One of the worldâ??s biggest charitable foundations has awarded close to $10 million to the University of Wisconsin-Madison for influenza virus research.
The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has awarded $9.5 million in a five-year grant to UW-Madison research scientists who are studying viral mutations that could be early warning signs of potential pandemic flu viruses.
The new class of actors at UW-Madison is an eclectic bunch. They come from all over the country, from as far away as Texas to as close as Baraboo and Milwaukee. As kids, they dreamed of being ballerinas, comic book authors and stunt men.
Now, theyâ??re looking to make their way as professional actors and teachers, committing the next three years of their lives to the acting training program at the university here. Theatergoing audiences will see them on stages all over the city – as well as in Spring Green and Milwaukee – through 2012 and beyond.
Wisconsinâ??s coaching staff plans to secure an evaluation of John Clayâ??s draft stock should the third-year sophomore tailback decide to enter the 2010 National Football League draft.
“I think at this stage Bret may have already started looking at some things and talking to some people to find out where he might fall,” UW running backs coach John Settle said, referring to head coach Bret Bielema. “And then weâ??ll probably have that talk based upon what he does these last few weeks.”
Flu cases on the University of Wisconsin-Madison campus dropped by two-thirds last week, prompting a student health official to wonder if the worst of the flu epidemic is over.
University Health Services (UHS) reported only 46 students were evaluated with influenza-like illness Nov. 8-14, the eleventh week of the fall semester. Thatâ??s down from 115 cases in week 10, and is the second-lowest number of flu cases seen at the clinic in one week since classes began Sept. 2.
UHS epidemiologist Craig Roberts said itâ??s hard to read what the drop in numbers mean.
The brains behind the Apex real estate empire claims it all started with a paper route.
When Bruce Bosben was 13, he began delivering The Capital Times to homes on Madisonâ??s west side. Bosben was eventually handling six different routes with the help of his family and in 1983 was named â??CT Carrier of the Year.â?
By the time he started college at UW-Madison, Bosben had saved enough money to pay his own tuition and launch the Empire Records store in the Westgate Mall.
As Wisconsin prepares for its critical Big Ten Conference finale Saturday at Northwestern before enjoying its second bye week of the season, UW fans are pondering Big Ten title chances and bowl game possibilities.
Following intervention by Gov. Jim Doyle, the University of Wisconsin System on Tuesday backed down in a funding dispute with Milwaukee-area legislators over control of the stateâ??s efforts to catalyze jobs and investment in the fast-growing water technology sector.
Mentions a poll last month by Ken Goldstein, a University of Wisconsin-Madison political scientist.
College students who live in coed dorms are 2.5 more times more likely to binge drink than students in single-sex housing, according to a new study. The results were based on surveys of more than 500 students from five college campuses.
A news release on the study from Brigham Young University said that 42 percent of students in coed housing binge drink weekly. Eighteen percent of students in all-male or all-female situations binge weekly.
The summer of 1987 was witness to the murders of three local women — all of the slayings reportedly unrelated to each other.
Two of the cases were solved; two different men sentenced to prison. But was one of them wrongly convicted? Or is he indeed a cold-blooded killer who, today, could have a shot at freedom?
In this riverfront village, a closed case still leaves open wounds.
Quoted: UW Law School professor Keith Findley, co-director of the Wisconsin Innocence Project
MADISON, Wis. — While many have heard about the potential risks of the H1N1 flu virus, many are just learning about the H3N8 virus. This is the influenza virus that affects dogs. While the virus isnâ??t yet in Wisconsin, experts said itâ??s only a matter of time before it will make an appearance.
Quoted: Dr. Sandi Sawchuk, School of Veterinary Medicine
….At the University of Wisconsin in Madison, Chinese undergraduates now account for more than half of the 1,109 Chinese students there. That increase is another sign that China is coming because Wisconsin, like many state schools, doesnâ??t provide scholarships for international undergrads. Last year, Chinese students paid out $2 billion in tuition nationwide. â??That money is keeping some American colleges alive,â? said Laurie Cox, who runs the international student center at the Madison campus.
â??Every time I turn around, another campus has signed a memorandum of understanding with another Chinese university,â? said Kevin Reilly, the president of the universityâ??s 26 campuses. Reilly recently joined Doyle on a trip to China. â??I came away thinking, if the 20th century was the American century … you have to believe that the 21st century will be the Chinese century.â?
Thirty-two years ago, Rita Swan and her husband walked into a Michigan hospital with their nearly dead baby in her arms. The decision to take their son was made after days of pitting their religious beliefs against the medical needs of their young child.
After a week in the intensive care unit, 16-month-old Matthew died of a strain of meningitis, a disease treatable with early detection through antibiotics. Swan and her husband left the spiritual healing of the Christian Science Church, to which they belonged, behind.
Quoted: Dr. Barbara Knox, the medical director of the University of Wisconsin Child Protection Program at UW American Family Children’s Hospital and an assistant professor in the Department of Pediatrics at UW-Madison.
The Dane County Cultural Affairs Commission has awarded 50 grants totaling more than $124,000 for community arts, cultural and local history programs, in the third and final grant cycle of 2009.
The county grants this year were matched by more than $910,000 from local foundations and funds, including the Evjue Foundation, the charitable arm of The Capital Times; the American Girlâ??s Fund for Children; the Endres Manufacturing Co. Foundation; Madison Community Foundationâ??s Arts Access Fund; the Overture Foundation; and the Pleasant T. Rowland Foundation.
Forty-four project grants totaling $109,700 were awarded in four areas, including visual arts, music, dance and arts in school.
(Among the recipients are UW Cinematheque, the UW-Madison Arts Institute, Li Chiao-Ping Dance, Jin-Wen Yu Dance, and the Wisconsin Union Theater.)
The University of Wisconsin-Madisonâ??s Labor Licensing Policy Committee voted to recommend that Chancellor Biddy Martin start taking steps to end the universityâ??s apparel contract with Nike, Inc. due to alleged labor rights abuses at two of the companyâ??s factories.
But donâ??t expect Martin to take any immediate action.
….Dawn Crim, a special assistant to the chancellor for community relations, said Monday the chancellor is hoping to hear back from Nike representatives before taking any major action against the company. She said the university is hoping to receive a phone call from Nike by the end of the week.
UW-Madison police and the Dane County Coronerâ??s Office are trying to identify a man whose decomposed body was found Friday by a university grounds crew working in a natural area adjacent to Picnic Point.
A preliminary investigation indicates that the man of unknown race, who was over 40, died of a self-inflicted injury, police said.
Winter is coming a bit early this year to the Union Terrace: The UW-Madison Hoofers club is bringing in 40,000 pounds of snow for a ski and snowboarding event, the Terrace Rail Jam, on Thursday.
About 45 to 50 skiers and snowboarders from around the Midwest (and a handful of national athletes) will compete in the rail jam, according to Hoofer Ski and Snowboard Club president Matt Hartig. Participants will showcase their tricks on a variety of obstacles, built on top of a 30-by-70-foot scaffolding covered in snow.
….Pinning down the informal economy is as tough as catching a fake Louis Vuitton vendor running from the police. But itâ??s huge in the United States â?? larger than the official output of all but the upper crust of nations across the globe. And, due to the recent recession, itâ??s growing.
Whether thatâ??s good or not depends entirely on oneâ??s point of view. The rise of the informal economy is either the flourishing of entrepreneurship among Americaâ??s poorest or a drag on legitimate businesses that play by the rules.
Quoted: Alfonso Morales, UW-Madison professor of urban and regional planning
….The military, after all, does not rely solely on patriotic feelings to build its force, and neither should the civilian parts of government. One of the most powerful incentives the military has is the Reserve Officersâ?? Training Corps, which offers assistance to those seeking higher education. Itâ??s time for a civilian ROTC.
Thatâ??s the idea of a bipartisan group of senators and House members who are proposing to create the Roosevelt Scholars program, named after Teddy Roosevelt. Reps. David Price, D-N.C., and Mike Castle, R-Del., have introduced a bill in the House, and a similar measure is expected in the Senate this week from Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., and George Voinovich, R-Ohio.
Although there is sentiment to include undergraduates in the program, the House bill is aimed at graduate students, because the federal government has a special demand for highly qualified employees who are otherwise attracted (and heavily recruited) by the private sector. In exchange for generous scholarships in fields such as engineering, information technology, foreign languages and public health, the scholars would commit to three to five years of service in an agency of the federal government.
Sesame Street,” which is celebrating its 40th anniversary, is not just a good show; itâ??s good for you, according to University of Wisconsin-Madison media experts.
“When it comes to educational benefits, the results have been overwhelmingly positive,” says Karyn Riddle, an assistant professor of journalism and mass communication. Riddle notes the PBS program is “the most heavily researched show in the history of television.”
Quoted: Charles Franklin, a political scientist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Mentions that state legislators will find it hard to return to the days when they committed themselves to funding two-thirds of public education costs, according to research by Andrew Reschovsky, a professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison who participated in the Pew study of the fiscal condition of the states.
Quoted: Larry Rittenberg, an expert on auditing and governance at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
The family of a Madison college student who was killed last year isnâ??t giving up its efforts to find her killer. Relatives of Brittany Zimmermann have placed ads on a Madison billboard and inside Metro Transit buses. Theyâ??re hoping the ads will encourage anyone with information on her 2008 death to come forward.
The University of Wisconsin-Madison cycling team has won a bid to host the 2010 and 2011 Collegiate Road National Championship races.
John Nelson knows how an organ donation can prolong a personâ??s life.
In 2001, Nelson donated part of his liver to a cousin, who had Hepatitis C. The disease destroyed her liver. The transplant, conducted at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, prolonged her life, even though she ultimately did die a year and a half later.
Good grief! UW-Madison is not going to use the Kindle e-book because visually-impaired people canâ??t find the button that makes the device read to them?
Pray tell: Where is the button on a regular book they can push to get that weighty hunk of paper and cardboard to read to them? How absurd can this tyranny of the minority get?
Members of the campus community, including several campus officials, are speaking out against recent incidents of graffiti in the residence halls, including a third incident that occurred last weekend in Melcher Hall, again using the n-word.
Director of Housing, Rhonda Viney, said that the people who committed these acts were cowardly and hid their actions in anonymity. Viney also encourages students to stand up against intolerance by posing the question, â??Is this acceptable to you, and if not, what are you going to do about it?â?
MADISON WKOW — They may have not been a large part of the debate, but students at the UW say health care reform would have a large impact on them. That was the message at a rally at the UW. Congresswoman Tammy Baldwin was guest speaker. She says nearly a third of students lack health insurance.
Senior Dustin Sherer, the Badgers’ former starting quarterback, was told during preseason camp the staff had decided to go with junior Scott Tolzien as the starter and redshirt freshman Curt Phillips as the backup. Sherer would have to stay sharp and ready just in case. He responded by becoming a mentor for them.
In his approach to National Security Agency surveillance, as well as CIA renditions, drone assassinations, and military detention, President Obama has to a surprising extent embraced the expanded executive powers championed by his conservative predecessor, George W. Bush. So says an online opinion column by Alfred McCoy, UW-Madison history professor and author of “A Question of Torture,” among other works.
Health officials in Wisconsin have won a $9 million federal grant to study the best ways to help people stop smoking. The grant from the National Institutes of Health will recruit 2,300 smokers at several clinics in southern Wisconsin, including Aurora Health Care, UW Health, Dean Health System and Mercy Health System. (Last item in briefs package)
A not guilty plea has been entered for former Vikings first-round draft pick Erasmus James, who is charged with disorderly conduct in a Madison bar fight.
One of the family members of this yearâ??s Wisconsin Farm Technology Days host farm has received the highest award conferred by the University of Wisconsin-Madison College of Agricultural and Life Sciences. Debbie Crave, who serves as vice president at Crave Brothers Farmstead Cheese Co., was presented with an Honorary Award during a banquet and ceremony at UW-Madison.
Quoted: Ralph Cagle, a legal ethics professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Special teaching coaches were credited with helping three Racine Unified schools improve communication and student achievement levels during the last school year. Now three more schools have that same chance. The teaching coaches are not only teachers with backgrounds working in school administration but also are employed part-time as specialists at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Wisconsin Idea Leadership Academy, a group focused on achieving equitable outcomes for different student groups.
The National Federation of the Blind is applauding the decisions of Syracuse University and the University of Wisconsin-Madison not to Amazon.comâ??s Kindle DX as a textbook replacement.
Kenny Dichter will hold a talk at Camp Randall about how he turned his passion for Badger sports into entrepreneurial ventures that ultimately led him to found Marquis Jet, a leader in fractional ownership private aviation.
The Freedom From Religion Foundation sent a letter to UW-Whitewater objecting to the fact that the university invited students to attend a prayer vigil for a student killed in the Fort Hood shootings.
Amy Krueger, of Kiel, was a psychology major who had transferred to UW-Whitewater last year. She was one of two Wisconsin soldiers killed in the attack.
The faculty adviser to College Republicans at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point says a recent event there did not violate a political fundraising ban. Professor Justin Rueb said the group did not solicit or collect any money for Republican Scott Walkerâ??s gubernatorial campaign.
MADISON (WKOW) — A former Badger football player appeared in Dane County court Thursday on charges of battery after an alleged bar fight last weekend. Erasmus James entered a not guilty plea at Thursdayâ??s hearing on felony battery charges. Police arrested James Monday after he allegedly lost his temper when a bartender wouldnâ??t serve him after closing time.
MADISON (WKOW) — Madison police officials are developing leads in trying to find the man who attacked and severely beat former Badger basketball player Darin Schubring.
Spokesperson Joel DeSpain said a witness told investigators someone in a Wizard of Oz-themed costume punched the unsuspecting Schubring several times in a downtown bar Halloween night. DeSpain said Schubring fell hard to the ground and the attacker ran off.
University of Wisconsin sophomore forward Laurie Nosbusch and freshman midfielder Alev Kelter have garnered All-Big Ten Conference honors, becoming the first Badgers womenâ??s soccer players to be so honored since since Kara Kabellis in 2006.
Jada Buggs hasnâ??t met or even talked with Morgan Paige yet. When they do get together, they should have plenty of notes to compare.
Buggs and Paige have more in common than being future University of Wisconsin womenâ??s basketball players. They made that official Wednesday when they signed their national letters of intent, following through on the verbal commitments they made to the Badgers in the spring.
In addition to sharing the same destination, Buggs and Paige have the common experience of playing for their mothers as coaches in high school.
Plenty of peopleâ??s Twitter feeds appear to be connected directly to their egos, but one scientistâ??s is actually wired to his brain. In April, University of Wisconsin doctoral student Adam Wilson â?? working with adviser Justin Williams â?? tweeted 23 characters just by thinking.
The Department of Natural Resources is tallying the final number, but already the 2009 black bear harvest is a state record.
Based on a preliminary report, hunters harvested 3,900 bears this fall, topping the previous high of 3,184 in 1998. The record was not unexpected. The DNR issued 7,310 bear kill permits this fall, a 57% increase from 2008 and most in state history. The jump in permits came on the heels of a University of Wisconsin study that estimated the stateâ??s bear population at 26,000 to 40,000, a substantial increase from previous studies.
The chancellor of the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and Milwaukee Police Chief Edward A. Flynn are planning to meet to discuss safety and crime-fighting efforts in the area near campus, according to an e-mail from the university and a Milwaukee police spokeswoman.
Quoted: Morris Davis, a real estate economist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Scientists have identified a gene that causes loss of hearing in old age, opening ways for more research to develop a drug that can prevent people from going deaf. Researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in the US who carried out tests on mice found that a gene called Bak is responsible for deafness.
Wisconsin residents should brace for more tax increases and service cuts, based on an analysis that rated the stateâ??s budget predicament among the 10 worst in the country. Story notes that Andrew Reschovsky, a professor in the LaFollette School of Public Affairs at the University of Wisconsin-Madison participated in the Pew Center analysis.
University of Minnesota leaders Wednesday released a draft conflict-of-interest policy that would ban faculty from a variety of questionable practices, including product endorsements and ghostwriting of research papers. Mentions that researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison who have received $20,000 per year from companies cannot conduct industry-funded trials of the companies’ products.
We are facing an epidemic in the United States today. From sea to shining sea, people everywhere are being infected. No, we are not talking about H1N1. Today in America 47 million people are testing positive for a lack of access to affordable and quality health care.
Most people assume that college students are not interested in the health care debate. But we have more at stake than anyone. Just because young people have no interest in attending town hall debates with disrespectful mobs screaming at each other, doesnâ??t mean we donâ??t support health care reform.
A Rice Lake company that provides community hospitals and clinics with diagnostic images pulled in a $3.35 million federal grant, making it the stateâ??s top recipient of such grants for the most recently completed reporting period.
Shared Medical Technology Inc. provides mobile medical diagnostic imaging to health care facilities in northwest Wisconsin, northern Minnesota and the Minneapolis/St. Paul area. With help from the Wisconsin Entrepreneursâ?? Network, the company won funding from the National Institutes of Health for a system to monitor fetal heart rates. The system, pioneered by a Medical College of Wisconsin doctor, is available at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and only a few other places in the world, said Tom Still, president of the Wisconsin Technology Council.
Paul Soglin might have imagined himself as a gubernatorial candidate at one point or another on the long strange trip that has been his political career. But the former Madison mayor, who has been out of office for more than a dozen years, has scrupulously avoided the lure of electoral politics since his narrow defeat in a 2003 comeback bid.
So why did Soglin declare last week that “if there is no viable Democratic gubernatorial candidate by Thanksgiving, I will announce my candidacy on Dec. 1, 2009”?
(Soglin is an adjunct associate professor in the LaFollette School of Public Affairs)
The University of Wisconsin-Madisonâ??s menâ??s basketball team hosts UW-Superior in an exhibition game Wednesday night at the Kohl Center. Since this is a higher education blog, weâ??ll stay away from breaking down the matchup and instead pose a question: Who is the most famous person to earn a degree from UW-Superior?
MADISON (WKOW) — University Health Services (UHS) reports that 115 students were treated for flu-like symptoms in the most recent week of the fall semester (November 1â??7).
That number is also the fourth-highest number of students with flu-like symptoms since the academic year began… and only the four time more than a hundred students came to UHS complaining of the flu.
A graduate of the University of Wisconsin-Madison needs help. Katie Meacham, who was diagnosed with Hodgkinâ??s Lymphoma one week after her 25th birthday in the spring of 2008, needs a stem cell transplant to save her life. But before this will be possible, a donor must be found who closely matches Meacham on a molecular level to reduce the risk of her body rejecting the donated cells.
If Wisconsinâ??s essence were distilled to one four-note riff, it would be this: D, C-sharp, E, D. Whether played on trumpets or pianos, sung by sopranos or tenors, thumped from synthesizers or shouted by rappers, those four musical notes are encoded into Wisconsinâ??s DNA. The notes, as well as the rest of the ditty that would become not just the Badger fight song but Wisconsinâ??s state song, were first performed 100 years ago Tuesday when a glee club warbled “On, Wisconsin!” for the first time in practice followed by the first known public performance at a pep rally the next day.
State Rep. Jon Richards on Monday demanded that the University of Wisconsin System fire the newly appointed staff member “whose role is to move freshwater research and economic development dollars away from Milwaukee.”
The Chronicle of Higher Education posed an interesting question with this article headlined “Are Too Many Students Going to College?”
The piece opens with the following paragraph: “With student debt rising and more of those enrolled failing to graduate in four years, there is a growing sentiment that college may not be the best option for all students.
At the same time, President Obama has called on every American to receive at least one year of higher education or vocational training. Behind the rhetoric lies disagreement over a series of issues: which students are most likely to succeed in college; what kind of college they should attend; whether the individual or society benefits more from postsecondary education; and whether college is worth the high cost and likely long-term debt.”
