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April 15, 2009 -A Norwegian man was caught in blizzard conditions on March 31 during a 5 day solo ski sailing attempt across Hardangervidda, the largest high mountain plateau in Northern Europe. Despite studying the advanced forecast and being prepared with the proper equipment, an unexpected late winter storm suddenly caused blinding, white-out conditions high winds and heavy snow snowfall.
March 2, 2010 – In February, Brent Martin was enjoying an off-road motorcycle trip with a group of riders across a remote desert near Lake Isabella in Southern California. He came upon an injured rider who just crashed her motorcycle. Martin stated that he had only limited cell phone coverage, and was unsuccessful maintaining a mobile phone connection and explaining their location to local 911 dispatchers.
"Being in the middle of nowhere limits your ability to effectively communicate your geographic location, even with cell phones," said Brent Martin, a motorcycle enthusiast and member of a Los Angeles County Search and Rescue team. "Everything looks the same out there and you're miles from any streets signs."
April 21, 2010 – On the morning of Sunday, March 14, Robert Cortis and three friends set off in their boat to enjoy the day fishing off the coast of
Mr. Cortis reported that their 23 foot 2006 vessel had begun to take on water due to a breach in the hull shortly before 4 p.m.
Despite cellular service and navigational devices, SPOT was needed to initiate life flight for critically injured rider
March 3, 2009 – SPOT LLC today announced that the SPOT Satellite GPS Messenger™ successfully notified emergency rescue authorities of a severely injured off-road motorcyclist in California's Mojave Desert. The man's condition became critical and despite cell phone service, friends at his side could not communicate their remote location to local authorities.
In January, David Cheney and friends had set off to enjoy a 100 mile motorcycle ride through the desert outside of Barstow, California. Thirty miles into the ride a fellow rider, and experienced desert racer, took a bad fall hitting his head. Some of the party rode on while others stayed behind to help.
On July 25, 2008 experienced outdoorsman Rejean Able, who was on a six week wilderness trek in Nunavik, located in the remote Ungava Peninsula of Northern Quebec, was rescued using his SPOT Satellite Messenger after a canoe accident left him stranded without supplies. As he was approaching a series of rapids, Mr. Able lost control of his canoe and capsized. Submerged with his feet caught under the seat of the canoe, he was able to free himself and swim to the embankment, but in the process lost his canoe and all off his supplies. He also lost his rifle which he had taken for protection against wolf packs known to be in the area.


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Editor's note: CNN contributor Bob Greene is a best-selling author whose books include "Late Edition: A Love Story" and "When We Get to Surf City: A Journey Through America in Pursuit of Rock and Roll, Friendship, and Dreams."
(CNN) -- An only-in-America tale for some future business-school textbook:
I was standing in a long security line at Midway International Airport in Chicago, waiting with hundreds of other travelers to go through the checkpoints. Things weren't moving especially swiftly.
Eventually I made it to the front, took off my shoes, grabbed a plastic bin and prepared to load my carry-on items into it.
I glanced down before dropping my shoes into the bin.
And saw, at the bottom of it, a colorful advertisement for an online merchant.
Maybe I'd taken note of the ads in the security-line bins before, maybe I hadn't. But on this day I made a point of looking at more of the plastic bins that were stacked up.
Advertisements at the bottoms of all of them.
I found myself shaking my head in grudging admiration. Someone, in this land of unfettered capitalism, had figured it out. While the rest of us were wearily bemoaning the inconvenience of airport security lines, the unhappy series of events that have made them necessary....
While the rest of us were standing in those lines stewing over what the world has come to, one person among us saw a potential moneymaking opportunity just waiting to be snapped up.
Soon enough I was talking with a fellow named Joe Ambrefe, the founder and chief executive officer of SecurityPoint Media, the company he runs in St. Petersburg, Florida.
He's the guy.
"It was just after 9/11," he said.
In that autumn of 2001, when the airports of the United States were reopening after the terror attacks, he was traveling on a multicity sales trip for a pharmaceutical company.
"I was stuck in the chaos," he said. It was evident that air travel would never be as free and easy as it once had been. The airports were about to become places of lengthy, frustrating waits in line, and of increasingly careful security checks.
As Ambrefe recalls it, the airport in Denver was where the idea hit him. He still has the notes he made to himself that day, written on a paper napkin.
"I looked at all the people around me," he said. "A lightbulb went on.
"This was an audience that was pretty captive."
"An advertising opportunity."
Now ... perhaps you don't think that airport security lines are necessarily the ideal place to pitch products to people. The travelers tend to be in a lousy mood, or at least an irritated one. No one enjoys being stuck in those lines, waiting to be electronically frisked.
Indeed, I have long believed that America's airports are places for which corporations will never attempt to buy naming rights. Cities desperately need revenue, but there is enough unpleasantness associated with the flying experience these days that you'll probably never see Coca-Cola International Airport, or Chevrolet, or Doritos. Companies tend to want people to associate them with happy venues.
Joe Ambrefe is not as shortsighted as I am. "Here is a contained area," he said, referring to the security lines. "Air travelers are a very desirable demographic. It's a fantastic opportunity to speak to them."
It took him several years to reach cruising speed (as it were). His business plan was this:
His new company would design and manufacture bright, white, clean-looking bins for the security lines. Bins that were more attractive than the clunky gray ones that most airports were using. He would offer to provide them free, thus sparing the airports the expense of buying their own. As a sweetener, he would also provide the carts to shuttle the bins that have gone through the checkpoints back to where more travelers are waiting, and would provide the tables for travelers to put their items into the bins. He would promise to replace the bins regularly, so they always looked crisp.
All he asked in return was the right to sell advertising on the floors of the bins.
"Sometimes the best ideas are simple ones," he said.
So far, he said, his bins are in 23 airports (he started with the big ones; he said he is in LaGuardia, JFK and Newark in the New York area, O'Hare and Midway in Chicago, Los Angeles, Orlando, Seattle, San Diego, Denver, and hopes to rapidly expand). And here are some of the companies he said have advertised with him:
Sony, Microsoft, Zappos.com, Honda, Charles Schwab financial services, Skechers shoes and Amtrak.
(Why Amtrak? It makes perfect sense, when you think about it. If someone is annoyed about the air-travel experience, what better place for Amtrak to appeal for future train business?)
The security lines are a paradoxically ideal place to make a pitch, he said: "The reality is, even though people don't like the lines, they accept the need for them." The advertisements in the plastic bins "can humanize the experience. They can put a smile on someone's face. Bring a chuckle."
And the beauty of it all from a merchandising point of view, he said, is that there's no way to avoid seeing the ads. You can electronically record a television show and zip through the commercials; you can flip through a magazine and skip the advertisements.
But when you finally reach the front of an airport security line, it's just you, and the bin, and the message.
The Transportation Security Administration has signed off on this and has set guidelines for the equipment; SecurityPoint Media doesn't pay the government for the right to put the bins in airports, but the TSA seems to like the idea of a private company picking up the costs. "The program is a good example of a public-private partnership that saves taxpayer dollars," TSA spokesman Nick Kimball told me. The individual airports share in the revenues from the advertising; Ambrefe said that the company now has 30,000 bins in airport security lines.
With this, you would think that advertising may have reached its ultimate saturation point. I asked Ambrefe if he could think of any place that would be off limits to the American advertising industry -- any place where placing an ad might be going too far.
He paused for a moment, then said:
"Not offhand."
The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Bob Greene.

subset: commoncrawl


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Matters of Scale - Road Rage
Percent of surface area in the city of Los Angeles dedicated in some way to the automobile (roads, parking garages, etc.)
70 percent
Percent of surface area in Los Angeles devoted to parks and open space
5 percent
Number of people killed in Amtrak passenger train accidents in the United States since 1971
fewer than 100
Number of people killed every year in automobile accidents in the United States
more than 40,000
Number of deaths in the United States due to airline accidents in 1997
Number of pedestrians and cyclists killed in the United States by motor vehicles in 1997 (the equivalent of a commercial airline crash with no survivors every two weeks)
Number of people displaced each year in the United States by new highway construction
Number of Croatians displaced by war in 1997
Cost of fuel in the United States to drive 24,000 kilometers (15,000 miles) in Honda's 2000 Insight, which gets 28 kilometers/liter (65 miles per gallon)
Cost of driving that same distance in Land Rover's 2000 Range Rover, which gets 6 km/l (15 mpg)
Total vehicle kilometers traveled by automobiles in Japan, France, Germany, Sweden, Italy, Canada, and the United Kingdom combined in 1997
2.6 trillion
Total vehicle kilometers traveled by automobiles in just the United States in 1997
2.4 trillion
Sources: David Engwicht, Reclaiming Our Cities and Towns: Better Living With Less Traffic (Philadelphia: New Society Publishers, 1993); personal communication with Irene Paul, Department of Parks and Recreation, City of Los Angeles, 28 June 2000; personal communication with Steven Taub, Amtrak representative; Alliance for a Paving Moratorium website < www.tidepool.com>; Consumer's Union, "How Green is Your Pleasure Machine?" Grist Magazine, 20 May 2000; Federal Aviation Administration, U.S. Department of Transportation, Headquarters Intercom, 8 September 1998; Immigration and Refugee Services of America, World Refugee Survey 1998 (Washington, DC: USCR Publications, 1998); Environmental Protection Agency fuel economy website <www.fueleconomy.gov> (based on $1.80 per gallon for price of fuel); Federal Highway Administration, Federal Highway Administration Highway Statistics Series 1997 (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1997) and U.S. Department of Transportation, Bureau of Transportation Statistics, G-7 Countries: Transportation Highlights, BTS99-01, Washington, DC, 1999, <www.bts.gov>. Compiled by Danielle Nierenberg.


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Defense Department ducks reform
In 2010, the parents of a Texas high school student told an Air Force officer they were concerned a recruiter was sending their daughter inappropriate text messages, showing up at her work and spreading rumors.
The officer listened to the complaint, but it went no further — a common practice for popular soldiers, according to a senior Defense Department official with knowledge of the case.
Story Continued Below
A year later, the parent of another teenage girl found suggestive photos in her text messages from the same recruiter, Tech. Sgt. Jaime Rodriguez.
( PHOTOS: Key players in military sexual assault fight)
This time investigators dug in, eventually speaking with more than a dozen young women, some who met Rodriguez after the first complaint, who said his behavior ranged from unwanted advances to rape. Rodriguez began serving a 27-year military prison sentence in June on a slew of sex crimes, the worst of which was aggravated sexual assault.
The case is just one example of what the Pentagon's own reports have concluded on sex crimes in the ranks: More than 90 percent of them are committed by predators who strike repeatedly, using positions of power, a weak reporting system and the culture of moving service members and officers from base to base every two or three years where they can prey on victims, over and over again.
At the same time, the Pentagon, renowned for keeping statistics on troop movements across the globe, has repeatedly failed over the past 25-plus years to track these bad actors, leaving sexual predators free to move about with little way for their higher-ups to see their history.
( Also on POLITICO: Pentagon cribs Hill ideas on sex assault)
Even the Air Force acknowledges the leadership team overseeing Rodriguez had no record of the 2010 complaint.
The Pentagon still says it's complied with each requirement Congress has put in place to address sexual assault in its ranks, and any delays are just the result of the normal process of handling records and working out bugs in its systems. In recent months, the Defense Department has even taken some proactive steps such as launching new training programs and reviewing thousands of personnel records. But a look at the history tells a different story: of a massive bureaucracy flouting Congress's wishes at every turn — even as recently as today, when a database mandated in a 2008 law still sits unfinished, despite the Pentagon spending nearly $14 million to put it in place.
"They do all these reports all the time about how they're taking care of it. And believe me, no one is more impressive than the United States military when they march in and say, 'They're taking care of it. We're in charge. We're going to make it happen.' And then the next year it happens again. So it's just a recurring problem," Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.) told POLITICO.
Congress is now confronting the Pentagon more aggressively than it ever has, considering measures as varied as New York Democratic Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand's proposal that removes the chain of command from prosecuting sexual assault cases to Sen. Claire McCaskill's push for another new database that compiles all accusations included in confidential victim reports.
( Also on POLITICO: Paul, Cruz join Gillibrand push on military sexual assault)
"I think this is something that is just common sense in the civilian world, and I was shocked it was something that hadn't even been contemplated in the military system," said McCaskill, a Missouri Democrat.
But it's unclear if this latest effort will crack the Pentagon's hierarchy, which has withstood embarrassing scandal after embarrassing scandal, at least eight defense secretaries and four presidents.
Just look at how the Pentagon has responded to calls from Congress to track cases and bad actors. It's routinely blown past deadlines — by years and decades — to set up two critical databases.
The first calls for an exhaustive criminal database extend back to the late-1980s, when Congress passed a law ordering every agency from the Pentagon to the National Parks Service to start reporting crime stats to the Justice Department. The Defense Department promised to have its system up and running by 2005, but it just finished in 2012.
Then in 2008 Congress told the Pentagon to specifically start tracking sexual assault cases, giving officials two years to get the job done. But five years later, it is still not complete.
"You've got perpetrators moving. You've got victims moving," said the DoD official with knowledge of the Rodriguez case. "If you've got a perpetrator at a base, his victim pool is ever changing."
Even senior Pentagon officials have acknowledged their shortcomings, arguing it's the byproduct of four branches not speaking the same language and privacy laws that present challenges when sharing the names of victims and service members accused of crimes but not convicted.
"We know we need a better system," Kaye Whitley, then the director of the Pentagon's lead sexual assault office, told a congressional panel during a 2008 House hearing at which both Democratic and GOP lawmakers expressed frustration with the department for its long delays in better tracking sexual assault crimes.
In the five years since that hearing, the Defense Department has spent about $13.9 million on the Defense Sexual Assault Incident Database, which Congress says needs to track such basic information as "the nature of the assault, the victim, the offender and the outcome of any legal proceedings in connection with the assault." But it's still not ready. The latest estimate for all systems go: Oct. 1.
The Army is the culprit for the most recent delay, according to the Government Accountability Office, which has been tracking the Pentagon's sexual assault work since 2008. "DoD is not there yet with the database, but they are closer than we have ever seen them," said Brenda Farrell, who runs the program monitoring the defense efforts.
Nate Galbreath, a senior executive adviser in the Pentagon's Sexual Assault Prevention and Response Office, also said the database is tardy because of "evolving reporting requirements that we have to keep working in."
"This year is our shakedown, and we're all just trying to keep track of what's in there and what's supposed to be in there," he said. "Anytime you deploy something, you've got to work the bugs out, and that's what we're doing."
Lawmakers and victim groups said the delays have had real consequences, since the system is supposed to give the Pentagon the ability to do things like name the bases with the highest and lowest rates for sexual assault. That can be useful data for sharing across branches and locations which practices are working well — and which aren't.
Maloney, the New York Democrat who is one of the leading advocates for the crime database, wrote to then-Defense Secretary Leon Panetta last year to complain about the delays.
"In fact, I believe you were in Congress and voted to enact the very law that created this reporting requirement," she wrote in the months before the system went live.
But Defense officials say that their criminal investigations aren't dependent on either of the databases, which don't even have a search function capable of typing in a suspect's name. Instead, they often turn first to 45 years of files located in the Defense Central Index of Investigations, an earlier iteration of which was dinged in a Defense Department Inspector General report in 2001 for having 1.4 million incomplete files.
Investigators also often question friends, colleagues, spouses and former girlfriends for details about any prior incidents. "That's typically where we get it, doing the grunt work, talking to someone who knows something," said the military official who works on sexual assault issues.
But it's not just the delayed databases that are the problem. There are many reasons for the Pentagon's shortcomings.
Critics say the justice system allows assailants to routinely plea-bargain down to less serious crimes, which makes for misleading data.
Nancy Parrish, president of Protect Our Defenders, a victim advocacy group, expects the Pentagon's new sexual assault database will very likely fall short by tracking only offenders convicted in military courts. There were only 238 people who fell into that category in fiscal 2012.
"So it is likely to be pretty small," she said, adding that perpetrators often end up convicted of something less serious than rape or sexual assault, such as a collateral offense like fraternization.
In some cases, alleged military perpetrators walk free. Here, Parrish cited the case of Jeremy Goulet, a former Army helicopter pilot in Hawaii who was accused of raping two women but negotiated a plea deal to drop the charges and accept a less-than-honorable discharge. Earlier this year, Goulet allegedly shot and killed two Santa Cruz police detectives seeking to question him about a sexual assault report at the coffee shop where he'd worked. The 35-year-old, also killed in the incident, had a criminal history after serving in the Army that included spending two years in an Oregon prison stemming from a concealed-weapon conviction and a peeping Tom incident.


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Serving as home of the Sycamore basketball team since the second game of the 1973-74 season and the home of the women's basketball program since the early 1990's, Indiana State University's Hulman Center is truly one of the Midwest's finest multi-purpose arenas. The 10,200-seat facility provides an outstanding atmosphere in which to watch college basketball.
Hulman Center was officially opened to the public on December 14, 1973. One of the finest college basketball facilities in the nation became even better with the addition of a new, portable hardwood basketball floor prior to the 2010-11 campaign.
In 2008, the floor at Hulman Center was renamed for legendary basketball coach John Wooden and his wife Nellie. Wooden's actual signature is now on permanent display on the court to commemorate Nellie and John Wooden's significant contributions to Indiana State Athletics.
In 2008, fans noticed a very large addition to the Hulman Center, as a new state-of-the-art center-hung scoreboard was installed prior to the season. The four-panel videoboard displays live action from games and concerts as well as text, videotaped and animated messages. In addition to the new scoreboard, a head scorer's table with five back-lit panels has been added on the main floor along with two shot clocks with game-time displays. Eight video monitors on the arena's upper concourse allow concession patrons to watch the on-court activities, see interviews or learn about upcoming events.
Hulman Center has served the sports world well by hosting numerous high school, college and professional tournaments and exhibitions. It was the site of the 1974 NCAA Mideast Regional featuring Notre Dame and Marquette and annually is the site of Indiana High School regional or semi-state tournaments. The Indiana Pacers, Boston Celtics, New York Knicks and Milwaukee Bucks of the NBA have all graced the Hulman Center hardwood as have participants of past NIT and Missouri Valley Conference tournament.
Some of the most popular entertainers in the world have appeared at Hulman Center including Charlie Pride, who played the first ever concert in the building in 1974. Others to appear recently include: Miranda Lambert, Jason Aldean, Luke Bryan, Brad Paisley, John Mellancamp, Rascal Flatts, Brooks & Dunn, WWE Smackdown & Raw; Toby Keith, Kenny Chesney, Shania Twain and KISS.


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Photo Coverage: Inside LIVING FOR TODAY Benefit at Joe's Pub with Tituss Burgess, Alysha Umphress & More
LIVING FOR TODAY. LIVING FOR TODAY: Back to the Drawing Board just played a one-night-only engagement at Joe's Pub (425 Lafayette Street). BroadwayWorld was there for the concert, and you can check out full coverage below!
The fifth annual LIVING FOR TODAY concert, showcased Broadway stars in an exciting night of music. This year's concert, titled BACK TO THE DRAWING BOARD, featured your favorite songs from Animated Films, as October 28 (the originally schedule date) was the 10th Annual International Animation Day! David Alpert (The Best Man, Flashdance, Talley's Folly, Trip to Bountiful) directed the evening, with Music Direction by Jason Wetzel.
The Gilana Shira Alpert Fund was created in November 2007 as a memorial to Gilana Alpert. Gilana was an incredible woman, very passionate about the causes in which she believed, and a friend to all. Due to a reaction to prescription medications she passed away at the young age of 26. The fund has already raised almost $27,000 and is designed to continue the work that Gilana was not able to finish herself. Those causes include Holocaust awareness, theatre education and outreach, human equality advocacy, and sex education. Past recipients include The Kinsey Institute, Theatre for Young Audiences, The Shoah Remembrance Committee, and the Howard Brown Health Center. This year's recipients will be announced at the concert. More information can be found at www.gilanasfund.com
Photo Credit: Kevin Thomas Garcia
David Alpert and Candice Bergen
David Alpert, Michael Wilson, Candice Bergen and James Lecesne
Jack Noseworthy, David Alpert, and Sergio Trujillo
Amy Persons
Shubert Alley - Jamison Scott, Kevin Massey and Patrick Massey
Rheaume Crenshaw and Cassandra Sandberg
Autumn Hurlbert, Hannah Elless and Tess Soltau
David R. Gordon and Courtney Reed
The Cast of "Living for Today"
Candice Bergen and James Lecesne
David Alpert and Candice Bergen
Autumn Hurlbert, Hannah Elless and Tess Soltau
Amy Persons
Shubert Alley
David R. Gordon
David R. Gordon
Alysha Umphress, Cassandra Sandberg and Rheaume Crenshaw
Alysha Umphress, Cassandra Sandberg and Rheaume Crenshaw


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The main objectives of The Scottish Mathematical Council are to foster and improve mathematical education at all levels, and to encourage the advancement and application of mathematics throughout Scotland. For this purpose the Council collaborates with educational, technological and industrial organisations and undertakes functions such as the following:
- the promotion and co-ordination of conferences, special courses and instruction and retraining schemes;
- the consideration of factors relating to the supply and deployment of trained mathematicians with special reference to the supply of teachers;
- the giving of advice on curricula, syllabuses, examinations and other subjects of mathematical interest;
- the collection and circulation of information and the publication of reports, articles, and other material of pedagogic interest;
- the setting up of committees to consider and report on special problems and subjects;
- the trusteeship of trusts established for the purposes associated with the objects of the Council;
- the problem solving competition 'Mathematical Challenge' for primary and secondary school pupils;
- the running of the National Final of the competition "Enterprising Mathematics in Scotland".
The SMC Journal is the main instrument for reporting on the above activities. It is published annually and sent to all secondary schools in Scotland and to many interested bodies in the UK and abroad.
You can also find us on Twitter (@scottishmaths) and on Facebook (login required).
We are a Participating Body of the Joint Mathematical Council of the UK.
The SMC Constitution can be downloaded here.


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At GDC Europe/Gamescom in Cologne Mike Capps today announced Epic is hard at work on Unreal Engine 4 and has five new games in development, with Develop quoting the Epic president explaining that Epic now has a renewed focus on the PC, saying: "The PC has for too long been a port-to platform." Details on the five games and their target platforms are not offered, but a post on GamesIndustry.biz (registration required) has further quotes from Capps' keynote suggesting that these will not all be full-scale AAA projects, as he says: "At Epic we didn't multiply the studio size by five when we started working on these multiple projects, so you can make some assumptions about the size of those projects." Here's more of his explanation of the new landscape of game development:
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FY 2009 Budget
AP Report
Transforming Higher Education
Teacher Fellowships
Picturing America
Forbes Special
Quote to Note
Upcoming Events
FY 2009 Budget
On February 4, President Bush released his Fiscal Year 2009 budget request, including $59.2 billion in discretionary funding for the U.S. Department of Education. The request is the same as last year's appropriation. However, within that total, the agency would receive sizable increases in priority areasstrengthening the No Child Left Behind Act, challenging high school students with rigorous coursework, and making college more affordableby reducing funding in other areas, eliminating 47 programs totaling $3.3 billion, and eliminating 759 earmarks totaling $328 million. Among the highlights:
No Child Left Behind
- a $406 million increase in Title I grants to states, to $14.3 billion (up 63% since 2001), to increase high schools' share of Title I allocations;
- a $607 million increase for Reading First, to $1 billion, to restore the funding required to implement this effective program;
- $491 million for School Improvement Grants, to support strong leadership in helping turning around low-performing schools and school districts;
- $409 million for Assessment Grants, including high school assessments aligned with college and work-ready standards; and
- $200 million for the Teacher Incentive Fund, to help develop modern compensation systems.
Other K-12 Education
- a $337 million increase in special education grants to states, to $11.3 billion, sustaining the federal contribution at 17%;
- $2.8 billion for Improving Teacher Quality state grants;
- $730 million for English language acquisition;
- $1.1 billion for new choice proposals: $300 million for Pell Grants for Kids, to supply scholarships for low-income students enrolled in restructuring schools or high school "dropout factories" to transfer to out-of-district public schools or local private schools, and $800 million for a revised 21st Century Learning Opportunities program, to transform that low-performing initiative into a scholarship program enabling poor students in struggling schools to enroll in high-quality afterschool programs; and
- $175 million for Academic Competitiveness Initiative proposals: $95 million for elementary and middle school components of Math Now, which would employ research-based instruction in math (based, in part, on the findings of the National Math Panel), $70 million for Advanced Placement/International Baccalaureate expansion, and $10 million to create an Adjunct Teacher Corps, which would encourage experienced professionals to teach high school courses.
Student Financial Aid
- $18.9 billion in combined discretionary and mandatory funding for Pell Grants (up 116% since 2001), to raise the maximum Pell Grant award to $4,800 (up 28% since 2001) and reach 5.8 million students (up 33% since 2001).
The Department's discretionary appropriations have grown by $17 billion, or 40%, since FY 2001. For more information, please go to http://www.ed.gov/about/overview/budget/budget09/summary/. (State-by-state tables are available at http://www.ed.gov/about/overview/budget/statetables/.)
AP Report
According to the College Board's fourth annual "Advanced Placement Report to the Nation," 15.2% of the graduating class of 2007 achieved mastery (at least a 3 on a 5-point scale) on one or more AP examsup from 11.7% for the 2002 class and 14.7% for the 2006 class. Moreover, six states now have more than 20% of their students graduate from high school having earned an AP exam grade of 3 or higher. Nevertheless, traditionally under-represented students still demonstrate much lower performance on AP exams. Indeed, although some states have successfully closed the gap for Hispanic students, no state with significant numbers of African-American or American Indian students has closed the gap. The report also spotlights states' efforts to implement programs that support academic achievement for all students. For more information, please go to http://www.collegeboard.com/about/news_info/ap/2008/.
Transforming Higher Education
Over the last week, in between her visits to Louisiana (1/31), Alabama (2/1), Mississippi (2/14), and Rhode Island (2/15) to discuss K-12 education, the Secretary spoke out on higher education. First, on February 8, she addressed the Greater Houston Partnership (http://www.ed.gov/news/pressreleases/2008/02/02082008.html). "Houston prides itself on serving as a headquarters for 23 of the Fortune 500 companies," she said. "So, I know you agree that instead of debating whether it's responsible to teach the fundamentals of reading and math we should be talking about how to prepare every student for college and today's global economy. That's why, two years ago, I launched a commission to start a national conversation on access, affordability, and accountability in higher education," led by a Houston businessman, Charles Miller. And, she continued, in "reaction" to the commission's report, "We're seeing some very encouraging things. A coalition of institutions began sharing information that has never before been publicly available.... Texas is using the accrediting process to increase access and innovation in higher education. Ivy League universities have increased aid to students. More consumers are talking in terms of quality, affordability, and return for investment." Then, on February 12, she delivered the keynote at the National Legislative Summit of the American Association of Community Colleges and the Association of Community College Trustees (http://www.ed.gov/news/pressreleases/2008/02/02122008.html). "Community colleges have never... rationed opportunity towards the privileged," she said. "Instead of keeping people out, you invite them in to higher educationand not just for degrees but for targeted workforce training. Your efforts must serve as a model because... shifting demographics and the rise of the global knowledge economy mean that we must educate more students to higher levels than ever before." Notably, President Bush appointed the first Deputy Assistant Secretary for Community Colleges, Pat Stanley, and Assistant Secretary for Postsecondary Education Diane Jones began her career as a community college teacher. Clearly, "We need better ways to follow students as they move across the system," she concluded, citing some budget items to assist. "Not just first-time, full-time, degree-seeking, non-transfer studentsbut all students." For more information, please go to http://www.ed.gov/about/bdscomm/list/hiedfuture/plan/.
At both venues, the Secretary lamented a House bill reauthorizing the Higher Education Act for failing to tackle the "real concerns of students and families." The White House has issued a detailed Statement of Administration Policy on the legislation. For more information, please go to http://www.ed.gov/news/pressreleases/2008/02/02062008.html.
Teacher Fellowships
While in Texas, Secretary Spellings announced the creation of Teaching Ambassador Fellowship positions at the Department for the 2008-09 academic year. These positions will offer highly motivated and innovative public school teachers the opportunity to contribute their knowledge and experience to the national dialogue on education. The program includes two tracks. Up to five Washington Fellows will become full-time federal employees in Washington, D.C., participating in policy discussions and working on education programs. Up to 20 Classroom Fellows will remain at their local schools under their regular teaching contracts and be paid for various assignments and projects throughout the school year on a part-time basis. All fellows will be selected on their record of leadership, impact on student achievement, and potential for contribution to the field. Only highly qualified public school teachers who have spent at least three years in the classroom are eligible to apply. And, to ensure collaboration, fellows must have the full support of their principals. Applications are due by April 7. Fellows will be named by early summer. For more information, please go to http://www.ed.gov/programs/teacherfellowship/.
Picturing America
Educators and librarians are invited to apply for a new initiative being offered by the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH). Picturing America is designed to promote the study, teaching, and understanding of American history and culture by introducing students and the general public to 40 of America's greatest art treasures. From the courage and leadership portrayed in Emanuel Leutze's Washington Crossing the Delaware to the power of democracy shown through Norman Rockwell's Freedom of Speech, these images of people, places, and events in American history allow citizens to better understand our nation's past and the principles for which it stands, while also providing an introduction to the broader world of the humanities. At no cost, NEH will furnish a set of high-quality reproductions of the art (approximately 24" x 36") and an illustrated teacher resource book with notes for all grade levels. For fall 2008, applications must be received by April 15. For more information, please go to http://picturingamerica.neh.gov/.
Forbes Special
Forbes magazine asked a number of leading educators, business executives, and politicians to come up with solutions for educating children in the increasingly complex and fast-moving world of the 21st century. Secretary Spellings submitted an essay on closing the "giant achievement gap." Essays are also available from such varied personalities as KIPP Co-Founder Mike Feinberg, Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates, and 2006 Nobel Peace Prize winner Muhammad Yunus. For more information, please go to http://www.forbes.com/2008/01/23/solutions-education-
Quote to Note
"The budget process is one where we must balance process and priorities, and I believe this budget does that for education. In addition to Reading First [being fully restored], I am pleased the budget calls for increased funding for Title I, IDEA, and Pell Grants. All of these programs are essential to ensuring that our children not only have access to a rigorous education, but one suited for the global economy. I hope Congress acts to fund these important programs at the level requested by the President."
|Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings (2/4/08),
announcing the President's FY 2009 budget request
Upcoming Events
The Department's next "Education News Parents Can Use" broadcast, on math education, is scheduled for March 18. For more information, please go to http://www.ed.gov/news/av/video/edtv/.
Next week, the Department will be exhibiting at the National Association of Secondary School Principals' Annual Convention in San Antonio (February 22-24). If you are attending this event, please stop by the Department's booth.
Credits, Subscribe & Unsubscribe
Please feel free to contact the Office of Communications and Outreach with any questions:
Director, Intergovernmental AffairsRogers Johnson, (202) 401-0026, firstname.lastname@example.com
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To be added or removed from distribution, or submit comments (we welcome your feedback!), please contact Adam Honeysett. Or, visit http://www.ed.gov/news/newsletters/edreview/index.html.
This newsletter contains hypertext links to information created and maintained by other public and private organizations. These links are provided for the user's convenience. The U.S. Department of Education does not control or guarantee the accuracy, relevance, timeliness, or completeness of this outside information. Furthermore, the inclusion of links is not intended to reflect their importance, nor is it intended to endorse any views expressed, or products or services offered, on these sites, or the organizations sponsoring the sites.


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When it comes to motor efficiencey, 'rewinding' has long been considered a naughty word. Not so, says a recent study
Claims that rewinding inevitably decreases the efficiency of induction motors have reached mythic status. Thanks in part to a handful of studies of mostly smaller motors (no larger than 30 hp or 22.5kW), many in the electrical industry have been led to believe that efficiency can drop by as much as 5% when a motor is rewound. Efficiency supposedly suffers even more with repeated rewinds. In an effort to dispel these myths, the electric motor repair industry, led by the Electrical Apparatus Service Association (EASA) and the Association of Electrical and Mechanical Trades (AEMT) undertook a study to find answers to efficiency questions for customers and others. The research focused on motors with higher power ratings than those in previous studies — those most likely to be rewound. The results are based upon independent efficiency testing before and after rewinding.
A key finding of the study was that the best rewind/repair procedures maintain motor efficiency within ±.2%. The multiple rewind stage of the study determined that efficiency actually improved .2% on average when best practices were followed. Publication of a comprehensive report and a new set of best practices in the coming months should help ensure comparable results for the entire industry.Objectives of the study. The study involved 23 low- and medium-voltage, 2- and 4-pole motors ranging from 50 hp to 300 hp (37.5kW to 225kW) ( Fig. 1 above). Both 50-Hz and 60-Hz IEC and NEMA designs were tested. Open drip-proof (IP 23) and totally enclosed fan-cooled enclosures (IP 54) were included. EASA and AEMT had several objectives, including the following:
Determine the effect of rewinding/repair on motor efficiency.
Investigate the effect of repeated rewinds on several motors.
Identify and compile a set of rewind/repair procedures that will maintain or improve motor efficiency.
Identify rewind/repair procedures that could degrade motor efficiency.
Identify and compile a set of best practices for motor rewinds.
The IEEE 112 Method B (IEEE 112B) method of efficiency testing was used. All testing used the loss-segregation method — at no load and full load — which allowed for detailed analysis. As a benchmark, the results were compared with those of round robin test programs previously conducted by members of the National Electrical Manufacturers Association (NEMA). Interestingly, the first NEMA tests were conducted without standardized test procedures and yielded results that varied by 1.7 points of efficiency. This variation was subsequently reduced to .5 points of efficiency when NEMA members used standardized test procedures.
The efficiency variation, per IEEE 112B, for the round robin tests of the 30kW motor didn't exceed 0.9 points. This was achieved without standardization and compares favorably with the 1.7% variation of the NEMA tests.Loss analysis. This study was conducted in three stages: six motors were stripped and rewound in Stage 1; 10 low- and medium-voltage motors and one high-voltage motor were stripped and rewound in Stage 2; and in Stage 3, four motors were stripped and rewound multiple times, and two motors were burned out five times and then rewound.
A low burnout temperature of 660°F (350°C) was used for Stage 1, which made it difficult to remove the coils and clean the slots. This resulted in mechanical damage to the stator core like flared teeth at the ends of the stator laminations, which increased the pulsating, or zig-zag, losses. Stray load losses increased significantly for these machines. No attempt to control winding resistance was made for the six machines rewound in Stage 1.
The burnout temperature range was increased to 680°F to 700°F (360°C to 370°C) for Stage 2, which made the coils easier to remove and required less cleaning of the stator slots. The winding resistance of the new coils also was controlled to avoid appreciable increases in stator I2R losses. The burnout temperature and the winding resistance controls for Stage 3 were the same as in Stage 2. Results for all three stages are shown in the Table).
Preliminary recommendations. As stated earlier, a list of best repair/rewind practices based on the results of the study will be published early next year. In the meantime, the following preliminary recommendations can help in maintaining the efficiency of rewound motors.Burnout process. It's important that this process be tightly controlled. Burning out at a temperature below 680°F (360°C) will not fully release the varnish, making coil removal difficult. The additional force required to remove the coils may cause mechanical damage, such as splayed teeth, which will increase the stray losses. Burning out at more than 680°F (360°C) for organic core plate or 750°F (400°C) for inorganic core plate may increase the risk of damaging the interlaminar insulation and increase the core losses.
Coil removal. Cutting the end winding with an air chisel resting against the core end laminations or causing the end laminations to flare when pulling the coils out of the slot will increase the stray losses (Photo).Conductor cross-sectional area. When changing wire gauge due to stock availability, never reduce the cross-sectional area because doing so will increase stator I2R losses. In fact, you should require that the cross-sectional area be increased whenever possible. Mean length of turn. Failure to control mean length of turn (MLT) may increase stator I 2R losses. Whenever possible, you should try to decrease the MLT. You can do this by reducing the straight section of the coil (where it exits the slot) to the minimum required for the slot liner cuff or tracking length. Remember to keep coil extensions as short as possible. Changing winding configuration. Don't change a two-layer winding to a single-layer winding. At first this may appear attractive since there are half as many coils to wind and connect. However, this could increase stator I 2R losses and will increase stray losses. Suitably trained personnel should control all winding conversions. Bearing lubrication. Over lubrication of bearings will increase friction losses and shorten bearing life. Mixing incompatible greases will increase friction losses and impair lubrication. Use sealed-for-life bearings or open bearings with manufacturer's recommended grease fill. Don't replace open or shielded bearings with sealed bearings unless they're the non-contact type. Ensure that bearings have the same internal clearance as original bearings. Decreasing the clearances could increase the friction losses. Fans. Replacing a fan with a different design could increase windage losses, raise temperatures, or increase I 2R losses. New fans should meet the designer's original intent. Catastrophic damage. It may be unwise to repair motors with catastrophic damage since there could be a reduction in efficiency. The customer's operational needs, however, may necessitate the repair despite the possibility of a reduction in efficiency. The cost of lost production may greatly exceed the cost of lower efficiency. In such cases, encourage the customer to purchase a new motor as soon as practical. Core losses. Due to the wide variety of electrical magnetic steels used by manufacturers, it's impossible to set rigid rules for core test acceptance. However, measuring core loss before burnout and after core stripping and cleaning will identify significant increases in core losses. Levels of repair. There are five levels of repairs dictated by the amount of work necessary to correct the damage sustained. Motors that require repair as noted in Levels 1 through 3 can usually be rebuilt and maintain their original efficiency levels. In the case of irreparable damage, it's not always possible to restore motors to their original efficiency levels. Motors that require a Level 4 or Level 5 repair should be evaluated based on the amount of damage that can't be completely repaired. Level 1. Basic reconditioning includes the replacement of bearings, cleaning of all parts, and replacement of lubricant. This level of repair also includes the addition of seals and other accessories as agreed upon with the customer. Level 2. This includes all of the items mentioned in Level 1 with the addition of varnish treatment of stator windings, repair of worn bearing fits, and straightening of bent shafts. Level 3. This includes all of the items mentioned in Level 1 as well as rewinding the stator, which involves replacing windings and insulation. Level 4. This includes rewinding of the stator plus major lamination repair or rotor rebarring. It may be necessary to replace the stator laminations or restacking of laminations. Shaft replacement would normally fall into this category. In short, Level 4 involves major repairs that are costly enough to justify examining the option of replacement. Level 5. This level includes motors that would normally be replaced except for special circumstances faced by the customer, such as no spare or unacceptable lead time for a replacement. Level 5 candidates include misapplied motors, those with inadequate enclosures, and pre-U-frame motors.
As these five levels imply, the damage resulting from a motor failure varies widely, as do the associated repair costs. An evaluation process that fails to consider the various levels of repair is too simplistic to yield an accurate assessment.
Bonnett is an education and technology consultant with EASA, St. Louis. Gibbon was with Dowding & Mills PLC, Birmingham, U.K., when the study was done.


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Jack Grace Band to perform at the Nelson Odeon Nov. 3
NELSON -- Jack Grace is a singer, songwriter and guitarist hailing from Brooklyn. He writes for himself and plays for others. Simple.
He'll demonstrate that simplicity on Saturday, Nov. 3 at 8 p.m. at the Nelson Odeon, bringing his original compositions and melodic style to Madison County.
Grace is most recently known as a country musician, but that designation belies the myriad influences that shape his sound.
It began with an obsession with the Beatles, and as a teenager, he wore out his Zeppelin records. Later, when he discovered Neil Young, he wore those discs out too. His first band, Steak, had a Zappa-inspired sound, he was told, when he was barely aware of the iconic figure who couldn't be bothered to stick to a single formula. Later, after discovering he had a baritone eerily reminiscent of the great Johnny Cash, he added some steel to the mix and suddenly everyone was calling him country.
His band members come from all walks of life: jazz, rock, country -- and even those sounds without a name. Bassist, vocalist and wife Daria (Melomane, Pre-war Ponies) keeps the rhythm going with the rotating drummers, Russ Meissner, Jason "J-Bird" Bowman and Bruce Martin (Tom Tom Club). Horns are provided by J. Walter Hawkes, Rob Henke and "Tuba Joe" Exley.
Five previous releases and tracks featured in the films "Super Troopers" and "Beer Fest" have garnered both a growing following and a steady hum of praise. Grace's debut, "Introducing the Songs of Jack Grace," was an acoustic affair, which many mistook as country.
"Fine, call it country if you want," he said at the time. "What you label it doesn't mean all that much to me."
His most recent release, "Drinking Songs for Lovers," had some country numbers, but he added mariachi horns to give them a Latin flavor, inspired by his yearly pilgrimage to Tulum, Mexico, where he likes to write songs on the beach.
His previous outing was a country concept album called "The Martini Cowboy," featuring a bossa nova number with lap steel front and center.
"What sets his songs apart from rest of the country or alt-country scene is his laugh-out-loud, absurdist wit," wrote Alan Young of the New York Press. "Not only is this a great party album and a great driving album, but it's also very smart and very funny."
"Make no mistake: Jack Grace is an old-fashioned country musician," said Kevin Canfield, writing for the New York Times.
Tickets are $20. Doors open at 7:30 p.m.
For more information or to purchase tickets, call 315-655-9193, email email@example.com or visit:


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79 Third Avenue
Albany, NY 12202
Phone/Fax: (518) 463-9883
Email: email@example.com
Committee Assignments: Health, Personnel and Special Nursing Home Facilities
Prior Committee Assignments: Social Services (Chair), Conservation & Improvement, Public Safety, Public Works and Civic Center
Lucille M. McKnight has been an Albany County Legislator since 1992, representing residents of the 2nd Legislative District and since the 2010 re-districting, she represents the 1st Legislative District.
Luci has served as President of the New York State Association of Counties (NYSAC), which represents and advocates on behalf of counties across New York at the state level and chaired the organization's Board of Directors. She also sat on NYSAC's standing Committees on Medicaid and Human Services and the Conference Committee, and represented New York State counties at National Association of Counties (NACo) conferences. Luci has been an Albany County representative on the four-county Capital District Regional Planning Commission since 2000 and served as its chair in 2004. The Commission has oversight of a State-funded $2 million project in collaboration with six waterfront communities along the Hudson River to address pollution from combined municipal and storm sewers. It also is focusing on a regional homelessness study, a foreign trade zone, Workforce Investment Board employment activities and open space strategies to curb suburban sprawl. She is a member of the Board of Directors of the Capital District Youth Detention Center, which operates the Juvenile Detention Center. She also is Chair of the Albany County Youth Board, which reviews funding applications for youth programs, and is a member of the Long-Term Care Council established by the County Executive.
Luci previously served on the Albany County Tobacco Task Force charged with developing a plan for distributing funds from the national tobacco settlement. She initiated the formation of the Welfare Reform Sub-Committee in 1997 to update and improve the 60-year-old program for the poor and needy.
As part of her legislative accomplishments, Luci initiated proposals to develop affirmative action policies in County Government for the hiring and advancement of minorities and women and establish a sexual harassment policy for County employees. She pushed for the ADT alarm system to help victims of domestic violence and initiated crisis counseling for violence-plagued inner-city neighborhoods. Her other legislative priorities have included the Underground Railroad Educational Museum, expansion of ACES in Sheridan Hollow and South End economic development initiatives, including a $600,000 federal HUD grant for startup and expansion loans to small businesses and expansion of a light industrial facility and funding to clean up brownfields on Franklin and Gansevoort streets. She has been in the forefront in support of legislation to help the frail elderly remain in their homes and to provide educational and health benefits for children. As a member of the Civic Center Committee, she advocated installing electronic curtains for the upper-seating levels of the Pepsi Arena. She worked successfully to defeat a forfeiture law that would have allowed police to seize cash and cars in certain misdemeanor cases. She also was a leader of a community effort to prevent the location of an asphalt plant and a garbage transfer station at the Port of Albany.
Luci has been active in her community. She is the mother of an adult son, Darrell, and has two grandchildren, Nadia and Miles.


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A major step towards the protection of the world's roadless areas was one of the fruits of the Rio+20 Summit. For the first time, roadless areas were mapped globally and presented to the public.
IUCN, the United Nations Environment Programme, the European Parliament's Rapporteur on Forests, MEP Kriton Arsenis, the Society for Conservation Biology (SCB), and the Indigenous Peoples' International Centre for Policy Research and Education, Tebtebba joined forces to organize an event aimed at putting the protection of roadless areas at the heart of the international environmental debate.
Two interactive maps of the world's remaining roadless areas were presented by Google and the European Environmental Agency (EEA). These maps show areas which remain insulated from the uncontrolled human pressure exerted by roads on natural resources and pave the way for global action towards the protection of biodiversity in a cost efficient and effective way.
IUCN's Director of Global Policy, Cyriaque Sendashonga, made the connection between roadless areas and the global 'Aichi' targets on biodiversity that were agreed by governments in 2010.
"Roadless areas are an important contribution to reaching the Aichi Target 11 of 17% of terrestrial ecosystems under a system of protected areas. IUCN is promoting all efforts to reach this target. We are developing a number of tools to help in this endeavour, including the concept of 'Key Biodiversity Areas' to allow policy and decision-makers and resource managers to make choices on where to set up such conservation areas to ensure broad coverage of all important components of biodiversity."
Mariana Vale from the Society for Conservation Biology cited examples from Europe on the impacts of roads on the remaining wildlife:
"With the road network stretching through almost every corner of the planet, habitat fragmentation by transport infrastructure, and consequential secondary development, is one of the most serious global threats to biodiversity. Large patches of roadless areas are rare. They render vital ecosystem services to society like clean water, clean air, protection against invasive species, pests and diseases, and represent a buffer against climate change. Let's protect these last remaining roadless areas."
The Google Earth maps of roadless areas can be found at http://earthengine.google.org/#state=gallery
EEA's Eye on Earth maps will be publicly available soon.


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7 Responses so far.
tb727 says:
Very well done Karl. I think you're kind saying Chris Wallace is one of the 5 dumbest human beings in the world. I really don't think you can find 4 humans dumber.
Another good week.
Ill take a loss from the Mavs. They are a team that you really cant hate. They have a great leader in Dirk. But next time the Celtics have to beat them.
And Ill take a win over Miami ANY DAY, ANY WEEK, ANY YEAR! It feels good to watch the Celtics dismantle the Heat and the 3 amEGOs! (I only respect Wade on that team, not even Eddie House anymore!)
The Grizz played good. Rudy Gay IS an All Star if you ask me. He is clutch, a good leader, young, athletic, etc etc. Great all around guy. Shaq had a great game against them.
Ready to see Rondo vs Wall on Wednesday! (if Wall plays-has a sprained ankle)
Danielle Hobeika says:
Wow, it's been a lonnnggg time since I have heard a Coolio song! Love it!
I agree Danielle, I forgot how good that song is! Love the unflattering pix of Lebron. And "Your brother is ugly" comment. Ha,ha. Go C's.
Toooo much Karl!
Three Toe says:
very nice work. i like how you stayed true to your word and put the Rondo dunk at the beginning. funky.
This Wa sThe Best!!!!


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The Role of Layer 4-7 Services in Scaling Applications for the Cloud-Computing Data Center
The Cloud Challenge
Cloud computing is increasing demands on applications and the application-delivery infrastructure must change to meet the challenge. Virtualization does not solve the problems with applications scaling, in fact it adds complexity. Infrastructure alone does not solve the challenge either. You don't want to oversubscribe or just add capacity on demand. The infrastructure needs to respond to user demand based on business value and maintain a favorable cost structure. This means that you need intelligent load processing to manage scale, especially given the evolution of applications, which now make numerous backend function calls, which create more traffic than at the front end.
The Need for Scale
Cloud-computing applications are characterized by stateful access, with differentiated service levels, charged to the end user using the pay-per-use pricing model. Implicit in this model is the assumption that a cloud application is always on. Scaling the cloud delivery model to an Internet scale (millions of users) is a challenge that next-generation Layer 4–7 infrastructure needs to overcome.
Scaling a cloud application involves scaling three mechanisms: location (mobility), replication, and load balancing. Virtualization was an early catalyst for cloud computing because it substantially lowered the cost of replication and mobility of a prepackaged application. It does not, however, solve the load-balancing problem. Load balancing involves scaling the address, name space, transport, session, identity, and business logic of the application. Clustering enables scaling of application business logic but leaves the rest of the problem to a proxy infrastructure.
Getting Beyond Stateless
Traditional data center proxy infrastructure (Layer 4–7) is stateless and focuses on transport-level session and content management. The state management in these proxies is limited to cookies that hold bare-minimum identity of the application server. Further, this state is not shared across a network overlay of proxies to enable an application for multi–data center applications or to distribute the processing to edges. For example, a load balancer does not a play any role in user customization in a data center application such as encryption of private data in the response. Not having this function in the proxy infrastructure means the data center has to incur a higher cost of development of the core application and is not able to use existing proxy infrastructure to deploy this function.
In the cloud-computing model, waiting for the application developers to add marginal functions to a cloud application (for example, user customization) will derail the business model. Adding functions to a cloud application needs to become the focus of proxy infrastructures in a cloud data center. To play this role, a load balancer needs to extract intelligence from metadata and integrate with infrastructure in the data center at layers higher in the Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) stack than Layer 2 or Layer 3.
A New Model is Needed
The current thinking in cloud computing is to disaggregate the load-balancer function and assimilate it into the switching infrastructure, hypervisor, and the virtual machine itself. One way to assimilate this function is to extend its footprint at the edge, offload stateless functions into the upstream switching and routing infrastructure, and subsume stateful functions that are currently part of the application server. In other words, convert the proxy infrastructure into a control-plane function with a distributed data plane. The evolution and eventual integration of the control plane into a cloud manager is a topic of discussion for thought leaders in the industry today.
Data centers are evolving to adopt a cloud service model. Whether the deployment model is public or private, the challenges that face application architectures are the same. To overcome these challenges, infrastructure used by the applications needs to evolve to support the cloud service models. Of the three models—PaaS , IaaS, and SaaS—IaaS and PaaS are expected to guide the evolution of Layer 4–7 services. The critical dimension of evolution for Layer 4–7 services embodied in an SLB is the programmatic dimension. SLB will have to expose all of its functions through API's as managed objects to an external cloud manager to enable scaling of applications in the cloud computing data center.
For a deeper read on this topic see, The Role of Layer 4-7 Services in Scaling Applications for the Cloud-Computing Data Center, by Vikas Deolaliker of Cisco.
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2 Comments
Vert nice indeed! Have you ever whiteboarded this solution out?


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Goodbye BORING clothes...
Our apparel and designs go together like bread and butter. It can be very frustrating to find a cute design you like only to find that the garment it's printed on sucks. So don't worry, we got you covered with the perfect mix of cute AND comfy ;)
Our approval rating on apparel is reported to be around 327% (no typo tere!)
4 Great Reasons to Rock our Apparel Today:
- CUTE MEETS COMFY: Super comfy, high quality print and guaranteed to fit. Be prepared to receive so many compliments you'll need to hire someone to deal with them all!
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Coming Soon!


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Combined Review: MythBusters Weird World of Water Science Exploration Kit and Magnificent Manicure Kit
Monday, October 26, 2009
*This is a combined review being conducted on behalf of Team Mom.
Elmer's has created two all-new science kits that we got to try out. I know what you're saying: "Elmers?!" That's exactly what I thought! But, letting my son try out the Mythbusters Weird World of Water kit and letting my daughter try out the Magnificent Manicure Kit would be tons of fun for all of us!
About MythBusters Weird World of Water kit:
Discover the mysteries of water; It freezes and boils and turns into gas. Is there anything it can't do? Can it suck a ship down the drain? Will you find hot water at the North Pole? Can water blast a rocket into space?
This kit is a trial-and-error hands-on kit, which was made popular by the Discovery Channel's top show. It includes most of the items you need to perform your experiments except for common household items like baking soda, tap water, and vinegar.
Did you know?
This kit was recently awarded the FamilyFun Magazine 2009 T.O.Y. award!
My son loves science (even though he swore he didn't when it came time to try out this kit! He's constantly refreshing my memory with facts that I've forgotten! We tried out the whirlpool (which was loads of fun!) and will be trying out launching our own rocket soon!
The directions were easy and clear, so much so that my 10 year old daughter (whom has ADHD) was able to follow along and help out!
This is a great kit for teaching your kids about science, and in this case, the power of water. I personally enjoyed seeing the delight in their eyes when we created our own whirlpool!
The Weird World of Water Kit is available nationwide at Toys "R" US, Target.com, and Walmart.com.
About "Scientific Explorer" Magnificent Manicure Kit:
Scientific Explorer partnered with UC Berkeley's Great Exploration in Math and Science (GEMS) program to create fun educational science kits like this one.
Did you know?
The Magnificent Manicure Kit just received the Creative Child Magazine's 2009 Toy of the Year Award in the Educational Toys Category
My daughter is somewhat-tomboy, somewhat girlie-girl, but I'm trying to get her to be more of a girlie-girl! The Magnificent Manicure Kit was definitely a way to do that! She's very independent so I let her read the directions and make the lotion and crystal mud on her own. It turned out very nicely and smelled great! I was a little apprehensive about letting her do a manicure on me, as I had just had acrylic nails put on a week before trying out this manicure kit, but to be honest, I had no problems at all! My skin felt soft afterwards, and smelled great! Now, anytime I want to get a manicure, all I have to do is ask my daughter!
This kit is available now at Toys "R" Us and www.toyrsrus.com
Thanks Team Mom, for providing us with these educational products for review! They were fun, educational, and we all learned something!


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Statistics Terms to Know when Using Excel 2007 Data Analysis Tools
With the data analysis tools available in Excel 2007, you can create spreadsheets that show the details of any statistic you can create a formula to find — and you can find any number. It helps to know what you're looking for and what to expect, and the terms in the following list help you understand what kinds of statistics you can produce.
average: Typically, an average is the arithmetic mean for a set of values. Excel supplies several average functions.
chi-square: Use chi-squares to compare observed values with expected values, returning the level of significance, or probability (also called a p-value). A p-value helps you to assess whether differences between the observed and expected values represent chance.
cross-tabulation: This is an analysis technique that summarizes data in two or more ways. Summarizing sales information both by customer and product is a cross-tabulation.
descriptive statistics: Descriptive statistics just describe the values in a set. For example, if you sum a set of values, that sum is a descriptive statistic. Finding the biggest value or the smallest value in a set of numbers is also a descriptive statistic.
exponential smoothing: Exponential smoothing calculates the moving average but weights the values included in the moving average calculations so that more recent values have a bigger effect.
inferential statistics: Inferential statistics are based on the very useful, intuitive idea that if you look at a sample of values from a population and the sample is representative and large enough, you can draw conclusions about the population based on characteristics of the sample.
kurtosis: This is a measure of the tails in a distribution of values.
median: The median is the middle value in a set of values. Half of the values fall below the median, and half of the values fall above the median.
mode: Mode is the most common value in a set.
moving average: A moving average is calculated using only a specified set of values, such as an average based on just the last three values.
normal distribution: Also known as a Gaussian distribution, normal distribution is the infamous bell curve.
p-value: A p-value is the level of significance, or probability.
regression analysis: Regression analysis involves plotting pairs of independent and dependent variables in an XY chart and then finding a linear or exponential equation that best describes the plotted data.
skewness: This is a measure of the symmetry of a distribution of values.
standard deviation: A standard deviation describes dispersion about the data set's mean. You can kind of think of a standard deviation as an average deviation from the mean.
variance: A variance describes dispersion about the data set's mean. The variance is the square of the standard deviation; the standard deviation is the square root of the variance.
z-value: This is the distance between a value and the mean in terms of standard deviations.


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I introduced a version check system that any of your plugins may use.
it is a patch...
The modified update.php (that only checked for new uniserver releases) checks now any
pluginname.version file in W:\plugins\ and a target webserver to see, if a new update is
availible and supplies a link.
It is still doing the version check for the Adminpanel.
Just a side note: this is going to be included in my plugin management system. my pluginname.conf specification will go with it.
just check it out.
it is quite easy to add version checking support to any of your plugins.
just a textfile with the ending of .version in the w:\plugins\ folder
with 5 or 6 entries.
1: Plugin Name
2: Version Number
3: URL where to find the Update
4: URL to Version file on server ( http://server/pluginname.version )
5: URL to changelog or notes
6: additional data used by the author (kepler plugin uses it to hold the kepler release version)
more at my page


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South Dakota Track Quickly Becoming a National Player [AUDIO]
When freshman Meghan Dennis heads down the javelin runway Wednesday night at the NCAA Division I Track and Field Championships in Eugene, Oregon, she'll be continuing the quick rise of the South Dakota women's track program to national prominence.
Dennis is one of four Coyotes field events athletes taking part in the meet, along with pole vaulters Bethany Buell and Emily Grove, and high jumper Megan Glisar.
For most schools the size of USD, getting four athletes to nationals is an accomplishment, to do it in just the Coyotes fourth season of D-1 eligibility is impressive. Head Coach Lucky Huber is enjoying the ride.
South Dakota is in Eugene this week looking to improve on last season's 34th place finish at nationals, as three athletes (Buell, Grove, and hurdler Alexa Duling) represented the Coyotes in Des Moines.
USD's women are ranked 31st in the nation coming into the meet, the fifth best among non-BCS conference schools.
This year's Coyote squad has a chance to make some real noise in Eugene as Buell and Grove qualified 1-2 in the pole vault, Glisar (the 2012 NAIA indoor champ) 13th in the high jump, and Dennis 17th in the javelin.
Glisar says success is contagious at USD these days.
For Grove and Buell, the credit for the success on the track in Vermillion all goes to Huber and his staff.
Huber believes that in order to attract the best talent to Vermillion, his staff needs to provide the best instruction possible.
For Grove and the other USD athletes, this run of success is making this mid-major upper Midwest school feel like the big time.
Dennis competes in the javelin Wednesday at 7:15pm Central, Buell and Grove go in the pole vault Friday at 5:15pm, Glisar in the high jump Saturday at 2:45pm.


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It is a common misconception that only fresh high school graduates can avail themselves of financial aid for their college education. As a result, a lot of adults who wish to return to college may be disheartened and eventually just give up on their dream to finally graduate.
Don't miss out on scholarships and grants you can still win for next fall. I've talked to families that are so amazing at the scholarship search that they didn't need the money they saved for college.
Start applying for scholarships and grants with the following five tips:
Learn how to fill out the FAFSA in seven easy steps. Feel free to use this video as a helpful companion while you work on your FAFSA.
Have you been brave enough to venture into the scholarship jungle? It can be an overwhelming, almost frightening place — there are hundreds, if not thousands, of choices. While the idea of free money sounds great (especially considering how outrageously expensive college is!), finding the right scholarships can take hours and hours of research. Many students are so overwhelmed, they end up not applying for any at all.
Your FAFSA should be completed as soon as possible, starting right now! Yes you need the information from your 2014 tax return, but don't wait until you've completed your taxes to start on the form. You can use estimated figures and go back and fix them once you've completed your taxes. keep reading for more tips and tricks.
With so few days left in the holiday shopping season, it is easy to find yourself buying last minute gifts that take you way outside of your budget. Friends or co-workers that you may not have included on your shopping list suddenly surprise you with a nicely wrapped, thoughtful gift and the waves of panic and guilt set in.
Continue reading...
Trying to Avoid All Student Loan Debt? Not So Fast!
As someone who has actively used student loans to help finance my own undergraduate and graduate degrees along with my husband's law degree, I have seen the benefits of taking on student debt to achieve specific goals firsthand. My husband is a practicing attorney and I have been steadily employed in the financial services industry ever…
Try a New Approach to Studying
Congratulations! Your midterms are probably over by now – perhaps your first big hurdle of the new school year. And by now you should be feeling pretty well established at school. New classes, new friends, new challenges.
But if those midterm grades weren't exactly what you'd hoped for, it's probably a good time to re-examine…
I just spent the weekend visiting my college roommate. Why is this noteworthy? Because I graduated a LONG time ago and we're still close friends. I feel lucky to have had her as a friend all these years.
Is what I have unusual? Maybe.
While there's no guarantee you'll…
I remember struggling in an intro chemistry class. I was totally lost and knew I needed help. I decided that a study group was the solution, so guess what I did? I asked the smartest guy in the room if he wanted to form a group with me. He…
A better deal from your local not-for-profit cooperative
More than 2,000 approved schools across the country
Answers to your most common questions
Financial resources to help you succeed in college and beyond


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Read more.
Being there is what matters
Be adventurous and reach out to places you haven't been before.
Go places you wouldn't believe were inside your reach.
Discover the advantages of the miniPRO's knee control bar and keep improving.
Master it
The ONE S2 not just a means of transport – it's quite something else than your regular hoverboard. Think extreme sports and hit the pavement at high speed. Take on your competition.
Go the extra mile
The Segway x2 SE is our all-terrain master. It gets you places where you need to be, safely and quickly. Or take the i2 and bring anything you need on the job. Whether it is business related or you need to get your hands dirty; with the mount accessories you can bring anything along.
"Watch Segway's personal robot in action" by Engadget
"Meet the Segway Robot: An R2-D2 you can ride" by IQ Intel


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Milpitas, Calif., November 25, 2015 – SanDisk Corporation (NASDAQ: SNDK), a global leader in flash storage solutions, today announced Urvashi Sheth, who leads the company's global customer care team, has been named a 2015 1to1 Media Customer Champion award recipient for implementing innovative, customer-focused strategies throughout SanDisk that have positively impacted the bottom line.
"This award honors the determination and creative approach Urvashi and our entire global customer service team have taken to create outstanding support for all our customers," said Shuki Nir, senior vice president, corporate marketing and general manager, retail, SanDisk. "Their best-in-class work ensures we deliver the highest level of service to our customers, as demonstrated by the consistently high satisfaction ratings and the loyalty to our brand."
SanDisk Global Customer Care enables effortless interactions with the company's customers in 16 languages and through a variety of channels, including mobile-enabled knowledge base, email, chat, SMS, phone and social media. In addition, Sheth and her team began offering product warranty replacement through online submission in the U.S. and EMEA earlier this year, reducing fulfillment time by 27 percent and increasing reported customer satisfaction by 7 percent.
"We take great pride in the fact that so many people and businesses around the world trust SanDisk products," said Sheth, senior director of global customer care, SanDisk. "Continuous improvement, understanding of our culturally diverse audience, and laser-sharp focus on service and support quality sets my team apart and truly delivers an outstanding experience."
"1to1 Media's Customer Champions is a one-of-a-kind awards program that honors and spotlights the individuals responsible for game-changing customer-focused strategies," said Mila D'Antonio, editor-in-chief of 1to1 Media.
Now in its 11th year, the 1to1 Media Customer Champions program recognizes customer-centric leaders who use innovative approaches to instill customer-focused strategies throughout their organizations and can demonstrate a positive bottom-line impact from doing so. This award marks the second consecutive year SanDisk has been recognized by 1to1 Media for its outstanding global customer experience. In 2014, 1to1Media and Gartner recognized SanDisk's Global Customer Care team as a Gold Winner of their CRM Excellence Award.1
About SanDisk
SanDisk Corporation (NASDAQ: SNDK), a Fortune 500 and S&P 500 company, is a global leader in flash storage solutions. For more than 25 years, SanDisk has expanded the possibilities of storage, providing trusted and innovative products that have transformed the electronics industry. Today, SanDisk's quality, state-of-the-art solutions are at the heart of many of the world's largest data centers, and embedded in advanced smartphones, tablets and PCs. SanDisk's consumer products are available at hundreds of thousands of retail stores worldwide. For more information, visit www.sandisk.com.
About 1to1 Media
1to1® Media is THE online destination for customer strategy resources to help organizations optimize their customer experience and realize the greatest value from their customers. 1to1 Media provides resources including in-depth articles, infographics, blogs, webinars, and whitepapers that help senior executives to drive change and make customer-based initiatives the centerpiece of their strategies.
1to1 Media's Weekly Digest delivers best practices, trends, and articles that highlight customer-focused initiatives to drive bottom-line impact.1to1 Media's annual awards programs, The Gartner & 1to1 Media CRM Excellence Awards and the 1to1 Media Customer Champions, highlight excellence among organizations and individuals that take a customer-centric approach to improving their business.
Backed by Peppers & Rogers Group, a global leader in customer strategy and relationship marketing, 1to1 Media combines thought leadership, field experience, and editorial expertise to deliver actionable content to its audience of more than 130,000 decision-makers.
© 2015 SanDisk Corporation. All rights reserved. SanDisk is a trademark of SanDisk Corporation, registered in the United States and other countries. Other brand names mentioned herein are for identification purposes only and may be the trademarks of their respective holder(s).
1 1to1 Media, 2015 Media Customer Champions Revealed, http://www.1to1media.com/view.aspx?docid=35593. 1to1 Media, 2014 CRM Excellence Awards, http://www.1to1media.com/cxexcellence/view.aspx?itemid=34850.
Media Contact
Michael Diamond
Phone: 408-801-1108
Email: firstname.lastname@example.com


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Quilt Improv Blog Tour
Today I'm very excited to share with you a new book by designer and author Lucie Summers,
Quilt Improv: Incredible Quilts from Everyday Inspirations
. Many of you probably know Lucie through
. I have a fair share of them in my stash and I'm constantly reaching for them when working on scrappy projects.
When I first opened Quilt Improv, I was absolutely blown away by the beauty of the photography. I have a very large library of quilting books. (Sort of a quilt book addict.) I think I can easily say, these are the most beautifully photographed quilts in my entire collection.
Seriously. If I could spell out what would make a perfect setting for quilt photos, I would probably say rustic barns...
historic looking stone walls...
And what is this? A truck full of flower bulbs? (LOVE!!)
I want to move into every picture! I honestly feel like this could be a coffee table book. Drool worthy.
Quilt Improv has directions for several improvisational techniques, referred to as The Building Blocks: Applique Circle, Basket Weave, Chain Pieced Strips, Chevrons, Crazy Triangles, Half Square Triangles, Log Cabins, Pieced Squares, Portholes, Quarter Circles, String Blocks and X Blocks; as well as 12 Quilts. Is is absolutely packed with information.
I decided to make a little project out of the book, and in the spirit of one of my New Year's Resolutions, include one of my kids in the fun. I showed my 4 year old the project - Chain-Pieced Strips. I let him dig through my scrap tubs and lay out all the fabrics.
I trimmed them to size and sewed them together. It was actually a really fun project to work on together. He was so excited, he kept saying "I can't believe I'm making my very own quilt!!"
I quilted and bound it and now it is a very special quilt for his stuffed panda.
Improv can be a little scary, but it's also quite freeing and a great way to sew with kids.
Be sure to check out the rest of the blog tour - some stops even have giveaways!


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Cinepaint is an Open Source image editor developed for the movie industry specifically to support high dynamic range image editing. Although originally based on the gimp image editor (for a long time cinepaint was called Film Gimp), this application has since diverged significantly.
Note that the Panorama Gimp plug-in doesn't yet support HDR or 16bit images, so there is no advantage using cinepaint over the gimp with this plugin.
There is a thorough cinepaint tutorial on manipulating 16bit photos.
A useful cinepaint plugin is Hartmut Sbosny's Bracketed exposures to HDR plugin for combining bracketed exposures.


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The KASPAR humanoid robot, developed at the University of Hertfordshire has previously been used in studies of human-robot interaction with normal and autistic children. We reported in 2007 on KASPAR being used to teach social skills to autistic children. According to a recently released paper, KASPAR is now being used by researchers interested in finding out if children interviewed by a humanoid robot respond in the same way as to human interviewers. In particular, they wanted to find out if children would be more or less willing to disclose information to robots. The results surprised the researchers, who had expected to see some preference in the children for either robots or humans. From the paper:
The results were contrary to our expectations. Rather than having a clear preference, the children behaved very similarly towards either of the interviewers (human/robot). The children used similar amounts of words, keywords and filler words when responding to both the robot and the human interviewer. There was also very little difference in the amount of words the children used relative to the amount of words the interviewer used. These findings illustrate that the children communicated with the robot in a similar way to which they did the human interviewer.
They did find one interesting difference. Their measure of the children's eye gaze reveals they spent much more time looking at the robot's face during interviews than they did with human interviewers. For all the details, read the paper by Luke Jai Wood, Kerstin Dautenhahn, Austen Rainer, Ben Robins, Hagen Lehmann, and Dag Sverre Syrdal, titled Robot-Mediated Interviews – How Effective Is a Humanoid Robot as a Tool for Interviewing Young Children?.


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Gov. Bill Ritter's mother, Ethel, left, with daughter-in-law Jeannie Ritter, auction chair Mary McNicholas and big buyer Edie Marks. Photo courtesy of MS Center Guild
It took months and plenty of time spent Googling handbag brand after handbag brand, but Mary McNicholas came through like the champion she is for the first Old Bags Bruncheon benefiting the Rocky Mountain Multiple Sclerosis Center.
"This is probably the hardest yet funniest auction I have ever done in the last 15 years," she said in the days following the event chaired by Michele Maxfield and Sandee Walling and held at Cherry Hills Country Club.
"There were purses on tables, hanging from the rafters, just about everywhere," McNicholas reports. The best news, though: "We sold 200 of the 218 purses that were donated."
The 200 guests weren't buying blind, either. "I wrote a description for every purse that I got by Googling them," McNicholas said.
Special purses were a gold metallic Longchamps bag donated, and autographed, by Academy Award winning actress Susan Sarandon; "Good Morning America" co-host Robin Roberts' Lands' End tote; and a Calvin Klein purse signed by vocalist Amy Grant.
CBS 4 anchorwomen Karen Leigh and Brooke Wagner sent handbags from their personal wardrobes, but two that generated tons of buzz were from Arlene Hirschfeld and Debbie Harung. Arlene gave a vintage Mary Frances green floral print bag while Debbie donated a white beaded number by Shariff with a clip to hold one's white evening gloves.
Another vintage donation had a cache of Green Stamps tucked inside.
Colorado first lady Jeannie Ritter served as honorary chairwoman and attended with her mother-in-law, Ethel Ritter. The speaker, Ann Fulton of Never Pay Retail, discussed the origins of purses.
The benefit committee was made up of Mary Edwards, Tricia Montgomery, Jo Fisher, Su Dell, Michelle Spickard, Sherry Batchelder, Millie Hock, Dianne Shipley, Ilona Dwoskin, Christine Hause, Suzanne Gibson, Ginny Mayers, Mona Palmquist, Barbara Weiskopf, Charleen Dunn, Patty Spurway and Beda Collins.
Denver Post Society Editor Joanne Davidson can be reached at 303-809-1314 or email@example.com


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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A federal appeals court signaled on Wednesday it was prepared to uphold a regulation designed to detect the sale of semi-automatic rifles to Mexican drug cartels, one of the few gun control measures put forward so far by the Obama administration.
Gun retailers and manufacturers, including a trade group based in Newtown, Connecticut, scene of the December 14 school massacre, say the rule is burdensome and violates federal law.
It requires stores in the four U.S. states bordering Mexico to send a notice to federal law enforcement whenever someone buys two or more of rifles during any five-day period.
The measure applies only to high-caliber, semi-automatic rifles that can use a detachable magazine.
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), which regulates gun sales, adopted the rule in 2011 amid rising cartel violence and at the urging of gun control groups for President Barack Obama to act.
Thousands of firearms are thought to cross the border illegally into Mexico each year, and semi-automatic rifles with detachable magazines are a favorite of drug traffickers, the ATF said in a report last year.
Mexican authorities recovered more than 68,000 U.S.-sourced guns from 2007 to 2011, the ATF said.
The rule applies to retailers in Arizona, California, New Mexico and Texas who, perhaps without realizing it, could be sources for those firearms.
Gun stores "have to create a new system to keep track of that," Richard Gardiner, a lawyer for retailers Foothills Firearms LLC and J&G Sales Ltd, told the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.
Federal law does not allow law enforcement to require that system, he said, calling it burdensome because store workers do not always know which of the guns they sell are covered.
The court's three judges, though, repeatedly doubted whether the rule creates much additional work.
"I don't remember the record containing any evidence of confusion," said Judge Harry Edwards.
ATF has a special phone number for retailers to call if they have questions, such as whether the rule covers a particular rifle, but few people have called, government lawyer Michael Raab told the court.
"Any dealer worth his salt" should know whether most guns he sells fit the criteria, Raab said, echoing the wording of a lower court judge.
Gardiner responded that evidence of the rule's burden is unnecessary because it is a government overreach.
The court is expected to decide within the next few months.
Gun rights advocates have also argued that the ATF measure could lead to a federal database of guns, which they fear would infringe on their rights. Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives have tried to cut off money to enforce the regulation.
The National Shooting Sports Foundation, a trade group for gunmakers and a plaintiff in the lawsuit, is based in Newtown, where gunman Adam Lanza killed his mother, 20 children and six school employees before shooting himself in one of the worst U.S. school shootings.
Lower court judges in Texas and Washington have upheld the ATF rule, which is an example of steps Obama can take outside the proposed gun control laws he is expected to send to Congress this month.
The case is National Shooting Sports Foundation Inc, et al, v. B. Todd Jones, U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, No. 12-5009.
Editing by Xavier Briand


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Dish Network to Close Its Remaining U.S. Blockbuster Stores
Move Ends an Era in Home Entertainment and Reflects Rise of Alternatives Like Netflix
The Blockbuster store, a fixture of many American neighborhoods for 25 years, will all but disappear in coming months, the chain's owner, Dish Network Corp., said Wednesday.
Dish, which bought the Blockbuster video-rental chain out of bankruptcy in 2011, said it would close the roughly 300 remaining stores it owns by early January. About 50 stores in the U.S. operated by franchisees, and more overseas, will remain open.


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Dumanis files against five as part of a broadening contracting investigation
DA's office raids South Bay politicos
Those whose homes were searched
Complaints preceded raids on South County school officials
Construction firms address South County probe
DA says officials took dinners, tickets, more
Sweetwater committee seeks contractor support
DA's South County timeline mixes meals, votes
Gandara hires lawyer in contracting probe
Compilation of U-T Watchdog stories leading up to and in the aftermath of Superintendent Jesus Gandara's ouster
Twenty-six felony charges were filed today against current and former Sweetwater schools officials, a dramatic start to what prosecutors say could be a widening corruption scandal rocking South Bay campuses.
Former Superintendent Jesus Gandara and board member Greg Sandoval each face eight felony charges. Current trustees Pearl Quinones and Arlie Ricasa each face four.
Henry Amigable, a construction company executive who has worked for both Sweetwater schools and Southwestern College on bond projects in recent years, was charged with two felonies, one of them bribery of public officials.
"It's the largest public corruption case our office has ever prosecuted -- systematic and pervasive," District Attornney Bonnie Dumanis said at a morning news conference announcing the charges. "Our investigation shows they traded their votes in awarding contracts for a long list of bribes."
Charges include bribery, perjury, influencing public officials and "obtaining a thing of value to influence a member of a legislative body."
Prosecutors raided the homes of most of those charged last month — in addition to homes of former Southwestern College officials who were not charged today. They seized computers, records and data linking them to what prosecutors allege are evidence of illegal gifts and outright bribes.
Dumanis said the charges filed Wednesday begin the process of holding the officials accountable.
Not charged today was Sweetwater board member Bertha Lopez or former Southwestern College administrators John Wilson and Nicholas Alioto, all of whom saw their residences searched by investigators in December.
According to prosecutors, the case was opened early last year, after a series of reports by The Watchdog exposed questionable billing, spending, solicitation of contractors and other practices by Gandara and Sweetwater board members.
Gandara's name is mentioned 74 times on the 41-page affidavit. He has retained former District Attorney Paul Pfingst as his criminal defense attorney. Gandara was terminated by the school board in June after the Watchdog series, including a story about him inviting district vendors and contractors to a bridal shower with a "money tree" for his daughter.
Among other things, the court papers indicate he took $1,000 from a contractor for a beauty pageant entry for his daughter. Other gifts, including meals and travel and sporting events, totaled $5,134.
The criminal charges center on officials accepting such gifts without reporting them on their state-required economic disclosures. Pfingst said problems with the paperwork are not unusual among officials who have to file them.
The Public Integrity Office also received repeated complaints from Sweetwater parents and former teachers about dubious contracting decisions and spending practices, including oversight of a $644 million bond passed by voters in 2006.
When Gandara was terminated, he received a payout of more than $400,000. He also was permitted to qualify for his lifetime pension.
His severance agreement stated, "The Superintendent shall be entitled to a defense and indemnification in any litigation arising from or relating to the scope of his employment with the district as provided by his contract and the California code."
Pfingst said the current proceeding is not litigation, but a criminal matter.
Each defendant was alerted to the charges by email minutes before Dumanis announced the complaints. They were not arrested. They were ordered to appear in Superior Court as soon as next week.
If convicted on all counts, the elected and former officials could serve between four and seven years in state prison.
Gandara's replacement, Superintendent Ed Brand, has called a noon news conference to discuss the charges.