When Marco Pinotti (HTC-Highroad) finished 9th overall in last year’s Giro d’Italia, a discerning minority regarded the performance, and not Ivan Basso’s victory, as the most significant of the Corsa Rosa for Italian cycling. For years an unheralded journeyman, Pinotti had slowly risen to prominence in the latter part of the noughties as contemporaries like Ivan Basso and Danilo Di Luca’s stock fell, their reputations and palmarès sullied by doping scandals.

Few, though, would have batted an eyelid at Pinotti’s five Italian national time trial titles, his four days in the pink jersey in 2007 or indeed his 2010 Giro campaign were it not for the anti-doping convictions he wore so forthrightly on his sleeve. A graduate engineer, he also spoke eloquently about the environment, the challenge of attracting kids to cycling and just about any topic on which his views were solicited. He was, in short, a worthy spokesperson for a cycling nation that for years had placed its trust in men of straw.

Last December, on the eve of the 2011 season, we sat down with Pinotti to retrace his career path up to this point. With just ten days to go to the start of the Giro in Turin, we’re about to discover whether cycling’s voice of reason – and Pinotti’s palmarès – will continue on the same heartening upward curve.

A shorter, adapted version of this interview appeared in the April issue of Procycling magazine.

Cyclingnews: Marco, let’s go right back to the start. How and why did you start cycling?

Marco Pinotti: I started riding when I was 16. I was Matteo Algeri’s teammate. One summer I went round to his house to do homework and we went for a bike ride together. He said I was quite good, that I should give it a go and so on. Then I went to watch an Under 23 race that October. I liked it so I started looking for a team. I found out there was one in my village. So I joined and the next season I started racing.

Did cycling run in the family?

No one rode bikes in my family but my granddad always liked cycling and wanted me to race. He died in January 1992 and that was the year I started racing. He never saw me on a bike but I know he’d have been my biggest fan. I was lucky to be from an area where there’s a lot of passion for cycling, which really developed after the war with Gimondi. He was winning in the sixties, then the oil industry was in crisis in the 1970s and people started using bikes as a mode of transport. So it really grew, then in the 1980s and 1990s you got the ripple effect of Gimondi and that generation. There were lots of clubs in the area then. In the second half of the 1990s, there were something like 27 professionals living in Bergamo, some born there, some from other regions or countries. They were all guys who had started riding in the late 1980s. Now it’s very different; now there are only a handful of pros in Bergamo. I think there are two reasons why it’s changed so much. One is that people just don’t ride bikes as much any more. The other is that the foreigners aren’t coming to Bergamo any more. There’s still Kanstantin Siutsou, Alexander Kuchinski, one of the Efimkin brothers, but that’s about it. That’s because it’s no longer a good place to train. If a young rider, someone like Tejay Van Garderen, asks me to recommend a place to stay and train in Italy, I’d like to say Bergamo but I tell them to go somewhere else.

Kids of your generation in Italy grew up very aware of cycling and the top riders, didn’t they? Do you think that’s changed now?

Italian kids are maybe as aware of cycling as they once were but it’s changed. There are a lot fewer races. There are a lot fewer kids too, when you think of it. Now families have one, two kids on average. There’s more traffic, so parents don’t want their kids on the road. And there’s a lot of competition from other sports. I don’t know…On one hand, the Federation will tell you that the numbers are going up but those statistics are “doped” slightly by the numbers doing mountain biking, which is safer. Granfondos have really taken off too – but those are generally over 30s who are doing it for health reasons. And again, Bergamo’s not at the forefront of that trend.

Did you follow the Giro, the Tour?

Even before I started racing, I followed cycling. I followed all sport. I loved the Tour – with LeMond, Bugno, the back end of Hinault’s career. But I didn’t have any idols as such. I can remember the Fignon and LeMond Tour really well. But I wasn’t a “fan” of any one rider.

You were more focused on your academic work? You went on to get a degree in engineering….

I was certainly more focused on my school work than cycling at that time. I started racing but I didn’t intend to turn pro. That idea only really entered my head the year before I turned pro. I always had to juggle academic work with cycling, so I was always a bit pressed for time. I thought I’d turn pro for two or three years and see how things went, whether my body could take the strain. But I would never have expected a career like I’ve had, so long and successful.

How successful were you as an amateur?

I won races but I was never up there with Basso and Di Luca, those guys. I was always in a small amateur team. Now, and even more so then, there was a massive difference between the big, very organized teams who went on training camps and were basically run like pro teams, with riders who were effectively pros because they’d left school and cycling was all they did. I never went to training camps. I just used to race on a Saturday then go back to my parents’. So, I won races but small ones. I was never really in the set-up for the national team. Time trials were the only way for me to get noticed on a national level. Without those, I would never have gone beyond a few good results in regional races. There was a bit of a dearth of good time triallists so that’s where I slotted in. That’s what got my name out there on a national level

They were rough, unpleasant times in Italian amateur cycling….

Yep. Absolutely. I don’t know what it’s like now but it certainly wasn’t easy then. History has taught us that a lot of victories in that era were the fruit of illegal short-cuts and not talent.

Pinotti in his element

You came into contact with professional cycling for the first time immediately after the Festina affair, when you joined Polti as a stagiaire in August 1998…

I guess I was conscious of what was happening…but the Festina affair was a good thing because it opened up the possibility for change. It gave cycling a big jolt. When I turned pro, I heard mentalities were already changing. Or at least there was that hope. So that was the first jolt, which made people finally take the war on doping seriously.

But did you know what you were getting into?

No, I had no idea.

And you hadn’t seen team-mates or opponents doping with your own eyes?

No.

So it wasn’t as though you were going to races and your team-mates were filling the minibar with EPO…

No. I think if that was ever the case, it probably changed in 1998. After Festina there probably wasn’t much organized doping. It was individual riders making their own choices then. Perhaps the teams were closing their eyes to it but there was no organized doping. I don’t know what it was like before Festina. But something definitely changed there.

Had you already asked yourself the question of whether you would dope or not?

I was lucky that I was turning pro just because I could. I also had an education behind me. I turned pro in 1999 and graduated in 2000. My main aim was to get my engineering degree, then I was going to evaluate whether I could still race my bike. If I could survive with my values and not do too badly…I like racing my bike, so why not continue? Then when I got my degree I felt even more secure because I had something to fall back on. I even went for interviews after I graduated just to see how attractive the offers were. But they weren’t so attractive that I wouldn’t rather carry on racing.

And in fact, in those first two years, you…

Did nothing [laughs].

Well, yeah, you didn’t get amazing results but you did OK.

Yes, yeah. I mean, I turned pro and rode and finished the Tour in my first year. It was one of my biggest achievements in the first part of my career. It was the first Tour that Armstrong won. I finished and the directeur sportifs were all happy with me. 

But it must have been tough.

Well, I didn’t do anything exceptional but, honestly, I finished without ever having been on my knees. I was OK. It was actually a really good thing to do the Tour in my first year because I said to myself that was as hard as it could get. The level was high but the others also had two legs, just like me, and there I was with them. It was a good first experience of the Tour.

Your friend Matteo Algeri had bit more trouble than you adapting to the pro scene.

He did two and a half years. He was passionate but he had lots of physical problems which maybe came from overextending himself to get up to scratch. He’d eventually had enough.

What were your sporting highlights in those first couple of years?

Finishing the Tour in 1999, coming second in a stage in 2001… I was in a break with Rik Verbrugghe. That was the first time I really became aware of Jonathan Vaughters because that was the day he had to quit the race because his eye was swollen from a bee sting and he couldn’t take cortisone. I saw the photos in the paper the next day. I was second in that stage and I was fifth or sixth in the young riders’ classification. I was 30 or 40 minutes behind on general classification but still one of the best Under 25s. That was good for me because I was coming off a few physical problems. Even then I realized that I recovered pretty well. I might have been 50th overall in that Tour but I was in the top five young riders and that was having lost a bit of time in the flat stages. In the mountains I was in the top 40 or 50. I can remember the Alpe d’Huez stage that Armstrong won, when he bluffed Ullrich. I was in the first group of around 40 at the bottom of Alpe d’Huez. I can remember Armstrong bluffing, the penultimate climb…

The Glandon.

That’s it. There were a few hard sections and I could see Armstrong dropping back behind me. He didn’t look too bad but it seemed strange that he was there at the back of the group. There was Livingston on the front, then Ullrich…I can remember Telekom working the whole day. Then we descended, got to the foot of Alpe d’Huez and I got dropped. I can remember being puzzled when I saw him on the Glandon.

With hindsight and everything that’s happening now, what are your impressions of Armstrong?

When I rode the Tour in 1999 he was a source of inspiration. I was like a lot of other people. Looking back now….when he gave up the first time and L’Equipe published the article about his 1999 urine samples, it was a bit of a kick in the stomach.

You believed in him before that?

Here’s the thing [long hesitation]. As long as you don’t have proof, you always hope. I hoped. But there I thought, blimey, everything people said, the rumours…it was all confirmed, albeit not from a legal point of view. Now all I know, I read in the newspapers, and when I read about this investigation in the United States, I just think there’s no point now – the time to act was years ago.

Would context be any excuse? If one were to say, if he’s proven guilty, that plenty of other people were doping?

No, it’s not.

There’s an argument that he also dictated, created the context. He was the standard bearer for the sport. If he had sent out strong signals, would the context have changed?

OK, but it’s not the riders’ responsibility to send out signals. His job is to race his bike and win. Armstrong never tested positive. OK, there are those tests from 1999 but he was never convicted. What annoys me is the role the authorities played or didn’t play. A few months ago I read Paul Kimmage’s book, Rough Ride. As I read it, I was thinking, blimey, this was 1990! And if my memory serves me, Kimmage said that one of the reasons he was writing it was so that the UCI would finally see what was happening. He talked about how the riders all knew there would be no dope tests in the last stage of a major tour, so they took amphetamines. And this gave him a dilemma: he didn’t want to take amphetamines but he did want to help his team leader. So what could he do? In the book, he was effectively asking why the UCI let this kind of thing happen. He wrote it as an invitation to the authorities to open their eyes. They didn’t and so they’re maybe the guiltiest ones.

OK, but there wasn’t always the technology to detect certain substances. The riders also had to take responsibility, let their own ethics govern the sport.

Agreed, but for years these people underestimated the problem. In 1997 it was the riders who applied pressure to introduce a haematocrit limit. Maybe it did more harm than good – I don’t know – but it was the people at the base of the pyramid, the riders, who demanded action before the authorities. I wasn’t there at the time but…I’m more angry with the people who facilitated all this or who didn’t do enough. But then yeah, you’re also right about riders and their ethics. Now there are people trying to undermine the credibility of the biological passport, which is a positive thing that the UCI have introduced. A lot has changed but when Landis says there are riders who the UCI has protected, if that’s true, it’s very serious.

Allegations don’t come much more serious that that.

Yeah, because there is this conflict of interests between promotion and organization. If I was in the UCI’s shoes, it’s clear that I would want to create heroes, drama. The two roles, promotion and legislation, should be separated. There ought to be collaboration with the UCI but they shouldn’t be in control of both areas.

Doping is a completely selfish act, isn’t it? Would you agree that these riders have no concern for the wellbeing of the sport?  

I agree.

For example, Danilo Di Luca gave an interview this winter explaining why he collaborated with the Italian Olympic Committee’s (CONI) anti-doping commission. He said he’d done it “because he couldn’t stand being away from races”. There was no notion of him doing it to serve the sport.

This is hypocrisy at its worst. Don’t get me started on Di Luca because if you do we’ll still be here tomorrow morning. I don’t want to talk about him.

But it’s obvious that you’d like to…

[long sigh] You can’t say what he said. I don’t know what he told the investigators – he must have said something if they reduced his ban – but compare Di Luca and Tom Zirbel. Zirbel was banned for two years by USADA having tested positive for DHEA. He didn’t know how it got into his body and he definitely didn’t take it intentionally. Nonetheless, he admitted that what enters an athlete’s body was his responsibility and he wasn’t able to prove that it was contamination, perhaps because he didn’t have the money and the lawyers. Anyway, he couldn’t prove it and he got banned for two years. There was another case - Zirbel heard about it - of an athlete who did manage to prove that he’d taken a contaminated supplement and the company got sued – but the athlete still only got a three-month reduction to his ban. Then along comes Di Luca, who’s already been charged twice -  once for consulting a doctor who’s banned from cycling for life and now for this. Di Luca tests positive, admits he did it and then he provides the investigators with information, which he can do because he’s an expert in the field, and they give him a nine-month reduction. Then what? He throws his hands up in the air and says, “I didn’t name any names. I didn’t spit in the soup. I just explained my doping methods.” So as an expert in the field, he’s told the investigators how you go about doping. At this point Zirbel says, “Ah, it’s a shame that I’m not an expert in doping. I should have pretended to be one then I’d be able to start racing again next year. Because I’m an idiot, though, and I let this substance get into my system without knowing how, I’ve got two years and I’m stuck with it.” You see these are the inconsistencies of the system. I read what Zirbel wrote and I thought, yeah, he’s right.  I respect him. I mean, they are two different bodies making the decisions, USADA and CONI, but the lack of uniformity is still unacceptable. It’s things like this that undermine cycling’s credibility.

And yet it’s a lot better than it was.

I say that if things remain as they are, it’s at least a big improvement on fifteen years ago. There’s been some progress. Everyone whinges about McQuaid but ever since he took over at the UCI – I don’t know, maybe under another president there would have been even greater strides – but things have improved. Maybe it’s because he’s come under pressure from WADA, the riders, the media, but efforts have been made. Cycling must be one of the cleanest sports now. I mean, I don’t know anything about other sports, but I know what happens in cycling. Sure, if you read WADA’s report on the Tour de France, you think to yourself that they’re still not doing enough, that the holes in the net are still too wide, but what do you do?

Is one of the reasons you still “hope” Armstrong was clean his charisma, his presence?

He definitely has that. I rode the 2009 Giro alongside him and you could see his charisma. Cycling has benefited from that. Do I hate him? No, because I’m more upset with the authorities. I never said a word to Armstrong all those years when he was winning the Tour. He was a lot more accessible at the Giro in 2009. Someone from the hospital in Bergamo called me during that race to ask whether Armstrong might agree to have his photo taken with the oncology department, since there was a stage finishing in Bergamo. I thought to myself there was no way, he’d have people asking him for stuff every two minutes…but I’d told this person that I’d try anyway. So at the first opportunity, in the middle of a stage one day, I found him in the bunch and asked him whether he might be able to help. He was really gracious, actually. He said they should look in the roadbook, find out where his team were staying at the end of the stage to Bergamo and meet him there in the evening. He even asked for their name, so he knew who it was. Sure enough, the day after the Bergamo stage, he found me in the bunch and told that the people had come and got the photos they wanted. Apparently the people from the hospital had invited him to some kind of conference in October but he couldn’t go because his girlfriend was due to give birth then. He was very approachable, really, which is not what you’d expect of someone that famous and in demand.

Another charismatic rider whose career overlapped with yours was Gilberto Simoni, your team-mate at Lampre and then again at Saunier Duval.

His was a different kind of charisma. He came to Lampre in 2000 and rode with us until the end of 2001, when he went to Saeco. Then in 2006 I rode with him again at Saunier Duval. I have good memories of him. He’s not someone who brings a team together, not that kind of leader…

Really?

Not in my experience. He was always a bit in his own world. He was very methodical [pauses] but in his own way. In winter, he hardly rode his bike. I can remember the first year that I was at Lampre, he started his training in January. Then he went and finished third in the Giro. Let’s say that he did things his way. Then, by the time we rode for Saunier Duval, he had become much more of a leader, which he needed to be because we had a lot of young riders. The directeur sportif would often give his briefing in the morning and Gibo would interject with his own ideas. He started to have a big influence on the directeurs sportifs, probably as a result of having won the Giro twice and grown in confidence. He didn’t shout but he didn’t have to; when he talked, you listened.

With the media, he was very enigmatic. Sometimes it could be quite comical.

He was like that with us too. You thought he wasn’t paying attention but he noticed everything, then he’d deliver these killer one-liners. If you messed up in a race he wasn’t one to bang his fists the table and if you did something right he’d always remember it. You’d finish stages happy with the work you’d done for the team but thinking Gibo probably hadn’t even noticed certain things, yet he always did. He was always brutally frank as well – a typical mountain man. He didn’t care about public relations.

Which other riders have particularly influenced you in your career?

I learned a lot from Chris Horner.

Tell us more.

Yeah. I raced with him at Saunier Duval. He had real race craft, really good tactical sense, but all of his own, very American. I can remember in the 2005 Tour of Switzerland, he, Leonardo Piepoli and Fabian Jeker were our strongest riders on the climbs and in the transitional stages rest of us had to cover the breaks. I can remember this puzzling him. He said that all team leaders seemed to do in Europe was sit on for the whole race and see how far they could get on the summit finishes. He couldn’t understand why the leaders didn’t also pull on the flat stages, or why they weren’t covering the breaks too. So he had pretty different perspective from the rest of us. He’d been in Europe in the late 1990s, it hadn’t really worked, then he’d come over for the second time in 2005. He was 34 at the time yet, to listen to him, you’d have thought that he still had six, seven years as a pro ahead of him. I couldn’t work it out: he’d been at La Française des Jeux, broken his scaphoid or something, then won everything in America and come back over here. And here he was now sounding like a kid at the start of his career. I said to myself, blimey, never mind six or seven, the way he’s talking he’s going to ride for another ten years. He was 34 then and now I’ve just had my best season at 34 years of age… and he’s just had his best year at 39.

So it was the power of positive thinking, youth as a self-fulfilling prophesy?

That’s it. I was 29 at the time and I was thinking I didn’t have that long left. I looked at him and thought he’d have one, two years at best. But then you heard him, and five years on you can see now that it wasn’t just wishful thinking on his part. There he is at 39 winning at the Tour of the Basque Country.

In your own career, moving to T-Mobile, which soon became Highroad, was a massive turning point.

Yeah. I’d always wanted to ride in a foreign team and the culture of an American team suited me perfectly. The constant striving to improve, the innovation…it lit a fire under the passion I already had.  It’s the main reason why I’ve improved so much. The old way that still prevailed in Italian teams had its advantages but you only have to look at what this team’s for done me to see that this is the way forward. Liquigas is still a big team but Italy’s still a very traditionalist country because its cycling culture has such deep roots. For example, in this team we spend hours if not days getting our bikes properly fitted. In Italian teams, if they do it, it’s just for show, for the press. I’m not even sure they’re convinced that these things have an effect on performance. For example, at Lampre, Compex supplied us with electro-stimulators, like they do here. But there the directeurs gave us the Compex and that was it, whereas here, last year, we had a two-hour seminar on how to use it. See what I mean? There I seem to remember half of the team got a Compex at the start of the season, they took some photos, then the rest of us got ours later in the year, but no one ever told us how to use it. The same thing with nutritional supplements and equipment. You might already know the stuff that they tell you but you might not. Maybe in Italy the amateurs are more advanced in terms of what they know but then they stop learning.

Somehow it’s hard to imagine you becoming a directeur sportif when you retire, whether it’s in Italy or anywhere else.

You never know. I can’t really see myself driving a team car but you never know. At the moment I’m thinking about racing and nothing else. I’m better off being like Chris Horner and living for the moment. That’s where my focus is now.

...

Yep, we messed up. That's the word out of the Cambridge-based consulting firm Monitor Group. Between 2006 and 2008, the company maintained a highly questionable business relationship with the regime of Muammar Qaddafi, the Libyan dictator. Monitor helped Muammar Qaddafi's son Saif write his PhD dissertation at the London School of Economics. It also hired some of the US and UK's foremost international relations experts to write glowing editorials and essays about the Qaddafi regime's efforts to clean up its act and enact democratic reforms. And the firm never revealed that it was all was part of a coordinated—and well-funded—effort to end Libya's status as a pariah state.

Not long after Mother Jones reported on Monitor's Libya project, questions arose about whether the firm had taken the proper steps to register as a lobbyist for Libya with the Justice Department. Offering advice on economic or governing reform without registering isn't illegal. But the Foreign Agent Registration Act (FARA) stipulates that groups like Monitor must register if they're planning on conducting "acts in a public relations capacity for a foreign principal"—which, as we reported, is primarily what Monitor's Libya project was all about. As we wrote back in March, Monitor decided to conduct an internal investigation into whether it had violated FARA, initially led by Eamonn Kelly, a senior partner at the firm. Later, the company brought in outside lawyers from the firm of Covington & Burling to finish the job.

The lawyers' conclusion: yes, Monitor most certainly did break FARA law. Today, the company announced that it is retroactively registering some of its past work in Libya, as well as its more recent work with Jordan. And on Tuesday, Monitor CEO Mark Fuller, who played a key role in the Libya project, resigned. Monitor also issued a press release on the findings of its internal investigation:

These decisions reflect a thorough fact-finding and legal investigation initiated by Monitor after issues concerning its work in Libya were raised earlier this year. The investigation, conducted by the law firm of Covington & Burling, included a review of Monitor engagements with foreign governments. That review concluded that some elements of Monitor’s work in Libya from 2006 through 2008 should have been registered under FARA. It also became apparent that a more recent item of work on behalf of the Kingdom of Jordan should have been registered. Monitor will now take all appropriate measures to remediate these errors.

The Boston Globe reports that Monitor is also likely to release details on how much it paid its academics, including British academic Sir Anthony Giddens. How did Monitor mess this up so bad? From the Globe:

[Eamonn] Kelly said the failure to register was due to a misunderstanding about legal requirements. But others said it reflects a deeper problem: The company was not transparent about the fact that it was engaged in a calculated effort to burnish Khadafy’s reputation, even to professors recruited in the effort.

"If I had known that a primary purpose of the visit to Libya was to influence public opinion in the United States, I would not have gone," Robert Putnam, a professor at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, said in a telephone interview yesterday. Other professors said they did not feel misled.

Whether the DOJ actually brings charges against Fuller, et. al, remains to be seen. But given the intellectual firepower and general worldliness of the people involved in its project, Monitor's excuse—"We didn't know, sorry"—is less than satisfying. Hopefully, the DOJ feels the same way. 

Yep, we messed up. That's the word out of the Cambridge-based consulting firm Monitor Group. Between 2006 and 2008, the company maintained a highly questionable business relationship with the regime of Muammar Qaddafi, the Libyan dictator. Monitor helped Muammar Qaddafi's son Saif write his PhD dissertation at the London School of Economics. It also hired some of the US and UK's foremost international relations experts to write glowing editorials and essays about the Qaddafi regime's efforts to clean up its act and enact democratic reforms. And the firm never revealed that it was all was part of a coordinated—and well-funded—effort to end Libya's status as a pariah state.

Not long after Mother Jones reported on Monitor's Libya project, questions arose about whether the firm had taken the proper steps to register as a lobbyist for Libya with the Justice Department. Offering advice on economic or governing reform without registering isn't illegal. But the Foreign Agent Registration Act (FARA) stipulates that groups like Monitor must register if they're planning on conducting "acts in a public relations capacity for a foreign principal"—which, as we reported, is primarily what Monitor's Libya project was all about. As we wrote back in March, Monitor decided to conduct an internal investigation into whether it had violated FARA, initially led by Eamonn Kelly, a senior partner at the firm. Later, the company brought in outside lawyers from the firm of Covington & Burling to finish the job.

The lawyers' conclusion: yes, Monitor most certainly did break FARA law. Today, the company announced that it is retroactively registering some of its past work in Libya, as well as its more recent work with Jordan. And on Tuesday, Monitor CEO Mark Fuller, who played a key role in the Libya project, resigned. Monitor also issued a press release on the findings of its internal investigation:

These decisions reflect a thorough fact-finding and legal investigation initiated by Monitor after issues concerning its work in Libya were raised earlier this year. The investigation, conducted by the law firm of Covington & Burling, included a review of Monitor engagements with foreign governments. That review concluded that some elements of Monitor’s work in Libya from 2006 through 2008 should have been registered under FARA. It also became apparent that a more recent item of work on behalf of the Kingdom of Jordan should have been registered. Monitor will now take all appropriate measures to remediate these errors.

The Boston Globe reports that Monitor is also likely to release details on how much it paid its academics, including British academic Sir Anthony Giddens. How did Monitor mess this up so bad? From the Globe:

[Eamonn] Kelly said the failure to register was due to a misunderstanding about legal requirements. But others said it reflects a deeper problem: The company was not transparent about the fact that it was engaged in a calculated effort to burnish Khadafy’s reputation, even to professors recruited in the effort.

"If I had known that a primary purpose of the visit to Libya was to influence public opinion in the United States, I would not have gone," Robert Putnam, a professor at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, said in a telephone interview yesterday. Other professors said they did not feel misled.

Whether the DOJ actually brings charges against Fuller, et. al, remains to be seen. But given the intellectual firepower and general worldliness of the people involved in its project, Monitor's excuse—"We didn't know, sorry"—is less than satisfying. Hopefully, the DOJ feels the same way. 

The 2010-11 Gallaudet University athletics year officially came to a close on Monday, May 2, in the Jordan Student Academic Center Multipurpose Room as the GU athletics department held its annual awards ceremony.

MIT SENSEable City Lab: Borderline

The Data Dimension at FutureEverything 2011 (Manchester, UK) features an eclectic mix of design and art projects which gesture towards a data-driven culture. The first microscope was designed by Galileo Galilei (1564–1642). The microscope, like the telescope, revealed entirely new worlds, at scales impossible for humans to perceive. Today, like their predecessor, scientists, artists, academics and amateurs, re-purpose, extend, and invent new technologies to observe and comprehend the things no one has seen or understood before. This not only reveals a previously unimagined realm, more than this it constructs a new reality, giving shape and life to a new dimension. The artworks featured in The Data Dimension are an example of the type of experiments taking place. They are spyglasses to study the microscopic, immaterial and infinitely complex. This is about illuminating a future, and creating a new perspective, on a world that is only beginning to emerge. The Data Dimension presents a selection of these Digital Microscopes; artworks that nurture new insights into the invisible infrastructures that make up our world. Here designers and artists visualise the invisible layer of complex data that surrounds our daily lives, making data come alive.
Nicholas Felton

Before we can do anything with data, we first need to gather the information. The devices and applications we daily use automatically capture data on the electronic interactions in our everyday lives. Some people voluntarily record everyday data, in some cases as a performative act, recording their daily routines and habits. One such data obsessive is Nicholas Felton, whose Annual Reports transform the minutiae of his daily interactions into graphic design. Seemingly mundane happenings such as his conversations with friends accumulate over time to reveal startling new dimensions on the everyday. Felton has released an app, Daytum, which enables all of us to similarly become hoarders of the everyday and to discover new dimensions on our own lives. New social realities emerge through capturing and making sense of everyday data. How do we come to know, or see, or experience something which has no physical form? To make sense of it we need to turn it into something we can understand. One way to do this is through visualisation. To visualise is to give form to something not yet known as a visual image; to turn it into something we can make sense of with sight. A commissioned artwork, FlavourCollider by Marcos Lutyens, gives visual form to the sense of taste. Located in a bar within the art space, users drink cocktails while wearing a EEG headset and their brain activity is translated into a real-time visualisation. The work explores the neurological condition of synesthesia, and the connection between taste and shape.
reMap from Bestario

Complexity is the consequence of our increased capacity to measure more accurately the world around us. The more we discover, the more complex the world becomes. reMap from Bestario, is a meta-visualisation; a visualisation of visualisations and, as such, serves as an excellent introduction to this domain. Curated by Manual Lima, this is a comprehensive review of visualisation projects that relate to complex systems. Bestiario pushes forward the technical display of world class data visualizations and allows audiences to instinctively search a huge database of visualizations using tags and keywords, allowing navigation using a semantic approach and depicting relations among them. This brings to life the way it is possible to search and navigate the new data domains. A regular collaborator in FutureEverything, Aaron Koblin, now heads the Google Data Arts department. Search is also an issue for the media industries and the BBC. Bill Thompson is part of a team working on the BBC Archive and building a Digital Public Space. Increasingly, we need more innovative ways with which to navigate this data terrain. BBC Data Art for example offer a glimpse of the future of television. We are still in search era, in which we are all just looking for things. A trio of projects, Political Atmospherics, NewsTraces and TV Related Content: News 24 suggest that in the future, we will have more systems that will do more for us, in ways that we can't yet comprehend. Berg, with Timo Arnall and Dentsu London, document real-time material representations that grow from an originating data source in Making Future Magic. This is a video sketch of an inventive technique for creating three-dimensional forms in light by moving an iPad through space. It is one of a series of experiments in giving tangible form to 'Immaterials' (Matt Jones), formless dimensions in our daily environments such as data and wifi clouds. The data dimension is immaterial, it affects everything, and yet we cannot reach out and touch it. Its physical reality is in the server farms, vast rooms full of computers hosting the data and applications. We make sense of it through metaphors such as the cloud, the domain of remote services and applications we access from any point in space. By transposing it from the confines of the screen and into the physical world, focus is drawn to the materiality of the data itself.
Nathalie Miebach

There is potential for us to do more than simply paint space with data. Art works include Form Follows Data, a data sculpture project in which Iohanna Pani presents her quantified self and her domestic encounters in the form of everyday objects, such as a cup which physically reflects the volume consumed each day, making tangible the language of personal statistical data. Capturing obscure weather data using very simple data-collecting devices and transforming it into abstract sculptures, Nathalie Miebach creates intricate wall pieces that function both as musical scores and weather almanacs. In Food of Art, Nadeem Haidary conducts data analytics on still life paintings, analysing twelve masterpieces for their nutritional content, breaking down food values from Frans Snyders' 39,851 calorie feast to Vincent Van Gogh's four meager onions. Presenting a witty analogue take on digital metrics in physical space, Hit Counter by Zach Gage is an interactive piece which narcissistically counts its own visitors and proudly presents this number as the art work itself.
Kevin MacDonald

New forms of narrative and personalisation are also possible. Chris Milk and Aaron Koblin's groundbreaking music video experiment for Arcade Fire, The Wilderness Downtown, shows a user her childhood streets after submitting postcode data. Search and mass participation strike a deeply cinematic note in a preview of 'The YouTube movie', a Kevin MacDonald directed feature film Life In A Day, edited together using thousands of YouTube clips uploaded in a single day, July 24, 2011. From intimate moments of personal experience, to vast themes of birth and death, an epic self-portrait emerges via mass participation, as editor Joe Walker creates a kaleidoscopic compilation from 4,500 hours of footage in 80,000 submissions from 140 nations. Upon viewing Borderline, from MIT SENSEable City Labs, we realise that lines on a map are in fact meaningful connections — a multitude of human interactions, unfolding before you in real time. Borderline redraws the map of Great Britain based on the complexity of billions of human connections, and asks if regional boundaries defined by governments respect the more natural ways that people interact across space. It reveals for instance that the effects of a possible secession of Wales from Great Britain would be twice as disruptive for the human network as that of Scotland.
Iohanna Pani

The Data Dimension also imagines a future beyond the computer screen. In the Media Surfaces video sketch, Berg present data in physical context. Travellers in a train station are able to interact with a panoply of screens and smart surfaces reflect our data back to us. Here, we imagine the built environment as interface, in what could be described as a form of data signage. A useful analogy to help explain this idea is to think of the world as a computer, with these signs playing the same role icons or menus do on a computer desktop, indicating objects and their operations; a graphical user interface for interaction with the world. Combine this characteristic with innovation in touch-screen display, which includes 'shape-memory' layers that when activated lend the displayed image physical texture. It is possible to imagine a future where data really is without boundaries and it shapes the physical world around us. Dr. Drew Hemment is an artist, curator and writer based in Manchester England. He is Founder and Director of FutureEverything (formerly Futuresonic, est. 1995), and is Associate Director of ImaginationLancaster at Lancaster University. Winner of the Lever Prize 2010, Shortlisted for the Big Chip International Award for Innovation 2010 and the Arts & Business Award 2010, Runner Up Lever Prize 2009, Honorary Mention for Director at Prix Ars Electronica 2008. His work has been covered prominently by New York Times, BBC and NBC, and he has served on many prominent international Art Juries including UNESCO DigiArts. In 1999, awarded a PhD at Lancaster University, in 2009 elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of the Arts (UK), and in 2010 an Eyebeam resident (USA).

Kevin Smith is an academic at HighWire, Lancaster University. His research focuses on the concept of Adaptive Signs- an entity that signifies the change in state of another entity by adapting accordingly. His research sits at the intersection of Information Design, Data Visualisation, Context Aware Computing and Organic User Interfaces.

Strayer University was founded in 1892 with a mission is to make high quality post-secondary education achievable for working adults. Strayer has become one of the most respected adult-focused universities in America and a leading provider of online education. We now serve more than 45,000 students online and at over 85 campuses in 21 states and the District of Columbia.

Strayer University’s Woodbridge, VA Campus is seeking a Part-Time Student Support Representative.

Through the guidance of the Student Support Managers, the Student Support Representative coordinates and implements the timely enrollment of continuing students, both in-school and reinstate, and all associated retention activities with assigned student advisees. Solicits feedback from students withdrawing from the University, provides guidance and assistance needed for the re-enrollment of out-of-school continuing students, and offers feedback to campus management regarding information attained from conversations with continuing students.


Essential duties of the Student Support Representative:

• Meets set enrollment goals on a regular basis as set forth by the Student Support Managers and Campus Director in coordination with the Campus Dean.
• Regularly meets with the Student Support Manager and others in the retention group to review continuing student enrollment activities and related issues.
• Monitors the progress of each student in meeting the expectations and timelines he/she established when developing his/her Personal Education Plan (PEP).
• Proactively supports the continued enrollment of students to increase their potential to attain their educational objectives.
• Regularly communicates with assigned in-school and reinstate student populations, via telephone, email and paper mailings, postings, surveys, and classroom presentations, to encourage and facilitate continued enrollment.
• Monitors attendance postings on a daily basis and follows-up with all students who have missed two or more consecutive class meetings.
• Identifies at-risk students and works with them to identify interventions (i.e. tutoring, additional academic advising, etc) needed to assist them succeed in collegiate environment.
• Reviews the University’s weekly drop report and contacts all assigned campus students appearing on the report, and encourages the re-enrollment of withdrawing students.
• Daily reviews enrollment reports and tracks numbers relative to the enrollment of continuing students.
• Reports and works to resolve problems impacting student enrollment with the appropriate department (e.g. student services, academics, etc.).

Requirements
• Two years experience in counseling or customer service.
• Excellent customer service and interpersonal skills.
• A goal and detail-orientated in their work style.
• A pro-active and highly organized approach.
• The ability to carry out multiple tasks and function with minimal supervision.
• The ability to meet set enrollment goals on a quarterly basis.
• Demonstrated knowledge of the student enrollment process and guidelines.
• Proficiency in MS Office Suite (Excel, Outlook, PowerPoint, Word, etc.)
• Excellent oral and written communication skills

Hours
Monday - Thursday 3pm-8pm
Saturday 9am-5pm
(Additional hours as needed)

If you are seeking a growing organization where you can use your talents to help others achieve their goals, come lead our professional admissions team. We offer a competitive salary and significant career growth opportunities.

To apply online, please visit www.strayer.edu/careers

• Location: Woodbridge, VA
• Compensation: $10-12/hour
• This is a part-time job.
• Principals only. Recruiters, please don't contact this job poster.
• Please, no phone calls about this job!
• Please do not contact job poster about other services, products or commercial interests.

Department of Radiology launches @StanfordImaging Twitter feed Scope (blog) The medical school's Department of Radiology recently launched a Twitter account - @StanfordImaging - to highlight the work of the academic department and to engage physicians outside Stanford. The feed is curated by Stanford resident ...

Although for good academic reasons I am rather wary of the normative aspects of the term recovery I was pleased to see that in the new Drug Strategy the coalition government recognise that recovery is "an individual, person-centred journey" and that they'll support "medicallyassisted recovery" (MAR). Although I have only recently come across the term after reading the work of William White (1), Lisa Mojer-Torres (2) and Stephen Bamber (3) amongst others, I am quite willing to put myself in the category of persons journeying along the MAR pathway. But my relationship to treatment was not always thus.

I have been taking opiates in one form or another for a number of years, and for most of that time I have been scripted and either studying at university or in work. Granted, when I first got a script back in 1993, after I'd developed a dependence on over-the-counter medications during the final year of my degree studies in London, I perhaps should have been offered a detox rather than a script, but I had just started a Master of Arts (MA) at the time and this would have unfeasible. So, I got myself on a script and started to stabilise with the notion that I'd give up at a later date, after my studies. I hadn't thought about rehab as then, and for many years after, I had the belief that only rock stars and the rich had that luxury. This was, perhaps, confirmed when I went for my first inpatient detox at High Royds Hospital, a rather elegant former pauper lunatic asylum, latterly an inpatient psychiatric unit on the outskirts of Leeds. Great as it was - as I had enjoyed reading Foucault's Madness and Civilization as part of my Cultural Studies MA - it was not so great for me personally. Unfortunately I had an adverse reaction to lofexidine and had to leave and return to my script after three days. My next attempt was a home detox with dihydrocodeine which I did for a few months, after which the addiction unit at Leeds bid me farewell and not long after that I moved back to London. However, although I wasn't then aware of the definition of addiction as a chronic relapsing condition, I found that I couldn't stop myself from traipsing around the many chemists in London purchasing anything with a codeine, morphine or opium content. I wasn't really made for the day to day use of street heroin and the culture around it, although I'd occasionally buy street methadone until I got another script sorted out, this time from the Drug Dependency Unit (DDU) in Camden. Again I found that with methadone I stabilised and got myself back to work. So what was wrong with methadone? At the time, for me, everything.

"I began to slowly reject my negative self-talk about being on methadone"

All I could see was the unwelcoming offices of the DDU based at the old Temperance Hospital on Hampstead Road with a lot of drug activity going on around it and the endless forms of control I had to submit myself to. Picking up every day, endless key worker visits, lack of spontaneity as I couldn't go away without giving my prescriber two weeks notice and, if I wanted to go abroad, having to choose a country that would let me in with methadone. It was tedious and boring. And this, I believed, was the function of treatment, to make drug taking as tedious and boring as possible so that you'd quit. But I didn't, I kept one foot in the world of the clinic and one foot in the street, topping up occasionally on street drugs and a rather nasty bout of bacterial endocarditis which left me with an artificial aortic valve and I ended up in hospital for almost 7 months. Sometime afterwards I tried quitting again at home, which worked for a while but then the same thing happened. Back on a script and working my way up the publishing sector ladder I got involved with Narcotics Anonymous (NA) despite being a committed atheist and having reservations about joining any group. I got a certain amount of support there and after five years on a script decided to go into rehab, still really being pushed along because I wanted to escape from what I saw as an institutionally unhealthy clinic system which has been documented so well by William White (4) in the United States.

I got accepted at a swish residential 12 step rehab in Wiltshire, and after six weeks of not exactly buying into the methodology, came out to no aftercare, apart from the little self referring I managed to do. You can guess what's coming next: in the middle of 2008 I found myself back on a methadone script and my only plans now were to get a job and wait a while. I consequently found myself interning at DrugScope in 2009 where for the first time I came across work on MAR which I devoured like a convert. I began to slowly reject my negative self-talk about being on methadone, and as I was in a supportive environment I was able to disclose that I was on medication and found I was not treated any differently. I'm currently on what these days would be considered a "low level optimal dose"and quite happy with it, so that when I do meet with my key worker once a month I usually have chat about what I've been reading lately and the current concerns in the treatment sector. I'm still with the local drug team but I'm currently looking into shared care as an option to free up more of my time.

The UK treatment system, and from my experience the mutual aid groups such as NA, are a long way from the US in accepting MAR as a treatment model for those who wish to go down that route. Medication-Assisted Recovery is a model of recovery which differs from the abstinence model in that those who are stable on a range of medications such as methadone, buprenorphine, and morphine are able to participate in the recovery movement. The UK has been rather slow in taking this idea forward whereas the US has several years of establishing this model. It works along with the usual recovery supports such as counseling and peer support. Although these medications are not a cure to dependency, they do help thousands maintain a fruitful and enjoyable life and play a role in helping people begin and sustain recovery. GPs may find Stephen Bamber's Infographic on Medication Assisted Recovery of use (5).

Methadone is still a highly stigmatised medication and it's going to take a lot of pushing and shoving to get the rights for those in MAR upheld. Through The Alliance (6) and other user groups you hear stories of Drug and Alcohol Action Teams invoking time-limited scripting, or removing injectables for those who need them against all the evidence to the contrary. And in the realm of employment there should be legislation to prevent discrimination against those on medications related to drug dependency or in recovery in general. I've been working on the stigma report for the UK Drug Policy Commission and it doesn't make for optimistic reading (7).

I'm currently trying my utmost to support groups working for users' rights, and I'm involved in Frontline, the Camden service users group and working with INPUD. I did, however, find myself err quite recently. I was having a sight test at the local optician and was asked what medication, if any, I was currently taking. I thought for a millisecond or three and replied, "ah, none...". A luta continua* as they say.

*The struggle continues

1. www.williamwhitepapers.com

2. www.facesandvoicesofrecovery.org

3. www.theartoflifeitself.org

4. White, W. (2009) Long term strategies to reduce stigma attached to addiction, treatment, and recovery within the City of Philadelphia. Philadelphia: Department of Behavioral Health and Mental Retardation Services

5. www.theartoflifeitself.org

6. www.m-alliance.org.uk

7. www.ukdpc.org.uk

 

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - After a series of high-profile natural gas drilling spills, the Energy Department named a panel to recommend ways to improve the safety of hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, a technique that has expanded the country's potential to extract the fuel.

President Barack Obama asked the DOE to form the panel of academic and environmental experts to identify any immediate steps that can be taken to improve the safety and environmental performance of fracking, the DOE said on Thursday.

[More]

Girls on the Run of St. Louis has been approved for $51,890 in state tax credits. The organization said it would use the Youth Opportunities Program tax credits to fund its after-school program for girls in third through eighth grades, the Missouri Department of Economic Development said. This program will use an academic curriculum which contains 20 lessons that focus on specific life skills and training for a 5K race. These skills include, conflict resolution, goal-setting, leadership and interpersonal...

San Francisco Examiner

Rankings show strong schools San Mateo Daily Journal Local schools found out where they ranked and just how much road must be covered by next year, when the California Department of Education yesterday morning released the 2010 Base Academic Performance Index growth targets and school rankings. ... New state rankings released for California schoolsSan Jose Mercury News Base Academic Performance Index numbers released by California Department of ...Imperial Valley Press 21 Poway Unified Schools Rank High in CaliforniaPatch.com Pomerado Newspaper Group -San Francisco Examiner -Gilroy Dispatch all 46 news articles »

Telaprevir SVR & African-Americans, Latinos & Advanced Fibrosis -
Reported by Jules Levin

62% of African Americans/Blacks achieved SVR with telaprevir compared to 25% of African Americans/Blacks who were treated with pegylated-interferon and ribavirin alone. Additionally, 62% of people with advanced liver fibrosis or cirrhosis (scarring of the liver) achieved SVR with telaprevir compared to 33% who were treated with pegylated-interferon and ribavirin alone. Old studies of peg/rbv in African-Americans yielded SVR rates of 5-26%.

African-Americans treatment-naïve: 61% had undetectable viral load at week 4 (RVR) and 46% at weeks 4 and 12 (eRVR)- 72% with RVR achieved SVR & 85% with eRVR achieved SVR. Similar for Latinos...

Hepatitis Awareness Month --- May 2011 Weekly
May 6, 2011 / 60(17);537

This month marks the 16th anniversary of Hepatitis Awareness Month in the United States. Viral hepatitis, particularly infection with hepatitis B virus (HBV) or hepatitis C virus (HCV), is a major cause of morbidity and mortality. This issue of MMWR includes a report that focuses on a recent trend in HCV infection.

The report shows an increase in cases of HCV infection during 2002--2009 among adolescents and young adults aged 15--24 years in Massachusetts and highlights the fundamental role of surveillance in identifying emerging patterns of transmission and developing appropriate public health response. The Massachusetts cases were reported from all areas of the state, primarily among non-Hispanic whites. Injection drug use (IDU) was the most common risk factor for HCV transmission, and the increase in case reports suggests an epidemic of HCV infection related to IDU in this age group in Massachusetts.

In 2010, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) of the National Academies of Sciences issued a report on viral hepatitis outlining recommendations for the prevention and control of HBV and HCV infection, including improvement in public health surveillance for viral hepatitis and viral hepatitis screening linked with prevention and care (1). In response to the IOM report, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services is developing a comprehensive viral hepatitis action plan that will set forth strategies to improve viral hepatitis prevention, care, and treatment in the United States. Additional information regarding viral hepatitis is available from CDC at http://www.cdc.gov/hepatitis

Most patients with NASH who develop hepatocellular carcinoma are men

A study in the most recent issue of Clinical Gastroenterology & Hepatology investigates characteristics of patients with NASH who develop hepatocellular carcinoma.

Nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) can progress to hepatocellular carcinoma. Dr Kohichiroh Yasui and colleagues characterized the clinical features of NASH patients with hepatocellular carcinoma. In a cross-sectional multicenter study in Japan, the team examined 87 patients with histologically proven NASH who developed hepatocellular carcinoma. The clinical data were collected at the time hepatocellular carcinoma was diagnosed. Obesity, diabetes, dyslipidemia, and hypertension were present in 62%, 59%, 28%, and 55% of patients, respectively. In nontumor liver tissues, the degree of fibrosis was stage 1 in 11% of patients, stage 2 in 17%, stage 3 in 21%, and stage 4 in 51%. The research team observed that the prevalence of cirrhosis was significantly lower among male patients compared with female patients. Dr Yasui's team concluded, "Most patients with NASH who develop hepatocellular carcinoma are men." "The patients have high rates of obesity, diabetes, and hypertension." "Male patients appear to develop hepatocellular carcinoma at a less advanced stage of liver fibrosis than female patients." Clin Gastroenterol Hepatol 2011: 9(5): 428-33 06 May 2011 Composite prognostic model for hepatocellular carcinoma recurrence A study in May's issue of Gastroenterology combines clinical, pathology, and gene expression data to predict recurrence of hepatocellular carcinoma. In approximately 70% of patients with hepatocellular carcinoma treated by resection or ablation, disease recurs within 5 years. Although gene expression signatures have been associated with outcome, there is no method to predict recurrence based on combined clinical, pathology, and genomic data. Dr Augusto Villanueva and colleagues from Spain evaluated gene expression signatures associated with outcome in a large cohort of patients with early stage, single-nodule hepatocellular carcinoma and heterogeneity of signatures within tumor tissues. The research team assessed 287 hepatocellular carcinoma patients undergoing resection and tested genome-wide expression platforms using tumor and adjacent nontumor, cirrhotic tissue. The team evaluated gene expression signatures with reported prognostic ability generated from tumor or cirrhotic tissue in 18 and 4 reports, respectively. In 15 additional patients, the team profiled samples from the center and periphery of the tumor, to determine stability of signatures. The researchers found that gene expression signatures that were associated with aggressive hepatocellular carcinoma were clustered, as well as those associated with tumors of progenitor cell origin and those from nontumor, adjacent, cirrhotic tissues. The team observed that the tumor-associated signature G3-proliferation, and an adjacent poor-survival signature were independent predictors of hepatocellular carcinoma recurrence, along with satellites. Samples from different sites in the same tumor nodule were reproducibly classified. Dr Villanueva's team concluded, "We developed a composite prognostic model for hepatocellular carcinoma recurrence, based on gene expression patterns in tumor and adjacent tissues." "These signatures predict early and overall recurrence in patients with hepatocellular carcinoma, and complement findings from clinical and pathology analyses." Gastroenterol 2011: 140(5): 1501-1512 05 May 2011

Show and Shines to support liver society

Two years and nine months: that's how long Karen Stacey has been on the waiting list for a liver transplant.

Despite the obvious stress experienced as well as impact on her day-to-day health, Stacey, 50, has not only stayed patient, she's stayed positive, dedicating herself to helping others facing a similar diagnosis with a liver disease. From family members to her community, Stacey has always been active in helping others. In 2008, she took her community activism to the next level by founding the Happy Liver Society, a non-profit providing advocacy and support services to liver disease patients. "I've always been that person that looks after people . . . It just is a comfortable role for me," she says.

Two new clinical trials registries established

1. The Cuban Public Registry of Clinical Trials / Registro Público Cubano de Ensayos Clínicos (RPCEC). This is the first Primary Registry to include trials in both Spanish and English. Spanish speakers might be interested in watching a video of the event held to make the announcement by the Ministry of Health in Havana, Cuba on 5th April 2011. Go to http://youtu.be/STeI9F-lnM0

2. The Brazilian Clinical Trials Registry / Registro Brasileiro de Ensaios Clinicos (REBEC) will focus on trials recruiting in Brazil. Announced on 12th April by the Brazilian Ministry of Health, it is the first Primary Registry in the Latin American region to include trials registered in Portuguese, and also allows registration in Spanish and English. Other Portuguese-speaking countries including Angola, Cabo Verde, Guiné-Bissau, Moçambique, Portugal, São Tomé e Príncipe and Timor-Leste are also encouraged to use the registry. Prospective registration of clinical trials is a legal requirement in Brazil (http://www.anvisa.gov.br/eng/index.htm).

REBEC is the first registry to use the open-source clinical trial registration software developed by Bireme (http://reddes.bvsalud.org/projects/clinical-trials/wiki) in partnership with the Department of Science and Technology/MoH and FIOCRUZ/MoH, called "Open Trials".


Imaging For Full-Body MRIs Significantly Improved By New Algorithm
A new study reveals an improved algorithm that can dramatically improve how radiologists capture and interpret full-body MRIs, particularly in the abdominal region. Motion artifacts in MRIs, such as patient movement, often...
,
Dramatic Shift In Understanding Of Personalized Medicine Suggested By New Research

Researchers at Mount Sinai School of Medicine, in collaboration with researchers at Loyola University Chicago Stritch School of Medicine, have made a critical discovery that may lead scientists to abandon the use of broad conventional ethnic labels - African-American, Hispanic, and Caucasian - to estimate a patient's genetic risk for disease. This first-of-its kind study conducted with diverse patients receiving care at a single urban academic medical center, marks an important step in the clinical application of personalized medicine.

The data are published online in the peer-reviewed journal PLoS ONE.

The Mount Sinai Biobank, a program of the Charles R. Bronfman Institute for Personalized Medicine, enrolls consented patients representing the diverse communities surrounding The Mount Sinai Medical Center, who confidentially provide DNA and plasma samples to aid in genomic and personalized medicine research. Researchers used state-of-the-art genomic technology to determine the genetic make-up, or genotype, of nearly 1,000 local Biobank participants who self-identified as European American, African-American, or Hispanic. They found that there was a continuum in ancestral genetic heritage at the individual level of African-American and Hispanic patients receiving care at Mount Sinai - meaning considerable fractions of their genome came from mixed European or African ancestry, respectively - and with it genetic variants that indicate risk for developing disease.

"Our data indicate that historical population labels may not be helpful in predicting disease risk or guiding how a patient will respond to certain medications," said Erwin Bottinger, MD, Director of the Bronfman Institute, and the Irene and Dr. Arthur M. Fishberg Professor of Medicine. "Rather, a spectrum of mixed ancestry is emerging in the largest U.S. minority groups. These findings further validate the importance of considering the unique genotype of the individual patient rather than grouping patients by self-reported ethnicity."

To date, genomic studies have overwhelmingly focused on populations with European ancestry, causing concerns about the applicability of their findings to determine disease risk and responsiveness to therapies for non-European, and in particular, mixed genetic backgrounds receiving care at urban medical centers.

"Our data indicate how important it is to evaluate patient populations at a local level," said Dr. Bottinger. "Now that we can determine the genotypic breakdown of our patients, we can begin to develop tests and tailor therapies for the diverse community we serve, allowing us to provide highly effective, personalized care."

On the basis of their findings, researchers at the Bronfman Institute are evaluating the clinical use potential of hundreds of genetic markers for major diseases, such as heart disease, kidney disease, liver disease, and diabetes, and various drug responses, in all Biobank samples. The goal is to identify those genetic markers that may be useful to predict disease risk in local people with mixed genetic backgrounds. The project will be completed with all 20,000 Biobank samples by the end of 2011.

"We anticipate the results, for the first time, will lead us to select the right genetic markers, and allow us to bring personalized genomic medicine to patients in the diverse Mount Sinai community who are being treated for diabetes and heart, kidney, and liver diseases, among other conditions," says Dr. Bottinger.

Also, Dr. Bottinger and his team at the Charles R. Bronfman Institute for Personalized Medicine are able to help guide other medical centers around the country in replicating their study. Additionally, they are continuing to broaden the number of consented donors in the Mount Sinai Biobank in an effort to uncover more genetic markers of disease and connections between self-identified population groups.

This study was supported by The Andrea and Charles Bronfman Philanthropies, Inc.

Source:
Mount Sinai Press Office
The Mount Sinai Hospital / Mount Sinai School of Medicine


Type 2 Diabetes Patients on Medication Report High Rates of Hypoglycemia

I think almost any high school kid you meet is interested in making money. Though I bet most are thinking about it more in the context of the new Xbox game they want, or maybe buying a car or some other more immediate gratification. Doug Bergman, a computer science educator from Porter-Gaud High School in Charleston, South Carolina decided to harness this natural drive with a much more forward thinking approach. Why not build entrepreneurial skills into his computer science course?

There are plenty of good coders out there, but when you mix savvy software development with business acumen – well that’s what books, movies and Silicone Valley/Redmond lure is all about. The super-smart savvy software developer, hatches a great piece of software and uses their business skills to shift the technology landscape [insert your favorite story here].

Doug submitted his application in Round 1 of the Microsoft Partners in Learning 2011 U.S. Innovative Education Forum (IEF) and it was a fascinating and inspiring read. The story begins with a goal of wanting to retain kids through a multi-year computer science curriculum (i.e., he needed a hook) and for this 11th grade course offering I believe he found just that. He challenged kids to develop a game or a simulation for the Xbox based on a subject area they were passionate about, which could be an extra-curricular area, or an idea that helps makes the world a better place. Then over the course of the semester students take that idea and create a game or simulation that teaches, demonstrates, and generates interest in the area they have chosen. He takes this one step further by placing equal emphasis within the course on the entrepreneurism. Taking advantage of the Network for Teaching Entrepreneurism (NFTE) Mr. Bergman weaves in the fundamentals of what it takes to build a successful business, including researching the marketplace, working together in teams, and finally, experimenting with and utilizing advanced programming skills to try to produce the highest possible quality product they can.

So to briefly summarize: 11th graders are collaborating together, developing business plans and creating a video game for one of the most popular gaming platforms in the world based on a subject they are passionate about. How’s that for 21st century learning in the classroom?

Like any good teacher Doug is already reflecting on what he learned from the project (pardon my paraphrasing):

• He was surprised that the concepts that they struggled with the most were not the complex programming code that their games required, but more so the entrepreneurial material. He found that many students have never really had to "sell" something, so the skills such as market research, marketing, financial analysis, and promotion are not concepts that they have a lot of experience with and it was crucial for students to understand how they can take Computer Science skills that they have developed in the classroom and use them to create and market something in the real world.
• The XNA Game Studio and C# language are very powerful and complex. There are ample guides, tutorials, and other help available, but there is really no way a student can get far before having to ask another student for help. As students work together learning new skills, they also give each other ideas that they can bring into their own games and simulations. In fact, Doug notes that numerous times students who had all been working together to help one person would all celebrate when the student would finally get something to work.

• And perhaps the most telling reflection is best left in Doug’s own words: “What I love about programming projects like this is that we encourage mistakes; in fact they are crucial to success. Whereas in another subject a student might get -5 points for making a mistake, students in Computer Science fail 20 or 30 times each class period, and they see those failures leading to their successes right in front of their eyes.”

In the final steps of this semester long endeavor, Doug makes this all very real. As students develop their business plans he places the added challenge of requiring them to present these plans to local business and academic leaders, parents, teachers and their peers effectively having them combine their semester’s work into a “product launch presentation.” Now he doesn’t leave them in the dark on how to get there. Over the course of the semester he arranged to have professionals ranging from game creators, marketing experts and programmers speak to his class to share their experiences, prompting one his students to presciently note: ‘Mr. Bergman, I am noticing it is not so much about the technology, it is about the people.’

Attention Mr. Bergman’s students, if you are reading this post, you can find job postings for Microsoft here though perhaps we are getting a bit ahead of ourselves, but our college internship program is good too. Seriously though, these are the types of projects employers want to see as do college admissions counselors. This is the real-world (albeit with a techie slant).

Doug worked across subject areas and within his school building to make this project a success. He credits a close partnership with his IT Director, Phil Zaubi, in helping him create this class and further he consulted his college counseling department for input as to how the project could best help his students in their college application process.

It is hard not to be inspired by an educator like Doug Bergman. Doug’s application along with the others I’ve highlighted in a previous post are incredible examples of how teachers are taking their profession to a new level.Teachers are innovating in their classrooms striving to engage students with real-world, authentic challenges that are directly relevant to students today, and to their futures.

We still have a little over a week left and we continue to receive amazing applications for the 2011 U.S. Innovative Education Forum. The final deadline to apply is May 15th. We would love to hear what you are doing in your classroom.

If you’d like to see a few pictures of Doug’s students at work, checkout TeachTec’s SkyDrive.

Regards,

Rob

(aka putting the “Teach” in TeachTec)

More than 50 percent of Long Beach's schools ranked in the bottom half statewide last year based on standardized tests, according to data released Thursday by the California Department of Education.

Morgan Hill Times

New state rankings released for California schools San Jose Mercury News As schools hold pep rallies to motivate students for the latest round of standardized tests, California's education department has added to the testing mania, releasing rankings based on last spring's performance. ... EDUCATION: Schools' academic ranks releasedPress-Enterprise API 2010 test results for San Francisco, San Mateo County school districtsSan Francisco Examiner Five GUSD schools ahead of API curveGilroy Dispatch all 26 news articles »

OTTAWA - Michael Ignatieff is returning to his first love — academia — after leading the federal Liberals to their worst electoral showing in history.

Ignatieff, who lost his own seat in Monday's bloodbath, has been appointed as senior resident at the University of Toronto's Massey College.

He will be teaching at university's faculty of law and the political science department, as well as at the Munk School of Global Affairs and the School of Public Policy and Governance.

Ignatieff is a graduate of the university and an internationally acclaimed academic and author.

He was lured into politics five years ago from a prestigious position at Harvard and has also taught at Oxford and Cambridge.

Massey College master John Fraser says the college's senior resident position has traditionally been offered to leaders making the transition from politics.

The position has been held in the past by former prime minister Pierre Trudeau, former Reform party leader Preston Manning and Bob Rae, now a Toronto Liberal MP but once NDP premier of Ontario.

Liberal party president Alf Apps said Ignatieff's decision to take a position at the U of T demonstrates he's not "just visiting" Canada.

The Tories pummelled Ignatieff throughout his two years at the helm of the Liberal party over the fact that he had worked in the United States and Britain for three decades before returning to Canada in 2005.

A steady barrage of Tory attack ads repeatedly asserted that Ignatieff was "just visiting" and that he "didn't come back for you." Many Liberals blame the ads, at least in part, for Ignatieff's inability to connect with voters.

Department of Biotechnology to launch Technology Acquisition Fund by year end pharmabiz.com Department of Biotechnology will be shortly introducing a Technology Acquisition Fund by the end of this year which may support buyouts of companies. The fund will also look at industry academic interaction for global partnerships. ...

It's not easy for a teacher to randomly call up the biology department at the local college and ask, "Do you have someone who can come talk to my students about how viruses attack cells?" Likewise, scientists interested in working with students and helping support academic instruction in the classroom don't always know which schools really want their help. Thankfully, Scientific American is about to make connecting scientists and schools a whole lot easier thanks to their new 1,000 Scientists in 1,000 Days program. They're recruiting "scientists who are willing to volunteer to advise on curricula, answer a classroom's questions, or visit a school—for instance, to do a lab or to talk about what you do."

Making the connection is essential given that "the U.S. ranks 27 out of 29 wealthy countries in proportion of college students with degrees in science or engineering." With dismal stats like those it's no wonder the Obama Administration is concerned about our global competitiveness and is working to get more students interested in science, technology, engineering, and math. Along with putting real-life applications of those subject in front of kids, getting real-life scientist role models into classrooms is absolutely necessary.

Interested scientists can head to the Scientific American site to add their name to the list of participants. The program hopes to have a directory of scientists available for teachers by the start of the 2011-2012 school year this fall.

photo (cc) via Flickr user amarette.

WASHINGTON- Today, President Obama Announced his intent to nominate Stephen Higginson to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.  

“Stephen Higginson is a distinguished candidate for the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit,” President Obama said.  “Both his legal and academic credentials are impressive and his commitment to judicial integrity is unwavering.  I am confident he will serve the American people with distinction.”

Stephen Higginson: Nominee for the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
Stephen Higginson was born in Boston, Massachusetts.  He attended Harvard College, where he received his A.B., summa cum laude, in 1983.  After graduating from Harvard, Higginson attended Cambridge University in England, where he was a Harvard Scholar, earning a Masters in Philosophy in 1984.  He then attended Yale Law School and obtained his J.D. in 1987.  While in law school, Higginson was Editor-in-Chief of the Yale Law Journal.
 
After graduating from Yale Law School, Higginson served as a law clerk to the Honorable Patricia M. Wald of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.  The following year, from 1988 to 1989, Higginson served as a law clerk to the Honorable Byron R. White of the Supreme Court of the United States.  He has been an Assistant United States Attorney since 1989, when he joined the Criminal Division in the District of Massachusetts.  Since 1993, Higginson has served as an Assistant United States Attorney in the Eastern District of Louisiana, where he became the chief of appeals in 1995.  As chief of appeals, Higginson has personally handled or supervised all criminal and civil appeals in the District, editing or writing more than 100 appellate briefs, and presenting numerous oral arguments before the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.  Higginson has received the Department of Justice’s awards for superior and outstanding performance as a federal prosecutor.  From 1997 to 1998, he served a six-month detail with the Department of State, working as deputy director of special projects for the Presidential Rule of Law Initiative.
 
Since 2004, Higginson has worked part-time in the United States Attorney’s Office, continuing to supervise the appellate section.  That same year, he joined the full-time faculty at Loyola University New Orleans College of Law, becoming an Associate Professor of Law.  Higginson teaches subjects including constitutional law, evidence, and criminal law.

Rumours started popping up earlier this afternoon on social networks that Michael Ignatieff, who just stepped down from his former gig as leader of the federal Liberal Party this week—you may have heard—is diving back into the academic world with a teaching position at the University of Toronto. Stephen Wicary of the Globe and Mail confirmed on Twitter that Ignatieff has been named senior resident at Massey College. The Globe adds that Ignatieff will teach courses in several departments, including the Munk School of Global Affairs and the political science department. U of T reportedly approached Ignatieff last year, when it was looking to replace Janice Stein, head of the Munk School, but he turned them down, saying the only job he was interested in was the prime minister's. [ more › ]

The Appleton Bilingual School, a new K-6 charter school administered by the Appleton Area School District, is seeking a full-time Bilingual (Spanish/English) First Grade Teacher for its inaugural 2011-2012 school year.

The Appleton Bilingual School develops academic excellence and language fluency in Spanish and English, builds cross-cultural relationships, and nurtures an enthusiasm for learning in order for students to achieve future educational and career success and to become active citizens in local and global communities. As an educator at the Appleton Bilingual School, you will “loop” with your class for two successive years, i.e. you will teach the same class of students the following year. In its first year, the Appleton Bilingual School will open with kindergarten and first grade classes, and add one grade level each following year. The 2011-2012 first grade teacher will likely be asked to teach kindergarten in 2012-2013.

The Appleton Area School District includes 17 elementary, 4 middle, and 4 high schools, in addition to 12 charter schools. The district is renowned for its innovative and supportive approach with charter schools. For more information about the Appleton Area School District, please click the following to be taken to its official website: http://www.aasd.k12.wi.us/

For more information about the Appleton Bilingual School, please click the following to be taken to its official website: http://web.me.com/number4boy/Appleton_Bilingual_School/Home.html

Appleton (pop 70,221) is the largest city and the cultural and economic hub of Wisconsin's Fox River Valley region (pop 200,000+). Appleton is home to Lawrence University, a vibrant downtown business and entertainment district, an attractive riverfront, dozens of parks, a minor league baseball team, and one of the Midwest’s largest shopping malls. Appleton's increasingly diverse population enjoys a high quality of life, and the city is consistently ranked as one of the nation’s safest. Appleton is situated two hours north of Madison and Milwaukee, thirty minutes south of Green Bay, and within a short drive or bike ride of countless rivers, lakes, trails, forests, nature preserves and other outdoor opportunities.

Benefits include:
-Competitive salary
-Outstanding fringe benefits package (medical, state pension)
-Partial ongoing professional development

Minimum Requirements:
-High degree of proficiency in two languages, Spanish and English
-Licensure to teach Kindergarten and Elementary Education through Grade 6
-Licensure or its equivalent in Bilingual Education
-Out-of-State applicants will be required to obtain Wisconsin K-6 licensure within 2 years of employment. The Wisconsin Department of Instruction may determine that additional coursework will be necessary to supplement your out-of-state bilingual licensure.

To Apply:
-Applicants must apply online via the Wisconsin Educators Career Access Network ("WECAN") site, at https://services.education.wisc.edu/wecan/
-The last day to submit applications is May 13, 2011

For more information, please contact Bill Curtis, ELL/Bilingual Education Coordinator at (920) 832-1729 or curtiswilliam@aasd.k12.wi.us

• Location: Appleton, WI
• Compensation: commensurate with experience/credentials
• Principals only. Recruiters, please don't contact this job poster.
• Phone calls about this job are ok.
• Please do not contact job poster about other services, products or commercial interests.

Trademark bullying is a big problem, and it's one that we regularly discuss here on the blog. It involves a trademark holder threatening and/or suing another company claiming infringement, where there's really none. It's quite effective and can have serious chilling effects. After Monster Energy Drink went after Vermonster beer for trademark infringement (yes, a trademark bullying cases that had nothing to do with one of the biggest trademark bullies, Monster Cable), Vermont Senator Patrick Leahy suddenly took an interest in trademark bullies. A report on the issue was requested, and the typically useless Commerce Department took on the task and did a ridiculous job at it. This is a commerce department that seems to think copyright, patent and trademark laws are wonderful and should only be expanded.

You can read the full report (pdf), but you won't get much useful out of it. Eric Goldman's detailed summary of the report's massive failings is much more educational. Basically, much of the "research" for the report came from big trademark holders -- who are often the biggest bullies -- rather than the victims of trademark bullying. So, of course, they said there really wasn't much of a problem at all, and the Commerce Department parroted that position.

The worst part, however, was in the whole discussion on the "duty to police." This is an issue that is regularly raised whenever we talk about trademarks, where people claim that you have to enforce your trademark or you can lose it. As we've explained many times, that's a bastardization of what the law and case law seem to actually say. It's only true that you need to enforce it in situations where there's an actual likelihood of confusion and/or it's being used in direct competition. The tangential or totally unrelated uses don't require you to enforce. Furthermore, there are alternative actions rather than threatening or suing -- such as offering up free or cheap licenses.

Goldman's section about this "duty to police" delves in even further, and basically shows why the Commerce Dept. report is useless:

Second, the report says "a trademark is a property right that an owner has a duty to police." WHOA! Many folks would dispute the characterization of trademarks as "property"; and many folks (including me) insist that the "duty to police" is massively overstated. Later, the report says, "In view of the mark owner’s obligation to police violations, aggressive enforcement of one’s trademark rights does not automatically equate to abuse or bullying." In effect, the report says that it doesn't see any problem at all; but if there is a problem, it's just the natural consequence of that pesky duty to police....oh well, c'est la vie.

Given its apathetic nature, the report doesn't make the logical jump that any intellectually curious person would instantly make: if the "duty to police" might be driving trademark owners to be (over)zealous in their enforcement efforts, maybe we should fix the duty to police. After all, this "duty" isn't in the statute at all; it's barely in the caselaw; and it could be easily remedied with a statutory clarification that might very well be welcomed by both trademark owners and secondary trademark users because it might eliminate ambiguity plaguing both communities. C'mon, guys--that conclusion isn't exactly rocket science.

From my perspective, the "duty to police" is like the proverbial monster under a child's bed. It's not actually there, but boy, it sure seems scary. My academic writing queue is too thick right now to tackle this issue immediately, but I don't recall seeing a good comprehensive academic article grokking the duty to police (if I'm forgetting something, please let me know). That would be an excellent paper topic. I would be happy to work with someone on this project so that we can demonstrate just how massively the "duty to police" is overstated--typically as a business development tool for trademark litigators trying to afford their kids' private school tuition. Naturally, the Department of Commerce report undertook no such research effort into the trademark policing duty itself.

But what do you expect from the Commerce Department? It's really turned into nothing more than an internal lobbying arm for big business, these days. It's too bad the FTC didn't take on this particular task, as it seems like it's really more something they should cover, and at least it's a federal agency that seems to really try to understand the issues, when it comes to intellectual property.

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The Boys & Girls Clubs of the Peninsula (BGCP) is a vibrant, entrepreneurial nonprofit that is committed to making our community a great place for all children to grow up. It is looking for 2 motivated and inspiring School Site Unit Director to manage its Center for a New Generation (CNG) after-school program at Hoover Community School in Redwood City, which currently serves 100 to 120 students in fourth through eighth grades and at James Flood School in East Palo Alto, which currently serves 115 to 130 students in kindergarten through eighth grades. .

Organization Description
BGCP’s mission is to guide and inspire the youth of our community to develop the attitudes and life skills they need to thrive. Every day after school and in the summer, children come to BGCP to gain a sense of belonging, have fun, and form positive relationships with caring mentors. In neighborhoods where more than half of youth drop out of high school, Club members learn the importance of education and become part of a community of learners, wanting and expecting to do well in school.

BGCP is the largest youth development organization in Silicon Valley, actively serving 1,400 youth in our clubhouses and school sites in East Palo Alto, Menlo Park, and Redwood City.

Program Description
BGCP, in partnership with the Ravenswood City School District and the Redwood City School District, currently runs Center for a New Generation (CNG) after-school programs at four school sites: James Flood School, Belle Haven Community School, Taft Community School, and Hoover Community School. CNG is designed to give students homework support, dynamic academic and enrichment activities that support and complement what is learned in school, and middle and high school preparation in order to improve their school outcomes and interest in learning. Drawing on best practices in youth development, staff members guide students to build academic and life skills in a meaningful and fun context.

The Flood CNG staff is comprised of a full-time School Site Unit Director, two part-time Assistant Directors, academic mentors, and credentialed teachers. CNG partners with other community-based organizations and volunteers to provide a well-rounded after-school program.
Flood CNG operates for the entirety of the school year and five weeks during the summer. The school-year program runs from 2:30 to 6 p.m. (1:30 to 6 p.m. on Wednesdays), with grades starting at staggered times as a result of the middle school students having an extended school day.

The Hoover CNG staff is comprised of a full-time School Site Unit Director, two part-time Assistant Directors, academic mentors, and credentialed teachers. Hoover CNG operates for the entirety of the school year. It is not currently funded to offer a summer program; as a result, the School Site Unit Director leads or co-leads a five-week CNG summer program at another location. The school-year program at Hoover runs from 3 to 6 p.m. (2 to 6 p.m. on Thursdays).

Program Goals
• Increase positive academic behaviors
• Develop positive attitudes/youth development indicators
• Provide positive supports and opportunities for members
• Increase parent/guardian engagement and satisfaction
• Guide members to actively select their high school and enroll in college prep classes
• Increase members' academic achievement



School Site Unit Director Responsibilities

Program Management:
• Manages all aspects of the after-school program, ensuring a quality educational and youth development experience for all participants.
• Collaborates with school and district staff, other SSUDs, and the Director of School-Site Programs to ensure that programming is aligned with the missions of the school, the district, and BGCP.
• Develops and regularly revisits instructional plans for each grade level, with the objective of supporting all members in becoming academically proficient and developing the life skills and attitudes necessary to achieve high school graduation.
• Determines ongoing needs/interests of students, parents, and school staff and reviews and revises program offerings to meet emerging needs/interests.
• Coordinates programming with partner community-based organizations and volunteers.
• Arranges trainings to support academic mentors in designing and delivering effective lessons.
• Prepares for and supports informal and formal program evaluation.
• Builds strong relationships with parents by leading parent orientations and meetings (possibly in English and Spanish); connecting daily at pick-up time; making phone calls regarding student attendance, attitude, and participation; encouraging participation in BGCP and school celebrations; and organizing workshops, family nights, or other events that increase parents’ connection to and involvement in their child’s school and education.
• Develops and maintains a strong relationship with Hoover's or Flood’s school staff, including scheduling regular check-ins with the principal and serving on the school site council and other decision-making bodies.
• Purchases and prepares materials for activities as needed.

Supervisory:
• Recruits, trains, and manages part-time staff, including evaluating and assessing their needs for ongoing professional development. Delegates work appropriately to assistant directors.
• Manages staff schedules, ensuring adequate coverage. Provides last-minute coverage in classrooms as needed.
• Leads professional development, staff meetings, and some trainings.
• Documents and shares lessons learned with other site managers across the organization.
• Creates a positive work atmosphere. Fosters teamwork and a constructive exchange of ideas.
• Ensures that all staff adhere to BGCP and school behavior, discipline, and safety policies.
• Sets high expectations for staff and students and demands compliance.

Administration:
• Manages site expenses, ensuring quality program implementation within budgetary limits.
• Compiles data and tracks students for program evaluation and reporting to Board, funders, the school district, and the state department of education.
• Creates opportunities to publicize and involve BGCP in school events (e.g. Open House, Back-to-School Nights, parent conference days, staff development) as well as events in the broader community (e.g., city council meetings, parent education opportunities). Prepares and gives presentations as needed.
• Supports BGCP events, initiatives, and general organizational needs.

Other Duties:
• Takes pride in and responsibility for school-site facilities:
 Organizes the CNG office. Keeps signs and bulletin boards neat and current. Decorates walls with members’ work and motivational pieces to create a space conducive to learning. Ensures that the area fosters physical and emotional safety.
 Proactively monitors work area and equipment for potential maintenance needs. Communicates needs to BGCP/district IT personnel.
 Ensures that all facilities on campus that CNG uses are left as they were found.
• Executes and participates in special events and fieldtrips as needed.
• Is respectful of other staff members’ time by being prompt to scheduled meetings.
• Is flexible with hours as needed for the program to best serve its members.

Required Qualifications
• BA/BS
• A minimum of one year successful experience as a teacher and/or administrator in an educational environment
• Knowledge of effective teaching methods and curriculum development and ability to design programs to meet the learning needs of elementary and middle school students
• A demonstrated ability to coordinate, inspire, and motivate others
• High level of communication skills, both written and oral
• Experience working in an ethnically diverse community
• Strong interpersonal, team development, organizational, and management skills
• Clear background check and history indicting fitness to work with children
• Negative results of TB Test
• Current CPR/1st Aid certification

Desired Qualifications
• Teaching credential (multiple-subjects or single-subject) and/or Master’s in Education
• Competency in writing and speaking in Spanish

These are full time, year round positions and offer an excellent benefit package.

• Compensation: $40,000+ DOE
• This is at a non-profit organization.
• Principals only. Recruiters, please don't contact this job poster.
• Please, no phone calls about this job!
• Please do not contact job poster about other services, products or commercial interests.

Originally posted in The Technium

A short report in Newsweek (High-Quality DNA) about a new Chinese initiative in genetic sequencing serves as a signal for several large global trends. First the opening sentences:

The world’s largest genome-mapping facility is in an unlikely corner of China.

Lesson 1: Science will go where there is the least resistance to it. It is borderless, constantly seeking the fewest restrictions and the most investments. Research and investigation will route around legislation and prohibitions or lax enthusiasm. Science will go where it is wanted.

The Illumina HiSeq 2000 is a top-of-the-line genome-sequencing machine that carries a price tag of $500,000. There are 128 of them here, flanked by rows of similar high-tech equipment, making it possible for the Beijing Genomics Institute (BGI) to churn out more high quality DNA-sequence data than all U.S. academic facilities put together.

Lesson 2: China still has a predominant copy-culture, preferring to copy ideas rather than invent their own. This was true of the US for its first 100 years. English authors and inventors thought of the US as one huge continent of intellectual pirates. And it was true. But just as the US quickly outgrew its copy-culture to become a culture of originality, so too is China. The notion that China is incapable of inventing world-class innovation is wrong.

The average age of the research staff is 26....Li Yingrui, 24, directs the bioinformatics department and its 1,500 computer scientists. Having dropped out of college because it didn’t present enough of an intellectual challenge, he firmly believes in motivating young employees with wide-ranging freedom and responsibility. “They grow with the task and develop faster,” he says. One of his researchers is 18-year-old Zhao Bowen. While still in high school, Zhao joined the bioinformatics team for a summer project and blew everyone away with his problem-solving skills. After consulting with his parents, he took a full-time job as a researcher and finished school during his downtime. Fittingly, he now manages a project on the genetic basis of high IQ.

Lesson 3: The shift we feel towards the east is just beginning. While China is aging and breeding below replacement level, their engineers are young and have decades of productivity ahead of them. They will sway the course of science. We should find out what they are thinking.

So far, at least 80,000 Western-trained Ph.D.s have returned [to China], the vast majority in the past five years.

Lesson 4: A reverse brain drain is operating. And not just from the US among overseas Chinese. Many capable non-Chinese researchers are taking positions in China. I think this is good for them, for China and good for the world. It's healthy competition for talent, and it should force more attractive conditions for research everywhere, particularly in the US, which has had little competition.

China has picked up the pace of patenting and in a few decades the total number of patents from China will exceed the total in the US, once the lone superman in patenting. Again, this is good for the world, and indirectly good for the US because it will force the States to invest more in R&D;, beef up education, make it more attractive for foreign talent, and easier to secure the brightest foreign students, and keep prohibitions of innovations to a minimum.

Adding family physicians could lower 30-day readmission rates related to pneumonia, heart attack and heart failure, say Boston University School of Medicine and Boston Medical Center researchers in a new report in the current American Family Physician.

Using data from the Hospital Compare database, the researchers calculated that by adding at least one family physician per 1,000 population, readmission rates could be reduced for pneumonia by 7 percent, heart attacks by 5 percent, and heart failure by 8 percent. These are these same conditions used by the Department of Health and Humans Services to evaluate readmissions.

Currently, 33 family physicians are available per 100,000 population. Increasing that number to 46 family practitioners could reduce readmission costs by $81 million per year for those three condition, according to the research prepared for the Robert Graham Center, a primary care think tank.

If the number of family physicians increased by 100 per 100,000 population, costs would decline by $579 million per year--or 83 percent of the $710 million target established by the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, the researchers said.

The idea is that more primary care doctors would be available to guide patients through the healthcare system and provide timely follow-up care, said senior author Brian Jack, MD, an associate professor and vice chair for academic affairs in the Department of Family Medicine at Boston University School of Medicine/Boston Medical Center.

"Of course family physicians save money in a lot of other ways because they work in the community," Jack told the Boston Globe.

Increased numbers of physicians in other major specialties--including general internal medicine--is associated with increased risk of readmission, the study noted.

For more details:
- see the American Family Physician article
- read the Boston Globe article

Related Articles:
Improving health literacy will decrease hospital readmissions, costs 
Hospitals risk readmissions, penalties with poor heart failure follow-up

I've obtained a couple of emails from higher education officials that indicate how they are starting to feel a sense of inevitability about what's to come in Carson City. One is a missive from a UNLV official that talks about newly revised academic cuts --he links to the spreadsheet. And the other is an email from longtime system lobbyist Jim Richardson to Nevada Faculty Alliance folks in which he laments the lack of higher ed discussion on "Face to Face" on Tuesday and expresses discouragement about how the lower ed budgets were closed. I also read between the lines a familiar, albeit whispered complaint from higher ed types at every session: They get short shrift compared to lower ed.

Interesting reading. Both epistles below:

To NFA State Board:

The shoes are starting to drop in Carson City. The budget closing yesterday for K-12 was fascinating to watch, but also quite discouraging, as the two sides are far apart. In what was obviously an effort to preempt the governor, the legislative leadership closed the largest budget of all – K-12 – yesterday, with a series of strictly partisan votes on key matters. The stories below give some details. Of particular interest will be the vote not to accept the salary cuts proposed for K-12 teachers. Will that position also apply to state classified employees and NSHE professional employees?? Also, with the willingness to add back operating funds continue as the NSHE budget closing takes place in the near future.

The testimony before the K-12 closing was carefully orchestrated and generally effective, especially the testimony offered by Steve Laden, who spent much of his time talking about the devastating effects of the proposed cuts to higher education that are being proposed. It was interesting to see representatives of the LV Chamber and the resort Association finally come to the table and offer support, but it may have been too little too late.

The governor’s speech, which is available below, was disappointing in that he adhered to his no tax line, and also only recommended $20 million from the $271 available to NSHE. The traditional breakdown of General Fund spending between K-12 and higher ed has been two to one, with K-12 getting about 35% and NSHE getting about 18%. The Sandoval budget changes that dramatically to over three to one in favor of K-12, and last night ne recommended that K-12 get $240 million while NSHE would get $20, a ratio of 12 to one! K-12 obviously needs more funding, but this proposal of how to use extra funding from the Forum seems a quite dramatic statement about budget priorities under this administration. And the message for students (and their parents), faculty, staff, and the State is a sad one.

I also include a link to a Ralston program yesterday where he interviews two R Senators (both of whom the NFA PAC endorsed) on the budget closing, the speech and budget matters in general. You will not find it encouraging. NSHE funding is being held hostage to changes over which we have little control. Regrettable, and surprising, there was no discussion of the NSHE budget proposals, which include the largest budget cuts of any entity for which the State is responsible. It seems that most legislators and others are refusing to acknowledge the many reforms that have taken place in NSHE over recent years. The list is long, but is being ignored.

The Reno paper has an editorial this morning urging the Legislature and Governor to compromise, but it does not even mention NSHE budget problems. I posted a comment which is below, right after that link.

Keep those cards and letter flowing! We cannot give up, no matter how discouraging the news from yesterday.

Jim

----

Subject: Fw: Revised Academic Cut Plan Proposals

Date: Tue, 3 May 2011 16:03:22 -0700

Dear Campus Community Members:

As you know, in March, UNLV was mandated to present full and specific potential budget cuts to the Board of Regents and the Legislature. Unfortunately, there was very little time to do so and, consequently, the ability of deans to consult with faculty were quite limited. At the end of March I instructed the deans to spend the month engaged in deliberate and extensive consultation with faculty over revisions to their original proposals. That consultation was, at a minimum, to take the form of college-or school-wide meetings as well as department meetings. In short, they were asked to ensure that everyone who wanted to participate would have an opportunity to do so.

As a result of this consultation the deans were requested to submit a revised proposal for how budget reduction targets would be met in each college or school. These revised proposals were due in my office no later than last Friday, April 29. My staff and I have analyzed these proposals and, in the interests of full disclosure and transparency, are providing the campus with a single document that summarizes these recommendations. The summary can be found at:

Proposed cuts

A spreadsheet such as this cannot convey all of the complexity and context of the deans' recommendations. Therefore, I would recommend that you discuss any concerns or issues that you may have regarding this summary with your dean.

We continue to hope that these drastic cuts to higher education generally and to UNLV specifically will not come to fruition, but we cannot count on that. Please be assured that we are doing all that we can to prevent these cuts from occurring and urge you to contact your legislators and let them know that UNLV is a benefit to the state and not a cost. Thank you.

Michael W. Bowers, Ph.D.

Executive Vice President & Provost

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Today's top SocietyGuardian stories

• Coalition scales back privatisation plans over 'excess profitmaking' fears

• Nationwide opens door for first-time buyers

• Nicholas Watt: Is David Cameron lining up Stephen Dorrell to replace Andrew Lansley?

• Peter Wilby: Supermarkets kill free markets as well as our communities

• Catherine Hughes: Obesity is bad, we get that

All today's SocietyGuardian stories

Other news

• Five young offenders have apparently committed suicide in custody in the space of 33 days, reports Children & Young People Now, prompting calls for an independent review of the youth secure estate. The number of young offender deaths is already this year is as high as in any entire year since 2005. In a CYP Now editorial, Ravi Chandiramani writes:

"Unlike YOIs and secure training centres, there has never been a suicide in a secure children's home, used to accommodate the youngest and most vulnerable offenders. These establishments have much higher staff-to-inmate ratios. Workers are qualified to provide care rather than containment and the focus is on improving children's outcomes. They are, inevitably, far more expensive to run.
The government should be brave and reinvest the savings from the recent fall in custody numbers into beginning to build a secure estate infrastructure that is more fit for purpose. That will reap its own rewards in the long run."

• One of Scotland's largest social care charities is proposing to cut salaries and reduce sick and maternity pay for 2,000 staff, according to Community Care. Quarriers, provides services to adults with disabilities and children and families across the UK, said the changes were necessary to protect jobs and remain competitive at a time when local authorities are being forced to slash funding for care providers.

• A top housing academic is to lead a review of cuts to housing benefit, reports Inside Housing. Ian Cole, professor of housing studies at Sheffield Hallam University, will lead an independent consortium of academics and research organisations to inspect the impact of the cuts to housing benefit, which started last month for new claimants. Other members include Peter Kemp from the Oxford Institute of Social Policy, Carl Emmerson of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, and Ben Marshall from Ipsos Mori.

• Will Hutton's fair pay proposals may be extended to the private sector, according to People Management. It says Hutton believes ministers are debating whether some of his suggestions on reforms to public sector pay, especially on transparency, could be rolled out to the private sector and whether the necessary legislation could be brought forward in the Queen's speech in the autumn.

• And finally, a tale of the big society in action from the Independent, which reports that a vandalised nature reserve has reopened after local residents rejected a £300,000 council scheme and did the repair work themselves for a tenth of the price. Huntingdonshire district council proposed a three-year redevelopment scheme, for the reserve on Holt Island in St Ives, Cambridgeshire, but a residents' group completed the same work in 18 months for £30,000.

On my radar ...

• The NHS "listening exercise". It's the theme of our NHS reforms live blog today. Steve Field, the former president of the Royal College of GPs who is leading the government's listening exercise on the planned NHS reforms, will be appearing in a live Q&A; from 1pm. Roy Lilley on the nhsmanagers.net blog, has the timeline for the exercise all mapped out:

"With time running out the whole thing will be rewritten by an ex-Cambridge bright-spark, working in the bowels of Number 10, and sent direct to the printers. Time's up. In fact it is the second week in June. Proof, not, that there was never going to be enough time to do this properly, no, no. Proof that the 'Listeners' had listened 'extra hard'.
The report will be released, under embargo, to the press. Some will jump the gun with stories such as; "The David Cameron's pause and listening exercise is expected to say that; everyone thinks Doc's should commission care, blah, blah.' A blaze of publicly will pronounce the Prime Minister was right, LaLa was right, the policy is lovely and 'Listeners' will look at the New Year's Honours List with more than the usual curiosity.
A row will erupt. Listeners will say they listened. The 'listened-to', will say they were not. Others will say it was done too quickly; it was a fit-up and does not address the issues ...
Chief Listener, Gis-a-Job Field, will go into hiding and be found, ten years from now, selling kites at the Benghazi Beach Club. Listeners will be snubbed, their careers tainted and they will cut lonely figures sitting by themselves in the far corner of the cafeteria."

Meanwhile, Andy Cowper relates on his Health Policy Insight blog how some people have had difficulty making their voices heard. A friend who wanted to contribute her views tried to get hold of details of where the billed 119 listening events were taking place yesterday. She was told to ask the Future Forum for its official list of events, but:

"The Future Forum, which is running the government's listening exercise, does not take incoming calls."

• Benefit reforms, which are being discussed at a Commons work and pensions committee hearing today. The committee will be taking evidence from Citizen's Advice Bureau, Rethink, Careers Development Group and Prof Paul Gregg, University of Bristol. Rethink's chief executive, Paul Jenkins, said ahead of the hearing that the charity had been contacted by increasing numbers of people with mental health problems who say their conditions are being exacerbated by the way the Department for Work and Pensions is going about introducing reforms. Jenkins said he would bring up the issue of benefit claimants being portrayed as workshy scroungers and cheats:

"There is a clear implication that anyone who receives incapacity benefit is in some way cheating the system. It is creating a culture of stigma, scaremongering and causing fear and anxiety among thousands of people with a severe mental illness.
"The employment minister claims that the government wants to support people who are vulnerable and need benefits, yet his department constantly represents the majority of people on benefits as unworthy of help."

Meanwhile, in this guest post on the TUC's Touchstone blog, Shelter chief executive Campbell Robb raises concerns about how changes ushered in by the welfare reform bill will have a "profound impact on housing". Robb says the switch from calculating benefit payments based on the Consumer Price Index, rather than the Retail Price Index needs an urgent review:

"Shelter joined up with the Chartered Institute of Housing to measure the impact this will have. Our research showed that by 2023, just ten years after the change comes in, 34% of local authorities outside of London will be unaffordable for people on LHA. Areas worst affected are concentrated in the East of England, East Midlands and the South West where rents have been rising fastest over recent years. In effect, claimants will find themselves priced out of huge swathes of the country.
What's more, further analysis shows a pattern between the areas with the highest proportion of claimants in work and the highest rates of employment. Meanwhile, regions that will remain affordable in 2023 – the North East, North West and Yorkshire and Humber – are those with above average rates of economic inactivity and unemployment. In other words, people claiming LHA will be forced to live in places with fewer employment opportunities."

• Mark Astarita, director of fundraising at the British Red Cross, who has been named as the new chair of the Institute of Fundraising. He will take up the post in July.

• This impassioned post about the tactics of the #no2AV campaign from the LisyBabe blog:

"One of the "no" campaign's loudest cries is that AV is too complicated for the masses. That you need to be some kind of genius to work out how to fill in a polling card under AV.
Out of fear that he wouldn't understand how to vote under AV; out of fear that AV is too confusing and too complicated, my father voted "no".
I am furious that the "no" campaign are preying on people like my dad by telling them they're too stupid to understand AV.
If my dad really believed that FPTP was a better system than AV I'd respect his choice. But that's not why he voted "no". The "no" campaign took advantage of his poor education, of his illiteracy, and his almost certain dyslexia by telling him that under AV he wouldn't be able to understand his polling card. They told him he was stupid and he believed it."

On the Guardian Professional Networks

• Live Q&A;, from 1pm: how can charities help secure their financial future?

• Freedom of Information disclosures from 30 London NHS trusts show that the biggest threat to NHS data security comes from staff

• Colin Cram, consultant and former director of the North West Centre of Excellence, on why public sector procurement needs a hands-on, integrated approach

In today's SocietyGuardian supplement

• Back in focus: photographer celebrates the Black Country

• Call for snapshots of migration

• Helping more disabled people get into politics

All the features and comment from the SocietyGuardian section

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on Mass Ave. starts Monday The private vendor in charge of Indianapolis' parking meters soon will begin replacing individual meters with multispace pay boxes. New boxes being installed Downtown this week in the 300 block of Massachusetts Avenue will be turned on by ParkIndy on Monday, according to a news release. Users will park in a numbered space and then pay at the nearest box; the company will provide 'ambassadors' during the first week to assist users. Beginning May 16, ParkIndy will install pay boxes in two locations Downtown and in Broad Ripple. Others will be installed through the summer, replacing most individual meters. Three companies that formed ParkIndy signed a 50-year lease of the city's 3,700 parking meters late last year. Since then, hourly rates in many areas have increased to $1, and ParkIndy has added evening and Saturday hours. A new endowed faculty position will advance volunteerism and service efforts at the University of Indianapolis. The $645,000 for the University Distinguished Professor of Service Learning position comes from 'the estate of a longtime benefactor whose family wishes to remain anonymous,' UIndy announced Tuesday. Service learning is a teaching method that emphasizes hands-on experience by combining classroom instruction with community-service projects. UIndy students logged more than 10,000 hours of volunteer work last academic year, according to the university's Community Programs Center. Among recent projects: Kinesiology students organized, promoted and hosted the 2011 Special Olympics Indiana State Youth Basketball Tournament in March, which featured 300 competitors from across the state. English department students helped Indianapolis Public Schools students develop, edit and publish creative-writing projects. Krannert School of Physical Therapy students have provided fitness sessions for senior citizens at the Baxter YMCA for several years. The endowment funds salary and allows for time, money and travel expenses to support community-service work. The first faculty member will be appointed to the position in 2012. in house fire dies An infant girl has died of injuries suffered last week in a fire at an Eastside duplex. Jasmine Sanders, 5 months, died Sunday at Riley Hospital for Children, Indianapolis Fire Department spokeswoman Capt. Rita Burris said. Firefighters pulled Jasmine and her sister, Aubrey Bartles, 4, from a burning two-story home in the 100 block of North Bradley Avenue about 3 a.m. April 25. Aubrey was also critically injured in the fire and treated at Riley. Her condition was not immediately available Tuesday. The fire was ruled accidental. in shooting of brother A 13-year-old boy has been charged with shooting his 11-year-old brother in the stomach on the Eastside last week. The boy was arrested Monday on preliminary juvenile charges of criminal recklessness and dangerous possession of a firearm, according to an Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department report. The boy's name was not released. Police found the 11-year-old with a gunshot wound on a couch Friday morning in an apartment in the 9400 bock of East 43rd Street. They also found the handgun thought to have been used in the shooting. Details on what led to the shooting were not available. The boy was taken to Riley Hospital for Children, where he remained in good condition. topic of round table Members of President Barack Obama's Advisory Council on Financial Capability will join Indianapolis first lady Winnie Ballard today for an event discussing the city's financial literacy programs. Ballard founded Indy's Campaign for Financial Fitness in 2008, and among its programs is Bank On Indy, which encourages Marion County residents without bank accounts to open checking or savings accounts. Others include financial education programs and a free tax-preparation program. Today's event in Mayor Greg Ballard's conference room is part of a 'listening tour' by federal officials and is closed to the public. The round-table discussion will include Louisa Quittman, director of community programs for the U.S. Department of the Treasury, and two members of the president's advisory council: Carrie Schwab-Pomerantz, president of the Charles Schwab Foundation, and Arty Arteaga, president and CEO of the Defense Credit Union Council. at Manual fundraiser Two of the greatest names in Manual High School basketball history will return to their alma mater Friday to participate in a fundraiser for drug treatment awareness. Tom and Dick Van Arsdale will compete in a free-throw shooting contest at the Docs vs. Jocks vs. Drugs event at 7 p.m. Friday at Manual, 2405 Madison Ave. The free-throw contest will be part of a night that includes a charity basketball game between teams of Franciscan St. Francis Health doctors and the high school's coaches and teachers. Money raised will go to school substance abuse programs. The Van Arsdale twins led Manual to the 1961 championship game of the then-single-class tournament, where they took Kokomo to overtime before losing. The event also will feature a free-throw contest between Indianapolis Public Schools Superintendent Eugene White and Robert J. Brody, CEO of Franciscan St. Francis Health. Tickets are $4 and may be purchased at the high school at game time. chief justice off bench The chief justice of Indiana's Supreme Court has missed several oral arguments and other court work in recent weeks because of a pinched nerve in his neck. Chief Justice Randall T. Shepard has been working to manage the pain from the pinched nerve, said a court spokeswoman. Shepard did go to the hospital at one point but wasn't admitted. Shepard, 64, was appointed to the Supreme Court in 1985 by then-Gov. Robert Orr and has been chief justice since 1987. in Noblesville dies Noblesville C. Murphy White, Noblesville's first black City Council member, who did away with regulations that restricted when blacks could swim in the local pool, died Sunday at St. Vincent Hospice in Indianapolis. He was 87. The lifelong Noblesville resident served on the council for 24 years, taking office in 1968. He was an insurance agent for John Hancock Life Insurance Co. 20 years. White, a 1941 graduate of Noblesville High School, was the only black student in the school. He served in the Navy during World War II. He was a member of Bethel AME Church. Star reports

A startup called Nanotune says its ultracapacitor technology could make electric cars cheaper and extend their range. The company, based in Mountain View, California, has developed a way to make electrodes that results in ultracapacitors with five to seven times as much storage capacity as conventional ones.

Using a conventional electrolyte, the company has demonstrated energy storage of 20 watt-hours per kilogram, as opposed to roughly five watt-hours for a conventional ultracapacitor. Using a more expensive ionic-liquid electrolyte, it has made ultracapacitors that store 35 watt-hours per kilogram. By the end of the year, the company hopes to approximately double this storage capacity, says Nanotune CEO Kuan-Tsae Huang. At 40 watt-hours per kilogram, the ultracapacitors would be an improvement over the batteries used in some hybrid vehicles

Eventually, Huang says, it may be possible to make ultracapacitors that store 500 kilowatt-hours per kilogram—about three to four times more than the lithium-ion batteries used in cars today. The practical benefit could be even greater. Cars are often engineered to use only half the storage capacity of their batteries, to keep them from degrading. But almost all of an ultracapacitor's storage capacity can be used.

Nanotune's technology is very expensive now—between $2,400 and $6,000 per kilowatt-hour. (The Department of Energy has proposed a goal of $250 per kilowatt-hour to make electric vehicles competitive with conventional ones.) Nanotune says, however, that its costs could come down to less than $150 per kilowatt-hour if the prices of some key materials, such as electrolytes, continue to fall, and as manufacturing is scaled up.

The company's energy-storage projections are based on several advances it is working on. Nanotune is currently making electrodes with pores that are about 4 to 5 nanometers across, but it says it can make them smaller (high porosity leads to high surface area, which makes it possible to store a large amount of charge) and tune them to match the needs of different electrolytes—the ion-conducting materials the electrodes are immersed in.

The company is also looking into using ionic liquids rather than conventional organic electrolytes. These increase the voltage of the system, greatly increasing energy storage, but typically they aren't compatible with conventional ultracapacitor electrodes. Finally, the company hopes to make use of recent academic findings that suggests that adding small amounts of ruthenium to the ultracapacitors can increase energy storage.

If you liked this article, please give it a quick review on ycombinator or StumbleUpon. Thanks

Summer camps still accepting registration

There is still space available in Hawaii Learning Resource's summer 2011 Academic Enrichment Camps. The academic camps, held in partnership with Honolulu-based Assets School, are held in Waimea at Hawaii Preparatory Academy's Village Campus.

The first two-week camp, the Summer Spy Academy, will be held from June 13 through 24 and targets incoming second- through sixth-grade students. The Summer Spy Academy focuses on building learning skills with an emphasis on observation, focus and listening.

The second two-week camp, the Game of Life, will be held from June 27 through July 8 and targets incoming sixth- through eighth-graders with a focus on project-based life lessons designed to build learning, team and life skills.

The camps run from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. Monday through Friday. Camp tuition is $400 per student for each two-week session, including lunch and snacks. Financial assistance is available. Each camp session is limited to 20 students. Applications will be accepted through May 27 and are available by visiting hawaiilearningresource.org or calling 885-9318.

May Day celebration slated for Saturday

Honaunau School will be holding its annual May Day Celebration at 8:30 a.m. Saturday. Back by popular demand, this year's event will include all of the traditional elements of days gone by. Come enjoy the royal court, student performances, country store, mango pickles, sushi, baked goods, plants, food booths, lei contest, rummage sale, silent auction and live auction.

The fifth-grade students will be representing the royal court, and the keiki in preschool through fourth grade will perform with their class. The public is invited. For more information, call Rena Grace at 328-2727.

Hookena School celebrates May Day Hoolaulea

Hookena Elementary School will celebrate its May Day Hoolaulea at 9 a.m. Friday. The May Day program will feature a royal court and hula performances from students and staff, followed by food, games and local entertainment provided by the PTO.

The event is open to the public. Proceeds from the Hoolaulea will go toward purchasing new computers for the school. For more information, call the school at 328-2710 or email Wryen Kiwaha at council@hookenapto.org.

WHEA End of Year Bash happening Friday

End of Year Bash, a fundraiser for West Hawaii Explorations Academy, will be held from 5:30 to 9 p.m. Friday in the parking lot behind Ceviche Dave's (above Costco) in Kailua-Kona. There will be live music by Leche de Tigre, vendors, raffle, a movie, food, silent auction and more. Those attending are asked to bring beach chairs for seating; no coolers.

Konawaena Elementary School announces third quarter GLO awards

GLO 1 Self-Directed Learner: Rodeo Denis, Alexander DeAhuiar, Mikaela La Marco, Carlos Garza-Malagon, Eli-Anthony Uemura, Maria Gutierrez-Valdovinos, Hunter Prior, Lacey Young, Keoki Matsuyama, Colby Cunningham, Natalia Magana Quezada, Susana Magana Garza, Ruth Kattil, D'Marco Mireles, Maria Ruiz jimenez, Michelle Tam, Jessica Transfiguracion, Pikake Keohuloa Kuanoni, Kyrin Young, Felipe Magana Zavala, Chris Ibarra, Donnia Kamram, Eunika Duque, Yadhira Ortiz Malagon, Shanessa Alves, Sydney Suzuki.

GLO 2 Community Contributor: Josiah Medeiros-Salvador, Noelani Kawaihoa, Logan Citron. Kekai Yamaguchi, Gustavo Magana, Ikaika Pelekane, Malakai Esperanza, Kassaiah Vidal Ganir, Taylor Lee Wana, Mersaydeez Rocha, Judah Halemano, Leina'ala Gonsales, Taylie Oshiro, Kaweo Lai, Manica Debrum, Keoni Aiona-Watan, Shayla Sayphone, Kira Kuanoni Fernandez, Jessica Magana Moreno, Anthony Magana, Bryson Navarro, CJ Yoshikawa, Lily Cho, Jorjah Losalio-Watson, Steven Texeira.

GLO 3 Complex Thinker: Shevy Landis Ku, Kaelon Beech, Heather Ikeda, Nyzea Kainoa, Kaiah Uchida, Makanaonalani Manuel, Payton Kim, Jayla Medeiros, Ka'ano'i Yglesias, Dylinn Burough, Megan Baguso, David Basa, Timothy Duffy, Riley Wilson, Jarvis Kalili, Makana Thomas, Leina Ann Garana-Takizawa, Riley Nakamura, Everett Bettencourt.

GLO 4 Quality Producer: Kiara Behrendt, Tamatasi Faafia Akeo, Kamomi Alu Kau, Kahiau Mainaaupo-Reilly, Cody Kashiwabara, Georgina Queja, Torrance Satta-Ellis, Willy Mongkeya, Delilah Cruz, PJ Palokoa Joe, Xandria Libarios Antolin, Shannel Romualdo, Jade Perez, Robert Fujimori, Alona Kaluau Taetuna, Jasmine Lerback, Chantel Espiritu, Kauionalani Navas-Colburn, Jeneral Lim, Nalani Wall.

GLO 5 Effective Communicator: Emilio Gutierrez-Valdovinos, Nainoa Nakano, Makamua Paris, Sabrina Michelle Gencono, Kimberly Garza Magana, Jannie Caravalho, Jenna Oyama, Jennifer Transfiguracion, Ka'i Kunitomo, Isami Mark Mongkeya, Zachary Vermeulen, Ivan Barido, Caysie Calpito, A.J. Allred.

GLO 6 Effective and Ethical User of Technology: Micah "Tema" Wong, Hiilei Tiqui, Alex Gandalera, Leilani Ruiz Jimenez, Joverson Joe, Makayla Abril Butters, Tiare Quintal, Forrest Lewi, Tyson Acacio, Stacey Maghanoy, Faith Johnson, James Clark, Liam Brent.

DOE pushes Step Up diploma

Hawaii P-20 Partnerships for Education, the Hawaii State Board of Education and the Department of Education is coordinating a statewide drive to encourage public school eighth- and ninth-graders to "step up," by opting in to earn the Hawaii State Board of Education's "Step Up" Recognition Diploma. This rigorous program includes more challenging classes in math, science and writing, and it also includes the completion of a senior project. The diploma is available to all Hawaii public school students beginning with the class of 2013 (current sophomores). The program now hopes to enroll as many eighth- and ninth-graders by May 31 as possible.

Students, parents and caregivers interested in learning more about the Step Up campaign or to enroll in program can visit stepuphawaii.org. For more information, visit p20hawaii.org.

HPA presents seventh-grade performance

The seventh-grade class at Hawaii Preparatory Academy will present "Cyber-Mare," a one-act play, at 7 p.m. Friday at the school's Gates Performing Arts Center. The event is free and open to the public.

In a series of true-to-life vignettes, "Cyber-Mare" explores various scenarios that can lead to trouble on the Internet.

Following the performance, the students will present a musical revue of popular Broadway hits, including songs from "Grease," "Hairspray" and "Rent." The production will highlight the talents of every member of the seventh-grade class.

For more information, call 885-2500 or 885-2500.

Waikoloa student wins Letters About Literature contest

Waikoloa reader Bruce Risley's letter to an author was selected as a Level I winner for Hawaii in the national Letters About Literature contest.

The public is invited to an awards ceremony honoring Risley at 2 p.m. May 11 at Thelma Parker Memorial Public/School Library in Waimea. He will read his winning entry and receive several cash awards and a Library of Congress Center for the Book certificate.

Risley wrote a letter to Richard and Florence Atwater about "Mr. Popper's Penguins." His letter now goes to the national competition to be judged by the Library of Congress Center for the Book. The program, open to fourth- through 12th-graders, is sponsored by the Library of Congress Center for the Book in partnership with Target stores.

For more information, call 887-6067.

2011 Microsoft Imagine Cup Festival - New Zealand Now in our fifth year with the most successful competition thus far, the 2011 Microsoft Imagine Cup saw nearly 300 entries and over 1500 students engaged in a competition that has truly taken flight in New Zealand. Each team gathered on the 12th of April ready to deliver a presentation that would stun and excite the judges. Each team presented twice to a mix panel of 20 judges from industry, media, academia and Microsoft. Concluding the grueling presentations, each team had the opportunity to showcase their project to the public, to our customers, partners, supporters, family and friends. Everyone was then invited to join us at the Finals Ceremony, where the top 4 teams were announced and presented again in front of a live audience and an elite group of judges whom then decided the ranking of the top 4 teams. Team OneBuzz from the University of Auckland emerged as the victors following a series of 15-minute presentations before the six-judge panel. Focusing on tackling malaria with sophisticated technology that would identify areas of high risk and provide real time information to those concerned to act! Revolutionising The Fight Against Malaria ! A huge thank you to everyone who has helped make this a fantastic event! All the teams and mentors for making this an extremely outstanding event! The Microsoft Imagine Cup Crew of Student helpers on the day, 32 in total. Our key sponsors on the day, the ISOM Department and the Business School, University of Auckland. A big thank you to Red Bull for keeping the students on the go throughout the day! Highlights from the Microsoft Imagine Cup NZ Festival below or check out our Facebook Page Some Facts: - 300 Software Design Submissions - 1500+ Students competitors - 800+ Attendees at the Festival - 25 External judges - 80 Student competitors, 60, Industry, Microsoft and Academic Mentors - 32 Student Helpers volunteering on the day - 150 Spot prizes including t-shirts and Movie Tickets - Ben Hurley (NZ Comedian Hosting the event), DJ General Lee ( Hosting the after party) - 200 Lunch Boxes, 500 Hot Dogs, 200 Pizzas and a whole lot of Red Bull (1000+) - $20,000 In prize money won on the night. - 8000+ Fans through the People’s Choice Award Campaign - 550 Registered attendees for the Festival - Top 4 Teams – 1st Place – Team OneBuzz, 2nd Place – Team MCG, 3rd Place – Team SkyEye, 4th Place – Team Kai     More than 800+ attendees packed the Auckland University Business School throughout the event Each student was provided with a pair of ‘bang-bang’ sticks to show their support for their team Celebrity MC Ben Hurley from TV3’s 7 Days Our very own New Zealand Microsoft Imagine Cup Panel of expert judges from industry, academia and local government Microsoft Crew – The team of student helpers behind the event! Around 800+ attendees rocked up to the event which kicked off with teams showcasing their idea. Teams went all out decorating their booths including leaflets, giveaways and a full blown mascot! Team OneBuzz Celebrate their win and take hold of the NZ Microsoft Imagine Cup. 20 Teams, Mentors, MS Crew – Class of 2011 – Microsoft Imagine Cup New Zealand Everyone at the after party with DJ General Lee with HOT DOGS and Pizza provided getting ready for what to expect in New York The Awesome New Zealand Imagine Cup Crew – Daryl Ooh, Melanie Barr, David Steele and Ryan Tarak Check out some of the media releases on the top teams: Outlet Date Title TVNZ 13-Apr-11 Students buzzing over imagine cup win National Business Review 13-Apr-11 Auckland uni students take out Microsoft Imagine Cup again Breakfast 13-Apr-11 Imagine Cup winners Computerworld 13-Apr-11 Anti-malaria app takes out Microsoft Imagine Cup Business To Business 13-Apr-11 Auckland Uni Students Strike Gold again Scoop 13-Apr-11 Auckland Uni Students Strike Gold again Infonews 13-Apr-11 Auckland Uni students strike gold again at the 2011 Microsoft Imagine Cup Waikato Times 13-Apr-11 Waikato pair make final NZCS 15-Apr-11 http://www.nzcs.org.nz/newsletter/article/110 UOA 15-Apr-11 http://web.ece.auckland.ac.nz/uoa/home/news/template/news_item.jsp?cid=376741

IL-Melrose Park (Chicago West), Everest College - Melrose Park, IL campusReq # 11-0904Job Summary: Assist students in meeting their academic and career goals by providing an inspired teaching environment through the highest quality of theoretical, practical and professional training. Support the academic department in maintaining a successful, efficient, ethical and regulatory accurate business within the overall Corinthian goal

IL-Melrose Park, Everest College - Melrose Park, IL campusReq # 11-0404Job Summary: Assist students in meeting their academic and career goals by providing an inspired teaching environment through the highest quality of theoretical, practical and professional training. Support the academic department in maintaining a successful, efficient, ethical and regulatory accurate business within the overall Corinthian goal

IL-Melrose Park, Everest College - Melrose Park, ILReq # 11-0750Job Summary: Assist students in meeting their academic and career goals by providing an inspired teaching environment through the highest quality of theoretical, practical and professional training. Support the academic department in maintaining a successful, efficient, ethical and regulatory accurate business within the overall Corinthian goals and o

IL-Melrose Park (Chicago West), Everest College - Melrose Park, IL campusReq#: 11-0903Job Summary: Assist students in meeting their academic and career goals by providing an inspired teaching environment through the highest quality of theoretical, practical and professional training. Support the academic department in maintaining a successful, efficient, ethical and regulatory accurate business within the overall Corinthian goal

2011 Microsoft Imagine Cup Festival - New Zealand Now in our fifth year with the most successful competition thus far, the 2011 Microsoft Imagine Cup saw nearly 300 entries and over 1500 students engaged in a competition that has truly taken flight in New Zealand. Each team gathered on the 12th of April ready to deliver a presentation that would stun and excite the judges. Each team presented twice to a mix panel of 20 judges from industry, media, academia and Microsoft. Concluding the grueling presentations, each team had the opportunity to showcase their project to the public, to our customers, partners, supporters, family and friends. Everyone was then invited to join us at the Finals Ceremony, where the top 4 teams were announced and presented again in front of a live audience and an elite group of judges whom then decided the ranking of the top 4 teams. Team OneBuzz from the University of Auckland emerged as the victors following a series of 15-minute presentations before the six-judge panel. Focusing on tackling malaria with sophisticated technology that would identify areas of high risk and provide real time information to those concerned to act! Revolutionising The Fight Against Malaria ! A huge thank you to everyone who has helped make this a fantastic event! All the teams and mentors for making this an extremely outstanding event! The Microsoft Imagine Cup Crew of Student helpers on the day, 32 in total. Our key sponsors on the day, the ISOM Department and the Business School, University of Auckland. A big thank you to Red Bull for keeping the students on the go throughout the day! Highlights from the Microsoft Imagine Cup NZ Festival below or check out our Facebook Page Some Facts: - 300 Software Design Submissions - 1500+ Students competitors - 800+ Attendees at the Festival - 25 External judges - 80 Student competitors, 60, Industry, Microsoft and Academic Mentors - 32 Student Helpers volunteering on the day - 150 Spot prizes including t-shirts and Movie Tickets - Ben Hurley (NZ Comedian Hosting the event), DJ General Lee ( Hosting the after party) - 200 Lunch Boxes, 500 Hot Dogs, 200 Pizzas and a whole lot of Red Bull (1000+) - $20,000 In prize money won on the night. - 8000+ Fans through the People’s Choice Award Campaign - 550 Registered attendees for the Festival - Top 4 Teams – 1st Place – Team OneBuzz, 2nd Place – Team MCG, 3rd Place – Team SkyEye, 4th Place – Team Kai     More than 800+ attendees packed the Auckland University Business School throughout the event Each student was provided with a pair of ‘bang-bang’ sticks to show their support for their team Celebrity MC Ben Hurley from TV3’s 7 Days Our very own New Zealand Microsoft Imagine Cup Panel of expert judges from industry, academia and local government Microsoft Crew – The team of student helpers behind the event! Around 800+ attendees rocked up to the event which kicked off with teams showcasing their idea. Teams went all out decorating their booths including leaflets, giveaways and a full blown mascot! Team OneBuzz Celebrate their win and take hold of the NZ Microsoft Imagine Cup. 20 Teams, Mentors, MS Crew – Class of 2011 – Microsoft Imagine Cup New Zealand Everyone at the after party with DJ General Lee with HOT DOGS and Pizza provided getting ready for what to expect in New York The Awesome New Zealand Imagine Cup Crew – Daryl Ooh, Melanie Barr, David Steele and Ryan Tarak Check out some of the media releases on the top teams: Outlet Date Title TVNZ 13-Apr-11 Students buzzing over imagine cup win National Business Review 13-Apr-11 Auckland uni students take out Microsoft Imagine Cup again Breakfast 13-Apr-11 Imagine Cup winners Computerworld 13-Apr-11 Anti-malaria app takes out Microsoft Imagine Cup Business To Business 13-Apr-11 Auckland Uni Students Strike Gold again Scoop 13-Apr-11 Auckland Uni Students Strike Gold again Infonews 13-Apr-11 Auckland Uni students strike gold again at the 2011 Microsoft Imagine Cup Waikato Times 13-Apr-11 Waikato pair make final NZCS 15-Apr-11 http://www.nzcs.org.nz/newsletter/article/110 UOA 15-Apr-11 http://web.ece.auckland.ac.nz/uoa/home/news/template/news_item.jsp?cid=376741

WASHINGTON – Today, President Barack Obama announced his intent to nominate the following individuals to key Administration posts:

• Tony D’Agostino, Member, Board of Directors of the Securities Investor Protection Corporation
• Janice Eberly, Assistant Secretary for Economic Policy, Department of the Treasury

President Obama said, “I am confident that these outstanding individuals will greatly serve the American people in their new roles and I look forward to working with them in the months and years to come.”

President Obama announced his intent to nominate the following individuals to key Administration posts:

Tony D’Agostino, Nominee for Member, Board of Directors of the Securities Investor Protection Corporation
Tony D’Agostino is a Managing Director and COO of the Global Quantitative Analytics group at UBS Investment Bank. From 2000 to 2009, Mr. D’Agostino worked at Wachovia Securities where he served as the COO of Equity Capital Markets, Co-Head of Program and Algorithmic Trading and as a trader and analyst for the firm's U.S. Equity proprietary trading business. Prior to 2000, Mr. D’Agostino served in the US Navy on active duty for 24 years, both as an officer and an enlisted sailor. While in the Navy, Mr. D’Agostino served in numerous roles from rescue swimmer and anti-submarine warfare sonar operator onboard the H-3 Sea King helicopter to Officer of the Deck and ships geophysicist onboard the aircraft carrier USS John F. Kennedy (CV-67). Mr. D’Agostino holds a B.G.S from the University of Kansas and an M.S. from the Naval Postgraduate School.

Janice Eberly, Nominee for Assistant Secretary for Economic Policy, Department of the Treasury
Janice Eberly is the John L. and Helen Kellogg Distinguished Professor of Finance at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University, where she has been a member of the faculty since 1997.  Professor Eberly previously served on the staff of the White House Council of Economic Advisors, and is on the advisory panels of the Bureau of Economic Analysis and the Congressional Budget Office.  Professor Eberly was a Sloan Foundation Research Fellow in Economics and is a Research Associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research.  Her research has been funded by the National Science Foundation, and she has held editorial positions at major academic journals, including the American Economic Review and the Journal of Monetary Economics.  Professor Eberly publishes widely on macroeconomics and finance, focusing on capital investment and household decisions. The American Economics Association elected her to its Executive Committee in 2007.  Prior to coming to Northwestern, Professor Eberly was a faculty member at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.  She received her B.S. from the University of California, Davis, in 1986, and her Ph.D.  in Economics from M.I.T. in 1991.

Professor of Animation Animation Historian Animation World Network SCAD Hong Kong seeks candidates for full-time faculty positions in the animation department. Qualified candidates should have a doctorate degree or its equivalent in animation, or a related field. A good portfolio and strong academic credentials are ... and more »

The Workshop agenda is finalized and listed below for your information.  I hope you can attend the  Cloud Futures 2011 Workshop on  Advancing Research and Education with Cloud Computing, taking place in Microsoft Conference Center, Redmond, WA, June 2-3, 2011.

Please note that Windows Azure Platform 180 Day Pass will be available for attendees who will be coming to Redmond. 

However, if you are not able to attend in person, we will broadcast life all the session taking part in Cascade auditorium and will video tape all presentations.  The videos will be available for view on the workshop web site and Faculty Connection after the workshop.

Workshop Overview

The Cloud Futures Workshop series brings together thought leaders from academia, industry, and government to discuss the role of cloud computing across a variety of research and educational areas—including computer science, earth sciences, healthcare, humanities, life sciences, and social sciences. Presentations and discussions will highlight how new techniques, software platforms, and methods of research and teaching in the cloud may solve distinct challenges arising in those diverse areas. Workshop Co-Chairs                                                                                       Ed Lazowska Bill & Melinda Gates Chair in CS & Engineering Seattle, WA Dennis Gannon Director, eXtreme Computing Cloud Engagement Microsoft Research - Redmond, WA Keynote Presenters Jim Larus Director, Research & Strategy eXtreme Computing Group Microsoft Research Mark Russinovich Technical Fellow Windows Azure Fabric Microsoft Corporation Michael Franklin AMPLAB Director University of California, Berkeley Workshop Agenda (check for agenda updates on the workshop website) June 2, 2011 8:00 Transportation from Bellevue Westin to Microsoft Conference Center 8:45 Welcome and Conference Logistics 9:00 Keynote -  Jim Larus, Microsoft Research, eXtreme Computing Group (Cascade) 10:00 Break 10:30 Systems 1 (Cascade) · Cloud, HPC, or Hybrid: A Case Study Involving Satellite Image Processing. Marty Humphrey, University of Virginia · Classical and Iterative MapReduce on Azure.  Geoffrey Fox ,  Indiana University · Data Semantics Aware Clouds for High-performance Analytics Systems.  Jun Wang, the University of Central Florida 10:30 Education (St. Helens) · Bringing the Cloud to the Classroom Using the Microsoft Imagine Cup. James L. Parrish, Jr., University of Arkansas · Introducing Cloud Computing into STEM Undergraduate Curriculum Using Microsoft Azure. Bina Ramamurthy, University at Buffalo · InstantLab – The Cloud as Operating System Teaching Platform. Alexander Schmidt and Andreas Polze, Hasso Plattner Institute 12:00 Lunch in Rainier 1:00 Keynote - Michael J. Franklin. AMPLAB Director University of California, Berkeley (Cascade) 2:00  Systems-2 (Cascade) · Into the Blue: Streaming Data Processing in the Cloud. Stephen Wong, Rice University · Stork Data Scheduler for Windows Azure. Tevfik Kosar, State University of New York (SUNY) at Buffalo · Relational Data Markets in the Cloud: Challenges and Opportunities. Magdalena Balazinska, University of Washington 2:00  Windows Azure Tutorial, Part 1, Krishna Kumar, Windows Azure Academic Lead (St.Helens) 3:30 Break 4:00 Applications 1 (Cascade) · Using the Cloud to Model and Manage Large Watershed Systems. Marty Humphrey, University of Virginia · Large Scale Prediction of Transcription Factor Binding Sites for Gene Regulation using Cloud Computing. Zhengchang Su, University of North Carolina · University of Southern California, Clever Transportation Project (USC2T).  Barak Fishbain, University of Southern California 4:00 Windows Azure Tutorial, Part 2, Krishna Kumar, Windows Azure Academic Lead (St.Helens) 5:30 Transfer to Hotel 6:30 Dinner at Din Tai Fung , Bellevue, WA (located in Lincoln Square, 2/F, next door to the Bellevue Westin Hotel) June 3, 2011 8:00 Transportation to Microsoft Conference Center from Bellevue, Westin 8:30 Breakfast in Rainier 9:00 Keynote -  Mark Russinovich, Technical Fellow, Windows Azure Fabric, Microsoft Corporation Cascade 10:00 Break 10:30 Systems 3 (St. Helens) · Multi-cloud and cloud-desktop coordination made simplified by GXP on Azure. Kenjiro Taura, University of Tokyo · Running Large Workflows in the Cloud. Paul Watson, Newcastle University · Towards Enabling Mid-Scale Geo-Science Experiments Through Microsoft Trident and Windows Azure. Eran Chinthaka Withana and Beth Plale, Indiana University 10:30 Applications 2 (Cascade) · Network Display and Sharing System for Large Cultural Heritage Objects via Cloud Computing Environments. Yasuhide Okamoto, University of Tokyo · Deep Natural Language Processing for Improving a Search Engine Infrastructure using Windows Azure. Daisuke Kawahara, Kyoto University · A Secure Multi-party Collaboration System for Australian Coal Supply Chains. Shiping Chen, CSIRO ICT Centre 12:00  Lunch in Rainier 1:00 Applications  3  (St. Helens) · Beekeeping Enters the Cloud. James T. Wilkes, Appalachian State University · Scaling Document Clustering on the Cloud. Rob Gillen, Oak Ridge National Laboratory · Microsoft Azure: The Ultimate Flexible Enterprise-Level Solution. Janet L. Bailey, University of Arkansas 1:00 Security and software development (Cascade) · Risk Assessment and Cloud Strategy Development.  Barbara Endicott-Popovsky, University of Washington · Cloud forensics: an overview. Keyun Ruan, University College Dublin · Cloud Based Product Development. Joris Poort, Harvard Business School 2:30 Break 3:00 Systems  4 (St. Helens) · Expanding the Horizons of Cloud Computing Beyond the Data Center. Jon Weissman and Abhishek Chandra, University of Minnesota · URSA: Scalable Load Balancing and Power Management in Cluster Storage Systems. Seung-won Hwang, Pohang University of Science and Technology (POSTECH) · Achieving energy efficient computing by jointly scheduling services and batch jobs in virtualized environments. Tajana Simunic Rosing, UC San Diego 3:00 Applications 4 (Cascade) · High through-put, low impedance e-Science on Microsoft Azure. David Abramson, Monash University · Abstractions for Life-Science Applications on Clouds. Shantenu Jha, Andre Luckow, Rutgers University · The Parallelization of Geoscience Apps at C3L with Azure.  Craig Mudge, University of Adelaide 4:30 Cloud Research Panel - Chair Ed Lazowska  (Cascade) Windows Azure Platform Offer For those attendees who do not currently have access to Windows Azure, Microsoft wishes to make available onsite attendees the Windows Azure Platform 180 Day Pass. This will provide you with 6 months of access to the Windows Azure and SQL Azure platforms with the following level of service: Windows Azure · 3 small compute instances · 3GB of storage · 250,000 storage transactions SQL Azure · Two 1GB Web Edition database AppFabric · 100,000 Access Control transactions · 2 Service Bus connections Data Transfers (per region) · 3 GB in · 3 GB out Please note:  the Azure Platform 180 Day Pass is not offered to remote attendees who participate in Cloud Futures 2011 via webcast/live-streaming. Workshop Registration The online registration for Cloud Futures 2011 is now open and will close on May 20, 2011.  The registration link can be accessed off the workshop website. If you are an academic, member of a research institute or a government employee, we are required to send notification to your institution to ensure that accepting anything provided by Microsoft (including meals, Windows Azure Platform 180 Day Pass) does not violate any applicable governmental laws, regulations, or the letter or spirit of applicable ethics policies in place at your institution.   During the registration process, you will be asked to also provide your dean or department head’s name and e-mail address so that we may send this notification (In the case of Germany, we are required to seek approval from your university rector or president.) We’d like to provide you with next steps to complete your registration.  1. Please complete your workshop registration by May 20, 2011.  (Click Logistics for Participants for Information on hotels, transportation and meals). 2. For international workshop attendees traveling to the United States, the U.S. State Department's website has information on the Visa Waiver Program (allowing travel to the U.S. for up to 90 days without a visa), travel by citizens of Canada, Mexico and Bermuda, and information on Visitor Visas for business or pleasure.  Questions about letters of invitation for visas to the United States should be sent to cloudfut@microsoft.com 3. If you need to cancel your registration for Cloud Futures 2011, please login to your workshop registration to complete the cancellation process.  Remember to cancel your hotel room before 4 pm the day before your check in date (i.e. 24 hours notification is required). 4. Please also send an email to cloudfut@microsoft.com to alert us of your change of plans.

Letter of invitation and Visas

A letter of invitation is not an absolute requirement for foreign nationals traveling to the United States.  However, the process of entering the U.S. is subject to a great degree of scrutiny, more so than there has been in previous years.  Therefore, we strongly recommend that individuals intending to travel to the U.S. for business visitor purposes (i.e. meetings, conference, etc.) request a business travel support letter by submitting a completed request form as early as possible before their travel date.  For international workshop attendees traveling to the United States, the U.S. State Department's website has information on the Visa Waiver Program (allowing travel to the U.S. for up to 90 days without a visa), travel by citizens of Canada, Mexico and Bermuda, and information on Visitor Visas for business or pleasure.  Questions about letters of invitation for visas to the United States should be sent to cloudfut@microsoft.com

I hope you would be able to attend and contribute to this workshop!

Yours sincerely,

Cloud Futures: Advancing Research and Education with Cloud Computing

Redmond, WA | June 2-3, 2011

http://research.microsoft.com/cloudfutures2011/

What should the relationship be between the ASUW president and UW President Young?

William Ray: Young should listen to our ASUW leaders. It’s up to the ASUW president and others to make sure they understand what the campus thinks — through The Daily, the ASUW Senate or some other way. Luckily, most of the students running for those positions next year are superbly qualified. As long as we voice our concerns with them, the administration should have a solid understanding of what we want as a student body.

Bernard Ellouk: The relationship between the ASUW president and the UW president should be close. It will be the responsibility of the ASUW president to be persistent in meeting and developing a relationship with the new president. This will become especially important when it comes to issues regarding funding and contentions on major campus initiatives.

Peter Sessum: If the ASUW president is just trying to pad his or her resume, I don’t think Young should waste the time. If there is a real interest in serving the campus community, then I think meeting a few times a month would be good.

What do you think of the possibility of Housing and Food Services (HFS) providing concession services to the UW athletic department?

William Ray: I really couldn’t care less who gets the contract, so long as the decision is rendered on the basis of cost and quality alone. Unfortunately, due to union pressure and other factors, I don’t imagine it’s going to be that way. Just remember next time you’re paying $9 dollars for dorm food that HFS is paying a consultant who’s working to convince the university to hire HFS for this project.

Bernard Ellouk: Why has HFS not been doing this from the start? This is our organization. HFS’s plan to use students from RSOs to run the concessions so they can raise money is a brilliant way to provide opportunities for our fiscally deprived RSOs. Besides being an organization that is accountable to students, HFS is not responsible for countless global incidents of unfairly treated workers, like Sodexo.

Peter Sessum: I think it is good. HFS will focus more on the interests of the student body and not the corporate bottom line. It puts Sodexo on notice to change some of their practices. HFS will also be more accountable to the UW and that will be what is best for the students.

The Union for Academic Student Employees at the UW (UAW) Local 4121’s has requested that mandatory student fees be waived for TAs and RAs. What do you think of this prospect?

William Ray: Graduate students want more money? Well, they would, wouldn’t they? That’s not surprising, so does everyone.

Bernard Ellouk: If these mandatory fees severely impact our ability to recruit and keep a talented group of TAs then yes, there should be serious discussion about removing them. If it can be shown that these fees will have a negligible impact on our budget, then many students, including myself, would support waiving them. But if there will be a negative impact, maybe this is a discussion that should be saved until we are on stronger financial footing.

Peter Sessum: As long as the person is receiving an education, he or she should be subject to the same student fees as the rest of us. A graduate student is still a student, right? If a person is a TA while working toward a master’s degree, fees should apply. If student fees do not apply to students working, I want my student fees back. I am working for The Daily while earning a degree in journalism.

A week after accepting the job as university president, Michael Young has now accepted a salary.

The UW Board of Regents approved the soon-to-be UW President Michael Young’s five-year contract yesterday, which listed Young’s total annual compensation at $802,000.

According to a press release from the university, the figure includes Young’s annual base salary of $550,000, “his annual compensation of $46,500 in retirement benefits and a $12,000 automobile allowance.” For each year, the president will also earn $193,500, which will be put into a deferred account. However, in order to collect the deferred sum, Young must remain at the university for the length of the five-year contract.

Board of Regents Chair Herb Simon said in the release that the board believes the contract is fair and reflective of the “competitive marketplace for presidents of major research universities, as well as the current economic conditions the state of Washington is facing.”

Young’s total compensation as University of Utah president for the 2009-10 academic year was about $724,000.

In a press conference held last week at the UW, Young said he would be willing to, and that it was expected that he would, agree to a salary less than that of former UW President Mark Emmert.

“It’s more than inevitable that I’ll accept less,” Young said at the conference.

In 2009, The Chronicle of Higher Education reported that Emmert was the second-highest-paid public-university president in the United States. If he had stayed at the UW for the 2010-11 academic year, he would have made more than $900,000. Instead, Emmert broke his contract by accepting the position as president of the National Collegiate Athletic Association in October 2010.

In addition to Young’s compensation, he will follow the tradition of all UW presidents since the 1940s and take residence at the UW’s Hill-Crest mansion, in Madison Park. Living in Hill-Crest, which was given to the UW by the Walker-Ames family in 1939, has been described as an additional benefit to being the UW president.

The home was remodeled in 2005, while Emmert resided there. According to The Seattle Times, the improvements cost $800,000.

Norm Arkans, UW vice president of media relations, said that the university paid for the remodel of the older building because the property is a university facility.

Young will have a tenured appointment in the UW School of Law. Arkans said the president, by definition, is a faculty member and must have an appointment in an academic department. Young’s previous career as a law professor is the reasoning behind this appointment.

Arkans explained that Young’s tenure will give him this appointment for life, which means that after he retires from his presidency, he is eligible to become a law school professor at the university.

Young will begin his term July 1, and Interim President Phyllis Wise will return to her position as provost after this quarter.

Reach reporter Daron Anderson at news@dailyuw.com.

The Department of Art at the Florida State University invites applications for a visiting non-tenure track faculty position in digital media for the 2011-12 academic year. Position will be  available in August 2011. One year (nine-month) contract responsibilities include a ...

Chic Little Devil Style & PR House is seeking interns to start as soon as possible. We are located in downtown LA in the fashion district, walking distance from FIDM. We have a 6,000 square foot space that has balconies that have great views of the city, which we utilize for photo shoots and various events. We are a cool and fun staff, but you'll be expected to work hard here too. Chic Little Devil is a rapidly growing company that deals with the city’s best stylists, photographers, producers and LA’s elite and celebrities. We are the ultimate one stop shop and concierge for fashion.

We are currently looking for interns in one of the two different divisions, the Style House. We will be looking for interns in the PR department in the very near future (approximately 1 month from now), so if interested in the PR department please apply, but know that no immediate positions are currently available.

The specific tasks and expectations for each are listed below.

1. PR
Basic understanding of PR and what it is is crucial to your success in this fast paced and exciting department. We expect girls/guys to take initiative, think “outside the box”, take responsibility for their work and conduct themselves in a professional manner at all times. Building contacts, database management, interacting with stylists, editors and celebrity publicists, press releases, magazine press clippings, new client scouting, gifting suites for events, pick ups/drop offs, celeb pulls, and organizing shoots. Must own a laptop that has MS office. PR interns only work Monday-Friday 10am-6:30pm. As well as special assignments as directed. Must be on time and stay for the full day because of the industry we are in we have things come up thought the day with VIP clients and need people here at all times. Partial days are not okay unless pre-approved by me ahead of time.

2. Style House
Go-backing, cleaning, merchandising, running errands, pickups/drop-offs, assisting clients, assisting on photo shoots, reception duties (i.e. phones calls, messages, greeting clients), opening & closing duties, and special assignments as assigned. Must be on time and stay for the full day because of the industry we are in we have things come up thought the day with VIP clients and need people here at all times. Partial days are not okay unless pre-approved by me ahead of time.

This is an unpaid academic or experience only internship. We are in need of hard working self starters that can keep up with a fast paced environment. Interns are expected to work 1-3 days a week from the hours of 10:00am to 6:30pm. This is a four month commitment in which each intern that completes their internship with no more than three missed scheduled days, will receive a $200 gift certificate to our showroom. Please answer and send ALL OF the following information with your RESUME

1. Name
2. Phone Number
3. The days you are available FROM 10AM - 6:30PM MON-FRI
4. A brief description of your work history
5. A description of your schooling and long-term goal.
6. What you want to gain from this internship.
7. Please write in the subject line "PR internship" or "Style house internship" for the position you are interested in.


Thanks so much in advance, and we'll talk to you soon....

Briana Vinson (Intern Manager)

• Location: Downtown Los Angeles
• Compensation: un-paid internship
• This is an internship job
• Principals only. Recruiters, please don't contact this job poster.
• Please, no phone calls about this job!
• Please do not contact job poster about other services, products or commercial interests.

We've been keeping a close eye on news about the relationship between BPA and asthma and allergies. We've talked about this subject before. (See BPA, Allergies, and Asthma and BPA, Triclosan Linked to Allergies.) A new study seems to provide further evidence of a connection between BPA exposure and respiratory trouble, reports CNN.com.

The research, presented at the Pediatric Academic Society's annual meeting, indicates that the higher the amount of BPA an expectant mother is exposed to early in her pregnancy, the more likely it is that her newborn will experience wheezing during the first three years of life. According to pediatrician Dr. Adam of Penn State’s Hershey Medical Center, "fetuses exposed to high levels of BPA at 16 weeks of gestation had an increased risk of transient wheeze. At six months the infants were twice as likely to wheeze; the condition persisted for three years then cleared up."

Women with higher BPA levels were involved with particular activities, including working as a cashier, eating canned foods, and being exposed to tobacco smoke.

There continue to be skeptics, however. Executive director of the Polycarbonate/BPA Global Group with the American Chemistry Council Steven Hentges says:

“This small-scale study, which has not been peer-reviewed or published in the scientific literature, is inherently incapable of establishing a cause-effect relationship between any causative agent and wheezing. The statistical associations reported in this study have not been verified or corroborated by any other study on BPA, which is one of the best tested substances in commerce. Based on the full weight of scientific evidence, government agencies around the world have determined that BPA is safe for use.”

Despite some critics' reluctance to admit that BPA could pose a threat, we believe that erring on the side of caution is the best option. To reduce BPA exposure, the Department of Health and Human Services and experts from the National Institutes of Health recommend the following:

• Purchase plastic containers marked at the bottom with recycle codes 1, 2, 4, 5, and 6. These plastics are unlikely to contain BPA.
• Look for the BPA-free label when shopping for food our other household items.
• Never microwave polycarbonate plastic food containers. High temperatures can break down the chemical and increase the chances that BPA will enter your food.
• Choose fresh or frozen vegetables to limit the amount of canned goods you consume. Can linings often contain BPA.
• Use glass, porcelain, or stainless steel to store food.
• Don't take receipts unless you have to.

Here is our latest round-up of the more colorful legal settlements made by some US health care organizations.

Cardinal Health

Cardinal Health is a pharmaceutical services company. Per the Kansas City Star:

A pharmaceutical distributor has settled a federal anti-kickback lawsuit by agreeing, in part, to pay $760,000 to former Kansas City Chiefs player Dan Saleaumua and a consultant.

That money is part of an $8 million settlement that Cardinal Health Inc. of Ohio agreed to pay the U.S. government to settle the lawsuit.

The lawsuit alleged that Cardinal offered Saleaumua and consultant Kevin Rinne an illegal $440,000 kickback so it could supply prescription drugs to seven Kansas City area Medicine Shoppe pharmacies that Saleaumua owned at the time.

Cerberus Capital Management/ Dyncorp/ Steward Health Care

This will require some explanation. Cerberus Capital Management now owns Steward Health Care, mostly composed of what was formerly known as Caritas Christi hospital system of Massachusetts, and a large group of physician practices now known as Caritas Christi Network Services (see posts here and here). Cerberus Capital Management now also owns DynCorp (see their web-site), which has been called one of the "leading mercenary firms," by an article in the Nation.

As reported by Bloomberg about DynCorp, and hence indirectly about Cerberus, and Steward Health Care:

DynCorp International Inc., the largest U.S. contractor in Afghanistan, agreed to pay $7.7 million to resolve allegations it submitted inflated claims for construction work in Iraq, the U.S. said.

The Justice Department said yesterday that DynCorp and its subcontractor, The Sandi Group, will settle a whistleblower case filed in federal court in Washington. The Sandi Group, accused of submitting false claims on a police-training contract in Iraq, will pay more than $1 million.

'The hard work of stabilizing Iraq is challenging enough without contractors and subcontractors inflating the cost of rebuilding by making false claims at taxpayers’ expense' Assistant Attorney General Tony West, who oversees the department’s civil division, said in an e-mailed statement.

DynCorp inflated the costs of building camps at various locations in Iraq, the U.S. said.

Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center

Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center is a prestigious medical center. Per the New Hampshire Union-Leader:

Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center has settled a case of alleged billing fraud to various federal health programs, such as Medicare, Medicaid and Veterans Affairs.

DHMC, which denied any liability in the matter, agreed to pay $2,227,075. The federal government recovers $1.5 million, Vermont $80,396, and New Hampshire $61,541, the U.S. Attorney for the District of Vermont announced Tuesday.

The investigation began in 2007 following a complaint filed by Dr. Thomas J. Prendergast, who was a physician in the DHMC pulmonary department in Lebanon. The complaint alleged the hospital improperly billed federal health care programs for services performed by resident staff without sufficient supervision by physicians. Regulations allow physicians to bill for certain services by resident staff, but only if the services are performed in the presence of a physician.

The investigation, conducted with the hospital's cooperation, found alleged improper billing in the anesthesiology department, pain clinic and radiology, according to the government. The billings at issue were from 2001 to 2007.

Masonicare

Masonicare is a not-for-profit "senior services provider." Per the Meriden (CT) Record-Journal:

A settlement agreement was reached today where Masonicare Health Center will pay the government almost $450,000 to resolve allegations the facility violated the False Claims Act, according to an announcement from U.S. States Attorney David B. Fein.

Fein explained the allegations against the senior-focused inpatient and outpatient health care facility involved improper billing to Medicare and Medicaid for injections of leuprolide acetate, or Lupron. The medication is used to treat prostate cancer in men and endometriosis and fibroids in women. The billing code for the female-related dosage has a higher reimbursement rate than the code for male-related doses, according to the statement.


The government alleges that Masonicare regularly billed for the female-related code for male patients who were being treated for prostate cancer, so they received a substantially higher reimbursement than it should have received, according to the statement.

Further, the government alleges that in 2009, the company realized it had improperly coded the Lupron injections services but never self-disclosed its improper bulling to the government or made any attempt to pay the money back to the Medicare and Medicaid programs, Fein said.

Summary

So in the last 10 days or so, we have seen legal settlements of charges of kickbacks by a pharmaceutical services provider, submitting inflated claims to the federal government made by a subsidiary of a private equity group which also owns a large hospital system and group of physicians' practices, billing fraud by an academic medical center, and false claims by a senior health care services provider. 

I begin to think that if we keep this blog going long enough, the parade of legal settlements will include the majority of US health care organizations.  Again, such legal settlements serve as markers of the scope of bad behavior by a wide variety of health care organizations, including some of the largest and/or most prestigious, but also including many organizations that work regionally or at the community level.  Bad behavior indicated by these settlements seems so prevalent that it must be an important reason for the chronic problems that afflict US health care, rising costs, diminishing access, and stagnant quality.  However, it still seems to be politically incorrect to discuss such mismanagement, malfeasance and/or corruption as important causes of US health care problems. 

Although sometime in the past there may have been a general societal understanding that health care organizations ought to be held to the highest standards, and ought to be lead by people with the best character and of the best reputation, now one seldom hears an expression of shame when such organizations settle claims alleging fraud, over-billing, etc, etc, etc.

Like nearly all such cases we have previously reported, none of these cases seemed to involve any negative consequences for any persons who authorized, directed, or implemented the questionable acts.  While the fines involved may seem large to ordinary folk, they are not big enough to markedly affect the organizations involved.  So the parade of legal settlements has had little deterrent effect. 

Once again, I say: we will not deter unethical behavior by health care organizations until the people who authorize, direct or implement bad behavior fear some meaningfully negative consequences. Real health care reform needs to make health care leaders accountable.

Lynne Wallom has been named director of nursing-professional excellence and Pamela Carlson Rosenkranz director of nursing-critical care services for Nemours Children’s Hospital in Orlando. Wallom will be responsible for creating the nursing education department at the hospital, as well as developing nursing practice standards. She will also provide oversight for the clinical education team, develop continuing education programs, and establish and coordinate all clinical interactions with affiliate schools of nursing for the new pediatric and academic health...

Provost Kaler's June Departure May Coincide With Academic Cuts THiNK Magazine “I expect Eric [Kaler] to try and manage the cuts before the new provost arrives,” said Michael Schwartz, a professor in the sociology department, in response to an audience question at a town hall meeting. “Any academic cuts will probably be done by ... and more »

EXECUTIVE ORDER

RECRUITING AND HIRING STUDENTS AND RECENT GRADUATES

By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, including sections 3301 and 3302 of title 5, United States Code, it is hereby ordered as follows:

Section 1.  Policy.  The Federal Government benefits from a diverse workforce that includes students and recent graduates, who infuse the workplace with their enthusiasm, talents, and unique perspectives.  The existing competitive hiring process for the Federal civil service, however, is structured in a manner that, even at the entry level, favors job applicants who have significant previous work experience.  This structure, along with the complexity of the rules governing admission to the career civil service, creates a barrier to recruiting and hiring students and recent graduates.  It places the Federal Government at a competitive disadvantage compared to private-sector employers when it comes to hiring qualified applicants for entry-level positions.

To compete effectively for students and recent graduates, the Federal Government must improve its recruiting efforts; offer clear paths to Federal internships for students from high school through post-graduate school; offer clear paths to civil service careers for recent graduates; and provide meaningful training, mentoring, and career-development opportunities.  Further, exposing students and recent graduates to Federal jobs through internships and similar programs attracts them to careers in the Federal Government and enables agency employers to evaluate them on the job to determine whether they are likely to have successful careers in Government.

Accordingly, pursuant to my authority under 5 U.S.C. 3302(1), and in order to achieve a workforce that represents all segments of society as provided in 5 U.S.C. 2301(b)(1), I find that conditions of good administration (specifically, the need to promote employment opportunities for students and recent graduates in the Federal workforce) make necessary an exception to the competitive hiring rules for certain positions in the Federal civil service.

Sec. 2.  Establishment.  There are hereby established the Internship Program and the Recent Graduates Program, which, along with the Presidential Management Fellows Program, as modified herein, shall collectively be known as the Pathways Programs.  I therefore direct the Director of the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) to issue regulations implementing the Pathways Programs consistent with this order, including:

(a)  a description of the positions that executive departments and agencies (agencies) may fill through the Pathways Programs because conditions of good administration necessitate excepting those positions from the competitive hiring rules;

(b)  rules governing whether, to what extent, and in what manner public notice should be provided of job opportunities in the Pathways Programs;

(c)  a description of career-development, training, and mentorship opportunities for participants in the Pathways Programs;

(d)  requirements that managers meaningfully assess the performance of participants in the Pathways Programs to identify those who should be considered for conversion to career civil service positions;

(e)  a description of OPM oversight of agency use of the Pathways Programs to ensure that (i) they serve as a supplement to, and not a substitute for, the competitive hiring process, and (ii) agencies are using the Pathways Programs in a genuine effort to develop talent for careers in the civil service;

(f)  a description of OPM plans to evaluate agencies' effectiveness in recruiting and retaining talent using the Pathways Programs and of the satisfaction of Pathways Programs participants and their hiring managers; and

(g)  standard naming conventions across agencies, so that students and recent graduates can clearly understand and compare the career pathway opportunities available to them in the Federal Government.

Sec. 3.  Internship Program.  The Internship Program shall provide students in high schools, community colleges, 4-year colleges, trade schools, career and technical education programs, and other qualifying educational institutions and programs, as determined by OPM, with paid opportunities to work in agencies and explore Federal careers while still in school.  The Internship Program would replace the existing Student Career Experience Program, established pursuant to Executive Order 12015 of October 26, 1977.  The following principles and policies shall govern the Internship Program:

(a)  Participants in the program shall be referred to as "Interns" and shall be students enrolled, or accepted for enrollment, in qualifying educational institutions and programs, as determined by OPM.

(b)  Subject to any exceptions OPM may establish by regulation, agencies shall provide Interns with meaningful developmental work and set clear expectations regarding the work experience of the intern.

(c)  Students employed by third-party internship providers but placed in agencies may, to the extent permitted by OPM regulations, be treated as participants in the Internship Program.

Sec. 4.  Recent Graduates Program.  The Recent Graduates Program shall provide individuals who have recently graduated from qualifying educational institutions or programs with developmental experiences in the Federal Government intended to promote possible careers in the civil service.  The following principles and policies shall govern the Recent Graduates Program:

(a)  Participants in the program shall be referred to as "Recent Graduates" and must have obtained a qualifying degree, or completed a qualifying career or technical education program, as determined by OPM, within the preceding 2 years, except that veterans who, due to their military service obligation, were precluded from participating in the Recent Graduates Program during the 2-year period after obtaining a qualifying degree or completing a qualifying program shall be eligible to participate in the Program within 6 years of obtaining a qualifying degree or completing a qualifying program.

(b)  Responsibilities assigned to a Recent Graduate shall be consistent with his or her qualifications, educational background, and career interests, the purpose of the Recent Graduates Program, and agency needs.

Sec. 5.  Presidential Management Fellows Program.  The Presidential Management Fellows (PMF) Program is an existing program established pursuant to Executive Order 13318 of November 21, 2003, that aims to attract to the Federal service outstanding men and women from a variety of academic disciplines at the graduate level who have a clear interest in, and commitment to, the leadership and management of public policies and programs.  The following requirements shall govern the PMF Program upon the revocation of Executive Order 13318, as provided in section 8 of this order:

(a)  Participants in this program shall continue to be known as Presidential Management Fellows (PMFs or Fellows) and must have received, within the preceding 2 years, a qualifying advanced degree, as determined by OPM.

(b)  Responsibilities assigned to a PMF shall be consistent with the PMF's qualifications, educational background, and career interests, the purposes of the PMF Program, and agency needs.

(c)  OPM shall establish the eligibility requirements and minimum qualifications for the program, as well as a process for assessing eligible individuals for consideration for appointment as PMFs.

Sec. 6.  Appointment and Conversion.  (a)  Appointments to any of the Pathways Programs shall be under Schedule D of the excepted service, as established by section 7 of this order.

(b)  Appointments to the Recent Graduates or PMF Programs shall not exceed 2 years, unless extended by the employing agency for up to 120 days thereafter.

(c)  Appointment to a Pathways Program shall confer no right to further Federal employment in either the competitive or excepted service upon the expiration of the appointment, except that agencies may convert eligible participants noncompetitively to term, career, or career conditional appointments after satisfying requirements to be established by OPM, and agencies may noncompetitively convert participants who were initially converted to a term appointment under this section to a career or career-conditional appointment before the term appointment expires.

Sec. 7.  Implementation.  (a)  Civil Service Rule VI is amended as follows:

(i) 5 CFR 6.1(a) is amended to read:

OPM may except positions from the competitive service when it determines that (A) appointments thereto through competitive examination are not practicable, or (B) recruitment from among students attending qualifying educational institutions or individuals who have recently completed qualifying educational programs can better be achieved by devising additional means for recruiting and assessing candidates that diverge from the processes generally applicable to the competitive service.  These positions shall be listed in OPM's annual report for the fiscal year in which the exceptions are made.

(ii) 5 CFR 6.2 is amended to read:

OPM shall list positions that it excepts from the competitive service in Schedules A, B, C, and D, which schedules shall constitute parts of this rule, as follows:

Schedule A.  Positions other than those of a confidential or policy-determining character for which it is not practicable to examine shall be listed in Schedule A.

Schedule B.  Positions other than those of a confidential or policy-determining character for which it is not practicable to hold a competitive examination shall be listed in Schedule B.  Appointments to these positions shall be subject to such noncompetitive examination as may be prescribed by OPM.

Schedule C.  Positions of a confidential or policy-determining character shall be listed in Schedule C.

Schedule D.  Positions other than those of a confidential or policy-determining character for which the competitive service requirements make impracticable the adequate recruitment of sufficient numbers of students attending qualifying educational institutions or individuals who have recently completed qualifying educational programs.  These positions, which are temporarily placed in the excepted service to enable more effective recruitment from all segments of society by using means of recruiting and assessing candidates that diverge from the rules generally applicable to the competitive service, shall be listed in Schedule D.

(iii) The first sentence of 5 CFR 6.4 is amended to read:

Except as may be required by statute, the Civil Service Rules and Regulations shall not apply to removals from positions listed in Schedules A, C, or D or from positions excepted from the competitive service by statute.

The second sentence of 5 CFR 6.4 is to remain unchanged.

(iv) The first sentence of 5 CFR 6.6 is amended to read:

OPM may remove any position from or may revoke in whole or in part any provision of Schedule A, B, C, or D.

The second sentence of 5 CFR 6.6 is to remain unchanged.

(b)  The Director of OPM shall:

(i) promulgate such regulations as the Director determines may be necessary to implement this order;

(ii) provide oversight of the Pathways Programs;

(iii) establish, if appropriate, a Government-wide cap on the number of noncompetitive conversions to the competitive service of Interns, Recent Graduates, or PMFs (or a Government-wide combined conversion cap applicable to all three categories together);

(iv) administer, and review and revise annually or as needed, any Government-wide cap established pursuant to this subsection;

(v) provide guidance on conducting an orderly transition from existing student and internship programs to the Pathways Programs established pursuant to this order; and

(vi) consider for publication in the Federal Register at an appropriate time a proposed rule seeking public comment on the elimination of the Student Temporary Employment Program, established through OPM regulations at 5 CFR 213.3202(a).

(c)  In accordance with regulations prescribed pursuant to this order and applicable law, agencies shall:

(i) use appropriate merit-based procedures for recruitment, assessment, placement, and ongoing career development for participants in the Pathways Programs;

(ii) provide for equal employment opportunity in the Pathways Programs without regard to race, ethnicity, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability, sexual orientation, or any other non merit-based factor;

(iii) apply veterans' preference criteria; and

(iv) within 45 days of the date of this order, designate a Pathways Programs Officer (at the agency level, or at bureaus or components within the agency) to administer Pathways Programs, to serve as liaison with OPM, and to report to OPM on the implementation of the Pathways Programs and the individuals hired under them.

Sec. 8.  Prior Executive Orders.  (a)  Effective March 1, 2011, Executive Order 13162 (Federal Career Intern Program) is superseded and revoked.  Any individuals serving in appointments under that order on March 1, 2011, shall be converted to the competitive service, effective on that date, with no loss of pay or benefits.

(b)  On the effective date of final regulations promulgated by the Director of OPM to implement the Internship Program, Executive Order 12015 (pursuant to which the Student Career Experience Program was established), as amended, is superseded and revoked.

(c)  On the effective date of final regulations promulgated by the Director of OPM to implement changes to the PMF Program required by this order, Executive Order 13318 (Presidential Management Fellows Program), as amended, is superseded and revoked.

Sec. 9.  General Provisions.  (a)  This order shall be implemented consistent with applicable law and subject to the availability of appropriations.

(b)  Nothing in this order shall be construed to impair or otherwise affect:

(i) authority granted by law, regulation, Executive Order, or Presidential Directive to an executive department, agency, or head thereof; or

(ii) functions of the Director of the Office of Management and Budget relating to budgetary, administrative, or legislative proposals.

(c)  This order is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity by any party against the United States, its departments, agencies, or entities, its officers, employees, or agents, or any other person.

BARACK OBAMA

THE WHITE HOUSE,
December 27, 2010.