The University of Wisconsin men?s hockey team has officially committed to play in another outdoor game. UW Athletic Department officials have signed a contract with InterSport, an event promotion company based in Illinois that?s putting together a regional college hockey doubleheader on Feb. 17, 2013, at Soldier Field in Chicago.
Have an idea for a software program that will make life easier or an online business you?ve dreamed of? Tech types and their supporters will gather on Friday for Startup Weekend Madison, a marathon, 54-hour collaboration aimed at turning digital ideas into reality. A program similar to Startup Weekend, 3 Day Startup Madison, will be held the following weekend of May 4-6, and is aimed at commercializing technology by UW-Madison students.
Wisconsin?s hoop dreams came halfway home Tuesday. The Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association agreed to keep the state boys high school basketball tournament at the Kohl Center in Madison where it belongs. It was a smart and exciting decision after months of doubt and testy exchanges between officials at the WIAA and UW-Madison, which traditionally hosts the state championships.
Despite a recession that caused an economic slump in the state from 2009 to 2010, Wisconsin?s poverty rate actually dropped, according to a new UW-Madison study. A report released Wednesday by the Institute for Research on Poverty notes that Wisconsin?s poverty rate fell from 11.1 percent to 10.3 percent, a drop made possible by safety-net public benefits programs including food stamps, tax credits and subsidized child care.
Expanding home visits to pregnant women and helping neighborhoods improve safety are goals of Janel Heinrich, who on Wednesday was named director of Public Health Madison and Dane County. “We?re trying to assure that individuals and communities are healthy,” said Heinrich, interim director since June and director of community health since 2008.
MADISON – Dr. Thomas Hartman Steele, Emeritus Professor of Nephrology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, died April 24, 2012, at home, surrounded by his family. He was 75. In 1970, Dr. Steele joined the faculty at UW-Madison where he served as a professor of medicine, attending physician and associate director of the university?s Department of Medicine Metabolic Unit.
Dear Editor: I am thrilled that the demise of the Bowl Championship Series could be imminent. While the conspicuous absence of an eight-team, neutral-site playoff solution dismays me, I literally laughed out loud when I saw the four-plus option in which two finalists could be chosen from a group of three semifinalists. What is it with major college football?s infatuation with absurdity? UW athletic director, Barry Alvarez, a longtime playoff obstructionist, cites preservation of Rose Bowl tradition as a reason to adopt the four-plus system.
There is still construction work going on — but much of it is on the University of Wisconsin campus or at hospitals not subject to the property tax. A lot of Madison companies are finding work — just not in Wisconsin.
The University of Wisconsin football team has had a relatively low number of injuries this spring. But the nagging injuries are starting to pile up, which could affect the players who available for the spring game on Saturday. Three positions that have been hit hard recently have been tailback, wide receiver and cornerback.
SUN PRAIRIE – Agnes (Trzebiatowski) Dushack, age 59, passed away on Monday, April 23, 2012, at Agrace HospiceCare Inc. in Fitchburg surrounded by her family. Agnes worked for UW Extension and for ICE and was awarded for Excellence at her job.
We all had to learn the tree poem in third grade, right? ?I think that I shall never see, a poem as lovely as a tree?? is the first stanza in Joyce Kilmer?s famous ode to trees, and those two lines probably pop into your mind when spring comes around and trees turn absolutely outrageous in color and blossom. One of the best places to go to see the natural fireworks is Longenecker Gardens at the UW-Madison Arboretum on the west side.
Nine properties, some publicly owned, will be honored by the Madison Trust for Historic Preservation on May 3. The awards honor building or design that maintain the historic character of a property or rehabilitate them for contemporary use. Among the honorees are North and South Halls and the Chazen Museum of Art.
Madison officials cheered the WIAA?s decision Tuesday to keep the state high school boys basketball tournament in the state capital through 2020 and expressed hope the girls tournament would return after leaving for Green Bay for two years.
When UW-Madison?s James Thomson in 1998 became the first scientist to grow human embryonic stem cells in a lab, it generated tremendous excitement about the medical possibilities. Thomson tried to downplay the breakthrough but talk spread about cures for Alzheimer?s or Parkinson?s disease, growing livers for cirrhosis suffers or producing healthy heart cells for cardiac patients. The miracle cures have been slow in coming, however.
Lab testing in Wisconsin has confirmed salmonella contamination in recalled yellowfin tuna and in a spicy tuna roll. The Wisconsin State Laboratory of Hygiene at UW-Madison found salmonella in samples that matched the DNA fingerprint of the outbreak.
….This notion of a disconnect between Wisconsinites and the state’s flagship institution of higher education may surprise some within the campus community, but those sentiments are broad-based and very real, according to a study released last month by UW-Madison political scientist Kathy Cramer Walsh. The paper gives an eye-opening account of state residents’ “pervasive sense of distance from UW-Madison,” and reveals a “widespread sense that the state’s flagship university is inattentive to the concerns of members of the public at large.”
The release of Walsh’s report is especially timely today, as UW-Madison is in the midst of celebrating the 100th anniversary of the Wisconsin Idea ? the principle that the teaching and research taking place at the university should be felt beyond the borders of campus. “That’s the big, sad story of the paper ? we are putting so much effort on campus into promoting the Wisconsin Idea and reviving it and aligning it with our work, and yet it’s kind of invisible to a lot of people in this state,” says Walsh.
A 21-year-old UW-Madison student was injured Tuesday by a hit and run driver on Park Street. Madison police said the crash was reported at 12:42 p.m. Tuesday in the crosswalk across Park Street connecting the pedestrian mall from the end of State Street to Bascom Hill. Anyone with information about the crash is asked to call 911.
Madison or Green Bay? The WIAA Board of Control is expected to deliver that much-anticipated answer Tuesday afternoon when it considers final proposals from the two cities and announces which of them will host for the WIAA state basketball tournaments in 2013 and beyond.
UW-Madison students will be reading ?Radioactive: Marie and Pierre Curie, A Tale of Love and Fallout? next fall as part of the university?s common reading program, Go Big Read, according to a UW-Madison news release Monday. The illustrated biography by Lauren Redniss, a National Book Award finalist, was chosen by interim UW-Madison Chancellor David Ward.
UW-Madison has agreed to change the wording on a scholarship letter after at least one student complained that it led her to believe she would receive thousands of dollars more than she did. The scholarship is called the Advanced Opportunity Fellowship and it was given to about 229 graduate students at UW-Madison in 2011-12. The fellowships are given to students who will increase diversity on campus.
You’ve got an idea for a new business, but what steps do you need to take to bring that idea to fruition? “It is always a good idea to do some research about the industry and the market to determine if there are barriers to entering the industry, if there is a need for the business and to explore what it really means to become a business owner,” says Michelle Somes-Booher, business coach at the UW-Madison Small Business Development Center.
“Madison is the perfect location for this event,” said Mayor Paul Soglin in a news release. “The combination of UW-Madison, Madison College and Edgewood College in conjunction with startup entrepreneurs provides a great environment.” Startup Weekend Madison is the latest in a string of almost 500 similar events that have taken place worldwide, with another 200 in the planning stages, according to a news release from the organization. Developers, designers, marketers, product managers and startup enthusiasts are invited, as well as anyone looking to test the waters of starting a business.
In Madison, Rising Sun is one of the last remnants of the once-thriving massage parlor scene, which appears to have started in the 1970s and once numbered in the dozens. The Downtown parlors drew heavy scrutiny during the 1980 murder trial of Barbara Hoffman, a former UW-Madison student and prostitute ? she worked part time at Rising Sun ? who was charged with poisoning two former customers at another Downtown massage parlor, causing their deaths. She was convicted in one of the murders and remains in state prison today.
Freshman guard Lacia Gorman, who had been granted her release to transfer from the University of Wisconsin women?s basketball program, has decided to go to Northern Illinois. Gorman will be reunited with former UW assistant coach Kathi Bennett, who originally recruited her to UW.
University of Wisconsin athletic director Barry Alvarez says he?s intrigued by pending discussions aimed at modifying the Bowl Championship Series formula. Commissioners from the six major BCS conferences and select athletic directors, including Alvarez, will meet in Hollywood, Fla., Tuesday through Thursday to weigh the merits of four options aimed at a playoff-type format.
Remember guerrilla cookies, a staple on the UW-Madison campus during those halcyon days of the late ?60s and early ?70s? This weekend, they will return.
For the Badgers and for Ryan, Uthoff?s departure means a waste of a year of scholarship and training that could have gone to a player with a stronger commitment to play for Wisconsin. And that?s no small thing. Uthoff was a waste of time and money. If the NCAA wants to get serious about avoiding these transfer dustups, it needs to look harder at mandatory four-year scholarship commitments from schools and players ? with only hardship transfers ? and stipends to cover extraneous costs for student athletes. Maybe the sports talking heads can lobby for that. Ryan, meanwhile, is moving on. He says he?s got a scholarship open and he?s doing some recruiting.
Flextory, a Web-based, flexible inventory system, is the big $10,000 winner of the 2012 UW-Madison Qualcomm Wireless Innovation Competition, held this week to highlight innovative, wireless technology products. UW senior Chris Beley, 22, a computer engineering and computer science major from Hayward, developed Flextory. It lets users decide what they want to organize and how they want to do so, and works by scanning bar codes.
MILWAUKEE – David E. Beckwith, a prominent Milwaukee attorney, former president of the University of Wisconsin Board of Regents, and community leader, died Saturday, April 14, 2012, in hospice at Saint John?s on The Lake. He was 84. Mr. Beckwith was educated at the University of Wisconsin-Madison graduating with degrees in labor economics B.S. and an LL.B. from the law school. He was a member of Phi Beta Kappa, and Order of Coif, and leading articles editor of the Wisconsin Law Review.
On the surface, a mud run is a test of will, endurance and strength as participants run, climb, crawl and maneuver through an obstacle course that can cover acres of challenging terrain. But events such as Tough Mudder, Warrior Dash and Spartan Race also are businesses that have led others to do their own variation of the popular races. One of the newest is LoziLu, based in part in Madison. The all-female event was created by two husband-and-wife teams who are graduates of UW-Madison and who invested $50,000.
MADISON – Richard Houden died peacefully on Thursday, April 19, 2012, surrounded by his family. As a sprinter, he had a magical year in 1947 when he set records for the Badgers, and was invited by an elite AAU track team to compete across Europe. Because of his accomplishments that year, he was later inducted into the UW Athletic Hall of Fame in September 2010?a true highlight of his life.
It is the little building project that could. For more than 10 years, the UW-Madison School of Nursing building has gone through a strange and twisting odyssey as politicians and officials flip-flopped about the fate of the project. It was placed at the top of priority lists, then taken off completely; it was slipped into a state budget in the middle of the night, then pulled out just as slyly. But finally, on Saturday, school officials and Gov. Scott Walker broke ground on the $52 million building.
April is Sexual Assault Awareness Month in the United States, which means Val Kowis has been even busier than usual. Kowis is chair of Promoting Awareness, Victim Empowerment (PAVE), a student organization at UW-Madison whose mission is to end sexual assault, dating/domestic violence and stalking on campus through education and activism.
It was during the 2006 Major League Baseball season, the summer after Ben Rouse?s freshman year at UW-Madison, that the Fort Atkinson native first wondered if it might be possible to attend all 162 games of a Milwaukee Brewers season. Rouse wants to attend every Brewers game this season, home and away, but it?s more than that. He thinks his story can help lift the profile of the Be the Match Foundation, which raises funds to provide marrow and umbilical cord blood transplants for patients with leukemia, lymphoma and other diseases.
Hugh Ambrose describes the seven-year production process for ?The Pacific? as ?a personal journey,? which he will relate in Madison on May 3 as keynote speaker for the Wisconsin Veterans Museum Foundation?s annual gala at the Monona Terrace and Convention Center.
John Hall, a graduate of Palmyra-Eagle High School and West Point who holds the military history chair at UW-Madison that was endowed by Stephen Ambrose shortly before his death, said both versions of ?The Pacific? do a good job of not sanitizing ?the theater of The Good War that starts to test and strain the word ?good?? due to the tactics of mutual annihilation.
A. The recent tornado outbreak in the Plains States was predicted by forecasters at the Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Okla., as far as seven days in advance. This kind of forecast undoubtedly contributed to a vigilance that resulted in only six lives being lost in this first major outbreak of the year.
A. “There?s been a considerable amount of debate over the cause of the extinction of the Ice Age giants ? the so-called megafauna ? with disagreement over whether human hunters or climate change were the cause of their demise,” said Jacquelyn Gill, a UW-Madison graduate student and Ice Age expert.
Dear Editor: As a newly accepted elementary education major to the UW-Madison School of Education, I am very troubled by the direction Gov. Scott Walker is leading public education in Wisconsin.
While state employees have seen their paychecks dwindle as they shell out more for health care and pension benefits, some Department of Justice employees were handed merit pay bonuses last month. WKOW-TV/Channel 27 reporter Tony Galli reported the bonuses on his blog last week after obtaining records showing $289,629 in payouts to 93 DOJ staffers. That?s an average of $3,114 each.
Because of the proximity to campus, many students attend the market to browse, taste-test, and purchase from the wide variety of produce and flowers. Morgan Rehberg, a freshman at UW-Madison said the Farmers? Market is a different experience than shopping at a grocery store. ?It?s bringing?the small town thing into a city,? she said. ?I like how they kind of meet together.?
All the action this weekend is at the Wisconsin Film Festival, which takes place in eight venues around town, including the UW-Cinematheque, Union South, and two screens in Sundance Cinemas. So nothing else going on there.
Jarrod Uthoff is free to speak with any program outside the Big Ten Conference after University of Wisconsin athletic department officials lifted some ?permission to contact? restrictions on him Thursday.
Just like that, the Jarrod Uthoff saga is over. That?s how it goes in today?s Twitter-driven world. Stories bubble to the surface, sides are taken, reputations are trashed and the media quickly moves on to some other topic. Problem is, it doesn?t go away that quickly for the subjects of the firestorm, who are left to deal with the fallout.
A former National Science Foundation director is set to speak at the University of Wisconsin-Madison about links between the weather and disease.
The University of Wisconsin-Madison is ending its nursing education program at Gundersen Lutheran in La Crosse. The UW School of Nursing dean says the university is consolidating its nursing school on the Madison campus.
Nick Offerman knows how to make an entrance. The ?Parks & Recreation? star had to start his show at the Wisconsin Union Theater late Wednesday night because so much of the audience was stuck in a seemingly endless will-call line.
What?s the appeal of international students? Colleges say they want to increase the diversity of their campuses to help all students. While UW-Madison may be well-known enough to not need recruiting help, that?s not the case for, say, UW-Superior. But the motive isn?t all about diversity. It?s also about money. International students pay out-of-state tuition, which is significantly higher than in-state tuition. Again, colleges will say the more out-of-state students they get, the lower tuition costs in-state students. The ethics behind commission-based recruiting are cloudy.
Dave Vander Meulen may have retired as the men?s basketball coach at UW-Whitewater in 2001, but he?s not done yet. As a basketball player, that is. Vander Meulen, 73, grew up in the sport and likes to say, “In 40 years, I never had to have a real job.”
Uthoff, a freshman forward who last week asked for and was granted a release from his scholarship with the Badger men?s basketball program, will first meet with associate athletic director Justin Doherty this morning to dispute restrictions placed on him by UW coach Bo Ryan.
University of Wisconsin wrestling coach Barry Davis knows the worst season in his 18-year tenure with the program could easily have been avoided had he prevented his three top wrestlers from taking Olympic redshirts.But Davis also knows doing that would have made him a hypocrite.
Chris Calvey calls it “a little bit of a crazy idea.” He?s a graduate student at UW-Madison, and along with some of his fellow students he?s organizing a major three-day conference in Madison starting Friday, April 27, for atheists, humanists and agnostics.
Gilles Bousquet, UW-Madison?s dean of international studies and vice provost for globalization, will serve as UW-Eau Claire?s interim chancellor, according to an announcement by UW System President Kevin Reilly.UW-Eau Claire will be without a chancellor after May 1 when Brian Levin-Stankevich leaves to become president of Westminster College in Utah.
University of Wisconsin System President Kevin Reilly has chosen an international expert to serve as UW-Eau Claire?s interim chancellor. Gilles Bousquet (zheel boo-SKAY) currently serves as dean of UW-Madison?s Division of International Studies and International Institute director.
Dear Editor: A new documentary film about the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, ?A Noble Lie ? Oklahoma City, 1995,? will be featured Thursday, April 19, in the Humanities Building, Room 1111, 455 N. Park Street on the UW-Madison campus. Admission is free.
The city?s sixth police district would encompass an area south and slightly west of Lake Mendota roughly bordered by Park, Regent and Monroe streets to the east and Whitney Way, Mineral Point Road and Gammon Road to the west, including city property adjacent to UW-Madison.
Chris Calvey calls it “a little bit of a crazy idea.” He?s a graduate student at UW-Madison, and along with some of his fellow students he?s organizing a major three-day conference in Madison starting Friday, April 27, for atheists, humanists and agnostics. As of this afternoon, 510 people had registered for the free event. Calvey expects the total to reach 700.
The Jarrod Uthoff saga continues to get more bizarre by the day. On Tuesday, University of Wisconsin men?s basketball coach Bo Ryan was heavily criticized by several members of the national media after a report surfaced that he had put the entire Atlantic Coast Conference on a list of teams that Uthoff is restricted from speaking with regarding a transfer.
When musing about the Edible Book Festival, it?s hard not to say ?Eat Those Words!? The annual festival, held April 10 at the UW-Madison?s Memorial Library as part of National Library Week, was a visual delight, but not meant to be eaten. Instead, the cupcakes, pies, cakes, breads, veggies, fruit, crackers and frosting (lots of frosting) depicted the creators? favorite tomes, signifying a book?s title or a moment taken from within the hard tack covers.
Forensics students, cover your ears: The speech coming from your bus driver trying to drive through Madison on Friday could be a bit colorful. Thousands of high school students from all corners of Wisconsin will be coming to UW-Madison on Friday and Saturday for the 118th annual Wisconsin Speech Festival.
The University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire is among a growing number of campuses turning to agencies to recruit foreign students. Recruitment agencies can charge schools more than $1,000 per international student, but universities say the cost leads to more revenue. During a four-year period, an international student will spend about $68,000 in tuition, said UW-Eau Claire international education director Karl Markgraf.
