These "students" know more about celebrities than they do about basic history and politics. This is why Wall Street wants to start so many charter schools - To make Americans even stupider.—Ronald David Jackson
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Obama Belongs on List of World's Tyrants | Against Authoritarian Threat of Far-Right |
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Showing posts with label higher education. Show all posts
Showing posts with label higher education. Show all posts
College Students' Answers to These Basic Questions Will Shock You — Yeah, They're Pretty Stupid
Paid Off By Monsanto: True Inside Story of How a College Professor Sells Out
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| Photo by William Murphy |
Former University of Illinois food science professor Bruce Chassy is known for his academic gravitas. Now retired nearly four years, Chassy still writes and speaks often about food safety issues, identifying himself with the full weight of the decades of experience earned at the public university and as a researcher at the National Institutes of Health. Chassy tells audiences that before he retired in 2012, he worked “full time” doing research and teaching.
What Chassy doesn’t talk much about is the other work he did while at the University of Illinois — promoting the interests of Monsanto Co., which has been trying to overcome mounting public concerns about the genetically engineered crops and chemicals the company sells. He also doesn’t talk much about the hundreds of thousands of dollars Monsanto donated to the university as Chassy was helping promote GMOs, or Monsanto’s secretive role in helping Chassy set up a nonprofit group and website to criticize individuals and organizations who raise questions about GMOs.
But emails released through Freedom of Information Act requests show that Chassy was an active member of a group of U.S. academics who have been quietly collaborating with Monsanto on strategies aimed at not just promoting biotech crop products, but also rolling back regulation of these products and fending off industry critics. The emails show money flowing into the university from Monsanto as Chassy collaborated on multiple projects with Monsanto to counter public concerns about genetically modified crops (GMOs) – all while representing himself as an independent academic for a public institution.
A New York Times article by Eric Lipton published last September laid bare the campaign crafted by Monsanto and other industry players to use the credibility of prominent academics to push the industry’s political agenda. That Times article focused primarily on University of Florida academic Kevin Folta, chairman of the university’s Horticultural Sciences Department, and Folta’s work on behalf of Monsanto. But an examination of recently released email exchanges between Monsanto and Chassy show new depths to the industry efforts.[...]
Chassy has said he did nothing unethical or improper in his work supporting Monsanto and the biotech crop industry. “As a public-sector research scientist, it was expected... that I collaborate with and solicit the engagement of those working in my field of expertise,” Chassy has stated.
[...]
- In a November 2010 email, Monsanto chief of global scientific affairs Eric Sachs tells Chassy that Monsanto has just sent a “gift of $10,000” to the university “so the funds should be there.” He then tells Chassy he is working on a plan for Monsanto and others in the agribusiness industry to support an “academics review” website that Chassy can use to counter concerns and allegations raised by critics of GMOs. “From my perspective the problem is one of expert engagement and that could be solved by paying experts to provide responses,” Sachs wrote. “The key will be keeping Monsanto in the background so as not to harm the credibility of the information.”
- In a separate 2010 exchange, Jay Byrne, president of the v-Fluence public relations firm and former head of corporate communications for Monsanto, tells Chassy he is trying to move the Academics Review project forward. He suggests “we work on the money (for all of us).” Byrne says that he has a list of GMO critics for Academics Review to target. He tells Chassy that the topic areas “mean money for a range of well-heeled corporations.”
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Neo-Confederates in Missouri Try To Revoke Scholarships of Football Players Who Refuse to Play for Political Reasons
Without the athletes, schools that have been raking in millions from their sport programs would be in a world of hurt. But racists want to send a message to any other black athletes who might be considering flexing their political muscles at schools with racial problems: "You are a slave. Get used to it."—Ronald David Jackson
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Missouri State Representative Files Bill to Revoke Striking Mizzou Players’ Scholarships
By Kevin McGuire
The Missouri House of Representatives will review a house bill filed by Republican state representative Rick Brattin that would seek to strip any scholarship athlete in the state of Missouri of his or her scholarship if they refuse to play their respective sport for any reason unrelated to health. This comes in the wake of the Missouri football player strike in the fall that ultimately led to the removal of Tim Wolfe as university president in November.
At this time there is no hearing scheduled and the bill is not yet confirmed for the House calendar in Missouri, but House Bill 1743 is officially prefiled as of Monday afternoon. The bill, which “Provides that any college athlete on scholarship who refuses to play for a reason unrelated to health shall have his or her scholarship revoked,” has a proposed effective starting date of August 28, 2016, just in time for next college football season. The strike from within the Missouri football team started when a statement from Missouri’s Legion of Black Collegians released a statement saying players of color will no longer participate in football activities until Wolfe resigned from his post following criticism over his handling of race-related events on Missouri’s campus.
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Greenpeace Sting Exposes Climate-Denying Academics-for-Hire
Professors from major U.S. institutions agreed to write reports promoting the benefits of CO2—and said they did not need to disclose fossil fuel funding
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| Princeton University Professor William Happer, agreed to write a report
for a Middle Eastern oil company on the benefits of CO2 and to allow the firm to keep the source of the funding secret. (Photo: James Loesch/flickr/cc) |
By Deirdre Fulton
As climate change deniers face growing scrutiny and skepticism, a new undercover investigation by the environmental group Greenpeace shines new light on academics-for-hire, who are willing to accept secret payments from fossil fuel companies to sow doubt about global warming.
The sting operation publicized Tuesday involved two Greenpeace UK employees posing as representatives of oil and coal companies, and asking U.S. academics to write papers touting the benefits of rising carbon dioxide levels and the benefits of coal use in developing countries.
Professors from Penn State and Princeton University "agreed to write the reports and said they did not need to disclose the source of the funding," according to reporting by Greenpeace Energydesk, a journalistic arm of the international environmental organization.
Energydesk reporters Lawrence Carter and Maeve McClenaghan continue:
Citing industry-funded documents—including testimony to state hearings and newspaper articles—Professor Frank Clemente of Penn State said: “In none of these cases is the sponsor identified. All my work is published as an independent scholar.”Among the exposé's other findings:
Leading climate-sceptic academic, Professor William Happer, agreed to write a report for a Middle Eastern oil company on the benefits of CO2 and to allow the firm to keep the source of the funding secret.
- US coal giant Peabody Energy also paid tens of thousands of dollars to an academic who produced coal-friendly research and provided testimony at state and federal climate hearings, the amount of which was never revealed.
- The Donors Trust, an organization that has been described as the "dark money ATM" of the US conservative movement, confirmed in a taped conversation with an undercover reporter that it could anonymously channel money from a fictional Middle Eastern oil and gas company to U.S. climate skeptic organizations.
- Princeton professor William Happer laid out details of an unofficial peer review process run by the Global Warming Policy Foundation, a UK climate skeptic think tank, and said he could ask to put an oil-funded report through a similar review process, after admitting that it would struggle to be published in an academic journal.
- A recent report by the GWPF that had been through the same unofficial peer review process, was promoted as “thoroughly peer-reviewed” by influential columnist Matt Ridley—a senior figure in the organization.
Watch the video below:
Late last month, Happer—who has said "more CO2 would benefit the world"—appeared at a climate skeptic summit in Texas, Energydesk reports. There, he defended CO2 production saying: "Our breath is not that different from a power plant." He went on to say, "If plants could vote, they would vote for coal."
As Carter and McClenaghan point out, the Greenpeace investigation follows recent reports showing fossil fuel companies burying the truth about climate change, while funding spurious research to cast doubt on the scientific consensus and make it "difficult for ordinary Americans to even know who to trust."
Reprinted with permission from Common Dreams.
'White Student Union' Pages on Facebook Reportedly Started by Neo-Nazis Who Don't Even Attend the Schools
While members of African-American, Latino and Asian student unions don't hide who they are and are happy to engage the public, most members of these alleged "white student unions" are hiding their identities.
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| This "white student union" poster is in the style of typical neo-Nazi art. |
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Dozens of ‘White Student Unions’ Have Mysteriously Materialized on Social Media in the Last Week
Groups claim to speak for students at Stanford, New York University, University of Missouri and elsewhere, but their origins are uncertain.
By Jamiles Lartey
At least 30 social media profiles of so-called “white student unions” have been set up in the last week, in response to nationwide student protests demanding action to address campus racism.
RELATED STORY: Student Union at Ryerson University in Canada Take Down "Pro-White Student" PostersThe pages claim to represent students at universities like Stanford, New York University and UC Berkeley, as well as at the University of Missouri, where protests this month forced the ouster of president Tim Wolfe and inspired activism on campuses elsewhere.
It appears that the first of these WSUs was the “Illini White Student Union”, created at the University of Illinois just hours after students gathered for a black solidarity event on campus last Wednesday. Its page has since been taken down by Facebook at the request of campus administrators.
“The Illinois student union that came on last week made us jump at the chance of creating an online presence,” according to someone claiming to be a spokesman for the WSU at UT Austin, who would not give his real name. “We kind of kicked ourselves for not doing it beforehand.”
UT Austin’s WSU describes itself on its page as a “group to promote the ethnic interests of white students and to protect us from BLM [Black Lives Matter] terrorism”. The spokesman said the group started as a collection of like-minded friends who began meeting to discuss topics like pride in white heritage and a sense that, in college classes, students are “drowning in an anti-white narrative”.
Given the rapid speed with which they have emerged, some have questioned whether the groups are really created by students. In a Medium post by the author “Bears for Equity”, it was noted late Sunday that well known white-supremacist and Neo-Nazi blogger Andrew Anglin called for his followers to “[m]ake more of these White Student Union pages on Facebook for various universities. You don’t have to go there. Make one for Dartmouth, Princeton, etc.”
The spokesman for the UT Austin WSU denied any connection to Anglin, and said that Anglin’s call for more group pages “really makes me cringe” and “cheapens what we are doing”. He also noted that the first post on his group’s page was made Friday, one day before Anglin’s post.
Other groups contacted by the Guardian also denied any connection to Anglin. A representative for the University of North Carolina WSU told the Guardian that “we denounce Anglin’s call for ‘dummy’ WSUs” and said they do not want to be associated with Anglin’s blog “The Stormer”. Similarly, a representative for the UCLA WSU said that Anglin’s “views and website are not at all representative of what we believe”. The WSU at UC Berkeley also denied any affiliation.
None of the representatives contacted were willing to identify themselves, citing security concerns. All of them also refused requests to confirm their student status by sending a message from an official school email.
[...]
Some of the recent pages seem more likely than others to be fake. A recent graduate of NYU, who didn’t want to give his name out of fear of online reprisals, said that when he started engaging with posters on the NYU WSU page, he noticed many had online ties to the white supremacist website Stormfront, and were far from New York City, in places like Atlanta and Portland, Maine. “I think that it probably did originate on Stormfront,” he said, “and got picked up by people on 4chan who just get amusement out of riling up ‘social justice warriors’, as they call them.”
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Pigs Among The Ivy: Yale Frat Had A 'White Girls Only' Halloween Party — Girls of Color Turned Away
If you ever wanted to know why US intelligence agencies love Yale graduates so much... Well, maybe now you know.
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Yale Sigma Alpha Epsilon accused of turning away students of color for ‘white girls only’ Halloween party
By Tobias Salinger
A Yale fraternity member used a “white girls only” policy to turn away students of color from a Halloween party Friday night, students said.
A brother at the Ivy League university’s Sigma Alpha Epsilon chapter screened out non-white students from a crowded party at the frat house as students waited in line to try to get in, Sofia Petros-Gouin told The Washington Post.
“A group of girls came up who were predominantly black and Hispanic. He held his hand up to their faces and said, ‘No, we’re only looking for white girls,’” said Petros-Gouin, a Columbia student who was visiting friends at Yale over the weekend.
“He pulled a blonde girl up from the bottom of the stairs — over some people — pushed her inside and said, ‘We are looking for white girls only, white girls only.’ No brothers corrected him or said anything.”
Officials at the international headquarters of SAE - which lost its University of Oklahoma chapter in March after a video of brothers singing a racist chant surfaced - promised to investigate the claims made by several students about the party.
Yale student Neema Githere first drew attention to the matter with a post on Facebook the day after the shindig. “I'd just like to take a moment to give a shoutout to the member of Yale's SAE chapter who turned away a group of girls from their party last night, explaining that admittance was on a ‘White Girls Only’ basis; and a belated shoutout to the SAE member who turned me and my friends away for the same reason last year.
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Top Universities in US Have A Huge Sex Abuse Problem - 30% of Women At Some Universities Report Sex Abuse (Report)
Twenty-Seven schools were surveyed by the American Association of Universities, and over a dozen declined to participate. According to the survey, 25 percent of female undergrads experienced "non-consensual sexual contact through force or in situations when they were incapacitated and unable to consent" at Brown University, and 35 percent of all students said sexual assault and misconduct is very or extremely problematic at the school. At Dartmouth College, those numbers were 28 and 30 percent. At the University of Michigan those numbers were 30 and 29 percent. At Harvard University, those numbers were 26 and 13 percent.
Households of Black College Graduates Lost Half Their Wealth — Despite Degrees
Black households headed by college graduates have been steadily losing ground to their white collegiate peers over the past two decades. Indeed, Black college families lost a much higher proportion of their net worth during this period than did Black families whose heads did not graduate from college – who didn’t have much to lose.
By Glen Ford, BAR Executive Editor
“Black college families saw a steady erosion of their economic status.”For generations, it has been an article of faith among Black people that education is the path to success, not just for the individual, but for the Black community as a whole. That’s never been entirely true, which is why W.E.B. Dubois was the first Black person to get a PhD from Harvard, but was not allowed to teach there, and why Black high schools in Washington, DC, during Jim Crow were full of teachers with doctorates who couldn’t find steady employment, elsewhere. The notion that college is the “great equalizer” in American society may have some validity for whites and Asian Americans, but for Hispanics and Blacks, the situation is much more complicated.
A new study by the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis finds that the wealth of Black families headed by college graduates diminished dramatically between 1992 and 2013. There were three recessions over that time period, but despite the downturns the median net worth, or wealth, of white households headed by a college graduate increased by 86 percent. For Asian college families, the rise in net worth was even more dramatic over the two decades; their wealth went up nearly 90 percent. But, Black families in which the head of household held a college degree saw their net worth drop by more than half: 56 percent, when adjusted for inflation. In other words, three recessions in 20 years didn’t stop whites and Asian American college graduates from steadily increasing their family wealth, while Black college families saw a steady erosion of their economic status. Hispanic households headed by college graduates lost a catastrophic 72 percent of their wealth in the last recession, alone, largely because they were even more heavily invested in housing than their Black counterparts.
“They were deeper in debt, both on their houses and their college educations.”
Indeed, Black college graduate households lost a lot more during the recessions than Black families headed by people without college degrees, whose wealth declined less than 4 percent. But, of course, that’s largely because most Black people don’t have much wealth to lose. After the last recession, Black median household wealth shrank to one-twentieth that of white families.
Black college households, along with their Hispanic peers, sank a lot more of their money into the family home, where much of it disappeared in the Great Recession. The homes of white college graduates declined in value by only 25 percent, during the economic meltdown. But Black and Hispanic college graduates’ homes lost about half their value.
The authors of the study conclude that the Black and Hispanic college families fared so badly during recessions because they were deeper in debt, both on their houses and their college educations. Without the benefit of affluent relatives, and in a job market rife with racism, their college degrees provided little protection from economic downturns.
The study states the obvious: that “higher education alone cannot level the playing field.” But a report by the Federal Reserve Bank cannot tell the real truth: that it is statistically impossible for Blacks, under the current system, to ever achieve economic parity with whites, no matter what their educations. What’s needed is a fundamental transformation of society – a revolution. Let that be a lesson to you.
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BAR executive editor Glen Ford can be contacted at Glen.Ford@BlackAgendaReport.com.
Women's Basketball Team Bullied, Abused And Segregated by Race by Coaches at University of Illinois - Lawsuit
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| Black players were called "toxic, poisonous, crabs, and west-side ghetto." Four of the women involved in a lawsuit against the University of Illinois (clockwise from upper left): Alexis Smith, Taylor Gleason, Jacqui Grant, and Taylor Tuck. |
By DAVID MERCER
Seven former University of Illinois women's basketball players sued the university Wednesday, accusing coach Matt Bollant and a former assistant of violating their civil rights by using race to divide the team and try to force some players out.
The lawsuit adds to this year's stream of accusations against the school's sports programs over player treatment. Some of the plaintiffs' parents made similar complaints to the school in May, claims that are being investigated by a university-hired law firm along with one from a former football player who says his injuries weren't properly handled. A former soccer player has sued the school over the handling of her concussions.
The university, athletic director Mike Thomas, Bollant, former assistant Mike Divilbiss and university trustees are named in the lawsuit, which was filed in federal court in Champaign. The ex-players seek at least $10 million in damages.
Bollant and Divilbiss are accused of holding segregated practices, using more severe discipline for black players and taking other steps that the players believe were designed to pressure black players and white players who supported them to leave the team, according to the lawsuit. Some of the accusations date to Bollant's hiring in 2012, while others address the two most recent seasons.
"The coaches were trying to run them off the program, and give up their scholarships and leave,' attorney Terry Ekl, who represents the players, said Wednesday. They declined comment through Ekl.
Chancellor Phyllis Wise said she was disappointed the players sued before the law firm's investigation is finished.
"I cannot stress enough that any time we learn that a student feels the experience at Illinois isn't excellent, we take those concerns seriously," Wise said. "We intended that through the external review process the student-athletes and their families would help us better understand their concerns and perceptions."
She also noted Thomas has recently added staff and made policy changes intended to prevent future problems.
Bollant, who was hired in 2012 after coaching at University of Wisconsin-Green Bay, wasn't reachable for comment. Divilbiss resigned from the university after the initial accusations became public and hasn't responded to phone calls since then. Both men are white.
Five of the former players — Alexis Smith, Nia Oden, Amarah Coleman, Sarah Livingston and Taylor Tuck— are black; Taylor Gleason and Jacqui Grant are white.
According to the lawsuit, Smith, Oden and Tuck were called "toxic" and "crabs" who pull each other down. The alleged segregated practices were referred to as "the dog pound."
The players also say the coaches implied at least some of the black plaintiffs were unintelligent, undisciplined "west-side ghetto" players.
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High Stakes Testing Goes Mega — With Predictable End Result: Billion Dollar Exam Scam in India — Dozens of Potential Witnesses Dead
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| In this Wednesday, March 18, 2015 file
photo, Indians climb the wall of a building to help students appearing
in an examination in Hajipur, in the eastern Indian state of Bihar. Education authorities in eastern India say 600 high school students have been expelled after they were found to have cheated on pressure-packed 10th grade examinations. |
By Rama Lakshmi
Nobody knows exactly when or why the witnesses and small-time crooks caught up in one of India’s biggest corruption scandals began dying under mysterious circumstances. But in the past two years, that’s what’s happened to more than two dozen people implicated in a $1 billion test-rigging scheme.
RELATED STORY: Chicago Teachers Union Breaks With Common Core -- High-Stakes Standardized Testing Doesn't Deliver Equity - It Reinforces InequityEven by standards in India, where corruption is routine, the scale of the scam in the central state of Madhya Pradesh is mind-boggling. Police say that since 2007, tens of thousands of students and job aspirants have paid hefty bribes to middlemen, bureaucrats and politicians to rig test results for medical schools and government jobs.
So far, 1,930 people have been arrested and more than 500 are on the run. Hundreds of medical students are in prison — along with several bureaucrats and the state’s education minister. Even the governor has been implicated.
RELATED STORY: Does Today Show Know Michelle Rhee's Record? -- The Corporate Education Lobbyist Was At the Center of a Cheating Scandal
RELATED STORY: "Everything You've Been Told About the 'Common Core' Curriculum is a Lie": Federal, State and Local Education Specialists Had Little Input — Its An Initiative Funded by Bill Gates to Create Compliant, Dumbed Down Citizens — VideoPolice have had their hands full racing to meet a July deadline in the criminal probe. And now they are faced with the deaths of more witnesses and suspects. In the past week, police said, one of those accused died after having chest pains in prison, another drowned in a village pond and a third died of a liver infection.
On Saturday, television reporter Akshay Singh died while investigating a suspect’s death. Singh sipped tea during an interview and began coughing and foaming at the mouth, according to media reports. He was rushed to the hospital, where doctors said he had suffered a heart attack. Police said the initial examination did not reveal anything “suspicious.”
The state’s government, run by the Bharatiya Janata Party, has said that “no conspiracy was found” in the recent deaths. But others involved in the case fear otherwise. The state’s chief minister, Shivraj Singh Chouhan, said on Sunday that his mind is in “agony and pain” and promised that all the deaths will be investigated.(5/7/15) Candle light vigil demanding justice for late journalist Akshay Singh held in Varanasi pic.twitter.com/lSdKjTgbC7
— ANI (@ANI_news) July 6, 2015
“The police say they keep coming up against a wall in their investigation every time someone is found dead,” said Chandresh Bhushan, chairman of the special investigation team that was appointed by the state court to monitor the police probe. “We ask them, ‘Why are so many dying in road accidents in this case? Does this have any link to the scam?’ There is no evidence of a link yet, but we cannot overrule it, either.”
Cheating on school and college tests is commonplace in India. A few months ago, photographs of parents hanging precariously from school windows to throw cheat sheets to their children caused nationwide outrage.
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Donald Trump's 'University' Ripped Off Millions From Trusting Students: Judge Demands Financial Records — RICO Lawsuit
Trump labeled a racketeer and conspirator. Perhaps that's how he made his billions.
By Elizabeth Warmerdam
Donald Trump must disclose how much money he made from Trump University, in the discovery phase of a RICO class action accusing him of defrauding students of millions of dollars, a federal judge ruled.
U.S. District Judge Gonzalo Curiel on Tuesday ruled that Trump's financial transactions involving Trump University are relevant to lead plaintiff Art Cohen's claims.
Curiel sustained Cohen's objections to Magistrate Judge William Gallo's discovery ruling this month that Cohen not be allowed to question Trump about the capital contributions he made directly or indirectly to Trump University.
In his October 2013 lawsuit , Cohen claims that Trump "devised and executed a scheme to make tens of millions of dollars" by misrepresenting that Trump University was an actual university taught by a faculty of professors at least partly selected by Trump himself.
Trump claimed that Trump University would teach some of his real estate investing secrets. The class was certified in October 2014.
To lure students, Trump spent up to $6 million a year on a national advertising campaign, which included YouTube, email, website and postal mail solicitations, the complaint states.
Cohen says he paid more than $36,000 for the program before realizing that Trump does not teach students his real estate investing secrets, contribute in any meaningful way to the curriculum, or handpick the instructors.
Judge Curiel found that evidence of Trump's profits is relevant and discoverable.
Trump failed to show "that a broad federal right to financial privacy exists that bars discovery regarding any financial transactions of a defendant accused of defrauding large numbers of people," Curiel ruled.
Cohen claims that Trump had substantial control over the university, provided the operating capital, participated in its operations and management, and made money from it.
"Thus, Trump's payments to, and receipt of funds from, Trump University would be relevant to supporting plaintiffs' claims," Curiel ruled. He added that such information is not readily available to Cohen outside of discovery.
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How Republicans Terrorize Educators: Snatched $3 Million from Law School After Professor Slams Voter ID
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| Professor Gene Nichols. |
Democrats in North Carolina are accusing Republican lawmakers of punishing the University of North Carolina School of Law with a last-minute budget cut because the school employs a professor who has been critical of their policies.
During a budget debate in the state Senate on Monday, Republicans passed a last-minute amendment that would strip $3 million from the law school and redirect it to the Mountain Area Health Education Center near Asheville, WRAL reported.
Democratic state Sen. Floyd McKissick noted that both schools could have been easily funded if Republicans had not repealed the privilege license tax for banks, which he said was costing the state $12 million a year.
State Sen. Terry Van Duyn, a Democrat from Buncombe County, asserted that the move had been done to punish the UNC School of Law after they refused to fire Professor Gene Nichol, who has been critical of the Republican-controlled legislature’s efforts to pass voter ID laws.
According to WRAL, a Republican-appointed UNC Board of Governors had forced the school to close the privately-funded Center on Poverty, Work and Opportunity earlier this year that was being headed by Nichol. But the school refused to fire him.
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The Story Behind The Ex-Frat Member and His Black 'Backup Singers' (Video)
Why did this ex-fraternity member who was expelled from Oklahoma University after he was recorded leading a racist chant have these black “backup singers” for his apology? Because one of his “backup singers” claimed to be channeling a TV character who plays a concubine who always gets “massa” out of trouble.—Ronald David Jackson
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House Mother of Racist Oklahoma University Fraternity Gives an Awesome Speech in Defense of the Frat
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| Beauton Gilbow: She's an inspiration to us all. |
Two-Faced Whites Make Blacks Very Wary of Friendship: Frat Members Who Chanted Racist Slogans Had Black Frat 'Brother'
The Tainted 'Gentlemen' of Sigma Alpha Epsilon
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| Sometimes you can't be sure which face is being shown to you. (Photo by Pikawil) |
There will never be a n***** SAE", those were the words so cheerfully sang by members of Sigma Alpha Epsilon's University of Oklahoma chapter on their way to "date night." That hateful and scripted chant came from SAE, a fraternity whose creed is the True Gentleman written by John Walter Wayland in 1899:
The True Gentleman is the man whose conduct proceeds from good will and an acute sense of propriety, and whose self-control is equal to all emergencies; who does not make the poor man conscious of his poverty, the obscure man of his obscurity, or any man of his inferiority or deformity…
Yet, there these men are on a bus, singing a song about lynching, to the tune of "If You're Happy and You Know It." It wasn't just one person singing it, but an entire bus of people, as if it were a dress rehearsal for a KKK retreat.
Contrary to what the Supreme Court may think by gutting the voting rights act -- 'cause you know, we don't really need it anymore -- post-racial we are not. Nope, racism is alive and well and thanks to social media no longer hidden. In just nine-seconds we received that reminder and William Bruce James II, a black member of the fraternity, a sucker punch.
There may not have been a n***** at SAE, but there was indeed at least one black man.
Having grown up in a small town in Oklahoma, Will was used to being the "only one." He may have been used to it but it wasn't something that he wanted. So, then how did he end up pledging SAE?
"A friend of mine had a grandfather that pledged Sigma Alpha Epsilon and he wanted me to go to the house with him to check it out, so I went. I may have been the only black person in the room, but they didn't make me feel that way. There was a feeling of inclusion."
That sense of inclusion faded away yesterday as he watched his fellow SAE brothers sing about lynching. The sadness in his voice was palpable as he talked about the good times he had being Song Chair of the fraternity. "I never heard that song before yesterday. We used to sing songs about symbolism and drinking, it was corny and spirited, this was something else."
He had hoped that his presence would have changed something. Made his brothers think about diversity and stereotypes. "I wouldn't say I was an ambassador, but I did think my presence would shift something, clearly I was wrong."
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White Racist Students at Oklahoma University Chant Their Racist Views — They Didn't Know The World Would Find Out (Video)
Students at Oklahoma University having a great time with a racist chant.
RELATED STORY: University of Oklahoma Fraternity Closed After Racist Chant
Professor Fired Over Gaza Tweets: Free Speech In America — Say What You Want... And Pay The Price
The promise of academic freedom in the United States is as empty as these chairs.
Gaza, Steven Salaita and the Threat to Academic Freedom at the University of Illinois: An Open Letter to the Chancellor of the University of Illinois at Urbana -Champaign.
By GIORGIO MARIANI
Dear Chancellor,
I have just heard of the decision you have made to rescind a contract with professor Steven Salaita for the views he has expressed on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. I am deeply troubled by your decision, which, by all standards, based on the information I have been able to gather so far, is a flagrant violation of academic freedom.
I take the liberty of writing this message even though I am not a US but an Italian academic. As a professor of American literature at the Sapienza University of Rome, who holds a PhD from Rutgers University and who has lived for more than twelve years in the US, enjoying the vibrant atmosphere of its academic life, I am not only worried, but outright shocked by such decision, which is contrary to everything the best American liberal thinkers, from Ralph Waldo Emerson onwards, have always stood for.
Screen capture from Steven Salaita's Twitter page. I am also compelled to write due to the fact that over the last five years I have visited your university as part of an agreement between our two universities. Professors from UIUC have visited and taught at my University, and I have been a fellow at the International Forum for US Studies on three separate occasions. I have always been proud to be the promoter of a collaboration between our two institutions. Until now your university has stood out as a beacon ofexcellence and free academic debate. Because of your unfortunate decision, your institution is now at risk of becoming a symbol of the ever-growing intolerance of the powers that be against any serious criticism of the status quo.
Criticism may at times be expressed in harsh words, and in the case at hand one does not have to agree with every single word uttered by Prof. Salaita to defend his right to express freely his views. Indeed, one may well disagree with what he says and, as Voltaire famously argued, be a staunch defender of his right to speak his mind.
I live in a country where the freedom of teaching is enshrined in the constitution. The last time Italian authorities directly intervened to curb academic freedom was during the Fascist regime. Since the days of Mussolini, not one single Italian academic has been fired or refused tenure because of his or her political views, no matter how extreme.
What is also in my view disconcerting is that, in the case of professor Salaita, his views have not been expressed ex-cathedra. I read that your decision is motivated by his “uncivil” views. I am afraid, however, that “uncivil” views were likewise expressed at some point or another in their careers, by the likes of Thomas Jefferson, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Margaret Fuller, Frederick Douglass, Mark Twain, Upton Sinclair, Denise Levertov and many, many other outstanding Americans. If the standards now applied to professor Salaita were the same for these and other American intellectuals, they would all be prevented from teaching at any university.
Screen capture from Steven Salaita's Twitter page.
I feel obliged to write this message also because I have been serving for the last three years as president of the International American Studies Association. A threat to academic freedom anywhere is a threat to academic freedom everywhere. The termination of Professor Salaita’s contract would not only be a dishonor to your institution but an offense to the liberty your country claims to have at heart.
I sincerely hope you will reconsider your course of action. You would prove yourself wise, magnanimous, and far-sighted.
Sincerely, Giorgio Mariani is a Professor of American Literature at Sapienza University of Rome.
_____________________
This open letter was re-printed in CounterPunch.
Koch Brothers Infiltrating Major Black Institutions — AFSCME Union Cuts Ties With United Negro College Fund Over “Koch Scholars” Program
By Joan WalshUnited Negro College Fund's "A Mind Is Gala" - March 7, 2013.
Rush Limbaugh attacked them as “lunatics” running a “plantation” for black “slaves.” Another right-winger claimed a “white” union president was out to hurt “disadvantaged black youth,” even though the union president in question is black.
It’s no surprise AFSCME’s decision to end its partnership with the United Negro Colllege Fund, in the wake of UNCF accepting a $25 million contribution from the Koch brothers to establish a “Koch Scholars” program, as well as participating in their annual right-wing strategy summit, has conservatives trashing the influential public sector union. It fits their favorite story line: Liberals are the real racists.
But even some non-wingnuts have piled on. The Root’s Keli Goff blasted the decision as “progressive intolerance,” insisting that the Kochs’ support of public sector union busting “has nothing to do with educating African-American students.” That’s led to renewed interest in AFSCME’s move, which president Lee Saunders announced two weeks ago.
In a letter to UNCF president Michael Lomax, AFSCME’s Saunders called the Kochs “the single most prominent funders of efforts to prevent African-Americans from voting.” Lomax’s appearance at the Koch brothers’ annual summit, where they plot conservative strategy – this year’s focus was taking back the Senate in 2014 — was “a betrayal of everything the UNCF stands for.” Members of AFSCME, a union that supports Democrats with money and people power, voted unanimously to back Saunders’ decision at their annual convention in Chicago last week.
“This is not a Democrat or Republican issue,” Saunders told Salon, in his first interview since the fracas. “It’s an issue of right and wrong.”
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Florida Teen Graduates From High School and College in Same Week
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| Grace Bush is one of nine children. |
Graduating from high school at 16 is impressive enough. But managing to get your college degree before you even graduate high school? Astounding.
Grace Bush is clearly a rare talent, both intelligent and incredibly hard working. The Florida teen recently earned her bachelor's degree in criminal justice from Florida Atlantic University. Later this week, she'll get her high school diploma from Florida Atlantic University High School.
So how does somebody graduate from college before high school?
Grace participated in Florida Atlantic University's dual enrollment program, which allows gifted high school students to earn college credit for the same courses. Students (and parents, who may foot the bill) save both time and money.
Grace admits that the order in which she is getting her diplomas is a little wacky. "It's kind of weird that I graduated college before high school," she told CBS Miami.
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American Universities — As Exploitative As Corporate America: Homeless Adjunct Professor Pushes For Fair Pay and Benefits - Sparks Support From Professors Across United States
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| Professors across America took to social media to support homeless adjunct professor's call for fair wages and benefits. |
Homeless professor protests conditions of adjuncts (via PBS News Hour)
Mary-Faith Cerasoli is an adjunct professor of Spanish and Italian. She has a master’s degree from Middlebury College. She’s also homeless. The 53-year-old staged a one-woman protest Friday afternoon in front of the New York State Department of…
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