The University of Illinois law school has been fighting to regain its footing after a scandal over the admission of students due to their political connections. Now, the school is reeling from a new controversy: the disclosure that the school has published misleading data on admissions in six out of the last ten years.
Category: Academia
I often read ABA Journal as a great source of legal stories. The journal however has been the center of controversy this month after reporting on the results of a study on the preference of secretaries vis-a-vis male and female partners. The study by Professor Felice Batlan interviewed 142 secretaries at larger law firms and produced a surprising result: not a single secretary preferred female partners. When the ABA Journal reported that surprising fact, professors accused it of fostering gender stereotypes, misrepresenting the results of the study, and displaying a sexist view of the work. Some demanded a retraction and apology from the ABA Journal.
Continue reading “ABA Journal Under Fire For Coverage Of Survey Of Legal Secretaries”
It appears that regular prostate checks were not common 2,250 years ago. Scientists have announced that they have found the oldest case of prostate cancer in a Ptolemaic mummy through high-powered digital imaging.
Continue reading “Mummy Told You To Check Your Prostate: Scientists Find Oldest Cancer”
In an amazing breakthrough, French researchers were able to restore the youth of cells taken from people aged over 100 years to reprogram them to the stem cells stage. The work published in Genes and Development Journal would suggest that aging is reversible.
Continue reading “Have Scientists Finally Found The Fountain of Youth?”
I am pretty certain I know the favorite graduate lab in Canada. Canadian researchers have just released the genome sequence of the Cannabis sativa, better none as The Purple Kush, one of the most potent forms of marijuana.
What do you get a new gas protoplanet just forming 450 Light Years ago. A Buzz Light Year nightlight? That is no doubt one of the pressing questions for a University of Hawaii astronomer who used the twin 10-metre Keck telescopes on Mauna Kea to capture the first direct image of a planet forming around a star. Much like human babies, it proved a bit gassy.
We just moved a little closer to making Superman obsolete. MIT scientists at the Lincoln Laboratory have announced that they have developed a new radar system that looks through walls using “ultrawideband multiple-input, multiple-output phased-array sensor.” For the rest of us, they developed x-ray vision!!!
Continue reading “MIT Scientists Discover X-Ray Vision . . . Sort Of”
This is a very cool story. Scientists have discovered that Mars once had a mild temperature of 64 degrees Fahrenheit. They deduced the temperature from a rock found in Antarctica that had a wild ride starting four billion years ago. (Of course, the scientists again ignore the “creation science” account and misjudge the age of the rock by just short of four billion years).
Continue reading “Rock of Ages: Scientists Determine Mars Once Had Mild Surface Temperature”
This week proved rather gruesome for teachers and students alike. In Illinois, Linda Walker (shown here) decided not only to hang herself but to do it in her kindergarten class. In France, a high school math teacher set herself on fire in the playground during the recreation period full of children.
Continue reading “School Horrors: Teacher in France Lights Herself On Fire on Playground While A Teacher in Illinois Hangs Herself in Her Classroom”
A Georgia teacher, Ashley Payne, has lost her lawsuit seeking damages after she said she was forced out due to a Facebook picture taken of her drinking in Europe. A teacher or parent had filed an anonymous complaint against Payne for photos showing her holding drinks in Europe — not normally a shocking image.
Continue reading “Georgia Court Rules Against Teacher Who Lost Job After Posting Facebook Pictures Drinking in Europe”
Florida Governor Rick Scott is messing with the wrong people. Recently, Scott used anthropologists as an example of the type of degree that the state could do without. Anthropologists have reacted across the country, suggesting that Scott should be re-classified as a Homo Moronus. I would be careful before you tick off people (in the case of forensic anthropologists) who dig up bodies for a living. In the academy, we have long viewed our anthropologist colleagues with a certain fear and intimidation. When you confront one of these guys at a faculty senate meeting, they make it clear that there are “a lot of still active tar pits around the country where mammals can disappear for thousands of years.” When a critic for another department disappears, they just shrug and say, “Louie, is sleeping with the aquatic vertebrate.”
Continue reading “Florida Governor Campaigns Against . . . Anthropologists”
I wanted to thank the faculty and students at the Fordham University Graduate School of Social Service for the honor of receiving the Dr. Mary Ann Quaranta Elder Justice Award this weekend in New York. This is the first year of the award, which is named after one of the great public interest figures and academics of our age.
Continue reading “Fordham and the 2011 Quaranta Award”
Submitted by Elaine Magliaro, Guest Blogger
From Climate Science Watch (March 18, 2010): To the libertarians, the widely-shared scientific assessment that human-caused climate change will likely produce major harmful consequences — and the communication of this evidence to the public by the leading climate scientists — poses a particularly serious threat. An informed public concerned about the likelihood of harmful impacts of unchecked global climatic disruption is more likely to call for significant government action to curb greenhouse gas emissions. In order to block proactive government policymaking and keep corporate interests unregulated, libertarian groups have focused a significant part of their efforts on climate change on distorting the science to confuse public opinion, denying the seriousness of the problem, and, most recently, impugning the integrity of the climate science community. The Koch brothers have stepped forward with deep pockets to bankroll such efforts.
Continue reading “The Mercatus Center: A Tentacle of the Deregulation-Loving Kochtopus Helping in the Effort to Deny Climate Change and Eviscerate the EPA”
Researchers led by MIT professor Daniel Nocera have announced the creation of “artificial leaves” that can convert the energy of sunlight directly into a chemical fuel that can be stored and used later as an energy source. The leaf uses abundant material and could prove a breakthrough in the search for new fuel systems.
While former U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales has been able to escape investigation and prosecution for his role in the torture program, no law firms or ranking law schools wanted to touch him as he sought gainful employment. Gonzales has been struggling to find someone who wants to be represented or taught by an individual ridiculed for politicizing the Justice Department and bringing in hacks who were accused of a variety of criminal and ethical violations. Well, he finally found one school. Belmont University has created an unaccredited law school in Tennessee. Its new Doyle Rogers Distinguished Chair of Law is no one else than Alberto Gonzales.
Continue reading “Gonzales Hired To Teach At Unaccredited Belmont Law School in Tennessee”