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Author: jplucas

Amid a rise in artisanal butter, state to make it easier to get a buttermaker license

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Wisconsin State Journal

Wisconsin is the only state that requires a buttermaker license, and it?s an arduous process to get one. It may soon get easier for would-be buttermakers throughout Wisconsin. In January, the state Agriculture Board approved a scope statement to propose revising the licensing of buttermakers. Such a change would provide more flexible training and education options for potential buttermakers. Current regulations require an apprenticeship of up to two years. Proposed rules would bring that down to 120 hours. Part of the new process would also involve a new Buttermakers Short Course, the first of which will be held Sept. 14-16 at UW-Madison through the Center for Dairy Research. The course is full.

NTSB faults pilot, missing equipment in Wis. crash

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Madison.com

Pilot error and a lack of proper warning equipment is being blamed for the 2008 crash of a University of Wisconsin Med Flight helicopter that killed three people. The National Transportation Safety Board announced its findings in the final report on the crash released Friday.

Start of college can be harder on parents than freshmen

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USA Today

Even for average parents, the letting go is difficult ? more so, they and many others say, than it was for parents of college-bound freshmen in decades past. Robin Kramer recalls how her own parents, who never attended college, dropped her off with a trunk full of belongings at Drake University, also in Iowa, in 1978. She set up her room and attended orientation without them there. “Its just what you did then,” she says. It was much the same for Paul, whose father took him to the University of Wisconsin in 1977 and then went fishing. But some say its often hardest for parents, who remember the days of college when there were fewer support systems in place for students.

Report paints bleak labor numbers for Wisconsin

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Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

When President Barack Obama arrives in Milwaukee for Monday?s Laborfest rally, he?ll be confronted by another troubling economic report that shows the toll the Great Recession has taken on America?s workers.

Only, this report isn?t national – it?s local.

Wisconsin has lost 155,200 jobs since the December 2007 start of the recession, according to a paper to be published Monday by the Center on Wisconsin Strategy.Researchers at the nonprofit think tank based at the University of Wisconsin-Madison document the recession?s impact, as well as longer-term job trends, in a biennial survey, “The State of Working Wisconsin 2010.”

Ex-UW researcher gets probation in misconduct case

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Madison.com

A judge has sentenced a former University of Wisconsin-Madison genetics researcher to two years of probation for submitting false data to federal reviewers. Goodwin pleaded guilty in June to one count of making a false statement. She acknowledged she included false data in a progress report to convince federal reviewers that her lab had made more progress than was actually the case. Goodwin worked at UW-Madison from 2000 to 2006.

On Campus: Former University of Wisconsin-Madison prof sentenced for misconduct in science

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Wisconsin State Journal

A former UW-Madison professor was sentenced to two years probation and $100,500 in fines for lying on a federal grant report. Elizabeth B. Goodwin, who was a UW-Madison associate professor of genetics from 2000 to 2006, admitted in June that she manipulated data in a federal grant progress report to convince reviewers she was making more scientific progress than was the case.

Alvarez talks Big 10 alignment

Posted on
WKOW-TV 27

In an exclusive interview with WKOW, Barry Alvarez talked about the new two division format that the Big Ten will employ beginning in 2011.”It?s OK. Every Big Ten team had to sacrifice something. I talked with Bret [Bielema] and you still have to win games to win the league. I think it?s fair,” Alvarez said while in Las Vegas for the Badger football team?s opening game against UNLV.

Stem-Cell Research Backed by a Company Advances to First Human Therapy Test

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Chronicle of Higher Education

In the last days of July, the Food and Drug Administration gave the green light to a clinical trial that has been nearly a decade in the making. The federal agency approved a test of some of the first fruits of human-embryonic-stem-cell research, in a new therapy that could help patients recover from spinal-cord injury.

UW connecting students with smart phones

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Wisconsin Radio Network

A growing number of UW-Madison students are bringing smart phones with them to school, according to a recent campus survey. The university is hoping to take advantage of the growing presence of the technology by launching its own smart phone application later this fall

Giving Up State Funds

Posted on
Inside Higher Education

How bad are things in California? The budget cuts and fiscal uncertainty are so severe that the University of California at Los Angeles?s business school is proposing that it give up all state funding — in return for greater budget flexibility and the right to raise out-of-state tuition to the levels of private institutions. The plan has been approved by UCLA, but is awaiting a review by Mark G. Yudof, president of the university system.

Wayne Burmeister: Remember the night the lights went out in Vegas?

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I know it?s a long time ago, but I would like revenge against the big guys in Vegas who were rumored to have had something to do with the power outage during the UW-Madison/UNLV game in 2002. The lights went out before ? according to their sports betting rules ? the game was complete. Why? They were about to lose millions because their odds makers underestimated the Wisconsin team. This is a call to action for all Badger fans going to Las Vegas to see the Badgers play, and for those who just like to place sports bets. Determine how much you expect to spend on slots, blackjack, craps and sports bets, and send that amount to the UW marching band.

Madison pharmacist accused of selling fake drugs

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Madison.com

A Madison pharmacist who has served on the University of Wisconsin Foundation is accused, along with a Middleton man, of importing and selling millions of counterfeit Viagra pills and other fake drugs. Fifty-five-year-old Marla Ahlgrimm and 63-year-old Balbir Bhogal are jailed in Dane County with a court hearing expected Friday. Ahlgrimm served on the UW Foundation for more than a decade and has been recognized locally and nationally for her business and civic accomplishments.

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Madison pharmacist accused of selling fake drugs (AP)

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Chicago Sun Times

A Madison pharmacist who has served on the University of Wisconsin Foundation is accused, along with a Middleton man, of importing and selling millions of counterfeit Viagra pills and other fake drugs.

Posted in Uncategorized

No silver bullets in forensic evidence

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Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen was right recently when he declared, “Murderers should fear forensic science.” Forensic science evidence can be a powerful tool against the guilty. It has also proven to be a powerful tool for exonerating the wrongly accused and convicted. [A column by Keith Findley, co-director of the Wisconsin Innocence Project. He is also president of the Innocence Network, an affiliation of more than 60 innocence projects around the world which filed a brief in the court of appeals challenging the ballistics expert’s claims in the case discussed.]

The Badgers at last have the core of a champion: Five outstanding players

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Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Lou Holtz believed five was a magic number in football and shared that philosophy in the late 1980s with one of his Notre Dame assistants, Barry Alvarez.

Alvarez embraced Holtz?s philosophy and took it with him to Wisconsin, where he resurrected a foundering program and won three Big Ten Conference and Rose Bowl titles in 16 seasons.

Big Ten’s new alignment separates UW from nearby rivals

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Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

So if you are a Wisconsin football fan, whether passionate or just on the periphery of the action, you?re probably feeling somewhat empty and perhaps a bit angry today.

When the Big Ten Conference on Wednesday night revealed its pair of six-team divisions for football, beginning in 2011 with the arrival of Nebraska, you learned:

? The Badgers and rival Minnesota will be in opposite divisions. The teams will face each other every season because the Gophers are UW?s protected crossover rival, but the game won?t be the regular-season finale in 2011 or ?12.

? The Badgers won?t face Iowa or Northwestern every season because the Hawkeyes and Wildcats are also in the division opposite UW.

? You?ll see a lot more of Illinois, Indiana and Purdue.

News: Church and State and Student Activities

Posted on
Inside Higher Education

The University of Wisconsin at Madison improperly denied funding for some activities of a Roman Catholic student group, imposing unconstitutional limits on activities involving worship, a federal appeals court ruled Monday.

11% of Wisconsin residents live in poverty

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Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

More than 11% of Wisconsin?s residents – including one in seven children – lived in poverty in 2008, according to the second Wisconsin Poverty Report. Authors of the report, to be published Thursday, said they created a new Wisconsin-specific measure of poverty.

Generous without a clue

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Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Wisconsinites, it turns out, have been paying attention to schools, except in one interesting way.

That we have been paying attention is heartening news out of that big survey this summer by University of Wisconsin-Madison political science guru Ken Goldstein. The headline from the survey was that a solid majority – 62% statewide, 68% in Milwaukee – believe the state?s “best and brightest” leave to find work. Presumably soured on who is left, a supermajority are either frustrated or angry at state government.

Going green: UW-Madison program helps businesses be eco-friendly

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Wisconsin State Journal

A new UW-Madison program to evaluate and promote sustainable business practices is helping Wisconsin companies earn recognition for going green, cutting waste and being socially responsible. ?There were many companies that were actively engaged on these sustainability issues, but they weren?t getting any credit for it,? School of Business professor Thomas Eggert said. ?They were doing things, but no one knew what they were doing.? That?s why the goal of Eggert?s Green Masters Program is as much to publicize the successes of company participants as it is to provide a viable framework for those actions.

Meteorite that hit Wisconsin is named

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Wisconsin State Journal

The meteor that lit up the sky of southern Wisconsin on April 14 and created an international buzz now has a name. The Meteoritical Society has aptly named it the Mifflin Meteorite, named after the town on which many of the pieces were found. The area is about 65 miles west of Madison in Iowa County just south of Montfort. The event drew meteorite hunters from around the country, national news organizations and researchers from UW-Madison and the Field Museum of Chicago.

A big snub to student smoking in Wisconsin

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Wisconsin State Journal

Here?s more evidence that smoking is slowly but surely heading for the ashtray of history. UW-Stout in Menomonie, about 200 miles northwest of Madison in Dunn County, just banned smoking and the use of all tobacco products on its entire campus, including outside in parking lots, on lawns and sidewalks. The ban kicked in Wednesday. Classes are to begin next week. It wasn?t faculty, administrators and parents who forced the change. It was the students themselves.

New era for UW

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The University of Wisconsin football team unveiled its Big Ten Conference schedules for the 2011 and 2012 seasons Wednesday in conjunction with the official announcements of division alignments in the new 12-team structure. One big development is that the Badgers host Nebraska in the Cornhuskers? first game as a Big Ten member on Oct. 1, 2011.

UW the big loser in Big Ten realignment

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When the Big Ten unveiled its divisional alignment and scheduling formula Wednesday, very little about the arrangement was alluring for Badgers fans. No school was going to get everything it wanted in this process, but where UW was concerned, the Big Ten trampled on tradition and ignored fan appeal.

Court: University must fund prayer activities

Posted on
Madison.com

A federal appeals court has upheld a lower court?s ruling that the University of Wisconsin-Madison must pay for student activities involving prayer, worship and proselytizing. The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in a 2-1 decision Wednesday that the university?s policy of turning down funding requests from student groups for such activities violates their First Amendment right to free speech.