It reads like something out of a Japanese horror film from the 1960s. After the nuclear accident at Japan’s Fukushima nuclear plant, scientists have found mutations in three generations of butterflies after the exposure to the radiation. They include smaller wings and damaged eyes and affect over ten percent of just that one species — suggesting possible damage to other species exposed in the area.
Category: Academia
There is an interesting story below about airlines that force men to switch seats when they are seated next to an unaccompanied child out of fear that they could be child molesters. A firefighter recounts how he was forced to move on a Virgin Australia flight because there was a child next to him. Qantas has actually defended the discriminatory policy.
Continue reading “Qantas Defends Policy To Bar Males From Sitting Next To Unaccompanied Minors”
Submitted by Elaine Magliaro Guest Blogger
In May, David Sirota penned an article for Salon titled Selling out Public Schools. In it, he said that Mitt Romney, President Obama, and both of our major political parties were “assaulting public education.”
Sirota wrote:
On the Republican side, the Washington Post reports Mitt Romney just unveiled “a pro-choice, pro-voucher, pro-states-rights education program that seems certain to hasten the privatization of the public education system” completely. On the other side, Wall Street titans in the Democratic Party with zero experience in education policy are marshaling tens of millions of dollars to do much of what Romney aims to do as president – and they often have a willing partner in President Barack “Race to the Top” Obama and various Democratic governors.
Funded by corporate interests who naturally despise organized labor, both sides have demonized teachers’ unions as the primary problem in education — somehow ignoring the fact that most of the best-performing public school systems in America and in the rest of the world are, in fact, unionized. (Are we never supposed to ask how, if unions are the primary problem, so many unionized schools in America and abroad do so well?) Not surprisingly, these politicians and activists insist they are driven solely by their regard for the nation’s children — and they expect us to ignore the massive amount of money their benefactors (and even the activists personally) stand to make by transforming public education into yet another private profit center. Worse, they ask us also to forget that in the last few years of aggressive “reform” (read: evisceration) of public education, the education gap has actually gotten far worse, with the most highly touted policies put in place now turning the schoolhouse into yet another catalyst of crushing inequality.
Continue reading “Stateside Louisiana: School Vouchers and the Privatization of Public Education”
The United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit has ruled against professor Lynn Branham who challenged her firing as violating her guarantee of tenure. The case, Branham v. Thomas M. Cooley Law Sch., No. 10-2305 (August 6, 2012) 2012 U.S. App. LEXIS 16266, contains some interesting language on the tenure and when it is more rhetorical and real. Ironically, Branham has relocated to the faculty of St. Louis Law School — just time for its dean to resign over the “disrespect” shown her by the University president. Cooley Law School has been getting a fair level of trial practice recently — as a defendant, plaintiff, or witness (here and here and here). That leaves the impression of a type of perpetual legal machine, producing lawyers who produce lawsuits in an endless loop of litigation.
Continue reading “Sixth Circuit Rules Against Cooley Law Professor”
Annette Clark, the dean of St. Louis University’s law school has resigned after only a year on the job in a very public spat with the University president Father Lawrence Biondi. Clark released a letter stating “From the beginning of my deanship, you have evinced hostility toward the law school and its faculty and have treated me dismissively and with disrespect.”
Louisiana education officials are moving to block a decision by the Delhi Charter School to ban pregnant students and require pregnancy tests for students suspected of being pregnant. The state-funded school in Delhi, Louisiana implemented its “Student Pregnancy Policy” to remove pregnant girls from school — requiring them to either find another school or study at home.
Continue reading “Louisiana School Requires Pregnancy Tests and Expulsion for Pregnant Girls”
Princeton University jurisprudence professor Robert P. George has launched a campaign to pressure the five top hotel chains to block access to pornography to “re-stigmatize” the industry. George is the McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence and Director of the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions at Princeton University. His view of a free and pluralistic society is strikingly different from my own. While George discusses his deep Catholic faith and fears for the morality of his neighbors, he believes that the solution is deny millions of travelers the right to choose their entertainment each year at these hotels.
The 2012 college rankings by Forbes are out. The top five are Princeton (1), Williams (2), Stanford (3), University of Chicago (4), and Yale (5). I am particularly pleased to see my alma mater — University of Chicago — again recognized in the top schools. Chicago was tied for fifth in the alternative U.S. News and World Report rankings. Rounding out the top ten are Harvard (6), West Point (7), Columbia (8), Pomona (9), and Swarthmore (10).
Continue reading “Top College Rankings: Princeton, Williams, Stanford, University of Chicago, Yale”
Still angry about how the jocks shunning you throughout high school? Well, now you know what a wild bottlenose dolphin feels like. For that first time in any other species, scientists have found that the dolphin form cliques based on their skills. The study found that the dolphin engaged in “inclusive inheritability” bonding after observing dolphins in Shark Bay, Australia.
Continue reading “Study: Wild Dolphins Are Totally Stuck Up”
A study by a former skeptic of global warming — and funded in part by the Koch Brothers — has confirmed that human activity is likely causing the Earth to warm. Prof Richard Muller was once a critic of global warming but now says the evidence is clear in establishing the connection to human activity.
A lawsuit has been filed against what many consider to be the nation’s top public high school, The Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology in Fairfax, Virginia. Coalition of The Silence, an advocacy group led by former county School Board member Tina Hone, and the Fairfax chapter of the NAACP have filed a civil rights complaint with the U.S. Department of Education alleging that the admissions process at Thomas Jefferson has resulted in too few minority students.
Continue reading “Thomas Jefferson High School Sued Over Minority Admissions”
Since prospective law professors are suing law schools on the basis of age discrimination, it did not take long for law students to follow suit. C. Michael Kamps of Rockwall, Texas, is suing Baylor Law School for age discrimination on the grounds that he went to college before the use of grade inflation — resulting in a discriminatory impact based on his age.
Continue reading “Law Student Sues Baylor For Age Discrimination”
We have previously discussed the role of former General Counsel Cynthia Baldwin in the disastrous handling of the Sandusky scandal by Penn State. Baldwin is cited in the Freeh Report for her alleged failure to fully informed university officials and her opposition to an independent review that might have protected the university from the scandal and recently imposed heavy penalties against the school. Now former Penn State president Graham Spanier is joining in that criticism, saying that Baldwin failed to hire an experienced law firm during the grand jury probe.
We have been discussing for years how the United States and other nations continue to underfund preparations for the next pandemic. While spending billions for wars in places like Afghanistan and Iraq, the U.S. has not done enough to fund medical research in anticipation of a worldwide killer that is now overdue from a historical standpoint. MIT researchers, however, have at least given citizens some help in planning for their pandemic travels. The researchers found that Kennedy and LAX are the leading risk airports. The third airport to avoid? Honolulu International. The research was published in the journal PLoS ONE.
Donald S. Dobkin, 59, has taken an unconventional approach to getting on a law faculty. Dobkin has repeatedly sued the University of Iowa and the College of Law after they turned him down for a faculty position — alleging age discrimination. Dobkin has sued Iowa before after he learned that an allegedly younger and less qualified lawyer was hired over him.
Continue reading “Lawyer Sues Iowa Over Refusal To Add Him To Law Faculty . . . Again”