrong message!
(Again, I come back to the fact that he had all summer to get himself together, and he can’t do it. Constitutionally, psychologically — I don’t know what the problem is, but unless he’s reading someone else’s words and sticking tightly to that script, he just lapses into bile.)
Of greater concern is how unprepared Harreld is to deal with an actual emergency or issue of serious gravitas. Not only has he fumbled basic decisions and responses over and over, but many of the wounds he suffered in his first year were entirely self-inflicted. Put any issue of real substance on his plate, let alone something unfolding in real time, and you’re going to get the same guy who literally could not — and still cannot — summon up a coherent response to the AAUP sanction.
http://qctimes.com/news/opinion/editorial/columnists/guest/guest-view-new-u-of-i-president-doesn-t-get/article_2bd9471c-cd8b-5940-b77e-1c962eb9cf0b.html
Even if he just calls Eileen Wixted and asks her how to handle the issue he does better than he’s done so far, so what’s the problem?
Tomorrow is a milestone in that the U.S. News rankings for 2017 will be released. Harreld doesn’t have to own them because he’s just starting his first full year, and it will be easy for him to spin the results regardless of the actual number. If they’re down, he hits the panic button. If they’re flat, he hits the panic button. If they’re bounced back at all from the plunge they took last year he takes credit for the rebound and still hits the panic button.
After this year, however, those numbers are on him, and because he’s made a huge deal about raising those numbers (and others of his own invention), he’s going to have to go all-in on committing time and resources to that end. And that in itself is failed leadership. (And also about what you would expect from a marketing weasel.)
After tomorrow the clock really starts ticking on Harreld, and he’s set some pretty audacious goals. Transformational change. Top 10 public research university during his tenure. Going all-in on big data, hydraulics and professional education (which seems to be his new name for the “executive education” course he taught at Harvard).
Then there are the cuts, which he’s hinted at and promised endlessly, yet never actually specified. You can only talk smack for so long before you have to hit someone, and so far Harreld hasn’t tipped his hand. Who’s going to take the brunt of his abuse, and how are they going to respond — both publicly, and behind the scenes?
And yes, I really lament the loss of Steinmetz. A man who positioned himself perfectly for the leap to Iowa, and who would have understood the institution instead of forcing the institution to bow to his blind spots. If there’s any silver lining it’s that he didn’t end up wasting his time working for, and being impeded by, the crooks at the Iowa Board of Regents.
Anyway, like I said, tomorrow’s the big day. After that, Harreld owns UI, and he’s going to have to start delivering on his promises. And that starts with his big speech and coronation on Friday, to which he has summoned all of the power players on campus. Can’t you just feel the adoration?
It is amazing the vacuousness of Harreld’s responses. Almost cocktail speech like. He goes on and on to say nothing.
Words like ‘doggone good’. What person in a major leadership role says crap like that? (George Bush excepted)
Look at his responses. He knows the backstory on Dr Cech but doesn’t appear to remember his name. (btw Cech is a chemist which Harreld doesnt seem to know, amazed Cech isn’t in medicine)
I was going to pretend I am a new CEO of IBM, then answer the DI’s questions, Let’s see if I can fake it in broad generalities.
Harreld doesnt seem to know academics, nor know his university, so he retreats to broad platitudes.
Or he is losing it cognitively.
This is Part 2 of J. Bruce Harreld Officially Welcomes His Excellency J. Bruce Harreld. For Part 1, click here.
Continuing from the recent Daily Iowan interview:
And so I think we’re beyond much of that and people are starting to see that I have probably more artists in my family than people would realize; I have four Mandarin speakers in my family, so I’ve got a multicultural background. I’ve got, as my wife says, whatever the student issue is, we’ve experienced it, so let’s sit down and work on it. So I think people are calming down. And the “but” I said earlier, is yeah, it’s calmed down, but now we’re working on the bigger issues. And the bigger issues are University of Iowa long term, how do we get to excellence? We’ve dropped in some rankings, we need to get faculty salaries up, we need to get staff’s salaries, we still have some gaps there, we have some new programs that are interdisciplinary in nature and we really need to funds them.
Here, in a tour de force of ego, Harreld not only name drops his accomplished relatives — who almost certainly acquired their language skills as a result of hard work, as opposed to lying — but manages to distill all of his themes into a seamless whole. There’s “calming down” again, and “excellence”, and “big issues”, and “rankings” and “salaries”. If it wasn’t so revolting it would be impressive for its improvisational ruthlessness.
DI: When you first start a new job, there are always things that surprise you or that you’re not expecting. Is there anything that really surprised you in this role?
Harreld: I think having talked to a lot of people, walking on campus, seeing all the backlash against me and how I was hired and all of that, left me with a sense that the institution had a lot of things that were really lacking, and I think now that I’ve been here I actually think we don’t know how good we really are. I mean there are a lot of things here that are really, really, really good and whether that be space physics or a writing, or rhetoric program, or athletics, or even some of our cultural houses, even thought we haven’t taken care of them for a while, there heritage and their history and the importance of that. So I could keep going; our law school going from pretty OK rankings to pretty doggone excellent rankings, our finance program in Tippie, the pharmacy, the dental school, the medical complex. So we have a lot here and … underneath all that, of course, are really great people and there are a lot of really good people, and yet we sit in an environment [where] all we want to do is complain. And all we want to do is say, “Jeeze, well, we’re just really not.”
Here we have the ultimate in condescension. If not for the Great Man coming to the University of Iowa — albeit as a result of a conspiracy of lies which he himself abetted — the natives at UI would not understand just how great their school really is. Lucky Iowans! And no, don’t look too closely at that first sentence, where Harreld gets in yet another dig at the people who opposed his hire, which has nothing to do with the question, and nothing to do with the rest of that sentence or paragraph.
And of course Harreld also has to come back to the idea that everyone is complaining — only here he deflects from complaints about his diseased presence on campus and redirect them into complaints about the school itself. If only the poor stupid Iowa natives would stop whining and complaining, and lift their downcast heads, J. Bruce Harreld could instill in them a marketing plan that would profit him greatly!
I felt like I’ve said publicly that I feel like at times we have a culture of dependency. It’s a culture that says, “Let’s go down to I-80 to Des Moines and ask for more and more money because woe is us,” you know. Instead, I think one of the things that we need to understand is start saying, “No, we could earn our way. We’re doggone good, and people like supporting winners and people with a smile on their face” instead of saying, “Oh, I’m just really struggling,” and so one of the things that’s really surprised me is the depth and breadth of the talent and the programs that are here. And why on earth don’t we polish those off, put them up, and get going with them. That’s good news.
Culture of dependency? Culture of dependency? This from the man who needed the corrupt sitting president of the Iowa Board of Regents and the corrupt VP for Medical Affairs at the University of Iowa to even have a shot at the job he now holds? And then he segues into “earn our way”, as if suddenly the University of Iowa is for-profit business?
Again, look at the impact of this sick messaging on a struggling college student. “People like supporting winners”. People like people “with a smile on their face”. And what the hell is wrong with saying you’re struggling when you’re really struggling? This is the same sham president who himself went down I-80 multiple times, begging the crony political powers that be to give him the job he now holds, and he’s the one passing out advice about self-reliance and “earning our way”?
After the next question Harreld gives a long whiny answer about how tough he had it commuting to campus and back, before again reminding the DI that he’s smart:
DI: So speaking of big challenges, there obviously is a lot of construction happening around campus; can you give us an update on it and where you hope to see it in the next few months?
Two years ago we missed a window for the Dubuque Street construction up through there and raising that because of the floods. It would have been a lot better two years ago, but it didn’t happen for a whole set of reasons, and that’s not the university, that’s the community. So, tough, but it’s what it is.
Translation: if only the regents had driven Sally Mason out sooner, and appointed Harreld in her place, he wouldn’t have had so much trouble getting to and from campus last year. And I honestly think in Harreld’s mind that he believes he would have seen the need and acted immediately, even though, when faced with an obvious problem at the UI Department of Public Safety, he took a close personal look at that issue and got the answer completely wrong.
Moments later, there’s this:
I used to say this, and I’ll repeat it, because you may not have heard it … when I talked to other presidents last year and asked them, Big Ten or other institutions, I’d say “What are you focused on? What are your big terms?” They would almost always go over infrastructure because it was so antiquated. And I would never say this to them, but I was certainly thinking it. Well, we’ve got the other issue, because we’ve got all infrastructure that’s going to be 21st-century infrastructure coming online here now in the next few months, big time.
And maybe there was a silver lining with what happened in 2008 with all the floods and all the wonderful work people here and FEMA have done to bring some of these buildings back to life.
Because J. Bruce Harreld wasn’t around in 2008, it’s perhaps understandable that he doesn’t know the reality of what happened. What’s not understandable is how a grown man could use the phrase “silver lining” to describe any part of an inundation that led to over a billion dollars in losses in Iowa City alone. And yet as you can see, not only does Harreld go there, but he makes clear that the silver lining is really his, personally, because now he gets all those snazzy new buildings to play with, instead of the old, “antiquated” facilities that are dragging down other campus leaders.
If, like world-class business executive and visionary leader J. Bruce Harreld, you’re not actually familiar with the flooding in 2008, the first thing you need to know is that the flooding in Iowa City was caused by heavy rains to the northwest, which fed into a series of rivers that angle cross the state to the southeast, where they empty into the Mississippi. All told, the flooding on those rivers did over $50B in damage, including submerging downtown Cedar Rapids and the surrounding area:
About 1,300 blocks or 10 square miles, including most of the downtown area, were inundated, with more than 5,000 homes being affected. Mays Island (which included the Cedar Rapids city hall, the Linn County courthouse, the county jail, and the federal courthouse) was flooded up to the second floor level. Buildings that did not suffer any first floor damage had flooded basements. The Czech Village, Time Check, and Cedar Valley/Rompot districts in particular sustained significant damage. The city’s domestic water distribution was compromised, as all but one of the city’s wells were flooded, and water usage restrictions were imposed; however through a massive sandbagging effort the city’s last remaining well was kept operational throughout the disaster.
Are you seeing the silver lining, because I’m not seeing it. One other thing I’m not seeing in the DI’s 5,000 word interview, by the way, is any mention of Sally Mason by J. Bruce Harreld. That’s partly weird because Mason was the one who pulled the school together and led the fundraising that went into buying J. Bruce Harreld all of his shiny new buildings, so he doesn’t have to mope around all day like a second-class fake university president. It’s also weird, however, because Harreld apparently likes Mason, whom he previously “worked with very closely” and knew for more than a decade as a member of the Purdue mafia — along with Purdue President Mitch Daniels, who was absolutely, positively the person who brought Harreld to the attention of the search committee, until suddenly he wasn’t.
And yet, as regular readers know, this isn’t the first time Harreld has failed to credit Mason with her successes. From an update to a post following Harreld’s first DI interview, in mid-April:
As before, Harreld’s comments about campus sexual assault were specifically prompted by questioning from the Daily Iowan. Had the DI not recently reported on that issue, and had they not continued to press Harreld for information, I have zero doubt that the issue would never have come up. Although Harreld’s response was scattershot and at times incoherent, there is also no question that he himself claimed implicit ownership of the plan’s advancement and success, while at the same time failing to mention Sally Mason at all. That disreputable tendency — first exhibited on his own resume, when Harreld took sole credit for works which were co-authored — is emblematic of why J. Bruce Harreld is temperamentally unsuited to be the president of any college or university.
Where J. Bruce Harreld should be generous and gracious, he is petty and self-serving. Where Harreld should instinctively put the completion of the six-point plan in historical context, he instead uses the work of others to whitewash his own past. Seven and a half months ago J. Bruce Harreld dismissed Sally Mason’s six-point plan to combat campus sexual assault as a joke. In the interview published today, however, he repeatedly implies that he himself was materially involved in the university community’s longstanding efforts to combat that problem. Once again, shame on J. Bruce Harreld.
That DI interview, conducted also with UI Provost P. Barry Butler, was just over 4,000 words, and again Mason’s name never crossed Harreld’s lips. What is his pathological need to scrub Sally Mason from the history books at Iowa? Why can’t Harreld be gracious about someone he also professes to like? (Those questions were rhetorical. For the full post following Harreld’s first interview, click here.)
Returning to the recent DI interview, after more on the benefits of catastrophic natural disasters, Harreld’s answer to the next DI question is interesting:
DI: People have said there are efforts to change the culture on campus by bringing together different disciplines — for example, the art museum and the plans with Seashore — is that your intention?
Harreld: I think the world as I see it, and the people I’ve been working with and the faculty, and the strategic planning team, the word of collaboration comes up a lot, and I’m picking it up in a lot of my comments even here today, because the world they see is one in which the disciplines we’ve had in the past will still be important, but it’s the interrelationship among the disciplines, academic disciplines, that starts becoming interesting.
I was at a dinner last night with some of our top medical researchers because they were celebrating a gentleman who was given an award for being the best mentor to graduate students in the medical area. There were probably about 30 people there. And the topic of conversation became the intertwining of these disciplines, and one person, who is Nobel laureate, by the way, who came here from the University of Colorado and grew up here in Iowa City, he spoke yesterday and came by some of the high schools and here on campus. His point was, he started describing his own lab, and one of the labs he has, and he’s doing medical research, and he listed all the disciplines of the people — graduate students in his lab — and you couldn’t find the “medical” word in there. They were engineers, they were biologists. And as you went through this, we all kind of said, “Wow, we really have scrambled these eggs.”
Now, personally, I think this is very smart stuff, and I couldn’t agree more strongly about the importance of collaboration among academic and scientific disciplines. I’m not sure that Harreld is being particularly insightful, however, but because three years ago I wrote this, as part of a yet-to-be-published work:
In the end, the only way to move medical science to open up a new inquiry is to first exhaust all other rational explanations. However, because of the inherent bias of specialization, the implicit blindness of generalization, and the truly dubious nature of many patient complaints, individuals suffering from previously unknown health problems may at times feel that galvanizing attention is a clinical impossibility. What one specialist considers meaningful another may discount out of hand. What one line of inquiry suggests, real-world limits on time, money and research may deny.
As I think everyone would agree, if a non-academic free-radical like me can get there on my own, I’m not sure how much credit J. Bruce Harreld deserves for recognizing collaboration and interdisciplinary research as the wave of the future. And yet from his answer it’s quite clear that Harreld himself thinks this is a very big thing, even if it’s already ‘out there’. So why does Harreld go on and about all that for five paragraphs?
The answer, of course, is that J. Bruce Harreld is positioning himself to take credit for any advances that come from interdisciplinary collaboration. Yes, dropping the “Nobel laureate” mingle was lame, as was dropping his home state of Colorado — where he and mentor Jerry Stead somehow managed to live only a hundred miles apart, yet absolutely never, ever, ever talked about the Iowa presidency until after Bruce Rastetter called first — but the real red flag is in the last line:
And as you went through this, we all kind of said, “Wow, we really have scrambled these eggs.
What’s that “we” doing in there? Because from the gist of the story it sounds like whatever transpired happened without Harreld’s help, but there Harreld is inviting himself to a heaping helping of credit. And yet as regular readers know, that’s actually Harreld’s modus operandi.
Start with Harreld’s narrative about his years at IBM and you find a man not only claiming to have been critical to that company’s avoidance of what would have been Chapter 11 bankruptcy at worst, but also taking credit for all of the successes that followed as the company finally caught up to the pace of change in technology. (Lou Gerstner? Who’s that?) Okay, sure — that’s what people do on their resumes, they take credit. Except on Harreld’s resume he also took sole credit for papers he collaborated on, and some only marginally at that. Which of course led to Harreld being censured before he even took office, which he later excused by claiming that’s how citations are done in the business world, even though he spent the prior eight years not in business but as a senior lecturer at Harvard. (I am still waiting for someone to produce a list of all of the university presidents who got themselves censured before their first day on the job.)
Want more? Okay, how about taking credit for the completion of Sally Mason’s six-point plan to combat campus sexual assault in last April’s DI interview? Which of course followed on Harreld trashing Mason’s six-point plan during his candidate forum, which he intended to replace with “N-O”. Which, immediately after his appointment, Harreld then augmented with the bold idea of deputizing the football team to “do something”.
Which now brings us back to last week’s DI interview, the advantages of collaboration, and this:
In that context, I believe architecture makes a difference in those types of things, and we ought to use architecture to our advantage. And also, location, obviously, is a piece of that. So, yeah. I think we’re facing a world in which we’ll respect the disciplines, because you need to have the groundings. At the same time, we’ll celebrate the interrelationship and intermingling.
Several places around the country have done similar things. It’s a little bit, in a crude way, it’s like an art museum and a library will be the third institution around the world that has formally put them together, in a way. One place is in Scotland, and one place is in Germany, I believe. You don’t do those things as accidents, you do them purposefully.
The backstory here is that Harreld blew up plans for a public-private partnership that was on the boards, which would have led to a new UI Museum of Art (UIMA) on the edge of downtown Iowa City. The University needs a new art museum because the old one was one of those antiquated buildings that Harreld was spared from by the fortunate floods of 2008. When Harreld refers to the rarity and brilliance of combining an art museum and library, he’s talking about the new plan to site the UIMA next to the main library, and have them play off each other. And it’s clear from his quote that he himself is taking credit for that decision.
Except, as regular readers know, that location was actually one of two sites previously considered in 2010, in a report requested by former President Sally Mason, whom Harreld of course goes out of his way to screw over once again. Why does Harreld constantly position himself to take credit for other people’s work? Well, I don’t know. All I can tell you is that if you’re doing anything right now on the UI campus, and it’s successful, J. Bruce Harreld is going to take credit. It doesn’t matter if he knew about it in advance or had any bearing on your work — if he’s in office when your ten or twenty or thirty years of hard work pay off, he’s going to be there for the pictures. (Unless Jean Robillard tells him to stay home)
The next question from the DI interview covers territory from the April DI interview, and indicates that Harreld’s attempt to redirect money from athletics to academics is looking less and less likely by the day. Which is of course why Harreld is now lowering the bar of success to ankle height. And of course on closer inspection, Harreld’s plan — which he trumpeted as his own with great fanfare earlier in the year — was originally put forward by former Regents President Michael Gartner. From the recent DI interview:
DI: In past interviews with us, you’ve talked about the possibility of moving money from the Athletics Department to other areas on campus. Where is that conversation now?
Harreld: It’s continuing to evolve. The basic thought is that I think every pocket of the university should have its own philanthropic activities. We have Dance Marathon, for one. It’s going on its 23rd year, and gee — good Lord, the students have enough that they do in their lives, they certainly don’t have a lot of excess cash, and they certainly don’t need to spend all the time they do on Dance Marathon, but yet they do. I think it’s been wonderful for the students. One of the things you learn with philanthropy is sometimes, as you give, you get more than what you actually give out of it in terms of experience, and support, and friendship.
The UI athletic department budget is over a hundred million dollars. The UI AD — whether Gary Barta or whoever replaces him — is never going to fork over any of that money. Instead, the AD will blow every available penny on bloated salaries, massive contracts, and improvements to facilities, etc. And I think maybe that’s finally sinking in for J. Bruce Harreld, even though he goes on and on for three more paragraphs.
After a question about whether the Athletics Department will expand (no), we get this:
DI: Do you see any improvements that could be made on sports facilities?
Harreld: To the best of my knowledge, there are no plans that I know of, but I’m sure they’re working it. I know there’s some discussions that’ll come up here in the next week about the golf course Club House, it’s pretty antiquated; I think that’s in the docket, the beginning part of that. We’re one of the few Big Ten schools that only have one golf course. The Club House is pretty antiquated. So yes, that’ll get done.
Leaving context aside, if there’s one moment in the entire DI interview which reveals the real J. Bruce Harreld, it’s this forlorn line:
We’re one of the few Big Ten schools that only have one golf course.
Now, I don’t know how many golf courses your college or university has, but from J. Bruce Harreld’s quote it’s clear he is not happy about having only one golf course. I’m not saying he would rank that failing with, say, not having even one art museum, but clearly it’s a concern. In fact, not only can you tell he’s bumming about only having one course, but he also mentions — twice — that the club house is “antiquated”, like all of those other shabby buildings that were thankfully wiped out by the 2008 floods. (Perhaps that’s part of his frustration. Why couldn’t the floods have taken the antiquated Finkbine club house, too, thus also saving him from that embarrassment?)
It is of course possible that there is a lot of unreported student unrest on campus about having an antiquated club house, to say nothing of only one course. Maybe students are having trouble getting tee times, maybe they’re bored with the course and want something new, or maybe they’re just used to the finer things in life. Or….
Maybe that’s all true, but only for J. Bruce Harreld, while the general student population has had nothing to say about Finkbine or its facilities. Instead, maybe J. Bruce Harreld is embarrassed to have his fat-cat friends or big UI boosters play a round there, particularly when he knows Augusta is just a short private jet flight away. Or maybe, when he’s trying to sell off chunks of the school to corporate CEO’s who are willing to ‘invest’ in research — as long as they get matching funds, free facilities, and an endless supply of free student interns — he feels inadequate about playing on campus.
To be honest, I don’t have a good explanation for why any of that came out of Harreld’s mouth, but because it did there are two important questions we need to ask. The first question, obviously, is whether Harreld’s statement — that Iowa is “one of the few Big Ten schools that only have one golf course” — is actually true. Well, here’s what I found after consulting the internet:
Illinois — 2 university-owned courses.
Indiana — 1 university-owned course.
Iowa — 1 university-owned course.
Maryland — 1 university-owned course.
Michigan — 1 university-owned course.
Michigan St. — 2 university-owned courses.
Minnesota — 1 university-owned course.
Nebraska — uses a privately owned course.
Northwestern — uses multiple privately-owned courses.
Ohio St. — 2 university-owned courses.
Penn St. — 2 university owned courses.
Purdue — 2 university-owned courses.
Rutgers — 1 university-owned course.
Wisconsin — uses a privately owned course.
By my count, then, out of fourteen Big10 schools there are three with 0 campus golf courses, six with 1 campus course, and five with 2 campus courses. Which does not at all square with this statement from the current president of the University of Iowa:
Is Harreld lying, because that’s just what Harreld likes to do? Did he get some bad intel from an overly-eager or golf-biased member of the Athletics Department? I honestly have no idea. What I can say with some certainty, however, is that even if I’m off on my research by 50%, and there are seven schools with two golf courses, or even eight, Harreld’s flat statement of fact is still wrong.
Which brings us to the second question we need to ask. When Harreld mentions the antiquated Finkbine club house once, it’s like — okay, sure, the garage at his chalet in Avon, Colorado is probably nicer than the Finkbine club house. When he comes right back to the same point, however, and repeats it, it’s as if he himself was personally traumatized by the Finkbine club house, which would mean he’s been there.
The reason that’s important is because, as we noted earlier in this post, J. Bruce Harreld has a “severe spinal problem”. While whatever back problem he’s tormented by doesn’t seem to preclude him from jogging, or helping students move their belongings, I think it’s pretty well-established that golf is one sport that can really wreck the human back. In fact, although I don’t play the game myself, I’ve never heard anyone say that their doctor told them to take up golf because of stenosis or scoliosis or a slipped disk or degenerative arthritis or anything other than just needing to get a little exercise and sun. So the obvious question we need to ask here is whether J. Bruce Harreld has actually been playing rounds of golf at Finkbine, both to establish that fact, and to better understand why he might make up a completely ludicrous, easily checked fact that was not even close to being true. (If you’ve played golf with Harreld at Finkbine, or anywhere else for that matter — say, in the past year — or you’ve seen him playing golf, or he went berserk with a nine iron in your office, drop me a note.)
The final two questions in the DI interview have to do with Iowa deciding not to pursue a Bias Assessment and Response Team on campus. While I agree with that decision, and I agree that the issues are complicated, for the purposes of this post we’ll focus on two specific sentences in Harreld’s otherwise lucid replies:
1) But we’re doing it in a very collaborative, very careful process with all elements of shared governments.
2) It reinforced, in my mind, the difficulty of the issue and the importance in working it through the entire shared government, communities, in a collaborative way.
I’m never sure in Harreld’s transcripts whether he’s the one who can’t say ‘shared governance’, or it somehow gets consistently garbled in transcription. In any case, it’s not surprising that a consummate marketing weasel would throw out the term whenever possible, particularly after laying waste to his own credibility and the credibility of the school by happily abusing shared governance in order to land the job he now has. Which is to say that as long as it suits his purpose, J. Bruce Harreld will happily take credit for doing the right thing, right up until it’s more profitable to do the wrong thing, which brings us back to the worst thing I said about J. Bruce Harreld in this entire post.
I think there are a lot of people who lie and I think there are a lot of people who take credit for things they haven’t done. Harreld’s propensity for both should immediately disqualify him from the job he now holds, but because the only reason he attained that position is that it was given to him by his co-conspirators, we know he’s not going to lose his job over being a liar or a cheat. What I do not believe, however, is that there are a lot of people who would knowingly do something wrong, then set about using the levers of power to blame the victims of their abuses. I know it happens, but it’s a deeply disturbing trait to victimize someone once, then victimize them again. And yet, as I noted at the beginning of this post, after having had the entire summer to get his mind right, Harreld’s instinct is still to taunt, belittle and invalidate the people who know — as a factual matter — that his presidency is illegitimate, and that’s menace.
The genuinely disturbing part, however, is that you would think most such people would recognize that it was in their self interest to adopt a more conciliatory tone, even if that’s not what was in their black heart. And yet despite the obvious benefit of doing so, it’s clear that Harreld can’t. Not that he won’t, not that he hasn’t thought about doing so, but that he quite literally cannot stop taunting, belittling and invalidating the very people that he himself abused in conspiring with Rastetter, Robillard and others.
What Harreld can do as president, of course, is command others to admire his greatness, and that’s what this coming week is about. Culminating in Harreld’s coronation on Friday, that may also be a good time to reflect on whether you intend to follow this man wherever he’s about to lead the university. Because if Harreld is capable of treating people who oppose him like dirt, even when he himself is demonstrably guilty of every charge that has ever been leveled against him, then it’s a given that at some point he may turn on you too.
From the official announcement:
Presidential program and reception
Friday, Sept. 16, 3–5 p.m., Hancher Auditorium
Join us in officially welcoming President Bruce Harreld to the University of Iowa.
If you do attend, while you’re listening to J. Bruce Harreld sound sensible, and watching him look like a normal human being on stage, remind yourself that despite the fact that he’s a liar and a cheat, at that moment he really does believe that he deserves — deserves — all of the attention he’s getting. Despite all of the secret meetings he held with Rastetter and Robillard, and kept secret until long after his appointment, despite the untold phone conversations and emails we don’t yet know about, despite the intent and the will to deceive the University of Iowa community, in Harreld’s mind the only people who are actually guilty of anything are those who would presume to hold him and his co-conspirators accountable for what they have actually done.
Update 09/22/16: It’s getting to the point that I can’t keep up with Harreld’s craziness. Although I commented on the following quote above, it didn’t really sink in until yesterday —
I have four Mandarin speakers in my family, so I’ve got a multicultural background.
What does that even mean? Remember — this is the same guy who declared himself to be a victim of actual hate speech because he had to deal with some protesters at a meeting. So when Harreld declares that he has a “multicultural background” himself because other people in his family speak a foreign language, I think the only conclusion we can reach is that he really believes that, which is nuts.
My grandmother had six years of Latin. That doesn’t mean I get to claim to have been shaped or improved or diversified by her life experience, or that she would even have implied such about herself. And yet here Harreld is, blithely equating other people’s linguistic accomplishments with being “multicultural”. No. Absolutely not.
The only cultural traits that Harreld has demonstrated himself are being an enormously privileged and emotionally needy white male, whose basis for personal relationships is bro culture, and whose faith in himself is such that he felt empowered to participate in and lie about the conspiracy that put him in office.
Salon posted a new article on the Right’s plan to starve the college beast: http://www.salon.com/2016/09/09/the-rights-war-on-college-starving-the-beast-exposes-the-fight-to-destroy-americas-great-public-universities/
“In one egregious example cited in the new documentary “Starving the Beast” (not an untypical example, sadly), public funding for Louisiana State University went from 75 percent of the school’s operating budget to about 13.5 percent — in nine years”
USNWR rankings are out. Overall conclusions:
1. Big Ten universities, making money hand over foot on sports (with their own network) might reconsider having say like a Big Ten Academic Station. Because overall the Big Ten, the heart of the countries public research universities, SUCKS.
Yeah UIowa sucks academically, but to be honest, Michigan has really plummeted in rankings sucking even more. The state must have directed Flint-lead water to Ann Arbor. School needs an overhaul.
Traditionally strong schools like Illinois, Minnesota Wisky, have totally screwed up. One could blame the leadership of morons like the Guv of Wisky Walker (didn’t even graduate from Marquette) but Minnie is down too.
The rankings for Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin, and Minnesota are totally unacceptable. I would wholesale fire those administrations for gross incompetence…and kick their Guvs out too.
Mitch Daniels has led Purdue to a very very hot #61. Come on PU. That really is PU! Ridiculous.
Let’s get to Iowa. Sure, Indiana has cut state support to like cents (that’s Veep candidate Pence….which is what he gives to education) so that is an excuse. There is no excuse for Iowa.
The great University of Iowa, led by genius J Bruce Harreld, falls in line w/ #82 tied with UC Santa Cruz. Well there is something to aim at: UCSC (and I only thought they had a boardwalk at Santa Cruz).
Iowa is looking up at Boston U, Col Mining, Tulane, and Yeshiva.
Harreld can point at disasters like UColordo (89), Bama (96), Nebraska (103), Oregon, Tenn, Mizzou, and Kansas, all of whom underachieve to a remarkable level. There is always somebody doing a worse job. Give Harreld time…
Oh and the great engineering school Iowa State at 108. One-oh-eight. President Leath should stop speculating on land and start paying attention to his academics.
Iowa #82 is pathetic. I would start with the pink slips at the Board of Regents. Bye bye to Braun, Connelly, Butler, Lehnertz, Matthes and the gang of incompetents and nincompoops who appear to be better at enriching themselves and cronies than at guiding a once good university to solid low level mediocrity. Can students even spell ‘Hawkeye’ anymore?
Hey but we have new infrastructure thanks to the blessing of the Great Flood.
So that’s two years in a row at #82 for national colleges. We’re also #33 for public universities, where we were #34 last year — except this year there are three schools at #33, so we basically haven’t moved in either ranking.
As for Iowa State, that’s what happens when you turn a university into an academic confinement operation. More students equals worse ratings — in lockstep. Which is also why Rastetter’s plan to become a top-tier public research university by growing enrollment was insane.
Speaking of which, it’s time for somebody to pin Harreld down about this:
“I think we could be a top 10 public research institution during my tenure.”
http://www.thegazette.com/subject/news/education/higher-education/university-of-iowa-president-changing-budgeting-process-20160324
He said that back in March, and he needs to make clear exactly where Iowa currently is in that made-up rankings classification. Then he needs to own that claim, and this is the week to make him do it.
He and Rastetter have actual faculty members writing trash marketing propaganda for them about becoming “Top 10”, only nobody’s specifying the actual metrics that are being used. Well, it’s time for Harreld to man-up and get specific, before he starts hosing precious resources down the drain in pursuit of this scam.
World Class? Marketing slogan only. Iowa is #128 among global universities. Zhejang University kicks Iowa’s butt. As does Cal Riverside, and Hamburg.
Tied with National Taiwan, and Western Australia.
Western Australia and Iowa: WORLD CLASS!
A little over a week ago we took a close look at the origins of J. Bruce Harreld’s obsession with college rankings. Where I previously believed that the fraudulently appointed UI president’s mania for gaming Iowa’s college rank was self-generated, it turns out the idea originally came from none other than Harreld’s boss — Regents President Bruce Rastetter — who, during a Faculty Senate meeting in early December of 2014, floated an audacious challenge to make Iowa one of the “top ten public universities”, or, “top ten public research universities”.
As we will see, when it comes to ranking aspirations almost everyone ends up setting squishy goals. Also, while Rastetter and Harreld could have already been in contact at that point, the record is clear that it was Rastetter who put the rankings challenge before the Faculty Senate, and Rastetter who called for a report to be issued by the Senate about how that objective might best be reached. (That report, presented last spring as a ‘white paper‘, was discussed at length in the post linked above.)
What we have not yet considered is where Rastetter himself got that bold idea. That’s an interesting question because while Rastetter is clearly gifted in terms of exploiting people and situations, he has shown no propensity for working from a blank page. In fact, immediately after floating his “top ten” challenge, Rastetter revealed his ignorance about how that goal might best be achieved by proposing that Iowa grow its way to “top ten” status, when enrollment increases actually have a negative effect on rankings. (The more students a school lets in, the less selective it can necessarily be, and that in turn hurts that school’s score. Yet somehow the President of the Iowa Board of Regents was oblivious to that basic dynamic when he made his proposal.)
So where did Rastetter get his “top ten” idea? Well, if you look into other schools which have attempted similar bold moves, you find that they all trace back to a single grand initiative put forward twenty years ago by the Kentucky General Assembly:
In 1997, the Kentucky General Assembly mandated that the University of Kentucky become a Top 20 public research university by 2020. In directing Kentucky’s flagship university to achieve this ambitious goal, the General Assembly did not provide specific definition to this mandate or the steps required to accomplish it. Former UK President Lee T. Todd, Jr. directed the development of a Top 20 Business Plan to identify measures of change and success and the financial and capital framework necessary to reach the specific targets. When the UK Board of Trustees adopted the Business Plan in December 2005, UK became the first public institution to develop and begin implementing a detailed roadmap to a specified, long-term goal.
Like Kentucky’s grand initiative, Rastetter’s unbidden challenge at the end of 2014 came with no details or specifics. It was left to the surprised members of the Faculty Senate to flesh out the details, even as Rastetter’s advice was to do the one thing that would make achieving that lofty goal impossible. (To be fair to Rastetter, at the time he was still hoping for passage of his performance-based funding plan, which encouraged enrollment increases at all of the state’s schools.)
As the University of Kentucky dutifully set about planning how to become a “Top 20 public research university by 2020”, other schools also got in on the act. As noted in another deep dive about college rankings, in 2001 the new president at Clemson University initiated the same challenge at that school:
When President James F. Barker took over the South Carolina institution in 2001, he vowed in his initial interview to move Clemson into the top 20 (a distinction that many research universities covet, but few can achieve, given that most of those already in the top 20 aren’t eager to relinquish their spots).
While other schools had tried gaming U.S. News’ rankings before (Northeastern began dong so in 1996), what set Kentucky’s initiative apart was both its standing and the public status of the school, as well as the degree to which the effort was integrated throughout the state. This was not just a bold move by an administrator looking for headlines, but a state-wide, vertically integrated attempt to use the University of Kentucky as an economic engine.
Where many schools intentionally used mushy metrics and marketing hype to drive their ranking schemes, Kentucky put out a comprehensive plan which included critical metrics — including details about the category of competition. From the “Top 20 Business Plan“, finalized in 2006:
This Plan establishes the fiscal and capital framework for accomplishing the Top 20 Compact that UK and the people of the Commonwealth created in 1997. It identifies clear goals and explains what it means to be in the Top 20 of 88 public research universities. And it shows the investments required to achieve them.
Note the specific mention of ranking in the “Top 20 of 88 public research universities”. Whatever else might be said about Kentucky’s Top 20 Plan, and more will be said in this post, the school committed to a serious, detailed, long-term effort to reach that goal. By contrast, Clemson’s plan (and the plan followed by Northeastern), was predicated on a willingness to game the U.S. News ranking system by any and every means available.
While Kentucky as a state and Kentucky as a school put a massive amount of time and resources into fleshing out a plan of attack, many more schools piled on the rankings bandwagon, setting their sights on top-ten or top-twenty rankings. Because achieving such status was a lot easier to imagine if the competition was smaller, however, many schools were intentionally vague about what they were actually competing for, and who they were competing with.
Where Kentucky was explicit — “Top 20 of 88 public research universities” — most schools kept the narrower “public research university” verbiage (as compared to the broader “public university” descriptor) while jettisoning any specific mention of how many schools fit that category. That’s important because not only does U.S. News not report rankings for that category (although they can be derived), but there is no consensus among all of the ranking organizations and institutions about what constitutes a “public research university”.
As might also be expected, as more and more schools joined the rankings bandwagon, the terminology of success broadened considerably, allowing everyone to aspire to and even claim exalted status. By the same token, aiming for a “Top X” ranking was dangerous because specifics could be checked. Even if you made up your own rankings category, and failed to specify how man schools you were competing against, aspiring to a top-ten or top-twenty ranking meant failure could be ascribed to you as well.
A win-win solution arrived with the introduction of the equally alliterative phrase ‘top tier’, which proved to be a wildly satisfying replacement for dangerously specific numeric goals. Perform and internet search for ‘top tier university’ (or ‘top-tier university‘) and you’ll find all sorts of schools either aspiring to that mushy claim, or simply bestowing it upon themselves. (‘Top tier’ as a phrase not only plays off ‘top ten’, but in Iowa it also plays off the TIER review process implemented by the Board of Regents.)
For example, here’s Texas A&M, an AAU school, claiming that it is a top tier public research university. As of yesterday, U.S. News had Texas A&M ranked #74 in national universities, and #27 in public universities. Here’s the University of Arkansas also claiming “top tier” status. For 2017, U.S. News has Arkansas ranked #135 nationally and #64 among public schools. Here’s the University of Tennessee aspiring to be a “top-tier public research university“, which — as far as I can tell — it could just go ahead and claim, since there is no agree-upon definition by which anyone could prove otherwise. (UT is #103 and #46.)
Compared to Kentucky’s painstaking process, metrics and goals, all of this literal and figurative self-promotion can be seen for what it is, which is nothing more than marketing hype. In the wide-open world of college rankings, ‘top tier’ simply means ‘super awesome’, albeit in phraseology which implies some actual accomplishment.
Again, that’s important because finishing in the top ten or top twenty is a fantasy for any school that hasn’t already been there for most of the prior decade. Because of structural limitations in the rankings themselves, because of costs, because of each school’s inherent advantages and disadvantages, for the most part any school’s ranking is baked into the cake within a relatively narrow band. If want to increase your ranking you also have only two options: either go the Kentucky route and throw everything you have at organically improving the school’s ranking-relevant metrics, or, throw in the towel on any pretense of integrity, like Clemson did, and just game the hell out of the system:
Although many people on the campus were skeptical, Clemson has pursued the goal almost single-mindedly, seeking to “affect — I’m hesitating to use the word ‘manipulate,’ ” Watt said — “every possible indicator to the greatest extent possible.” She added: “It is the thing around which almost everything revolves for the president’s office.”
While the University of Iowa can choose the Kentucky way or the Clemson way, or some hybrid in-between, the fact remains — and it is an indisputable fact — that unless the category Iowa is competing in only has ten schools to begin with, it is not going to become a “top ten public research university”, let alone a “top ten public university”, no matter which approach J. Bruce Harreld takes. And yet there Harreld was, back in March, saying this:
No — whether Harreld goes the Kentucky route of the Clemson route that is never,ever going to happen, but of course being Harreld he’s giving mixed signals about that as well. Instead of details and specifics, Harreld is full of platitudes and generalizations. Instead of stating which rankings or schools Iowa is competing against, the words ‘top tier’ are constantly conflated with ‘top ten’ and ‘top twenty’.
For example, here are two quotes from the recent press release announcing UI’s Harreld-centric week of “Inspiration”, which culminates in Harreld’s big speech on Friday:
From Monday, Sept. 12, through Thursday, Sept. 15, 12 areas of campus will hold open houses for the public in order to showcase a small part of what makes the UI a top public research university.
Top…what? Top ten? Top two hundred?
“Instead of focusing on a single event, President Harreld wanted to use the week as an opportunity to celebrate the UI in a larger sense by recognizing important milestones and moments while turning our attention to what it means to be a top-tier public research university today and into the future,” says Linda Snetselaar, associate provost for outreach and engagement and member of the Week of Inspiration planning committee.
Wait — “top-tier”? What happened to Harreld’s unambiguous goal of “top 10”? Well, between dropping that “top 10” quote at the end of March, and being presented with the Faculty Senate ‘white paper’ at the beginning of April, the goal posts began to move:
A highly aspirational goal would be for the University of Iowa to move into the top 10 among all public universities.
In fact, the title of the ‘white paper’ itself demonstrates the bait-and-switch phrase-swapping we’ve been talking about. From the page on the Faculty Senate site, which links to the ‘white paper‘:
Advancing UI’s Status as a Top-Tier Public Research University
Read the white paper on advancing the University of Iowa’s status as a top-tier public research university, Top-tier white paper.
Nothing solid, nothing about ‘top ten’ or even ‘top twenty’. Instead, despite Rastetter’s clear mandate of becoming a “top ten” school, the Faculty Senate took a long look at the problem and backed all the way off to “top tier”. Then, in early June, we got this — from a working draft of the new UI Strategic Plan:
* UI recovers its status as a top-20 public research university.
Again, while the ranking is specific, there are no details, no metrics, no context. Just “top-20 public research university” as a bullet point, which, as already noted, does not exist as a U.S. News ranking category.
Where Rastetter wanted “top ten” in early December of 2014, and he got “top 10” from Harreld a year and a half later, he only got “top-tier” and “highly aspirational” from the Faculty Senate, while Harreld’s own Strategic Plan moved the goal posts back to the “top-20” of the Kentucky and Clemson plans. Where the University of Kentucky produced a full-on business plan, however, the only document to come out of UI so far is an eight-page Faculty Senate ‘white paper’ which doesn’t even qualify as toilet paper. And of course there have been absolutely no specifics from Harreld at all. (For reasons no one can explain, the Faculty Seante ‘white paper’ which was released last spring carries a “Fall|16” date on the title page, suggesting it may yet drop in service of Harreld’s “top 10” initiative.)
So where did Rastetter come up with his bold (and naive, or disingenuous) challenge for Iowa to become a “top ten public research university”? Well, there are any number of pathways for such an obvious idea, but one direct route has to do with Kumble Subbaswamy, provost of the University of Kentucky, who was one of two finalists for the presidency at Iowa State University in 2011. At the time, Rastetter had just recently been appointed to the Iowa Board of Regents, while Kentucky’s “Top 20” plan had been grinding away for the better part of fourteen years — but only five since completing the comprehensive business plan which would dictate the pursuit of that objective. (If you haven’t checked out the business plan, or the Top 20 website, you should. The business plan runs 44 pages, and the website is impressive for the amount of information it provides — particularly compared with similar undertakings by other schools, and the glaring lack of any supporting information from Harreld’s administration.)
So how did things actually turn out for Clemson and Kentucky? Well, after selling its institutional credibility for almost fifteen years, Clemson now ranks #66 among national universities, and #23 among public schools — so it’s close, but still short of becoming a top-twenty public research institution. (Clemson hit #22 in 2009. In 2011, Clemson introduced its own version of the Kentucky plan, also aiming for top-twenty by 2020. To see just how far down the rankings rabbit hole Clemson has gone, click here.)
As for Kentucky, with four years to go until its self-imposed 2020 deadline, and with over a decade since its full-bore business plan was unveiled, the University of Kentucky currently ranks #133 in national universities, and #63 in public schools. Meaning not only is a “Top 20” ranking not going to happen in any category, but the case could be made that the last thing any school should do is follow the Kentucky plan.
(As far as I can tell, the single biggest determinant of a college or university ranking is how far it is to the nearest beach. And, no, that’s not a joke or a dig at the students, or not only. Faculty and admins go to the beach as well, or, more likely, to their beach house or their country club on the shore, or the marina that berths their sloop. Point being, even within a single rankings system not all of the relevant factors will be captured, and that’s particularly true of intrinsic factors like geography.)
Because no school that is not already in the top fifteen is ever going to make it into the top ten in any category, it makes sense that Iowa has now dropped back — like Kentucky and Clemson, and so many other schools — to aiming to become a “Top 20” school among “public research universities”. Unlike Kentucky, however, which identified 88 such competitors, Iowa has been typically squishy not only about the number of schools it is competing with, but about where it currently ranks among those schools. (In the 2017 U.S. News rankings, Iowa is #82 among national universities, and in a three-way tie at #33 among public schools, but again there is no ‘public research university’ category.)
While U.S. News is the college rankings leader, a lot of other organizations are getting into the rankings game because that’s where the page hits are. And while U.S. News doesn’t have a specific category for “public research universities”, others do. Running a search for ‘best public research universities‘ turns up plenty of rankings, none of which provides any useful insight about what a ‘public research university’ actually is, or how many exist.
For example, BestCollegeReviews.com has a page listing the Top 50 Public Research Universities. While Iowa States comes in at #39, Iowa doesn’t even make the list. CollegeRaptor.com lists the 25 Best Research Universities (not necessarily public), and again Iowa does not make the list. CollegeChoice.net ranks the Best National Research Universities (again, not necessarily public), and out of 50 schools Iowa does not make the list. BestColleges.com lists 40 Colleges Spending the Most on Research & Development in 2016, and again Iowa doesn’t make the list.
As for how Harreld intends to move the rankings needle, it should be obvious that he cannot announce that he’s embarking on the Clemson plan even if that’s what he has in mind. Openly acknowledging that he was throwing the entire weight of his office at manipulating a ranking as an end in itself would be administrative suicide, even with Rastetter watching his back at the board. By the same token, however, there’s no chance that Harreld and Rastetter can ramp-up the kind of comprehensive approach that Kentucky took, meaning the best that Harreld can offer is something Kentucky-like — or maybe Kentucky-lite — as a feint. (Again, that may be what the “Fall|16” version of the Faculty Senate ‘white paper’ is for. Anyone who knows anything about college rankings will know it’s a joke, but from a distance it looks legitimate.)
In 2001 Clemson started at #38 among public universities, but it still hasn’t cracked the top 20 in that category. Although Iowa is currently in a three-way tie at #33 — again, for public universities, as opposed to public research universities — not only did Clemson go all in on gaming the U.S. News rankings right down to the sleaziest tricks in the book, but they made most of their gains at a time when other schools we’re not competing as hard. Now, fifteen years later, it’s common for most schools to massage their ranking numbers, meaning it will be significantly harder for Iowa to make a similar move.
In order to legitimize whatever Harreld intends to do, he has to put forward some version of the failed Kentucky plan, but even that plan will be fake. Instead, he will set about trying to move Iowa’s ranking needle by going the Clemson route, which has admittedly proven much more effective. What may not be so obvious, particularly to people who are just turning in, is that Harreld is already well-along in his own version of the Clemson plan, as previously detailed in another post back in April:
Ceaseless in his intent to deceive, during the week since he conducted the Daily Iowan interview Harreld has massaged his four filters to make them more attractive to the masses. From a report on today’s Iowa Board of Regents meeting in Council Bluffs, by the Gazette’s Vanessa Miller:
During a Board of Regents meeting Thursday in Council Bluffs, Harreld highlighted principles that will guide the university’s planning and budgeting process — student success, quality indicators, values, and the future.
Notice the change. The values filter is still ‘values’; the previously unfinished future filter is now ‘the future’; the student outcomes and success filter is now ‘student success’, but rankings is now ‘quality indicators’. Can you think of anyone who is against values, the future, student success and quality indicators? No? Me either. Then again I don’t think even the most horrific political regimes in human history would have been against any of those factors.
When you come across someone whose carefully chosen words quite literally mean nothing, it’s worth asking why. Instead of talking about rankings now, the illegitimate president of the University of Iowa will be taking about ‘quality indicators’, as if those are not rankings, or are not effectively synonymous with what he means by ‘student success’. The entire filtering process is aimed at improving Iowa’s national college rank, and two of Harreld’s four filters are ranking factors, yet the word ‘ranking’ has now been scrubbed. This is transformational change at the University of Iowa.
Now compare Harreld’s public rhetoric in mid-April, regarding the filters he was applying to every line-item in the budget, with this final report from the Staff Council Executive Meeting at the end of June, which Harreld attended:
Out of these discussions, four areas have been defined:
1. Student Outcomes & Success (four year graduation rate)
2. Our Rankings (very relevant information that we need to be aware of, they can influence behavior)
3. Values (importance, worth, usefulness of something)
4. Sense of the Future (where are we going, what do we want to accomplish)
In public, Harreld ditched any talk of rankings. Internally, however, rankings were and remain the sole focus of what Harreld laughably touts as his new “collaborative budgeting process”. As noted in the post linked above, of Harreld’s four “filters”, the first two are both rankings related, while the second two are meaningless — meaning any proposed expenditures are already being filtered through only one criteria, which is how that money will help Iowa’s ranking.
And yet at this point that kind of Clemson-grade deceit shouldn’t really be shocking. As the former head of global marketing for IBM, not only is Harreld a marketing weasel, but as detailed in numerous posts he was also a co-conspirator in his own fraudulent hire. Meaning if the man was willing to help Rastetter and UI VP Jean Robillard hijack the entire university by putting him in the driver’s seat, it stands to reason that he’s not going to have any ethical qualms when lying to the school about gaming Iowa’s national college rank.
So why should you care? Well, if this was just another big fundraising push, or an attempt to generate support for an extra-curricular agenda, that would be one thing. But the problem with Harreld’s rankings scheme — whatever it turns out to be — is that the time and resources that will be devoted to that scheme have to come from somewhere, and that somewhere is the operating budget of the school. The same budget that funds faculty salaries and research will now be repurposed away from those organic metrics, and toward the process of gaming Iowa’s ranking.
The problem with taking a hands-off, not-my-problem approach to the scam already underway is that the actual evidence — the data, the research — conclusively shows that no matter how Harreld goes about whatever he’s aspiring to accomplish in raising Iowa’s rank, it will not work. Meaning all that time and all of those resources will be wasted when they could have been put to more effective use. That in turn means that to divorce yourself from that reality you’re going to have to embrace the idea that facts just don’t matter, which of course opens the door for others to question why your facts matter to you.
While higher education may not get a lot of headlines, it’s not as if people haven’t noticed what happened at Kentucky. Here’s an update from Inside HigherEd in 2005. And here’s a NYT update from 2007. Here’s an actual academic paper titled Engagement as a Brand Position in the Higher Education Marketplace from 2007. Here’s the Kentucky president stepping down in 2011, followed by a 2011 story in the Chronicle of Higher Education about Kentucky falling short — a full nine years before the 2020 deadline. And finally, here’s an actual analysis of the failed Kentucky business plan, from 2013.
Point being, while you may think that what Harreld’s doing is somehow apart from you, it’s not, on three fronts. First, Harreld’s ranking obsession will consume precious resources. Second, those resources will be diverted and reallocated based on rankings alone. Third, at some point what’s happening at Iowa will become the text of some other academic’s study, including questions about why the faculty bought into a plan that literally had no chance of success.
The reason all of this is important has nothing to do with yesterday’s release of the U.S. News rankings, and everything to do with the week of ‘inspiration’ currently unfolding on the UI campus. Designed to feature Harreld, and to build up to his official installation on Friday, from a thematic perspective Harreld is obligated to come across with something more than administrative positioning. After spending his first ten months in office blaming everyone else for what’s wrong at Iowa, he has to start specifying the changes he intends to make. And among those specifics should be the specifics of how he intends to make Iowa a “top 10” or “top 20” school, or whatever goal he finally commits to pursuing.
Starting Friday, J. Bruce Harreld owns the University of Iowa. There won’t be any more hiding or excuses. When he puts forward his vision for the school, the specifics of those plans should be subjected to the same academic rigor that is routinely applied to everything from student papers to departmental research proposals. When it comes to raising a school’s ranking by any means, there is a large and growing body of evidence that such efforts are minimally effective, and that must be factored in when determining whether Harreld’s plans are worthwhile. Anything else is not simply an abdication of responsibility, it is a betrayal of the ethos of education.
The problem with setting out specifics, of course — as detailed in this post — is that it makes it that much easier to know when Harreld has failed. And as a savvy former business executive, if Harreld knows how to do one thing it’s avoid accountability. That in turn makes it all the more important to insist that Harreld provide Kentucky-like specifics, instead of allowing him to continue speaking in generalities while implementing his Clemson-like plan behind the scenes.
J. Bruce Harreld is a marketing weasel. He is a former business executive who lied himself into office. He doesn’t care one whit about anyone else, which is why he’s already reconfigured the budgeting process to prioritize Iowa’s rankings above all. Those members of the faculty who put their names on the Senate ‘white paper’, even if they intended to write something other than the marketing trash that emerged, have already been burned by Harreld and his rankings scheme.
They won’t be the last.
There really is no magic in attaining a level of a ‘top tier research’ university. Check the literature, which Harreld will never do.
Down to brass tacks, a school needs to find research funds, carry out successful research, then publish in high quality journals.
An institution needs to retain faculty who build a career eminent enough to publish high quality chapters, books or edit same.
A university should promote and maintain high level graduate programs. Such graduates populate other universities and even their own graduate university.
A school should develop faculty who lead in their fields The faculty should be well known, and elected or appointed to high level national or international positions.
There should be awards given to the faculty, the Nobel or Pulitzer the highest, but there are plenty of other awards, some discipline specific.
The university library should maintain important volumes, and journals and perhaps even a collection of rare sources.
Students should be high achieving and successful Undergraduates should be accepted to professional and academic post-graduate schools. There should be a record of students achieving great things.
The professional schools should not only produce high quality practitioners in their states, like law and medicine, engineering, and vet medicine, but should produce a number of academic leaders.
Administration should recognize these goals. They should understand such a desire to be top-tier isn’t bullsh*t it is supporting faculty maintaining high level offices or laboratories, or centers. It is giving artists excellent galleries, and musicians wonderful auditoria.
Administration should support national and international leaders, giving students and faculty the resources and freedom to achieve and achieve in a way of original work, not follow-the leader.
Administration should promote their students and their faculty to allow them the facilities and resources, and freedom to map out original and innovating research.
Does Harreld understand one iota of these methods of attaining ‘top tier’ status? Maybe one or two aspects he may have picked u long his occasional academic life )although he doesn’t understand how academia composes CVs).
I doubt operatives and cronies like Braun, Connolly, Mathess and Lehnertz get some business principles but do not understand academic achievement si a different ball game tan selling Boston Chicken or screwing and lying to citizens about the stink of hog confinement lots.
Rastetter, as a agribusiness czar doesn’t get any of this although he understands rankings; after all he is ware the Iowa football team is threatening to break into the top 10.
So in the end I expect Harreld to scam, BS, and fake his way through all; maybe he will put kiosks on the Pentacrest. More likely Harreld will support and promote Harreld because after all, there is nothing more that high achieving academicians respect than the architect of the IBM turn-around of the 80s and 90s.
Rastetter will simply run and hide as he usually does, hide behind his isolated existence as well as his army of accountants to protect his ag profits.
If Harreld really wants to make the UIowa a top tier research university he better find someone with the expertise to understand the issues and the balls to take on these other dead-weight, money-grabbing cronies as a vice president. And he better find the support staff and the funding to uplift his school……
It seems to me that the moment — literally, the second — that you start talking about rankings as an objective, regardless of the number you’re aiming for, that you’re finished. Ideally you would take a look at your given school, then improve metrics as you’re able as long as those metrics were closely associated with the education that you’re supposed to be providing. The moment you put the rankings first, however — akin to teaching to the test, as mentioned in an earlier post — then everything you do is judged by that lens, and not at all by the lends of education.
UI, ISU and UNI are state schools. Because Rastetter has also turned them into hog lots they are now firmly anchored in the commodity end of the educational spectrum. And as far as I’m concerned, that’s fine, because that’s always been the mission. Maybe kids are less prepared than they used to be, but that only means there should be more assets going to educating those kids and making sure they have the mental health resources necessary if they become overwhelmed.
Instead, we’ve got the Iowa Board of Regents paying a carpetbagging dilettante $800K per year ($200K deferred, but his total compensation package puts him in the top-fifteen in the country -=- think about that), to game the rankings. How about we take that money and put it toward something useful, like more teachers? (Not “world-class” teachers, but more good faculty who want to stay instead of bolt town after three years?)
There’s nothing wrong with being a LA&S university, but man, you gotta tend that garden just like any other. Instead, the BoR went and got a varmint and turned him loose in the fields.
That’s really good, Mark.
Here’s the thing: topism is predicated on the idea that the national STEM funding agencies will actually, someday, send money your way. And the trend is very clear: the funding agencies, all of which are anxious, all of which (except perhaps DOD) are fighting anti-science, particularly anti-basic-science, forces in Congress, have been spending less and less, comparatively, in the midwest over the past decade or so. There is nothing to indicate reversal of the trend. Here’s who gets the bulk of the research money: Massachusetts, California, New York, Pennsylvania, and to lesser extents exactly the other places you’d expect, none of which are Iowa. Iowa, in a very real sense, is not on the map. And it’s not going to be on the map, because there is no infrastructure here to support the kind of large-scale work the agencies want to see going on in this country. No wishfulness, no mandatory grantsmanship seminar, can solve this problem. Billions of dollars might be a start, but only a start, because a strong research infrastructure has to be connected to other primetime local infrastructures, and we just don’t have very many of those here. There is no industrial corridor. There are not lots of people who know how to operate in an industrial corridor. There are not legal and accounting people who support industrial corridors. My guess is that Iowa Code doesn’t even envision these things any too clearly, so even if the lawyers showed up, they’d have nothing but US code to go by. (Consider the mess the state got itself into when it tried to play just in the minors in film production.)
While Bruce is a meanspirited dude not oversupplied with wattage, he isn’t stupid, and he’s spent enough time in the bigs to know all of this. He also knows what a midwest is. Which means that once he gets over his own hot air, he surely knows that we are not anybody’s top anything, unless you count the writing program which has been very quietly tiptoeing away from the university for some time now. (Heard about a Writing University lately? Nope? Me either. I’m sure Marilynne will have a nice time in New England, also that it’s going to sting when she accepts the next big prize in some room at Harvard or Yale and not here.)
Which means that all this top talk is pure Harold Hill. You don’t have to be a top university. You just have to say you’re a top university. And there will be tens of thousands of marks, excuse me, marketing targets, excuse me, futures of America willing to believe you because they really like thinking nice things about Iowa, and frankly they don’t want to hear anything bad about it. Which is why very sick people who live in Iowa City and know the ropes, as well as people with very sick children, are very quiet when they leave so that they can go to hospitals where their lives or their children’s lives stand a good chance of being saved. People get quite upset here if you say that the local hospital nearly killed your child through negligence and incompetence, and that you had to go to Chicago or St. Louis or Minnesota, where they’re now doing fine, thank you.
And I guess that’s what it comes down to with topism. I was struck, when I first moved here, by the nice, if silly, way that folks would applaud you for breathing. It took me a very long time to understand that part of the purpose of that applause was in blurring the distinction between things that actually deserve applause and things that don’t, so that no matter what happened, you could feel good about yourself and the life you hadn’t actually chosen but pretended you had. And, in the end, nobody was ever going to call you out for not doing such a hot job after all, and you wouldn’t have to spend quite so much time resenting people who were demanding more of you. The problem is that the geographic boundaries of this compact end, oh, well before you get to Bethesda and Arlington, where they make those research money decisions, and where they don’t care whether you feel terrible or not. They just look and see that not much is going on, comparatively — and that’s always the word that’s hard to hear, comparatively — and send the money elsewhere. Sure, they’ll be very pleased to find individual researchers here and there who’re really knocking it home, and those people will get funded, and nobody at the agencies will be surprised when they move to California, North Carolina, New York, etc.
It’s interesting, by the way, that you mention Clemson. I first became aware of Clemson’s existence in about 2000, and was surprised that I hadn’t heard of it — but not too surprised, because past NCSU, Emory, and…um…Emory I hadn’t paid much attention to the schools south of Hopkins. But they were plainly serious. The thing is, they were serious for real. They weren’t put-up-banners serious. They had a lot of smart people working energetically, to the point where you thought oh, well, Clemson’s okay. Their entire plan may have consisted in “hey, we have a lot of smart people here. Perhaps we should get out of their way and have real research tools and libraries and conference support for them to work with instead of “we found it in a cereal box” stuff. You know, like they’re always telling us, in these anguished tones, that they need.”
And then there’s Iowa. Old skinflinty Iowa that’s managed to survive by being old skinflinty Iowa. Old skinflinty Iowa’s never going to do those things. It will pretend to do those things. It will warm itself with tales of having gotten some bargain back-of-the-storeroom remnant that’s just as good as those things and outsmarted those coastal idiots once again, but then it’ll turn out that the facility only works when this one guy can tickle it into working, or it catches fire easily, or something. Which’ll teach those fancy eggheads to ask, won’t it. Spent all that money and they still don’t get any work done.
Iowa is a poor skinny schoolmaster and a farmer and a lad in the backyard with a Christmas telescope. Iowa’s actually very good at being a poor skinny schoolmaster and a farmer and the backyard lad with the telescope. We once had public universities that were in a sense the flowering of those archetypes. Here’s what Iowa is not: some burly Chicago financial exchange. Anything with the name Rockefeller in front. Anything that involves making the future.
Never understood the problem with knowing your own nature and playing to it, but that’s not really what crooks and charlatans are all about, is it.
Wow, Dormouse, just a bit cynical. (but not undeservedly cynical)
It is beyond the veil that anyone would think a marketing weasel who made his small mark in Chicago and Armonk NY would be able to turn UIowa into a research giant.
UIowa made a reputation by honest hard-working leadership as provided by Willard Boyd. Therefore I disagree that Iowa is lazily floating down the crick with a piece of straw in mouth, fishing for bullhead with a piece of red cotton. True that UIowa is energized by an international contingent of good people; but false that Iowans are happy to blow smoke rings all day.
I point out that within 15 miles, two notable people grew up: James Van Allen in Mt Pleasent, and Robert Noyce in Burlington.
Van Allen, of course, was instrumental in the US space program a Time Man-of-the-Year.
Noyce was the MIT-educated engineer who worked with Gordon Moore in founding Intel.
Two native Iowans who arguably changed the course of the 20th century. One stayed in state, one left, landing in California.
It is absolutely true that the greatest innovation will happen in MA, CA, NY, and even NJ; therefore talented Iowans will leave for other destinations. Iowa after all, is the agricultural heart of America not the scientific nor the cultural heart. However there is a role for native Iowans, and adopted Iowans to achieve at a high level, despite the modest circumstances. A fellow like Harreld will never support and nuture that. A fellow like Steinmetz might have.
I don’t know when I first noticed that people from Iowa were insecure about being people from Iowa, but it royally pissed me off. Travel around the country or the world and everybody’s pretty much the same unless they’re being led by a fascist or a warmonger. Even recently, when McKibben and others fell all over themselves thanking Steven Leath for buying land in Iowa I wanted to barf.
The man is from North Carolina, not Monaco. (And for the record, I love NC and its people, and have since my youth.)
Unfortunately, you can see Branstad playing to that insecurity constantly, and now Harreld is doing it in spades with the “Top 10” talk, or whatever number he’s teasing now. And it’s never going to happen — not top ten, not top twenty, not top forty — and he knows that. And yet he’s still doing it because he’s a marketing weasel.
I don’t really see any out except for the collapse that’s coming. The way that Bohannan and Vaughn and others at UI rolled over for this fraud, and the degree to which they reflexively banded together to try to deflect attention from Robillard’s central role in that fraud, speaks volumes about the utter lack of any moral compass at the school. Yes, I’m sure there are good people who are just keeping their heads down, but at the highest levels of administration there wasn’t even a squawk. Instead, people lined up to tell even more lies on behalf of Harreld and his co-conspirators.
So Harreld will waste a lot of time and money and move the needle barely if at all, and whenever someone else comes along and tries to do it the right way again the needle will snap back and it will look like they did something wrong.
The people we should all being caring most about are the kids coming to UI, some of whom just need the right spark to do really great things. Instead, we’ve got a pugnacious brat running the school, talking trash about anything that isn’t world-class, instead of doing the hard work to actually meet the student’s needs.
It’s been a really eye-opening year for me on that score, and I’m still surprised by the depth of the corruption. The only silver lining is that Harreld’s out of places to hide. He probably won’t do three town halls this year, either, but at the first one he’s going to have to come across with actual plans and commit to targets, and that’s going to be interesting.
Because if we’ve learned anything about Harreld so far, he absolutely cannot stand being held accountable for his behavior.
I have a lecture I give that bores everyone to death. I have no idea why, but your reply reminded me of it.
It is about Joseph Warren and physicians who actuality stood up to bullies in 1775. (Warren was a physician from Boston who co-funded the Sons of Liberty. He was brutally killed and mutilated at Bunker Hill. Paul Revere — Warren’s dentist — identified his mutilated body some time later from dental records.) Warrens brother also helped the revolutionaries; he later founded Harvard Med School.
One of Paul Revere’s compatriot riders was Dr. Samuel Prescott. He died in a British prison.
Benjamin Rush. Josiah Bartlett. Lyman Hall. Oliver Walcott. Matthew Thornton. All were physicians and ‘academics’ who stood up to authority, some losing their life.
Long ago most academics quit standing up to the cronies and administrators attempting to monetize college or dumb it down. No more metaphoric Joseph Warrens.
So I guess comments about Vaughn and Bohannon remind us that only a few from within will fight this abuse of higher education.
Get on the train, the Harreld Train. Come to the reception to honor his illegitimate presidency.
The New York Times addresses college rankings in a column today:
Shortly before the newest U.S. News & World Report college rankings came out last week, I got a fresh glimpse of how ridiculous they can be …
If you have been keeping up with the fraudulent appointment of J. Bruce Harreld as president of the University of Iowa, most of what follows will be familiar. I offer it here in compressed form so the absurdity of Bruce Rasetter’s deceit will be clearly apparent. For further elucidation on specifics, follow the links.
On 07/30/15, just prior to the initiation of the formal cut-down process by the 2015 University of Iowa Presidential Search and Screen Committee, committee member and Regents President Bruce Rastetter arranged secret meetings between undeclared candidate J. Bruce Harreld and four members of the Iowa Board of Regents. Those face-to-face interviews, which took place in two meetings of two regents each at Rastetter’s private place of business in Ames, not only included two regents who were not on the search committee, but also the passing of Harreld’s resume to all four regents outside of the committee’s internal process for document review.
Between his own meetings with Harreld and providing face time with four other regents on the nine-member board, Rastetter secured five votes in Harreld’s favor before the search committee even began winnowing candidates. With co-conspirator and high-ranking University of Iowa administrator Jean Robillard chairing the search, and also acting as interim president, the outcome of the search was effectively determined in Harreld’s favor over a month before the final vote was taken. (While it is true that the secret regent meetings may also have violated the state’s Open Meeting law — which has in turn led to a lawsuit being filed on that basis — for the purposes of this post we are concerned only with whether the 07/30/15 secret regent meetings were fair to other candidates and members of the committee.)
Although the secret regent meetings took place on 07/30/15, it was not until weeks after Harreld’s shocking appointment on 09/03/15 that those meetings were revealed to the general public, to all of the former members of the search committee, and even toother members of the Board of Regents who were kept in the dark about those meetings through the entirety of the search and election process.
Whatever else we do or do not know about the fraudulent 2015 UI search, it is clear from the record that not only did those secret meetings take place, but that the six people involved — Rastetter, Harreld, and the four regents who met with Harreld on that day — all conspired to keep those meetings secret after the fact. It is also known that no other candidates received such meetings. What is not known but is believed, is that the full search committee was never informed about the secret regent meetings with Harreld, and that other candidates were never informed that they had the right to ask for such meetings — even after it was determined that such meetings would be provided to Harreld. Somehow, out of all of the candidates who eventually applied for the job, only Harreld purportedly knew that he had the right to ask for those meetings, and only Harreld exercised that right.
In an official statement released on 09/24/15, as word of the secret regent meetings was rapidly spreading, Regents President Rastetter asserted that as a candidate for president at Iowa, Harreld had that specific right:
Although no other candidate knew they had a right to such meetings, and neither the search committee nor the board notified any other candidates that they had a right to such meetings, in the statement above Rastetter asserts that right as a matter of board policy. Which brings us now to Rastetter’s 03/22/16 interview with the Des Moines Register, when Rastetter asserted that specific right again [question at 23:29; answer at 23:52]:
And we would have entertained any candidate who asked to meet with any regents, and try to sell them on why they should want to be president of the University of Iowa. That’s what we’re supposed to do — is be advocates for the university and the state, and encourage people to do their diligence before they apply, so they’re comfortable with, with the job, and know more about the job.
In the context of the 2015 UI search, it is clear that the only candidate was who aware of and afforded what Rastetter deems a basic right was J. Bruce Harreld. In terms of running a fair search, it is clear on that basis alone that Rastetter and UI administrator Jean Robillard not only did not run a fair search, but that they went out of their way to administer an unfair search by giving Harreld preferential treatment.
Even with all that, however, until a few days ago there was a belated, after-the-fact opportunity for Rastetter to demonstrate some validity to his claim, and that had to do with the recently launched search for a new president at the University of Northern Iowa. Specifically, if the 2016 UNI Search and Screen Committee publicly announced that any and all candidates — declared or undeclared, because Harreld himself was undeclared at the time — could meet with any or all regents in face-to-face interviews, then Rastetter could claim that his explanation for the preferential treatment Harreld received during the 2015 UI search was correct. Three days ago, however, the ad for the UNI position was posted, and there is no mention of any candidate right to meet face-to-face with any or all members of the board, let alone any right to do so outside of the formal application and candidate-review process.
Rastetter’s position was and remains that it is a basic right of every candidate in a regents search to be able to meet with any or all members of the Iowa Board of Regents, and it is a responsibility of the regents to facilitate and attend those meetings. And yet over two separate presidential searches, the only candidate who ever took advantage of that right — and almost certainly the only candidate who was ever apprised of that right — was J. Bruce Harreld, during the 2015 UI search. Despite the UNI ad now being published, and despite multiple press releases from the 2016 UNI committee, and multiple reports in the press about the UNI search, and awareness by the board of Rastetter’s prior claim, there has not been a single mention of the candidate right that Rastetter asserted in his official board statement on 09/24/15, and reiterated in his DMR interview on 03/22/16.
Despite corroborating statements by co-conspirators Rastetter and Harreld, no evidence has ever been presented — no letters, emails or texts — that J. Bruce Harreld asked to meet with four regents on 07/30/15. To this day, over a year after the conclusion of the fraudulent 2015 UI search, no evidence has ever been presented that Rastetter or any other regent, or any officer or employee of the regents, or any other member of the search committee, communicated the right of candidates to meet face-to-face with any or all regents to any candidate. Now, during the 2016 UNI search, there is also no evidence that candidates have been apprised of that same right, which not only calls into question Rastetter’s veracity about the 2015 UI search, but once again leaves open the possibility that one or more candidates will exploit that same right during the UNI search, rendering that presidential appointment illegitimate as well.
One other way of looking at all this, of course, is that other than Rastetter’s statements to the contrary, there is no evidence that any such candidate right ever existed prior to the 2015 UI search, during the 2015 UI search, or exists now, during the 2016 UNI search. Absent any such evidence, in fact, the only possible conclusion is that when Regents President Rastetter said, during his 03/22/16 interview with the Des Moines Register, that “[the board] would have entertained any candidate who asked to meet with any regents”, he was lying in order to cover up one of many preferential acts which were afforded to J. Bruce Harreld during the corrupt and fraudulent 2015 UI presidential search. What remains unclear is why the Des Moines Register itself has not yet commented on this glaring disparity, particularly given the bearing it could have on the legitimacy of the UNI search.
Not Ken Burns says
There may surely be something to the fine are of lying through your teeth that can be learned from these four blaggards.
http://www.biofuelsdigest.com/bdigest/2016/08/16/branstad-christie-and-rastetter-named-to-trump-ag-advisory-panel/
In Iowa, Governor Terry Branstad, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, and Bruce Rastetter, the president of Summit Ag Group, have been appointed to Donald Trump’s agricultural advisory panel. Rastetter denies it is part of a plan to be named Secretary of Agriculture in the event of a Trump presidency while Brandstad had denied being an advisor to Trump last week. He has been advising Trump on renewable fuels in recent weeks. Rastetter is heavily invested in corn and soybeans.
A few weeks ago — or maybe it was a month — I was doing a little light reading on the University of Iowa website when I ran across a link, which led to another link, which delivered me to the home page of the UI Office of the Ombudsperson. Given how the administrative ranks at the university had either been co-opted by, or rolled over for, J. Bruce Harreld immediately after his fraudulent appointment, until that moment it had not occurred to me that there might be an actual honest broker anywhere in UI administration. After reading every page on the ombudsperson’s site, I finally concluded that while their mission was laudable, there was no way to determine whether they themselves had been co-opted by, or had rolled over for, J. Bruce Harreld. And yes, I’m sure that’s not a nice thing to say about an ombudsperson, but after coming to the embarrassingly late realization that Attorney General Tom Miller actually works for Regents President Rottweiler, I don’t have a lot of faith that the powers that be in any organization will ever police themselves. (On the UI org chart you’ll find the ombudsperson’s office beneath the office of president, so it’s clear who works for whom.)
Flash forward to a week ago or so and I ran across a related page while again linking my way through the UI site — this one on the subject of conflict management. Wouldn’t you know it, right there on that page was a big ol’ wisdomatic quote from J. Bruce Harreld himself:
Effective conflict management is critical to the success of our institution. Our large and diverse university includes thousands of students, faculty and staff who work, study and live closely together, which inevitably leads to conflicts. In addition, academic environments necessarily involve strongly-felt differences of opinion, critiques, and evaluations. Un-addressed conflicts, however, reduce the productivity of faculty, staff and students, taking time and energy away from research, teaching, learning and other important endeavors. Managing conflicts well is an important part of a vital, thriving community and is essential to effective collaboration and teamwork and the development of trust. It is my hope that the resources provided on this website will help everyone on campus take responsibility to manage conflict early, respectfully, and appropriately.
Bruce Harreld
If you’ve been following the Harreld hire at all, and in particular if you’re aware of Harreld’s gurgling response to the AAUP sanction, you know that the line where Harreld talks about “un-addressed conflicts” goes beyond projection to jet-black trolling. And yet because Harreld is the president regardless of his illegitimacy, he gets to tell other people how to deal with issues in a manner that he himself cannot demonstrate.
That page on conflict management also led me to a page which talks about core values, which was as hilarious to read as both the old and new strategic plans for the Iowa Board of Regents. Like those regent pages, the UI Core Values page mentions a number of lofty ethical goals that Harreld and his co-conspirators would never pay any attention to because you can’t be honest and thoroughly corrupt at the same time.
As to how all this relates to Harreld’s fraudulent hire, the nightmare scenario for anyone working at UI is that the illegitimate J. Bruce Harreld or the traitorous VP for Medical Affairs Jean Robillard will use their positions of authority to punish people who do not want to play ball with their corrupt administration. And of course that’s exactly what you would expect from the kind of ethical trash that would conspire to steal the president’s office in the first place, so it’s hard not to think that at some point someone is going to show up in the ombudsperson’s office asking for relief because they are being targeted.
Admittedly, if you’re not up to speed on Harreld and his ruthless approach to administration that may sound implausible, but I guarantee it will sound eminently plausible as soon as you finish reading the following quote about J. Bruce Harreld’s time at IBM:
On Culture
Culture is a critical control system, it needed to be managed actively
* Actions speak louder than words, and is the most effective way to set the culture
— Public hanging of non-performers and culture change resistors was done in order to send a message, but this was done sparingly
— Public rewards were communicated across all levels of the business in order to encourage and reinforce behavior
Now, you’ve probably noticed that a number of people at UI have proudly signed on to the carrot side of Harreld’s heavy-handed approach to changing the school’s “critical control system”, and that he himself has not been shy about handing out rewards to those who have demonstrated loyalty going all the way back to the fraudulent 2015 search which propelled him into office. By the same token, however, it should also be clear that Harreld has no compunction about making an example out of people who oppose him, whether that involves taunting, belittling and invalidating them in the press, or hanging them in public.
While all of that has been percolating in the background for the past month or so, I am bringing it to the fore today because yesterday, on 09/19/16, the Gazette’s Vanessa Miller put up an interesting story about the UI Office of the Ombudsperson, and in among the various details from the recently released annual report was this:
The report notes a variety of campus-specific stresses potentially contributed to the office’s activity last year.
“UI is dealing with a striking number of challenges, including a disputed presidential search, retirements of key administrators, the implementation of (the Board of Regent’s transparency study,) tension with the Board of Regents, ongoing economic challenges, a stunning number of major building projects, national tension about race and politics, and more,” according to the report.
Out of 600-plus visits over the previous year, the report from the Office of the Ombudsperson acknowledges that factors related to Harreld’s fraudulent hire may have played a part in some of that traffic, and I think that leads to an obvious question. What is the reality base in the ombudsperson’s office regarding Harreld’s fraudulent hire? Because to hear Harreld tell it, all of the noise last year surrounding his sham appointment was about the regents and old grudges, and had nothing to do with the fact that he himself conspired to hijack the job he now has.
Without exception, in fact, the official line from UI administration — of which Harreld is undeniably the head — is that there was no UI complicity in the fraudulent 2015 UI search that led to Harreld’s appointment. Harreld is so good with his carrot that he even convinced the current and past Facutly Senate presidents to promulgate that lie, and of course the traitor Robillard has been peddling multiple strains of denial (often in contradictory fashion) since teeming up with Rottweiler to run the sham search. Meaning despite the obviousness of both Robillard’s and Harreld’s complicity, you can’t actually find anyone in UI administration who has gone on the record and said that the claims of innocence made by Harreld (and Robillard, and Thomas Vaughn and Christina Bohannan) are misleading at best and false at worst.
So, what about the UI Office of the Ombudsperson, which is right there on the UI administrative org chart, and reports directly to Harreld? Are they reality based, or are they living in the same co-opted and corrupt bubble that the rest of UI administration has embraced?
The reason I think that question is important is because the reality base a person comes from has a lot to do with how that person reacts to other situations. For example, years ago, if you were being sexually harassed /a> or tormented at the University of Iowa, you would have gotten no relief from the administration because there just wasn’t any sensitivity to such abuses. Now, decades later, UI may actually give out an award with your name on it, in deep thanks for taking all of the abuse that they did nothing to prevent.
In that context, the same question holds regarding honesty, integrity and ethics. Are those real standards at UI, or are they just branding statements — as they clearly are at the Iowa Board of Regents? In a given dispute does it actually matter if one person is credible and the other is a proven liar, or is the power structure at UI the only relevant dynamic? Does the ombudsperson’s office actually exist to promote justice on the UI campus, or just to make problems go away as quickly and quietly as possible?
If you go to the UI ombudsperson’s website, you’ll see seven menu items on the top-level nav for the site:
Resources and Training
So far, so good. If you’re being hassled by a malevolent bureaucracy that has decided to make an example out of you, those are some pretty reassuring links. Even better, the text on the homepage makes clear that you’re in the right place:
The Office of the Ombudsperson is a resource for any member of the university community – including students, faculty, and staff – with a problem or concern. We provide informal conflict resolution, mediation services and advocacy for fair treatment and fair process. Services are:
* Confidential
* Neutral
* Informal, and
* Independent
We offer a safe place to discuss conflicts or any concerns you might have about the university or its policies or procedures, and we will answer your questions, help you figure out your options, refer you to other offices if necessary, and help you resolve your concerns (see How We Can Help). The University of Iowa Operations Manual prohibits retaliation against staff, faculty and students for contacting the Ombuds office (see Job Security and Protection of Students)
Pretty good, right? In particular, if you’ve been reading Ditchwalk posts about the Harreld hire, you know that nobody at the Board of Regents or in the upper reaches of UI administration takes fairness seriously, so the idea that fairness is an objective of the Office of the Ombudsperson is good news. As is the idea that the ombudsperson is independent, and that you can’t be retaliated against for seeking help.
Also, from the homepage sidebar:
The Office of the Ombudsperson maintains strict confidentiality. The only exceptions to this are:
* If we learn that there is a risk of physical harm to anyone.
* If we are ordered by a court or required by law to disclose information.
This makes the Office of the Ombudsperson a safe place to talk about any concerns, including but not limited to sexual harassment or misconduct, discrimination, violation of policies, and unethical behavior.
Unethical behavior! You mean, like lying about how you got your job? (Hold that thought.)
The fact that sexual harassment is specifically listed suggests that the ombudsperson’s office exists in the real world, as opposed to the public relations fantasy that has been created by Harreld and the UI Office of Strategic Communications. So maybe the ombudsperson’s office really would do their best to get an individual some relief if that individual was being abused by an unethical person is a position of power, as opposed to just having a personal dispute or disagreement over policy.
On the How We Can Help page you learn that the ombudsperson’s office is a clearinghouse for information — what your options are in a given situation, and how the ombudsperson’s office may (or may not) be able to help facilitate a resolution to your problem. The Mediation page gives a quick overview of that service, while the About Us page introduces the two ombudspersons currently employed in that role. The Code of Ethics page expands on the info in the homepage sidebar, and the FAQ is informative and includes another reference to fairness:
Will the ombudsperson be my spokesperson and represent me?
No. The ombudspersons are neutral, impartial third parties. They do not advocate for either side and do not represent individuals. They strive for fairness and help people reach mutually satisfactory agreements.
And later there’s this bit of welcome reassurance:
How can the ombudsperson really be neutral, when they are university employees?
The ombudspersons are independent of all other offices on campus when they are serving in their role as an ombudsperson. While the Office of the Ombudsperson is a University department that reports to the University President, the office’s description in the Operations Manual allows the ombudspersons to remain free from university interference when working to resolve your concern. They do not report information gained from individual visitors to the President, though they do discuss trends they observe on campus (while being careful to protect confidentiality). The ombudspersons are neutral and do not represent your interests or the university’s interest; they help everyone involved find a fair resolution.
The Reports and Documents page contains links to reports and documents, including the report referenced in Miller’s story. Finally, the Resources and Training page contains the best single page of links I’ve run across on a UI web page — including a link to the Code of Student Life, which includes this no-nonsense standard:
Section D: Prohibited Conduct
Any student found to have committed any of the following acts within the scope of this policy as it is defined in Section C shall be subject to discipline by the University.
D.1 Academic Misconduct. …
D.2 Collusion. The aiding, abetting, assisting, or attempting to aid or assist another individual to commit a violation of any rule(s) in the Code of Student Life.
D.3 Use of Fabricated or Falsified Information. The furnishing of false information to any University employee, faculty member, or office, as well as the forgery, alteration, or misuse of any University document, record, or identification.
D.4 Bribery. Offering or causing to be offered any bribe or favor to any University employee or faculty member in an attempt to influence a decision or action.
Great stuff! Speaking of which, are UI administrators held to those same standards? Yes? No? Only if the top-ranking administrator wants them to be?
Point being, if you’re looking for dishonestly, collusion, or fabricated or false information, you don’t have to look any farther than J. Bruce Harreld and Jean Robillard — the two highest-ranking administrators on the UI campus. Which brings us back to our question. Do the people who work in the UI Office of the Ombudsperson actually know what happened during the Harreld hire, or are they working from Harreld’s propaganda that any abuses of power emanated solely from the Board of Regents? Because even if they are fiercely independent, if someone comes into the ombudsperson’s office looking for fairness and ethical treatment in the face of an administrative abuse of power, and the ombudsperson’s office does not know that J. Bruce Harreld and Jean Robillard both lied, on the record, in order to cover up the conspiracy behind Harreld’s fraudulent appointment, then I’m not really sure said individual will get a fair shake.
To that end, then, if you know anyone in the UI Office of the Ombudsperson who might appreciate specific, verifiable information about the abuses of power committed by Harreld and Robillard during and after the 2015 UI presidential search, please direct them to this post and the following three links:
* J. Bruce Harreld in his own words. 2 Videos, 2 Origin Stories.
Clear evidence of J. Bruce Harreld lying about the origins of his candidacy to the press, the people of Iowa, and the UI community, only moments after his fraudulent appointment.
* The evolving J. Bruce Harreld origin story, and where it inevitably leads.
A point-by-point examination of the lies told, on the record, by the cabal of conspirators who jammed Harreld into the office.
* J. Bruce Harreld: Co-conspirator.
A point-by-point examination of the ways in which Harreld abetted his co-conspirators.
Again, maybe it doesn’t actually matter that the man who is now in charge of the University of Iowa, and ultimately in charge of enforcing the university’s code of conduct, and in charge of many if not most of the administrative decisions that will be made for the foreseeable future, is a proven liar. But at the very least, if I was working in the UI Office of the Ombudsperson, I think that’s information I would want to have. Because even if it’s not material to my independent status as an information resource or moderator or conflict management expert, I would want to know that the one person I was obligated to report to on campus actually conspired with others on campus to steal his job.
In a recent post, and in other posts over the past year, we took a close look at J. Bruce Harreld’s obsession with gaming Iowa’s national college rank — particularly but not exclusively in terms of the numbers put out by U.S. News & World Report. As the fraudulently appointed president of the University of Iowa, we now know that Harreld was given marching orders by Regents President Bruce Rastetter to make Iowa a “top-ten” or “top-tier” or top-something university, and in response Harreld has gone on the record saying Iowa could become a “top-ten research institution” during his illegitimate tenure in office.
At the same time, as demonstrated to a nauseating degree during Harreld’s recent self-celebratory week of “inspiration”, he has worked hard to sell the University of Iowa as a credible institution of higher learning focused on research and education. And yet, even in constantly harping about the need to hire “world-class faculty”, which would seem to speak directly to both of those issues, we know that Harreld’s main interest in such hires is the degree to which they will improve Iowa’s rank. Likewise, while Harreld was purportedly hired to lead the school at a time of critical change in higher-ed, bringing a transformative vision to the school, Harreld spends a lot of time talking up Iowa’s core values and heritage. Thematically, it’s as if Harreld is selling the academic version of Hollywood’s ‘new cliche’ — meaning a kind of ‘transformative tradition’ in which everything is both sparkling new and the same as it ever was.
Exploiting the Troops
In prior posts on the subject of rankings, one of the points we have raised again and again is the fact that the rankings themselves are of little actual value. Yes, college students and administrative marketing weasels obsess about them in the same way that people obsess about all sorts of meaningless numbers, but in terms of actually determining value or worth, rankings are only as accurate as the data behind them, and quite often the data in the U.S. News rankings has been corrupted by the reporting institutions themselves. That is in fact the whole point of Harreld’s commitment to game Iowa’s college rank, because it is possible to do so, albeit usually to marginal effect.
After the most recent post on Harreld’s deeply cynical plan to implement Rastetter’s utterly idiotic plan, Frank Bruni of the New York Times wrote a fortuitous column titled Why College Rankings are a Joke:
Shortly before the newest U.S. News & World Report college rankings came out last week, I got a fresh glimpse of how ridiculous they can be — and of why panicked high school seniors and their status-conscious parents should not spend the next months obsessing over them.
I was reporting a column on how few veterans are admitted to elite colleges and stumbled across a U.S. News sub-ranking of top schools for veterans. Its irrelevance floored me. It merely mirrored the general rankings — same institutions, same order — minus the minority of prominent schools that don’t participate in certain federal education benefits for veterans.
It didn’t take into account whether there were many — or, for that matter, any — veterans on a given campus. It didn’t reflect what support for them did or didn’t exist.
It was just another way to package and peddle the overall U.S. News rankings, illustrating the extent to which they’re a marketing ploy. No wonder so many college presidents, provosts and deans of admissions express disdain for them. How sad that they participate in them nonetheless.
Now, the first point to make here is that while real college presidents, provosts and deans of admission may express disdain for college rankings, the fraudulently appointed president of the University of Iowa, who used to be the head of global marketing for IBM, is so completely all-in on college rankings that he has already rigged the entire budgeting process at UI to serve that end. And yes, that’s pretty damn sad.
The most important point to make about Bruni’s column is that here we once again have the time-honored tradition of exploiting troops who have served our country for publicity and feel-good, flag-waving goose bumps. Wait — make that American goose bumps. No — better yet, make that ranked American flag-waving goose bumps.
None of this is surprising, of course. By packaging the troops in a trumped-up data set, U.S. News not only makes itself look good, but it gives the marketing weasels at universities across the country another way to sell themselves in the crowded higher-ed marketplace. As Bruni points out, there is no actual number crunching involved in the veterans rankings, but they’re presented anyway, because U.S. News is nothing if not a willing enabler of the publicity value of its own product.
Predictably, in touting this year’s U.S. News rankings, the UI Office of Strategic Communication made good use of U.S. News’ meaningless numbers:
The UI also made the “National Universities” list of the 2016 Best Colleges for Veterans. The UI ranked 50th among all publics and privates, up 15 spots from last year. Among publics, it was ranked 24th.
Again, here we have the media machine of a billion-dollar research university touting a meaningless (if not made-up) metric in order to sell itself, and I can’t really think of a better example of the wholesale hypocrisy that J. Bruce Harreld has brought to Iowa. In order to promote a school which is predicated on reason and scholarship, Harreld and his media machine are promoting a third-party metric which means nothing. Yes, it’s advertising, yes, everybody does it, yes, it’s expected and factored in — but there is still a cost. And in particular you don’t get to go down the rankings road the way Harreld has, committing the entire UI administration to the singular purpose of gaming Iowa’s rank, and not also do real damage to the credibility of the institution.
Exploiting the Faculty
The problem with committing a entire billion-dollar research university to the gaming of its college rankings is that doing so necessarily drives that hypocrisy down to the faculty level, which should be immune to such ploys. Yes, people expect colleges to tout their rankings, and to put the best face possible on their numbers, but only as a veneer. The idea that rankings — no matter how diligently quantified — might become the engine of scholarship, or influence scholarship, should be anathema to everyone.
As detailed in the most recent post on Harreld’s rankings obsession, however, that’s clearly not the case at the University of Iowa. Not only did the Faculty Senate put together a working group in response to Rastetter’s initial rankings challenge back in December of 2014, but the eventual work product of that group had little or nothing to do with scholarship and everything to do providing propaganda in service of Rastetter’s goal. For many if not most of the people in that working group, having their name on a trash document which is itself antithetical to scholarship won’t have much impact on them personally, because it’s outside their sphere, but that’s not true of everyone.
As noted in the prior post on the subject, one of the people I was most intrigued by while learning about the Faculty Senate Working Group (FSWG) was Michael Sauder, a professor in the Sociology department. Sauder initially spoke to the Faculty Council as an expert on the subject of rankings, and even from the meeting minutes it was clear that he knew Rastetter’s challenge was folly. Based on his expertise it’s also not surprising that the Faculty Council recommended him to be one of eleven faculty in the FSWG, but therein lies the problem.
What I did not know at the time — because I am an idiot and didn’t check — was that Sauder (along with Northwestern’s Wendy Espeland), has written a book about college rankings, titled Engines of Anxiety:
Students and the public routinely consult various published college rankings to assess the quality of colleges and universities and easily compare different schools. However, many institutions have responded to the rankings in ways that benefit neither the schools nor their students. In Engines of Anxiety, sociologists Wendy Espeland and Michael Sauder delve deep into the mechanisms of law school rankings, which have become a top priority within legal education. Based on a wealth of observational data and over 200 in-depth interviews with law students, university deans, and other administrators, they show how the scramble for high rankings has affected the missions and practices of many law schools.
Engines of Anxiety tracks how rankings, such as those published annually by the U.S. News & World Report, permeate every aspect of legal education, beginning with the admissions process. The authors find that prospective law students not only rely heavily on such rankings to evaluate school quality, but also internalize rankings as expressions of their own abilities and flaws. For example, they often view rejections from “first-tier” schools as a sign of personal failure. The rankings also affect the decisions of admissions officers, who try to balance admitting diverse classes with preserving the school’s ranking, which is dependent on factors such as the median LSAT score of the entering class. Espeland and Sauder find that law schools face pressure to admit applicants with high test scores over lower-scoring candidates who possess other favorable credentials.
Extrapolate all of that that from law schools to entire universities, and you can see the damage — the perversion — that rankings cause when spineless administrators give in to their appeal. Now factor in an administrator like Harreld, who is full-on in favor of doing everything possible to maximize the University of Iowa’s rankings, and there’s no end to the amount of damage that diseased mindset may do to the institution.
In fact, as a case in point, we only have to look at Sauder’s participation in the FSWG, which led to a ‘white paper’ which was presented to Harreld in April of 2016, while Sauder’s book was published in May of 2016 — only one month later. For someone like, say, Lena Hill, whose name is also on the FSWG paper, who was also on the search committee that nominated Harreld, and who now serves as Harreld’s senior associate to the president, it doesn’t matter that the ‘white paper’ was trash because it doesn’t speak to her competency as a professor in the English department. For Sauder, however, that FSWG paper couldn’t be more relevant to his work, and yet there it is, standing in direct counterpoint to the themes and conclusions in his book.
Exploiting the Opportunity
As someone outside academia, I have to say that it’s more than a little disappointing watching faculty members happily throw another faculty member under the bus in order to advance their own personal agendas, but then again bureaucracies are the antithesis of courage. If you can get ahead even a little bit by selling someone out, why not? That’s pretty much the ethos that Harreld embodies in every cell of his lying, cheating body, so in that sense his affinity for gaming Iowa’s college ranking can’t even be seen as surprising. (It’s corrupt, but not surprising.)
The good news for Sauder, or anyone else who has an academic interest in the damage that such vain pursuits do to institutions of higher education, is that Harreld is about to give everyone a front-row seat into exactly that. He will try to hide his machinations, of course, as he’s already done with the budgeting process, but they will still be visible, and will be all the more obvious behind the scenes in conversations and decisions to which only administrators and faculty are privy.
Faculty on campuses across the country also do not have to come together en mass to repel the kind of crony abuses of power that are taking place at the University of Iowa. In fact, faculty don’t even have to police themselves, wasting time by trying to identify who actually believes in scholarship, and who’s just looking for the quickest way to the top. As noted in a Des Moines Register letter-to-the-editor in July, by UNI Professor Rodney Dieser, all it takes are a few faculty here and there doing actual research:
Goodall’s research clearly demonstrates that when research-based universities hired accomplished scholars, research productivity and country/global ranking goes up and when they hire an outsider — such as Bruce Harreld — research productivity and country/global ranking slip downward, often times in an accelerated fashion. Goodall’s recommendation, based on longitudinal research evidence, is that the president’s level of scholarship should be equal or better than the top 10 percent of faculty in the university that he/she presides over. Related to Harreld’s scholarship, it is obvious why there is great concern at the UI and why the question of respect of the institution has been raised.
Despite the fact that the Iowa Board of Regents is responsible for higher education in Iowa, and that the University of Iowa is the state’s flagship school, the corrupt leadership at the board hired Harreld based on nothing more than a tattered three-page resume and a billowing cloud of marketing hype emanating from his body. (Okay, to be fair, Harreld’s willingness to do whatever he was told certainly helped.) There was no reason involved, and no evidence presented that business executives — let alone pugnacious executives with no history of academic administration — are of any particular benefit, yet the board went out of its way to run a fraudulent search and fix the election in Harreld’s favor.
At some point in the future, and maybe the not-so-distant future, someone is going to crunch the numbers at Iowa and we’re going to know whether Harreld’s hire, and Harreld’s complete commitment to gaming Iowa’s college rank, was a good idea or not. That the UI Tippie College of Business in particular has had literally nothing to say about this issue is particularly telling, but all is not lost. Somewhere, either on campus at UI or at another school, someone is getting ready to document the academic atrocities committed at UI in the name of expediency, vanity, ego and vice, and I expect that J. Bruce Harreld himself will have a starring role in that scholarship.
Iowa sure hired themselves gems for university presidents didn’t it?
Iowa State president Steve Leath, between making sweet investment land deals with Bruce Rastetter money and chatting up Rastetter’s dilettante candidates for UIowa presidency, flies himself to North Carolina using one of Iowa State’s airplanes. Who would have thought? No one apparently until one year after the incident when Leath crash landed on an Illinois airport, damaging the Cyclone wings.
Another fortuitous discovery about Leath Behavior?
Appears Leath uses the ISU plane for ‘official’ business and ‘private’ business (he has family and a tree farm in NC). Heck-fire if youre an ethically challenged university president just get in the old ISU airplane, fire her up and wing it down to see the folk in Tar Heal country. Just like you can use state property any time you want: grab a car from the pool to head out to the drive-in, use a state tractor to till your garden, take condoms from student health …..
What a legacy of corruption this Bradstad/Rastetter regime is building up: Sweet unadvertised jobs for cronies in academia; big bonuses for buddies; sweetheart no-bid contracts for operatives; free money for land (and your chicks for free); almost free airplanes (the state pays for repairs); nice grants and monies for Rastetter v ISU.
How nasty bad does it sound for the ISU president to borrow the state plane to travel? Obviously he saves time and money using it for his padded trips back home. And he is a amateur pilot to boot; his wreck was bailed out by the state no less. Leath needs to save time because he is so busy making corrupt land deals too ( he said he wants to stay in Iowa, hahahaha, what a line?)
Leath could stay in Iowa. Long stay with free meals and bed (if Iowa had anything but a eunuch as AG)……for presidential malfeasance.
http://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/education/2016/09/23/iowa-state-president-damaged-school-airplane/90962114/.
What we have now are two university presidents who lied themselves into their most recent BoR contracts. Harreld lied in order to cover up the conspiracy that put him in office, which was led by the president of the board. Leath lied — at least purportedly — to the board, by hiding the accident until long after he had signed his new 5-year deal, which included a pay raise and additional deferred compensation.
In 2015 alone, these two clowns were paid close to $1.5M dollars by the people of Iowa, as directed by the Iowa Board of Regents. You couldn’t make this up if you tried, but it’s really happening.
CL says
https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2016/04/28/new-book-based-interviews-law-deans-and-admissions-officers-details-impact-rankings
Here are a couple links to Sauder’s book.
One of the things I try to do here on Ditchwalk – by which I mean always, not just in terms of the fraudulent hire of J. Bruce Harreld as president of the University of Iowa — is to put issues in context. I do that because I find it far too easy for people to slip into a mindset in which the thing they’re thinking about or talking about or writing about at the moment is the most important thing ever. (For a quick guide about how issues are prioritized on Ditchwalk, see the handy Ditchwalk Indignation Scale.)
My first published post on the shameful debacle that unfolded last year at about this time was titled Anatomy of the Harreld Hire. It was posted on 09/13/15. What I have not said before is that I actually wrote that post a week earlier, then deleted the entire thing. And by deleted I do not mean I simply clicked ‘trash’, and then was able to recover the post. I mean I deleted it in its entirety, because I knew what I would be committing to if I decided to go to war with the crony trash that precipitated Harreld’s sham hire.
What I did not anticipate at the time of deletion, however, was that whatever part of me had initially been outraged by Harreld’s hire was not willing to give up that fight. Which is why, a few days later, I rewrote the entire post, point by point, from memory. As to why Harreld’s hire — whether legitimate or illegitimate at the time — prompted such fury, I would point to this, from early in that initial post:
Among the pressing problems facing the students at the University of Iowa are alcohol abuse, the stigma of being seen as a party school, and a shocking correlation between alcohol abuse and sexual assault. How is Harreld prepared to meet those cultural challenges, drawing on his expertise as a businessman? He isn’t. Harreld has no relevant experience, and the Iowa Board of Regents knew he had no relevant experience when they hired him, even as the regents also knew about those pressing problems.
I next tried to wriggle off the Harreld-hire hook in early November, just as Harreld was taking office. Here is the first paragraph of that post, titled Sexual Assault and the Harreld Hire:
What is the last post on the hiring of J. Bruce Harreld to be the next president at the University of Iowa was also the first. I originally wrote this post in my head — or rather, it wrote itself — on September 5th, two days after the election. I finally typed it out over this past weekend, after two months of doing my best to understand the pathology that led to his appointment. Over that span I discovered more ugliness than I would have thought possible, most of it in human form. While this post is informed by that ugliness, and my newfound awareness has reinforced my original conviction, it is in spirit unaltered.
Prior to Harreld’s election my only thought about the retirement of Sally Mason was that I hoped the new president would make two pressing cultural issues a priority. Those issues were alcoholism and sexual assault, which are obviously intertwined.
What I did not know when that post went live was that in only a few hours I would learn that J. Bruce Harreld had so radically changed the origin story of his candidacy as to prove — beyond any doubt — that he himself had lied to the press, the people of Iowa and the UI community only moments after being appointed in early September. It was at that point not only that I rejoined the conversation about Harreld’s corrupt appointment, but that I mentally settled in for the long haul.
To the extent that the story of Harreld’s fraudulent hire has also exposed endless corruption emanating from the Iowa Board of Regents — including news this week that ISU President Steven Leath damaged a state-owned plane on a private trip, then lied about the cause to cover up for his own incompetence as a pilot — my original and ongoing motivation to stay with the Harreld story has not and will not change. The University of Iowa campus is and has been sick for a long time. When given the chance to address that sickness, however — which the Iowa Board of Regents was not only fully aware of, but used as a cudgel to browbeat the former president — the corrupt, lying trash leadership of the regents, in conspiratorial consort with the highest-ranking UI administrator at the time, instead rigged a fake search at taxpayer expense so they could hire an arrogant, condescending, pugnacious, bro-culture brat. In so doing, and in accepting that rigged appointment, Harreld and his co-conspirators made clear that the safety and security of students on campus was irrelevant to their aims as corrupt administrators, let alone as men.
What Rape is and is Not
Whether you personally agree with that assessment of J. Bruce Harreld or not, the next bit of context we need to address has to do with who is and is not a victim. While it’s understandable that Harreld himself might not feel too good about being described as an arrogant, condescending, pugnacious bro-culture brat, he is not a victim in that regard because he is being paid $800K per year ($200K deferred) to be the president of a billion-dollar public research university. Just like the head football coach or basketball coach, part of Harreld’s pay is compensation for taking the heat that anyone has to take in the public eye, whether they’re a good and decent person, or crony garbage hired by the corrupt Board of Regents.
While the issue of sexual assault was both the impetus for my initial engagement with the Harreld hire, and the impetus for the recently released UI ‘Speak Out Iowa’ campus climate survey, there is an almost inherent uncertainty if not euphemism in the term ‘sexual assault’ — to say nothing of the term ‘climate survey’. To omit any possibility of confusion, in this post we will not be focusing on the spectrum of demented conduct which falls under the heading of verbal or physical sexual harassment, but on rape. And to omit any confusion about what rape is, we will first describe what rape is not.
Rape is not a statistic in a climate survey. For the purposes of this post it is not even a crime, because we can imagine rape happening in a lawless society. Rape is also not a dramatic act recreated in any medium regardless of the talents of the creators. If you were once riveted by a theatrical portrayal of rape, if you found yourself deeply affected by the dramatization of rape or the acting chops of those involved, you have still not experienced rape.
Rape is a traumatic experience which happens to human beings not only far too frequently around the world, and far too frequently in the United States, but far too frequently on the campus of the University of Iowa. For the purposes of this post, and acknowledging a very small number of rapes which do not meet this test, we will define rape as the uninvited introduction of a penis into the body cavity of another human. The act of rape may be opportunistic, if the victim is unconscious, or, if the victim is conscious, it may be forcible and involve threats and acts of violence including slaps, punches, bites and choking, or the brandishing and use of weapons.
When the act of rape is completed, the experience of rape is not. Rape victims, if they are conscious, may no longer fear for their immediate safety, but must still recover from and process the trauma of that experience, including deciding what to do in response to that violation. If the rape is reported, the victim may have to endure invasive requirements imposed on them by the authorities, extending the trauma. If the victim knows the attacker, and even if the victim identifies the attacker, because of the presumption of innocence and procedural delays the victim may be repeatedly exposed to that individual in the future. If the victim does not know their attacker, they may wonder if every male they encounter was the attacker. In any case, all rape victims will also wonder if the individual who raped them will try to rape them again.
Even if the rapist is caught and held with no chance of parole or escape, the experience of rape continues for the victim. Tests will need to be conducted to determine whether the penis (or penises) in question was (or were) also diseased. If the victim was female, and the vagina was penetrated, the victim will have to make choices regarding the possibility of conception that they would otherwise not have been forced to make. Depending on the circumstances, simply determining the physical toll of the rape could take weeks or longer.
Finally, even if the rapist is convicted, no diseases are contracted and no pregnancy occurs, the experience of rape will stay with the victim forever. Some victims will be able to move on in most respects, but some victims will be so traumatized that they will never be able to have a normal relationship with another human being, let alone a normal intimate relationship. If the rapist remains free, the post-traumatic stress only intensifies. If the rapist is never identified, the post-traumatic stress only intensifies.
The Origin of the ‘Speak Out Iowa’ Campus Climate Survey
In the summer of 2014, in response to unending reports of sexual assault on college campuses across the country — if not also to untold millennia in which women had been and still were being openly treated as disposable objects of sexual gratification by males at every level of cultural strata — a bipartisan bill was introduced in the U.S. Senate:
The lawmakers, led by Senator Claire McCaskill of Missouri and Senator Kirsten Gillibrand of New York, both Democrats, said that the bill responds to a national problem of campus sexual assault and the publicized cases of colleges mishandling investigations.
“If you are a young woman who goes to college, you are more likely to be sexually assaulted than if you didn’t,” Gillibrand said. “The price of a college education should not be that one in five students is sexually assaulted.” (That one-in-five figure, though widely cited, is questioned by some.)
The legislation would require all colleges to conduct anonymous surveys of students about their views of sexual assault on campuses. The results of the so-called “climate surveys” would then be published online for prospective students to see. The White House has recommended that colleges conduct such evaluations, but the bill would make them mandatory.
The goal is to gauge the actual prevalence of sexual assault or other troubling behaviors on an individual campus, McCaskill said, rather than rely only on the number of reported incidents for such a widely underreported crime.
In response to the threat of that proposed legislation, the American Association of Universities (AAU), of which the University of Iowa was and is a member, offered to conduct climate surveys on behalf of its member organizations. Perhaps predictably, the AAU’s offer seemed to be more concerned with giving its member institutions political cover and plausible deniability with regard to sexual assault than with actually getting to the root of the problem. To the University of Iowa’s credit — and unlike fellow AAU member Iowa State University — UI declined to participate in the AAU survey:
Twenty-six of the AAU’s 60 U.S. members told Inside Higher Ed this week that they had decided against participating in the association’s survey project, which some victims’ advocates and sexual violence researchers had criticized.
The universities gave various reasons for not participating, and several said that they would be designing and conducting their own surveys.
The AAU announced in November that it was contracting with a research firm, Westat, to develop and implement a campus “climate survey” for any of its members institutions that wanted to participate. The association said that one goal of the project was to fend off Congressional efforts to require universities to annually survey their students about the prevalence of sexual assault. And one reason that some in Congress have pushed for broad surveys — as opposed to the campus-by-campus approach some AAU members are now embracing — is to allow for comparisons of how institutions are doing.
Universities had to decide within the past several weeks whether they wanted to pay about $85,000 to participate.
The AAU’s survey had been criticized by several dozen scholars who study sexual violence as well as some victims’ advocates for, among other things, not pledging to release campus-by-campus data, but to share only aggregate data. Critics also said the process lacked transparency and input from enough scientists who study sexual assaults on campuses.
As the AAU surveys got underway, and as the University of Iowa began planning its own survey, the 2015 UI Presidential Search also began. Seven months later, in early September of that year, the conniving Iowa Board of Regents, in league with traitorous interim UI President and VP for Medical Affairs, Jean Robillard, shocked the world by appointing J. Bruce Harreld as president despite an utter lack of qualifications for the job, and strong if not overwhelming opposition on campus. Less than a month later, as the machinations and lies of Harreld and his co-conspirators came into focus, Iowa State University released the results of its AAU-sponsored climate survey:
In a three-week period in April 2015, more than 5,200 Iowa State students completed the web-based survey.
An estimated 11.7 percent of the students at the 27 participating institutions experienced nonconsensual penetration or sexual touching involving physical force or incapacitation during their college careers, AAU reported today based on completed surveys from more than 150,000 students. At Iowa State, the comparable figure is 9.7 percent.
Among female undergraduate students at the 27 institutions, the incidence rate was 23.1 percent. At Iowa State, the rate was 19.4 percent.
In addition to asking students about experiences over their entire college career, the survey asked specifically about academic year 2014-15. The results show 7 percent of Iowa State students experienced some type of nonconsensual sexual contact during the year.
Just over a month later, and ten days or so before J. Bruce Harreld officially desecrated the University of Iowa by taking office, the school finally announced its own climate survey on campus sexual assault:
The University of Iowa will conduct a campus climate survey to examine sexual misconduct occurring on campus, including sexual harassment, dating violence, stalking, and sexual violence.
All degree-seeking undergraduate, graduate, and professional students will receive an email invitation to complete the Speak Out Iowa online survey on Monday, Oct. 26. The survey will be open through Friday, Nov. 20 and will ask about knowledge, opinions, and beliefs about subjects such as campus policies and resources, perception of the campus climate, and the prevalence of sexual misconduct. Participation is voluntary, and responses are anonymous. All UI students are encouraged to participate.
In mid-December, however, it was announced that the deadline for the survey had been extended, in part because the survey itself was a mess:
The 32,000-plus University of Iowa students asked to participate in a first-of-its-kind survey aimed at assessing the issue of sexual violence on campus were given three extra weeks to complete the questionnaire after some complained it contained offensive gaffes.
Instead of a Nov. 20 deadline, students have until the end of Friday.
UI Vice President for Student Life Tom Rocklin said the university added time “to give as many students as possible the opportunity to complete the survey.”
By Nov. 20, about 2,230 students had participated, or roughly 7 percent of those invited to do so beginning Oct. 26. That number increased to 2,560 — about 8 percent — as of Thursday.
“We’ve heard from many students that the survey’s length deterred them from responding,” Rocklin said. “We’ve also had isolated comments about specific aspects of the survey.”
At the time, the newly installed sham president, J. Bruce Harreld, was notified of problems with the survey:
“There were questions of whether you committed acts under the umbrella of sexual assault,” [Graduate student Spenser] Santos said. “Some people answered, ‘no, no, no,’ and then were given a follow-up question that should have been given only if someone answered in the affirmative.”
Santos said several friends reported experiencing the problem and didn’t finish the survey because of it.
“This was upsetting and triggering to many who experienced the follow-up question identifying them as perpetrators,” Santos said in a letter to UI President Bruce Harreld. “And it is doubly upsetting that no announcement and apology for the error has been made public.”
Santos said the survey was corrected by the time he logged on, but peers who were asked the wrong questions sent messages to administrators, calling the gaffe “unacceptable.”
“My colleagues who are survivors reported seeing it,” he wrote to Harreld. “They expressed shock that anyone could look at this survey and not see how it would trigger survivors in many ways.”
Although the original plan was to release the results of the four-week UI survey in the spring of 2016, most of the spring term came and went with no announcement. Then, in May, on an obscure UI web page, it was announced that the results of the survey would not be made public until fall because of low participation:
Although the University of Iowa had planned to release results from a first-of-its-kind campus climate survey in the spring, a final report won’t be made public until fall due to “a smaller than anticipated sample size.”
Of the 32,000-plus UI students asked to participate in the survey aimed at evaluating sexual violence on campus, just 2,683 filled out the questionnaire — or about 8 percent. The university in the fall took steps to try and increase participation, extending the deadline by three weeks and changing portions of the questionnaire that had prompted some complaints.
And the specific reason given for the delay?
According to an update posted on the UI Division of Student Life website in May, the university had hoped to share a final report before the end of the spring semester.
“However, additional statistical consultation was needed to address a smaller-than-anticipated sample size, which delayed the final analysis,” according to the update. “Waiting until fall will allow us to engage with our campus constituents as we identify next steps.”
Finally, last week, on 09/21/16, the results of the UI ‘Speak Out Iowa’ climate survey were released, more than a full year after the AAU surveys were completed, and more than a full year after J. Bruce Harreld’s appointment. (Key findings here; full report here.)
From the lede to Vanessa Miller’s report on the survey in the Gazette:
Even though fewer than 3,000 of a potential 28,787 University of Iowa students completed a survey gauging sexual violence on campus, one in five female undergraduates who did fill it out reported being raped since enrolling at the university.
From the lede to Jeff Charis-Carlson’s report in the Press-Citizen:
The results of a recent campus climate survey on sexual misconduct include higher numbers than any University of Iowa official wanted to see.
More than 1 in 5 female undergraduate students who took part in last year’s “Speak Out Iowa” survey say they were raped during their time at UI. For undergraduate female students who filled out the survey, 21 percent said they were raped and 20.5 percent reported attempted rape.
More than 11 percent of female first-year undergraduates surveyed said they were raped during their first semester on campus.
By any measure — by every measure — the results of the UI climate survey on campus sexual assault are horrifying. And yet, precisely because the University of Iowa chose to go its own way, because the university created its own one-off survey, and because it botched the implementation of that survey, the University of Iowa performed the neat trick of being able to discredit its own report. From Miller’s story:
Still, participation was so low — 9.3 percent — officials raised cautions about extrapolating the results campuswide, although many of the findings are consistent with national averages.
From Charis-Carlson’s story:
UI officials caution that there are some factors to keep in mind when reading through the survey results.
Because the survey had a response rate of only 9.3 percent, they said the sample size is relatively small and the results may not be reflective of experiences of the broader student population.
Also, about three-fourths of the 2,683 of those completing the survey were women. The gender breakdown among UI students is closer to 52 percent female and 48 percent male.
Data, but unreliable data. Data, but incomplete data. Data, but biased data.
Had the same data been reported in the context of any other organization or business, or function of government including the military, it would have been so shocking as to instigate a full-scale criminal investigation. And yet because of its bungled and sparsely answered survey, the University of Iowa simply declared those same results moot. Sure, women were being raped, but like the rapists themselves the percentages reported by UI couldn’t be trusted.
Which of course prompts an obvious question. Whose fault is this?
J. Bruce Harreld and the ‘Speak Out Iowa’ Climate Survey
No matter how early we might speculate that J. Bruce Harreld began conspiring with Regents President Bruce Rastetter, UI VP for Medical Affairs Jean Robillard, and megadonor Jerre Stead, to steal the job he now holds, the impetus for the UI climate survey on campus sexual assault clearly predates the most paranoid scenario. At about the time when former UI President Sally Mason was officially announcing her retirement, in mid-January of 2015, Iowa opted out of the AAU survey and decided to go its own way. That in-house survey then underwent development during the spring, summer and early fall of 2015, paralleling the ongoing presidential search and sham appointment of Harreld on 09/03/15..
Although Harreld remained largely out of sight for the following two months, as details of his fraudulent hire were repeatedly revealed in the press, it’s safe to assume that he was brought up to speed on all of the initiatives underway at UI, including the ‘Speak Out Iowa’ climate survey. Although the survey went live about ten days before Harreld took office at the beginning of November, it was — as a result of the extension triggered by the botched rollout — active for the first six weeks of Harreld’s tenure. Meaning even at that point the early problems and low response rate would have been known to UI administration.
As an issue, campus sexual assault was making major headlines at the time, and would have been well-known to Harreld if he had had any prior experience in academic administration, which he did not. Instead, as a swashbuckling former business executive, by his own admission Harreld somehow arrived on the UI campus almost completely oblivious to the issue, despite having been a lecturer at Harvard for the preceding six years. From J. Bruce Harreld’s candidate forum, on 09/01/15, at the 57:42 mark:
Harreld: I sense that the issue of sexual harassment is front and center in the dialogue here and I’m must honestly say I’m a little perplexed by that because I … I spent some time talking about culture and this is a cultural issue at the core of this — and I thank my daughter who went to Pomona for actually enlightening me, because I said to her, “Was this going on when you went to Pomona X years ago? Is it … was this really a part of … ?” She said, “Of course.”
But I … I sense what you’re saying is a little more intense now and she said, “Actually I think for some reason it’s become a part of the culture, maybe the male culture to actually do inappropriate, say inappropriate things,” and then I go off and say, “Okay, I got it.” I believe if you’re gonna change culture, the action of leaders is critical in this — and by the way doing nothing and saying that we’re gonna use some legal issues and what have you to actually delay doing something — it’s a real issue.
I read the six-point plan, I can’t even remember all six points…shame on me — I guess, but I actually have a sort of two-letter plan: N-O, we don’t do that, we’re not gonna tolerate it and we’re gonna actually go after to the hilt the perpetrators. I don’t care the hell who they are, whether they’re football players or whatever, and if that then … and that’s how I think because we if don’t do that, I think we then bring … open up the door for a lot of other issues like Title IX and mischief in other places in athletics.
But the first things first — which is that we don’t do that, we’re not a community that does do that and again shame on me if I don’t deal with that. And I think part of dealing is not … is, let’s get away from all the other things, it’s wrong. When it occurs we actually go after the person who caused the problem and deal with it, deal with it quickly.
Now, as regular readers know, this particular moment in the Harreld hire has become legend for multiple reasons. From trashing Sally Mason’s six-point plan, to proposing his own gung-ho two-letter plan, to — three days later, on the day after his fraudulent appointment — deputizing the football team to “do something”, Harreld’s bombast about campus sexual assault during his candidate forum still says more about his lack of qualifications than anything before or since.
Regarding the UI ‘Speak Out Iowa’ climate survey and Harreld’s personal responsibility for its success, however, we can draw a few conclusions from the passage quoted above. First, whatever Harreld thought about Sally Mason’s six-point plan before he eventually took credit for it himself last April (without mentioning Mason’s name in the process), it’s clear from Harreld’s own words that even before he was appointed he was not only aware of and had read the six-point plan, but he was aware that campus sexual assault was “front and center in the dialogue” at the University of Iowa.
Second, Harreld’s response — however idiotic — included the following two quotes, which explicitly make him responsible for the ‘Speak Out Iowa’ climate survey:
…the action of leaders is critical in this…
….shame on me if I don’t deal with that.
Only two days after his disastrous candidate forum, the thoroughly corrupt Iowa Board of Regents appointed Harreld president-elect of the University of Iowa. Having already read Sally Mason’s plan, and having taken such a strong rhetorical stand against campus sexual assault, it is reasonable to assume that Harreld was thus aware of the development and upcoming release of the UI campus climate survey on sexual assault, which went live approximately seven weeks later. It is also reasonable to assume that as responses came in, that Harreld was made aware of the low rate of response, and of the problems with the survey itself.
Admittedly, for the average status-quo academic administrator, that kind of survey and data analysis may have been far afield, but in an ironic stroke of luck it turned out to be right in the middle of J. Bruce Harreld’s otherwise absurdly narrow intellectual wheelhouse. As an engineer and MBA, Harreld had been trained, twice, to gather and analyze data, often using higher levels of math than most people ever encounter. As a longtime executive at IBM, and as the man who single-handedly kept that company from imploding, Harreld also knew everything there was to know about gathering data in large organizations, and about how to best sift through that data for answers. And it’s not just me saying that.
From an article by the Press-Citizen’s Jeff Charis-Carlson, dated 11/02/15 — the day Harreld finally took office:
(As regular readers know, and as covered in numerous posts, J. Bruce Harreld is so obsessed with rankings data and gaming Iowa’s national college rank that he has made that objective the centerpiece of every budgeting decision throughout the school. It cannot be overstated how committed Harreld is to rankings data.)
Continuing, from the same article:
On planning how to respond to sexual assault on campus:
“Let’s get more prepared. Let’s anticipate ahead of time some of these things that might occur. I think we can actually sketch out the unfortunately really nasty things that might happen in these types of environments — and I pray nightly that they don’t.
“On the other hand, we don’t need to wait for the moment to occur. We can actually prepare a little ahead of time. What happens in the organizations I’ve lead is that we go through the preparations. It never really comes exactly the same way … but it makes you a lot sharper when it does.”
“One of the things that I’ve learned is that you have really, really good people, you get your facts straight, and you get prepared ahead of time.”
From an 11/13/15 interview on Iowa Press, only two weeks after taking office, and in the middle of the UI ‘Speak Out Iowa’ climate survey:
Well, let’s back up and — I’m a data freak — let’s get the data right.
From a 12/16/15 Staff Council Executive Meeting:
We discussed the recent staff survey and how to look at the data gathered. President Harreld would like a paragraph about each main issue in the form of “what is the issue” and “what does the data say”. He gave an example about parking and collecting the data about how many parking spaces are available on campus and how much do people pay. This will not be a one-time process. President Harreld believes in continuous process improvement. The Executive Committee will work on a report of the survey and what issues we will likely pass on to President Harreld.
From an article by the Press-Citizen’s Charis-Carlson, about Harreld’s first (and, so far, only) town hall, on 02/24/16:
The event had been billed as a two-hour town hall session in which Harreld and three UI administrators would provide an update on how UI officials are addressing strategic planning, long term operational needs and short-term student housing concerns. Officials did not previously specify how much time would be left for community questions.
Without outlining the timeline for the event, Harreld began his remarks with a data dump of the metrics used by various ranking organizing for evaluating UI.
From a 05/03/16 interview with the Daily Iowan:
DI: Speaking of the strategic plan, there have been members of the College of Liberals Arts and Sciences and members of the faculty who are concerned about the state of resources for tenure-track faculty at the university. How do you plan to address these concerns? More broadly, how does increasing or decreasing these faculty members fit into your vision for the UI?
Harreld: Well, we’ve first off collected all the data, so every college has gone through where their faculty rank relative to their peer group. So, they’ve got the data.
Here’s Harreld in a Corridor Business Journal article by Chase Castle on 06/22/16, promising to increase resource allocations to specific programs:
University of Iowa President Bruce Harreld said that to compensate for historic lows in state funding, the university is likely to pursue more research partnerships with corporations, and may concentrate resources internally toward select areas such as big data, hydraulics and professional education.
Finally, here is J. Bruce Harreld only three weeks ago, in a DI interview at the start of the 2016-2017 academic year:
…I think people need to trust one another and start having meaningful discussions of where their differences are, and why they have differences are, and sometimes they’re legitimate from different points of view, and sometimes they’re illegitimate because they don’t have the right data and so at any rate, starting to work at that.
And of course Harreld is right. Without data you know nothing. So what the hell happened with the ‘Speak Out Iowa’ climate survey?
J. Bruce Harreld’s Commitment to (Not) Gathering Data
How did the University of Iowa spend an entire extra year on its own climate survey, as compared to the AAU survey, yet somehow manage to discredit its own mortifying results with a lower response rate? Better yet, how did that happen when the Iowa Board of Regents fraudulently hired the exact right person to wring rock-solid data from every aspect of the University of Iowa, including parking-space rates?
Well, those are all good questions. Unfortunately, because J. Bruce Harreld is a liar, and because his crack administrative team wouldn’t know how to tell the truth if you spotted them the truth, there’s no chance that we’re ever going to find out what happened behind the scenes. In fact, if we go poking around too much the most likely result is that J. Bruce Harreld — a consummate, gut-fighting bureaucrat — will simply hang an underling out to dry instead of standing up, being a man and taking responsibility himself.
How do we know? Because at the beginning of the current term, after an entire gratuitous week of celebrating himself, in which Harreld weaseled his way into story after story about the University of Iowa and its accomplishments — which in turn followed a week of public relations events staged for Harreld’s benefit, including bravely battling his “severe spinal problem” to help students move into the dorms, and exploiting a dying old football coach for publicity stills — J. Bruce Harreld was completely absent from any reporting on the horrifying results of the climate survey by either the Gazette or Press-Citizen. The reason for that absence was that despite using the UI Office of Communication and his powers as president to inject himself into every UI press release imaginable, in the original UI press release about the survey — which was signed by, but not specifically attributed to, Harreld — there wasn’t a single direct quote. (As far as I can tell, Harreld still hasn’t been quoted on the record about the results.)
Despite being a “data freak”, despite data showing that UI is a sexual predator’s playground, despite endlessly hyping his own business background and savvy, the fraudulent president of the University of Iowa, J. Bruce Harreld, has put as much distance between himself and the feeble results of the Speak Out Iowa survey as possible. And this despite the fact that if he wasn’t the head of a university or college, where, apparently, such serial sexual maulings are expected, it’s impossible to believe that Harreld would still have his job. Again, imagine if one in five female guests reported being raped at a given resort, or if one in five female employees at IBM had reported being raped.
In fact, you probably can’t imagine those situations because they would be completely insane. And yet, at the University of Iowa the only response that same news has occasioned from the man at the top of the administrative heap is allowing his signature to be included among a group of individuals on an unattributed press release. No statement of shock or revulsion — no follow-up using the same caricatured passion he displayed at his candidate forum — just a boilerplate message which is even less likely to garner attention than the failed climate survey itself.
And then there’s the timing. The shocking results of the UI climate survey did not drop during Harreld’s personally choreographed two-week coronation — they came out only after Harreld was done soaking up all the applause he could manufacture. And yet what information could be more critical to all of the students on campus, and particularly young women in their first year, who are most vulnerable? What responsible leader learns that the community they preside over is a sexual hunting ground, then spends two weeks basking in self-congratulatory, trumped-up media events?
But that’s only the beginning of questions about the release of the data, which takes us back to last spring, when the results were initially slated to be revealed. Even back then, while J. Bruce Harreld was using a $1.7M funding shortfall to jack up the cost of being raped on campus, the general results were certainty known, yet the reporting of those results was put off until the beginning of the current term. Through the end of the 2015-2016 school year, and through the summer term, when UI administration clearly knew what they had, there was nothing.
I know next to nothing about statistics and data analysis, but what I do know is that from the earliest responses to the UI climate survey back in October and November of 2015, administrators at the university — including J. Bruce Harreld himself — were aware of the nightmarish results. You can tweak data all you want in order to graph it and chart it and put it in context, but when one in five of any group says they’ve been raped — not sexually assaulted, but raped — you’ve got a world-class problem. Delaying notice of that problem in order to do “additional statistical consultation” was tantamount to delaying the report of a building fire — which is to say that it was insane.
So who decided that no advance word of the deeply embarrassing and damaging results of the UI climate survey would be released — even if doing so might have given students a critical, perhaps even life-altering heads-up about their own personal safety? Well, again, the captain of the ship is J. Bruce ‘Data Freak’ Harreld. The same J. Bruce Harreld who had a disastrous first year on the job, and who just spent the beginning of this semester orchestrating a campus-wide publicity tour to demonstrate what a wonderful human being he is. And there’s no way in hell he didn’t know the results of the climate survey as soon as they started coming in.
Unfortunately, however, that just brings us back to the stalemate we ran into before, where we’ll never really know who gave the order to sit on the survey results until last week. So instead, we’re going to ask a different question. Let’s assume that J. Bruce Harreld wanted more data on campus sexual assault and rape — better data, more extensive data — than has ever been collected on any campus ever. Given his educational background, his business chops, and his self-professed data fetish, what could possibly stop him? If Harreld didn’t have the right people on staff he could pick up the phone and call someone at IBM or Boston Consulting and have the right person in an hour. If he wanted to make sure students participate in large numbers he could have made the survey mandatory.
While the genesis of the UI climate survey on sexual assault predates Harreld’s tenure in office, he was president-elect while the final touches were being added to the bungled survey, and president while the majority of the survey was taking place. He was also president when the survey results were first analyzed and known internally, and president when the decision was made to put off releasing the results until the current semester, and president when the decision was made to release the results only after his recent media blitz was over. And of course as that same president, Harreld’s only statement about the results of the survey has been as a passive member of an organizational press release.
Ironically, the J. Bruce Harreld who failed to accurately gauge and report on sexual violence on the UI campus is the same J. Bruce Harreld who made data collection in service of gaming Iowa’s college rank the number one priority of his administration. In pursuit of that deranged goal Harreld has gone so far as to rig the entire budgeting process to accomplish that objective, made it clear to faculty and staff that improving int the rankings is the only relevant objective, and even co-opted the Faculty Senate into writing a trash report in support of that time-and-resource-wasting vanity. So you would think — if Harreld was actually motivated to do so — that he could implement and execute one crummy survey that would give him the answers he needed in order to aggressively combat and even prevent rapes on campus. And yet just as obviously you would be completely wrong in making that assertion.
Which raises another question. Just how personally vested in the question of campus sexual assault, including rape, is J. Bruce Harreld? Because if there’s any time-honored tradition on campuses around the world, it’s that ignoring the problem is best for everyone except the women (and men) who are being assaulted and raped. That is in fact why the federal government decided to mandate data collection on such crimes, because the thin reporting available elsewhere wasn’t cutting it. Despite clear awareness of that chronic if not endemic problem, school administrators and marketing weasels had no incentive to notify students or their parents that a given campus — or every campus — was a locus of sexual predation.
Fortunately, in this particular instance we do have an answer from J. Bruce Harreld. From his interview with the Daily Iowan three weeks ago, on 09/07/16:
I’ve got, as my wife says, whatever the student issue is, we’ve experienced it, so let’s sit down and work on it.
And yes, we’re going there.
Mr. and Ms. J. Bruce Harreld and the Student Issue of Being Raped
To begin, no — I am not denigrating J. Bruce Harreld’s wife by referring to her with a ‘slave name’ or as Harreld’s property. I am using “Ms. J. Bruce Harreld” in this instance because in the quote above, and in other mentions of his wife that Harreld has offered as proof that he’s a genial fellow, we do not actually have his wife on the record. Yes, I know his wife’s name, yes, I know she has a life of her own, yes, I know she’s an attorney. But I also know that J. Bruce Harreld makes things up on occasion, if not perpetually, which means we can’t assume that any story he relates about his wife is accurate. So until she goes on the record herself, we’re just going to think of Harreld’s wife — as introduced into the conversation by Harreld himself, in quotes to the press — as a figment of Harreld’s imagination that goes by the name of Ms. J. Bruce Harreld.
Now, personally I do not know, and have no right to know, whether Mr. or Ms. J. Bruce Harreld have been touched by rape, or whether any of their relatives or close friends have been touched by rape to their knowledge. What I do know from this quote, however —
….whatever the student issue is, we’ve experienced it….
— is that it once again raises questions about J. Bruce Harreld’s veracity. And pulling back to look at the full context of that quote does not help Harreld’s case:
And so I think we’re beyond much of that and people are starting to see that I have probably more artists in my family than people would realize; I have four Mandarin speakers in my family, so I’ve got a multicultural background. I’ve got, as my wife says, whatever the student issue is, we’ve experienced it, so let’s sit down and work on it. So I think people are calming down.
As you can see, most of this is completely nuts. Nobody is concerned about the number of artists that Harreld does or does not have in his family. What they’re concerned about is that Harreld himself is a liar and a cheat, and that he conspired with others to steal the job he now has. Even if they weren’t concerned about that, however, the fact that he has artists in his family does not make Harreld an artist, or artist-friendly, or an appreciator or supporter of the arts.
The same goes for Harreld’s lunatic line about having four Mandarin speakers in his family, and how that supposedly grants Harreld a “multicultural background”. No, that’s not how multiculturalism works. You don’t get to label yourself as multicultural because of the accomplishments of the people you’re related to.
And of course at the end of the above quote we again have Harreld trolling people about “calming down”, as detailed exhaustively in a prior two-part post. And there, sandwiched between all three of those Harreld-isms, we have the bold assertion — not only by Harreld but also attributed to his wife — that they have “experienced” every “student issue”, which would include the issue of being sexually harassed, stalked, assaulted and even raped.
Now, if this is ringing a faint bell, you’re right — we’ve actually been down this road before with Mr. and Ms. J. Bruce Harreld, at least as recounted by Harreld himself. From Harreld’s second extended DI interview, conducted last year on 05/03/16:
DI: Do you see the university taking the policy stance toward any kind of speech, like hate speech?
Harreld: No, in terms of hate speech, sometimes hate speech for one person is love speech for somebody else. If it crosses the line and we need to do something about it which I don’t think has occurred .
Lon Moeller: We’ve had conversations with the law school about kind of educating the campus about the value of free speech what a public forum is, and I think those conversations will continue.
Harreld: And even in my own town meetings, we’ve gotten right up against that. I could argue that a lot of it has been hateful to me. My wife was at the last meeting and she’s certainly found some of it that way, but what’s the point?
Now again, we don’t actually have J. Bruce Harreld’s wife on the record here, but it’s pretty clear from Harreld’s comments, and his report of his wife’s response, that they both equated what Harreld experienced in a town meeting with the kind of hate speech normally directed at people who belong to abused protected classes or minority groups. Given that the Harreld’s are both white and stinking rich, that would seem to be rhetorical overreach, and yet that really does seem to be what he’s claiming. (I would also point out that where Harreld said, “in my own town meetings”, plural, he had actually held only one of a promised three town meetings at that point, and would not hold another during that academic year. And yes, that’s Harreld once again telling a lie simply because the opportunity presented itself.)
Four months later, then, when we once again find Harreld invoking his wife in order to prove that he’s already “experienced” every possible “student issue”, what are we to think? Well, for all of the reasons listed in this post and more, if we tried to build a circumstantial case that sexual assault and rape were deeply personal issues for J. Bruce Harreld, we would fail. From Harreld’s comments at his candidate forum to his comments immediately after being appointed, to his comments throughout the 2015-2016 academic year, his rhetoric has all the poignancy of someone opposed to ‘badness’ or people ‘not being nice’.
For example, here’s the anti-abuse part of the press release that accompanied publication of the results of the climate survey:
The University of Iowa is committed to addressing sexual misconduct, dating violence, and stalking.
There is absolutely no place for these actions on our campus – and we have a committed team working collaboratively to prevent violence, provide support to survivors, and hold offenders accountable.
No mention of the word ‘rape’. Then later, there’s this:
Sharing these results is an opportunity to engage the entire campus community in the conversation about this important issue and we’re committed to creating a safe and healthy environment for everyone. Improving the campus climate will require sustained community-wide effort.
Please join us as we address these difficult challenges together.
Even a full year after his disastrous candidate forum, and having had time to digest the results of the ‘Speak Out Iowa’ climate survey, Harreld’s rhetoric about sexual assault and rape is distant, abstract, administrative. There’s no personal engagement, at all, which really does call into question his assertion that he and his wife have “experienced” every “student issue”. In fact, after talking about the importance of leadership on the issue during his candidate forum, Harreld’s leadership is not only lacking, but he’s actually going backwards.
We know this because of one thing Harreld got right during his candidate forum. Here again is that specific text from the longer passage quoted above:
I don’t care the hell who they are, whether they’re football players or whatever and if that then … and that’s how I think because we don’t do that, I think we then bring … open up the door for a lot of other issues like Title IX and mischief in other places in athletics.
Harreld is exactly right. If you don’t take a stand against the really horrible stuff — actual crimes against individuals — then you send a tacit signal that administrative abuses are also acceptable or condoned, or at least not taken seriously. And yet what do we find Harreld doing only two months after taking office in early November of 2015? Despite the fact that Athletic Director Gary Barta was facing a federal gender discrimination investigation and a related civil lawsuit, Harreld backs up the truck — in a secret deal that is only outed in the press weeks later — and gives Barta a massive new contract extension and pay increase.
Because that wasn’t enough, however, several months later, when Barta found himself facing a second lawsuit, and the Athletics Department was targeted in a second and much broader federal gender discrimination investigation — which included on-site evidence collection — not only did Harreld refuse to give up his bro culture man-crush on Barta, he doubled down. From a 05/26/16 KGAN interview with Karen Fuller:
“The people he’s hired, the way he’s run the inst…the athletic department is world class, and we should be really, really proud of it. And I’m glad that he’s a — on the team, and I’m glad he’s a friend.”
That interview aired shortly after UI administration meekly announced that the results of the long-completed ‘Speak Out Iowa’ climate survey would be delayed so “additional statistical consultation” could be performed. As noted in a recent post, that interview was also the moment when J. Bruce Harreld sold out every woman on campus and went all-in on bro culture at UI. There is no way that Harreld’s pro-Barta message did not have an effect on the men on campus, just as repeatedly kicking the scandalous climate survey down the road had an effect — and a bad one. (And of course at the beginning of the current semester, the results of the survey were are also delayed until after Harreld and Barta announced the massive new contract for head football coach Kirk Ferentz.)
When you’re a leader — meaning a real leader, and not just a toady tool — you don’t pick and choose the issues you lead on. Yes, palling around with jocks has to be very exciting for a former dweeb business executive, but that former dweeb business executive is also responsible for the rapes on campus, even if that’s not as much fun. Which once again brings us back to the question implicit in Harreld’s quote:
Just as we’ll never know what went on behind the scenes with the climate survey, we’ll never know — and should not know — whether the Harreds have been touched by rape in some meaningful way. What we can say, however, without intruding on anyone’s privacy, is that Harreld’s statement is either true or false with regard to rape.
If it’s true, then obviously that’s horrible. But that should also give the Harreld’s as a couple personal motivation to fight tooth and nail for women (and men) on campus. In fact, if that is the case, one way that Ms. J. Bruce Harreld might put that horrible “experience” to work for the University of Iowa — besides keeping her husband focused on the issue — would be to become the director of the Rape Victim Advocacy Program, which lost its director last January. As Harreld himself might say, that would be a great way to “work on” that “student issue”, while also touching the lives of people who had been victimized.
(Whether there are plans to discontinue the RVAP program or not, I don’t know, but perhaps the hiring process was held up while Harreld turned the UI HR department into his own private crony jobs emporium. In any case, the fact that the RVAP director position has not been filled in over nine months would seem to lend credence to the idea that preventing and responding to rapes is not a priority for J. Bruce Harreld.)
Alternatively, if J. Bruce Harreld and Ms. J. Bruce Harreld have not been touched by rape, and yet they also truly believe they have “experienced” every “student issue”, then they both owe the entire campus an extensive apology for being truly miserable, thoughtless human beings. And yet when you’re stinking rich and jetting around the country on private jets, from one of your two or three or four multi-million-dollar homes to the next, and on a whim you decide to devote a few years to civilizing the backward Iowa natives, I think that’s pretty much exactly the kind of mistake you make. You assume you’ve seen it all because you’ve got a complex tax return or family members who speak Mandarin, when in fact you’re so clueless as to constitute a danger to the campus in and of yourself. (In fact, that’s a telling mistake Harreld has made before, and quite recently.)
A Grave Injustice
Now, if you have that thing in your head where you reflexively think of wealthy people or successful people or famous people as having special emotional sensitivities which must be respected, while regular people deserve little or no emotional regard, then you’re probably having trouble keeping your priorities straight right now. So as a reminder, this isn’t a post about hurt feelings, its a post about men who stick their penises into the body cavities of other human beings without being invited to do so, and how best to prevent that from happening. In that context, J. Bruce Harreld is not only not deserving of deference, he’s obligated by the absurd amount of money he’s making to set aside his own personal emotional needs and petty vanities and lead on that issue, even if he would really rather not.
In fact, if the King and Queen of the University of Iowa find themselves incensed at having their integrity questioned — leaving aside the fact that we already know the King has no integrity — that in itself is a pretty clear indicator that they don’ t have the slightest idea what real victimization is like. The kind of victimization that leads to a life on prescription-strength tranquilizers, chronic insomnia, bouts of weeping and depression, and on and on. The kind of victimization that even causes some people to kill themselves, because they can’t ever recover their sense of identify after being violated.
Speaking of which, as if determined to prove my point, while also going down in history as walking, talking fecal matter, Baylor’s former president, Ken Starr (yes that Ken Starr), popped up in the press a couple of days ago, right while I was in the middle of this post. Here is what the former esteemed university president and federal prosecutor had to say:
Speaking at the Texas Tribune Festival, Starr offered support for Briles, who was removed as coach in May after an investigation by the Pepper Hamilton law firm found the football program failed to adequately deal with student complaints accusing players of sexual assault.
“A grave injustice was done to Art Briles,” Starr said. “Coach Briles has been calumnied … it’s completely unfair.”
No. Art Briles is not a victim of anything. At Baylor, Briles was both a successful football coach and a failure as a man. Just like Joe Paterno was a successful football coach at Penn State, and a failure as a man. Just as so many males have been successful in their collegiate professions, yet failures as men when it came to meeting their responsibility to protect the most vulnerable on campus. To whatever degree the media machines currently propping up J. Bruce Harreld eventually declare his illegitimate presidency to have been a success, we now know, based solely on the way in which the ‘Speak Out Iowa’ campus climate survey was conducted and reported — apart from the actual plague of rape and sexual assault on the University of Iowa campus, which he is responsible for fighting with every fiber of his illegitimate presidency — that Harreld himself can be added to that inglorious list.
Looks like where there is smoke there are cyclones.
AP has been digging into ISU President Leath’s barn-storming escapades. Seems like university business involves celebrity hunting trips, relative t rips to basketball games, and it looks like just about any thing the President could dream up.
Damn nice perk!
http://pilotonline.com/news/nation-world/north-carolina/apnewsbreak-iowa-state-leader-used-nd-plane-for-nc-trips/article_3569d41e-ec51-5307-90bf-48fc17653428.html
PA Dolan says
Without in any way taking President Harreld off the hook, let’s bear in mind that the women of the U of Iowa and their allies have been begging, cajoling, asking and demanding that the university assess the prevalence of sexual misconduct for decades. The response has ranged from overt stonewalling to passive aggressive.
Consequently, the University has been able to say it’s doing something, when it’s mostly engaged in covering its ass. Here’s one example https://now.uiowa.edu/2013/12/making-campus-safe-all. But when pressed to put its full weight behind the effort, it has refused. (One small but telling example. President Mason was asked to sign a letter to students asking them to respond to the survey listed above. She refused.)
In my view, it’s clear that the only reason the University engaged in any survey at all was because it was required to by law. That culture was well established here well before J. Bruce Harreld arrived. Apparently there’s one part of the status quo he’s okay with.
Sorry. To clarify: President Mason was asked to sign an email. To its credit UI Student Government stepped up when she refused.
I completely agree about the shameful history at UI regarding sexual assault and violence. (The Jean Jew case is but another sordid and disgraceful tangent.) I tried to allude to that history in the post, when I said, “The University of Iowa campus is and has been sick for a long time.” However, I also wanted to keep the spotlight on the now, because I can’t do anything about the past. (While the problem has clearly been ongoing, and is not limited to UI, I worry that to some people the history of abuses committed grants those crimes — and they are crimes — some kind of insane legitimacy, as if victimizing other human beings really is just part of the collegiate experience.)
As we have recently seen with gay marriage, and earlier with civil rights and other cultural tipping points, there are moments when the bar of expectations is raised, and this is one of those moments. Whatever Harreld’s predecessors failed to do, he is going to own in full if he also fails to make headway. Much as I’m sure Harreld would prefer to preside over the UI campus in an age reminiscent of his own frat-boy experience at Purdue, there are no more excuses.
Ken Starr is out at Baylor — a private, religious school in the heart of Texas — because he viewed sexual violence against women as incidental to his job. If it can happen there, it can happen at UI.
Again, it’s beyond belief that they are now using their own incompetence to discredit the horrors communicated by those who took the survey seriously. And yet I do not know if they actually understand that what they just did is invalidate not only the survey, but the women who had the courage to step forward and respond. That Harreld has simply been allowed to pass this off as somebody else’s responsibility is both emblematic of his gutlessness, and indicative of the degree to which he has co-opted the very people on campus who should be most furious.
Then again, when you can claim to have been a victim of hate speech and nobody on campus questions your right to do so, and you can claim to be multicultural because other people in your family speak Mandarin, and you can claim to have a severe spinal problem when all evidence points to the contrary, you don’t really have anything to worry about when you cripple a survey, delay the results so that they won’t interfere with your self-aggrandizing agenda, and then order your subordinates to disavow the findings.
Robillard to “step down” from both positions.
“I write to share with you my plans to step down as vice president for medical affairs and dean of the Roy J. and Lucille A. Carver College of Medicine. President Harreld plans to launch a search for my successor immediately, and to help ensure a smooth transition I am pleased to remain in my role until a new leader is named and to work as hard as ever.”
Two questions; Did exodus of staff play a part in this decision? How golden is his parachute?
Here’s where I’m at on this. I do not think Robillard was forced out. I don’t think anyone could have dislodged him if he did not want to go. Absent a health issue, then, this is to some degree voluntary.
On the other hand, I do believe pressure played a part, including Robillard’s role in the 2015 presidential search. Most likely, I think he’s looking ahead and simply doesn’t want to end up wearing whatever is coming down the pike. He can step back and take credit for a whole bunch of stuff, and if it all blows up later he’s clean — at least in terms of the legacy he’s currently touting.
Vanessa Miller had more quotes from Robillard, Rastetter and Harreld in a piece late Friday, but because they’re all liars you can’t trust anything they say. Everyone wanted him to stay, it’s all his decision to walk away, blah blah blah.
I don’t know that we’ll ever know the truth. The one way we might is if another shoe drops, and one of the biggest hanging shoes is the total cost of the new Children’s Hospital. Over a year ago it was already $68M over budget, so I’m guessing it’s close to $85 or $90 now — which would be north of a 33% cost overrun. Throw in labor issues, Robillard’s insane plan to shorten medical college, his bizarre half-year tenure as dean of that college, and there are a lot of reasons why he might just want to bow out now, before things really go south. (Even patient care is faltering under his watch, but it hasn’t collapsed enough yet that he’s been blamed for it.)
How golden is the parachute?
– heads of departments and deans (I believe) can receive their full salary paid out for a couple years after they step down. For instance if you were a Chair of Medicine and you got 450,000 a year to pontificate, you could step down, assume normal clinical roles (which would generally be paid form 100,000 to 250,000) or less at your full bloated salary.
-Consider he gets 1,000,000 a year now
-Consider he likely gets about 150,000-200,000 a year in deferred income (retirement)
– consider they continue to pay his health insurance
I would say, conservatively Robillard has from 10-20 million in the bank. He likely has 5-6-7 million in retirement benefits.
You are talking about a guy who might work 5-6 months a year, then spend the rest of his time at one of his 3-4 vacation homes.
I know one past chairman who made about 400,000/yr., and now maintains 2 homes in other states; he stays in hotels in IC.
That’s how sweet it is.
As you are probably aware, AP reporter Ryan Foley recently broke a story about a 2015 airplane accident which Iowa State and the president of the Iowa Board of Regents covered up for more than year:
Iowa State University President Steven Leath caused “substantial damage” to a university airplane he was piloting when it made a hard landing at an Illinois airport last year — a costly incident kept quiet for 14 months.
Reports obtained by The Associated Press show both wings suffered damage after Leath failed to navigate windy conditions and hit the runway at the Central Illinois Regional Airport in Bloomington, Illinois. Experts said the accident appears to have involved a relatively inexperienced pilot making an error.
Following Foley’s original reporting there has been a steady drip-drip-drip of additional information, including multiple lies told by Leath and officials at Iowa State in repeated attempts to kill the story. If you want to follow the carnage you should read Foley’s piece, then go here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and — as of this post — here, with more certainly to come. In this post, however, we will limit ourselves to Leath’s original sin, which was almost killing himself and his wife at the Bloomington, Illinois airport.
Flying any airplane is a complicated task. Even the gentlest, most forgiving aircraft can kill you ten different ways without breaking a sweat. The faster an airplane flies, the less forgiving it will be in almost any flight environment, and the more likely it is that you will have less time to recover from any mistakes you make. If you screw up at altitude, however, you necessarily have an advantage when compared with making the same mistake close to the ground, which is why pilots pay particularly close attention to what they are doing when they are landing.
The vagaries of air as a fluid are such that sooner or later every pilot will experience a momentary loss of control requiring an immediate and accurate correction. As we will see, there is one particularly harrowing instance when it does not matter what a pilot does because a crash becomes inevitable, but such instances are rare and tend to produce telltale impacts. For the most part, as you might imagine, the more volatile the air is the bumpier the ride will be all the way to touchdown. Given the right mix of sudden changes in wind direction and velocity, it’s possible for almost any pilot to have a bumpy landing, or even to have to ‘go around’ for another try — which is in fact normal procedure. If you can’t put your plane on the ground in controlled flight, then as long as you have sufficient fuel on board you are taught to back off and try again.
Here is how ISU President Steven Leath’s accident was initially described in Foley’s story:
In a statement to the Federal Aviation Administration, Leath explained that as he was trying to land the Cirrus SR22 single engine plane, he “encountered an extremely strong gust that lifted me and I quickly added power but still dropped hard hitting the right wingtip.” He said he was turned off the runway and that as he came back onto it, his “left wing flap caught the top of a runway light.”
An airport inspection found “substantial damage to both wings,” debris on the runway from the broken light and skid marks.
Now, it’s one thing to routinely lie to the press, the people of Iowa and your own campus as a university president, and another thing altogether to lie to the FAA. So if we’re to believe anything that Leath has said about the accident — and as regular readers know, believing anything Leath says is a bad idea — we’re probably correct in assuming that his explanation to the FAA was more accurate than any of the excuses that followed.
Later in Foley’s report we also get this:
Patrick Smith, an expert pilot who reviewed the incident at AP’s request, said it appeared to be “another pretty clear-cut example of a comparatively inexperienced pilot messing up.”
“The winds on the report were well within the typical capabilities of even the most below-average pilot,” he said.
Pilot Kerry Riley landed his plane shortly before Leath without incident. The Champaign, Illinois, man said the weather was changing and there were strong gusts, but “I wouldn’t call it extraordinary.”
So the conditions were less than ideal, but still manageable, meaning Leath just screwed up. And yet in the very next paragraph in Foley’s story, we get this:
The university called the conditions “a localized downdraft within a thunderstorm” and noted the incident didn’t meet the FAA’s technical definition for an accident. It said Leath has flown for 10 years.
By shocking coincidence, on the same day that Foley’s well-researched story broke, Iowa State’s press office put out an extended press release to get ahead of the story and change the narrative. In that release, here is how Leath’s accident was described:
On one of the aforementioned occasions, in July of 2015, while piloting the Cirrus SR22, President Leath encountered a microburst, a localized downdraft within a thunderstorm. As a result, he experienced a hard landing at the Bloomington, Illinois airport. Following the landing, a wing flap of the Cirrus clipped a runway light.
While a “microburst” or a “localized downdraft within a thunderstorm” certainly sounds menacing, nowhere else do we find anyone talking about microbursts, downdrafts or thunderstorms. Even Leath, as quoted in his original statement to the FAA, does not mention anything about microbursts, downdrafts or thunderstorms. Instead, he specifically mentions “an extremely strong gust that lifted me”. In addition, the pilot who landed just before Leath also made no mention of a microburst, downdraft or thunderstorm in the area. (The ISU press release also omits the fact that Leath’s right wingtip struck the ground first, before he took out the light with the left wing.)
Three days later, here is how Leath himself characterizes the accident in an official statement:
With respect to the hard landing incident, there was no attempt to hide this event from anyone. When it happened, I immediately notified the airport tower and ISU Flight Service and subsequently the FAA. I later notified Board of Regents President Bruce Rastetter.
Once again, Leath himself simply describes the accident as a “hard landing”. (Regarding Leath’s lie that “there was no attempt to hide this event from anyone”, two quick points. First, when you damage your plane and the airport you’re landing at, you certainly better notify the proper authorities. Second, when Leath says he notified Rastetter, he means he did so over a month later, after Leath signed a lucrative new contract extension. At that time at least one of the regents who voted in favor of that contract did not know about Leath’s accident, and still did not know over a year later when Foley’s story broke. So yes, both Wrong Way Leath and Regents President Bruce Rastetter intentionally hid the story from practically everyone.)
At the same time that Leath was issuing his own statement, the microburst excuse was being reported in the student paper — the Iowa State Daily:
The school said Friday that Leath “encountered a microburst, a localized downdraft within a thunderstorm” while he was flying, and “as a result, he experienced a hard landing at the Bloomington, Illinois airport.”
The next day, the microburst excuse was also included in the Gazette’s coverage of Leath’s accident:
The actual cost to repair the university-owned Cirrus SR22 that Leath was flying in July 2015 when he experienced a microburst and hard landing — clipping a wing flap on a runway light — was $12,591.72, according to ISU spokesman John McCarroll.
If you are not well-versed in flying or meteorology you may now be wondering if a microburst or downdraft is significantly different from any other type of gusting wind, and the answer, emphatically, is yes. No one who flies, and no one who studies the weather, would ever describe a microburst or a downdraft as a wind gust — which is why Leath himself does not confuse those terms, nor do any of the pilots quoted in Foley’s story.
A microburst or downdraft is not only a specific weather phenomenon, but one that is uniquely lethal to aircraft during landings. To see why, imagine you’re flying straight and level, but all of the air you’re flying through is moving straight down, like an elevator. You’ll still be flying, meaning you’ll still have positive control over your plane, but you will also lose altitude, often at a considerable rate. In fact, unless you are flying a jet fighter there may be nothing you can do to prevent that loss of altitude. If all of the air around you is going down, and you cannot power your way out of that problem, then you are going down with it.
Perhaps the most infamous example of what happens to an airplane in a microburst or downdraft concerns the crash of Delta Air Lines Flight 191 in Dallas, Texas, in August of 1985. In that accident, an L1011 airliner on final approach was slammed into the ground by a microburst because the pilots could not spool the engines up quickly enough to regain altitude. Had the same downdraft occurred at 30,000 feet the plane would have also lost altitude, and anyone who wasn’t buckled in may well have hit the ceiling, but the plane itself would not have crashed, or even necessarily sustained any damage.
As a result of the Flight 191 crash, awareness and understanding of the threat of microbursts grew considerably, such that many airports are now equipped with microburst detectors, and all commercial aircraft are equipped with radar that can detect windshear. Too, because thunderstorms are a prime generator of microbursts, pilots are taught to avoid landing when thunderstorms are in the area, which means it’s exceedingly unlikely that Leath would have even headed for Bloomington, IL, if his avionics reported unstable weather in that location.
So if there was no “microburst”, and there was no “localized downdraft within a thunderstorm”, why did Wrong Way Leath bounce himself, his wife and his airplane all over the Bloomington, Illinois airfield? Again, here’s Leath’s description of what happened:
…Leath explained that as he was trying to land the Cirrus SR22 single engine plane, he “encountered an extremely strong gust that lifted me and I quickly added power but still dropped hard hitting the right wingtip.” He said he was turned off the runway and that as he came back onto it, his “left wing flap caught the top of a runway light.”
While the Cirrus SR22 is a small, single-engine airplane, it’s also pretty fast. Even at 100% flaps its normal landing speed is 80-85 knots indicated (p. N-13), which translates to 92-98 mph . (To put that in context, if you’ve ever landed in a small plane before, the odds are that your landing speed at touchdown was considerably slower.)
You can get a sense of the speed of a normal Cirrus SR22 landing here and here. If you listen to the audio in the second link, or read the comments, you’ll see that the pilot lands at a slightly slower speed than recommended because the manual reflects best practices at maximum gross weight. In any case, however, as the rate of closure in the videos shows, that plane is not your grandfather’s Piper Cub.
The next thing you need to know is that when you’re flying in gusty conditions you need to be up on power so you don’t find yourself suddenly stalled by a change in wind direction or a momentary decrease in headwind. No matter what you’re flying, the only thing holding your plane up in the air are the invisible gasses flowing over the surface of your wing at sufficient speed, and in gusting conditions that speed is inherently unreliable. So even though landing is trickier when the winds are gusty, you want to make sure you are using more power on approach.
When Leath says that a strong gust lifted his plane, that makes sense. Increase the speed of the air flowing over the wings and you increase lift. What’s odd is that he mentions adding power, because A) he should already be up on power because of the gusting winds, and B) his first correction would normally be a quick lowering of the nose to compensate. The obvious conclusion from Leath’s report is that it must have been a really strong gust, which means the correct move at that point would have been to go around — particularly since Leath says he lost the runway track as well.
If you’ve ever been in a small plane landing in gusty winds, or even watched one from the ground, you’ve seen the pilot make almost constant corrections. In fact, in this video you can see the pilots of large planes — including huge airliners — doing exactly the same thing, because landing in gusty winds or with a crosswind requires constant corrections. While pilots may also make power corrections at the same time, sustained increases in throttle often lead to a go-around — meaning an aborted landing, even if the plane was almost on the ground.
Again, no matter what size or type of aircraft you’re piloting, you want to ‘fly’ your plane through the landing, with positive control, not just drop it on the runway. In the above video, the first plane actually climbs back into the sky after initially touching down (watch for a telltale puff of smoke from the right main, when the tires make contact), because the pilot could not transition to a smooth landing. And that was exactly the right call.
As already alluded to, the next problem with gusty winds is that they are almost never blowing straight down the runway, right at your plane. If you’re lucky, there will be multiple runways which allow for landings in either direction, but that’s not always the case. If you can only land in one direction, and that would give you a strong tailwind, most pilots would not even try to land in those conditions, and rightly so. If there is only one runway and the wind is blowing at ninety degrees to that strip, and gusting to boot, that’s another indication that you should find somewhere else to land if at all possible.
From the other pilot who landed at Bloomington on that day, we know the weather wasn’t crazy. From the pilot who reviewed the conditions on that day, we know the flight conditions were manageable. And yet, still, Leath got crossed up and not only managed to hit one wing on the runway, he hit the other wing on a runway light — meaning on two occasions his wings were not straight and level.
When you’re attempting a crosswind landing, there are two techniques you can use: crabbing or slipping. The techniques differ in the control surfaces which are employed to remain flying on a straight track, but in the case of slipping there’s also a bit of a performance penalty:
If you choose the sideslip technique, the airplane will be cross-controlled, making your stall speed higher. Set your target airspeed a couple of knots above your usual approach speed to make sure you have some margins to play with. If the conditions are gusty, give yourself even more of a buffer, since a forward wind gust means airspeed to the airplane. Be ready to make quick corrections with power and directional control because the wind can quickly change its speed and direction.
Because slipping involves using the ailerons (which are on the wings, as opposed to crabbing, which uses the rudder on the tail), and because slipping requires an uptick in power — particularly in gusting conditions — then any change in the angle of attack of the wing (from pulling on the yoke or shoving the nose down) or the speed of the air over the wings, will affect how each wing is functioning. If you get a little off course and drop a wing to correct, you could actually cause a momentary stall on the flight surface of only one wing — and if that happens when you’re close to the ground that would be bad.
I’m not a pilot, but if I had to guess, I’d say that Leath was side-slipping on approach, and when he got hit with a big gust he made a correction which momentarily stalled his right wing, which then dropped and struck the ground. In trying to regain control of the plane while also maintaining his track down the runway Leath then over-corrected, which caused his left wing to drop and clip a runway light.
I don’t think there’s any question that Leath screwed up, and I think he’s lucky no one was injured or killed. As to why Leath screwed up, however, that brings us back to this:
We’ll get to the “localized downdraft” part of that quote in a moment, but look at that second sentence. If you know anything about flying you know it doesn’t matter how long — in years — someone has been licensed to fly. What matters is not only how many total hours they have at the controls, but how many hours in type. ISU President Steven Leath may have received his private license ten years earlier, but that tells us nothing about how proficient he was in piloting that particular plane.
In terms of flying the Cirrus SR22, we know the plane that Leath damaged was purchased by Iowa State in 2014, and that Leath’s accident occurred in the summer of 2015. While it’s possible that Leath had hundreds or even thousands of hours in rented Cirrus SR22’s — or that Iowa State also previously owned a different Cirrus — it’s also possible that Leath had minimal experience with the plane until it was purchased by the university. It’s also possible that even if he used that plane for a year and a half before the accident, that use may have amounted to only a handful of hours, few of them involving gusty crosswind landings. Which is to say that the university’s implicit claim that Leath’s ten-year piloting career had any relevance to the accident was misleading at best, and, given the particulars, potentially provably false.
What we do know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, is that any contention that Leath was caught in a microburst or downdraft is flagrantly false. So false, in fact, that no one who was paying any attention to what Leath himself said could have written and disseminated that explanation, except for the express purpose of deceiving everyone who received that misinformation. Which brings us to an interesting observation.
Is it possible that Leath himself ordered the ISU press office to spread that lie? Yes, of course. When it comes to covering his own ass — as we learned earlier this year, when the crony Rastetter-Leath land deal was exposed — Steven Leath will say whatever it takes to avoid taking responsibility for his own unethical if not illegal actions. Indeed, the very fact that Leath has not publicly corrected the microburst lie makes clear that he is happy to have that misinformation weaseling its way into the public consciousness.
More importantly, however, along with key personnel at the Iowa Board of Regents, including president Bruce Rastetter, other members and officers, and ISU”s Leath, and UI’s J. Bruce Harreld and Jean Robillard, we can now add the Iowa State University press office to the long list of lying trash serving the aims of crony corruption in Iowa. And what particularly interests me about that development is that despite the propaganda generated by the UI Office of Strategic Communications (OSC), I have never accused them of flat-out lying on Harreld’s behalf, or Robillard’s, or anyone else’s.
The UI OSC may not always tell the complete truth when they know it, but over the past year I don’t remember anyone simply inventing and spreading a full-on lie in order to bail out a high-ranking administrator at the University of Iowa. In fact, on at least two occasions I can recall OSC staff contradicting high-ranking administrators who were lying their asses off. At the taxpayer-funded Iowa State press office, however, even that minimal degree of professionalism and integrity is clearly not a concern.
Update 10/04/16: Yesterday the AP’s Ryan Foley reported that the FAA put Leath through a check ride to make sure he was current on his piloting techniques:
FAA rules say that such rides are usually required after accidents or incidents when the pilot’s competence was the apparent cause of what happened.
So no — there was no microburst, there was no downdraft, and thunderstorms played no part in Leath almost killing himself and his wife. He screwed up on a windy day, and thankfully no one got hurt. Also, thankfully, the federal government isn’t run like Terry Branstad runs Iowa, or Bruce Rastetter runs the Iowa Board of Regents. It’s not just enough to be in tight with your crony pals — you actually have to demonstrate that you have the necessary skills and training to fly a plane.
Getting serious, or at least less excitable, for a moment:
Somewhere in there, Leath is busy flogging the tenured at ISU and demanding they bring home money. Research grant money. The thing is, the people who run the agencies and who hand out the money are not actually stupid. When they see that a university president is not only a crook but a damn fool, they are, I’d guess, much less inclined to cut checks to send to researchers at that university. The research funds will go directly to the researcher, but any promises to support the research institutionally, any sense that the slice on top that’s supposed to be for facilities support/maintenance will actually be used that way — why would the federal program officers believe the money wouldn’t be pissed away in a demolition derby of some kind? Or on locker rooms? Or a presidential palace? I don’t think they would. And unfortunately it only takes the shadow of doubt for “fund” to turn into “not a priority at this time”
If I had to guess, I’d guess that Leath & co would react by announcing that the program officers all do the same thing. But they don’t. It’s the defense of every corrupt person, that everyone else is just as corrupt. Fortunately, it isn’t true. As these stories keep rolling out, though, I imagine it will indeed have some effect on ISU’s funding levels.
This makes sense.
The president of a university has several jobs: such as fund-raising; leadership of academics, research, and professionalism; assuring the safety of students; and faculty, budgeting etc. One of the most important ‘jobs’ of a president is to set the moral compass of the university, to anchor the honest and accountable execution of all the teaching, research and public service a university offers.
And what have we at ISU and Iowa. ISU is led by a dishonest, manipulative liar who flies in university planes for his own private business, makes land-buying schemes, advances his political agenda, and hauls in big bucks.
Iowa is led by a profiteering dilettante who is whole unqualified, lied to get his position (both on paper in in words), who likewise profits from his position.
And all the crony minions in between.
Who would trust this crew to supply an honest education to students? Who would trust them to insure ethical and honest research practices? Who would assume these clowns can design an open, honest, and appropriate budget for their schools? Right, really moral compasses as they lie, cheat, and steal all at the public trough.
One of the more interesting contrasts between Leath and Harreld is that Leath has been on the job since 2012 (appointed September of 2011), while Harreld only has 11 months under his belt (appointed September of 2015). Whatever it’s like to work for either of those impossibly arrogant men, Leath has been bombasting (new word — either pronunciation is acceptable) the ISU campus for four and a half years, and I’m guessing between the land deal and the plane crash that there are some people who are tired of taking crap from him.
To your point about external funding, I think you’re right — a lot of people may just shuffle the Iowa State (and Iowa, and BoR) files to the bottom of the pile, because who needs it? Who needs the headache of trying to figure out who can be trusted in a system filled with crony jerks, when you can just give that same money to someone in a state that has effective controls?
I’ve also been laughing myself sick the past day or two at this huge new fundraising scheme at Iowa State, which had to be in the works for months — then Ryan breaks the plane crash story!
http://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/education/2016/10/02/iowa-state-launches-11-billion-fundraising-campaign/91439734/
Yet another lesson in which you own your mistakes and move on, as opposed to trying to hide them.
Who’s giving money to a school that buys its president a hot little airplane on the sly? Any big donor is going to lock up their contributions with iron-clad guarantees, which means the small donors are the ones who will be paying for whatever perk Leath feels he’s owed next. Even the name of the campaign — “Forever True, For Iowa State” — is hilariously ironic.
The true colors showing at this point are absolutely blazing, too.
He wishes those durn relatives of his had never got on the plane. Not “I wish I hadn’t invited them.” They’re doing him dirty by having accepted the invitation of the fancy show-off plane ride.
Next set of ingrates: the press. After all he’s done for ISU! Focusing on a trivial little lawbreaking…just out of curiosity, had Leath ever been arrested for anything? Internal complaints at the last place? I mean I’m 100% sure it would all have been someone else’s fault or insultingly trivial, no matter what it was, but it does seem to me that the guys who can’t own up to their own peccadilloes don’t start behaving that way out of the blue at Leath’s age.
Interesting how you connected the dots here.
Leath, given his own private playground, in what should be the public university environment, went pretty (excuse the pun) hog wild.
So the big speculation is that Leath, needing to see family and run his business in North Carolina, needed a faster mode of transportation than normal working stiff human beings. Suppose it does take a full day to drive to DSM airport, fly to Raleigh or Durham then drive home. So Leath leans on the bean-counters at ISU to buy the little hot rod they did. He doesn’t have time to wait, just like that Trump fellow.
Why should a man with so many irons in the \]==fire waste time? He has political obligations to Rastetter to fulfill. He is a man on the lookout for land in Iowa which he can buy on a suspect floated loan from his political connections and not pay the usual fees. He has his tree farms in NC. He has to conspire to hire other state university presidents. There is a helluva lot of lobbying to do. And oh yeah, a university to run. That is a busy schedule.
Obviously absolute power absolutely corrupts and Leath took full advantage of his perch on top of a major university (colleges now being one way to wealth and power as a fellow like Rastetter knows).
However like most nouveau rich and powerful, Leath overplays his hand. Too much land, too much salary, too much airplane, too much scheming, all on the public coin.
More and more leaths (I mean leaks) out each day. Turns out the FAA even retested Leath because of his bad piloting skills http://www.kcrg.com/content/news/FAA-says-agency-retested-ISU-president-after-rough-landing-395703251.html. And he gets the ISU PR group to write blatant lies to cover up his ineptness.
Sounds like this leach, I mean Leath has sucked too much blood from the state. I suspect he is going to hard time surviving all this…or he should have. ISU looks like a bunch of bumbling lying bumpkins whose president borrows the university plane like a scooter, winging off to his private adventures in NC, then happily slides the rig into third in an airport in Illinois.
I suspect Robillard looks at the consequences as the past 5-6-7 years of this crony party start unraveling; the no-bid contracts, the crony jobs, the system gaming, the Rastetter manipulation of ISU to kick a bunch of African refugees off the ranch, all come to light. Robillard has alot to hide including his complicity in the presidential search, the massive cost overruns (more to come) and massive ineptness of the construction of his pet Children’s Hospital, and his inept guidance of the UIHC and College of Medicine comes to light. He can continue on as Prof at Pediatrics (at his current salary of a million or so) and rake in the money without cleaning up the impending huge mess, leaving that to his poor successor.
This Mess under Branstad is likely to be a huge tug of war the next couple years as the media and others seek to dig exploring what really was going on and who was really bilked out of millions, while the state and university PR machines work very hard at hiding the truth and excuse-splaning away the crony buffoonery…
This is actually sort of what I was thinking about the sudden Robillard announcement (note that Harreld’s careful to say that it’s been on the table for quite a long time and they’ve been begging him to stay, which almost certainly means he surprised everyone with the decision). I think he saw writing on the wall, and I’m also thinking there’s some unhappy and expensive news waiting to come out of the children’s hospital.
I don’t know if anybody’s noticed, by the way, but that’s a very large building in a state without a giant number of children. You may recall the much more modest children’s hospital of 15-20 years ago. While I believe that one was outgrown, it’s difficult for me to imagine that this region actually has enough seriously ill children to fill that building and keep it occupied. It’s possible that on the inside it’s just an incredibly inefficient use of space, but even if that’s so, you do still have to maintain the space.
The thing is, even if things start falling apart now, I can’t see where the grownups start showing up. Where would they even come from so long as Branstad and Rastetter are still running this show?
My impression last year was, and remains, that the new Children’s Hospital was not built to meet current demand, but to take market share away from surrounding healthcare providers. Parents with sick kids are trauma victims themselves, and if you proclaim yourself the best that’s where parents are going to want to go. At least right up until they read that the sitting Ag Secretary, former Iowa Governor Tom Vilsack, had to come to Iowa and rip Robillard and the College of Medicine for falling behind the rest of the country on opioid treatment protocols. (Or those same parents really dig into the details in the U.S. News Hospital rankings.)
I also believe that Robillard is getting out before the roof caves in, and the coming numbers on the CHI cost overruns are part of that. He’s left a terrible mess, including whatever is happening at the College of Medicine.
And by the way — when this guy is signing your praises, that’s pretty much the end of any talk of a legacy:
The excuses given during the unveiling of the Children’s Hospital included ‘we will fall behind competition if we don’t build this’. Unfortunately no one in the press actually questioned this logic. There were no stats to back up the claim.
Academic medical centers (AMC) do not answer to normal economic pressures. Building in AMC is a matter of reputation and stature in the academic world. If Standford or tOSU built new hospitals, it would be a lose of face for the UIHC not to match.
One paper I read stated that the leaders of AMCs want ‘nice carpets, new buildings, and pretty secretaries”; perhaps a bit dated, but generally right on. It is bragging rights at major conferences.
Robillard is a pediatrician. He wanted to divert funds to his monument. He did and now he is gone (without naming rights). The actual number of patients to be served in the space will be remarkably low.
And you are right, there are more cost overruns to be released. Things are behind schedule and over-budget.
Hate to be so negative on all this, but sooner or later someone has to call a halt to all the new construction for show-offs sake. Iowa’s population of 3 million doesn’t support the massive luxury over-building. Further as pointed out here, while children are important, Iowa’s population tends to be aged. Where is the new ‘geriatric hospital’?
It is clear why drug treatment and narcotic treatment facilities died: 1.) it is messy business…you cannot have a ‘narc captain’ the same way you can have ‘kid captain’ at football games; 2.) Insurance does not reimburse drug treatment facilities like it does say pediatric ortho surgery; 3.) It is just not sexy to offer drug treatment programs and thus all efforts at that (after being banished to Oakdale) have been eliminated at UIHC). The medical intelligentsia looks way way down on drug treatment (ever see a building named after a drug addicted person?)
Vilsack’s Govt is partially to blame for this; Medicaid/Medicare/Insurance has almost no concern about the drug dependent for all the above reasons.
What scares the hell out of me is that the new Children’s Hospital and everything else at UIHC succeeds first and foremost on reputation, which Robillard and Rastetter seem to have taken for granted. If there’s a high-profile slip-up, or a sudden slip in the rankings, then the entire enterprise will be devalued, and more and more people will look for treatment elsewhere (like Mayo).
To be particularly crass about it, if you want the Jerre Steads of the world to keep throwing money at you, you have to take care of them and their families, which you can’t do if you take your eye off the quality factor. Stead doesn’t want his named on a stain — notwithstanding his complicity in the Harreld fiasco. He’s giving that money to be “world-class”, but, like Harreld, Robillard took that to be a marketing cry, not a goad to actually build a rock-solid organization from the ground up.
The chaos at the College of Medicine only intensifies my unease.
Just in the past twenty-four hours or so I’ve really come to realize how much damage Branstad has done to the state overall, but specifically how much damage he did by appointing Rastetter. I don’t see any way things get better in less than a decade, because the corruption is so entrenched. (I know people who are not familiar with this blog will think I’m making a political point, but I’m not. I don’t care about party affiliation, I care about good governance, and after six terms Branstad’s disease is so entrenched it’s going to take half a generation to recover.)
The dynamic between Rastetter, Robillard and Harreld is toxic as well. They’re all co-conspirators, which means none of them can really control the others. All one of them has to do is start talking to the press and they all go down the tubes — and we’re talking in a matter of days, not months.
The funniest part about Robillard bowing out is that what Rastetter and Harreld are now saying (we tried to get him to stay) is like the bizarro-world reverse of the garbage Harreld told about his own hire (they all wanted me, I couldn’t have been less interested).
Not too fast! says
Robillard may NOT be on his way out of UI!
These guys are thinking three steps ahead of the rest of us. That’s what makes them so dangerous.
In fairness to Robillard he is going to be 73. And the workload must be incredible. He can retain his million dollar salary while serving as a part time clinician — a very plum deal.
However, the leadership vacuum is getting ridiculous. Aside from the departmental leadership ineptness and vacancies, Robillard will leave holes in the Veep role and the Dean role. With a crippled president — Harreld in no way is remotely qualified to oversee searches of this magnitude — one wonders who is calling the shots at the COM and the UIHC.
Will we see so me kind of asset sell-off? Privatization? Selling off assets is what Branstad is all about (like Medicaid, Mental Health etc etc). Should we all be prepared to see the Cigna-UIHC? Or the Humana-UIHC?
The hell they are.
And tv, yeah, that’s exactly the kind of deal they work in the end, because someone will cut them a fat personal check for it.
I’ve been wondering about privatization for some time.
I also still don’t get how Stead got the naming rights to CHI, retroactively, for a measly $5M donation three months prior, when those rights could have gone for $15-20M. For a bunch of guys who profess to be all about the bottom line, that’s a staggering giveaway.
People immediately jump to Leath’s defense.
http://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/opinion/readers/2016/10/04/isu-president-leath-has-been-unnecessarily-vilified/91328364/
Iowa State announces a new fund raising initiative:
You are telling me that people are that dumb, to be played like fools for Leath’s enjoyment?
I doubt that over 1 % (maybe 0.1%) of ISU grads make what Leath makes per year. The new graduates are coming out with huge loan debts. Meanwhile their president is flying a university plane, damaging it with ineptness, giving himself fat raises, steering high paying jobs to Branstad/Rastetter cronies, guiding money to Rastetter, and getting sweetheart land buy loans NOT AVAILABLE to ISU grads. You are telling me that ISU wants contributions to fund the corrupt activities behind the scenes?
What is this like? Contributing to Al Capone’s operation, only not getting any booze in return? Arrogance!
Foley, continuing his work reported extensively today about the Leath trips.
Seems ISU inadvertently had momentarily posted the plane’s schedule online (is this like someone inadvertently mailed Trumps taxes to the NYT).
http://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/2016/10/04/donations-fund-iowa-state-president-steven-leaths-plane-use/91554408/
Read the article. Wonder if ISU knew it had such a jet-setting president. In North Carolina for a couple weeks. Bow hunting with the stars in Texas. Hunting in Indiana. Stopping in New York for fuel so the family can watch ISU play basketball in NYC.
Most of this is on the public donations dimes.
I wonder if Leath was ever in Ames. Maybe it was just lucky that he was in town to meet with Harreld in 2015; Leath is usually traveling and hunting with the stars. Must be an impressive life to be jetting all over the place like the CEO of IBM.
Sounds like the subject of ‘You’re So Vain”. Nova Scotia to Saratoga, you’re sooo vain.
How much has it cost the ISU fans to have a jet-setting, hip president?
I think ISU President Steven Leath is headed for another hard landing.
Hey but Leath is sorry!
“I regret all of this,” Leath said Wednesday during an interview with the Iowa State Daily in his office. “I don’t like to bring any negative image to the university. The fact that there has been all kinds of articles written about this makes me sad.”
http://www.iowastatedaily.com/news/politics_and_administration/campus/article_09652364-8b0a-11e6-ac12-5741764bf660.html
What will Leath do when he is sad? Head to the Leath-Rastetter Bar-L ranch in northern Iowa? Cruise out to North Carolina? Count his money?
Oh gosh, he’s sad.
I’m sad, too, Wrecker McPhee. Sad about the destruction of what had been a remarkably good public higher-ed system. Sad about all those screwed-over kids and parents. It’s sad.
Leath’s sadness seems to have had this effect on him:
https://twitter.com/rjfoley/status/783837835266633728
And that’s only hours after Ryan reported that the regents were going to conduct a “compliance review” that would have bought everyone time:
http://www.seattletimes.com/nation-world/board-will-review-iowa-state-presidents-plane-use-travel/
I don’t know if Leath decided that Rastetter was going to hang him out to dry or not, but this is clearly an escalation between the two men, if not open warfare.
ISU far outclasses the University of Iowa in a aircraft.
The ISU planes are a Cirrus (2011) and the King Air 350. Both were purchased in 2014.
Iowa meanwhile has:
1. Cessna 172n (1979)
2. Beech A36 (1977)
There is a 1972 helicopter and some kind of jet flight trainer.
Really, an old pathetic fleet compared with LeathAir.
Poor UNI doesn’t appear to own a small aircraft. No wonder they cannot retain a president.
The University of Dubuque, with a pilot program, cannot match ISU. Dubuque has a few Socata TB-20 TRINIDAD from the 90s.
AirLeath rules!
Very interesting Leath v. Rastetter…
If Leath commented that Rastetter was involved in the land deal, he is escalating the controversy. Implicating his cronies…slowly turning….
I wonder if Leath understands his arse is on the line…even if the Iowa AG is solidly asleep at the wheel.
But getting any truth out of these guys is impossible. Leath is maybe the worst public liar in Iowa. In this article. Leath lied (or walked back) many many things. http://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/investigations/readers-watchdog/2016/07/08/regents-firm-sold-land-isu-president-leath/86815250/
First Leath said the big land buy was no ones business. Then he said he consulted an ISU lawyer. Then he walked that back and said a private lawyer (each statement reveals more and more corruption). Later it was revealed Leath consulted McKibben, another regent.
Leath is a man who writes his own rules, and rather bad at covering his arse when his actions are obviously in conflict with university policy and likely more than that == illegal.
When the Regents announced they were investigating Leath, he must have realized the depth of Rastetter’s sociopathic rage. Cross the Bruce and suffer the consequences.
There has to be many many bits of evidence of Leath’s malfeasance. He felt as long as Rastetter was covering for him (as well as Branstad, and the AG) he was immune to prosecution. Now if Rastetter has decided to sacrifice Leath….all that protection vaporizes.
This is like the mob. The Boss has put out a hit on one of his capos. So what can the capo do? He turns. He goes to the FBI, sings, and then into the witness protection program.
Wonder who would prosecute this malfeasance? And wonder where Leath will end up in the witness protection program?
Here’s Ryan’s story, backing it all up:
http://www.seattletimes.com/nation-world/iowa-state-president-learned-my-lesson-on-use-of-plane/
Given that Sahai has already stated that the other regents weren’t informed about the plane accident prior to voting on Leath’s sweet new deal, Leath can also hang Rastetter out to dry by claiming that he told Rastetter about the accident before the vote. (That won’t save Leath, but it would cripple Rastetter.)
Also, why is he flying a hotrod like that when he can’t control it? You’re right, that’s a fast put-down speed.
I did used to fly, and also worked at a small airport, and what I saw was that every now and then a show-off with money — doctor, usually — would in fact kill himself with his inability to control his toy. These guys never did buy ordinary get-you-there planes. What they really wanted, of course, was Gulfstreams, but that was out of their league. But anyway yeah, every now and then one of them would just drop right out of the sky, usually after having broken a piece off their plane with a maneuver that exceeded tolerances. There was even a plane popular around that time known colloquially as the Doctor-Killer. V-tail. (Bonanza? Can’t remember.) Saw it happen once.
The thing is, someone who’s careless flying is not so often a careful person on the ground. Can you imagine Skorton doing this? I can’t.
What also astonishes me is how these women go along for the ride. Not just in the plane, but in life. Can’t understand them. I mean if Leath had said to me, “Hey, come for a ride,” I’d have said, “Sorry, I don’t fly with amateurs who don’t have time for adequate practice and are shady anyhow.” But in she pops.
Returning to the subject: beyond huntin’ and flyin’ and real-estate-finaglin’ otherwise good-ol-boyin’ it up, does this guy run a university? Or is someone else handling that part now?
Your memory is correct. The v-tail demon back in the day was indeed the Beechcraft Bonanza. We had one in Iowa City when I was growing up, and yes, it was owned by a doctor.
Like the Cirrus, the Bonanza was a hot plane in its day, and yes, it killed a lot of people.
You can indeed tell a lot about a person by how they fly. Flying is about preparedness, discipline, and knowing your limits. There are numbers for everything, and they’re constantly changing. If you do not know those numbers and abide by them, you’re just marking time.
Leath is not a numbers guy. He may be when he’s in a lab, but when he’s being the Laird of Iowa State, he’s a shoot-from-the-hip guy. The kind of guy who forgets the numbers and gets fixated on sticking a landing so he looks cool, instead of fixating on being safe, or keeping his wife safe. Or maybe he forces the plane down when he should go around, because he cut his schedule too tight and doesn’t want to miss the kickoff of the big game.
(To be fair to Leath, Harreld would kill himself and his instructor during the first lesson.)
I would still love to know the total hours Leath had in type, before the school decided to buy him this hot little rocket and turn him loose.
As to your question in the comment below, Leath was very clear about why he needed someone to buy that plane that he almost killed himself and/or his wife in. From an ISU propaganda sheet custom-tailored for the occasion:
I maintain an extremely busy, complex schedule that often requires travel across the state and country. Given the challenges and expense of commercial air travel, I believed my ability to fly this plane as an FAA certified pilot would allow for more efficiency and flexibility as well as a more cost-effective travel option.
Okay, sure — that clearly has no applicability whatsoever to taking an eleven day vacation, but I really don’t think we can expect coherence from Leath at this point.
As for the cost-effectiveness, that’s $500,000 outright for the plane, plus fuel costs, maintenance costs, storage costs, tax costs, the occasional repair costs, and insurance, which is obviously going to be way cheaper than working out some frequent-flyer deal with a national carrier that won’t kiss his entitled ass like everyone at Iowa State.
Holy ****** of ****. That ******* actually got them to buy him a ************* half-million-dollar toy. Whose **** is he ******* and with what kind of velvet prep for the lips?
************ THAT’S A HALF-MILLION DOLLAR PLANE.
*Why* is Leath flying that thing at all? He can’t ******* go coach like the rest of us?
AND WHAT THE HELL, he just took the half-million-dollar Foundation-paid toy he can’t handle for a spin down home? For goddamned kicks? Show it off to the folks?
What a turd. Good ol’ boy turd. Buy him a replica General Lee, it’s cheaper, and he can land it in a ditch somewhere.
I get some great laughs here. General Lee? Hilarious.
Don’t Leath ideas. I can see the ISU buying an orange General Lee, and see it parked outside his land grab up in northern Iowa….. so Leath can pull donuts out in the field when he is bored…
As you probably heard last Friday, University of Iowa Vice President for Medical Affairs and Dean of the College of Medicine, Jean Robillard, will be stepping down from both positions as soon as a replacement is, or replacements are, hired. As to how that hiring process will play out, all you have to know is that the imposter Robillard jammed into office while serving as chair of the 2015 UI presidential search committee will now dictate the terms of the search. From the Daily Iowan’s Marissa Payne, on 10/01/16:
The UI will conduct a national search for Robillard’s replacement, said UI spokesman Tom Moore. The UI will announce a search committee within the next few weeks, Moore said, and once it is formed, the panel will meet with Harreld to discuss criteria for the position.
It is a convention of administrations and bureaucracies the world over that everyone says good things about anyone who bows out, no matter how much damage that person did on the job. In keeping with that tradition, the UI press release announcing Robillard’s resignations contains no mention of the fact that he chaired the sham 2015 UI committee that nominated J. Bruce Harreld, let alone that he scandalously betrayed the University of Iowa while doing so. (Even in the History Department, UI will only get around to dealing with Robillard’s flagrant treachery and abuses of power after a decade or two, if then.)
For Robillard’s actual legacy regarding the 2015 UI presidential search, see here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and especially here. Likewise, if you’re interested in Robillard’s real legacy regarding his dual administrative roles, keep your eye on faculty resignations at the UI College of Medicine over the next year, on the total cost overrun at the new Children’s Hospital (which was already $68M, or 27%, at this time last year), on the frightening U.S. News rankings for procedures performed at UIHC, and on a host of other performance metrics that Robillard will be responsible for even after some poor sap or saps signs on to take the heat and clean up the mess.
If that all seems like a lot of work, however, and you just want to read the single greatest indictment that anyone will ever level against Robillard, that would be this, from former president of the Iowa Board of Regents, Michael Gartner:
“There are few people I respect more than Jean Robillard,” Gartner said.
Granted, that certainty seems like a laudatory quote, but what you may not know is that in 2007, Michael Gartner himself tried to install a puppet president of his own at the University of Iowa. Even better, when Gartner was rebuffed he actually blew up the entire search like a petulant child, after which a second search was initiated, leading to the appointment of Sally Mason. (In that context, it is entirely plausible that Gartner respects Robillard for pulling off the caper he himself bungled, but that’s hardly a feather in Robillard’s cap.)
Whether Robillard is genuinely fading into the cockroach-infested woodwork at UI, or simply gearing up to do more damage with the illegitimate crony in the president’s office, there is at this moment an ongoing presidential search taking place at the University of Northern Iowa. While we have previously talked about the farce of Regents President Pro Tem Katie Muholland co-chairing that committee, and we have repeatedly noted that Mulholland’s committee has not alerted potential candidates to a crucial secret right that Harreld himself exploited at UI, we do have the official advertisement for the UNI position, and that in turn allows us to shed some important light on Robillard’s fraudulent 2015 search.
A Few Minor Changes
Over a year ago now, when I first learned that Harreld had been appointed, I knew nothing about how presidential searches were conducted at colleges or universities. I still don’t know a lot, but what I do know about the 2015 UI search is that it was corrupt, and the one person who corrupted that search more than anyone else was Jean Robillard. Yes, Robillard was either working hand in hand with, or at the direction of, Regents President Bruce Rastetter, but Robillard was a full partner in Rastetter’s fraud. From administering the committee in ways which ensured Harreld’s nomination, to disbanding the committee immediately after nominating Harreld — thus preventing the committee from meeting its traditional screening responsibilities — Robillard was the engineer of the carnage that followed, and is equally responsible for all of the damage Harreld is about to do.
Back in October of last year, when I first read the advertisement for the 2015 UI search, I knew that one of the ways the committee opened the door for Harreld to slither through was by making the candidate criteria preferred, rather than required. As for the rest of the ad, however, I had nothing to compare the text to, so I didn’t know if other intentional loopholes were staring me in the face. Now, however, with the release of the 2016 UNI ad, the ways in which Jean Robillard himself personally greased the nominating process for Harreld are starkly evident.
Now, I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking, “Gosh, Mark, how do we know it was Robillard who rigged the ad, and not one of the other people on the committee who later turned out to have helped Robillard and Rastetter corrupt the process?” Well, that’s a good question. For the answer we can thank the Press-Citizen’s Jeff Charis-Carlson, who reported the following on 05/08/15, from the link just above:
The committee unanimously approved the job description, pending a few minor changes to be made by Robillard.
So — what were those “minor changes” made by Robillard? Well, we don’t have before-and-after drafts, or surveillance footage, or hacked hard drives to search, but comparing Robillard’s handiwork to the 2016 UNI position description is indeed revealing of Robillard’s duplicity.
As regular readers know, the currently constituted Iowa Board of Regents is so thoroughly corrupt as to resemble more of a disease process than a deliberative body. As such, despite the carnage from the 2015 UI search (which included the unprecedented sanction of UI by the AAUP), the board and its toadies on the hand-picked 2016 UNI search committee once again refused to require a Ph.D for the open presidency. From Charis-Carlson on 09/06/16:
The committee charged with searching for the next president of the University of Northern Iowa says that person should possess an academic background strong enough to meet the qualifications for tenure at the 11,000-student university.
The committee, however, also remains open to the possibility of that next leader may not have earned a Ph.D or other terminal degree in his or her field.
The implication of the 2016 UNI search committee also leaving the door open to a non-traditional (meaning sham) candidate was not lost on anyone who was familiar with the administrative abuses perpetrated during the 2015 UI search. From the Gazette’s Vanessa Miller, on 09/06/16:
“I told [Regents President Pro Tem, and Co-Chair of the 2016 UNI Search Committee], Katie [Mulholland] this morning that we will be ever watchful for a bait-and-switch at the end,” [said Sen. Jeff Danielson, D-Cedar Falls]. “That cannot happen here like it did at Iowa.”
Less than a week later, on 09/12/16, the final UNI position description was posted on the search firm’s website. Under the heading of “CHARACTERISTICS”, the contentious degree criterion was listed third:
Earned doctorate or terminal degree appropriate to the discipline (strongly preferred);
For the text of the UI position description we turn to records released to Stephen Voyce under the Freedom of Information Act. In a compilation titled Email+Parker+Board+of+Regents.pdf (p. 66), we find this email from Peter ‘Crony Contracts’ Matthes — ex officio of the 2015 UI search committee — to the rest of the committee, on 05/11/15:
Please find the revised and Committee Chair approved job description.
Thanks again for all your work and suggestions.
Again, note the “Committee Chair approved” designation, giving Robillard ownership of the resulting document. As attached to that email, the full position description appears on p. 67-69 of the compilation file. In that three-page position description, the “Qualifications Preferred” and “Skills” sections make up the last page and a quarter of the attachment, leading to this at the bottom of p. 68:
Qualifications Preferred
• An earned doctorate or terminal degree
While the stated criteria are the same for both the 2016 UNI search and the 2015 UI search — “earned doctorate or terminal degree”, and “preferred” versus ‘required’ — there is one small and obvious difference between the two searches, and one large and not-so-obvious difference. The small and obvious difference is that the 2016 UNI committee lists the degree criterion as “strongly preferred”, while the 2015 UI committee merely listed the same degrees as “preferred”. Then again, as a practical matter there are no standards for discriminating between such terms, so despite the stronger characterization it’s easy to see why a state senator and others might still be concerned about a last-minute bait and switch at UNI.
The larger and not-so-obvious difference between the 2016 UNI search and the 2015 UI search is that where all of the qualifications for the UI search were listed as preferred rather than required, under the “CHARACTERISTICS” section of the 2016 UNI position description only the degree criterion is listed as preferred in any strength — as specifically denoted by the parenthetical.
Because all of the 2015 UI qualifications were listed as preferred, literally anyone was eligible to apply for the position of president at the University of Iowa. By contrast, here is the heading and the first line of text for the 2016 UNI search criteria:
The successful candidate should possess the following characteristics:
Yes, the language is still mushy — “should” rather than ‘must’ — but from the wording of the criteria that follows, including the parenthetical “strongly preferred” after the degree criteria, it can be inferred that the rest of the criteria are required. More importantly, in stating the specific criteria for the UNI search, the wording itself was at times significantly more specific, further constraining the pool of potential candidates.
For example, here is the first criterion for the 2016 UNI search, as it appears in the position description:
• Significant senior-level executive experience in an academic institution;
Now consider the same criterion as listed second in the 2015 UI position description:
• Administrative experience demonstrating the ability to lead a complex academic research institution and medical center
As you can see, what’s missing from the 2015 UI criteria, but present in the 2016 UNI criteria, is the word “academic”. Again, however, that omission will come as no surprise to regular readers because J. Bruce Harreld was hired with absolutely no experience in academic administration. Yes, the 2015 UI administrative-experience requirement made it unlikely that a baker or waiter would land the job, but there was no expectation that candidates would have any idea what the hell they were doing on a university of college campus. (Which, coming up on a full year now of Harreld’s gaffes and blunders, to say nothing of his soulless disinterest in dealing with mental health issues on campus, has already proven to be an unconscionable mistake.)
To its credit, the 2016 UNI search committee specifies “significant senior-level executive experience in an academic institution” (italics mine), meaning Harreld would not be eligible to lead the much smaller, non-research-oriented University of Northern Iowa, which also does not host a major teaching hospital. (This is the bizarro world of crony corruption at the Iowa Board of Regents. J. Bruce Harreld is qualified to run the University of Iowa, and not qualified to run UNI.)
From just two criteria, then — degrees held and administrative experience — we can see how the 2015 UI search committee exploded the available pool of candidates to include business burnouts like Harreld, while the 2016 UNI criteria constrains the pool to candidates with a background in academic administration. Even the second criterion listed for the 2016 UNI search backs up that intent relative to the degree requirement:
• Strong academic background with documented, relevant research;
• Earned doctorate or terminal degree appropriate to the discipline (strongly preferred);
Where the 2015 UI search put its lax degree requirements up front, and relaxed all of the criteria on the list by designating them “preferred”, the first two criteria in the 2016 UNI position description make clear that the “successful candidate” will come from academia. In fact, in the 2015 UI position description, the only two specific criteria which are even listed — in the entire ad — are the preferred degrees and the non-academic administrative-experience requirement. Following those two meager bullet points there is a meaningless section titled “Values and Principles” which repeatedly demands “a commitment to” eight different line items, meaning the majority of the 2015 UI position description simply requires a pledge on the part of interested candidates.
(Hilariously, the “Values and Principles” section includes a commitment to shared governance, which Robillard and the board summarily shredded during the 2015 search, and which Harreld has done nothing to uphold. Infuriatingly, it also includes a commitment to student safety and welfare, which Harreld betrayed on day one when he vowed to game UI’s national college rank, while intentionally slow-walking desperately needed mental health resources that could keep students from killing themselves.)
Even the issue of fundraising — which is often held out as the main responsibility of a college or university president, over and above even the school’s academic mission — is watered down in the 2015 UI position description. Listed under the “Skills” subsection of “Qualifications Preferred”, that criterion reads:
• Ability to raise funds from private, state and national sources and to articulate to external audiences the value of supporting the University
For what many believe is the most important aspect of being a university president, the 2015 UI fundraising criterion for a major research university does not even demand “demonstrated ability”, just “ability” — meaning another pledge. Which is of course perfect, not only because there is no pledge that J. Bruce Harreld would not be willing to make, but because Harreld had no applicable fundraising experience when he took the job.
Now compare that with the 2016 UNI position description, and that committee’s expectations with regard to fundraising:
• Sustainable and proven strategies for student recruitment methods, retention, and enrollment management;
• Experience in fiscal management, resource generation, and effective fundraising;
Not just the “ability” to raise funds, but “experience” raising funds.
To whatever extent the 2016 UNI search committee is still leaving the door open to board mischief, by the stated criteria in the position description it would not be possible to hire J. Bruce Harreld. Yet despite the much greater size and complexity of UI, in 2015 Jean Robillard dumbed down the criteria for that search to such a degree that the position was tailor-made for a man of Harreld’s background, or lack thereof.
Having successfully watered down the candidate criteria, then, the only administrative crime left for Robillard to commit was watering down the application process as well, which he managed to do in spectacular fashion by again altering a single word. Here is the application process as described in the 2016 UNI position description:
NOMINATIONS AND APPLICATIONS
Nominations are invited. To assure best consideration, applications should be received by October 19, 2016. The application should include a letter of interest of not more than three pages; a current résumé (or curriculum vitae); and the names of five professional references with each person’s position, office or home address, e-mail address, and telephone numbers.
Now here is the equivalent section from the 2015 UI position description:
The Board of Regents and the University of Iowa invite letters of nomination, applications (letter of interest, resume/CV, and contact information of at least five references), or expressions of interest to be submitted to the search firm assisting the University.
Incredibly, because of a carefully placed “or”, Robillard made it possible to apply for the job of president of a billion-dollar research university without submitting any paperwork at all. All candidates had to do was submit an “expression of interest”, or get some sap like Mitch Daniels to nominate them, and they were in. By contrast, the application process for the 2016 UNI search compels all of the requested information to be supplied.
And no, that is not a loaded reading of the 2015 UI text. As regular readers know, the only documentation Harreld ever submitted to the 2015 UI search committee was a ratty three-page resume which was so full of lies that it later led to his censure by UI faculty. Where most candidates in 2015 submitted an extensive CV — as attested to by none other than Katie Mulholland herself, after meeting in secret with Harreld and getting an advanced look at his resume — Harreld submitted no additional documentation, including no letter of application. (As the AAUP investigation noted (p. 8), it has never even been determined whether Harreld officially applied for the position through the search committee.)
In sum, then, in comparing the 2015 UI position description to the 2016 UNI position description, we see that by changing three words and dropping one — ‘required’ to ‘preferred’, ‘experience’ to ‘ability’, ‘and’ to ‘or’, and omitting ‘academic’ — Jean Robillard gutted the entire UI search process in exactly the right way so as to shepherd his done-deal sham candidate, J. Bruce Harreld, through the search and (non-)screen process. Will the regents and their minions at UNI still try to corrupt the 2016 search? Of course — that’s what corrupt people do. And yet compared to the 2015 UI search, the UNI position description is iron-clad in its insistence that the next president of that university will come from academia.
This and the other abuses of power that Jean Robillard committed during the 2015 UI search represent his true legacy. When he had the opportunity to do the right thing he did the wrong thing so consistently and reflexively as to call into question every other accomplishment in his life. And again the great irony in all this, now that Robillard is stepping down from his dual leadership roles, is that Harreld will be the key player in the hiring of Robillard’s replacement, thus perpetuating the corruption that began when former Regents President Gartner allowed former Interim UI President Gary Fethke to appoint Robillard as VP for Medical Affairs without a search.
Instead of conducting fair and honest searches, the same old boys’ network has been passing off leadership positions at UI for over a decade, and there is no reason that think that practice will change under J. Bruce Harreld. If there is a search for a new Dean at the College of Medicine, that person — or some other person — may also simply be appointed to the role of VP of Medical Affairs, perhaps using one of those HR waivers that Harreld has taken a fancy to lately. In any event, the causes of diversity and inclusion, and even the cause of hiring the best available candidate, will once again be subordinated to the whims of a self-interested man.
Slightly off-piste but the more I look at that CHI building, the more I think it’s going to be the one that takes the whole house of cards down. I mean I know the idea is to steal business from some magical radius around, but not only don’t I believe there’s that much business to steal, it skips right over the whole business where parents deliberately take their children elsewhere, sometimes at great expense and inconvenience, because their very sick children are not actually getting good medical care at UIHC.
This is perhaps what Bruce was talking about when he was saying that it’s time now to think about who goes in the buildings, but you cannot buy A-1 medical people and bring them to a shambles. A-1 medical people will run away from your shambles. We’ve had many of them take a hike in the last decade.
I’m guessing we’re going to spend a ****-ton of money trying, though. (And rob and squash a lot of other programs to do it.) And along the way we’ll buy a high-priced charlatan doc and advertise the bejeezus out of him, and push him to build some kind of medical carnival in that building and shower him with money to do it, and he’ll take us for a ride, but we won’t get a great hospital. We’ll still have a hospital that parents rescue their kids from. And the numbers will have been crap the whole time, and the whole thing will slide into a money black hole that starts eating the rest of the joint, which, if you’ll recall, is only making about $5M a year, with the rest coming from playing the market — and that only works when Wall Street cooperates. Meaning that the nest egg from playing the market will, if CHI doesn’t pan out, drain right into it, and then when the market goes to hell (or when the nest egg’s gone) we have a serious problem.
In a different part of the world you could switch up and turn it into a geriatric hospital, which is to say, a hospital, but Iowa’s always had trouble that way because there’s no culture of running to the doctor every time you’ve got a spot or your arm’s hanging off funny, also not enough people have insurance that cover such things, also the Medicaid privatization can’t be helping.
I guess they could turn the top half into luxury suites for season ticketholders and give them a very short walk to Kinnick, but the tailgating would play hell with the patient care.
I’m suddenly reminded of the media corporations’ takeover of publishing in the ’90s, and how pissed they were when they found out that books weren’t widgets after all, that they’d imagined riches there, and that they weren’t going to make any money from them. One thing I’ve learned from sitting in meetings with the high-level people who plan these sorts of things is that they’re shockingly bad with numbers and they’ve got no clear sense of the business at all. They just, with great self-assurance, make things up and actually believe that this will do, so long as they’ve tested their own parachutes.
It’s really too bad.
I’m wholly in your camp these days, and not due to some anti-Harreld bias. My biggest concern after the fraudulent Harreld hire was exposed was that someone in Robillard’s critical position thought nothing of simply throwing over the entire search process to a corrupt political appointee like Rottweiler. Even if you have to go down swinging, you’re supposed to oppose that, and yet Robillard was all-in on the scam, if not gleefully so.
Everything from the symbolism of CHI looming over Kinnick — meaning it can be seen and adored by the muckety-mucks in the corporate pressbox suites when the team is fumbling away another victory — to the hard numbers on the cost (which clearly exploded, if that wasn’t anticipated beforehand), to the degree to which CHI is clearly sapping resources away from core functions (staffing), to the unbridled emphasis on rank money-making in the press, tells me that this is an organization that has been hollowed out. It still looks good on paper, but the damage has been done.
Also, these people are courting a lawsuit hard.
Suppose three readers here merely expressed interest, and the search firm never got back to them, never did any sort of screening. And the anointed candidate expressed interest, and there was great expression of interest.
On what basis, then, were the first three ignored?
It seems to me that an easy way of shutting that down is simply to ask all readers across social media to — if they’ve even a glimmer of interest in the job — express interest directly to the search firm.
Also, have they published contact info for the search firm? I mean to whom are you supposed to express your interest?
The info is in the full ad/pd, but yeah — they don’t make it easy.
The UNI search website is here, but it’s meager:
https://uni.edu/presidential-search/messages
(Click the ‘update to AGB search’ message and you’ll be taken to the AGB website, where you can then click on the advert.)
Would be very interesting to know what kind of feedback AGB was getting about the position (and about the Board of Regents) before Wrong Way Leath’s flying exploits became front-page news. I can imagine that the UNI committee will now have an even harder time finding first-class candidates.
Oh, they won’t get any first-class candidates. They all saw what happened to Krislov and the others. They’d better hope for third-class.
I think actually you can trust that the idea is to find a mid-career ax man. Harreld and Leath are already in competition to mechanize everything they can, essentially turn as much of ed over to the screens and robots as looks possible from some delusional pov. Then you hire a bunch of kids at no money or benefits to babysit the machines and play CSR a while before moving on to their “real jobs”. Essentially, the idea is to “deliver educational content” while running a research institute with a football team. The ed content can be contracted out, largely — get someone to write a course script, throw a prof with a name a bone to deliver it online. The growth area’s in what’s called “retention”, meaning the kids taking the online courses won’t actually watch the videos, and if they do, they won’t understand anything and won’t finish the courses. And you need them to take the test at the end and score high so that you can say you did good with educating them and sign them up for the next class in the sequence. So you’ll need to hire battalions of nice overeducated ladies at $12/hr to handhold groups of kids through and help them with their homework. You won’t want TAs for that, they’re much too expensive.
To get there, though, you’ve really got to fire a ****-ton of people. Although first you hire people who’ll help you shop for IT solutions.
Anyway, the UNI guy will be charged with making UNI “lean”, meaning eviscerated. Then he’ll be expected to move on. And I’m still not sure I believe that ed will stay at UI, rather than being shunted back up there. I have a feeling that they’ll want Weeg for bioengineering types. But I think this comprehensive business is on its way out regardless. These guys don’t really want humanities anywhere. It’s full of smart kids who like to poke at social institutions, and the last thing they need is anything like that.
As alluded to in an earlier post —
https://ditchwalk.com/2016/07/16/ongoing-harreld-hire-updates-6/comment-page-1/#comment-355493
— I think the most likely outcome is that current Interim President Wohlpart applies for and is given the job. Not only is his interim presidency an effective trial run in dealing with the BoR and faculty, but I don’t think there’s any way the board would have kicked Ruud to the curb the way they did if they didn’t already know how this was going to play out.
Wohlpart steps in, the board allows him to do and say all the right things during the interim period, hearts swell with gladness, Wohlpart wins the day, then the blood starts flowing.
— Meant also to add that, yes, Leath’s interview just reeks of condescension and a patronizing tone. The man is caught dead to rights, and yet his response to that is to just keep shoveling the manure, lying to the students, and deflecting blame onto the people who are reporting the facts. It’s pathetic, and yet so clearly the style of university presidents in the state of Iowa.
No wonder the board wouldn’t renew Ruud’s contract. He wasn’t trashy enough.
Couple of comments:
– The positions of VP Medical, and Dean COM are somewhat removed from the Board of Regents. Really there should be a minimum of interaction there, beyond the COM and UIHC should endeavor to select the very best people for those jobs. Unfortunately the BOR became politicized over the past decade, which introduces new complexities.
– The VP does negotiate over state support , which has dwindled, because the UIHC would not play some of the state’s political games (and that may be why Robillard played ball with Rastetter/Branstad)
– I do not think parents are grabbing their kids en mass to flee the UIHC. It is true that the qualify of faculty has decreased with the tilt toward ‘the health care industry’ which makes UIHC salaries relatively lower (not starvation obviously). Also the huge debt that medical people graduate with tends to force their hands toward more lucrative positions in larger metro areas. Some also recognize the over-bureaucratized AMC means less individual creativity and freedom for professionals used to controlling their own careers. On the other hand the medical ppl at UIHC do not have to deal as much with insurance reimbursement as private practice.
– One major player who escapes most news stories these days is the UIHC CEO. As long as the UIHC makes money, the CEO will be a very large presence in selecting the VP/Dean. Although he makes near a million a year, most people have no idea of his name.
– So the people who will be selected as finalists in this search will likely have some credentials in medical research/practice/grants. No way can Harreld claim the least bit of experience in these areas. However such person must be able to comply with UIHC business ppl (who are also not too bowed by an IBM-retiree).
– The last two Deans/VPs came from pediatrics at Michigan. So the new person will be either: 1. Someone internally or 2. someone from pediatrics or internal medicine who can mix and match medicine with business. This person will be far more qualified to lead than Harreld or Rastetter.
– The one harbinger of change to look at is business experience with a private/public AMC. If Branstad and or Rastetter has decided to sell off UIHC assets then they need the sort of person who has experience with that complication.
If you candidates from medical centers that were sold off to private health care entities, then you know what is up.
Banner bought the Univ of Arizona in 2015, under state GOP leadership. Emory was thinking the same. Duke and Cleveland Clinic have ‘arrangements’.
Considering the Branstad public asset sell-off and the Rastetter blurring of private/public lines, if you see MDs from Duke or Cleveland Clinic, or one of the major New York players, you will know what the next move will be.
It is even conceivable that Robillard stooped to conquer. Perhaps he resigned as VP/Dean to then accept a private position in some new business-COM-UIHC enterprise.
Or he is accepting nice fees as a consultant with the ultimate inside access. Looking at the Medicaid debacle, that seems to be the Branstad-GOP way.
– It is true that the ppl in charge, the administration doesn’t really know about medical services. I fact they don’t care. Administration wants to market the UIHC as an amusement park with smiles all over. It might be a real jolt to them to realize sick people are in pain, bleed and suffer. They die too. That would shatter marketing weasels images.
Yeah, actually, the parents of every seriously ill kid I’ve known who started out at UIHC, because rankings and besides they’re here and the insurance covers it, grabbed the kids and got the hell out. Because their kids were dying here. They took them elsewhere and got excellent care. I have no idea how they paid for it, but I guess when the situation is “she’s dying and these jerks are standing around with their thumbs up their butts”, you figure it out.
It’s a real thing, unfortunately. And it doesn’t surprise me. I’ve had surgery scheduled (and misscheduled) in a grungy room where the surgeon waltzed in without a clue about what we were supposed to be doing. My kid’s been exposed to measles. I’ve been lied to routinely, told that of course no med students or first-year residents will be in attendance, and then bam, they try to shove them on you to start fumbling with procedures till you yell bloody murder to make them stop and go away, and then of course you sound like the insane patient. I got consequentially wrong info from UIHC staff while pregnant and after delivery. I’ve seen a friend with a lifethreatening but strange illness get shrugged at — the docs got to “huh, don’t know what that is” AND THEN STOPPED. Didn’t try to find someone with more expertise. Didn’t work their networks. Didn’t work their brains, either. Just stopped.
Robillard selling out sounds about right to me. Either way. One of the reasons I decided to stay here after school was that the medical care and its availability were tremendous compared with what was going on on the coasts. That’s not a reason to stay anymore, and it sounds like within five years we’ll see mortality and morbidity rates climb significantly here even for those who can get the care.
Not my experience at all. There will always be parents who will try every other option available in a serious situation but there are still pediatric specialists in oto, ortho, neurosurg and optho that draw patients from outside the state and even outside the country.
But that is also an asset that could be mined if the motivation is privatization. The Children’s Hospital also makes room for more adult inpatient units and they will make that transition so that every room in the hospital will be for single occupancy. Big selling point (and also reduction of ID vectors) in the Disnification of health care. Not many AMC hospitals can say that and that could be seen as a big asset to be mined also.
No: let me be quite clear.
The parents were not “trying every option available” to find optimal whatever.
They went to UIHC because it was local, paid for, and well-advertised.
Their kids were so poorly cared for at UIHC that they were, in literal fact, suffering major organ traumas from their diseases and dying, and the UIHC staff seemed not to know what to do about this, would in fact frequently do nothing.
The parents — multiple sets — took the children — multiple children — elsewhere. Not shopping them around, not let’s try this let’s try that: they each went to one other hospital, where they found the care that saved their children’s lives.
Okay? Let’s be very, very plain about that.
I mean I guess this is something else that can’t be helped. There’s a significant allergy in this part of the country to noticing that we’re doing something poorly. Because it’s local, and because people mean well, it is by definition high-quality stuff. Arguing against this, and even demonstrating plainly that it’s third-rate at best and often worse, gets derailed into the land of hurt feelings, thus obviating, once again, the need to look in cleareyed fashion at what’s going on.
That, in a nutshell, is why your state higher ed system is turning to ****, and why Rastetter and the rest are having such a walk doing it. You’re never going to fight anything if you’re committed to, regardless of weather, talking about how great it is.
I’m not one to fight culture, and that is very much the culture here. But I can also see when a party’s over.
It is of course not true that all critically ill children are misdiagnosed at UIHC. It is almost certainly true that UIHC fails more often than people know, if only because of the gaping disparity between UIHC’s reported ratings and those of a hospital like Mayo or Hopkins.
I do agree with dormouse’s point that there is a kind of entrenched fantasy in the Iowa mind that things are rosy because they must be, rather than because they are provably so. If you want UI to be great you don’t hire a carpetbagging dilettante to squawk about “excellence” or “world-class” this and that — you hire someone who can credibly lead the school.
UIHC needs the person who replaces Robillard to be strong enough to insist on doing all of the little things that matter to patient care, not the sloganeering that Harreld is doing at UI. The best-case scenario would be someone who’s willing to expose the problems in order to fix them, but the regents would never go for that.
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/ Dallas Museum of Art Celebrates the Exciting Addition of Three Major Works of European Art to Its Renowned Collection
Dallas Museum of Art Celebrates the Exciting Addition of Three Major Works of European Art to Its Renowned Collection
Acquisitions Include a Rare 17th-Century Masterpiece by Jacques Blanchard and Significant Works by Modern Masters Piet Mondrian and Pierre Bonnard
Dallas, TX—January 29, 2018—The Dallas Museum of Art is excited to announce the gift of three major works of European art that reflect the extraordinary generosity of Dallas collectors and their dedication to expanding the Museum’s collection in meaningful ways. “These astonishing acquisitions of a seductive painting by the ‘French Titian’ Jacques Blanchard, a monumental double-sided drawing by Piet Mondrian, and an early 20th-century painting by Pierre Bonnard, will invigorate the Museum’s renowned European collection,” said The Eugene McDermott Director of the DMA, Agustín Arteaga.
Zeus and Semele is a recently rediscovered masterwork by the important 17th-century Baroque painter Jacques Blanchard. Although not as well known today–a fate related to the artist’s early death at 37 and resulting scarcity of his work—Blanchard was celebrated in his day for his richly hued and sensual subjects inspired by 16th-century Venetian painting. Through the generosity of collectors Thomas C. and Jeanne Campbell, who gifted this exceedingly rare and remarkable painting to the Museum’s Foundation for the Arts Collection, the DMA continues to expand its Old Master collection with exceptional works of art.
Ann Jacobus Folz’s extraordinary gift of two amazing examples of European Modernism reinforces the Museum’s impressive holdings of early 20th-century art. The first is an impressive scaled, double-sided charcoal drawing by the modern master Piet Mondrian, the eleventh example by Mondrian to enter the collection. The DMA has the second largest holdings of his work in the U.S. thanks to the continued generous giving of Dallas collectors. The front side boasts an evocative, almost painterly drawing that relates closely to the painting Farm Near Duivendrecht, in the Evening (c. 1916) in the Museum’s collection. On the back, an abstract composition titled The Sea (Ocean 2) reveals the beginning of Mondrian’s move away from representational imagery toward the grid structure that would become a hallmark of later works such as the DMA’s Composition with Large Blue Plane, Red, Black, Yellow, and Gray (1921) and Place de la Concorde (1938–54). “This crucial intermediary phase of Mondrian’s stylistic development was, until now, missing from the collection,” noted Nicole Myers, the DMA’s Lillian and James H. Clark Curator of European Painting and Sculpture. “With this gift, our visitors will be able to experience the dramatic transformation of Mondrian’s approach—from Post-Impressionism to Abstraction—as it unfolds across the walls of our galleries.”
With Folz’s incredible gift, the Museum also acquired a significant painting by Pierre Bonnard, its seventeenth work by this influential Modern artist. In spite of the Museum’s deep holdings, Woman with a Lamp (1909) is the first acquisition that captures Bonnard’s transition from the decorative Nabi aesthetic of the 1890s to his more abstract, brightly hued paintings from the 1920s on. A combination of both his early and late styles, this luminous painting infused with a sense of quiet mystery connects the Museum’s collection, bridging the gap from Interior: The Terrasse Children (1899) to Nude, Yellow Background (c. 1924) and beyond.
“We are extremely grateful for the recent gifts to our European collection by Thomas C. and Jeanne Campbell through the Foundation for the Arts Collection and by Ann Jacobus Folz,” added Arteaga. “The three new works contribute to further establishing the strength and breadth of the DMA’s European collection, highlighting artistic achievements and milestones throughout centuries of creativity. The DMA is honored to have such supportive donors whose inspirational gifts of art continue to grow and enhance our global collection.”
Additional information on each acquisition follows:
Zeus and Semele (1632), Jacques Blanchard (1600–1638)
Zeus and Semele, of 1632, was reattributed to Blanchard in 2014 by leading experts based primarily on its close relationship to Blanchard’s Danae in the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Lyon. After its reattribution, the painting, whose subject is taken from the Greek mythological story of Semele, a princess of Thebes, and the love affair she had with Zeus, underwent conservation treatment at the DMA in 2015.
Jacques Blanchard was a French Baroque painter whose five years spent working and studying in Italy greatly influenced his artistic approach. Inspired by 16th-century Venetian painters, including Titian, Blanchard was celebrated for his skills as a colorist and enjoyed important commissions in his hometown of Paris throughout his career. This Venetian-inspired style is seen in the DMA’s new acquisition, particularly in the richly hued palette and the sensuous treatment of the nude.
Farm Near Duivendrecht (recto) and The Sea (Ocean 2) (verso) (c. 1905–1914), Piet Mondrian (1872–1944)
This large double-sided drawing, Farm Near Duivendrecht (recto) and The Sea (Ocean 2) (verso), by Piet Mondrian is the eleventh work of art by this incredibly influential artist of European modernism to enter the DMA’s collection. The motif of the farm near Duivendrecht was one of his favorites at the beginning of his career and was so popular with collectors that he continued to make new versions of the subject well into the 1910s. The recto of this charcoal drawing is one of those late iterations, and is compositionally similar to the DMA’s painting Farm Near Duivendrecht, in the Evening (c. 1916). Together they present a unique opportunity to make side-by-side comparisons to gain insight into Mondrian’s artistic process.
Completed two years prior, the drawing on the verso, The Sea (Ocean 2), was produced during a period when Mondrian was breaking away from representational painting, and it anticipates the evolution of his style toward compositions dominated by geometric shapes and interlocking planes. It represents an important transitional phase in his development that was previously missing from the DMA’s collection.
Woman with a Lamp (1909), Pierre Bonnard (1867–1947)
Woman with a Lamp by Pierre Bonnard is the first work to enter the DMA’s collection from the artist’s fascinating period when he began departing from the Nabis style. Bonnard was a founding member of the Nabis, a group of Post-Impressionist French artists active from 1888 to 1900 whose works are characterized by greatly simplified flattened forms and broad patches of solid color. He was particularly drawn to capturing intimate scenes of everyday life. Woman with a Lamp was completed shortly after the group disbanded, at a moment when Bonnard was developing a new painting style and a different compositional structure for his interior scenes. It introduces a motif that would become one of the most dominant in his interiors of the 20th century: a long dining room table covered in a vibrant red tablecloth.
Images: Jacques Blanchard, Zeus and Semele, c. 1632, oil on canvas, Dallas Museum of Art, Foundation for the Arts Collection, gift of Mr. and Mrs. Thomas C. Campbell, 2017.42.FA; Piet Mondrian, Farm Near Duivendrecht (recto), The Sea (Ocean 2) (verso), c. 1905–14, charcoal on paper, Dallas Museum of Art, gift of Ann Jacobus Folz, 2017.44.1.a–b; Pierre Bonnard, Woman with a Lamp, 1909, oil on paper, mounted on board, Dallas Museum of Art, gift of Ann Jacobus Folz, 2017.44.2]
About the Dallas Museum of Art
Established in 1903, the Dallas Museum of Art (DMA) is among the 10 largest art museums in the country and is distinguished by its commitment to research, innovation, and public engagement. At the heart of the Museum and its programs is its global collection, which encompasses more than 24,000 works and spans 5,000 years of history, representing a full range of world cultures. Located in the nation’s largest arts district, the Museum acts as a catalyst for community creativity, engaging people of all ages and backgrounds with a diverse spectrum of programming, from exhibitions and lectures to concerts, literary events, and dramatic and dance presentations. Since the Museum’s return to free general admission in 2013, the DMA has welcomed more than 3.2 million visitors. For more information, visit DMA.org.
The Dallas Museum of Art is supported, in part, by the generosity of Museum Members and donors, the citizens of Dallas through the City of Dallas Office of Cultural Affairs, and the Texas Commission on the Arts.
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kongo.com – Four Related Novellas
I am very excited about the upcoming release of my book, kongo.com. It’s a bit different than your typical novel or short story collection. It is comprised of four related novellas that each tell a distinct story about a behemoth corporation, kongo.com.
It’s no secret that online organizations are part of our everyday life. The company portrayed in this book takes what we know today to the next level.
It takes place in a not to distant, potential future. The stories in this book are all based on the possible evolution of existing technology – nanotechnology, artificial intelligence and our obsession with our devices.
Over the next couple of weeks, leading up to the release, I’m going to tell you a bit about each novella. Three of the four were previously published on my blog as serials. these three have been enhanced and modified. The fourth story is brand new and is meant to tie the previous three stories together.
I look forward to your reaction to these excerpts. This first week, I’m going to introduce you to Joyce and her quest for fitness and the ideal body in the story No Pain, No Gain.
No Pain No Gain – An Excerpt
Joyce loved her stylish new personal fitness device. She had saved up for the latest Buff Cuff. It was not cheap, but the girls in the office all had them. Most had received them as gifts from their boyfriends or husbands. Joyce didn’t have either of these, so she had to buy one for herself, but that was okay. If it worked as advertised, she would have a boyfriend or husband soon.
Joyce had tried everything to lose weight. Diets, exercise and pills had not worked. She investigated bariatric surgery and was not a candidate. She was about 35-40 pounds overweight which was below the threshold for which insurance would pay for the surgery. She even considered gaining enough weight to qualify for the surgery, but that seemed self-destructive, especially with her borderline hypertension and diabetes.
Her doctor had sent her to a nutritionist, but nothing seemed to help. Then she saw an infomercial for the Buff Cuff. Its technology was cutting edge and the spots featured numerous testimonials, some from women just like Joyce, touting the product and its life-changing benefits.
When Joyce saw the price, about what she made in a month, she hesitated. These infomercials could be biased and misleading and, when weighing the priority of rent, her POS car and utilities, the Buff Cuff seemed like a reckless purchase. Then her coworkers started raving about the ones they received and started talking about and showing their results.
Marcy, who seemed to be perpetually pregnant, received a Buff Cuff as a present from her husband. At first, she was angry with him taking it as a message that he thought she was fat. After she started using it, however, her baby weight began to drop off almost instantly. She was thinner and more fit than anyone in the office had ever seen her. Her energy level improved as did the quality of her work.
Then Jennifer, the leading office donut and cake consumer, started noticeably trimming down when her husband gave her a Buff Cuff for her birthday. Her eating habits changed, and she started working out at the gym at the end of each day.
This was when Joyce realized that this fitness gadget was not an anomaly. There was something there. She resolved to save up enough to purchase one. It was now six months later, and she had scraped together the funds she needed. She sat in front of her computer looking at the latest models. She had just enough for generation 4.0. This was the latest and the manufacturer, Kongo-Fit, a subsidiary of the giant retail mail order conglomerate, kongo.com.
The device touted the usual fitness gadget technology. It could monitor heart rate and count the number of steps for its wearer. Somehow, through patented technology that was rushed through government approval, this device could also monitor oxygen levels, blood sugar and blood pressure all in one device. It was equipped with an array of sensors that used ‘super-secret’ technology (in the company’s words) to ‘help you with your fitness journey’. As a result, it was being prescribed for patients by medical professionals at a staggering rate. Insurance companies were scratching their collective heads as they pondered whether to pay anything toward this device.
Joyce counted down the minutes on Friday afternoon. Her package from Kongo was due to be delivered today and would likely be waiting for her when she got home. The office, an accounting and financial advisory firm, was quiet on this Friday afternoon at the end of summer and that made the time pass much more slowly. While she waited, Joyce reached into her desk and pulled out a dark chocolate bar that she had been saving for this day. She unwrapped it and savored it as she acknowledged to herself that this would be the last one until she reached her weight and fitness goals.
Mercifully, she found some work that took her to five o’clock. When that magic hour arrived, she nearly sprinted from her desk, as close as she could get to sprinting, anyway. She got into her ancient Chevy Cruze. It was nine years old with over 120,000 miles on it. She opened the door and could still smell the fast-food from lunch. In anticipation of receiving her Buff Cuff, she had done somewhat of a farewell tour this week consuming all her guilty pleasure foods. She truly believed that this small piece of electronics was going to deliver her from her life of obesity and bad habits. She didn’t want to be delivered without saying goodbye to her old friends like tacos, French fries, milkshakes, and cupcakes. The debris in the back seat confirmed her venture into each of these favorite food groups.
Joyce battled the traffic as she on her way home. She pulled into a space near her apartment building and went out to the community mailbox. As she unlocked the one for her unit, her hand was shaking. She internally scolded herself for being so excited about receiving this gadget, but she couldn’t help it. Finally, she wrestled the key into the lock and opened the small door to her mail slot. It was empty. Not only was the Buff Cuff absent, but there was no mail at all despite it being nearly 6 PM.
There was a precedent for this. Her mail delivery person was a woman who was in her late 60s or early 70s. She sometimes fell behind on her route if there were several medium to large packages to be delivered. Today must have been one of those days. Joyce wasn’t sure what to do. She guessed she would go up to her apartment and change and come back and check the mail later.
Just as she was about to do so, she saw the mail delivery woman’s battered white jeep pulling into the parking lot. There were three community boxes in this lot for each of the three buildings that surrounded the cars belonging to their occupants.
She watched as the woman moved at the pace of a three-toed sloth as she carefully put bundles of mail in the slots in box one. Next would be box two and then, finally, box three, where Joyce’s mail was assigned. Joyce thought about returning in 15 minutes or so, but just knowing that her Buff Cuff was on the verge of being delivered and was in this civil servant’s hands, she wanted to supervise the process.
After what seemed like days, the woman navigated the jeep toward box three. She gathered her bundles of mail and opened the rear of the box to place them in the individual slots. In anticipation, Joyce opened her slot. Immediately, the woman stopped her task and looked at Joyce over the top of her thick bifocals.
“Miss, I can’t deliver the mail with a slot open. That’s against regulations.”
“It’s my slot.”
“That doesn’t matter. Please close it so I can continue.”
Joyce let out a frustrated sigh and closed the small door to the slot. Finally, the woman finished placing mail and Joyce reopened it. There were a couple of envelopes and a small parcel in a bubble wrapped sleeve. The return address had the Kongo-Fit logo. As she pulled it out of the slot, she was a bit underwhelmed at the packaging and the size and weight. She held in her hands nearly a month of her salary. It seemed like it should be bigger or at least weightier.
She was out of breath as she climbed the stairs of building 23 to her second floor 1-bedroom apartment. She had that same shakiness in her hands when she opened the door. She wondered to herself, was she putting too much faith in this small package? Would it change her life? Then she thought of Marcy and Jennifer. It had certainly worked for them.
Joyce carefully opened the package. There it was. Her very own Buff Cuff. It came with the standard black band. She would have to save up to buy other colors. She opened the molded plastic packaging and carefully set her new purchase on the table. The instruction booklet was amazingly small, but there was a comprehensive web site and social media community around the device. She had already feverishly read the areas that were accessible to the public prior to being a registered purchaser.
As soon as she opened it, she realized the instruction booklet was essentially a quick start guide. It had three steps to complete before she could put it on her wrist. She pulled the plastic tab from the back of the unit that covered the sensor array and separated the battery from the device. As she did this, the face of the Buff Cuff came to life. It read, “Hello Joyce. Have a great day!”. She was a bit surprised by this, but she had used her name when she purchased the device on line and remembered checking the box that said it was for her own personal use. The next step was to put the device on her wrist. It instructed her to put it on the wrist of her dominant hand, which in Joyce’s case was her left. She felt a slight vibration as the device seemed to mold to her wrist as she fastened it.
The next step was to register the device. She brought up the Buff Cuff site and entered the serial number as instructed. As she did this, it brought up her name and address. There were several fields she was asked to enter to complete each screen. As she entered height, weight, desired goal weight and blood type, she felt the device vibrate a few more times. As she saved her information, she felt a slight pinch under the face of the Buff Cuff. She supposed that was normal. It vibrated again and showed readings on the face. Her respiration was 20 breaths per minute – high end of normal. Here blood pressure – 130 over 85, a bit high. Her blood glucose level – 150 – too high for someone who hadn’t eaten since lunch, but she did have the chocolate bar. The reading made sense.
Now that her Buff Cuff was on her wrist, the sensation was a bit anti-climactic. She didn’t feel different and she still had laundry to do. She would get on the web after she started her clothes in the wash. Joyce gathered up her dark clothes and walked down the stairs and to the apartment complex’s laundry room. She put the clothes and detergent in the washing machine and pulled some quarters out of the little canvas bag where she collected them for this purpose, put them in the slot and started the machine.
Joyce walked back to her apartment feeling much the same as she did before she received her new purchase. She was a bit depressed. She was out a month’s salary and didn’t feel inspired to do anything. She got back to her apartment and went directly to the freezer for a carton of Ben and Jerry’s peanut butter cup ice cream. She took it over to her computer with the intention of looking up more information on her new acquisition and, possibly, investigating how to return it for a refund.
When she sat down, she saw a message on the computer display screen that must have come up while she was putting in her laundry in. It said, ‘ACTIVATE FINAL CONFIGURATION (Y/N)’. Joyce looked at the message and felt a sudden feeling of relief. She eagerly keyed in a ‘Y’ and checked the box saying she accepted the terms and conditions without actually reading them. She then clicked continue. The browser refreshed with a congratulatory message and she felt a slightly sharper pinch under the face of the Buff Cuff. It was very brief, but she felt a slight electrical current emanating from the device, down her left arm and into her body. It was gone as quickly as it happened.
Joyce clicked on the home page and started to read about her device’s capabilities as she took a generous spoonful of ice cream from the carton. She absently spooned the frozen treat into her mouth and began to savor the flavor. Suddenly, she began to gag and spit the ice cream out. It tasted horrible. It was a mixture of a creamy and vinegary taste that was rancid in her mouth. She dropped her spoon on the floor and looked at the carton. The ice cream looked fine. She checked the expiration date and it was still months away. She had already eaten a third of this carton last night and it tasted fine then. She looked at it again and then sniffed it. It smelled as bad as it tasted.
Joyce dumped the ice cream in the sink, rinsed out the carton and threw it in the trash. She still had the horrible taste in her mouth. She grabbed her last 20-ounce bottle of cola from the fridge. She was going to switch to diet or some other low-calorie drink but had this one bottle of regular soda left. She quickly twisted off the top and took a large mouthful from the bottle. She immediately spit it into the sink. It tasted like a mouthful of vinegar to her.
She grabbed a glass from the cabinet and filled it with cold water from the fridge door. Water was the last resort. She hated the taste of it but needed something safe to rinse the taste from her mouth. As she swirled the water around in her mouth, she was shocked by the taste. It was the best tasting, most refreshing drink she ever experienced. She quickly drank the rest and filled the glass two more times. The taste was gone from her mouth. In fact, she felt like she had just brushed her teeth. The aftertaste of the water was wonderful.
Joyce needed to eat something. She opened her cupboard and saw that there was a can of green beans in the back. For some reason, the picture of the beans on the label made her mouth water. She opened the can, poured the beans into a bowl and put them in the microwave for 30 seconds. When they were done, she wolfed them down with a spoon and followed them with three more glasses of water. She felt more satisfied from this small meal than she had from anything she’d eaten in recent memory.
By this time, Joyce needed to transfer her laundry to the dryer. She changed into sweat pants and a t-shirt. For some reason, instead of her usual flip-flops, she put on socks and laced on her rarely used sneakers. She grabbed a load of white clothes and trotted down to the laundry room. After she transferred the clothes and put in the new load, she suddenly felt the urge to run. Joyce had never been a runner, but for some reason that was all she had the desire to do at this moment. She left the laundry room and ran around the perimeter of the apartment complex three times. The distance was at least a mile, which was about a mile farther than Joyce had ever run continuously in her life.
She was physically exhausted but exhilarated at the same time. It was a feeling she had not experienced before. She finished her laundry and returned to her apartment feeling energized, yet tired. She took off her sweaty clothes and padded into the shower. She let the hot water soothe her muscles which had been shocked by their sudden use. She put on pajamas, crawled into bed and entered the deepest, most restful sleep she had felt in a very long time.
The next morning, Saturday, Joyce awoke feeling a bit sore, but energized. She needed to get some groceries. She got dressed and went to the supermarket. As she cruised up and down the aisles, she gradually filled her cart. By the time she got to the checkout, she didn’t recognize what she was about to purchase. The cart was filled with organic fresh fruits and vegetables, yogurts and whole grain concoctions. These were things Joyce had never purchased, yet somehow, she had grabbed them from the shelves as if she had made a stringent list of healthy foods. The funny thing was, everything looked delicious to her.
She brought her purchases home and put them away. After a breakfast of yogurt mixed with granola and a banana, she had the urge to take another run. She got dressed and did another set of laps around the complex. Once again, she felt great.
This behavior continued for the next week. Joyce was getting up early to run. She was packing herself a healthy lunch for work and making sensible meals for dinner. It felt like this lifestyle change required no effort on her part. She had a wonderful week. When she shared her new-found energy with her co-workers, they agreed that they had felt the same thing once they activated their Buff Cuff. The device was truly a miracle.
On the Saturday, one week following her purchase, Joyce bounced out of bed and headed for the scale. She had not weighed herself the entire week. She wanted to see if this drastic change in her lifestyle would have an impact after a week. She wanted to see a three or four-pound difference in her weight. She was astonished to see that she was eleven ponds lighter. She checked the scale and stood on it three times to be sure.
Joyce showered. Her plan was to clean out her apartment today. She had been putting it off, but today she felt like she had the energy and desire to do it. As she dried herself off and got dressed, she thought about where to start. She looked in the mirror trying to spot a difference in herself. As she ran a brush through her hair, the first large clump of hair fell out.
kongo.com is now available for pre-order on Amazon.com by clicking HERE.
This entry was posted in book marketing, book promotion, Book Release, New Book and tagged book marketing, book promotion, Book Release, New Book by Don Massenzio. Bookmark the permalink.
8 thoughts on “kongo.com – Four Related Novellas”
harmonykent on March 14, 2019 at 6:01 am said:
Wonderful excerpt, Don. Can’t wait to read the book when it releases. Reblogged this on https://harmonykent.co.uk/kongo-com-four-related-novellas/
Don Massenzio on March 14, 2019 at 7:02 am said:
Thanks so much for sharing this.
Check out this post from my author blog
Margot Kinberg on March 14, 2019 at 7:35 am said:
Oh, this is an intriguing beginning, Don! You’ve done a really effective job of portraying Joyce, and of showing how she might be drawn to spend so much money on this device. It’s an interesting concept for a story, too. I’ll be looking forward to reading the rest when the book comes out.
Thank you Margot.
John W. Howell on March 14, 2019 at 1:16 pm said:
All the best, Harmony. Thanks, Don.
Pingback: kongo.com – Four Related Novellas | Welcome to Harmony Kent Online
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A man, a bunker and a bunch of computers
Resident Medic, Crazy Finn
Location: In the cold north called Finland
Four computer screens lit the small room dimly. It was a good way to conserve power, though – no unnecessary lighting. That way, the batteries that kept the lighting running would have time to recharge. Andy sat by the desk, glancing between the screens. Three screens were divided in to a dozen windows a piece, all showing images from cameras, mounted in various locations around the world. The connection wasn’t too fast, but enough to get an updated image every five seconds or so. The guys, who had built the system knew, what they were doing.
On the fourth screen, lines of raw data scrolled on, line after line. While the images were important, the data was even more. It would download on to the server bank and some guy somewhere out there would go through it in some location, Andy had no idea of. He had been hired just a year before the war – to care for a link-station abroad, he had been told. Nobody told him, what kind of a link-station it would be, just that he wasn’t supposed to talk about what he saw. He had been supposed to be relieved three months ago, but from what he could gather, the relief wasn’t going to be there very soon. While he would have liked to get out of there, he knew, it was much safer to stay in. Here, he’d have a water filtration system, a huge storage room full of preserved food and shelter from what was out there. And he was in a location, people would have hard time reaching.
Another burst of raw data caught his attention. It was not just static, it was a communiqué – actual people sending a message somewhere. It had been several weeks he had last seen anyone transmitting anything else but raw data. “Dragonfly back in operation”, the message said. ”Proceeding with the operation Aesclepius.” Aesclepius? Wasn’t that some ancient Greek guy? Andy had never been too interested in ancient history at school – that’s mainly why he ended up studying electronics in the community college and not in to the MIT or CalTech. But he was good at what he did – there had been a bunch of people after the position and he had gotten it right from under their noses.
All of a sudden one of the cameras on the three split screens went on to live footage mode, draining bandwidth from the others. It took Andy a moment to figure out, what camera it was – circuit A3C982. Hell, it was the one outside his location. This time, it was not a wild animal that had walked past the motion sensors cone. No, it was a human most certainly and he was holding a gun. He was right outside the door of the bunker, looking at the door oblivious of the camera. Damn, that guy must have been a good climber to get up here. And what was he really looking for? Even if he could have detected the transmission, he would have needed at least three radio stations around the bunker to pinpoint the emissions from the antenna, located at the peak. No, this could not be a coincidence.
Andy saw the man to reach for the keypad next to the door. He punched in a code – Andy held his breath – would this be the guy, who was here to relieve him? Yes, the door opened for him, so he had to be from the company – Andy couldn’t say for certain, what the company was actually dealing with, even if he had worked for it over a year and a half. In that time, he had watched all the data he could receive from outside – the satellite transmissions going dead and the backup ham radio system going online. It had been spooky – the whole world being engulfed in a nuclear fire and electromagnetic pulses wreaking havoc on all the electronics, except those he had access to. He supposed, the guys who had built this system had taken precautions against such occurrences.
Andy knew, the guy would soon appear in the room – he had been waiting for this for a long time. He would be going home somehow – he didn’t know, how that would be achieved, but he thought the company would handle that somehow. If the guy was here, there would most certainly be some kind of intercontinental transportation available – there had to be, because his relief would come from the States. How else would he have gotten in to Eastern Turkey?
The door opened. “Hello the…”, Andy managed to say before the man shot him in the head with a heavy pistol. He would never go home.
"Listen to me, nugget, and listen good. Don't go poppin' your head out like that, unless you want it shot off. And if you do get it shot off, make sure you're dead, because if you ain't, guess who's gotta drag your sorry ass off the field? Were short on everything, so the only painkiller I have comes in 9mm doses. Now get the hell out of my foxhole!" - an unknown medic somewhere, 2013.
Send a private message to Medic
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Why Do Old Places Matter? Community
By Tom Mayes posted 03-10-2015 15:57
Note: Tom Mayes' popular Why Do Old Places Matter? series is now available as a book Why Old Places Matter. Order the book today.
Editor's Note: Click here for full coverage on the Why Do Old Places Matter? series including the Spring 2015 issue of Forum Journal.
Tom Mayes, a 2013 Rome Prize winner in Historic Preservation from the American Academy in Rome is back in Washington, D.C., these days. But he hasn't stopped thinking and writing about why old places matter. His series of essays about his experiences and research continues here.
Old places foster community.
One of the first people I interviewed about why old places matter was Dennis Hockman, editor-in-chief of Preservation magazine, who lives in an old neighborhood near Baltimore, Maryland. Dennis told me that one reason old places matter is because of community. Dennis described a cluster of ideas about how old places foster community, from a shared sense of place, to the storytelling that happens in old neighborhoods, to the way people meet and gather on common ground. “People matter more than buildings, than things,” Dennis told me, “but the spirit of the people—the heartbeat of the community—is in the old things.”
We see how old places foster community in the way many old neighborhoods seem to have their own personalities,1 in the way Main Streets and historic post offices act as the daily gathering place for people,2 and in the way people in some old towns seem to be able to run into exactly the person they need to see exactly when they need to see them. People are proud of where they live. They identify with where they live. They are able to run their lives efficiently where they live. They feel connected and interconnected and embedded where they live. And when they leave, they may feel homesick, as I was when I first left the Ramah community near Huntersville, North Carolina, to go to the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill. I missed not only my family and our farm, but the whole familiar interconnected web of people and place that made up Ramah, from the taste of pound cake at dinners at our old, white frame church, to the cedar trees that lined the barbed wire fences at Mr. Ed Barnhardt’s farm.
But how do old places, old buildings, old cities and towns foster community? What particular role do old places play? The writer Wendell Berry says, “A community is the mental and spiritual condition of knowing that the place is shared.”3 The architectural critic Paul Goldberger said, “In an age in which we travel from private houses in little enclosed metal boxes on wheels into private office cubicles and then back again…there is precious little sense of shared experience in our lives, or at least precious few times in which shared experience is expressed in terms of a common physical place.” 4
A vibrant area of South Pasadena, California, which was threatened by highway construction | Barry Schwartz
Old communities are often the places where people share a common space, a common experience, and a shared sense of what the space means to them. People in a community share a sense of its identity and character, which is often represented by the old places that serve as community landmarks. In 2014, graduate student Sandra Shannon (look for a post from her in the coming months) conducted a survey that asked people about their preferences for old and new buildings. In reviewing the results, Shannon concluded with the idea of “...most people believing that historic resources are community assets and preservation is an important community service, even in comparison to other services considered important, such as economic development and public landscaping.5”
A great example of the way old places foster community is how we experience post offices. Local post offices, often architecturally distinctive and in the center of town, serve as both meeting places and community landmarks.6 That’s one reason people fight so fiercely to keep historic post offices. A recent newspaper article from Milton, Tennessee, captured the reasons that old post offices help give a sense of community:
Resident Michelle Eastman said, "The history is great, but the convenience of it being here is better."
“While Milton's strong families are still in place, the symbols they feel make the community are at risk of going away. In turn, the town and its leaders are willing to fight to try to keep its longtime identity in place.”
"When you don't have a gathering place to go to, you start to lose your identity."7
Post offices are but one of the many old places that foster community. Schools, churches, town squares, parks, streets, blocks of houses, all of these allow people to share a place. In planning lingo, these may be referred to as “community assets.” The planner Jeffrey Soule wrote about how communities can “map” these shared assets:
“A key way to engage the community and gather specific data regarding how people use space and ultimately what they value, cultural mapping starts by asking the question “Where are the places in your community that are important to you?”
This is first done as a list-making exercise to identify the places within a community that people value: local meeting places, locations which serve to build community cohesion, spiritual sites, places of visual quality, and others. Participants then go out into the community and actually map where these values and activities are found…[material omitted] …After the site visits, the group then goes through a process to discuss the values that these places represent and determine the threats to maintaining that place in the community.”8
The post office building in La Jolla, California, which continues to serve as a meeting place for residents | Adrian Fine/National Trust for Historic Preservation
In an older community, many of these community assets are already established, and the conditions that foster community already exist. The old buildings, streets, and parks may already be designed for walkability and interaction. These places may already have gathered stories over time, from the memory of the quirky family who lived in the house on the corner, to recollections about the crotchety old man who warned the kids off his lawn, to reminiscences about schools that generations of families attended. These buildings, streets, and even trees, serve as landmarks for telling stories that give people a sense of something shared—something lived together. The experience of living, working, shopping, exercising, worshipping, and playing in and around these old places builds a sense of shared community, and it is a sense of community that transcends generations.
For more than two decades, planners, academics, preservationists and everyday people have lamented the way sprawl has destroyed the American landscape, diminished the distinctiveness of places, and eviscerated the vitality of older towns and cities, essentially how it has destroyed community. New urbanists promote placemaking—the design of new places to foster a distinctiveness of place and a sense of community.9 Developers of new places advertise walkability, design (front porches, alleys, garages behind the houses), open space, squares, and a mix of retail, residential and work places (the very things that many old places already have), that are intended to allow people to interact with each other, to avoid getting in their car, and therefore create the conditions that foster community.10
I applaud these efforts. Yet something critically important is often overlooked, and that is the idea that the development of a real community takes time. Community develops through the interaction between people and place over time. We cannot build a community—we can only foster the conditions in which communities can grow and thrive. Community occurs in the organic interaction between people and place. And over time, these communities typically develop with a diversity of ages, incomes, and ethnicities. Charles Wolfe, in Urbanism Without Effort, suggests that real urbanism is best when it is recognized where it already exists and has developed organically. “I believe the best urbanism is often the urbanism we already have, and that understanding the organic nature of this 'urbanism without effort' is key."11 Old places have by their very nature developed organically, and in many cases have already developed the attributes that foster community.
Yet not all old places are successful communities. Some old neighborhoods are unsafe, undervalued, and (for the moment) undesirable on the real estate market, and do not provide their residents with adequate economic, educational or other opportunities. In these undervalued neighborhoods, a focus on old places as community assets can play a role in turning these communities around so that they are increasingly valued by their residents and by newcomers. In fact, one of the factors that suggests success for a community, if there is re-investment, is the presence of old places that give the community a sense of shared history, identity, and memory. The Preservation Green Lab of the National Trust has studied neighborhoods in Philadelphia and Baltimore to identify the neighborhoods that are likely to be successful if government programs invest in them. A key factor is the presence of older smaller buildings.12
Little Havana in Miami, Florida, is a living community | Steven Brooke Studios
The flip side of the coin is also true. If older, smaller building can foster success, the loss of old places can lead to a lost sense of community. Former National Trust president Richard Moe wrote in Changing Places, “Like individuals, a community can fall victim to amnesia, can lose the memory of what it was, and thereby lose touch with what it is and what it was meant to be. The loss of community memory happens most frequently and most dramatically in the destruction of familiar landmarks that are themselves familiar reminders of who we were, what we believed, and where we were headed.”13The loss of familiar landmarks means the loss of a community asset that may be most helpful in reversing the decline of a community, and may diminish the identity that remaining residents share.
Old places foster community by giving people a sense of shared identity through landmarks, history, memory, and stories, by having the attributes that foster community, such as distinctive character and walkability, and by serving as shared places where people meet and gather. In her report on the survey of Americans about historic preservation, Sandra Shannon wrote, “community satisfaction has been found to be significantly associated with a person’s overall quality of life. Its effect on quality of life is second only to marital satisfaction. It might be easy to brush off preference as something that is a low priority to people in the grand scheme of things, but it appears to actually matter to people in a deep way, and from a planning standpoint, this humanistic element should be an important consideration.14 If community is “shared experience … expressed in terms of a common physical place,” old places are crucial. Old places are where people, time and place intertwine to form community.
Let me know how you think old places foster community.
1. Just ask people from Takoma Park, an old town near Washington, D.C., or Georgetown, D.C. or the neighborhood of Capitol Hill. Each has a distinct personality.
2. See the website, www.savethepostoffice.com. Accessed February 28, 2015.
3. Berry, Wendell. The Long-Legged House (Berkeley, CA: Counterpoint Press 2012) Google e-book, 61.
4. Goldberger, Paul. “Cities, Time and Architecture,” A speech for the Nelson-Atkins Museum, Kansas City, MO 2007.
5. Shannon, Sandra. “A Survey of the Public: Preference for Old and New Buildings, Attitudes about Historic Preservation, and Preservation-Related Engagement.” Master’s Thesis, University of Southern California. December, 2014.
6. For more on the important role that post offices play, see the website, savethepostoffice.com. Professor Steve Hutkins, who operates the website, emphasizes the meeting place aspect of post offices, as well as their historic and artistic significance. See his interview in the Gothamist. Accessed February 28, 2015.
7. Wilson, Brian. “Milton residents fight to keep Milton's community identity." Accessed February 15, 2015.
8. Soule, Jeffrey. “Using the Historic Urban Landscape Approach.” Accessed March 8, 2015. For more on communities defining their identity, see “Hatcher, William. “Building and Selling Community Identity, PATimes, 2013, "Building and Selling Community Identity." Accessed March 2, 2015.
9. See the Charter of the Congress for the New Urbanism, which includes the statement, “We stand for the restoration of existing urban centers and towns within coherent metropolitan regions, the reconfiguration of sprawling suburbs into communities of real neighborhoods and diverse districts, the conservation of natural environments, and the preservation of our built legacy.” www.cnu.org/charter. Accessed March 2, 2015.
10. In the rush to focus on the excitement of new places, planners and government officials often have not paid sufficient attention to the real communities—the older places that already exist, which may not be as architecturally sophisticated or aesthetically pleasing. Yet community may exist there. One of the conundrums of the interaction between the preservation field and the smart growth movement, is that the smart growth movement did not seem to acknowledge the reality that many older suburbs function very well, and are successful communities where people love to live.
11. Wolfe, Charles R. (2013-05-02). Urbanism Without Effort (Island Press E-ssentials) (Kindle Locations 426-429). Island Press. Kindle Edition.
12. National Trust for Historic Preservation, Preservation Green Lab. “Place Based Metrics for Older Neighborhoods,” Accessed February 28, 2015.
13. Moe, Richard and Carter Wilkie. Changing Places Rebuilding Community in the Age of Sprawl. New York: Henry Holt and Company 1997, 261 (citations omitted).
14. Shannon, Sandra. “A Survey of the Public: Preference for Old and New Buildings, Attitudes about Historic Preservation, and Preservation-Related Engagement.” Master’s Thesis, University of Southern California. December, 2014.
Tom Mayes is the deputy general counsel for the National Trust for Historic Preservation. In 2013 Mayes was awarded the Rome Prize in Historic Preservation from the American Academy in Rome.
#HistoricSites #Economics #whypreserve
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Halsey’s “Hopeless Fountain Kingdom” is saturated with colorful, cinematic perfection
Credit: Astralwerks
Joshua Modglin
Filed under A&E, Music
A dystopian, post-apocalyptic city. Two households, one feud. Two star-crossed lovers, one hopeless story.
Now, you may be thinking of “Romeo and Juliet,” but this is actually the story weaved cleverly throughout the sixteen songs of Halsey’s sophomore album, “Hopeless Fountain Kingdom.”
Using the themes from Shakespeare’s world renowned play, singer and songwriter Halsey took the original story and made it her own. Two years after the release of “BADLANDS,” her debut album, “Hopeless Fountain Kingdom,” has redefined the genre of alternative, the story of star-crossed lovers and the music Halsey makes.
Because “Hopeless Fountain Kingdom” may be so different from her first album, it is hard to compare with her other releases. This is a new sound, a new age of Halsey that breaks past the standards set by “BADLANDS.”
Halsey showcases her masterful creative touch and emotionally chilling, raspy vocals as she explores this new world and new story that encompasses the album. As the character she portrays in the plotline matures, the tone changes to match the progressing story, ending with a different sound than what it started with.
Every song has a unique sound, a unique glimpse of what makes up this dystopian, Shakespearean world she created, and who she sings to be. The diversity in style, however, formulates something even better; the different sounds come together to give the album its own unique sound that can’t be defined.
Halsey’s intense and poetic breakup tale of an album opens with “The Prologue,” which immediately sets the tone for the rest of the songs and establishes the direct connection between the album’s story and “Romeo and Juliet.” In the first half of the song, she reads the prologue from the original play in a dramatic fashion, setting up the wild world and story of the two star-crossed lovers.
The second single she released from the album, “Eyes Closed,” is one of the strongest on the tracklist. Opening with a somber, atmospheric sound and soft wailing tune that turns into the chilling repetitive chord of an electric guitar, the song will already make you shiver. Throughout the song, she explores the theme of unrequited love and continues to stun listeners with her haunting, obviously vulnerable vocals.
“Heaven In Hiding” is also one of my favorites, as she explores the boundaries of her voice and creates a foot stomping masterpiece of a song. She sings, “I can put on a show, I can put on a show / Don’t you see what you’re finding? / This is Heaven in hiding.”
The most iconic song of the album has to be “Now or Never.” This may be because it was the first single released in April, but Halsey used it to introduce everyone to the story of the star-crossed lovers, especially with the music video that pays tribute to Baz Luhrmann’s version of “Romeo and Juliet.” Despite being criticized for sounding similar to Rihanna’s “Needed Me,” the song will be seen as a classic on “Hopeless Fountain Kingdom,” and might be the upcoming vibe of the summer.
What really sets the album apart from everything else, however, are the two songs “Sorry” and “Devil In Me.” Halsey reveals her vulnerable side through the piano ballad of “Sorry,” and shows her raw vocals in “Devil In Me,” which she co-wrote with Sia Furler (known as “Sia”). You can hear Sia’s influence in Halsey’s voice as she sings, but most importantly, “Devil In Me” allows her story and character to come full circle at the end of the album.
Personally, my favorite two songs on the album are “Walls Could Talk” and “Strangers.” These two are reminiscent of “BADLANDS,” yet strengthen the difference between the two and continue the development of the story.
As you could tell, there is so much to say about Halsey’s cinematic masterpiece of an album. Most notably, other than her talent, is the ability to make her songs sound like a specific color. In “BADLANDS,” she specifically aimed to have her songs sound blue and pink, which was the color scheme of the cover. In “Hopeless Fountain Kingdom,” her songs sound like the colors of red and gold, which are, consequently, part of the cover color scheme. Making something sound like a color takes pure talent and vision, only adding to the perfection of Halsey’s creativity.
Stunning with atmospheric tunes, head-banging jams, and emotionally chilling songs, “Hopeless Fountain Kingdom” is purely poetic and cinematic. Only Halsey can create a visual narrative with ease through this work of art, which proves how talented she actually is. Despite the theme of being “hopeless,” everyone should be hopeful for the future of Halsey.
At this rate, as everything she releases gets better, who knows what she will accomplish and create next. But I’m sure it will be one heck of a colorful and cinematic experience.
hopeless fountain kingdom is STILL the Number 1 album worldwide wow. I hope you are loving it ❤️ https://t.co/V38jkM68C0
— h (@halsey) June 4, 2017
Hopeless Fountain Kingdom:
“Heaven In Hiding”
“Now Or Never”
“Walls Could Talk”
“Bad At Love”
“Don’t Play”
“Angel On Fire”
“Devil In Me”
Tags: album review, Grammy's, Halsey, Romeo and Juliet
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Hammond Backs Legal Action to Stop U.K. PM Suspending Parliament
U.K. Chancellor of the Exchequer Philip Hammond said he would back a legal challenge against the government if the new prime minister tried to suspend Parliament to force through a no-deal Brexit.
Boris Johnson, the favorite to succeed Prime Minister Theresa May this month, has refused to rule out proroguing — or suspending — Parliament to fulfill his pledge to leave the European Union on Oct. 31. Though Johnson has said he’s “not remotely attracted to the idea,” he’s keeping his options open.
Such a move would provoke a constitutional crisis because Parliament is “dead-set against” a no-deal Brexit, Hammond said on Bloomberg TV on Friday. “If anybody were to attempt to shut down Parliament in order to carry out a course of action which Parliament is known to oppose, that would be very serious indeed,” he said.
Hammond said he “strongly supports” the position of former Conservative Prime Minister John Major, who said this week he would be prepared to take the government to court if the new premier tried to suspend the legislature. Members of Parliament also voted this week in favor of a plan to prevent prorogation — the latest attempt to block a no-deal Brexit.
“If we aren’t able to prevent that course of action through Parliament, then certainly there will be resort to the courts,” Hammond said.
On Thursday, Chief Secretary to the Treasury Liz Truss — a loyal supporter of Johnson — said prorogation should remain an option, and told Major to stop being “a back-seat driver.”
In the Bloomberg TV interview, Hammond refused to say if he would support a vote of no confidence in the government if it was the last resort to stop a no-deal Brexit, calling it a hypothetical question. He said that while the chance of the U.K. leaving the European Union without an agreement “is not negligible,” he still sees a negotiated exit as the “most likely outcome.”
This article is for general information purposes only. It is not investment advice or a solution to buy or sell securities. Opinions are the authors; not necessarily that of OANDA Corporation or any of its affiliates, subsidiaries, officers or directors. Leveraged trading is high risk and not suitable for all. You could lose all of your deposited funds.
Dean Popplewell has nearly two decades of experience trading currencies and fixed income instruments. He has a deep understanding of market fundamentals and the impact of global events on capital markets. He is respected among professional traders for his skilled analysis and career history as global head of trading for firms such as Scotia Capital and BMO Nesbitt Burns. Since joining OANDA in 2006, Dean has played an instrumental role in driving awareness of the forex market as an emerging asset class for retail investors, as well as providing expert counsel to a number of internal teams on how to best serve clients and industry stakeholders.
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Successful or No?
By The_Typer, January 29, 2014 in DFA: Discussion and Feedback
Yeah, long tail + Act 2 bump + new release platforms + discounts should mean this game makes very healthy numbers this year.
Double Fine still has the whole mobile market to explore later. I'm pretty sure their dream of self-funding is very close to become real.
randomfoo
Apparently, the Topseller-list is revenue based, not sales based (i.e. any game half the price of BA has to sell twice as much to be in the same place). With some more digging, I think it's pretty easy to get a measure on how well it's performing. DayZ sticks on #2 and sells a million copies in a month or ~30k copies a day. It also costs about the same as BA. So if BA stayed near the top of the list for a few days, it has to have sold some solid ten thousand copies already.
Edit: If anyone has any clue how long it stayed in, say, the top 5 (during pre-order period already?), that'd be nice to know. The first time I checked was after release.
On the flip side, there's Garry's Mod, which sold about 50k copies/month or 1.5k copies/day during a time where it was staying around #20 (where BA is now). As it costs about half as much, that means for BA the sales need to be halved; so like 750 copies/day.
In other words, the more often BA peaks, the better, but if it gets steady sales that keep it around #20 for a few months, that's fine too.
The Garry's Mod comparison is actually super useful to help ballpark numbers. As you've pointed out, Garry has been pretty forthcoming with sales numbers (older). (He also just published numbers on how Rust sales have compared).
Here's the info you want on sales chart history: comparing Rust, Garry's Mod, and Broken Age
Looks like it's doing pretty well. Also, since it's tracking so closely to Garry's Mod right now, if you found some recent absolute numbers you'd get pretty accurate revenue numbers for BA, I suspect.
suejak
Why are we wringing our hands and making excuses? If the game were a wild success on steam, we'd be hearing it from a celebratory dev team. It's obviously selling pretty modestly, but the results are so unclear that there's no way we'll know if it's good enough for DF or not until they tell us.
TrueStoryGuy
Sexy Robot
Double Fine will probably tell us how much money they've generated through a Backer Episode, much like what they did with Brütal Legend. Though, it may take some time since Steam only pays out to companies once a quarter. It may be until April or May when we hear about it, and that might be around Episode II releases. Quite possibly to backers.
That's cool, but why do you italicize proper nouns?
No one are making excuses, we're looking at the charts and speculating, for fun and because it's interesting.
I know for some people this kind of speculation might look like hunting for excuses, but I do it for the fun of it. I do the same thing with movie boxoffice results from time to time as well. I don't get a dime if I am right or wrong, but I find it oddly entertaining to see where as my estimations go right or wrong.
doccolinni
Action Forum Commander
Why the hell are these charts upside-down?
Anyway, someone who is not lazy can now easily calculate the total number of sales from that I guess.
yea, on one hand it is probably the case that people are playing a short time and then don't return to it once they have completed it (while most other games have different experiences), on the other hand we don't know how many of the backers are now playing the game because they were reminded by the media coverage and or didn't had the time before to play it.
At least metacritic looks fine: http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/broken-age-act-1 I think that with the lack of difficulty (puzzles) and length this ratings are very good. It is a bit sad that probably the most influencal german magazine "gamestar" only gave it 79 points though and an other german magazine only 76 (pc games) out of 100 points. The problem here is, that germany still is one of the biggest markets for adventure games and you need 80+ to be seen as a "good" game there.
Anyway, I also am one of those guys that noticed double fine because of the kickstarter and bought other games of them I otherwise wouldn't have bought. I think it had a huge impact and lots of people take notice of them now and this will continue until act 2 and beyond no matter if the news are "broken age - a failure" or "broken age - a moderate success". And this alone will be worth the money they may not get back. Especially if they continue to produce creative low budget games and maybe another adventure after broken age to please the adventure fans with all the tools they made now (it should be a lot easier and cheaper, I hope).
All in all it is a bit sad that 3 M just weren't enough. Otherwise it would have been a huge success already. I hope that other kickstartergames and also double fine learnt from that. But I am very curious for the RPGs (wasteland 2, Pillars of eternity and torment: tides of numenera) to see if they manage with their budgets, because RPGs usually are a lot more expensive with people expecting 40 hours gameplay+ from them and tend to compare it to games with 20 times the budget like skyrim.
Ha, awesome. Thanks! Massively useful, exactly what I was looking for. I dunno about recent sales figures, but I simply took the last that was available here, which is September last year. As you can see, GMod sold about 250k units @ 10 USD, which means 2,5 million in revenue. Mapped to Broken Age, this means about 100k units @ 25 USD. And now I made this handy graph:
So if BA was performing exactly GMod there, it would sell about 100k copies in a month. It's slightly below that, at about 80% I'd say, so it's on track for like 80k copies in a month, of which my best estimate is that about 50k copies are already sold. Currently, it will sell about 1000 copies per day.
So that's that
liquidsnakehpks
lol if the game had a cheap achievement like the one for opening the game , that could give a better estimate as in counting how many people got that
Adventure games don't tend to sell as steadily as other games, so let's imagine pessimistically that Broken Age will sell 60k copies this month. That's net sales of $1.5 million, of which Double Fine will probably see about $1 million.
I think that's in the low range of what we can expect Double Fine to make from the game in the first month since pre-orders opened. I think it'll drop off quite sharply after that, with a small bump from whatever DRM solution they go with an another small bump from mobile versions.
I'd estimate based on these shaky figures that in the first few months sales will die off around 120,000 - 250,000 which is a big range, but deliberately because there are so many unknowns.
Things that will almost certainly improve that figure:
Amnesia Fortnight is happening VERY soon. I think they might be filming the pitches now:
http://distilleryimage4.ak.instagram.com/e375d6328a1011e3944f12e000151e5c_8.jpg
I would be astonished if there wasn't some sort of Broken Age + Amnesia Fortnight bundle deal as part of this if you pay over a certain amount.
Later on in the year, Steam Summer Sale will hit. I think Broken Age will see significant sales from that as it's perfect timing. By that time almost all the people who were going to buy it anyway will have, and it'll be an easy choice for the 'I'll wait for the sale' crowd. I can see LOTS of sales coming through this, though the value of each sale will of course be less.
Then when Act 2 comes around there'll be another round of hype and reviews that will increase sales and all the 'wait till it's done' people will buy it at that point, which is probably looking at July-August now.
Then another Steam Sale at the end of the year. I think year long sales of 350,000 - 550,000 are a reasonable estimate range. If we assume that 1/3 of those come from a sale of average 50% sale that's a Double Fine take of (approximately) $4.8 million - $7.5 million
Which, coincidentally, is about enough money needed to make another game at the Broken Age level without crowdfunding, or possibly something bigger, considering that they have an engine and toolchain now.
OR, those numbers may be way off because of all we don't know.
ThunderPeel
$20 Bill in an Old Coat
It actually doesn't. The budget of Act II no longer depends on the sales of Act I. That idea is off the table, because it was a bad one from the start. With 'perhaps' and 'maybe' figures, you can't do budgets. DF matched the KS funds with money of their own, so we're talking about approximately $6 million flat for the entire game, and that's it.
Is that true? I hadn't heard this. Or if I had, I'd forgotten.
Speaking of mobile sales -- it COULD be a lot of money for DF, right?
@ThunderPeel: I can't quite remember where I heard it first, either in a recent episode or a post, but that was the gist of it, yes. It's welcome, but not needed. In the
the other day, Tim described it that way that the money from the first part "... helps us be more secure as we stay independent".
Jallen
Ditto, kinda a relief; as you said impossible to budget accurately with a guesstimate. Especially as (I've just learned) Steam only gives money quarterly.
If we're estimating ~100k sold in the first month I think DF will be satisfied; a long way off that pie-in-the-sky 500k figure but the game will definitely make it's money back in the long run.
Bat4Dead
Note that Broken Age had 87 142 Backers on kickstarter and then approximately another 150 000 through Humble Bundle and Slacker Backer program
With these numbers they already have a sale of 237 142 units and counting with another 100 000 from Steam the first month if KestrelPis estimations are correct
That means there would only be ~150 000 units left to reach the dream goal of 500 000 units sold
1) I don't think they're counting backers in the number of sales they want to achieve, because that's money that's already been spent on the game
2) I'm not sure those figures are accurate - they sound too high. You must be counting people who only backed the Amnesia Fortnight and didn't also back Broken Age. I'm not sure we have good numbers on how many people actually became backers through humble. Slacker Backers there were 8413 of, I don't expect Humble made that figure MUCH higher.
I don't know if core backers are part of this count, but most of the Humble Bundle sales didn't include BA since it obviously wasn't part of the basic package.
cwm9
Double Action Newbie
It's also important to remember that the iOS/Android versions haven't even been released yet. There is a large audience that only plays games on the portable devices, and they haven't even been given the opportunity to buy yet. Not everyone has or wants Steam.
If the PC version on steam is able to completely pay for development and even a little profit, everything sold on Google Play and the iTunes store is going to be 100% profit.
Back up on 16th place on the sales charts.
Guybrush guy
I'm confident this game is going to sell well.
they are #8 for Mac sales and #3 for linux. i know that PC users far outweigh the number of Mac and Linux users. but being in the top ten or slightly below it in any service that provides sales to over 5 millions people is a great thing.
they have a long road ahead with many opportunities to gain revenue. Humble bundle, App store, GOG, steam sale.
I have bought two gift copies for friends, and when it comes out for mobile platform i'm going to be purchasing it again.
The_Typer
I agree with this. A lot.
In terms of the game being a success, in technical terms it already is.
As we've discussed, we crowd funded a game. That budget helped pay for a game. It was made clear that Double Fine did have to find an extra $3 million to help continue the project.
That game we helped fund got made and is done and now available on Steam to everyone.
Now because Tim designed a game that's too BIG and LARGE for the prospected budget across a certain amount of time, the game was split in two with the gamble that the funds raised from the release of the first part will fund the second.
I suppose this splits the discussion into two different realms of "success".
Our backer money is technically now used up, but because the game designed by our money is now cut in half, it's continued work doesn't hinge on the success of Broken Age Part 1, but moreso determines what choices are probably going to be made in the development of Part 2 and how many people they can hire for the team, and other related decisions (where they can get more money in sales of Broken Age, etc. etc).
So if we're going to just count in terms of units sold that helps fund the second game, we're counting from I'd say pre-orders and release day onwards.
However technically anyone who backed high enough to get the game also bought the game. So in total units sold just as a selling point statistic, then we could include backers and slacker backers.
I think that distinction needs to be made clear if anyone is trying to count how many units have been sold and how much MOOLAH that sends to Double Fine.
Backer money has been SPENT. It's not helping the company further except in the fact that our money gave them the ability to make this game and make MORE MONEY off of it (which is wonderful!).
Just using some simple Algebra, Double Fine needs to sell roughly 171,527 copies (Rounded up from ".586") in order to break even from the amount of money that they spent in order to give us Broken Age, including Act Two. I used the formula "X(24.99*.7)=3,000,000" Where 24.99 is the price, .7 is the amount Double Fine keeps from Steam, X is the variable for the copies sold, and 3,000,000 is roughly the price Double Fine is looking to get back in order to break even.
I think Broken Age has been released too early for Humble Bundle but I know they did something similar with Brütal Legend last year. Maybe they'll release it with the soundtrack and ask $35 for it like they did last time. They also have Spacebase DF-9 in Early Access, and Hack N Slash can be pre-ordered, and they're both Amnesia Fortnight 2012 titles. Let us not forget The Cave, which came out late January 2013 (Though, I'm not sure if Double Fine has the rights from SEGA for the Steam version or not).
It's possible with this lineup that Double Fine can have a very successful Amnesia Fortnight 2014. Which will help prove that Double Fine can become a fully independent studio, and help Broken Age become a success.
Then, of course, there are the Steam sales. I imagine Double Fine will play is conservatively at first, but as the game gets older, then the percentage off will increase.
I'd be interested to see how Amnesia Fortnight goes - last time I seem to recall they lost money on it despite the Humble thing being quite successful. Though of course usually they never get ANY money back from AF, so it was still a win from a business perspective (it's essentially an investment in R&D)
I don't think it's too early for Broken Age to be a part of the Amnesia Fortnight Humble event, in some form (perhaps a deal where if you give $25 or more you get Broken Age + Soundtrack + Amnesia Fortnight prototypes), and I think they'd be silly not to do something like that.
honeymaker
I'd be interested to see how Amnesia Fortnight goes - last time I seem to recall they lost money on it despite the Humble thing being quite successful.
I wouldn't be surprised if they eventually have broken even on AF 2012. Tim sent out a tweet to encourage people to buy it, as they were nearly there and that was before they started the pre-order for the Blu-Ray release (which I assume would have at least some profit margin).
Maybe they'll also throw Hack "n" Slash and a new version of Autonomous into the mix. The sandwich made me think of the Humble Double Fine Bundle: maybe we can customise our own Amnesia Fortnight Sandwich this time.
There is also at least one unannounced title. I read in an interview with Drew Skillman on a Dutch website that he was working on a "to be announced" project of which he was not the project lead. With already four teams working on different games I'm having trouble guessing what this could be. Maybe an Oculus Rift title with Nathan Martz at the helm?
Regarding Broken Age, I think it can also do really well in the Mac App Store. The Cave is always in the top 100 game charts there. Not sure if that is because games don't sell really well on the Mac App Store, but I would say that it could help sell Broken Age among the more casual gamers.
There is also at least one unannounced title. I read in an interview with Drew Skillman that he was working on an "to be announced" project of which he was not the project lead. With already four teams working on different games I'm having trouble guessing what this could be. Maybe an Oculus Rift title with Nathan Martz at the helm?
I'm actually surprised The Cave is still doing so well on the Mac App Store, that's good for it (even though it's a game I was personally mildly disappointed by*).
You might be right, Amnesia Fortnight probably did break even in the end. In either case, it was great value for money as R&D as it got Spacebase made that recouped its Indie Fund investment in a few short weeks, and we have Hack 'n' Slash coming.
There's definitely an extra value proposition this time around. They can end up bundling in stuff like Spacebase too, because it's a previous AF title, as well as all the old prototypes, and the new ones. Cool stuff, but I doubt Amnesia Fortnight is going to become a money-making engine for them any time soon (except in the sense that it already is, as a way of generating game prototypes and ideas)
*feel like I should qualify this, because I did enjoy chunks of the game, I just think the platforming got in the way more than it didn't. It was deliberately not-challenging, instead supposed to be a fun way of getting around. But it wasn't fun enough to counter the annoyance of having to backtrack and juggle one item at a time, especially for a game that demanded multiple playthroughs. But I enjoyed the world and the mini-plots and the atmosphere.
Just using some simple Algebra, Double Fine needs to sell roughly 171,527 copies (Rounded up from ".586")
The general approach is OK for getting a ballpark, but your significant figures imply a degree of accuracy that just isn't there.
Presale copies were sold at 10% off. It's unknown how many presales there were (based on the chart positions, probably not too many) and will affect the revenue numbers. In general, # of full priced sales is going to be a lot less important (between discounts and different price points for bundles, mobile, etc). Similarly, we have no idea about soundtrack sales through Bandcamp/Steam.
Also, I'm assuming you got $3M as a number that they need to recoup by subtracting $6M-3M, but remember, both those numbers are pretty inexact. When they talk about $6M in the doc, they could just as easily mean $5.8M or $6.3M - we're not privy to any of the details of the actual budgeting. Also, I'm not sure how accurate the $3M from crowdfunding number is - while they ended w/ $3.3M from KS, remember 10% fees come out, then there's 2PP's budget, and then fulfillment costs for rewards (11K t-shirts, hundreds of posters, books, etc don't come for free!). I recall $2.3M being mentioned as the number after all of these costs, although I don't have a reference handy (and I don't know offhand about the Slacker Backer numbers).
There are a lot of unknowns, so I'd just try to keep that in mind when throwing out/trying to figure out numbers.
I'm guessing we'll see a video/project update followup where Greg or Justin will give some thoughts on how sales were (at least versus their expectations, if not actual numbers), but it's probably too early to tell. I'm sure everyone would have loved if BA stayed in the top 5/10 longer, but if it hangs around at the current level for a while, that's great. If it drops precipitously, well, that's probably bad. (Probably won't happen - there's not a lot of stuff out now, the game is good, and hopefully word of mouth will help the audience keep expanding, but who knows, maybe Oprah recommends it and sales go through the roof. Hard to predict these things.).
At this point it feels like Double Fine has a lot of experience w/ doing sales/bundles, so I'm sure they can turn the knobs as appropriate. Honestly, that'd be a pretty interesting documentary section in topic, but who knows if they'll be going into that at all...
From what we've seen so far, I think Act 1 sales is successful since it's been well received and will give the team the breathing room they were looking for (bringing in $1-2M, relaxing deadline pressure) and Act 2 will be able to go off pretty much as planned. With the additional sales opportunities (mobile platforms, Act 2 release), I think that chances are good that Broken Age will end up making DF some money as well as serving as a flag planting.
Like you mentioned, they have a lot of fires going at any given time, so hopefully the number will work out so DF can keep doing their thing independently. It's incredibly exciting to see that happening and I'm glad to be cheering them on.
I'm always surprised by it too, particularly because I've rarely seen it on Steam since its launch. It may have to do with pricing as well, because it's considerably cheaper on the Mac App Store. Also, it's listed as a Double Fine app (not Sega), which makes me think that DF owns the rights to the Mac version.
Cool stuff, but I doubt Amnesia Fortnight is going to become a money-making engine for them any time soon (except in the sense that it already is, as a way of generating game prototypes and ideas)
They'll probably gain more in terms of publicity than actual money.
I think releasing the DFA documentary for the general public in the near future might also be a very good move to help sell Broken Age, as that will no doubt be covered by the press and receive some (hopefully positive) reviews.
herberck
I think it would be smart for them to release the documentary for free. I cant imagine anybody who watched the documentary not wanting to try out the game.
I dont have enough faith in humanity not to foresee hundreds of threads of Backers crying about it and also 2playerproductions might not be so happy about it
Still i think it would be a brillant move although it probably will never happen.
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Lawsuit over Stairway to Heaven
By jim6225, May 18, 2014 in News
Blue-Eyed Merle
Location:The Air Above the Din
10 hours ago, luvlz2 said:
Jimmy looks dynamite!
Mithril46
Location:Smithtown, NY
I love the way Robert talks, having heard/read quite a few the last 5-10 yrs., interviews. And he hardly seemed rattled
from the lawsuit debacle. However the description of what he and his band does, as if they were creating some
fantastic holographic universe of music and sound, well, each to their own. Robert remains a fantastic singer
despite anything. The ideas and obscure "ethnic" musics Robert wants to stir into his mix, I've said before, he needs
higher caliber musicians. And the piracy thing, YouTube, etc., if you're a musician 20 yrs old now, and you became successful , getting a huge record company deal probably wasn't even thought about. Of course Robert is very rich and
there are plenty of much less successful artists from the past who are denied royalties, very unfair, you are talking
about musicians in poverty.
Location:Missouri USA
Higher caliber musicians? Get real. The ones he's used on his last few albums are outstanding. smh
zeplz71
Location:LA
http://www.rollingstone.com/music/features/ozzy-osbourne-led-zep-trial-was-waste-of-f--king-time
Ozzy Osbourne: Led Zeppelin Trial Was 'Waste of F--king Time'
"That group is fucking phenomenal," Black Sabbath singer says. "Why would they rip anybody off?"
Ozzy Osbourne cannot believe that Led Zeppelin had to defend themselves in court last month, when a man representing the group Spirit alleged they'd ripped off that band's instrumental "Taurus" to write "Stairway to Heaven."
"It's fucking crazy, actually," the Black Sabbath singer tells Rolling Stone as part of an interview that will publish in full in the future. "That should have never gone to court. I heard the original thing, and there's just a slight similarity. It's like saying any fucking song with that kind of a guitar on it is a rip-off. It's not fair. There's only so many fucking notes on a guitar, and it wasn't that much like 'Stairway to Heaven.' I'm amazed it lasted so fucking long, you know?"
"You listen to 'All Right Now' by Free and you listen to Steve Miller's 'Rock'n Me,' and it's exactly the same riff and they haven't sued each other," he continues. "It's exactly the same."
After a weeklong trial, the jury ultimately sided with Led Zeppelin in the case, which dated back to a 2014 filing. The Black Sabbath singer can't believe it lasted as long as it did. "I've met John Bonham; I've met all of them," he says. "That group is fucking phenomenal. What do they need a fucking songwriter for? Why would they rip anybody off? It's just a waste of fucking time. I'm really surprised it went to court. It's fucking crazy.
"They don't deserve it," he continues. "It's like, do you honestly think they'll sit there and go, 'Oh, we'll steal this and change it a bit like this so it sells.' Fuck. Give me a break. The song that was played was kind of a bit similar but it was only the chord sequence."
Osbourne, a native of Birmingham, England, knew Led Zeppelin's members casually before they were famous, as some of them lived there in the late Sixties. "We were friendly with John Bonham and Robert Plant," he says. "Robert's a great singer. He's one of the greats. He was very influential on a lot of singers in his day. I haven't seen Robert for a long time. I hope he's all right."
Even after both bands made it onto the charts, they continued to hang out, with Bonham occasionally asking to sit in on Bill Ward's drums early on. Classic Rock reports that in 1975, Led Zeppelin joined Sabbath in the studio during their Sabotage sessions for a jam on Sabbath's "Supernaut."
When Rolling Stone asks Osbourne about the jam, he says he can still picture it. "Jimmy Page wasn't there, but John Paul Jones, Robert Plant and John Bonham were there," he says. "And we just had a jam. It was all right. It was just a jam."
It was just all right? "I just jammed out, you know?" Osbourne says. "I can't think back on it now, like, 'Whoa, we just jammed with Zeppelin.' It's just what we did. We were all stoned anyway."
Lycanthrope
Location:The Darkest Depths of Mordor
Jeff Beck on the lawsuit:
http://www.billboard.com/articles/columns/rock/7438982/jeff-beck-beck01-loud-hailer-stairway-to-heaven-lawsuit
Outside of his own busy schedule, Beck was also paying close attention to the Led Zeppelin "Stairway To Heaven" plagiarism case, partly as an interested musician, but just as much as a longtime friend and music mate of Jimmy Page. "I had to smirk because I knew that Jimmy and Robert would come out on top," Beck says. "Apparently you can't copyright a chord sequence. It has to have a lyric or some kind of a meaningful melody to be copyrighted. And it is a chord sequence which has been used loads of times, but not in such an iconic way. It clearly is the same chord sequence [as Spirit's 'Taurus'], but then we're all guilty of stealing a chord sequence and sticking some words on top of it. So I think it's a bit of bravado to try to bring it to court, but Jimmy came out ahead. So, lucky Old Jim!"
sam_webmaster
LEDZEPPELIN.COM ADMIN
Location:Great White North
from Jimmy Page today:
"A few weeks have past since the judgement of the Stairway to Heaven case in Los Angeles, with the jury reaching a unanimous decision in a remarkably short time. Throughout the lengthy journey to that verdict, and even more recently, I have received and been aware of the overwhelming wave of support, encouragement, and congratulations that has been deeply moving."
"I’d like to take this opportunity to personally thank all those who contributed such a positive energy to me."
www.jimmypage.com
Ddladner
Jimmy, you are a gentleman, indeed. Please know that on any given day, there is tremendous positive energy directed to you. It is truly remarkable! ❤️
Thanks for posting, Sam!
KellyGirl
Location:U S A
10 hours ago, Ddladner said:
Awww this was sweet of Jimmy!! Very nicely put Ddladner!! Our girl minds thinking alike!!
Always sending the good vibes to my fave musician!!
Location:Down By The Seaside
sixpense
12 minutes ago, Walter said:
It will go down like a Lead Zeppelin!
23 hours ago, KellyGirl said:
41 minutes ago, sixpense said:
Absolutely! I don't know how Malofiy can even pursue this. Even for a lawyer, he is such a money grubbing, attention seeking, ambulance chasing, scum bag! Of course, he couldn't keep goin if he didn't have $ support behind him....
ZepDomi
15 hours ago, Walter said:
Who's the bigger scumbag, Malofiy or Skidmore? At what point does Skidmore actually act like the trustee to the estate that he's supposed to be?
Wow, everybody involved on the plaintiff's side are p a i n f u l l y annoying.
I can feel a rant coming on when it comes to everybody from that cockroach they
call a lawyer, to the sisters who say this is for the kids.... and only the kids.
I don't see this appeal having any legs though. It's not going anywhere. I'm just
turned off at how greedy Randy's family and friends can be. His own son isn't
even part of this. That tells me all I need to know about those tied to his estate.
Damn vultures.
Edited July 26, 2016 by KellyGirl
3 hours ago, ZepDomi said:
That's what my last sentence was referring to. He couldn't pursue this without $ backing.
Tea41
Location:NY
They need to give it up, and get some real music of their own instead of parasitically clinging to Zeppelin's talent for $. Skidmark needs to get a life. This stupid song Taurus isn't even worth a listen much less a lawsuit, Spirit needs to stop flattering themselves and delusionally thinking they are worth comparing to Led Zeppelin even for a second. Taurus is so unmemorable, these maggots must have alot of cash to keep suing Zep. They will keep losing.
The picture posted before with Page with the dark sunglasses and hilarious comical smile on his face, with Plant and
Jones, is the best way to see this appeal. I wouldn't even bother following this anymore, because it's not like there
was any point in the trial where the plaintiffs were seriously gaining momentum. I'm sure that Jimmy, although
more serious than lighthearted, will have many belated laughs about this debacle with friends and family.
Balthazor
Most of the stories I've read about this appeal include the line:
"The filing does not provide legal arguments for why the case should be reconsidered."
This is a little baffling to me. Without any legal arguments for reconsideration, wouldn't it just be dead on arrival? I mean what, does the filing say "we think this case should be reconsidered...just because"?
Maybe filings of this kind don't normally include legal arguments, the stories aren't real clear on that. Seems like an incredible long shot that this appeal would even be taken seriously, I can't imagine any judge allowing it to move forward.
#1fan
Location:crosby, mn
They were not allowed to play both songs, had to go by sheet music and a piano, he wants the jury to hear the songs. it could be bad if some jury members think it sounds the same.
Edited July 30, 2016 by #1fan
On 7/30/2016 at 4:12 PM, #1fan said:
Yeah but I highly doubt that's going to be enough to grant an appeal, because it would require basically retroactively changing the law to do so. If the sheet music was all that was copyrighted prior to 1972 then that's what they have to go on. Appeals are typically granted on the basis of either some kind of judicial error or malfeasance, or on the basis of new evidence coming to light. It'll be extremely hard for them to argue that a judge following the law represents judicial error or malfeasance.
This is incorrect. Before deliberation, the jury asked to hear both songs, the known recorded final versions as they appear on the records, and immediately voted unanimously there was no infringement. The appeal will go nowhere.
Edited August 2, 2016 by Tea41
PlanetPage
http://indianexpress.com/article/lifestyle/art-and-culture/theres-a-songbird-who-steals-2917845/
Led Zeppelin’s Stairway to Heaven: There’s a songbird who steals?
Even if the band had lost the lawsuit, Led Zeppelin’s Stairway to Heaven would be still be on top of the charts.
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Written by Akhil Sood | Published:July 17, 2016 12:00 am
For years, Led Zeppelin have been accused of lifting parts of Jimmy Page’s intro of Stairway to Heaven from another song. (Source: Andrew Smith)
In countries more developed than ours, you have massive guitar stores, with a designated area where you can plug the guitars into the amps available and test them out. Most of these shops will have a sign in the area, warning all former and future guitar virtuosos that they’ll be kicked out if they play Led Zeppelin’s Stairway to Heaven. This song has p***ed off the employees so much that it’s now banned (along with a select few others: Smoke on the Water by Deep Purple, AC/DC’s Highway to Hell, and Hotel California by Eagles).
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It’s an impossible task to evaluate the worth of a single song and locate its place in the history of rock ‘n’ roll, so the best we can do is judge it by anecdotal evidence and causality. Inspiring thousands of children to pick up the guitar to learn it should fare quite high on the basis of these parameters, I think. Today, 45 years later, even in India, you’ll have pre-pubescent chumps buying a rackety Givson guitar for Rs 3,000 and forcing their parents to pay for a guitar teacher. “Screw scales and exercises,” they say, “I want to learn Stairway to Heaven.” It’s a testament to the longevity of a single melody, which steers the song into such lofty heights, developing new lives with each passing movement. For what it’s worth, the relevance of this song has not waned (And I say this as a sceptic, one who staunchly refuses to commit to the cult of Led Zeppelin.)
There’s no such thing as a perfect song, of course; if there were, there’d be no need to write or listen to any new music. We’d just play that thing on loop until rigor mortis. But you have all these little self-contained rules and regulations to judge just how important a song really is. Being a source of inspiration is a major factor, but so is the obsession it can elicit.
Music fans tend to, by nature, be a nerdy lot who’ll internalise music to worrying degrees, getting lost in the process. Like that time one sadsack young fan decided he liked Stairway to Heaven so much that he just had to play it backwards. Thus began the discovery of those mythical Satanic proclamations that are apparently embedded in the song. Inciting such rabid commitment has to stand for something.
There’s a case to be made about the musicianship and the songwriting: how so much of what we hear in the mainstream is essentially rehashing old tropes and tricking our brains into mistaking familiarity for fondness. Some songs are simple and catchy, so we like them (like everything the Beatles wrote before they discovered drugs). Some aren’t, but they’re well-crafted, so we like them anyway (like everything the Beatles wrote after). Stairway to Heaven falls somewhere in the middle: it’s not exactly a simple three-chord song, and has plenty of dynamics in its arrangement. But it’s not some grand display of virtuosity either. It’s just a really solid rock ‘n’ roll song with that little something extra.
I don’t know them personally, but the guys in the band sound like horrible people. They took the “sex, drugs, rock ‘n’ roll” template to its logical extreme — the tragic death of drummer John Bonham is a case in point. And yet all’s forgiven. In fact, they’re venerated for their recklessness. They’re icons of rock ‘n’ roll, to the point that so much of the music that came after them was really either a continuation of what they did, or a counter-response to it.
Photo of Led Zepplin – (L-R) John Paul Jones, Jimmy Page, Robert Plant, John Bonham – posed, group shot, sitting on car bonnet – first photo session with WEA Records in London in December 1968. (Photo by Dick Barnatt/Redferns)
You can’t attribute all of that to just one song, but it does help. It has that transcendental quality that unites opposing factions. You can play it at a house party and no one minds; play it on a “Bollywood night”, an “EDM night”, or just at a dive bar with crackly speakers, and no one minds. The reaction is always one of thrill or wistful nostalgia. So you judge the band less harshly.
That softened stance becomes all the more important given recent events. They have, since before this writer was even born, been facing accusations that the memorable intro by Jimmy Page features parts they lifted from the guitar line of a song called Taurus, by an obscure ’60s psychedelic band called Spirit, who they crossed paths with back in the day. The suit was finally filed in 2014, and, last month, Led Zeppelin was found not guilty of plagiarism. It doesn’t mean they didn’t steal it, though —just that a jury decided that they hadn’t.
That’s the thing: anything truly famous and remarkable will inevitably be followed by persistent accusations of dishonesty and intellectual theft (just ask Anu Malik). Sometimes it’s because of the endless maze of copyright laws, where copying certain things is permitted, like a chord progression, but copy a guitar line and you’re dead meat. It get more complex when you bring a tribute or homage into the picture. The reason why people commit crimes is not because we’re immoral; it’s because the laws are impossible to fully understand. The answer is rarely black-and-white, but the conversation itself — and how closely it’s followed by people — signifies its relevance in contemporary culture. And just for that, Stairway to Heaven has now become an even more important song in the grand scheme of things.
Akhil Sood is a Delhi-based musician and journalist.
Edited August 4, 2016 by PlanetPage
juxtiphi
Location:Ma.
Great deal of back handed slapping in that article.
I don't know Akhil Sood personally but reading this article makes me think he is a horrible person.
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Justice Committee finds that the Ministry of Justice’s legal aid reforms have harmed access to justice
By Lee Henderson, Goodman Ray
On 12 March 2015 the Justice Committee published its report on the impact of changes to civil legal aid under Part 1 of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 (LASPO).
The Justice Committee found that the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) had:
– harmed access to justice for some litigants;
– failed to achieve three of its four objectives for the reforms to legal aid;
– realised an underspend in the legal aid budget; and
– failed to achieve its aim of providing a ‘safety net’ protecting access to justice for the most vulnerable people.
Underspend
In its November 2014 report ‘Implementing reforms to civil legal aid’, the National Audit Office stated that the Legal Aid Agency was funding “legal help in 326,000 fewer cases than would have been expected without the reforms. It agreed funding for representation in court in 36,537 fewer cases.” The report concluded that the “Ministry is on track to exceed spending reduction forecasts by £32 million.”
The Committee asked Mr Shailesh Vara, the Minister for Legal Aid, why there had been an underspend. Aside from the Legal Aid Agency’s debt collection system’s success the reasons offered were that there had been a “lower take-up of mediation” than expected, that “many other agencies provide this sort of advice”, and “people are aware that there have been reductions in legal aid and they simply are not coming forward”. This last comment is particularly frustrating: people believe that legal aid is no longer available because the MoJ has failed to inform them otherwise.
The Committee heard evidence that people are not accessing legal aid because they do not have enough information on whether they are eligible. Most of the witnesses approached by the Committee placed the failure to provide good public information on the Government’s doorstep. This lack of accessible and useful information is a theme in the report. The Committee recommends that the MoJ undertakes a public campaign to combat the widespread impression that legal aid is almost non-existent. Perhaps the £20 million underspend could be utilised to inform the public that legal aid is still available rather than relying on solicitors ( that people do not go to see because they do not think they can get legal aid) to inform them.
Exceptional Case Funding
Where an individual’s case is not within the scope of LASPO they may, in exceptional cases, be entitled to legal aid. An application must be made to the Legal Aid Agency’s exceptional case funding team.
As the LASPO Bill passed through Parliament the MoJ estimated that 5,000 to 7,000 applications for exceptional case funding would be made each year and that around 3,700 of those applications would be granted (around 53% to 74%). The Legal Aid Agency’s latest figures show that 151 of 2,090 applications made between April 2013 and September 2014 were granted – that is a success rate of 7.2%. Of the 151 successful applications 21 were for family law matters. Is this a safety net? Or is it a token gesture by the MoJ in an attempt to ensure that LASPO is compliant with human rights?
Some of the witnesses approached by the Committee criticised the formal guidance given to caseworkers, others the approach, knowledge and ability of the caseworkers – either way this is surely easily remedied? Whatever the reason for the low success rate, exceptional case funding has failed to offer a safety net to those most in need of legal aid.
The ‘legal aid: exceptional case funding’ section on the gov.uk website states that a client can apply directly to the Legal Aid Agency for exceptional case funding. It advises applicants that they must meet the ECF criteria set out in LASPO and described in the Lord Chancellor’s funding guidance (a link to this guidance is provided which takes the applicant to a page featuring the ECF application form and the accompanying guidance). The application form is complex, lengthy and, along with the accompanying guidance, drafted in a way that is inaccessible for those clients most likely to be entitled to exceptional case funding. It is surprising therefore to read Mr Vara’s comment to the Committee that “there is a belief that it is a discretionary fund and that, if you are turned down through the normal route, then, if you apply here, you might just be lucky”. Perhaps if the website gave prospective applicants comprehensible guidance on what a successful ECF application might look like the belief that it is a discretionary fund might be dispelled. Mr Vara is correct in one sense: “you might just be lucky”. Indeed, it appears that luck plays a far larger part in accessing legal aid than might be expected.
For any chance of success the ECF application must be made by an expert on the area of law in question (who, it should be noted, will spend at least three to four hours completing the form – excluding time spent taking instructions from the client – but will not be paid for an unsuccessful application). It is surprising and demoralising for those making these applications to learn that the application is then determined by a caseworker without any specialist knowledge of the relevant area of law.
Domestic Violence Gateway Evidence
LASPO took private family law proceedings out of the scope of legal aid. Where a person has suffered domestic violence they may still be able to obtain legal aid for private family law proceedings. They must however be able to prove the domestic violence by way of specified evidence, evidence which must be less than 24 months old.
The Committee’s report cites a statistic provided by the charity, Rights of Women: 39% of victims of domestic violence did not have the evidence required for a legal aid application.
Rights of Women recently challenged the regulation that places a time limit on the required evidence, amongst other things. The challenge failed. The court said that “the time limit provides a test of the on-going relevance of the abuse.” The test is arbitrary – it does not take into account the lasting impact of domestic violence, the ever-changing relationships that are often the subject of private family law proceedings, and the fact that those relying on the evidence are often not the one resorting to the courts.
The Committee offers a common sense recommendation: that the Legal Aid Agency be given discretion in respect of the 24 month time limit.
Litigants in Person
The MoJ has suggested that the rise in cases where both parties are litigants in person has not resulted in longer hearings, that, in fact, such hearings are comparable in length to those where the parties have representation. The statistics on which this claim is founded are based on the courts’ case management tool used for providing time estimates for hearings which often do not correlate with the actual hearing times therefore it is difficult to know how useful (if at all) this suggestion is.
The MoJ predicted that there would be an additional 9,000 Mediation, Information and Assessment Meetings (MIAMs) each year following the changes to legal aid. The number of MIAMs has actually declined by 17,246 per annum. This has resulted in a £20 million underspend in the legal aid budget.
Some of the witnesses approached by the Committee felt that the decline was due to a serious lack of information about mediation available to those about to enter family law proceedings.
It is clear that the current system requires urgent attention. Access to justice has been harmed yet there has been a significant underspend of the budget – this is a nonsense. The public’s perception of legal aid has been determined by press headlines rather than the reality and the MoJ has made a lacklustre and failed attempt with its updated website at offering the facts to those looking to access justice. Those most in need of legal aid must persevere with the clumsy and ill-conceived system for exceptional case funding only to have their application determined by an under-trained and under-qualified caseworker.
Accessing legal aid can be, it seems, a matter of luck rather than entitlement.
The Committee’s report can be found here.
In keeping with our founding principles Goodman Ray continues to be committed to undertaking publicly funded work in all those areas of family law which remain in scope. If you are in doubt whether your case is one of the kind that is still covered by the legal aid scheme please contact us.
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Veterans Day Q&A with GoRail’s own
November 19, 2014 June 28, 2016
Larry Lloyd is a GoRail organizer who has worked to educate community leaders in many states about the benefits of moving more freight by rail. He also continues to serve our country in the Army Reserve. As we all celebrate the sacrifices of the men and women serving our country, we asked Larry a few questions about the connection between railroads and our nation’s armed forces.
GoRail: Talk a little bit about your military experience.
LL: I have served in the Army for a total of 12 years. Four active duty as an infantry squad leader and the rest in the Army Reserve, currently as a Staff Sergeant and Civil Affairs Team Leader. While on active duty I was stationed in South Korea for a year and deployed as a part of Operation Iraqi Freedom with the 101st Airborne Division for a year. Last year I deployed to Uganda with my Civil Affairs Team. We supported the Ugandan Peoples Defense Forces (UPDF) military operations in Somalia in order to defeat al-Shabaab. We did this by strengthening the UPDF’s collaborative civil military operations, military-to-military activities, and building partnerships with civil society.
GoRail: What do you do now at GoRail?
LL: I lead GoRail’s education and advocacy efforts across much of the Midwest and get to work with our hundreds of state-wide partners and community leaders across the region. We all work to promote the benefits of record rail investment – economic development and job creation, cleaner and more efficient freight transport and moving the nation toward energy independence.
GoRail: What is the most important skill you took from your time in the military and how does it translate into the work you do now?
LL: There are many but the one that stands out in my mind is determination. As the Soldier’s Creed states we always place the mission first, never accept defeat and keep ourselves physically and mentally tough. That is a quality that someone is not born with. It has to be developed and few places do it better than the military.
Lloyd (far right) and a fellow soldier with their interpreter in Iraq in 2006
GoRail: Would you recommend the rail industry for someone just finishing military service? Why?
LL: Railroads are a great opportunity for anyone retiring from the military. All the more so I think for members of the Reserve and Guard. GoRail has been reflective of the rest of the rail industry in seeing my military service as something that makes me even better at my civilian job. Their support has been better than I could have asked for. That is why I nominated GoRail for and they received the Patriot Award from Employer Support of the Guard and Reserve.
GoRail: What is the rail industry doing to encourage the hiring of veterans?
LL: The rail industry has been unmatched in its drive to seek out and hire veterans. Their partnership with the Employer Support of the Guard and Reserve, and with the White House Joining Forces Initiative makes railroads front and center in the eyes of current service members. The men and women I serve with mention their recruiting efforts often. In fact, the rate at which railroads are hiring people with military service has allowed them to exceed their 2012 commitment under the Joining Forces Program. This means that nearly one-in-four of every new railroad hire has military service.
At GoRail, part of our job is to help educate the public about importance rail plays in our daily lives. The rail record on veterans hiring is something I’m proud to share.
We at GoRail are honored to work alongside Larry and are humbled by the sacrifices by all our brave men and women serving our nation in the military. Please join us in thanking all veterans for their service.
Policy Issues, Veterans
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All Star Comics
This article is about the 1940s comic book series. For the DC Comics imprint starting in 2005, see All Star DC Comics.
All Star Comics is an American comic book series from All-American Publications, one of three companies that merged with National Periodical Publications to form the modern-day DC Comics. While the series' cover-logo trademark reads All Star Comics, its copyrighted title as indicated by postal indicia is All-Star Comics, with a hyphen.[2] With the exception of the first two issues, All Star Comics told stories about the adventures of the Justice Society of America, the first team of superheroes, and introduced Wonder Woman.
All Star Comics #3 (Winter 1940–1941)
Cover art by Everett E. Hibbard
Quarterly #1–4, 18–27
Bimonthly #5–17, 28–57[1]:15
(Original run)
Summer 1940 –
February–March 1951 (Revival)
January–February 1976 –
September–October 1978
No. of issues
(Revival)
Main character(s)
Justice Society of America
Gardner Fox, John Broome, Robert Kanigher[1]:21–34
Bernard Baily, Jack Burnley, Lee Elias, Frank Giacoia, Joe Giella, Irwin Hasen, Everett E. Hibbard, Carmine Infantino, Jack Kirby, Joe Kubert, Harry Lampert, Sheldon Moldoff, Win Mortimer, Martin Nodell, Bob Oksner, H. G. Peter, Paul Reinman, Bernard Sachs, Joe Simon, Alex Toth, Keith Giffen, Wallace Wood, Joe Staton[1]:21–34
Publication historyEdit
Original seriesEdit
All Star Comics #1 (Summer 1940). Cover art is a collage of previously published panels by various artists.
The original concept for All Star Comics was an anthology title containing the most popular series from the other anthology titles published by both All-American Publications and National Comics.[1]:13–14
All Star Comics #1 (cover-dated Summer 1940) contained superhero stories that included All-American's Golden Age Flash, Hawkman, Ultra-Man, as well as National's Hour-Man, Spectre, and Sandman. The adventure strip "Biff Bronson" and the comedy-adventure "Red, White, and Blue" also premiered with the Summer 1940 cover date.[2]
Issue #3 (Winter 1940–1941)[3][4] depicted the first meeting of the Justice Society of America, with its members swapping stories of their exploits which were subsequently illustrated in the comic's array of solo adventures. In addition to the Flash, Hawkman, Hour-Man, the Spectre, and the Sandman were Doctor Fate from National's More Fun Comics; and the Green Lantern and the Atom from All-American's flagship title All-American Comics.[5][6] The Justice Society of America (JSA) was originally a frame story used to present an anthology of solo stories about the individual characters,[1]:43 with each story handled by a different artist.[1]:43 Comic historian Les Daniels noted, "this was obviously a great notion, since it offered readers a lot of headliners for a dime, and also the fun of watching fan favorites interact."[7] The anthology format was dropped in 1947 and replaced with full issue stories featuring the heroes teaming up to fight crime.[1]:43
All Star Comics #8 (cover dated January 1942) featured the first appearance of Wonder Woman in an eight-page story written by William Moulton Marston, under the pen name of "Charles Moulton" with art by H. G. Peter.[8] The insert story was included to test reader interest in the Wonder Woman concept. It generated enough positive fan response that Wonder Woman would be awarded the lead feature in the Sensation Comics anthology title starting from issue #1.[9] That same issue saw the induction of Doctor Mid-Nite and Starman as members of the Justice Society as well.[7] Starting with issue #11, Wonder Woman would appear in All Star Comics as a member of the Justice Society as their secretary.
With issue #34 (April–May 1947), Gardner Fox left the series and a new super-villain, the Wizard,[10] was introduced. The Injustice Society first battled the JSA in issue #37 in a tale written by Robert Kanigher.[11] The Black Canary guest starred in issue #38 and joined the team three issues later in #41.[12]
All Star Comics increased its frequency from a quarterly to a bimonthly publication schedule, and the JSA lasted through March 1951 with issue #57 in a story titled "The Mystery of the Vanishing Detectives".[13]
Superhero comics slumped in the early 1950s, and All Star Comics was renamed All-Star Western in 1951 with issue #58. In this issue, the "Justice Society of America" feature was replaced by Western heroes.[14]
Artwork from an unpublished All Star Comics story titled "The Will of William Wilson" survived and was reprinted in various publications from TwoMorrows Publishing.[15]
All Star Comics #58 (January–February 1976). Art by Mike Grell.
1976 revival seriesEdit
In 1976, the name All Star Comics was resurrected for a series portraying the modern-day adventures of the JSA. The new series dismissed the numbering from All-Star Western and continued the original numbering, premiering with All-Star Comics #58.[1]:194 Starting with issue #66, a hyphen was added to the title and the words "All-Star Comics" became a much smaller part of the cover; while the words "Justice Society" became much larger. The 1970s series introduced the new characters Power Girl[16][17] and the Helena Wayne version of the Huntress.[18] This series ran for seventeen issues before it was abruptly canceled with issue #74[19] as part of the DC Implosion and the JSA's adventures were folded into Adventure Comics.[20]
After 23-year-old Gerry Conway became an editor at DC Comics, long-time JSA-fan Roy Thomas suggested to Conway that the JSA be given their own title again. Conway offered Thomas a chance to ghostwrite an issue of the revived All-Star Comics, but he declined as Thomas was under an exclusive contract with Marvel Comics at the time.[21] However, in 1981 Thomas moved to DC and was able to work with the characters.[22]
Subsequent revivalEdit
A two-issue All-Star Comics series was published as a part of the "Justice Society Returns" storyline in May 1999.[23]
Collected editionsEdit
All Star Comics Archives:
Volume 0 collects #1–2, 144 pages, March 2006, ISBN 1-4012-0791-X
Volume 1 collects #3–6, 272 pages, 1992, ISBN 1-5638-9019-4
Volume 2 collects #7–10, 256 pages, 1993, ISBN 0-9302-8912-9
Volume 3 collects #11–14, 240 pages, November 1997, ISBN 1-5638-9370-3
Volume 4 collects #15–18, 224 pages, December 1998, ISBN 1-5638-9433-5
Volume 6 collects #24–28, 240 pages, October 2000, ISBN 1-5638-9636-2
Volume 7 collects #29–33, 216 pages, July 2001, ISBN 1-5638-9720-2
Volume 8 collects #34–38, 208 pages, August 2002, ISBN 1-5638-9812-8
Volume 9 collects #39–43, 192 pages, August 2003, ISBN 1-4012-0001-X
Volume 10 collects #44–49, 216 pages, August 2004, ISBN 1-4012-0159-8
Volume 11 collects #50–57, 276 pages, March 2005, ISBN 1-4012-0403-1
Volume 1 collects #58–67 and DC Special #29, 224 pages, August 2006, ISBN 1-4012-0970-X
Volume 2 collects #68–74 and Adventure Comics #461–466, 224 pages, February 2007, ISBN 1-4012-1194-1
Showcase Presents: All-Star Comics collects issues #58–74 and Adventure Comics #461–466, 448 pages, September 2011, ISBN 1-4012-3303-1
Millennium EditionEdit
In 2000 and 2001, DC Comics reprinted several of its most notable issues in the Millennium Edition series. All Star Comics #3 and #8 were reprinted in this format.[24][25]
^ a b c d e f g h Thomas, Roy (2000). The All-Star Companion: An Historical and Speculative Overview of the Justice Society of America. Raleigh, North Carolina: TwoMorrows Publishing. ISBN 1893905055.
^ a b All-Star Comics at the Grand Comics Database
^ The Catalog of Copyright Entries 1940 Periodicals Jan–Dec New Series Vol 35 Pt 2. Washington, D.C.: United States Copyright Office. 1940. p. 373.
^ "All-Star Comics #3 (Winter 1940–1941)". Grand Comics Database.
^ Wallace, Daniel; Dolan, Hannah, ed. (2010). "1940s". DC Comics Year By Year A Visual Chronicle. London, United Kingdom: Dorling Kindersley. p. 33. ISBN 978-0-7566-6742-9. DC took the 'greatest hits' premise of the comic to its logical conclusion in All Star Comics #3 by teaming the Flash, the Atom, Doctor Fate, Green Lantern, Hawkman, Hourman, Sandman, and the Spectre under the banner of the Justice Society of America for an ongoing series. CS1 maint: Extra text: authors list (link)
^ Levitz, Paul (2010). "The Golden Age 1938–1956". 75 Years of DC Comics The Art of Modern Mythmaking. Cologne, Germany: Taschen. p. 56. ISBN 9783836519816. Mayer and Fox cooked up one of the biggest ideas in superhero history: What if the varied stars of All-Star Comics actually met and worked together?
^ a b Daniels, Les (1995). DC Comics: Sixty Years of the World's Favorite Comic Book Heroes. New York, New York: Bulfinch Press. p. 54. ISBN 0821220764.
^ Marston, William Moulton (w), Peter, H. G. (p), Peter, H. G. (i). "Introducing Wonder Woman" All Star Comics 8 (December 1941 – January 1942)
^ Wallace "1940s" in Dolan, p. 40: "Wonder Woman...took the lead in Sensation Comics following a sneak preview in All Star Comics #8."
^ Wallace "1940s" in Dolan, p. 55: "Gardner Fox penned his last story about the Justice Society of America in this issue. The writer...introduced an ill-tempered illusionist called the Wizard."
^ Wallace "1940s" in Dolan, p. 56: "In Robert Kanigher's story...a cabal of villains united as the Injustice Society of the World and took revenge on the JSA's assembled do-gooders."
^ Wallace "1940s" in Dolan, p. 57: "Black Canary made her first appearance outside of Flash Comics in a feature by writer Robert Kanigher and artist Alex Toth...By the story's end, Black Canary was considered for JSA membership but wouldn't officially join until All Star Comics #41."
^ Broome, John (w), Giacoia, Frank; Peddy, Arthur F. (p), Giacoia, Frank; Sachs, Bernard (i). "The Mystery of the Vanishing Detectives!" All Star Comics 57 (February–March 1951)
^ Irvine, Alex "1950s" in Dolan, p. 66: "As superhero comics continued to decline in popularity, many of them mutated into Western, crime, and horror titles. The superhero omnibus All Star Comics was one such series, becoming All-Star Western as of issue #58."
^ Thomas, Roy (December 11, 2006). "From All-Star Companion v. 2 – Where There's a 'Will' — There's 'William Wilson'!". Newsarama. Archived from the original on December 6, 2008. Retrieved March 17, 2012.
^ McAvennie, Michael "1970s" in Dolan, p. 169: "Along with artist Ric Estrada, [Gerry] Conway also introduced the DC Universe to the cousin of Earth-2's Superman, Kara Zor-L a.k.a. Power Girl."
^ Conway, Gerry (w), Estrada, Ric (p), Wood, Wally (i). "The Super Squad!" All Star Comics 58 (Feb. 1976)
^ "All-Star Comics #69". Grand Comics Database.
^ Levitz, Paul (w), Staton, Joe (p), Giella, Joe (i). "World on the Edge of Ending" All Star Comics 74 (September–October 1978)
^ Wells, John (October 24, 1997), "'Lost' DC: The DC Implosion", Comics Buyer's Guide, Iola, Wisconsin (1249), pp. 131–132, The contents of All-Star Comics #75 were split into a two-part Justice Society story published in Adventure Comics #461–462.
^ Thomas, Roy (April 2002). "All The Stars There Are in (Super-hero) Heaven!". Alter Ego. Raleigh, North Carolina: TwoMorrows Publishing. 3 (14). Retrieved June 23, 2013.
^ Markstein, Don (2010). "All-Star Squadron". Don Markstein's Toonopedia. Archived from the original on April 4, 2012.
^ All Star Comics vol. 2' at the Grand Comics Database
^ "Millennium Edition: All Star Comics No. 3". Grand Comics Database.
All Star Comics at Mike's Amazing World of DC Comics.
← The first Green Lantern was debuted by Marin Nodell. See Alan Scott and Green Lantern for more info and the previous timeline. Timeline of DC Comics (1940s)
July 1940 The first Ray was debuted by Lou Fine. See Ray (comics) for info and next timeline. →
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Anuradha Paudwal (born 27 October 1954) is an Indian playback singer who works in Bollywood.[2][3] She was awarded the Padma Shri,[4] India's fourth-highest civilian award, by the Government of India in 2017.[5] She is a recipient of the National Film Award and a four-time winner of the Filmfare Award.[6][7]
Anuradha Paudwal at 57th Idea Filmfare Awards, 2011
Alka Nadakarni
(1954-10-27) 27 October 1954 (age 64)[1]
Playback singing, Bhajans
T-Series, Tips Music, Venus Worldwide Entertainment
She was married to Arun Paudwal, a music composer and has a son named Aditya Paudwal and a daughter named Kavita Paudwal, who is also a singer.[8][9]
Awards & recognitionEdit
The President, Shri Pranab Mukherjee presenting the Padma Shri Award to Dr. Anuradha Paudwal, at a Civil Investiture Ceremony, at Rashtrapati Bhavan, in New Delhi on March 30, 2017
2017: Padma Shri by Government of India[10]
2013: Mohammed Rafi Award by Maharashtra government[11]
2011: Mother Teresa Award for Lifetime Achievement[12]
2010: Lata Mangeshkar Award by the Madhya Pradesh Government[13]
Filmfare Awards:
1983: Best Female Playback Singer - "Maine Ek Geet Likha Hai" (Yeh Nazdeekiyan)
1984: Best Female Playback Singer - "Tu Mera Hero Hain" (Hero (1983 film))
1989: Best Female Playback Singer - "Keh Do Ki Tum" (Tezaab)
1990: Best Female Playback Singer - "Tera Naam Liya" (Ram Lakhan)
1990: Best Female Playback Singer - "Bekhabar Bewafa" (Ram Lakhan)
1991: Best Female Playback Singer - "Mujhe Neend Na Aaye" (Dil)
1992: Best Female Playback Singer - "Bahut Pyar Karte Hain " (Saajan)
1986: Best Female Playback Singer - "Mere Man Bajo Mridang" (Utsav)
1991: Best Female Playback Singer - "Nazar Ke Saamne" (Aashiqui)
1992: Best Female Playback Singer - "Dil Hai Ke Manta Nahin" (Dil Hai Ke Manta Nahin)
1993: Best Female Playback Singer - "Dhak Dhak Karne Laga" (Beta)
National Film Awards:
1989: Best Playback Singer (Female) - "He Ek Reshami" Kalat Nakalat
Odisha State Film Awards
1987: Odisha State Film Award for Best Singer - Tunda Baida
1997: Odisha State Film Award for Best Singer - Khandaei Akhi Re Luha
Guild Film Awards
2004: Nominated for Apsara Award for Best Female Playback Singer
OthersEdit
She was honored with D Litt degree by the Padmashree Dr D.Y. Patil University.[6][14]
Main article: List of songs recorded by Anuradha Paudwal
Sadak 2 (2020)
Jaane Hoga Kya (2006)
Kalyug (2005)
Kasak (2005)
Lucky: No Time for Love (2005)
Zameer (2005)
Kisna: The Warrior Poet (2005)
Subhash Chandra Bose (2005)
Ab... Bas! (2004)
Shukriya: Till Death Do Us Apart (2004)
Julie (2004)
Aan: Men at Work (2004)
Yeh Lamhe Judaai Ke (2004)
Muskaan (2004)
Paap (2003)
Wrong Number (2003)
Aapko Pehle Bhi Kahin Dekha Hai (2003)
Ek Hindustani (2003)
Jee Aayan Nu (2003)
Rishtey (2002)
Shakthi: The Power (2002)
Maine Dil Tujhko Diya (2002)
Awara Paagal Deewana (2002)
Hum Kisi Se Kum Nahin (2002)
Hum Tumhare Hain Sanam (2002)
Lajja (2001)
Ek Rishtaa (2001)
Mitti (2001) (Anuradha Poudwal)
Raja Ko Rani Se Pyar Ho Gaya (2000)
Beti No. 1 (2000)
Mohabbatein (2000)
Shikari (2000)
Dhaai Akshar Prem Ke (2000)
Hadh Kar Di Aapne (2000)
Papa the Great (2000)
Khauff (2000) (Anuradha)
Aaj Ka Nanha Farishta (2000)
Badal (2000)
Pukar (2000)
Bulandi (2000)
Mela (2000)
Le Chal Apne Sang (2000)
Khoobsurat (1999 film)
Raja Kumarudu (1999)
Mann (1999)
Rajaji (1999)
Silsila Hai Pyar Ka (1999)
Lal Baadshah (1999)
Daag: The Fire (1999)
Hum Aapke Dil Mein Rehte Hain (1999)
Hu Tu Tu (1999)
Heeralal Pannalal (1999)
Hum Saath-Saath Hain: We Stand United (1999)
Shaheed-E-Mohabbat (1999)
Sooryavansham (1998)
Sar Utha Ke Jiyo (1998)
Gharwali Baharwali (1998)
Salaakhen (1998)
Keemat: They Are Back (1998)
Pyaar Kiya To Darna Kya (1998)
2001: Do Hazaar Ek (1998)
Ghar Bazar (1998)
Ankhon Mein Tum Ho (1997)
Aflatoon (1997)
Mr. and Mrs. Khiladi (1997)
Prithvi (1997)
Naseeb (1997)
Mera Damad (1995)
Bewafa Sanam (1995)
Prem Shakti (1994)
Insaaf Apne Lahoo Se (1994)
Kachehri (1994)
Aaja Meri Jaan (1993)
Izzat Ki Roti (1993)
Muqabla (1993)
Hasti (1993)
Kala Coat (1993)
Mahakaal (1993)
Prateeksha (1993)
Sahibaan (1993)
Zakhmo Ka Hisaab (1993)
Junoon (1992)
Humshakal (1992)
Tahalka (1992)
Mr. Bond (1992)
Sahebzaade (1992)
Meera Ka Mohan (1992)
Mera Dil Tere Liye (1992)
Beta (1992)
Isi Ka Naam Zindagi (1992)
Sadak (1991)
House No. 13 (1991)
Ajooba (1991)
Dushman Devta (1991)
Farishtay (1991)
Vishnu-Devaa (1991)
Saugandh (1991)
Dil Hai Ki Manta Nahin (1991)
Indra Bhavanam (Telugu) (1991)
Jeene Ki Sazaa (1991)
Shankara (1991)
Baaghi: A Rebel for Love (1990)
Agneekaal (1990)
Nyay Anyay (1990)
Zimmedaaar (1990)
Aashiqui (1990)
Tum Mere Ho (1990)
Bandh Darwaza (1990)
Swarg (1990)
Amiri Garibi (1990)
Zahreelay (1990)
Maha-Sangram (1990)
Atishbaz (1990)
Awaargi (1990)
Jawani Zindabad (1990)
Pathar Ke Insan (1990)
Tejaa (1990)
Bhrashtachar (1989)
Shehzaade (1989)
Batwara (1989)
Abhimanyu (1989)
Rakhwala (1989)
Bade Ghar Ki Beti (1989)
Purani Haveli (1989)
Kasam Suhaag Ki (1989)
Jaaydaad (1989)
Nigahen: Nagina Part II (1989)
Ram Lakhan (1989)
Suryaa: An Awakening (1989)
Taaqatwar (1989)
Namumkin (1988)
Paap Ko Jalaa Kar Raakh Kar Doonga (1988)
Janam Janam (1988)
Biwi Ho To Aisi (1988)
Ram-Avtar (1988)
Shoorveer (1988)
Khatron Ke Khiladi (1988)
Ek Hi Maqsad (1988)
Jeete Hain Shaan Se (1988)
Kanoon Ki Hathkadee (1988)
Mar Mitenge (1988)
Siraj (1988)
Superman (1987)
Hifazat (1987)
Kachchi Kali (1987)
Insaaf (1987)
Khooni Mahal (1987)
Sansar (1987)
Nazrana (1987)
Loha (1987)
Gammat Jammat (1987)
Parivaar (1987)
Sutradhar (1987)
Waqt Ka Shahenshah (1987)
Watan Ke Rakhwale (1987)
Amrit (1986)
Karamdaata (1986)
Swati (1986)
Bhagwaan Dada (1986)
Tan-Badan (1986)
Aap Ke Saath (1986)
Aaj Jhale Mukt Mi (1986)
Nagina (1986)
Sadaa Suhagan (1986)
Anokha Modh (1985)
Lallu Ram (1985)
Sur Sangam (1985)
Aakhir Kyon? (1985)
Ek Se Bhale Do (1985)
Bahu Ki Awaaz (1985)
Bhagwan Shri Krishna (1985)
Jaan Ki Baazi (1985)
Jaga Hatare Pagha (1985)
Sankha Sindura (1985)
Teri Meherbaniyan (1985)
Love Marriage (1984)
Utsav (1984)
Ram Tera Desh (1984)
Lakhon Ki Baat (1984)
Ek Nai Paheli (1984)
Insaaf Kaun Karega (1984)
Farishta (1984)
Grahasthi (1984)
Hiran Ne Kanthe (1984)
Radha (1984)
Coolie (1983)
Woh 7 Din (1983)
Rang Birangi (1983)
Souten (1983) (Anuradha Podwal)
Bhakta Salabega (1983)
Jheeati Sita Pari (1983)
Kaberi (1983)
Swapna Sagara (1983)
Udaya Bhanu (1983)
Teesri Aankh (1982)
Jeevan Dhaara (1982)
Apradhi Kaun? (1982)
Dholi (1982)
Ucha Dar Babe Nanak Da (1982)
Prem Geet (1981)
Ek Duuje Ke Liye (1981)
Jagya Tyathi Sawaar (1981)
Pujarini (1981)
Walayati Babu (1981)
Do Premee (1980)
Baata Abaata (1980)
Chann Pardesi (1980)
Trinath Mela (1980)
Yuvraaj (1979) (Anuradha)
Lahu Ke Do Rang (1979)
Amar Deep (1979)
Dooriyaan (1979)
Saajan Bina Suhagan (1978)
Badaltey Rishtey (1978)
Nasbandi (1978)
Aahuti (1978)
Amar Shakti (1978)
Janam Janam Na Saath (1977)
Kachcha Chor (1977)
Sandhya Tara (1977)
Udhar Ka Sindur (1976)
Abhimaan (1973)
List of songs recorded by Anuradha Paudwal
^ Puja Bajaj (27 October 2014). "अनुराधा पौडवाल Happy Birthday, जानें उनकी जिंदगी से जुड़ी कुछ बातें" (in Hindi). Aaj Tak. Retrieved 17 March 2018.
^ S. Ravi (29 April 2016). "'Success is ephemeral': Anuradha Paudwal". The Hindu. Retrieved 17 March 2018.
^ PTI (1 February 2017). "Wanted to quit playback singing at my peak: Anuradha Paudwal". Hindustan Times. Retrieved 17 March 2018.
^ "Padma Awards 2017 announced". Press Information Bureau. 25 January 2017. Retrieved 17 March 2018.
^ PTI (26 January 2017). "It is prasad for my hard work: Anuradha Paudwal on Padma Shri". Mumbai: Indian Express. Retrieved 17 March 2018.
^ a b PTI (30 December 2016). "Playback singer Anuradha Paudwal to be conferred with honorary D Litt degree 2018. Rani Laxmi bhai Award". Indian Express. Retrieved 17 March 2018.
^ Tomar, Sangeeta (12 August 2017). "इस सिंगर को दूसरी लता मंगेशकर बनाना चाहते थे गुलशन कुमार" (in Hindi). Amar Ujala. Retrieved 17 March 2018.
^ "Singing sibling". India Today. 15 April 1995. Retrieved 17 March 2018.
^ "My mother's guidance most important to me: Kavita Paudwal". Eenadu. 14 May 2017. Retrieved 17 March 2018.
^ Sharma, Smrity (25 January 2017). "Padma Awards 2017: Aashiqui singer Anuradha Paudwal surprised by the unexpected honour". India.com. Retrieved 17 March 2018.
^ "Mohd Rafi Award goes to Anuradha Paudwal". Prahaar. 25 December 2013. Retrieved 17 March 2018.
^ Rajiv Vijayakar (14 April 2011). "Mother Teresa Award for Anuradha". Mumbai: Indian Express. Retrieved 17 March 2018.
^ PTI (6 December 2010). "Ravi, Anuradha Paudwal receive Lata Mangeshkar award". Mumbai: India Today. Retrieved 17 March 2018.
^ Mishra, Sanjay (3 January 2017). "गायिका अनुराधा पौडवाल 'डी लिट' की उपाधि से सम्मानित" (in Hindi). Navbharat Times. Retrieved 17 March 2018.
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Anuradha Paudwal.
Anuradha Paudwal on IMDb
List of Hindi movies with songs by Anuradha Paudwal
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Gabriel Moore
Find sources: "Gabriel Moore" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR (March 2013) (Learn how and when to remove this template message)
Gabriel Moore (January 1, 1785 – June 9, 1845) was a Democratic-Republican politician and fifth Governor of the U.S. state of Alabama (1829–1831).[1]
United States Senator
from Alabama
March 4, 1831 – March 3, 1837
John McKinley
5th Governor of Alabama
November 25, 1829 – March 3, 1831
Samuel B. Moore
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives
from Alabama's 1st district
Constituency established
Clement Comer Clay
from Alabama's at-large district
John Crowell
Constituency abolished
Member of the Alabama Senate
Stokes County, North Carolina
June 9, 1845(1845-06-09) (aged 60)
Caddo, Texas
Jacksonian
Mary Parham Caller
Matthew Reed Moore (1738-1801) Letitia Dalton (1742-1838)
Life and PoliticsEdit
Moore was born in Stokes County, North Carolina of English descent and some French descent.[2] He moved to Huntsville, Alabama in 1810. Moore served in the territorial legislatures, and was elected to the United States Congress in 1821. He was re-elected to the United States Congress in 1827.[3]
Moore was the second Representative of the state of Alabama, and the first Representative of its First Congressional District.
He served 1 term as representative of the at-large district of alabama (1821-1823). Gabriel was one of four candidates in the running. Gabriel won with 67.57% of the vote. He served as Alabama's 1st district representative (1823-1829). In the 1823 election, he was the only candidate. Winning all 3,304 votes. In the 1825 election, he was one of 2 candidates, himself and Clement C. Clay. He won with 71.12% of the vote.
In 1831, two years into his four-year Governorship, Moore resigned to seek a Class 3 spot in the Senate. In response to his resignation, Moore was replaced as Governor by Alabama Senate President Samuel B. Moore (no relation).
Gabriel's Senate bid was successful, and he served for six years as Class 3 Senator alongside William R. King before losing out to John McKinley in 1837, who had preceded Moore in 1831. During his tenure in the Senate, Moore also served as chairman of the House Committee on Revolutionary Claims. Following his loss to McKinley, Moore moved to Caddo Lake, Texas, in 1843, where he died two years later at the age of approximately 60.
^ "Alabama : Past Governors Bios". National Governors Association. Retrieved June 12, 2019.
^ Dictionary of North Carolina Biography: Vol. 4, L-O By William S. (ed.) Powell page 296
^ "Alabama Governors: Gabriel More". Alabama Department of Archives and History. Retrieved June 27, 2012.
United States Congress. "Gabriel Moore (id: M000898)". Biographical Directory of the United States Congress.
A New Nation Votes
John Crowell Member of the U.S. House of Representatives
from Alabama's at-large congressional district
March 4, 1821 – March 3, 1823 Succeeded by
Alabama split into congressional districts
New seat Member of the U.S. House of Representatives
from Alabama's 1st congressional district
John Murphy Governor of Alabama
November 25, 1829 – March 4, 1831 Succeeded by
John McKinley U.S. Senator (Class 3) from Alabama
Served alongside: William R. King Succeeded by
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Gabriel_Moore&oldid=901570557"
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For other uses, see Princess (disambiguation).
Find sources: "Princess" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR (September 2014) (Learn how and when to remove this template message)
Princess is a regal rank and the feminine equivalent of prince (from Latin princeps, meaning principal citizen). Most often, the term has been used for the consort of a prince, or for the daughter of a king or prince.
Princess as a substantive title
Some princesses are reigning monarchs of principalities. There have been fewer instances of reigning princesses than reigning princes, as most principalities excluded women from inheriting the throne. Examples of princesses regnant have included Constance of Antioch, princess regnant of Antioch in the 12th century.[1] Since the President of France, an office for which women are eligible, is ex-officio a Co-Prince of Andorra, then Andorra could theoretically be jointly ruled by a princess.
Princess as a courtesy title
Descendants of monarchs
For many centuries, the title "princess" was not regularly used for a monarch's daughter, who, in English, might simply be called "Lady". Old English had no female equivalent of "prince", "earl", or any royal or noble title aside from queen. Royal women were simply addressed or referred to as "The Lady [Firstname]". For example, Elizabeth and Mary, daughters of Henry VIII of England, were often simply referred to as "the Ladies Elizabeth and Mary".[2] This practice, however, was not consistent. In the marriage contract between Prince George of Denmark and Anne, daughter of James II of Great Britain, Anne is referred to as "The Princess Anne".[3]
Practice in Britain began to change in the 18th century. After the accession of King George I to the British throne, the children, grandchildren, and male-line great grandchildren of the British Sovereign were automatically titled "Prince or Princess of Great Britain and Ireland" and styled "Royal Highness" (in the case of children and grandchildren) or "Highness" (in the case of male line great grandchildren). Queen Victoria confirmed this practice in Letters Patent dated 30 January 1864 (the first Act of the Prerogative dealing with the princely title in general terms). On 31 December 2012, Queen Elizabeth II issued letters patent enabling all children of the eldest son of the Prince of Wales to enjoy the princely title and style of Royal Highness, as opposed to only the eldest son.[4][5]
Wives of princes
In European countries, a woman who marries a prince will almost always become a princess, but a man who marries a princess will almost never become a prince, unless specifically created so. From 1301 onward, the eldest sons of the Kings of England (and later Great Britain and the United Kingdom) have generally been created Prince of Wales and Earl of Chester, and their wives have been titled Princess of Wales.[6]
Queen Elizabeth II of United Kingdom issued Letters Patent dated 21 August 1996, stating that any woman divorced from a Prince of the United Kingdom would no longer be entitled to the style "Royal Highness". This has so far applied to Diana, Princess of Wales, and Sarah, Duchess of York. Similarly, in Denmark, Alexandra, Countess of Frederiksborg, lost her status as princess upon her divorce from Prince Joachim of Denmark; Queen Margrethe II bestowed instead upon her former daughter-in-law the additional personal title Grevinde af Frederiksborg.[citation needed]
British princess
List of fictional princesses
Lists of princesses
^ Runciman, Steven (1987). A History of the Crusades: The kingdom of Jerusalem and the Frankish East 1100-1187. II. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. p. 507. ISBN 9780521347716.
^ Camden, William (1688). The History of the Most Renowned and Victorious Princess Elizabeth Late Queen of England (4th ed.). London, UK: M. Flesher. p. 5.
^ Douglas, David C., ed. (2006) [1966]. English Historical Documents, 1660-1714. London, UK: ROUTLEDGE. ISBN 9780415143714.
^ "No. 60384". The London Gazette. 8 January 2013. p. 213.
^ "Royal baby girl 'would be princess'". BBC News. 9 January 2013. Retrieved 6 July 2013.
^ Given-Wilson, Chris, ed. (2010). Fourteenth Century England. VI. Woodbridge, UK: The Boydell Press. p. 131. ISBN 9781843835301.
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For other people named Sarah Fisher, see Sarah Fisher (disambiguation).
Sarah Marie Fisher (born October 4, 1980) is an American retired professional race car driver who competed in the Indy Racing League (IRL) (now IndyCar Series) and the Indianapolis 500 intermittently from 1999 to 2010. She also raced in the NASCAR West Series (now NASCAR K&N Pro Series West) in 2004 and 2005. Once described as "the poster child of the IRL",[1] Fisher took part in 81 IndyCar Series events, achieving a career-best finish of second at the 2001 Infiniti Grand Prix of Miami—the highest placing for a woman in the IRL until Danica Patrick's 2008 Indy Japan 300 victory. Fisher was the first woman to claim a pole position in a major American open-wheel race and had nine starts in the Indianapolis 500—the most for a woman in the race.
(1980-10-04) October 4, 1980 (age 38)
Columbus, Ohio, United States
IRL IndyCar Series career
Debut season
Sarah Fisher Racing
Dreyer & Reinbold Racing
Kelley Racing
Walker Racing
Team Pelfrey
17th in 2007
Previous series
NASCAR West Series
Championship titles
WKA Grand National Championship
WKA Grand Nat'l Championship
Circleville Points Championship
Dirt Track Rookie of the Year
IndyCar Most Popular Driver
NASCAR West Most Popular Driver
Scott Brayton Driver's trophy for the Indy 500
Firestone Tireiffic Award
Fisher was born into an Ohioan family with a background in racing; she began competing at the age of five when her parents entered her in a quarter-midget race before progressing to karting three years later. She achieved early success with three World Karting Association championships and later moved into sprint car racing, where her success was moderate. Fisher debuted in the IRL at the final race of the 1999 season. During her 11-year professional career, sponsorship problems limited her participation in the series. In 2008, Fisher established and drove for Sarah Fisher Hartman Racing until her retirement at the end of the 2010 season.
In retirement, Fisher focused on operating her team full-time and fielded drivers Ed Carpenter and Josef Newgarden, both of whom achieved modest success with the team. She retained ownership of the team until she merged it with Ed Carpenter Racing to become CFH Racing for the 2015 season. In 2016, Fisher sold her stake in CFH Racing to focus on a full-time career in business in Indiana but remained with the team to help with sponsorship development. That year, she was hired as the IndyCar Series' official Safety Car driver, a role she currently shares with former driver Oriol Servià.
Sarah Marie Fisher was born on October 4, 1980 in Columbus, Ohio.[2] An only child,[3] her family had a racing background; Fisher's father Dave competed in go-kart events against race car drivers Mark Dismore and Scott Goodyear. Her mother Reba, a middle-school teacher, is the daughter of one of Ohio's early woman aviators and drove go-karts in the backyard of her house. Fisher's parents met at a go-kart street race held in Commercial Point.[2] Fisher's grandparents owned a go-kart track in Richwood and her uncle was an local engine builder.[4][5] She was raised in Commercial Point,[6] a small farming village 20 mi (32 km) south of Columbus.[7] In her youth, Fisher tried several sports, including soccer, swimming, and gymnastics but auto racing appealed most to her.[7] She was taken to her local race track to watch her father compete.[8]
Sarah Fisher's quarter midget race car, displayed at the 2007 Indianapolis 500
Fisher was given her first car, a Barbie pedal vehicle, at the age of four. She began racing at the age of five when her parents fitted her into a quarter-midget car, which she used for three years.[2] Fisher's father devised a schedule to enter her at small, indoor tracks during the winter,[9] and both her parents supported her.[4] She cited Jacques Villeneuve, Steve Kinser and Dave Blaney as her racing heroes.[10] When Fisher turned eight, she joined the World Karting Association (WKA) and became its Grand National Champion four times (1991, 1993 and 1994); she was also Circleville Points Champion in 1993.[11] Fisher and her family viewed her karting days as a family activity, not as a precedent to progression in the sport.[5] She was introduced to endurance karting in 1994, learning endurance and patience, and reinforcing her smooth driving style.[9] She won the 1995 Dirt Track Racing Round-Up Rookie of the Year award.[12]
In late 1995, Fisher's father purchased a 360 cu in (5,900 cm3) sprint car and she competed in eight World of Outlaws races. The following February, Fisher progressed to a 410 cu in (6,700 cm3) car and competed at local venues with the All Star Circuit of Champions (ASCoC) during the season.[9] She competed in all 62 races of the 1997 ASCoC, gaining a season-best finish of second at Eldora Speedway.[8] Her father broke his arm at the start of the 1998 season, preventing him from rebuilding two engines to allow Fisher to continue racing. With her father's help, Fisher reconstructed both engines; he felt it would be better for her to compete against top-level sprint car drivers. During the year, Fisher participated in 40 events; by the end of the season she had learned the techniques of driving sprint cars.[9]
Fisher's parents visited multiple tracks to watch three divisions of asphalt racing[9] and they decided to enter her into the United States Auto Club (USAC) Midget division,[13] which was the most competitive form of racing they saw. Fisher also drove in events sanctioned by the Automobile Racing Club of America (ARCA) and the National Alliance of Midget Auto Racing (NAMARS) in the Midwestern United States. She won five feature races and broke Winchester Speedway's lap record.[9] That year, Fisher graduated with honors from Teays Valley High School seventh overall in her class[2] and a grade point average of 4.178, earning induction into the National Honor Society.[14] She enrolled at Ohio State University in August 1999 to pursue an undergraduate degree in Mechanical Engineering. Before the school year commenced, Fisher received a telephone call to compete in the Indy Racing League (IRL).[2]
Racing careerEdit
Fisher's victory at Winchester Speedway attracted the attention of Team Pelfrey owner Dale Pelfrey.[15] She signed a three-year contract with the team on August 24, 1999,[16][17] and passed an IRL-sanctioned rookie test at Las Vegas Motor Speedway supervised by former driver Johnny Rutherford six days later;[16] Fisher forwent the series' race at the track to broaden her experience.[15] She also chose not to compete in the U.S. F2000 National Championship, a series in which several IRL drivers participated to further their careers, and had to familiarize herself with asphalt race tracks due to her background in dirt racing.[18] Fisher made her début at Texas Motor Speedway and qualified in 17th place, making her the youngest person to take part in a IRL event.[4] She finished the race in 25th place, having been off the leader's pace, and drove into the pit lane after 66 laps to retire with a failed timing chain.[15]
Team owner Derrick Walker sought a young driver who could appeal to both fans and his sponsors; he felt Fisher was the ideal person.[19] Before the Texas round, Walker was impressed with Fisher and talked to her about securing a race seat.[20] After an attorney helped Fisher terminate her contact with Pelfrey,[21] in February 2000, she signed a three-year contract to drive for Walker Racing and moved to Indianapolis to be close to the team.[6][22] She missed the season's first race at Walt Disney World Speedway but finished 13th at Phoenix International Raceway.[19] After two races with the team, Walker switched Fisher from an outdated chassis from Riley & Scott to an Oldsmobile-powered Dallara.[23] Two races later, she became the third—and youngest—woman to compete in the Indianapolis 500;[10] she started 19th but retired on the 74th lap when she collided with Lyn St. James and Jaques Lazier, and was classified 31st.[24] During that season, Fisher occasionally raced at the front of the field.[9] Later in the season, she became the youngest woman to achieve a podium position by finishing third, and the youngest female to lead a lap in the IRL in the Belterra Resort Indy 300 at Kentucky Speedway.[25] Fisher ended the year 18th in the drivers' standings[26] and fans voted her Open Wheel Magazine Driver of the Year in the IRL category.[27]
Fisher remained with Walker Racing for the 2001 season. At the season's second race, the Infiniti Grand Prix of Miami at Homestead-Miami Speedway, she took second place, the best finish of her IRL career, and the highest for a woman until Danica Patrick's 2008 Indy Japan 300 win.[28] Fisher qualified 15th for the Indianapolis 500 but retired after seven laps when her car understeered into the turn-two wall, collecting Scott Goodyear. She was hospitalized with a fractured lower back.[29] Two races later, at Pikes Peak International Raceway for the Radisson Indy 200, Fisher came tenth, her second and last top-ten finish of 2001.[30] During practice for the SunTrust Indy Challenge at Richmond International Raceway two weeks later, she crashed heavily in turn two and was hospitalized with neck pains.[31] Later that day, IRL's director of medical services Henry Bock declared Fisher fit to race,[32] and she finished in 17th place after qualifying a season-high second. She finished no better than 11th in the final six races and was 19th in the drivers' standings with 188 points.[33] Fans voted Fisher the IRL's Most Popular Driver of 2001.[34]
Fisher as a Dreyer & Reinbold Racing driver in 2003
On April 8, 2002, Fisher requested a release from her contract with Walker Racing after the team switched to the rival Championship Auto Racing Teams (CART) full-time, and problems with finding sponsorship from her performance in the 2001 season's second half meant a full IRL campaign was unfeasible.[35][36] Walker wanted to enter Fisher into the Toyota Atlantic Series as preparation for CART; Fisher declined because she believed in the Indianapolis 500's prestige and wanted to help IRL become the United States' premier open-wheel racing series.[37] Her season began at the fund-raising Toyota Pro/Celebrity Race, finishing third in the pro class and fifth overall.[38] Her race engineer was Mark Weida.[39] Two days later, Dreyer & Reinbold Racing hired Fisher to drive its No. 24 G-Force GF05C Infiniti VRH35ADE V8 car in place of the injured Robbie Buhl in the season's fourth round, the Firestone Indy 225.[40] She placed a season-best fourth.[41]
Fisher was later signed to race in the Indianapolis 500 in May in Dreyer and Reinbold's No. 23 car.[42] She recorded a four-lap average qualifying speed all-time record for a woman in Indianapolis 500 history at 229.439 mph (369.246 km/h) for ninth.[43] Fisher finished 24th out of 33 drivers.[44] A month later, Dreyer & Reinbold confirmed Fisher would remain with them until the end of the season.[45] After leading four laps for eighth at the Michigan Indy 400,[44] Fisher set a Kentucky Speedway track record at 221.390 mph (356.293 km/h) to earn the pole position for the Belterra Casino Indy 300 and the first for a woman in American open-wheel racing.[46] In ten races, she scored 161 points for 18th in the championship standings.[44] Fisher was voted by fans as IRL's Most Popular Driver for the second successive year.[34]
In September 2002, the McLaren Formula One team invited Fisher to drive its spare MP4-17 in a demonstration run at Indianapolis Motor Speedway's road course during the 2002 United States Grand Prix weekend.[47] Fisher secured sponsorship to compete in the season-opening Toyota Indy 300[48] and Dreyer & Reinbold changed manufacturers to Dallara and engines to Chevrolet. At Phoenix International Speedway in the year's second race, she took her sole top-ten finish of her campaign in eighth.[49] At the Indianapolis 500, she qualified in 24th; in the race, she retired after spinning into the turn-three wall due to an engine malfunction after 14 laps, bruising her left foot and coming 31st.[50] During the race weekend, it was announced that Fisher had received enough sponsorship funding to complete the season.[51] At the Richmond race, she had her season's best qualifying performance in second.[52] Fisher did not start the Firestone Indy 225 at Nazareth Speedway because of a severe back contusion from a serious accident.[53] She finished her fourteen-race season 18th in the points standings, scoring 211 points.[49] Fans voted Fisher IRL's Most Popular Driver Award for the third year in a row.[34]
On February 12, 2004, it was announced that Fisher had switched from Dreyer & Reinbold Racing to Kelley Racing; the team expressed its hope of taking part for the majority of the 2004 season but Fisher did not contest the season-opening Toyota Indy 300 due to a lack of sponsorship.[54] Two months later, Fisher entered the Indianapolis 500 in Kelley's No. 39 Dallara Toyota Indy V8 entry after they received sponsorship for the event.[55] She qualified in 19th and finished the rain-shortened race in 21st.[56] Afterward she sought another team for which to drive.[57] Later that year, Fisher made her stock car racing debut, entering a NASCAR West Series (now NASCAR K&N Pro Series West) race in the No. 20 Bill McAnally Racing car at Phoenix after Richard Childress Racing (RCR) owner Richard Childress asked Bill McAnally if she could fill in for Kerry Earnhardt, who was competing in the EA Sports 500 at Talladega Superspeedway.[58] Fisher qualified in 14th and finished in 21st place due to a battery failure after 104 laps.[59]
In January 2005, Fisher announced she would participate in all of the rounds of the 2005 NASCAR West Series, driving for RCR's development program through NASCAR's Drive for Diversity scheme.[60] She signed a three-year contract with RCR[1] and planned to compete in the Busch East Series (now NASCAR K&N Pro East Series) and the ARCA Re/Max Series in 2006.[61] To prepare for the season, Fisher acquainted herself with the heavier, less-powerful stock cars.[62] She began the season with a 20th-place finish in the United Rentals 100 at Phoenix.[63] Three races later, Fisher had her first lead-lap finish, coming 12th in the Autozone Twin Championships before her first top-ten result, an eighth in the King Taco 150 at Irwindale Speedway.[64] She qualified a season-high third in the Coors Light 200 at Evergreen Speedway; Fisher led the first laps (seven) for a woman in NASCAR West Series history, finishing 11th.[65] She had top-ten finishes at Pikes Peak, Thunderhill Raceway and Mesa Marin Raceway for a final championship standing of 12th with 1,471 points.[64] Fisher's results made her eligible for the exhibition Toyota All-Star Showdown, which she finished 11th. She was awarded the NASCAR West Series Rookie of the Year award and was voted by fans as its Most Popular Driver.[66]
After Fisher could not put together a full NASCAR program due to sponsorship problems,[67] she moved back to Indianapolis to find and prepare for a full-time seat in the IndyCar Series.[66] Although she missed the 2006 Indianapolis 500,[68] Fisher participated in a match race at Stafford Speedway on July 11.[69] A month later, Dreyer & Reinbold Racing hired her on a one-race contract for the Meijer Indy 300 at Kentucky.[70] Fisher secured the seat by retaining her contact with the team through her engagement with tire changer Andy O'Gara, and by her attending several IndyCar races throughout the season.[71][68] Additionally, the team contacted sponsors for sufficient funding for her participation in place of Ryan Briscoe who had Supercars commitments.[72][73] Fisher finished in her starting position of 12th after car setup problems. Her performance in this race led to Dreyer & Reinbold hiring her for the season-ending Peak Antifreeze Indy 300 at Chicagoland Speedway.[74] In the race, Fisher took a 16th place finish, giving her a two-race points total of 32 and 25th in the drivers' standings.[75]
Fisher practicing for the 2007 Indianapolis 500
On January 30, 2007, it was announced that Fisher would return to Dreyer & Reinbold for the 2007 season after the team expanded to two cars.[76] Starting eighth in the season-opening XM Satellite Radio Indy 300 at Homestead–Miami Speedway, her best qualifying performance of the season, she finished in 11th place.[77] Although plans were made for Fisher not to compete on road courses,[78] Dreyer & Reinbold later added those races to Fisher's schedule.[79] The first and best road-course finish of Fisher's career was a 15th place at the Honda Grand Prix of St. Petersburg, the second round of the season.[77] At the Indianapolis 500, Fisher qualified in 21st place. She finished in the 18th position after the event was shortened by rain after 166 laps.[80] Although Fisher struggled with her performance throughout the remainder of the season due to an uncompetitive car package,[81] she had two top-ten finishes; tenth at Texas Motor Speedway and seventh at Iowa Speedway. She finished 17th in the drivers' championship with 275 points.[77]
Fisher driving in practice for the 2008 Indianapolis 500
Fisher left Dreyer & Reinbold at the conclusion of the season to establish Sarah Fisher Racing with her husband Andy O'Gara, father-in-law John O'Gara and agent Klint Briney in February 2008. She drove the No. 67 Dallara IR-05 Honda HI7R car on a part-time basis.[82] To compete in the Indianapolis 500, Fisher relied on funding from fans, and had to secure $1 million from sponsors to enter the race after funding from an energy drinks company failed to materialize.[83][84] She qualified in 22nd place;[84] in the race, Fisher was collected by Tony Kanaan after he spun exiting turn three on the 106th lap, finishing 30th out of 33 starters.[85] Afterward, she expressed concerns to ESPN reporter Jamie Little about not competing in further events in the season due to sponsorship issues.[86] In July, however, it was announced that Fisher had obtained financial support for the Kentucky and Chicagoland races.[87] She finished 15th in Kentucky after her rear-right suspension broke while she battled with Danica Patrick in turn one[88] and bruised her right ankle after a heavy collision with the turn-four SAFER barrier due to a rear-right shock absorber failure, finishing in 24th place at Chicagoland.[89] With 37 points, Fisher was 34th in the final standings.[90]
Fisher during qualifying for the 2009 Indianapolis 500
In January 2009, Fisher received funding from her primary team sponsor to enter four oval-track events in the 2009 season: Kansas, Indianapolis, Kentucky and Chicagoland.[91] Fisher did not contest the entire season due to budgetary constraints caused by the global financial crisis that downturned the American economy.[92] After finishing 13th at the Kansas round, she received additional sponsorship funding to compete at Texas and Homestead-Miami.[93] She qualified 21st at the Indianapolis 500 and finished a career-best 17th place. Fisher's participation meant she surpassed the record for the most starts by a woman in Indianapolis 500 history with eight.[94] She received the Scott Brayton Award as the media voted her the driver who best exemplified "the character and racing spirit of the late driver Scott Brayton".[95] The rest of the season was sub-par for Fisher; her year's highest result was a 12th-place finish at Kentucky. Her final championship placing was 25th, accruing 89 points.[96]
Although the press initially reported she would compete in the 2010 Honda Grand Prix of St. Petersburg for the first time since 2007,[97] she chose to forgo the race and the following Indy Grand Prix of Alabama at Barber Motorsports Park, and replace herself with fellow American driver Graham Rahal, persuading her primary sponsor Rahal was ideal for her team. The two-race agreement reduced Fisher's 2010 schedule from nine rounds to seven.[98][99] Thus, her season's first round was at Kansas,[99] where she finished 17th after a season-best qualifying start of 14th.[100] At the Indianapolis 500, Fisher had a career-worst start of 29th; she finished the race 26th after she was collected in a lap 124 multi-car crash.[101] Fisher had her season's best finish with a 15th place at Texas, which she equaled at Chicagoland.[102] She ended the season with a 22nd at Homestead-Miami Speedway. Fisher was 26th in the drivers' standings with 92 points.[100] In October 2010, she said she had sacrificed the running of her team because of her status as driver/owner. Fisher subsequently sought a full-time competitor but did not rule out a part-time schedule for herself.[103] In November, however, she announced her retirement from racing, and confirmed that driver Ed Carpenter would race the No. 67 car in the 2011 season.[104]
Post-racing careerEdit
In her first season solely as a team owner, Fisher focused on all of the oval track races of the 2011 championship with 17 employees.[105][106] In May 2011, she was appointed to a three-year term on the National Women's Business Council, an nonpartisan advisory panel to the President of the United States and Congress on business issues concerning women.[107] On the council, Fisher represented women in the entertainment and sporting industries, and she later participated in research initiatives aimed at helping women enter the American business sector.[86] She formed an partnership with businessman and oil tycoon Wink Hartman in late 2011, and the renamed Sarah Fisher Hartman Racing team began competing in the IndyCar Series full-time from the 2012 season.[108] As co-owner of Sarah Fisher Hartman Racing, Fisher had moderate success; Carpenter took the team's only IndyCar Series victory at the 2011 Kentucky Indy 300, and two second-place finishes were scored by his successor Josef Newgarden—one each in the 2013 and the 2014 seasons.[109]
In 2015, Fisher returned to competitive racing by entering the Chili Bowl; she watched her brother-in-law participate in the 2014 iteration of the race. Fisher's brother-in-law and several other drives helped her become acquainted with driving midget cars on dirt.[110] She reached the C-Features portion of the tournament and was eliminated at that stage after finishing sixth in its first race.[111] That year, Sarah Fisher Hartman Racing merged with Ed Carpenter Racing to form CFH Racing.[112] Newgarden won two races for the team at the 2015 Honda Indy Grand Prix of Alabama and the Honda Indy Toronto, and two more second-place finishes at the Pocono Raceway and Iowa Speedway races.[113] In January 2016, Fisher entered her second Chili Bowl, driving the No. 67SF car.[114] She was eliminated after failing to finish high enough in the I-Main Division heat to advance further in the competition.[115]
Fisher sold her share in CFH Racing that month but she stayed on to help the re-named Ed Carpenter Racing with its sponsorship development and worked with the team's existing partners. She focused on establishing a business venture, the Speedway Indoor Karting track in Speedway, Indiana, which began operations three months later.[116] In March 2016, Fisher accepted an offer by IndyCar's president of competition and operations Jay Frye to be the series' pace car driver for 14 out of 16 races, after the aging Johnny Rutherford retired for all but two races.[117] Fisher was the sole driver of the pace car for the 2017 season, but she was unavailable for all of the races in the 2018 season, and shared the pace-car duties with former driver Oriol Servià.[118] In September 2018, Fisher was part of a group of former team owners that purchased the defunct Whiteland Raceway Park with the aim of renovating it.[119]
Public image and personal lifeEdit
Amy Rosewater of USA Today noted that Fisher was originally called "the poster child of the IRL" in its formative years.[1] She is described as having a "upbeat style, big smile and engaging laugh that punctuates her conversations", making her popular with IndyCar's fanbase.[120] Fisher did not engage in media activities to capitalize on her glamorous viewpoint because of her wholesome personality.[62][120] She had difficulty finding funding throughout her career because sponsors wanted her to be "more than a novelty in a man's sport" and become a competitive racer despite increasing attendance figures at IRL events.[121] Although team owner Derrick Walker said Fisher progressed into top-level open-wheel racing early due to her status as a female driver,[122] she was named Sports Illustrated's Top 10 Female Race Car Drivers in the World in 2007.[123]
Fisher attended Butler University, studying part-time for a degree in mechanical engineering but left her course because of the demands of her schedule. Fisher also enrolled at Ellis College of New York Institute of Technology for a short time.[67] In August 2013, she began studying a bachelor's degree at WGU Indiana's College of Business.[124] Fisher married front-left tire changer Andy O'Gara on September 15, 2007, at St. Roch Catholic Church in front of members of the IndyCar community.[125] Fisher gave birth to their first child, Zoe O'Gara, on September 13, 2011. Their second child, Daniel James O'Gara, was born on June 12, 2014.[126]
In June 2002, Fisher lent her support to the Girl Scouts' campaign "Girls Go Tech", which encourages young women to study science, technology, engineering and mathematics.[127] She worked with the ALS Association Indiana Chapter in late 2011, raising more than $25,000 in a fundraiser in Beech Grove, Indiana to promote awareness of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis after an employee of Sarah Fisher Hartman Racing was diagnosed with the disease.[128] Fisher co-wrote a book titled "99 Things Women Wish They Knew Before Getting Behind the Wheel of Their Dream Job" in 2010.[129]
Motorsports career resultsEdit
American open wheel resultsEdit
(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position)
IRL IndyCar SeriesEdit
Dallara IR9
WDW PHX CLT1
C INDY TXS PPIR ATL DOV PP2 LVS TX2
Riley & Scott Mk V
WDW PHX
13 LVS
Dallara IR-00
31 TXS
12 PPIR
25 ATL
14 KTY
3 TX2
17 HMS
2 ATL
11 INDY
10 RIR
17 KAN
12 NSH
19 GTW
11 CHI
24 TX2
G-Force GF05C
HMS PHX FON NZR
4 INDY
24 TXS PPIR RIR
22 MIS
8 KTY
8 GTW
15 PHX
8 MOT
14 NZR
DNS CHI
18 FON
HMS PHX MOT INDY
21 TXS RIR KAN NSH MIL MIS KTY PPIR NZR CHI FON TX2
HMS STP MOT INDY WGL TXS RIR KAN NSH MIL MIS KTY
12 SNM CHI
11 STP
15 MOT
10 IOW
7 RIR
16 WGL
15 MDO
14 SNM
17 DET
HMS STP MOT2 LBH2 KAN INDY
30 MIL TXS IOW RIR WGL NSH MDO EDM KTY
15 SNM DET CHI
24 SRF3
STP LBH KAN
17 MIL TXS
17 IOW RIR WGL TOR EDM KTY
12 MDO SNM CHI
14 MOT HMS
SAO STP ALA LBH KAN
22 WGL TOR EDM MDO SNM CHI
1 The VisionAire 500K was abandoned after three spectators were killed when debris from a crash on the track went into the grandstands.
2 Run on same day.
3 Non-points-paying, exhibition race.
(Non-win)
(Non-podium)
11 5 83 1 0 2 8 0 0
Indianapolis 500Edit
2000 Dallara IR-00 Oldsmobile Aurora V8 19 31 Walker Racing
2002 G-Force GF05C Infiniti VRH35ADE V8 9 24 Dreyer & Reinbold Racing
2003 Dallara IR-03 Chevrolet Indy V8 24 31 Dreyer & Reinbold Racing
2004 Dallara IR-04 Toyota Indy V8 19 21 Kelley Racing
2007 Dallara IR-05 Honda HI7R V8 21 18 Dreyer & Reinbold Racing
2008 Dallara IR-05 Honda HI7R V8 22 30 Sarah Fisher Racing
NASCAREdit
(key) (Bold – Pole position awarded by qualifying time. Italics – Pole position earned by points standings or practice time. * – Most laps led.)
West SeriesEdit
NASCAR West Series results
NWSC
PHO MMR CAL S99 EVG IRW S99 RMR DCS PHO
21 CNS MMR IRW
Bill Maropulos Racing
20 MMR
16 PHO
28 S99
12 IRW
8 EVG
17 PPR
9 CAL
22 DCS
12 CTS
6 MMR
^ a b c Rosewater, Amy (March 8, 2005). "Fisher changes lanes, moves into stock cars". USA Today. p. 10C. Retrieved December 6, 2018 – via Biography in Context.
^ a b c d e Schuster, Casey; Resteck, Hilary. "Sarah Marie Fisher" (PDF). The Henry Ford. Retrieved July 9, 2016.
^ Sloop, Richard (December 10, 2000). "Sarah Fisher interview". motorsport.com. Archived from the original on December 14, 2001. Retrieved June 14, 2019.
^ a b c Meixell, Ted (August 22, 2003). "IRL's Sarah Fisher got over "normal' quickly". The Morning Call. Archived from the original on December 5, 2018. Retrieved July 9, 2016.
^ a b Leonard, Mark (July 2008). "An Interview With IndyCar's Sarah Fisher" (PDF). National Kart News. pp. 60–65. Archived (PDF) from the original on November 29, 2011. Retrieved July 9, 2016.
^ a b Robbins, Liz (May 26, 2000). "AUTO RACING; At 19, Sarah Fisher Reaches Starting Line at Indy". The New York Times. Archived from the original on September 8, 2015. Retrieved July 9, 2016.
^ a b Banks, Sandy (October 30, 2001). "Women Find a True Calling Under the Hood". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on October 18, 2015. Retrieved December 7, 2018.
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^ a b c d e f g "Sarah Fisher". Thunder Valley Racing. Archived from the original on December 5, 2018. Retrieved July 9, 2016.
^ a b Kallmann, Dave (May 24, 2000). "Smart, smooth, fast, committed/ She has a place in big race". Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. pp. C1 & C4. Retrieved July 9, 2016.
^ Curott, Jamie (September 21, 2000). "Driving ambition: At 19, Sarah Fisher is 'the real deal' in racing circles". CNN. Archived from the original on December 9, 2018. Retrieved December 9, 2018.
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^ Hanley, Jim (October 9, 1999). "Female racer learning how to play game". The Hour. 128 (242). p. B1. Retrieved July 9, 2016.
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^ a b c Smith, Steven Cole (February 2000). "Can This Little Girl Help Save The IRL?". Car and Driver. p. 1. Archived from the original on April 25, 2016. Retrieved July 9, 2016.
^ a b Lance, Dave (October 17, 1999). "Hard work paying off for 18-year-old Sarah Fisher". Dayton Daily News. p. 8D. Retrieved December 5, 2018.
^ "Fisher To Be First IRL Lady". CBS News. Associated Press. October 6, 1999. Archived from the original on December 5, 2018. Retrieved December 5, 2018.
^ Tatko, Ann (June 16, 2000). "Fisher adjusts to rookie life on car scene". The Gazette. Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service. p. K1822. Retrieved December 5, 2018 – via Gale Power Search.
^ a b Bechtel, Mark (April 24, 2000). "Student Driver IRL rookie Sarah Fisher jumped from high school to racing's Ph.D. program". Sports Illustrated. Archived from the original on December 5, 2018. Retrieved July 9, 2016.
^ Myslenski, Skip (May 23, 2000). "Sarah Fisher, starting her first Indianapolis 500, shows she belongs". Chicago Tribune. Archived from the original on December 5, 2018. Retrieved July 9, 2016.
^ Cavin, Curt (December 20, 1999). "Overnight success?". Autoweek. 49 (53): 49. ISSN 0192-9674. Retrieved December 6, 2018 – via EBSCO's Academic Search.
^ Barr, Josh (May 26, 2000). "She's in the Driver's Seat". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on December 6, 2018. Retrieved December 6, 2018.
^ "Women with drive: Sarah Fisher". W Series. Archived from the original on December 8, 2018. Retrieved May 30, 2019.
^ "Indy's women take each other out early". ESPN. May 2000. Archived from the original on June 17, 2016. Retrieved July 9, 2016.
^ "Fisher starting from scratch in stock cars". Billings Gazette. Associated Press. September 15, 2005. Archived from the original on December 6, 2018. Retrieved December 6, 2018.
^ a b "Sarah Fisher – 2000 Indy Racing Northern Lights Series Results". Racing-Reference. Retrieved July 9, 2016.
^ "IRL: Sarah Fisher voted award". motorsport.com. December 21, 2000. Archived from the original on September 16, 2014. Retrieved July 9, 2016.
^ Caldwell, Dave (April 21, 2008). "Patrick is Just Getting Revved Up". San Francisco Gate. Archived from the original on December 5, 2018. Retrieved July 9, 2016.
^ Fisher, Sarah (September 5, 2001). "A grueling month". ESPN. Archived from the original on July 8, 2008. Retrieved July 9, 2016.
^ Fisher, Sarah (September 5, 2001). "Nothing Rocky about Colorado". ESPN. Archived from the original on December 5, 2018. Retrieved December 5, 2018.
^ "Fisher checked over after practice shunt". Autosport. June 29, 2001. Archived from the original on December 5, 2018. Retrieved December 5, 2018.
^ Bock, Henry (June 28, 2001). "Fisher In, Out of Hospital after Crash". Speedvision. Archived from the original on October 7, 2001. Retrieved December 5, 2018.
^ a b "Sarah Fisher – 2001 Indy Racing Northern Light Series Results". Racing-Reference. Retrieved December 5, 2018.
^ a b c Schoettle, Anthony (May 12, 2008). "Overshadowed by Patrick, Fisher fights to keep racing". Indianapolis Business Journal. Archived from the original on December 5, 2018. Retrieved December 5, 2018.
^ Herman, Steven (April 7, 2002). "Fisher Released From IRL Contract". Plainview Daily Herald. Associated Press. Archived from the original on December 5, 2018. Retrieved December 5, 2018.
^ Ballard, Steve (May 24, 2002). "Women's racing careers still stuck in low gears". Indianapolis Star. Archived from the original on June 3, 2002. Retrieved December 5, 2018.
^ M. Clash, James (January 21, 2010). "In Pictures: The Greatest Risk They Ever Took". Forbes. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ Henderson, Martin (April 14, 2002). "Swimmer Torres Makes a Splash". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on January 3, 2018. Retrieved January 1, 2018.
^ Merkin, Scott (September 6, 2002). "Confidence in the car". Chicago Tribune. Archived from the original on December 5, 2018. Retrieved December 5, 2018.
^ "Fisher Returns To Indy Racing League". Indy Racing League. April 15, 2002. Archived from the original on December 16, 2002. Retrieved December 5, 2018.
^ Wolf, Jeff (April 23, 2002). "Fisher drives wellafter hitching ride". Las Vegas Review-Journal. p. 5C. Retrieved December 5, 2018 – via Gale Power Search.
^ "Fisher lands ride for the Indy 500". News & Record. May 8, 2002. Retrieved December 5, 2018.
^ "Fisher enjoys perfect day at Indy". ESPN. Associated Press. May 11, 2002. Archived from the original on December 5, 2018. Retrieved December 5, 2018.
^ a b c d "Sarah Fisher – 2002 Indy Racing League Results". Racing-Reference. Retrieved December 5, 2018.
^ "Fisher agrees deal". BBC Sport. June 25, 2002. Archived from the original on June 20, 2003. Retrieved December 5, 2018.
^ Queenan, Bob (August 12, 2002). "Fisher Finishes 8th After Historic Feat". The Cincinnati Post. Archived from the original on September 16, 2002. Retrieved December 5, 2018.
^ "Fisher to run a McLaren car next week". United Press International. September 19, 2002. Archived from the original on December 5, 2018. Retrieved December 5, 2018.
^ Taylor, John (March 1, 2003). "Ready to roll; With a sponsor in tow, Sarah Fisher heads to Miami with just racing and winning on her mind". The Washington Times. p. C06. Retrieved December 6, 2018 – via Biography in Context.
^ a b c "Sarah Fisher – 2003 IndyCar Series Results". Racing-Reference. Retrieved December 6, 2018.
^ "Crash just a bump in road; Fisher finishes only 14 laps, but her stay at IMS features new sponsorship deals". The Indianapolis Star. May 26, 2003. p. R04.
^ "GMAC to back Fisher at Indy and beyond". Crash. May 23, 2003. Archived from the original on December 6, 2018. Retrieved December 6, 2018.
^ Rea, Dick (June 27, 2003). "Dixon Steals Richmond Pole from Sarah Fisher". WTHR. Archived from the original on December 6, 2018. Retrieved December 6, 2018.
^ Mitchell, Kent (August 26, 2003). "Motorsports Report". The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Associated Press. p. C7. Retrieved December 6, 2018 – via Gale Power Search.
^ Yates, Reggie (February 12, 2004). "Sarah Fisher signs with Kelley Racing". The News-Sentinel. Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service. p. K6633. Retrieved December 6, 2018 – via Gale Power Search.
^ "Bryant backing confirms Fisher Indy seat". Crash. April 28, 2004. Archived from the original on December 6, 2018. Retrieved December 6, 2018.
^ a b "Sarah Fisher – 2004 IndyCar Series Results". Racing-Reference. Retrieved December 6, 2018.
^ "Fisher Says She'll Wait For Right Opportunity". Indy Racing League. Associated Press. August 4, 2004. Archived from the original on October 28, 2004. Retrieved December 6, 2018.
^ Armijo, Mark (September 23, 2004). "Fisher to make NASCAR debut at PIR". The Arizona Republic.
^ a b "Sarah Fisher – 2004 NASCAR West Series Results". Racing-Reference. Retrieved November 16, 2017.
^ Fabrizio, Tony (January 30, 2005). "Fisher Looking To Reach NASCAR". The Tampa Tribune. Archived from the original on February 7, 2005. Retrieved December 6, 2018.
^ Rodman, Dave (January 6, 2006). "RCR increases efforts of developmental program". NASCAR. Archived from the original on January 12, 2006. Retrieved December 7, 2018.
^ a b Glick, Shav (July 22, 2005). "Before Danicamania, Fisher Was the Star". Los Angeles Times. p. 1. Archived from the original on December 6, 2018. Retrieved December 6, 2018.
^ Blakesley, Steven (March 10, 2005). "Fast & Furious Female; Fisher joins McAnally racing team for 2005 season". The Press-Tribune. Archived from the original on December 6, 2018. Retrieved December 6, 2018.
^ a b c "Sarah Fisher – 2005 NASCAR West Series Results". Racing-Reference. Retrieved November 16, 2017.
^ Hilderbrand, Brian (August 2, 2005). "Columnist Brian Hilderbrand: Tracy prepared to take first spin in stock car". Las Vegas Sun. Archived from the original on December 6, 2018. Retrieved December 6, 2018.
^ a b Preston, Jen (May 19, 2009). "Driving Through the Glass Ceiling: Sarah Fisher". Bleacher Report. Archived from the original on May 21, 2009. Retrieved December 6, 2018.
^ a b Ma, Earl (September 8, 2006). "Fisher back to the future". motorsport.com. Archived from the original on March 30, 2010. Retrieved December 6, 2018.
^ a b Graves, Gary (August 9, 2006). "Open wheel has a hold on Fisher". USA Today. p. 07C. Retrieved December 7, 2018 – via Biography in Context.
^ "Pitkat celebrates with birthday win at Stafford Speedway". The News-Times. July 9, 2006. Archived from the original on December 7, 2018. Retrieved December 7, 2018.
^ "Sarah Fisher gets 1-race IRL deal". East Bay Times. August 4, 2006. Archived from the original on December 7, 2018. Retrieved December 7, 2018.
^ Schwarb, John (August 13, 2006). "Fisher ready to see where dream takes her". ESPN. Archived from the original on December 6, 2018. Retrieved December 6, 2018.
^ Lewandowski, Dave (July 22, 2006). "Fisher unlikely to return to series in No. 5 car". IndyCar Series. Archived from the original on October 17, 2006. Retrieved December 7, 2018.
^ Fryer, Jenna (August 17, 2006). "IRL's Sarah Fisher Seeks a Second Chance". The Oklahoman. Associated Press. Archived from the original on December 6, 2018. Retrieved December 6, 2018.
^ Graves, Will (August 17, 2006). "Fisher just happy to get a ride; 12th place at Meijer earned next IRL gig". Winnipeg Free Press. p. C14. Retrieved December 7, 2018.
^ "INDYCAR: Dreyer & Reinbold Confirms Rice, Fisher". Speed. January 30, 2007. Archived from the original on February 16, 2007. Retrieved December 7, 2018.
^ a b c d "Sarah Fisher – 2007 IndyCar Series Results". Racing-Reference. Retrieved December 7, 2018.
^ Caldwell, Dave (March 18, 2007). "Fisher Gives Series Two Women at Wheel". The New York Times. Archived from the original on June 5, 2015. Retrieved December 7, 2018.
^ Freeman, Glenn (March 23, 2007). "Fisher adds road courses to schedule". Autosport. Archived from the original on December 7, 2018. Retrieved December 7, 2018.
^ El-Bashir, Tarik (May 28, 2007). "Taken by Storm". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on December 7, 2018. Retrieved December 7, 2018.
^ "IndyCar Still Waits for Fisher to Emerge". The New York Times. Associated Press. August 11, 2007. Archived from the original on June 20, 2013. Retrieved December 7, 2018.
^ Demmons, Doug (February 28, 2008). "Sarah Fisher starts her own IndyCar team". The Birmingham News. Archived from the original on December 7, 2018. Retrieved December 7, 2018.
^ Lemke, Tim (May 23, 2008). "Fisher, Patrick on different tracks; One struggles, one cruises to Indy 500". The Washington Times. p. A01. Retrieved December 7, 2018 – via Biography in Context.
^ a b Caldwell, Dave (May 23, 2008). "When Driver's Sponsor Disappears, Her Resolve Doesn't". The New York Times. Archived from the original on January 6, 2018. Retrieved December 7, 2018.
^ Wells, Mike (May 26, 2008). "Sarah Fisher's frustration boils over". The Indianapolis Star. Archived from the original on May 28, 2008. Retrieved December 7, 2018.
^ a b Petry, Tori (May 24, 2013). "Sarah Fisher isn't slowing down with racing". ESPNW. Archived from the original on December 7, 2018. Retrieved December 7, 2018.
^ English, Steven (July 17, 2008). "Fisher to enter Kentucky and Chicago". Autosport. Archived from the original on July 20, 2008. Retrieved December 7, 2018.
^ Cavin, Curt (August 9, 2008). "Last lap, last laugh: Castroneves gambles, but Dixon wins again". Autoweek. Archived from the original on December 7, 2018. Retrieved December 7, 2018.
^ "Chicagoland: Sarah Fisher Racing race report". motorsport.com. September 7, 2008. Archived from the original on December 7, 2018. Retrieved December 7, 2018.
^ Beer, Matt (January 13, 2009). "Fisher secures four-race programme". Autosport. Archived from the original on January 30, 2009. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ Peterson, Rick (April 2, 2009). "Driver Fisher gearing up for Kansas". The Topeka Capital-Journal. Archived from the original on January 17, 2010. Retrieved December 7, 2018.
^ Llewellyn, Craig (April 28, 2009). "Dollar General gives Fisher two further outings". Crash. Archived from the original on December 8, 2018. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ Marot, Michael (May 25, 2009). "Meira breaks two vertebra in crash-filled Indy 500". Delaware County Daily Times. Associated Press. Archived from the original on December 8, 2018. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ "Scott Brayton Driver's Trophy Award Winner". Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Archived from the original on October 10, 2014. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ "Fisher to Race in Grand Prix". St. Petersburg Times. January 29, 2010. p. 1C. Retrieved December 8, 2018 – via Biography in Context.
^ Panzariu, Ovidiu (March 11, 2010). "Sarah Fisher Happy for Graham Rahal Signing". Auto Evolution. Archived from the original on May 12, 2010. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ a b "Rahal To Drive Sarah Fisher's Dollar General IndyCar Entry". SportsBusiness Daily. March 11, 2010. Archived from the original on December 8, 2018. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ a b c "Sarah Fisher – 2010 IZOD IndyCar Series Results". Racing-Reference. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ Markey, Matt (May 31, 2010). "Patrick's top-10 finish eases sting of being booed by fans". Toledo Blade. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ Crouse, Karen (December 29, 2010). "Leaving Cockpit for Family". The New York Times. Archived from the original on December 8, 2018. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ C., C. (October 6, 2010). "Gone Fisher". Auto Action (1411): 12. ISSN 1320-2073. Retrieved December 7, 2018 – via EBSCO's Academic Search.
^ Demmons, Doug (November 29, 2010). "Sarah Fisher announces her retirement from IndyCar as a driver". The Birmingham News. Archived from the original on December 5, 2010. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ "Sarah Fisher: From Driver To Owner At TMS". KTVT. June 9, 2011. Archived from the original on August 7, 2011. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ Auman, Greg (March 23, 2011). "Life Outside Driver's Seat; Now retired, Sarah Fisher adjusts to being a full-time IndyCar owner". St. Petersburg Times. p. 1C. Retrieved December 8, 2018 – via Biography in Context.
^ "Sarah Fisher Appointed to National Women's Business Council" (Press release). National Women's Business Council. May 12, 2011. Archived from the original on June 5, 2018. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ Dixon-Fitzwater, Janice; Smith, Ben (July 29, 2015). "Sarah Fisher, Businesswoman". Northwest Indiana Business Magazine. Archived from the original on December 8, 2018. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ Shumaker, Cathy (April 5, 2015). "IndyCar: Newgarden And CFH Racing Carrying Momentum Into Indy". Vavel. Archived from the original on December 8, 2018. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ Spencer, Lee (January 16, 2015). "Sarah Fisher just wants to have fun". motorsport.com. Archived from the original on December 8, 2018. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ "Coons Wins at Chili Bowl; Swindell and Bell Steal Show". Speed51.com. January 16, 2015. Archived from the original on January 21, 2015. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ Martin, Bruce (September 17, 2014). "IndyCar: Newly formed CFH Racing chooses Chevy power". Fox Sports. Archived from the original on September 18, 2014. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ Olson, Jeff (August 30, 2015). "Josef Newgarden's IndyCar career moves into fast lane". The Tennessean. Archived from the original on December 8, 2018. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ Sribhen, Arni (January 11, 2016). "Fisher ready to race in Chili Bowl". IndyCar Series. Archived from the original on January 15, 2016. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ Smith, Fred (January 17, 2016). "Ganassi NASCAR Prospect Rico Abreu Wins Second-Straight Chili Bowl". Road & Track. Archived from the original on January 22, 2016. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ Cavin, Curt (January 28, 2016). "Pit Pass: Fisher, Hartman split from Carpenter's IndyCar team". The Indianapolis Star. Archived from the original on March 7, 2016. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ DeGroot, Nick (March 9, 2016). "Sarah Fisher named official pace car driver for 2016 IndyCar season". motorsport.com. Archived from the original on December 8, 2018. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ Bonkowski, Jerry (April 6, 2018). "IndyCar veteran Oriol Servia named to IndyCar pace car driver team". NBC Sports. Archived from the original on April 10, 2018. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ Brown, Andy (September 15, 2018). "Former IndyCar Owners Acquire Whiteland Track". Inside INdiana Business. Archived from the original on December 8, 2018. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ a b Scheiber, Dave (March 28, 2007). "Fisher home, and she has company". St. Petersburg Times. Archived from the original on May 17, 2008. Retrieved December 7, 2018.
^ Cavin, Curt (April 29, 2002). "Another Chance". Autoweek. 52 (18): 1. ISSN 0192-9674. Retrieved December 7, 2018 – via EBSCO's Academic Search.
^ "Sarah Fisher trying to get her career out of neutral". The Index-Journal. Associated Press. May 30, 2004. p. 8B. Retrieved July 9, 2016 – via Newspapers.com.
^ "Top Women Race Car Drivers". Sports Illustrated. March 21, 2007. Archived from the original on December 7, 2018. Retrieved December 7, 2018.
^ "Sarah Fisher determined to add 'graduate' to resume, attend WGU". Greencastle Banner-Graphic. May 23, 2013. Archived from the original on August 26, 2013. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ Shoup, Kate (July 25, 2016). "How They Met: Sarah Fisher and Andy O'Gara". IndyCar Series. Archived from the original on July 28, 2016. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ "IndyCar Team Owner Sarah Fisher Has 2nd Child". ABC News. Associated Press. June 13, 2014. Archived from the original on June 14, 2014. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ Higgins, Amy; Koucky, Sherri, eds. (June 19, 2003). "Role-model racer". Machine Design. 75 (12): 1. ISSN 0024-9114. Retrieved December 7, 2018 – via EBSCO's Academic Search.
^ "Sarah Fisher Works To Cure Deadly Disease". WRTV. November 18, 2011. Archived from the original on December 8, 2018. Retrieved December 8, 2018.
^ Altobelli, Liza (August 27, 2010). "Record 5 women racing at Chicagoland Saturday". ESPN. Archived from the original on December 9, 2018. Retrieved December 9, 2018.
^ "Sarah Fisher – 1999 Pep Boys Indy Racing League Results". Racing-Reference. Retrieved December 9, 2018.
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Sarah Fisher.
Sarah Fisher driver statistics at Racing-Reference
Sarah Fisher career summary at DriverDB.com
Vitor Meira Scott Brayton Award
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sarah_Fisher&oldid=901815887"
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American novelist
Bret Easton Ellis (born March 7, 1964) is an American author. He is considered to be one of the major Generation X authors and was regarded as one of the so-called literary Brat Pack.
QuotesEdit
When I was bullied: you manned-up. You learned something. You realized: I'm not getting the gold star. You realized: you lose. Deal with it.
On being bullied and the It Gets Better Project
I didn’t think anyone outside of LA would read Less Than Zero. I thought The Rules of Attraction would be a huge hit. I assumed people would react to American Psycho as a comedy. I thought I showcased some of my best writing in The Informers. And I was totally caught off-guard by the amount of good reviews and bad reviews Glamorama elicited. I’ve stopped guessing because I’m always wrong. And quite honestly: I don’t care. Writing the book is the main thing. Waiting for a reaction: a waste of time. But, obviously, I hope people respond to the book in a favorable way. I don’t want people to dislike it. But I don’t really mind if they do.
I read it for the first time in about 20 years this year–-recently. It wasn't so bad. I get it. I get fan mail now from people who weren't really born yet when the book came out. I don't think it's a perfect book by any means, but it's valid. I get where it comes from. I get what it is. I know that sounds so ambiguous. It's sort of out of my hands and it has its reputation so what can you do about it? There's a lot of it that I wish was slightly more elegantly written. Overall, I was pretty shocked. It was pretty good writing for someone who was 19. I was pretty surprised by the level of writing.
On Less Than Zero
It might be my favorite book of mine. It was a very exciting time in my life. I was writing that book while I was at college. Sort of like the best of times, the worst of times. There was a lot of elation, there was a lot of despair. It was just a really fun book to write. I loved mimicking all the different voices. The stream of conscious does get a little out of hand. I kind of like that about the book. It's kind of all over the place. It's casual. It's scruffy. That's the one book of mine that I have a very, very soft spot for.
On The Rules of Attraction
I reread that book in the summer of '03. . . . And I hadn't looked at that book either since '91. And I was dreading it. I thought it was going to be a really terrible novel. Everything everyone had ever said about it was going to be true. . . . And I started reading it... and I was surprised. It was good. It was fun. It was not nearly as pretentious as I remember I wanted it to be when I was writing it. Not nearly as weighted down with the importance that I thought I was investing it with. I found it really fast-moving. I found it really funny. And I liked it a lot. The violence was... it made my toes curl. I really freaked out. I couldn't believe how violent it was. It was truly upsetting. I had to steel myself to reread those passages.
On American Psycho
It's definitely the book that I can tell—I don't know if other people can tell but I can tell as a writer–-is probably the most divisive that I've written. It has an equal number of detractors as it does fans. It doesn't really hold true with the other books. It was the one that took the longest to write, and the one that seemed the most important at the time. It's an unwieldy book... I like it.
On Glamorama
Less Than Zero (1985)Edit
People are afraid to merge on freeways in Los Angeles.
Disappear here.
The Rules of Attraction (1987)Edit
...and it's a story that might bore you but you don't have to listen, she told me, because she always knew it was going to be like that, and it was, she thinks, her first year, or actually weekend, really a Friday, in September, at Camden, and this was three or four years ago, and she got so drunk that she ended up in bed, lost her virginity (late, she was eighteen) in Lorna Slavin's room, because she was a Freshman and had a roommate and Lorna was, she remembers, a Senior or Junior and usually somestimes at her boyfriend's place off-campus, to who she thought was a Sophomore Ceramics major but who was actually either some guy from N.Y.U., a film student, and up in New Hampshire just for The Dressed to Get Screwed party, or a townie.
American Psycho (1991)Edit
ABANDON ALL HOPE YE WHO ENTER HERE is scrawled in blood red lettering on the side of the Chemical Bank near the corner of Eleventh and First and is in print large enough to be seen from the backseat of the cab as it lurches forward in the traffic leaving Wall Street and just as Timothy Price notices the words a bus pulls up, the advertisement for Les Miserables on its side blocking his view, but Price who is with Pierce & Pierce and twenty-six doesn't seem to care because he tells the driver he will give him five dollars to turn up the radio, "Be My Baby" on WYNN, and the driver, black, not American, does so.
p. 3; the opening of the book.
"Wait," she gasps.
"What?" I moan, puzzled but almost there.
"Luis is a despicable twit," she gasps, trying to push me out of her.
"Yes," I say, leaning on top of her, tonguing her ear. "Luis is a despicable twit. I hate him too," and now, spurred on by her disgust for her wimp boyfriend, I start moving faster, my climax approaching.
"No, you idiot," she groans. "I said Is it a receptacle tip? Not 'Is Luis a despicable twit.' Is it a receptacle tip? Get off me."
"Is what a what? I moan.
"Pull out," she groans, struggling.
"I'm ignoring you," I say, moving my mouth down on her small perfect nipples, both of them stiff, sitting on hard, big tits.
"Pull out, goddamnit!" she screams.
"What do you want, Courtney?" I grunt, slowing my thrusts down until I finally straighten up and then I'm just kneeling over her, my cock still half inside. She hunches back against the headboard and my dick slides out.
p. 103; Patrick is sleeping with Courtney, the fiancee of his associate Luis Carruthers, whom he despises and later finds has a homosexual attraction towards him. The dispute is over what type of condom he is wearing.
Glamorama (1998)Edit
Specks—specks all over the third panel, see?—no, that one—the second one up from the floor and I wanted to point this out to someone yesterday but a photo shoot intervened and Yaki Nakamari or whatever the hell the designer's name is—a master craftsman not—mistook me for someone else so I couldn't register the complaint, but, gentlemen—and ladies—there they are: specks, annoying, tiny specks, and they don't look accidental but like they were somehow done by a machine—so I don't want a lot of description, just the story, streamlined, no frills, the lowdown: who, what, where, when and don't leave out why, though I'm getting the distinct impression by the looks on your sorry faces that why won't get answered—now, come on, goddamnit, what's the story?
We'll slide down the surface of things...
'As a general rule you shouldn't expect too much from people darling,' and then I kiss her on the cheek.
'I just had my makeup done, so you can't make me cry.'
She staggers over to the bathroom door and grabs the edge of it to balance herself and blood starts running down her legs in thin rivulets and when she lifts up the robe we both can see her underwear soaked with blood and she pulls it off, panicking, and suddenly a huge gush of blood expels itself from beneath the robe, splashing all over the bathroom floor.
She gasps, a thick noise comes out of her throat and she doubles over, grabbing her stomach, then she screams. Looking surprised and still clutching her stomach, she vomits will staggering backwards, collapsing onto the bathroom floor. There are strands of tissue hanging out of her.
I'm Christian Bale", Russel, says, taking [her hand].
"Oh right," she says. "Yeah, I thought I recognized you. You're the actor.
The stars are real.
The future is that mountain.
Lunar Park (2005)Edit
You do an awfully good impression of yourself.
"I hear today's college women are 'prodigious.'"
"Prodigious? Is that what you heard?"
"Well, I read it in a magazine. It was something I wanted to believe."
"The Jayster. Always a dreamer."
That doesn't sound like...the Jayster.
About Bret Easton EllisEdit
A case could be made for Mr. Ellis as a covert moralist and closet sentimentalist, the best kind, the kind who leaves you space in which to respond as your predispositions nudge you, whether as a commissar or hand-wringer or, like me, as an admirer of his intelligence and craft.
George Stade, The New York Times Book Review.
Retrieved from "https://en.wikiquote.org/w/index.php?title=Bret_Easton_Ellis&oldid=2591474"
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Talk:Doctor Who
This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Doctor Who page.
New discussion topics go at the bottom of the page; click here to start a new topic.
New to Wikiquote? Welcome! Frequently asked questions.
This is not a forum for general discussion about the page's subject.
Talk page guidelines
I've added a terse introduction to the section on the Doctor himself based on text originally from a Wikiquote article "The Doctor (Doctor Who)" created by 82.36.121.94 on 24 May 2005. — Jeff Q (talk) 15:25, 6 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Sound clipsEdit
I've just removed some external links to MP3 sound clips added by Jawr256. The problems are two-fold:
We're a text-based quote project, and have no policy that I'm aware of on including multimedia. (We don't even promote images for articles, although some do have them.)
MediaWiki projects (especially Wikipedia) and the projects' developers are extremely hostile to MP3s because of their proprietary license requirements, which are felt to be incompatible with the GFDL under which MW projects (including Wikiquote) operate.
This is one of many cases of logically "pushing the envelope" of Wikiquote practices. I'm being the old, protective stick-in-the-mud, but I invite folks who would like to see (or rather hear) sound clips for quotes to bring this up on the village pump. (I think the Daleks' "EX-TER-MI-NATE!" is an excellent test case of the utility of sound clips.) We've got plenty of other growth pains we're dealing with right now; what's one more? But I caution that this issue may take quite a while to address, given the legal issue. — Jeff Q (talk) 07:11, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Unquiet Dead QuoteEdit
I've got most of this convasation between Chris and Simon - if someone could just patch it up, as it's one of the classic moments of the new series.
source of Doctor quotesEdit
If I didn't know better, i'd swear someone just copied the Dialogue Triumphs sections from the "Discontinuity Guide"
100,000 BC QuotesEdit
I saw some time ago the title for the first Doctor Who story bieng 100,000 BC, now it's An Unearthly Child - I like the second one best. But the Wikiquote is still 100,000 BC!
RedirectionEdit
When people search 'Dalek' they get 'The Doctor' on Wikiquote.
Eighth Doctor quote - genuine?Edit
I'm not sure the "Guardian of Light and Time" quote from the Eighth Doctor is genuine. Certainly it wasn't used in the actual TV movie, though perhaps it could be found in the shooting script or the novelization. It sounds more like something from one of the other novels, though. [I don't have a WikiQuote ID, but on Wikipedia I'm... Histrion]
Re - "Guardian of Light in Time" was an expression used only by the Fourth Doctor in the "Key to Time" series, and by the Fifth Doctor in the story "Enlightenment".
SplittingEdit
This page needs to be split as it is very long and growing. I'm proposing that we leave this page as a sort of contents and create:
Doctor Who conversation
Other Doctor Who characters
(The latter will include the "companions", "adversaries"/"enemies" and "other characters" sections.
Please give your comments by 08:00 UTC on Thursday 25th August as that is when I will split the page
Jawr256 07:07, 31 July 2005 (UTC)
How about
Supporting Characters (Doctor Who)
Conversations (Doctor Who)
(As you mentioned, Supporting Characters would of course include sections for "companions", "adversaries" or "enemies" and "other characters".)
A similar scheme could also be used on other pages as they grew too large.
Trying to remember a quoteEdit
I remember a conversation between the Fourth Doctor and Romana concerning her name in The Ribos Operation. I know they were kind of tossing up between Romana and Fred (I think she wanted Fred, he wanted to call her Romana). Does anyone know the full quote? --Jb-adder | Talk
The internet says:
D:"Your name!"
R:"What about my name?"
D:"It's too long... by the time I've called out "Look out Romanadv... what's your name again?"
R:"Romanadvoratrelundar!"
D:"By the time I've called that out you could be dead! I'll call you Romana"
R:"I don't like Romana!"
D:"It's either Romana or Fred!"
R:"All right call me Fred!"
D:"Good! Come along Romana!"
Which meshes with my own memory of the conversation.
Thanks. I actually went and found a clip of that conversation, so I've transcribed (if that's the word) the convo onto the quotes page. --Jb-adder | Talk
PunctuationEdit
Whoever wrote the quotes on the ninth Doctor had an abysmal sense of punctuation; Someone needs to get in there with a truckload of commas and scatter them pretty thoroughly. If I find the time one of the next days I'll do it. Kamagurka
Also, if people are adding in quotes, please say the full context of what's happened (for example, someone said a quote from 'the Doctor having a really good time'. I mean, when isn't the Doctor having a really good time?) and, if it's a conversation, who said what. And please research the quote a wee bit so that everything is known about it. And if you vaguely remember the quote, don't add it, it just involves more cleanup. :/ Irrevilent 01:33, 9 May 2006 (UTC)
Splitting into multiple pagesEdit
Okay, since the first proposed splitting didn't take place, how about this: a seperate page for each Doctor? The changes from Doctor to Doctor are great enough that each Doctor could be considered a seperate show, so it should be simple emough to split the article along those lines. I don't know how often this site gets checked, but if I don't hear any objections by June 17, I'll split along those lines. --Kerowyn 05:11, 10 June 2006 (UTC)
I like that idea. It'll also help me resist peeking at the 10th Doctor quotes while waiting for Series 2 to come over to the US. Trad Redav 23:33, 11 June 2006 (UTC)
Sounds good to me. --Joseph Q Publique 01:26, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
I don't like the idea. It's a quotes page for the programme and that's how it should be, it's not like it's a huge amount and it's well structured enough. Instead, effort should be focused on correcting spelling, grammar and punctuation in quotes already there and reorder them in chronological order of serial and when they're said. Once that's done, they don't have to be split, it just makes it more confusing. Irrevilent 19:04, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
Well, I find the current structure confusing since quotes from the same episode can wind up in one of three different sections.At the very least it should be consolidated by Doctor. But the file size is huge. People generally know which Doctor they're looking for, so I don't think having ten different pages will create any confusion. Just leave this page as a disambiguation page to the 10 subpages. --Kerowyn 02:54, 13 June 2006 (UTC)
It's my first visit to the Wikiquote section and I think it definitely needs splitting up. Even with the contents links to various parts of the page, it is overly long. It does not look neat - it looks like an amateurish, (which is a bit pot-call-the-kettle-black coming from me, a relative beginner), long list and does it not make reading it easy. Sorry if that sounds a little harsh, it is not meant to, I just think it would look better split up. I agree with the point about leaving this as a contents page, by the way. -- User:Finallycreatedaccount 04:06, 17 June 2006
I've also got an idea to port the table from the Firefly page and use it as an organizational template, but that might prove to be beyond my abilities. Kerowyn 19:51, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
To Do ListEdit
The split is complete and I'm working on formatting issues on all 10 pages. The major issue now is organizing the quotes by season. This shouldn't be too hard to do, since you can get the info from Wikipedia, but I was hoping someone else would take care of this, since I can only do so much. =) Also the quotes left on the main central page need to be placed with their respective episodes, although the quotes regarding the show itself can be left on the central page. Thanks! --Kerowyn 05:33, 3 July 2006 (UTC)
ProblemsEdit
Where did the Daleks link go?
OH MY GOD!!!!!! SOMEONE HAS DELETED THE WHOLE DALEK PAGE!!!!!!!!! WHO THE HELL DID THIS!!!! I DEMAND TO KNOW!!!!!!!
A vandal. STUPID VANDALS! I hate them. Maybe even some a**holes from my school (they always diss Doctor Who!)
People at my school say things about the Doctor you don't want to hear.
I blame the Cybermen.
Unsourced quotes about the programmeEdit
These should be provided with sources before being moved back into the article.
I thought he was full of heart. Full of warmth. I thought he was charismatic, funny, gentle and, and, and there were certain moments in that, that were some of the best moments of Doctor Who ever made.
Russell T. Davies, Executive Producer and writer, on The TV movie featuring the 8th Doctor.
The fact is the Time Lords did start it, all the way back in Genesis of the Daleks.
Russell T. Davies, on the Time War
Although Rose doesn't know what this "cockney" dude has to do with the sudden rash of killer mannequins.
American TV Guide on the plainly Northern Doctor played by Christopher Eccleston.
Merging companion articlesEdit
In keeping with the general idea of Wikiquote:Fictional characters, I suggest merging articles on the doctor's companions/sidekicks (Rose Tyler, Jack Harkness, Donna Noble, Martha Jones, River Song, Amy Pond, & Rory Williams) into the articles on the quoted works, i.e. the Nth Doctor articles. ~ Ningauble 19:29, 17 May 2011 (UTC)
In keeping with a sense of NEED of a repudiation of the general idea of the DRAFT policy of Wikiquote:Fictional characters I propose that it actually be VOTED upon within the next couple of months — and to a great extent REJECTED — as an example of the type of OVERLY restrictive and exclusionist policies that have been crafted by increasingly presumptuous cliques which I believe have been driving people away from being contributors on this and other wikimedia wikis — far more than the random ridiculous and contemptible acts of vandalism which they might encounter have. I would also propose that the existing Wikiquote:Limits on quotations policy page, which I consider ridiculous and contemptibly overly restrictive ALSO be addressed. I would propose at LEAST a MONTH for people to provide arguments on the issues and perhaps alternative drafts PRIOR to VOTING — and then a period of at least a MONTH for the voting itself. ~ Kalki (talk · contributions) 21:11, 17 May 2011 (UTC)
Concur I'm one of those ex-contributors, more on Wikipedia than anywhere else. --Joe Sewell (talk) 20:38, 16 August 2012 (UTC)
I suggest that Jack Harkness should be kept as his own page, since he is more than just a companion, and is mainly the main character of another show, and while that show is a spinoff of Doctor Who, could very well be counted as enough self-standing for it to count Jack Harkness as more than just a companion of the Doctor.
Some have previously proposed exceptions to Wikiquote:Limits on quotations for Doctor Who — or their own particular favorite shows. I do not agree with such narrow focus, but agree the currently policy is overly restrictive and overly rigorous and mistaken in many of its presumptions. I encourage anyone who wishes to see more quotes available on this page and pages for all television shows and movies, and to have the rules expressed in terms of general and malleable guidelines rather than rigorous mandated limitations, to register an account name here as soon as possible, so as to become elligible for voting on this and future issues. ~ Kalki (talk · contributions) 05:47, 18 May 2011 (UTC)
I support this idea as commented on in the Village Pump. Thenub314 15:49, 18 May 2011 (UTC)
The same considerations would apply to nemesis articles: Black Guardian, Cybermen, The Daleks, and The Master. ~ Ningauble (talk) 15:49, 30 August 2012 (UTC)
Support Merge - Article can be merged now. OccultZone (talk) 17:07, 27 August 2014 (UTC)
Why? Just because you support the merge? I think there needs to be a bit more consensus before that can happen. In fact since it has now been close to 3 years since the last comment and more than six years since the proposal was first made, I think it's safe to say it isn't going to happen. I'd support removal of the "merge proposal tags" as I think after more than half a decade it's pretty obvious what direction it's going. 136.159.160.4 15:29, 13 July 2017 (UTC)
Need for more registration and input by Doctor Who editors — and others.Edit
I encourage many of the people who have edited here, or at other pages, whether related to Doctor Who or not, to register a username so as to more effectively voice opinions and to be able to vote in major issues that occur on the wiki in the months and years to come.
At the Village Pump I raised the issue of a need to expand potentials and lessen restrictions on this and other pages. I believe that there is need for extensive discussion and eventually a vote on this matter, within a few months.
I intend to gradually do extensive work on the Doctor Who pages in coming months — adding airdates and links, and doing minor cleanup work. I don't plan to actually add many quotes to the articles initally, but eventually might do so, as I review past episodes of the series in the coming year. I encourage anyone interested in developing the Doctor Who pages more extensively to register a user account here, so as to have more effective influence on policy decisions which need to be confronted in coming months regarding existing guidelines and limitations that have been promoted regarding quotes from TV shows and films, including those of Doctor Who. ~ Kalki (talk · contributions) 06:48, 31 May 2011 (UTC)
alternative fan doctor whoEdit
yes i have been looking at the wikia doctor who quotes and i want to add my ownn using Rowan Atkinson and Babarba Benedetti alternative doctor who quotes by these two other doctor's doctor who is the best. it rocks the rest david tennant and matt smith love dem
Well I do think, though that was a comedy skit, Scream of the Shalka should be added, as, while it may be an alternate timeline now, it most definitely WAS canon back when it was made. So Shalka could potentially be added, as it was OFFICIALLY CANON before 'new who' was made. KoscheiOfGallifrey (talk) 22:04, 14 February 2019 (UTC)
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Signalling theory
(Redirected from Honest signal)
This article is about signalling in evolutionary biology. For the analogous theory in economics, see signalling (economics). For the engineering concept, see signal theory.
By stotting (also called pronking), a springbok (Antidorcas marsupialis) signals honestly that it is young, fit, and not worth chasing to predators such as cheetahs.
Within evolutionary biology, signalling theory is a body of theoretical work examining communication between individuals, both within species and across species. The central question is when organisms with conflicting interests, such as in sexual selection, should be expected to provide honest signals (no presumption being made of conscious intention) rather than cheating. Mathematical models describe how signalling can contribute to an evolutionarily stable strategy.
Signals are given in contexts such as mate selection by females, which subjects the advertising males' signals to selective pressure. Signals thus evolve because they modify the behaviour of the receiver to benefit the signaller. Signals may be honest, conveying information which usefully increases the fitness of the receiver, or dishonest. An individual can cheat by giving a dishonest signal, which might briefly benefit that signaller, at the risk of undermining the signalling system for the whole population.
The question of whether selection of signals works at the level of the individual organism or gene, or at the level of the group, has been debated by biologists such as Richard Dawkins, arguing that individuals evolve to signal and to receive signals better, including resisting manipulation. Amotz Zahavi suggested that cheating could be controlled by the handicap principle, where the best horse in a handicap race is the one carrying the largest handicap weight. According to Zahavi's theory, signallers such as male peacocks have 'tails' that are genuinely handicaps, being costly to produce. The system is evolutionarily stable as the large showy tails are honest signals. Biologists have attempted to verify the handicap principle, but with inconsistent results. The mathematical biologist Ronald Fisher analysed the contribution that having two copies of each gene (diploidy) would make to honest signalling, demonstrating that a runaway effect could occur in sexual selection. The evolutionary equilibrium depends sensitively on the balance of costs and benefits.
The same mechanisms can be expected in humans, where researchers have studied behaviours including risk taking by young men, hunting of large game animals, and costly religious rituals, finding that these appear to qualify as costly honest signals.
1 Sexual selection
2 Honest signals
3 Dishonest signals
4 Sports handicapping metaphor
5 Costly signalling and Fisherian diploid dynamics
7 Human honest signals
7.1 Costly signalling in hunting
7.2 Physical risks as a costly signal
7.3 Religion as a costly signal
Sexual selection[edit]
Main article: Sexual selection
When animals choose mates, traits such as signalling are subject to evolutionary pressure. For example, the male gray tree frog, Hyla versicolor, produces a call to attract females. Once a female chooses a mate, this selects for a specific style of male calling, thus propagating a specific signalling ability. The signal can be the call itself, the intensity of a call, its variation style, its repetition rate, and so on. Various hypotheses seek to explain why females would select for one call over the other. The sensory exploitation hypothesis proposes that pre-existing preferences in female receivers can drive the evolution of signal innovation in male senders, in a similar way to the hidden preference hypothesis which proposes that successful calls are better able to match some 'hidden preference' in the female.[1] Signallers have sometimes evolved multiple sexual ornaments,[2] and receivers have sometimes evolved multiple trait preferences.[3]
Honest signals[edit]
Eurasian jay, Garrulus glandarius, gives honest signals—loud alarm calls—from its tree perch when it sees a predator.
Further information: Unconscious communication, Reciprocal altruism, and Aposematism
In biology, signals are traits, including structures and behaviours, that have evolved specifically because they change the behaviour of receivers in ways that benefit the signaller.[4] Traits or actions that benefit the receiver exclusively are called cues. When an alert bird deliberately gives a warning call to a stalking predator and the predator gives up the hunt, the sound is a signal. When a foraging bird inadvertently makes a rustling sound in the leaves that attracts predators and increases the risk of predation, the sound is a 'cue'.[4]
Signalling systems are shaped by mutual interests between signallers and receivers. An alert bird such as a Eurasian jay warning off a stalking predator is communicating something useful to the predator: that it has been detected by the prey; it might as well quit wasting its time stalking this alerted prey, which it is unlikely to catch. When the predator gives up, the signaller can get back to other tasks such as feeding. Once the stalking predator is detected, the signalling prey and receiving predator thus have a mutual interest in terminating the hunt.[5][6]
Within species, mutual interests increase with kinship.[7] Kinship is central to models of signalling between relatives, for instance when broods of nestling birds beg and compete for food from their parents.[8][9]
The yellow-banded poison dart frog gives an honest signal of its toxicity to warn off predators and reduce the frog's risk of injury.
The term honesty in animal communication is controversial because in non-technical usage it implies intent, to discriminate deception from honesty in human interactions.[10] However, biologists use the phrase "honest signals" in a direct, statistical sense. Biological signals, like warning calls or resplendent tail feathers, are honest if they truly convey useful information to the receiver. That is, the signal trait[a] conveys to the receiver the presence of an otherwise unobservable factor.[b] Honest biological signals do not need to be perfectly informative, reducing uncertainty to zero; all they need to be useful is to be correct "on average", so that certain behavioural responses to the signal are advantageous, statistically, compared to the behaviour that would occur in absence of the signal.[11] Ultimately the value of the signalled information depends on the extent to which it allows the receiver to increase its fitness.[12] Hence, "honest" signals are evolutionarily stable.
One class of honest signal is the aposematic warning signal, generally visual, given by poisonous or dangerous animals such as wasps, poison dart frogs, and pufferfish. Warning signals are honest indications of noxious prey, because conspicuousness evolves in tandem with noxiousness. Thus, the brighter and more conspicuous the organism, the more toxic it usually is.[13][14] The most common and effective colours are red, yellow, black and white.[15]
Dishonest signals[edit]
Male fiddler crab signals with its enlarged fighting claw, but weak regrown claws may be dishonest signals.
Because there are both mutual and conflicting interests in most animal signalling systems, a central problem in signalling theory is dishonesty or cheating. For example, if foraging birds are safer when they give a warning call, cheats could give false alarms at random, just in case a predator is nearby. But too much cheating could cause the signalling system to collapse. Every dishonest signal weakens the integrity of the signalling system, and so reduces the fitness of the group.[16][17] An example of dishonest signalling comes from Fiddler crabs such as Uca lactea mjoebergi, which have been shown to bluff (no conscious intention being implied) about their fighting ability. When a claw is lost, a crab occasionally regrows a weaker claw that nevertheless intimidates crabs with smaller but stronger claws.[18][19] The proportion of dishonest signals is low enough for it not to be worthwhile for crabs to test the honesty of every signal through combat.[16]
Richard Dawkins and John Krebs in 1978 considered whether individuals of the same species would act as if attempting to deceive each other. They applied a "selfish gene" view of evolution to animals' threat displays to see if it would be in their genes' interests to give dishonest signals. They criticised previous ethologists, such as Nikolaas Tinbergen and Desmond Morris for suggesting that such displays were "for the good of the species". They argued that such communication ought to be viewed as an evolutionary arms race in which signallers evolve to become better at manipulating receivers, while receivers evolve to become more resistant to manipulation.[16][17] The game theoretical model of the war of attrition similarly suggests that threat displays ought not to convey any reliable information about intentions.[20]
Sports handicapping metaphor[edit]
Main article: Handicap principle
The best horses in a handicap race carry the largest weights, so the size of the handicap is a measure of the animal's quality.
In 1975, Amotz Zahavi proposed a verbal model for how signal costs could constrain cheating and stabilize an "honest" correlation between observed signals and unobservable qualities, based on an analogy to sports handicapping systems.[21][22] He called this idea the handicap principle. The purpose of a sports handicapping system is to reduce disparities in performance, making the contest more competitive. In a handicap race, intrinsically faster horses are given heavier weights to carry under their saddles. Similarly, in amateur golf, better golfers have fewer strokes subtracted from their raw scores. This creates correlations between the handicap and unhandicapped performance, if the handicaps work as they are supposed to, between the handicap imposed and the corresponding horse's handicapped performance. If you knew nothing about two race horses or two amateur golfers except their handicaps, you could infer which is most likely to win: the horse with the bigger weight handicap, and the golfer with the smaller stroke handicap. By analogy, if peacock 'tails' (large tail covert feathers) act as a handicapping system, and a peahen knew nothing about two peacocks but the sizes of their tails, she could "infer" that the peacock with the bigger tail has greater unobservable intrinsic quality. Display costs can include extrinsic social costs, in the form of testing and punishment by rivals, as well as intrinsic production costs.[23] Another example given in textbooks is the extinct Irish elk, Megaloceros giganteus. The male Irish elk's enormous antlers could perhaps have evolved as displays of ability to overcome handicap, though biologists point out that if the handicap is inherited, its genes ought to be selected against.[24]
Peacock signals reproductive fitness with its large colourful tail, possibly because it is a handicap.
The essential idea here is intuitive and probably qualifies as folk wisdom. It was articulated by Kurt Vonnegut in his 1961 short story Harrison Bergeron.[25] In Vonnegut’s futuristic dystopia, the Handicapper General uses a variety of handicapping mechanisms to reduce inequalities in performance. A spectator at a ballet comments: "it was easy to see that she was the strongest and most graceful of all dancers, for her handicap bags were as big as those worn by two hundred pound men." Zahavi interpreted this analogy to mean that higher quality peacocks with bigger tails are signalling their ability to "waste" more of some resource by trading it off for a bigger tail. This resonates with Thorstein Veblen's idea that conspicuous consumption and extravagant status symbols can signal wealth.[26]
The enormous antlers of the extinct Irish elk, Megaloceros giganteus may have evolved as displays of ability to overcome handicap.
Zahavi’s conclusions rest on his verbal interpretation of a metaphor, and initially the handicap principle was not well received by evolutionary biologists.[22] However, in 1984, Nur and Hasson[27] used life history theory to show how differences in signalling costs, in the form of survival-reproduction tradeoffs, could stabilize a signalling system roughly as Zahavi imagined. Genetic models also suggested this was possible.[28] In 1990 Alan Grafen showed that a handicap-like signalling system was evolutionarily stable if higher quality signallers paid lower marginal survival costs for their signals.[29]
In 1982, W.D. Hamilton proposed a specific but widely applicable handicap mechanism, parasite-mediated sexual selection.[30] He argued that in the never-ending co-evolutionary race between hosts and their parasites, sexually selected signals indicate health. This idea was tested in 1994 in barn swallows, a species where males have long tail streamers. Møller found that the males with longer tails, and their offspring, did have fewer bloodsucking mites, whereas fostered young did not. The effect was therefore genetic, confirming Hamilton's theory.[31]
Another example is Lozano's hypothesis that carotenoids have dual but mutually incompatible roles in immune function and signalling.[32] Given that animals cannot synthesize carotenoids de novo, these must be obtained from food. The hypothesis states that animals with carotenoid-depended sexual signals are demonstrating their ability to "waste" carotenoids on sexual signals at the expense of their immune system.[32][33]
The handicap principle has proven hard to test empirically, partly because of inconsistent interpretations of Zahavi’s metaphor and Grafen’s marginal fitness model, and partly because of conflicting empirical results: in some studies individuals with bigger signals seem to pay higher costs, in other studies they seem to be paying lower costs.[34][35] A possible explanation for the inconsistent empirical results is given in a series of papers by Getty,[36][37][38][39] who shows that Grafen’s proof of the handicap principle is based on the critical simplifying assumption that signallers trade off costs for benefits in an additive fashion, the way humans invest money to increase income in the same currency.[c] But the assumption that costs and benefits trade off in an additive fashion is true only on a logarithmic scale;[41] for the survival cost – reproduction benefit tradeoff is assumed to mediate the evolution of sexually selected signals. Fitness depends on producing offspring, which is a multiplicative function of reproductive success given an individual is still alive times the probability of still being alive, given investment in signals.[27]
Costly signalling and Fisherian diploid dynamics[edit]
The effort to discover how costs can constrain an "honest" correlation between observable signals and unobservable qualities within signallers is built on strategic models of signalling games, with many simplifying assumptions. These models are most often applied to sexually selected signalling in diploid animals, but they rarely incorporate a fact about diploid sexual reproduction noted by the mathematical biologist Ronald Fisher in the early 20th century: if there are "preference genes" correlated with choosiness in females as well as "signal genes" correlated with display traits in males, choosier females should tend to mate with showier males. Over generations, showier sons should also carry genes associated with choosier daughters, and choosier daughters should also carry genes associated with showier sons. This can cause the evolutionary dynamic known as Fisherian runaway, in which males become ever showier. Russell Lande explored this with a quantitative genetic model,[28] showing that Fisherian diploid dynamics are sensitive to signalling and search costs. Other models incorporate both costly signalling and Fisherian runaway.[42][43] These models show that if fitness depends on both survival and reproduction, having sexy sons and choosy daughters (in the stereotypical model) can be adaptive, increasing fitness just as much as having healthy sons and daughters.[42][43]
Examples[edit]
One theory is that autumnal colours are a signal from trees to aphids of powerful chemical defences.
Sam Brown and W. D. Hamilton[44] and Marco Archetti[45] proposed that autumn leaf colour is a signal from trees to aphids and other pest species that migrate in autumn to the trees. In their theory, bright autumn coloration with pinks and yellows is costly to trees because pigments require energy to synthesize, but the investment may help them to reduce their parasite load.[44][45]
Stotting, for example in Thomson's Gazelle, is cited as an example of signalling: the gazelles jump close to a predator instead of escaping, in what could be a signal of strength.[46]
Human honest signals[edit]
Human behaviour may also provide examples of costly signals. In general, these signals provide information about a person’s phenotypic quality or cooperative tendencies. Evidence for costly signalling has been found in many areas of human interaction including risk taking, hunting, and religion.[47]
Costly signalling in hunting[edit]
A male hunter and a female gatherer of the Kali'na people of Guyana, drawn by Pierre Barrère in 1743. Generous sharing by male hunters may serve as a "costly signal", helping them to acquire mates.
Large game hunting has been studied extensively as a signal of men’s willingness to take physical risks, as well as showcase strength and coordination.[47][48][49][50] Costly signalling theory is a useful tool for understanding food sharing among hunter gatherers because it can be applied to situations in which delayed reciprocity is not a viable explanation.[51][52][53] Instances that are particularly inconsistent with the delayed reciprocity hypothesis are those in which a hunter shares his kill indiscriminately with all members of a large group.[54] In these situations, the individuals sharing meat have no control over whether or not their generosity will be reciprocated, and free riding becomes an attractive strategy for those receiving meat. Free riders are people who reap the benefits of group-living without contributing to its maintenance.[55] Fortunately, costly signalling theory can fill some of the gaps left by the delayed reciprocity hypothesis.[56][57] Hawkes has suggested that men target large game and publicly share meat to draw social attention or to show off.[58] Such display and the resulting favorable attention can improve a hunter’s reputation by providing information about his phenotypic quality. High quality signallers are more successful in acquiring mates and allies. Thus, costly signalling theory can explain apparently wasteful and altruistic behaviour.[29][57][59][60][61]
In order to be effective, costly signals must fulfill specific criteria.[21][47][62] Firstly, signallers must incur different levels of cost and benefit for signalling behaviour. Secondly, costs and benefits must reflect the signallers’ phenotypic quality. Thirdly, the information provided by a signal should be directed at and accessible to an audience. A receiver can be anyone who stands to benefit from information the signaller is sending, such as potential mates, allies, or competitors. Honesty is guaranteed when only individuals of high quality can pay the (high) costs of signalling. Hence, costly signals make it impossible for low-quality individuals to fake a signal and fool a receiver.[21][47][62]
Bliege Bird et al. observed turtle hunting and spear fishing patterns in a Meriam community in the Torres Strait of Australia, publishing their findings in 2001. Here, only some Meriam men were able to accumulate high caloric gains for the amount of time spent turtle hunting or spear fishing (reaching a threshold measured in kcal/h). Since a daily catch of fish is carried home by hand and turtles are frequently served at large feasts, members of the community know which men most reliably brought them turtle meat and fish. Thus, turtle hunting qualifies as a costly signal. Furthermore, turtle hunting and spear fishing are actually less productive (in kcal/h) than foraging for shellfish, where success depends only on the amount of time dedicated to searching, so shellfish foraging is a poor signal of skill or strength. This suggests that energetic gains are not the primary reason men take part in turtle hunting and spear fishing.[47] A follow-up study found that successful Meriam hunters do experience greater social benefits and reproductive success than less skilled hunters.[63]
The Hadza people of Tanzania also share food, possibly to gain in reputation.[64] Hunters cannot be sharing meat mainly to provision their families or to gain reciprocal benefits, as teenage boys often give away their meat even though they do not yet have wives or children, so costly signalling of their qualities is the likely explanation.[65] These qualities include good eyesight, coordination, strength, knowledge, endurance, or bravery. Hadza hunters more often pair with highly fertile, hard-working wives than non-hunters.[66] A woman benefits from mating with a man who possesses such qualities as her children will most likely inherit qualities that increase fitness and survivorship. She may also benefit from her husband’s high social status. Thus, hunting is an honest and costly signal of phenotypic quality.[67]
Among the men of Ifaluk atoll, costly signalling theory can also explain why men torch fish.[56] Torch fishing is a ritualized method of fishing on Ifaluk whereby men use torches made from dried coconut fronds to catch large dog-toothed tuna. Preparation for torch fishing requires significant time investments and involves a great deal of organization. Due to the time and energetic costs of preparation, torch fishing results in net caloric losses for fishers. Therefore, torch fishing is a handicap that serves to signal men’s productivity.[56] Torch fishing is the most advertised fishing occupation on Ifaluk. Women and others usually spend time observing the canoes as they sail beyond the reef. Also, local rituals help to broadcast information about which fishers are successful and enhance fishers’ reputations during the torch fishing season. Several ritual behavioural and dietary constraints clearly distinguish torch fishers from other men. First, males are only permitted to torch fish if they participated on the first day of the fishing season. The community is well informed as to who participates on this day, and can easily identify the torch fishers. Second, torch fishers receive all of their meals at the canoe house and are prohibited from eating certain foods. People frequently discuss the qualities of torch fishermen. On Ifaluk, women claim that they are looking for hard-working mates.[68] With the distinct sexual division of labor on Ifaluk, industriousness is a highly valued characteristic in males.[69] Torch fishing thus provides women with reliable information on the work ethic of prospective mates, which makes it an honest costly signal.[57]
In many human cases, a strong reputation built through costly signalling enhances a man’s social status over the statuses of men who signal less successfully.[54][70][71] Among northern Kalahari foraging groups, traditional hunters usually capture a maximum of two or three antelopes per year.[72] It was said of a particularly successful hunter:[73]
"It was said of him that he never returned from a hunt without having killed at least a wildebeest, if not something larger. Hence the people connected with him ate a great deal of meat and his popularity grew."[73]
Although this hunter was sharing meat, he was not doing so in the framework of reciprocity.[73] The general model of costly signalling is not reciprocal; rather, individuals who share acquire more mates and allies.[21][47] Costly signalling applies to situations in Kalahari foraging groups where giving often goes to recipients who have little to offer in return. A young hunter is motivated to impress community members with daughters so that he can obtain his first wife. Older hunters may wish to attract women interested in an extramarital relationship, or to be a co-wife.[74][75] In these northern Kalahari groups, the killing of a large animal indicates a man who has mastered the art of hunting and can support a family.[76] Generally, many women seek a man who is a good hunter, has an agreeable character, is generous, and has advantageous social ties.[72][75][76] Since hunting ability is a prerequisite for marriage, men who are good hunters enter the marriage market earliest. Costly signalling theory explains seemingly wasteful foraging displays.[66]
Physical risks as a costly signal[edit]
Young men may take part in risky sports like motorcycle racing to signal their strength and skill.
Costly signalling can be applied to situations involving physical strain and risk of physical injury or death.[77][78][79] Research on physical risk taking is important because information regarding why people, especially young men, take part in high risk activities can help in the development of prevention programs.[78][79] Reckless driving is a lethal problem among young men in western societies.[80] A male who takes a physical risk is sending the message that he has enough strength and skill to survive extremely dangerous activities. This signal is directed at peers and potential mates.[21] When those peers are criminals or gang members, sociologists Diego Gambetta and James Densley find that risk-taking signals can help expedite acceptance into the group.[81][82]
In a study of risk taking, some types of risk, such as physical or heroic risk for others' benefit, are viewed more favorably than other types of risk, such as taking drugs. Males and females valued different degrees of heroic risk for mates and same-sex friends. Males valued heroic risk taking by male friends, but preferred less of it in female mates. Females valued heroic risk taking in male mates and less of it in female friends. Females may be attracted to males inclined to physically defend them and their children. Males may prefer heroic risk taking by male friends as they could be good allies.[79]
In western societies, voluntary blood donation is a common, yet less extreme, form of risk taking. Costs associated with these donations include pain and risk of infection.[83] If blood donation is an opportunity to send costly signals, then donors will be perceived by others as generous and physically healthy.[21][84] In a survey, both donors and non-donors expressed perceptions of the health, generosity, and ability of blood donors to operate in stressful situations.[84]
Religion as a costly signal[edit]
Further information: Evolutionary psychology of religion
Religious rituals such as snake handling may be explainable as costly signals.
Costly religious rituals such as male circumcision, food and water deprivation, and snake handling look paradoxical in evolutionary terms. Devout religious beliefs wherein such traditions are practiced therefore appear maladaptive.[85] Religion may have arisen to increase and maintain intragroup cooperation.[86] Cooperation leads to altruistic behaviour,[87] and costly signalling could explain this.[21] All religions may involve costly and elaborate rituals, performed publicly, to demonstrate loyalty to the religious group.[88] In this way, group members increase their allegiance to the group by signalling their investment in group interests. However, as group size increases among humans, the threat of free riders grows.[55] Costly signalling theory accounts for this by proposing that these religious rituals are costly enough to deter free riders.[89]
Irons proposed that costly signalling theory could explain costly religious behaviour. He argued that hard-to-fake religious displays enhanced trust and solidarity in a community, producing emotional and economic benefits. He showed that display signals among the Yomut Turkmen of northern Iran helped to secure trade agreements. These "ostentatious" displays signalled commitment to Islam to strangers and group members.[90] Sosis demonstrated that people in religious communities are four times more likely to live longer than their secular counterparts,[56][87] and that these longer lifespans were positively correlated with the number of costly requirements demanded from religious community members.[91] However, confounding variables may not have been excluded.[92] Wood found that religion offers a subjective feeling of well-being within a community, where costly signalling protects against free riders and helps to build self-control among committed members.[93] Iannaccone studied the effects of costly signals on religious communities. In a self-reported survey, as the strictness of a church increased, the attendance and contributions to that church increased proportionally. In effect, people were more willing to participate in a church that has more stringent demands on its members.[94] Despite this observation, costly donations and acts conducted in a religious context does not itself establish that membership in these clubs is actually worth the entry costs imposed.
Despite the experimental support for this hypothesis, it remains controversial. A common critique is that devoutness is easy to fake, such as simply by attending a religious service.[95] However, the hypothesis predicts that people are more likely to join and contribute to a religious group when its rituals are costly.[94] Another critique specifically asks: why religion? There is no evolutionary advantage to evolving religion over other signals of commitment such as nationality, as Irons admits.[87] However, the reinforcement of religious rites as well as the intrinsic reward and punishment system found in religion makes it an ideal candidate for increasing intragroup cooperation. Finally, there is insufficient evidence for increase in fitness as a result of religious cooperation.[87] However, Sosis argues for benefits from religion itself, such as increased longevity, improved health, assistance during crises, and greater psychological well-being[96] though both the supposed benefits from religion and the costly-signaling mechanism have been contested.[97]
Alarm signal
Dramaturgy (sociology)
Green-beard effect
Origin of language
Signalling (economics)
^ Economists call what is available to the receiver "public information".
^ Economists call the unobservable thing that would be of value to the receiver "private information"; biologists often call it "quality"
^ Grafen’s proof is formally similar to a classic monograph on economic market signalling by Nobel laureate Michael Spence.[40]
^ Gerhardt et al, 2007
^ Møller, 1993
^ Pomiankowski, 1993
^ a b Bradbury 1998
^ Bergstrom 2001
^ Getty 2002
^ Johnstone 1998
^ Godfray 1995
^ Dall 2005
^ Maan & Cummings 2012
^ Blount 2009
^ Stevens & Ruxton 2012
^ a b c Krebs and Dawkins 1982
^ a b Dawkins and Krebs 1978
^ BES 2008
^ Lailvaux 2008
^ Caryl, 1979
^ a b c d e f g Zahavi 1975
^ a b Zahavi 1997
^ Searcy 2005
^ Feldhamer, 2007. p. 423.
^ Vonnegut 1961
^ Veblen 1899
^ a b Nur 1984
^ a b McElreath 2007
^ a b Grafen 1990
^ Hamilton 1982
^ Møller 1994
^ a b Lozano 1994
^ McGraw 2003
^ Kotiaho 2001
^ Getty 1998a
^ Getty 1998b
^ Spence 1974
^ Tazzyman, 2014
^ a b Eshel 2002
^ a b Kokko 2002
^ a b Hamilton 2001
^ a b Archetti 2000
^ Maynard Smith 2003
^ a b c d e f Bliege Bird et al. 2001
^ Gurven and Hill 2009
^ Hawkes 1990
^ Weissner 2002
^ Bliege Bird and Bird 1997
^ Gurven et al. 2000
^ a b Wiessner 1996
^ a b Barrett et al. 2002
^ a b c d Sosis 2000
^ a b c Smith and Bliege Bird 2000
^ Hawkes (1991, 1993)
^ Johnstone 1995, 1997
^ Zahavi 1975, 1977
^ a b Hawkes and Bliege Bird 2002
^ Smith et al. 2002
^ Marlowe 2010
^ a b Hawkes et al. 2002
^ Sosis et al. 1998
^ Sosis 1997
^ Kelly 1995
^ Dowling 1968
^ a b Lee 1979
^ a b c Thomas 1959
^ Lee 1993
^ a b Shostak 1981
^ a b Marshall 1976
^ Bleige Bird et al. 2001
^ a b Nell 2002
^ a b c Farthing 2005
^ Nell 2001
^ Densley, James A. (2012-08-01). "Street Gang Recruitment: Signaling, Screening, and Selection". Social Problems. 59 (3): 301–321. doi:10.1525/sp.2012.59.3.301. ISSN 0037-7791.
^ 1952-, Gambetta, Diego (2009). Codes of the underworld : how criminals communicate. Princeton: Princeton University Press. ISBN 9780691119373. OCLC 243550245.
^ Schreiber et al. 2006
^ a b Lyle et al. 2009
^ Tuzin 1982
^ Steadman and Palmer 2008
^ a b c d Bulbulia 2004
^ Irons 2001
^ Iannaccone 1992
^ Sosis and Bressler 2003
^ Hood et al. 2009
^ Wood 2016
^ a b Iannaccone 1992
^ Rees 2011
^ Schuurmans-Stekhoven 2016
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An Introduction to the Theory of Honest Signalling
Animal behavior online: Deceit
Journal of Management: Signaling Theory: A Review and Assessment (2011, behind paywall)
Patterns of evolution
Coloration evidence for natural selection
Parallel evolution
Divergent evolution
Paradox of the plankton
Predator satiation
Anti-predator adaptation
Aposematism
Apparent death
Deimatic behaviour
Distraction display
Unkenreflex
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Signalling_theory&oldid=906403387#Honest_signals"
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Pakistani children's education activist
"Malala" redirects here. For other uses, see Malala (disambiguation).
Yousafzai in October 2015
Native name
ملاله یوسفزۍ
Mingora, Swat, Pakistan
Birmingham, England, UK
Canada (honorary)[1]
Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford
Activist for female education, former blogger for BBC Urdu and student
Activist for the right to education, especially female education
Toor Pekai Yousafzai (mother)
Ziauddin Yousafzai (father)
(Full list)
www.malala.org
Malala Yousafzai (Malālah Yūsafzay: Urdu: ملالہ یوسفزئی; Pashto: ملاله یوسفزۍ [məˈlaːlə jusəf ˈzəj];[2] born 12 July 1997)[2][3] is a Pakistani activist for female education and the youngest Nobel Prize laureate.[4] She is known for human rights advocacy, especially the education of women and children in her native Swat Valley in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, northwest Pakistan, where the local Taliban had at times banned girls from attending school. Her advocacy has grown into an international movement, and according to former Pakistani Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, she has become "the most prominent citizen" of the country.[5]
Yousafzai was born to a Pashtun family in Mingora, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan. Her family came to run a chain of schools in the region. Considering Muhammad Ali Jinnah and Benazir Bhutto as her role models, she was particularly inspired by her father's thoughts and humanitarian work.[6] In early 2009, when she was 11–12, she wrote a blog under a pseudonym for the BBC Urdu detailing her life during the Taliban occupation of Swat. The following summer, journalist Adam B. Ellick made a New York Times documentary[3] about her life as the Pakistani military intervened in the region. She rose in prominence, giving interviews in print and on television, and she was nominated for the International Children's Peace Prize by activist Desmond Tutu.
On 9 October 2012, while on a bus in the Swat District, after taking an exam, Yousafzai and two other girls were shot by a Taliban gunman in an assassination attempt in retaliation for her activism; the gunman fled the scene. Yousafzai was hit in the head with a bullet and remained unconscious and in critical condition at the Rawalpindi Institute of Cardiology, but her condition later improved enough for her to be transferred to the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham, UK.[7] The attempt on her life sparked an international outpouring of support for Yousafzai. Deutsche Welle reported in January 2013 that Yousafzai may have become "the most famous teenager in the world".[8] Weeks after the attempted murder, a group of fifty leading Muslim clerics in Pakistan issued a fatwā against those who tried to kill her.[9] The Taliban was internationally denounced by governments, human rights organizations and feminist groups. Taliban officials responded to condemnation by further denouncing Yousafzai, indicating plans for a possible second assassination attempt, which was justified as a religious obligation. Their statements resulted in further international condemnation.[citation needed]
Following her recovery, Yousafzai became a prominent activist for the right to education. Based in Birmingham, she founded the Malala Fund, a non-profit organisation,[10] and in 2013 co-authored I Am Malala, an international best seller.[11] In 2012, she was the recipient of Pakistan's first National Youth Peace Prize and the 2013 Sakharov Prize.[12] In 2014, she was the co-recipient of the 2014 Nobel Peace Prize, along with Kailash Satyarthi of India. Aged 17 at the time, she was the youngest-ever Nobel Prize laureate.[13][14][15] In 2015, Yousafzai was a subject of the Oscar-shortlisted documentary He Named Me Malala. The 2013, 2014 and 2015 issues of Time magazine featured her as one of the most influential people globally. In 2017, she was awarded honorary Canadian citizenship and became the youngest person to address the House of Commons of Canada.[16] Yousafzai attended Edgbaston High School from 2013 to 2017,[17] and is currently studying for a bachelor's degree in Philosophy, Politics and Economics at Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford.[18]
1.1 Childhood
1.2 As a BBC blogger
1.2.1 Banned from school
1.2.2 Girls' schools reopen
1.3 As a displaced person
1.4 Early activism
2 Murder attempt
2.1 Medical treatment
2.2 Reaction
2.3 United Nations petition
2.4 Criminal investigation, arrests, and acquittals
3 Continuing activism
3.1 Representation
3.2 Malala Day
3.3 Nobel Peace Prize
3.4 David Letterman interview
5 Reception in Pakistan
6 Awards and honours
Yousafzai with her father Ziauddin in 2013
Yousafzai was born on 12 July 1997 in the Swat District of Pakistan's northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, into a lower-middle-class family.[19] She is the daughter of Ziauddin Yousafzai and Tor Pekai Yousafzai.[20] Her family is Sunni Muslim[3] of Pashtun ethnicity.[21] The family did not have enough money for a hospital birth and as a result, Yousafzai was born at home with the help of neighbours.[22] She was given her first name Malala (meaning "grief-stricken")[23] after Malalai of Maiwand, a famous Pashtun poet and warrior woman from southern Afghanistan.[24] Her last name, Yousafzai, is that of a large Pashtun tribal confederation that is predominant in Pakistan's Swat Valley, where she grew up. At her house in Mingora, she lived with her two younger brothers, Khushal and Atal, her parents, Ziauddin and Toor Pekai, and two pet chickens.[3]
Fluent in Pashto, Urdu and English, Yousafzai was educated mostly by her father, Ziauddin Yousafzai, who is a poet, school owner,[25] and an educational activist himself, running a chain of private schools known as the Khushal Public School.[26][27] In an interview, Yousafzai once stated that she aspired to become a doctor, though later her father encouraged her to become a politician instead.[3] Ziauddin referred to his daughter as something entirely special, allowing her to stay up at night and talk about politics after her two brothers had been sent to bed.[28]
Inspired by Muhammad Ali Jinnah and Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, Yousafzai started speaking about education rights as early as September 2008, when her father took her to Peshawar to speak at the local press club.[6] "How dare the Taliban take away my basic right to education?" Yousafzai asked her audience in a speech covered by newspapers and television channels throughout the region.[29] In 2009, Yousafzai began as a trainee and then a peer educator in the Institute for War and Peace Reporting's Open Minds Pakistan youth programme, which worked in schools in the region to help young people engage in constructive discussion on social issues through the tools of journalism, public debate and dialogue.[30]
As a BBC blogger
See also: First Battle of Swat
From left to right: Martin Luther King Jr, Nelson Mandela and Muhammad Ali Jinnah have influenced Yousafzai
In late 2008, Aamer Ahmed Khan of the BBC Urdu website and his colleagues came up with a novel way of covering the Taliban's growing influence in Swat. They decided to ask a schoolgirl to blog anonymously about her life there. Their correspondent in Peshawar, Abdul Hai Kakar, had been in touch with a local school teacher, Ziauddin Yousafzai, but could not find any students willing to do so, as it was considered too dangerous by their families. Finally, Yousafzai suggested his own daughter, 11-year-old Malala.[31] At the time, Taliban militants led by Maulana Fazlullah were taking over the Swat Valley, banning television, music, girls' education,[32] and women from going shopping.[33] Bodies of beheaded policemen were being displayed in town squares.[32] At first, a girl named Aisha from her father's school agreed to write a diary, but then the girl's parents stopped her from doing it because they feared Taliban reprisals. The only alternative was Yousafzai, four years younger than the original volunteer, and in seventh grade at the time.[34] Editors at the BBC unanimously agreed.[32]
I had a terrible dream yesterday with military helicopters and the Taliban. I have had such dreams since the launch of the military operation in Swat. My mother made me breakfast and I went off to school. I was afraid going to school because the Taliban had issued an edict banning all girls from attending schools. Only 11 out of 27 pupils attended the class because the number decreased because of the Taliban's edict. My three friends have shifted to Peshawar, Lahore and Rawalpindi with their families after this edict.
Malala Yousafzai, 3 January 2009 BBC blog entry[23]
"We had been covering the violence and politics in Swat in detail but we didn't know much about how ordinary people lived under the Taliban", said Mirza Waheed, the former editor of BBC Urdu. Because they were concerned about Yousafzai's safety, BBC editors insisted that she use a pseudonym.[32] Her blog was published under the byline "Gul Makai" ("cornflower" in Urdu),[35] a name taken from a character in a Pashtun folktale.[36][37]
On 3 January 2009, Yousafzai's first entry was posted to the BBC Urdu blog. She would hand-write notes and then pass them on to a reporter who would scan and e-mail them.[32] The blog records Yousafzai's thoughts during the First Battle of Swat, as military operations take place, fewer girls show up to school, and finally, her school shuts down.
In Mingora, the Taliban had set an edict that no girls could attend school after 15 January 2009. The group had already blown up more than a hundred girls' schools.[32] The night before the ban took effect was filled with the noise of artillery fire, waking Yousafzai several times. The following day, Yousafzai also read for the first time excerpts from her blog that had been published in a local newspaper.[23]
Banned from school
Following the edict, the Taliban destroyed several more local schools. On 24 January 2009, Yousafzai wrote: "Our annual exams are due after the vacations but this will only be possible if the Taliban allow girls to go to school. We were told to prepare certain chapters for the exam but I do not feel like studying."[38]
It seems that it is only when dozens of schools have been destroyed and hundreds others closed down that the army thinks about protecting them. Had they conducted their operations here properly, this situation would not have arisen.
Malala Yousafzai, 24 January 2009 BBC blog entry[38]
In February 2009, girls' schools were still closed. In solidarity, private schools for boys had decided not to open until 9 February, and notices appeared saying so.[38] On 7 February, Yousafzai and her brother returned to their hometown of Mingora, where the streets were deserted, and there was an "eerie silence". "We went to the supermarket to buy a gift for our mother but it was closed, whereas earlier it used to remain open till late. Many other shops were also closed", she wrote in her blog. Their home had been robbed and their television was stolen.[38]
After boys' schools reopened, the Taliban lifted restrictions on girls' primary education, where there was co-education. Girls-only schools were still closed. Yousafzai wrote that only 70 pupils attended, out of 700 pupils who were enrolled.[38]
On 15 February, gunshots could be heard in the streets of Mingora, but Yousafzai's father reassured her, saying: "Don't be scared – this is firing for peace." Her father had read in the newspaper that the government and the militants were going to sign a peace deal the next day. Later that night, when the Taliban announced the peace deal on their FM Radio studio, another round of stronger firing started outside.[38] Yousafzai spoke out against the Taliban on the national current affairs show Capital Talk on 18 February.[39] Three days later, local Taliban leader Maulana Fazlulla announced on his FM radio station that he was lifting the ban on women's education, and girls would be allowed to attend school until exams were held on 17 March, but they had to wear burqas.[38]
Girls' schools reopen
On 25 February, Yousafzai wrote on her blog that she and her classmates "played a lot in class and enjoyed ourselves like we used to before".[38] Attendance at Yousafzai's class was up to 19 of 27 pupils by 1 March, but the Taliban were still active in the area. Shelling continued, and relief goods meant for displaced people were looted.[38] Only two days later, Yousafzai wrote that there was a skirmish between the military and Taliban, and the sounds of mortar shells could be heard: "People are again scared that the peace may not last for long. Some people are saying that the peace agreement is not permanent, it is just a break in fighting."[38]
On 9 March, Yousafzai wrote about a science paper that she performed well on, and added that the Taliban were no longer searching vehicles as they once did. Her blog ended on 12 March 2009.[40]
As a displaced person
See also: Second Battle of Swat
After the BBC diary ended, Yousafzai and her father were approached by New York Times reporter Adam B. Ellick about filming a documentary.[34] In May, the Pakistani Army moved into the region to regain control during the Second Battle of Swat. Mingora was evacuated and Yousafzai's family was displaced and separated. Her father went to Peshawar to protest and lobby for support, while she was sent into the countryside to live with relatives. "I'm really bored because I have no books to read," Yousafzai is filmed saying in the documentary.[3]
That month, after criticising militants at a press conference, Yousafzai's father received a death threat over the radio by a Taliban commander.[3] Yousafzai was deeply inspired in her activism by her father. That summer, for the first time, she committed to becoming a politician and not a doctor, as she had once aspired to be.[3]
I have a new dream ... I must be a politician to save this country. There are so many crises in our country. I want to remove these crises.
Malala Yousafzai, Class Dismissed (documentary)[3]
By early July, refugee camps were filled to capacity. The prime minister made a long-awaited announcement saying that it was safe to return to the Swat Valley. The Pakistani military had pushed the Taliban out of the cities and into the countryside. Yousafzai's family reunited, and on 24 July 2009 they headed home. They made one stop first – to meet with a group of other grassroots activists that had been invited to see United States President Barack Obama's special representative to Afghanistan and Pakistan, Richard Holbrooke. Yousafzai pleaded with Holbrooke to intervene in the situation, saying, "Respected ambassador, if you can help us in our education, so please help us." When her family finally did return home, they found it had not been damaged, and her school had sustained only light damage.[3]
Early activism
Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, one of Yousafzai's sources of inspiration
Following the documentary, Yousafzai was interviewed on the national Pashto-language station AVT Khyber, the Urdu-language Daily Aaj, and Canada's Toronto Star.[34] She made a second appearance on Capital Talk on 19 August 2009.[41] Her BBC blogging identity was being revealed in articles by December 2009.[42][43] She also began appearing on television to publicly advocate for female education.[33] From 2009 to 2010 she was the chair of the District Child Assembly of the Khpal Kor Foundation through 2009 and 2010.[44][45]
In 2011 Yousafzai trained with local girls' empowerment organisation, Aware Girls, run by Gulalai Ismail whose training includes advice on women's rights and empowerment to peacefully oppose radicalisation through education.[46]
In October 2011, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, a South African activist, nominated Yousafzai for the International Children's Peace Prize of the Dutch international children's advocacy group KidsRights Foundation. She was the first Pakistani girl to be nominated for the award. The announcement said, "Malala dared to stand up for herself and other girls and used national and international media to let the world know girls should also have the right to go to school."[47] The award was won by Michaela Mycroft of South Africa.[48]
Her public profile rose even further when she was awarded Pakistan's first National Youth Peace Prize two months later in December.[32][47] On 19 December 2011, Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gillani awarded her the National Peace Award for Youth. At the proceedings in her honour, Yousafzai stated that she was not a member of any political party, but hoped to found a national party of her own to promote education.[49] The prime minister directed the authorities to set up an IT campus in the Swat Degree College for Women at Yousafzai's request, and a secondary school was renamed in her honour.[50] By 2012, Yousafzai was planning to organise the Malala Education Foundation, which would help poor girls go to school.[51]
Murder attempt
As Yousafzai became more recognised, the dangers facing her increased. Death threats against her were published in newspapers and slipped under her door.[52] On Facebook, where she was an active user, she began to receive threats.[32] Eventually, a Taliban spokesman said they were "forced" to act. In a meeting held in the summer of 2012, Taliban leaders unanimously agreed to kill her.[52]
I think of it often and imagine the scene clearly. Even if they come to kill me, I will tell them what they are trying to do is wrong, that education is our basic right.
Malala Yousafzai envisioning a confrontation with the Taliban[32]
On 9 October 2012, a Taliban gunman shot Yousafzai as she rode home on a bus after taking an exam in Pakistan's Swat Valley. Yousafzai was 15 years old at the time. According to reports, a masked gunman shouted: "Which one of you is Malala? Speak up, otherwise I will shoot you all."[27] Upon being identified, Yousafzai was shot with one bullet, which travelled 18 inches from the side of her left eye, through her neck and landed in her shoulder.[53][54] Two other girls were also wounded in the shooting: Kainat Riaz and Shazia Ramzan,[55] both of whom were stable enough following the shooting, to speak to reporters and provide details of the attack.
After the shooting, Yousafzai was airlifted to a military hospital in Peshawar, where doctors were forced to begin operating after swelling developed in the left portion of her brain, which had been damaged by the bullet when it passed through her head.[56] After a five-hour operation, doctors successfully removed the bullet, which had lodged in her shoulder near her spinal cord. The day following the attack, doctors performed a decompressive craniectomy, in which part of her skull was removed to allow room for swelling.[57]
On 11 October 2012, a panel of Pakistani and British doctors decided to move Yousafzai to the Armed Forces Institute of Cardiology in Rawalpindi.[57] Mumtaz Khan, a doctor, said that she had a 70% chance of survival.[58] Interior Minister Rehman Malik said that Yousafzai would be moved to Germany, where she could receive the best medical treatment, as soon as she was stable enough to travel. A team of doctors would travel with her, and the government would bear the cost of her treatment.[59][60] Doctors reduced Yousafzai's sedation on 13 October, and she moved all four limbs.[61]
Offers to treat Yousafzai came from around the world.[62] On 15 October, Yousafzai travelled to the United Kingdom for further treatment, approved by both her doctors and family. Her plane landed in Birmingham, England where she was treated at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital, one of the specialties of this hospital being the treatment of military personnel injured in conflict.[63] According to media reports at the time, the UK Government stated that "[t]he Pakistani government is paying all transport, migration, medical, accommodation and subsistence costs for Malala and her party."[64]
Yousafzai had come out of her coma by 17 October 2012, was responding well to treatment, and was said to have a good chance of fully recovering without any brain damage.[65] Later updates on 20 and 21 October stated that she was stable, but was still battling an infection.[66] By 8 November, she was photographed sitting up in bed.[67] On 11 November, Yousafzai underwent surgery for eight and a half hours, in order to repair her facial nerve.[53]
On 3 January 2013, Yousafzai was discharged from the hospital to continue her rehabilitation at her family's temporary home in the West Midlands,[68][69] where she had weekly physiotherapy.[53] She underwent a five-hour long operation on 2 February to reconstruct her skull and restore her hearing with a cochlear implant, after which she was reported to be in stable condition.[70][71] Yousafzai wrote in July 2014 that her facial nerve had recovered up to 96%.[53]
Barack Obama, Michelle Obama and their daughter Malia meet Yousafzai in the Oval Office, 11 October 2013
The murder attempt received worldwide media coverage and produced an outpouring of sympathy and anger. Protests against the shooting were held in several Pakistani cities the day after the attack, and over 2 million people signed the Right to Education campaign's petition, which led to ratification[72][73] of the first Right to Education Bill in Pakistan.[74][verification needed] Pakistani officials offered a 10 million rupee (US$105,000) reward for information leading to the arrest of the attackers. Responding to concerns about his safety, Yousafzai's father said: "We wouldn't leave our country if my daughter survives or not. We have an ideology that advocates peace. The Taliban cannot stop all independent voices through the force of bullets."[60]
Pakistan's president Asif Ali Zardari described the shooting as an attack on "civilized people".[75] UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called it a "heinous and cowardly act".[76] United States President Barack Obama found the attack "reprehensible, disgusting and tragic",[77] while Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Yousafzai had been "very brave in standing up for the rights of girls" and that the attackers had been "threatened by that kind of empowerment".[78] British Foreign Secretary William Hague called the shooting "barbaric" and that it had "shocked Pakistan and the world".[79]
American singer Madonna dedicated her song "Human Nature" to Yousafzai at a concert in Los Angeles the day of the attack,[80] as well had a temporary Malala tattoo on her back.[81] American actress Angelina Jolie wrote an article about explaining the event to her children and answering questions like "Why did those men think they needed to kill Malala?"[82] Jolie later donated $200,000 to the Malala Fund[83] for girls' education.[84] Former First Lady of the United States Laura Bush wrote an op-ed piece in The Washington Post in which she compared Yousafzai to Holocaust diarist Anne Frank.[85] Indian director Amjad Khan announced that he would be making a biographical film based on Yousafzai.[86]
Ehsanullah Ehsan, chief spokesman for the Pakistani Taliban, claimed responsibility for the attack, saying that Yousafzai "is the symbol of the infidels and obscenity", adding that if she survived, the group would target her again.[87] In the days following the attack, the Taliban reiterated its justification, saying Yousafzai had been brainwashed by her father: "We warned him several times to stop his daughter from using dirty language against us, but he didn't listen and forced us to take this extreme step."[55] The Taliban also justified its attack as part of religious scripture, stating that the Quran says that "people propagating against Islam and Islamic forces would be killed", going on to say that "Sharia says that even a child can be killed if he is propagating against Islam".[88]
On 12 October 2012, a group of 50 Islamic clerics in Pakistan issued a fatwā – a ruling of Islamic law – against the Taliban gunmen who tried to kill Yousafzai. Islamic scholars from the Sunni Ittehad Council publicly denounced attempts by the Pakistani Taliban to mount religious justifications for the shooting of Yousafzai and two of her classmates.[89]
Although the attack was roundly condemned in Pakistan,[90] "some fringe Pakistani political parties and extremist outfits" have aired conspiracy theories, such as the shooting being staged by the American Central Intelligence Agency to provide an excuse for continuing drone attacks.[91] The Pakistani Taliban and some other pro-Taliban elements branded Yousafzai an "American spy".[92][93][94][95]
United Nations petition
On 15 October 2012, UN Special Envoy for Global Education Gordon Brown, the former British Prime Minister, visited Yousafzai while she was in the hospital,[96] and launched a petition in her name and "in support of what Malala fought for".[97] Using the slogan "I am Malala", the petition's main demand was that there be no child left out of school by 2015, with the hope that "girls like Malala everywhere will soon be going to school".[98] Brown said he would hand the petition to President Zardari in Islamabad in November.[97]
The petition contains three demands:
We call on Pakistan to agree to a plan to deliver education for every child.
We call on all countries to outlaw discrimination against girls.
We call on international organisations to ensure the world's 61 million out-of-school children are in education by the end of 2015.[98]
Criminal investigation, arrests, and acquittals
The day after the shooting, Pakistan's Interior Minister Rehman Malik stated that the Taliban gunman who shot Yousafzai had been identified.[99] Police named 23-year-old Atta Ullah Khan, a graduate student in chemistry, as the gunman in the attack.[100] As of 2015[update] he remained at large, possibly in Afghanistan.[101][102]
The police also arrested six men for involvement in the attack, but they were later released due to lack of evidence.[101] In November 2012, US sources confirmed that Mullah Fazlullah, the cleric who ordered the attack on Yousafzai, was hiding in Eastern Afghanistan.[103] He was killed by a U.S.-Afghan air strike in June 2018.[104]
On 12 September 2014, ISPR Director, Major General Asim Bajwa, told a media briefing in Islamabad that the 10 attackers belong to a militant group called "Shura". General Bajwa said that Israrur Rehman was the first militant group member who was identified and apprehended by the troops. Acting upon the information received during his interrogation, all other members of the militant group were arrested. It was an intelligence-based joint operation conducted by ISI, police, and military.[105][106]
In April 2015, the ten who were arrested were sentenced to life in prison by Judge Mohammad Amin Kundi, a counterterrorism judge, with the chance of eligibility for parole, and possible release, after 25 years. It is not known if the actual would-be murderers were among the ten sentenced.[102] In June 2015, it was revealed that eight of the ten men tried in-camera for the attack had in fact been secretly acquitted, insiders revealed one of the men acquitted and freed was the murder bid's mastermind. It is believed that all other men who shot Yousafzai fled to Afghanistan afterwards and were never even captured. The information about the release of suspects came to light after the London Daily Mirror attempted to locate the men in prison. Senior police official Salim Khan stated that the eight men were released because there was not enough evidence to connect them to the attack.[107][108]
Continuing activism
Traditions are not sent from heaven, they are not sent from God. It is we who make cultures and we have the right to change it and we should change it.
Yousafzai at the Girl Summit in London[109]
Innocent victims are killed in these acts, and they lead to resentment among the Pakistani people. If we refocus efforts on education it will make a big impact.
Yousafzai expressing her concerns to Barack Obama that drone attacks are fueling terrorism[110]
Yousafzai spoke before the United Nations in July 2013, and had an audience with Queen Elizabeth II in Buckingham Palace.[111] In September, she spoke at Harvard University,[111] and in October, she met with US President Barack Obama and his family; during that meeting, she confronted him on his use of drone strikes in Pakistan.[110] In December, she addressed the Oxford Union.[112] In July 2014, Yousafzai spoke at the Girl Summit in London.[113] In October 2014, she donated $50,000 to the UNRWA for reconstruction of schools on the Gaza Strip.[114]
Even though she was fighting for women's rights as well as children's rights, Yousafzai did not describe herself as a feminist when asked on Forbes Under 30 Summit in 2014.[115][116] In 2015, however, Yousafzai told Emma Watson she decided to call herself a feminist after hearing Watson's speech at the UN launching the HeForShe campaign.[117]
On 12 July 2015, her 18th birthday, Yousafzai opened a school in the Bekaa Valley, Lebanon, near the Syrian border, for Syrian refugees. The school, funded by the not-for-profit Malala Fund, offers education and training to girls aged 14 to 18 years. Yousafzai called on world leaders to invest in "books, not bullets".[118][119]
Yousafzai has repeatedly condemned the Rohingya persecution in Myanmar. In June 2015, the Malala Fund released a statement in which Yousafzai argues that the Rohingya people deserve "citizenship in the country where they were born and have lived for generations" along with "equal rights and opportunities." She urges world leaders, particularly in Myanmar, to "halt the inhuman persecution of Burma's Muslim minority Rohingya people."[120][121] In September 2017, speaking in Oxford, Yousafzai said: "This should be a human rights issue. Governments should react to it. People are being displaced, they're facing violence."[122] Yousafzai also posted a statement on Twitter calling for Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi to condemn the treatment of the Rohingya people in Myanmar. Suu Kyi has avoided taking sides in the conflict, or condemning violence against the Rohingya people, leading to widespread criticism.[123]
In 2014, Yousafzai stated that she wished to return to Pakistan following her education in the U.K., and inspired by Benazir Bhutto, she would consider running for prime minister: "If I can help my country by joining the government or becoming the prime minister, I would definitely be up for this task."[124] She repeated this aim in 2015[125] and 2016.[126] However, Yousafzai noted in 2018 that her goal had changed, stating that "now that I have met so many presidents and prime ministers around the world, it just seems that things are not simple and there are other ways that I can bring the change that I want to see".[127] In an interview with David Letterman, for Netflix's show My Next Guest Needs No Introduction, Yousafzai was asked: "Would you ever want to hold a political position?" and replied "Me? No."[128]
Former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown arranged for Yousafzai's appearance before the United Nations in July 2013.[96] Brown also requested that McKinsey consultant Shiza Shahid, a friend of the Yousafzai family, chair Yousafzai's charity fund, which had gained the support of Angelina Jolie.[96] Google's vice-president Megan Smith also sits on the fund's board.[129]
In November 2012, the consulting firm Edelman began work for Yousafzai on a pro bono basis, which according to the firm "involves providing a press office function for Malala".[96][129] The office employs five people, and is headed by speechwriter Jamie Lundie.[129] McKinsey also continues to provide assistance to Yousafzai.[129]
Malala Day
Yousafzai on a special visit to Strasbourg in November 2013
On 12 July 2013, Yousafzai's 16th birthday, she spoke at the UN to call for worldwide access to education. The UN dubbed the event "Malala Day".[130] Yousafzai wore one of Benazir Bhutto's shawls to the UN. It was her first public speech since the attack,[131] leading the first ever Youth Takeover of the UN, with an audience of over 500 young education advocates from around the world.[132]
The terrorists thought they would change my aims and stop my ambitions, but nothing changed in my life except this: weakness, fear and hopelessness died. Strength, power and courage was born ... I am not against anyone, neither am I here to speak in terms of personal revenge against the Taliban or any other terrorist group. I'm here to speak up for the right of education for every child. I want education for the sons and daughters of the Taliban and all terrorists and extremists.[131]
Yousafzai received several standing ovations. Ban Ki-moon, who also spoke at the session, described her as "our hero".[130] Yousafzai also presented the chamber with "The Education We Want",[133] a Youth Resolution of education demands written by Youth for Youth, in a process co-ordinated by the UN Global Education First Youth Advocacy Group,[134] telling her audience:
Malala day is not my day. Today is the day of every woman, every boy and every girl who have raised their voice for their rights.[135]
The Pakistani government did not comment on Yousafzai's UN appearance, amid a backlash against her in Pakistan's press and social media.[136][137]
Words from the speech were used as lyrics for "Speak Out", a song by Kate Whitley commissioned by BBC Radio 3 and broadcast on International Women's Day 2017.[138][139]
Nobel Lecture by Malala Yousafzai
On 10 October 2014, Yousafzai was announced as the co-recipient of the 2014 Nobel Peace Prize for her struggle against the suppression of children and young people and for the right of all children to education. Having received the prize at the age of 17, Yousafzai is the youngest Nobel laureate.[14][15][140] Yousafzai shared the prize with Kailash Satyarthi, a children's rights activist from India.[141] She is the second Pakistani to receive a Nobel Prize after 1979 Physics laureate Abdus Salam.[142]
After she was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, there was praise, but also some disapproval of the decision.[143][144] A Norwegian jurist, Fredrik Heffermehl, commented on being awarded the Nobel Prize: "This is not for fine people who have done nice things and are glad to receive it. All of that is irrelevant. What Nobel wanted was a prize that promoted global disarmament."[145]
Adán Cortés, a college student from Mexico City and asylum seeker, interrupted Yousafzai's Nobel Peace Prize award ceremony in protest for the 2014 Iguala mass kidnapping in Mexico, but was quickly taken away by security personnel. Yousafzai later sympathised, and acknowledged that problems are faced by young people all over the world, saying "there are problems in Mexico, there are problems even in America, even here in Norway, and it is really important that children raise their voices".[146]
David Letterman interview
In March 2018, Yousafzai was the subject of an interview with David Letterman for his Netflix show My Next Guest Needs No Introduction. Speaking about the Taliban, she opined that their misogyny comes from a superiority complex, and is reinforced by finding "excuses" in culture or literature, such as by misinterpreting teachings of Islam.[147] On the topic of her attackers, Yousafzai comments that "I forgive them because that's the best revenge I can have". Pointing out that the person who attacked her was a young boy, she says that "He thought he was doing the right thing".[148]
Asked about the presidency of Donald Trump, Yousafzai said: "Some of the things have really disappointed me, like sexual harassment and the ban on Muslims and racism."[149] She also criticised the Trump administration's proposed budget cuts to education, saying that education is the first step to "eradicating extremism and ending poverty". Throughout the episode, clips are shown of Yousafzai acting as a tour guide for prospective students to her college Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford.[147]
From March 2013 to July 2017, Yousafzai was a pupil at the all-girls Edgbaston High School in Birmingham.[17] In August 2015, she received 6 A*s and 4 As at GCSE level.[150] At A Level, she studied Geography, History, Mathematics and Religious Studies.[151] Also applying to Durham, Warwick and the London School of Economics, Yousafzai was interviewed at Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford, in December 2016 and received a conditional offer of three As in her A Levels; in August 2017, she was accepted to study Philosophy, Politics and Economics (PPE).[151][152]
Reception in Pakistan
Reception of Yousafzai in Pakistan is mostly negative. Yousafzai's opposition to Taliban policy makes her unpopular among Taliban sympathisers.[153][154] A Dawn columnist alleges that she is scapegoated by the failing state government,[153] and a journalist in The Nation wrote that Yousafzai is hated by "overzealous patriots" who are keen to deny oppression of women in the country.[154] Yousafzai's statements conflict with the view that militancy in Pakistan is a result of Western interference,[136] and conservatives and Islamic fundamentalists describe her ideology as "anti-Pakistan" and "anti-Islam".[155][156]
In 2015, the All Pakistan Private Schools Federation (APPSF) banned I Am Malala in all Pakistani private schools, and the president Mirza Kashif Ali released a book I Am Not Malala.[157] The book accuses Yousafzai of attacking Pakistan's army under the pretence of female education, describes her father as a "double agent" and a "traitor" and denounces the Malala Fund's promotion of secular education. However, Ali claimed that "we are not against her but the ideology being imposed on us" and pointed out that the APPSF went on a national strike when Yousafzai was attacked.[158]
Conspiracy theorists in newspapers and on social media have alleged that Yousafzai staged her assassination attempt, or that she is an agent of the American Central Intelligence Agency.[137][136] Many Pakistanis view her as an "agent of the West",[159] due to her Nobel prize, Oxford education and residence in England.[160] Another conspiracy theory alleges that Yousafzai is a Jewish agent.[160][155] However, Yousafzai does have some support in Pakistani media; Farman Nawaz argues that Yousafzai would have gained more fame in Pakistan if she belonged to the province of Punjab. His opinion was not given importance by the mainstream media of Pakistan but his views in this regard were published by Daily Outlook Afghanistan.[161] Yousafzai is seen as courageous by some Pakistanis.[155]
On 29 March 2018, Yousafzai returned to Pakistan for the first time since the shooting. Meeting Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi,[162] she gave a speech in which she said it had been her dream to return "without any fear".[163] Yousafzai then visited her hometown Mingora in Swat Valley.[164] The APPSF, a group representing the 173,000 private schools in Pakistan, organised "I am not Malala Day" on 30 March.[157] Yousafzai responded by saying "I am proud of my religion, and I am proud of my country."[156]
Yousafzai receiving the Sakharov Prize at the European Parliament in November 2013
Murals dedicated to Yousafzai in Rome
Yousafzai has received the following national and international honours, listed by the date they were awarded:
2011: International Children's Peace Prize (nominee)[47]
2011: National Youth Peace Prize[32]
January 2012: Anne Frank Award for Moral Courage[165][166]
October 2012: Sitara-e-Shujaat, Pakistan's third-highest civilian bravery award[167]
November 2012: Foreign Policy magazine top 100 global thinker[168]
December 2012: Time magazine Person of the Year shortlist for 2012[169]
November 2012: Mother Teresa Awards for Social Justice[a][171][172]
December 2012: Rome Prize for Peace and Humanitarian Action[173]
January 2013: Top Name in Annual Survey of Global English in 2012[174]
January 2013: Simone de Beauvoir Prize[175]
March 2013: Memminger Freiheitspreis 1525[176] (conferred on 7 December 2013 in Oxford[177])
March 2013: Doughty Street Advocacy award of Index on Censorship[178]
March 2013: Fred and Anne Jarvis Award of the UK National Union of Teachers[179]
April 2013: Vital Voices Global Leadership Awards, Global Trailblazer[180]
April 2013: One of Time's "100 Most Influential People in the World"[181]
May 2013: Premi Internacional Catalunya Award of Catalonia, May 2013[182]
June 2013: Annual Award for Development of the OPEC Fund for International Development (OFID)[183]
June 2013: International Campaigner of the Year, 2013 Observer Ethical Awards[184]
August 2013: Tipperary International Peace Award for 2012, Ireland Tipperary Peace Convention[185]
2013: Portrait of Yousafzai by Jonathan Yeo displayed at National Portrait Gallery, London[186]
September 2013: Ambassador of Conscience Award from Amnesty International[187]
2013: International Children's Peace Prize[188][189]
2013: Clinton Global Citizen Awards from Clinton Foundation[190]
September 2013: Harvard Foundation's Peter Gomes Humanitarian Award from Harvard University[191]
2013: Anna Politkovskaya Award – Reach All Women in War
2013: Reflections of Hope Award – Oklahoma City National Memorial & Museum[192]
2013: Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought – awarded by the European Parliament
2013: Honorary Master of Arts degree awarded by the University of Edinburgh[193]
2013: Pride of Britain (October)[194]
2013: Glamour magazine Woman of the Year[195]
2013: GG2 Hammer Award at GG2 Leadership Awards (November)[196]
2013: International Prize for Equality and Non-Discrimination[197]
2014: Nominee for World Children's Prize also known as Children's Nobel Prize[198]
2014: Awarded Honorary Life Membership by the PSEU (Ireland)[199]
2014: Skoll Global Treasure Award[200]
2014: Honorary Doctor of Civil Law, University of King's College, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada[201]
2014: 2014 Nobel Peace Prize, shared with Kailash Satyarthi[15]
2014: Philadelphia Liberty Medal[202]
2014: One of Time Magazine "The 25 Most Influential Teens of 2014"[203]
2014: Honorary Canadian citizenship[204]
2015: Asteroid 316201 Malala named in her honour.[205]
2016: Honorary President of The Students' Union of the University of Sheffield[206]
2016: Order of the Smile[207][208]
2017: Youngest ever United Nations Messenger of Peace[209]
2017: Received honorary doctorate from the University of Ottawa[210]
2017: Ellis Island International Medal of Honor[211]
2017: Wonk of the Year 2017 from American University[212]
2017: Harper's Bazaar inducted Malala in the list of "150 of the most influential female leaders in the UK".[213][214]
2018: Advisor to Princess Zebunisa of Swat, Swat Relief Initiative Foundation, Princeton, New Jersey[215]
2018: Gleitsman Award from the Center for the Public Leadership at Harvard Kennedy School[216]
2019: For their first match of March 2019, the women of the United States women's national soccer team each wore a jersey with the name of a woman they were honoring on the back; Carli Lloyd chose the name of Yousafzai.[217]
International Poetry Festival 2013 in Argentina, to honour Yousafzai
Yousafzai's memoir I Am Malala: The Story of the Girl Who Stood Up for Education and was Shot by the Taliban, co-written with British journalist Christina Lamb, was published in October 2013 by Little, Brown and Company in the US and by Weidenfeld & Nicolson in the UK.[218] A reviewer for The Guardian called the book "fearless" and stated that "the haters and conspiracy theorists would do well to read this book", though she criticised "the stiff, know-it-all voice of a foreign correspondent" that is interwoven with Yousafzai's.[219] A reviewer for The Washington Post called the book "riveting" and wrote "It is difficult to imagine a chronicle of a war more moving, apart from perhaps the diary of Anne Frank."[220] Entertainment Weekly gave the book a "B+", writing "Malala's bravely eager voice can seem a little thin here, in I Am Malala, likely thanks to her co-writer, but her powerful message remains undiluted."[221]
A children's edition of the memoir was published in 2014 under the title I Am Malala: How One Girl Stood Up for Education and Changed the World.[222] According to Publishers Weekly, in 2017 the book had sold almost 2 million copies, and there were 750,000 copies of the children's edition in print.[223]
Yousafzai at Women of the World Festival, 2014
Yousafzai was the subject of the 2015 documentary He Named Me Malala, which was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature.[224] In 2017, a Hindi biopic film Gul Makai was announced, with Reem Sameer Shaikh portraying her.[225]
Yousafzai authored a picture book, Malala's Magic Pencil, which was illustrated by Kerascoët and published on 17 October 2017.[226] By March 2018, The Bookseller reported that the book had over 5,000 sales in the UK.[227] In a review for The Guardian, Imogen Carter describes the book as "enchanting", opining that it "strikes just the right balance" between "heavy-handed" and "heartfelt", and is a "welcome addition to the frustratingly small range of children's books that feature BAME central characters".[228] Rebecca Gurney of The Daily Californian gives the book a grade of 4.5 out of 5, calling it a "beautiful account of a terrifying but inspiring tale" and commenting "Though the story begins with fantasy, it ends starkly grounded in reality."[229]
In March 2018, it was announced that Yousafzai's next book We Are Displaced: True Stories of Refugee Lives[230] would be published on 4 September 2018 by Little, Brown and Company's Young Readers division. The book is about refugees, and includes stories from Yousafzai's own life along with those of people she has met.[231] Speaking about the book, Yousafzai said that "What tends to get lost in the current refugee crisis is the humanity behind the statistics"[230][232] and "people become refugees when they have no other option. This is never your first choice."[233] Profits from the book will go to Yousafzai's charity Malala Fund.[230] She visited Australia and criticized its asylum policies and compared immigration policies of the U.S. and Europe unfavourably to those of poor countries and Pakistan.[234] The book was released on 8 January 2019.[235][236]
Women's education in Pakistan
Women's rights in Pakistan
Farida Afridi
Bibi Aisha
Muzoon Almellehan
Sahar Gul
Humaira Bachal
Aitzaz Hasan
Women's rights in 2014
British Pakistanis
Pakistan portal
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Malala: Wars Never End Wars, DAWN, 2013 interview with audio clips of Yousafzai
"Malala Yousafzai collected news and commentary". The Guardian.
"Malala Yousafzai collected news and commentary". The New York Times.
Class Dismissed: Malala's Story, English-language documentary
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Malala Yousafzai (Pakistan)
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1998: John Hume / David Trimble
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2014: Kailash Satyarthi / Malala Yousafzai
2015: Tunisian National Dialogue Quartet
2016: Juan Manuel Santos
2017: International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons
2018: Denis Mukwege / Nadia Murad
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Management Buy Out concluded at Engineering Technology Group
A Management Buy Out led by former Group Sales and Marketing Director Martin Doyle and Managing Director John Temple has been successfully concluded at the Southam, Warwickshire based Engineering Technology Group.
With effect from 19th May 2015 Martin Doyle became Group Managing Director and John Temple Executive Chairman with ETG founder and former Chairman Paul Rhodes retiring from the organisation.
Comments Martin Doyle; “Along with our senior management team we will be building on the success of the business and making effective use of all the initiatives within the Group that have been successfully implemented in recent times. These include establishing the Wellesbourne Operations facility, ETG Ireland and the new ETG Workholding Division that includes Hyfore.
“The signing of this deal marks the beginning of the next stage of growth for the Group. Our intention is to continue to evolve and grow this company to be the best in everything it does; in doing so we will be focusing on efficiencies, customer care, back up and support to increase our market share and further improve our customer retention.”
ETG founder Paul Rhodes started the company nearly 20 years ago, having the foresight to align himself with renowned and well respected machine tool builders such as Chiron and Nakamura-Tome. These respected brands elevated the business ahead of the competition with their superior technology but he also instilled a spirit and culture within the Group allowing ETG to deliver value-added services and expertise that its customers have come to appreciate.
John Temple’s professional development of the company as Managing Director in recent years has advanced the organisation to what it is today and he will remain a significant shareholder within the business as Executive Chairman, ensuring the board’s effectiveness in all aspects of its role and helping to effectively position the company to facilitate its future expansion.
The deal – a secondary management buyout – was funded by Santander Corporate Banking, Birmingham including finance from the bank’s specialist Growth Capital Fund arranged by James Cooksey. Santander has a long standing relationship with The Engineering Technology Group although the new owners stress that the business shareholding remains entirely with the directors of the company.
In conclusion, Martin Doyle comments; “As Group Managing Director I look forward to cementing our position as the premium brand machine tool and engineering solutions provider in the UK and Ireland and the opportunity to work with a team who I consider to be the smartest people within our industry. ETG is a continuing success story and with the support of all the team, we are embarking on another exciting chapter in ETG’s history.”
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Trump administration halts fetal-tissue research by government scientists
The policy also requires an ethics review for any grant applications to the US National Institutes of Health that involve fetal tissue.
US President Donald Trump’s administration is ending fetal-tissue research by government scientists and placing restrictions on academic researchers seeking grants from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) for studies involving fetal tissue.
The administration said on 5 June that it will set up an ethics-review board to evaluate each NIH grant application that would support research with fetal tissue, which is collected from elective abortions. But the government has already decided against renewing its contract with a laboratory at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), that uses fetal tissue to study HIV.
“Promoting the dignity of human life from conception to natural death is one of the very top priorities of President Trump’s administration,” the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) said in a statement.
By: Sara Reardon/Nature News
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Artist Journeys
Influences & Inspirations
Inside the Industry
WTF IS A GENRE?
Conrad Clifton
What year is it? Are people really still separating sh*t into boxes? What even are genres these days?
Ok, I get that it makes the “system” easier, and it works for the business part of music. Record companies use these designations to file artists into neat and easily trackable boundaries. Then marketing, promotions, radio and press outlets use these boundaries to file artists into safely targeted consumer parameters.
As a result, the consumer becomes very passive, and puts little to no thought into what’s good, or what they enjoy, or why. And this works for the system, as long as we keep consuming. Plus, they get to use these same targets, boundaries and music to sell us more sh*t that we don’t need – but that’s a different article.
I’ve always thought that as consumers, we are just better than that.
Nobody is all one way. Once we’re exposed to something new, we can like different things, and we should be able to make that decision for ourselves. And it’s a great feeling to try something unfamiliar, and find that we love this ‘new thing.’ That’s the beauty of discovery, and the music that we’ve picked for ourselves has a lasting effect, because it’s personal.
Why limit yourself to boundaries that someone else has set for you?
“Music is art, and art is subjective.”
Hip-hop is always my favorite ‘go-to’ genre, but it wasn’t the first music I was introduced to. My parents played a lot of soul and jazz music when I was a baby, and as I got a little older, started adding R&B and rap into the mix – there was always music in our house. We even had lip syncing challenges, and the dance-offs were TOO real.
It wasn’t until much later that I got into alternative and indie rock – and a few years after that, I found house music and other experimental electronic genres, like footwork and bmore club. And trap is as much a rip from rap music as rock & roll was from blues, so there’s that. But I’ve always had a strong connection to hip-hop, because it’s the only genre that continues to incorporate ALL other genres.
There’s countless examples, from A$AP Rocky sampling Moby for his latest single, and Wiz Khalifa sampling Alice Deejay for one of his biggest hits – and of course Drake, who samples every genre from Nola Bounce and Dancehall, to Afrobeat and Jersey Club.
I love the fluidity. I love that I’m being inspired by different styles of music on a subconscious level, without even knowing what the style is or where it originated. It just feels good as sh*t.
This is what drives me. I always want to give the listener something that has a balance of ‘a little familiar,’ and ‘a little unfamiliar,’ but always something that makes you feel. Good art should make you feel something.
“Ultimately, the goal is to find your own sound.”
From the artist’s perspective, it’s easier to allow inspiration and creativity to flow freely – to see where it takes you musically. I’d even say it’s more natural to follow true inspiration down a rabbit hole, instead of trying to follow standards and rules that dictate a predetermined outcome.
It’s like the head vs. the heart. Thinking vs. feeling.
That being said, both are extremely important to the outcome of the final product. Skill, knowledge, technique and direction all come into practice when it’s time to actually finish a song. BUT, you should be free enough creatively to have come up with something interesting in the first place.
Ultimately, the goal is always to find your own unique sound. Have some artistic integrity. Get away from making sound-alike tunes. Otherwise you’re just helping dilute the music you’re into, and as an artist you’re forgettable.
When I’m listening to music, I have a thing where I’ll get bored, or uninterested if I know where a track is going. This happens in my production process too. So for me, a unique sound grew from experimenting with multiple genres. If I know a song is following some set of obvious rules, I lose interest quickly. Like “oh it’s gonna build right here,” and “here comes that drop that always happens in this type of track,” or “yeah, this is where the airy female pop vocal goes.” Nah. I’ve heard this before. Like a lot.
It’d be like knowing the end of every movie, at the beginning of every movie. No thanks. And every genre is guilty of it, from hip-hop to country. And I guess you could say, that’s where a genre starts to define itself, or set its own boundaries. But, I think that’s the point where I get bored with the “limitations” of a genre. I think styles should be defined by the artists that cultivate them. Like, “this song feels like Thom Yorke meets Bonobo,” or “this artist is a combination of Kid Cudi and ODESZA.”
And, I think the newer generation of creators and consumers feel the same way. I see more overlapping influences in music, now more than ever, and I couldn’t be more excited. It’s a huge relief for me, I’ve been waiting for us to reach this point for a long time.
Mainly, because this is my normal creative process – pulling from different (sometimes opposite) influences, and producing a new interesting vibe that even I couldn’t expect. But, also because my favorite music is something that I can listen to over, and over, and not lose interest. Something that feels unique to itself, even within a given musical style.
Like a BBC murder-mystery TV series, that’s written so well that you’ll never know what to expect – but the feeling of each reveal is so significant, and worthy of each unique build up. Something where you can feel the changes happening, as if you’re being carried somewhere vs. mentally knowing what’s going to happen, when it’s going to happen, and how it’s going to happen.
“The future of music is genre fluidity.”
I don’t make disposable music. Which is unfortunate, because I could probably be rich and famous already. But I like some disposable music, and I understand the experience of it – I’m just not built that way. I put a lot (probably too much) thought and emotion, into my stuff. And there’s a threshold, where the listener can’t tell how much work went into making something (and of course, most don’t care either way), so the important thing is “how it feels.”
When someone’s listening to your music, they’re not thinking about how many jungle sounds and 808 subs you stacked to make your kick. No, at the most they’re thinking “f*ck, I feel like I’m being punched in the chest every time this kick hits, and I love it.” DJing is the same way. The average person could care less about your turntablism, or that you’re juggling tracks on four decks. No, they only care how it felt when you played a song they love, but added a new unexpected vibe to it, and then that progressed into something totally unfamiliar, that they now love as well.
That feeling is priceless. I’ll put in the extra work for that.
The one major caveat to having a unique sound, is that it’s harder to gain traction and popularity. Nothing really to do with the listeners, but more-so the writers, tastemakers, promoters, etc.
Gatekeepers are less willing to take a risk in supporting you, if they can’t guarantee some kind of return on investment.
Which brings us full-circle to those boundaries we talked about. Gatekeepers go with what’s already working, that’s the nature of the business. So if you choose to be unique and stand out, understand that it may take you longer to blow up; in my opinion it’ll feel way more rewarding. I started Infinity Pool Recordings as a result of this.
After sending so many demos, asking for help and hearing so many “no’s,” I decided I could push releases better myself (and with the help of a few friends). There are so many dope artists out there that don’t easily fit into one box – nor should they. I’m taking everything I’ve learned over the years, and using it to help other unique artists get their music out, and build a listener base of true day one’s that couldn’t give a f*ck about a genre. The future of music is a genre fluidity. Let’s get it.
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Everyone You Love Will Die
Love Letter to San Pedro
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Former supermarket, Elyria, Ohio
Re: Former supermarket, Elyria, Ohio
Post by Daniel » 20 Jan 2010 02:22
Ah... you cleared up another mystery for me! I had been looking for the Ridge View shopping center! I found an old aircheck of WKYC/1110 and they were advertising a nightclub in that shopping center. I was curious about this place so I was trying to find buildings they had inhabited to get some idea of what it was. One location was given as 16110 Lorain, which is now the parking lot of Ganley Ford. Apparently I'll never see how big the slot was in the Ridge View shopping center, either!!
Post by rich » 20 Jan 2010 14:36
FWIW, the back of Ridgeview used to be visible from the Ohio Turnpike--one of the many landmarks I used to use to "mark time". I think there was an illuminated sign for Pick-n-Pay that faced the turnpike. If you figure out where Lorain is close to the turnpike, you'd be able to guess the approximate location. BTW--WKYC was 1100. Before 1965 it was KYW.
Google Maps still lists the Ridge View on the map... but when you look at the satellite view... dirt lot! Sorry I missed out on it, though, as I'd love to track down the former Pick N Pays and see what they are now. (I meant 1100 for 'KY... I was listening to jingles from 1110/WBT as I was typing) I'll stop before I carry this way off topic and get a spanking from the mod. :)
The former Pick-n-Pays should be easy to track down. One of the oldest is still functioning as retail. That one is on Coventry Road in Cleveland heights. Used to be Medic Drug, now another drug store, but with groceries, opposite the interscetion with Hampshire, I believe. That was store #1, although their actual first supermarket was on E 185th St. I think #1 probably replaced a Cottage Cremery location--Cottage was Pick-n-Pay's predecessor. Probably dates from the late 30s. The E 185th store has been altered beyond recognition but used to have a black ceramic tile front with "Pick-n-Pay" in white and dated to the 1930s; it may have been Cleveland's first super. It was Gale's Bi-Rite for decades and much enlarged over time, with a plain brick front. I forget what's there now. It's on E 185 about a block N of the LaSalle theatre, same side of the street as the LaSalle. That store was replaced by the one on Neff Road & E 185th in the 60s which Tops proposed enlarging or replacing right around the time they left Cleveland. that was one of the last stores to keep the "Pick-n-Pay" name.
Another real oldie was demolished and now has a Walgreen's on the site. It was on Lake Shore Blvd in Euclid, next to a large BP station between E 222nd and E 225th. That store dated from the 40s and had a pylon unlike anything they subsequently used. P-n-P extended the front forward in the late 60s into what previously had been parking and the interior had several remodels, but the pylon was never altered and the store lasted well into the 80s. It was replaced by a Tops almost directly across Lake Shore, which replaced the long closed Shore theatre, the long running Northeast Appliance flagship and some other smaller stores.
A number of other old stores have been demolished: Willo Plaza in Willoughby (c 1957; it would have been a few store fronts up from the current Rite-Aid), Shoregate in Willowick (c. 1959; demolished in the last couple years as part of the shrinking/redevelopment of the center), but some oldies are still functioning as some sort of retail, though difficult to recognize such as the stores at Eastgate (c. 1954, originally a Foodtown toward the S end of the main strip), Golden Gate (c. 1959, toward the N end of the strip), and Euclid-Richmond Plaza (early 50s) in Euclid (a few storefronts down from the drug store). The Harvard-Lee store (c. 1949, on Harvard) still exists but has either been replaced or greatly expanded. The Chagrin-Lee store in Shaker was either demolished or incorporated into the Blaushild car dealerships that are now repurposed as adult day care and other businesses. They had a store at Green Light Plaza on Euclid Ave opp the end of Green Road in Cleveland (c. 1950). That store and one in the Shaw-Hayden business district in East Cleveland were among the first to close--back in the late 60s or early 70s. The store on Euclid Ave in E Cleveland that you posted awhile ago came after them and was the survivor of the three. I haven't looked at Green Light in years--it had a Kroger that relocated to Five Points in the 60s (still functioning as a super--St Clair & E 152nd) . The Green-Light Kroger was demolished and replaced by a Fazio's. The Pick-n-Pay was converted to a one-off discount format by Fisher/Fazio; Toby has posted about it. There also was a Woolworth in the plaza. The zigzag store had at least three siblings--Detroit & Warren in Lakewood, Buckeye Road E of 116th that may be the Sav-Alot that's there now, and Hough & E 79th--that store was sold to a group of African-American investors after the 1966 Hough riots. It had several owners--I don't know what it is now.
The P-n-P in the Skateland Plaza (9300 Euclid) has been discussed previously--I think the plaza has either been replaced or the store is something else. That one dates to somewhere in the late 50s, but the original skating rink strurcture was older. Another oldie would be at Painesville Shopping Center on Rt 20 in Painesville township. That store dated to about 1956 and was in the middle of the main strip. There also was a Kroger, which lasted into the 80s, further West. They had a store at Van Aken Center (the strip that backs up to Warrensville, c. early 50s) that was replaced by a store at Pavillion (current Giant Eagle, but i don't think it's the original location there). The Van Aken store is probably part of the foot print for the upscale grocery that's there now. The plaza also had a Fisher and a Woolworth.
Pick-n-Pay started out on the East Side, so most of the classic oldies are in inner ring East Side suburbs or the edge of the of Cleveland proper, with a few exceptions. They expanded through the purchase of stores from Foodtown in 1959 (some redundant stores spun-off to A&P or independents) and a steady pace of their own store building through the 50s and 60s. Their burst of store building ended in the late 60s with a number of infill locations in the inner city, mostly on the West Side. The chain built few new stores until their "Food Palace" superstore opened in Southgate in the mid 70s, although did do quite a bit of remodeling during the intervening years. Willo Plaza and Euclid-Richmond were other early "Food Palaces", converted around 1977. That took place when a group of investors lead by Julie Kravitz took over the chain from Cook United.
MarkW78
Location: Wellington, Ohio
Post by MarkW78 » 25 Jan 2010 13:17
Toby Radloff wrote: Thanks for the clarifications. I think both Big Lots and Save A Lot took over that same Kroger building (correct me if I'm wrong...I think Big Lots is in the front and Save A Lot is in the rear.
The building that I am referring is (at present) only Big Lots. It may have been a Save A Lot at some point before Big Lots, I don't recall what was in there. The Save A Lot in this area is at Cleveland Street and Gulf Road, near the Elyria Post Office, Ridge Tool, and a Walgreens. That Save A Lot was a Dave's, but I have no idea what was there before that. The Kroger/Big Lots building is between Route 57 and South Abbe Road, just north of Broad Street. It shares a parking lot with a store that I remember being a Clarkins at one point in time. The next store I remember in this Clarkins building was a home improvement center (not Builder's Square, but I can't think of the name of it). There was a video store in a small portion of this building for a number of years with the remainder being empty until someone turned it into a flea market several years ago. That all ended when heavy rains and clogged roof drains ended in the rear wall of the building collapsing along with a small portion of the roof. That was repaired, but I don't believe the flea market ever reopened. Last I knew, Lorain County bought the building to use for offices.
Wellington Village Market
Post by Daniel » 02 Feb 2010 00:10
I made a return trip to the area, and made a stop in at the "Superstore" prototype Kroger that replaced the location that is now home to Goodwill. The exterior is unaltered, but the interior has been heavily modified. Even the floor was replaced.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/67661849@N00/4323638360/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/67661849@N ... otostream/
The building across the parking lot MarkW was referring to is still there, the home improvement store he was thinking of was DIY Home Warehouse. The signs for the closed swap meet thing were still up -- the sign visible from the main street can be seen in one of my shots of the Kroger building.
danielh_512
Location: Cleveland
Contact danielh_512
Post by danielh_512 » 03 Feb 2010 05:44
Kroger's lifespan in Lorain County appears to have lasted much longer than in the Cleveland area. While people have mentioned the superstore that's now Big Lots, Kroger did build a greenhouse at the Sheffield/Elyria line at the intersection of Abbe Rd. and Rt. 254. This is still pretty visible, and is home to a Discount Drug Mart. If the Abbe Rd. site with the other Discount Drug Mart is correct, and it wasn't Fazio's, then this greenhouse probably replaced it, being a short distance away.
It seems the Cleveland chains of the early years didn't have as strong a hold in Lorain County, which shows to this day. While Kroger left Cuyahoga County with their namesake in the late 70's as previously discussed, the Lorain County store probably lasted until the mid-80's at least. Considering the closer proximity of Lorain County to Sandusky (Only 35-40 miles West of Elyria), this store could have been combined into that market area.
That area had another Kroger superstore on the Elyria/Lorain line right along Rt. 57. That's now a Save-a-Lot/Dollar General unit, I believe. Another superstore was right on Rt. 20 in Norwalk which appears to have been under UFCW 880 and separate from the still-open Sandusky store. Apples took this one over, and it's now closed.
Sdorulla
Location: Cleveland, OH
Post by Sdorulla » 03 Feb 2010 13:07
The dime store at Ridgeview was G.C. Murphy. They also had a store in Kamms Plaza (Lorain Ave. and Rocky River Drive) in Cleveland. These are the only Murphy's in the Cleveland area that I know of.
@daniel512: Fisher Foods (Fazio's predecessor) had stores in Lorain County going back to the 40s, including downtown Elyria, Oberlin and at least one 50s shopping center store in Lorain. Fisher was the dominant chain in the grocery store and early supermarket era. Pick-n-Pay had a store at Sheffield Plaza, which I think was late 50s/early 60s, as well as Ridegview, but didn't expand much. Foodtown was never there, as far as I know. the demographics would never have drawn Heinen's or the Stop-n-Shop co-op. The other co-ops either focused on inner-city and near suburbs (Square Deal, Sav-Mor, Eagle) or had a funny collection of stores (Bi-Rite).
Lorain County was considered rather separate from "Greater Cleveland" until fairly recently and Elyria and Lorain had very different identities--Elyria was the county seat, while Lorain was more of a factory town (steel, shipbuilding) and had a more varied ethnic mix. Both towns were less affluent than the nearest towns that were considered Cleveland suburbs, including well-off places like Bay Village From the 70s onward, the only substantial growth in Lorain County has been the outward expansion of suburban Cleveland. "Greater Cleveland" historically has meant Cuyahoga County and, perhaps, western Lake County and now parts of Geauga and northern Summit County. Culturally, Cleveland is one of several places where the East meets the Midwest and the areas West of Cleveland feel much less pull than those to the East. That all starts on the West Side of Cleveland---it's not unlike the MD/VA split in the DC area and, in fact, East Side Clevelanders gravitate toward MD and DC, while West Siders go to VA.
Back to areas W of Cleveland--except for Lorain and Elyria, most of those markets didn't grow very much after WWII. The Sandusky/Port Clinton area was a draw for Clevelanders and for Cleveland businesses like Pick-n-Pay, but that area also has been a long-time draw for Mansfield (just down 250), Columbus, Toledo, and even southern Ohio. Fisher had an old 40s/50s store in Norwalk, but never expanded further West. they did expand South to Mansfield and to Warren.
Kroger kept one of their stores in Lake County (Painesville), as well as the ones in Lorain County, in addition to Akron-Canton and Warren/Youngstown after they left Cleveland. One of the Lake County stores was turned into Horne's (Great Lakes Mall) and may have been taken by the mall, rather than being one they wanted to close. The Willowick store would have been more integral to the Cleveland operation. They continued to advertise on Cleveland tv, but not in Cleveland newspapers.
Post by MarkW78 » 10 Feb 2010 11:49
danielh_512 wrote: Another superstore was right on Rt. 20 in Norwalk which appears to have been under UFCW 880 and separate from the still-open Sandusky store. Apples took this one over, and it's now closed.
I think you mean Route 250 in Norwalk. The company that I work for owns the Apples name from Lorain County west and the Norwalk store was ours. I can't remember exactly how long that Apples was open (I believe it was around 20 years). We closed it in December 2008 and moved all useful equipment and fixtures to storage or our other stores. This was shortly before we opened our newest store in Sheffield Lake in a store that Giant Eagle had vacated about the same time we closed Norwalk. I'm not sure who built this Sheffield Lake store - it is in a plaza off of Lake Road (address is actually 4100 Ivanhoe Drive).
I believe the Kroger/Big Lots location remained a Kroger into the mid-1980s. I remember Kroger signs on the building when I was younger and we were going to my aunt's house. I seem to remember a Rini Rego store in this building before Big Lots. Not sure if there were other tenants between Kroger and Big Lots.
Ah, if you work for Apples, then maybe you would know what, if anything, the Abbe Rd. store originally was. I went in there after I photographed the Kroger Big Lots to pick up some Mello Yello. (Which you can't buy in Cuyahoga County!) I love your well-preserved ex-Tops out in Sheffield. I'd love to photograph that interior! :) (Most store employees don't understand someone being a supermarket hobbyist, LOL)
It took me a few days to track down, but I did find out the history of the Abbe Road store. It was built by A&P. I don't know when or how long their store was in business. The company I work for opened the present Apples store in 1979.
If you pm me your contact information, I will talk to the store manager at Sheffield Center and see if I can get you in to photograph the store.
Post by Toby Radloff » 07 May 2010 19:28
Last time I was in Elyria, the former superstore Kroger on Abbe Road is now a Save A Lot. I would like to guess that the supermarket where the Discount Drug Mart and Goodwill are could be either Meyer Goldberg (a Lorain County grocery chain that went out of business in the late 1970's) or an independent (Sparkle, Apple's, or IGA?) I think Elyria's Fazio's was closer to the mall. Other possibilities could be a 1950's/1960's Kroger that preceded the Abbe Road superstore, or Loblaws. I know that Loblaws had stores in Berea, Sandusky, and possibly Toledo; they may have been in Lorain/Elyria as well. Next time I'm in Elyria I do plan to check out that Goodwill store.
I do stand corrected. Kroger had two superstores in Elyria. The Abbe Road store is Big Lots now. Another superstore building is on the Lorain-Elyria border, north of Midway Mall...that is now Save-A-Lot. I got the two buildings confused since they are within a few miles of each other.
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Saudi-led Coalition Killed 68 Children in Yemen: UN
The Saudi-led coalition that is fighting Houthirebels in Yemen is responsible for the deaths of scores of children since last summer, a United Nations report says.
Al Jazeera obtained excerpts from the confidential report by the UN Office on Children and Armed Conflict, which was sent to the UN Security Council on January 19.
According to the excerpts, the Saudi-led coalition killed 68 children and wounded 36 others from July to September 2017.
The report found there were at least 20 coalition raids every day – some targeting schools and homes.
Saudi Arabia, together with several other Arab nations, launched a military campaign in 2015 that aimed at rolling back advances made by Houthi rebels after they overran much of the country, including the capital, Sanaa, in 2014.
The Saudi-led intervention initially consisted of a bombing campaign and later saw a naval blockade and the deployment of ground forces into Yemen.
The coalition says it is attacking positions of the Houthi rebels in response to a request from the internationally recognised government of President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi.
Houthi killings
In addition to the coalition, the UN report also points fingers at the Houthis, blaming the rebels for the deaths of 18 children since last summer. Another 29 children were wounded in attacks by Houthis in the same period, the report says.
The report also notes that recruitment of children to fight has increased, particularly by the Houthis and the Yemeni National Army.
The UN describes the situation in Yemen as “the worst man-made humanitarian crisis” in the world, with the ongoing conflict making an already dire situation worse.
Speaking to Al Jazeera from Sanaa, Shabia Mantoo, spokesperson for the UN refugee agency, UNHCR, said thousands in Yemen are in desperate need of aid.
“It’s not just affecting children. It’s affecting everyone. It’s affecting 75 percent of the population. So our concern is that as long as this conflict continues, we’re going to see more and more casualties. We’re also going to see the humanitarian needs rise as well.
“So, children, women, the elderly, people with particular vulnerabilities; they are suffering the most in Yemen at the moment,” Mantoo said.
According to the UN children’s aid agency, UNICEF, more than 5,000 children have been killed or injured in the war – an average of five children a day – since the conflict escalated in March 2015.
UNICEF also says that more than 11 million children are in need of humanitarian assistance and nearly two million children are suffering from acute malnutrition.
In addition to a massive cholera outbreak, Yemen has also seen outbreaks of diphtheria in recent months.
Suze van Meegen, spokesperson of Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) in Yemen, said it is time the international community wakes up to the humanitarian situation in the country.
“It is astounding to me that we have the United Nations Security Council that has not commented on Yemen in, now more than seven months. The scale of suffering in Yemen is incomparable. We have 22 million people in need.
Read full article on Aljazeera, February 2, 2018.
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