As e-book technology becomes more commonplace on college campuses, the U.S. Justice and Education departments raised concerns Tuesday that some universities are using devices that donâ??t meet accessibility standards set by the federal Americans with Disabilities Act.
First launched at the University of Wisconsin-Madison 10 years ago, Grandparents Universities are now offered by dozens of schools. The bigger programs, such as the University of Wisconsinâ??s, tend to provide mini-courses similar to the programs offered to students. “Dairy science is very popular here,” says Kate Dixon of the Wisconsin Alumni Association. Dixon says classes arenâ??t the programâ??s main draw. “What we hear year in and year out is that itâ??s the mixing of generations thatâ??s really unique,” she says.
In a commentary accompanying the study in The Lancet, Dr. Ronald Klein of the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, Madison, noted the three-fold increase in severely low blood sugar found in those on intensive therapy. Technological improvements are needed, he said, to normalize blood sugar without causing it to drop dangerously low.
Quoted: “I think part of the issue here is the Obama administration wants to start getting a message out that in fact their policies have been relatively successful and while we still have a long ways to go, we are actually making progress,” said University of Wisconsin-Madison political scientist Charles Franklin.
After returning from six months in Brisbane, Australia, I worked for the International Academic Programs office at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. I know, from personal experience and from working with perspective students, that the decision to go abroad can be overwhelming.Â
A Republican lawmaker asked the attorney general Tuesday to investigate the University of Wisconsin Systemâ??s decision to give a high-level job to Democratic Gov. Jim Doyleâ??s top aide.
A state lawmaker asked Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen to investigate the UW Systemâ??s hiring of a former cabinet member to Governor Doyle, alleging the hiring did not comply with system hiring policies.
The U.S. Supreme Court decision on Monday that struck down handgun restrictions imposed by the City of Chicago was seen as a major victory for gun-rights advocates. Higher-education leaders, however, are optimistic that the ruling will not undermine campus bans on firearms.
A lawmaker is asking the attorney general to investigate the University of Wisconsin Systemâ??s decision to give a high-level job to Gov. Jim Doyleâ??s top aide.
Marsha L. Davis passed away peacefully, Thursday, June 24, 2010. Marsha was a teacher and educator in Dodgeville; Reedsburg; UW-Madison; Marion College, Fond du Lac; Augustana College, Rock Island, Ill.; Nicolet H.S., Glendale; and Governor’s State College, Chicago, Ill.
Samuel Craighead (Craig) Alexander, M.D., of the Quadrangle, Haverford, Pa., died unexpectedly in Rockport, Maine June 23, 2010. He was chairman of the Anesthesia Departments at the University of Connecticut School of Medicine and University of Wisconsin School of Medicine, serving at the latter for 20 years.
Dr. Charles R. “Chuck” Stearns, renowned polar researcher, treasured friend and beloved father and brother, passed away unexpectedly, on Tuesday, June 22, 2010.
Harold E. Zwickey died following a short illness on Wednesday morning, June 23, 2010. He worked for the University of Wisconsin Extension Printing as an offset pressman until retiring in 1989.
Peggy Ann Gilbert Taggart of Whitewater, and formerly of Janesville, died Saturday, June 25, 2010. Peggy worked for the state of Wisconsin for 31 years, the last 28 for UW-Madison at DoIt (Division of Information Technology) as a computer programmer and analyst.
Phil Moy has been monitoring the Asian carp situation for years. The fisheries and invasive species specialist with the University of Wisconsin Sea Grant Institute isnâ??t happy. As he puts it â??theyâ??re nudging their slimy little noses against the shores of Lake Michigan.â?
The table just east of the cozy fireplace at Buckets Pub remained vacant as business picked up during Mondayâ??s lunch hour. A cardboard cutout of Bucky Badger was positioned at the center of the table, next to a framed Journal Times Best of Racine certificate that reads, “Voted Best Sports Fan.”
The human body makes rare antibodies effective against all flu viruses and these might be boosted to design a better universal flu treatment, researchers reported on Monday. Tests on mice suggest these immune system proteins could help most people survive a normally lethal dose of flu virus, the team at the University of Wisconsin and Seattle-based Theraclone Sciences said.
“I was fatigued, tired, depression, affected my whole family with this whole thing.” Dan Fabisiakâ??s family has tried desperately over the years, to find a way to cure his kidney disease.
The Supreme Court ruled Monday that a state law school may refuse to recognize a religious student group that discriminates against gay students and non-Christians, in a 5-4 decision that could affect campuses nationwide. Dividing along ideological lines with the liberals in control, the justices said that a public university may condition official recognition of a student group on the groupâ??s agreement to open membership to all students who want to join.
Regarding a Thursday letter questioning the stateâ??s Charter Street Biomass Plant, this plant will transform our energy and environmental landscape…Just last week 25 volunteers ranging from UW-Madison students to state agency leaders successfully planted 3,000 willow trees in what had been a marginal-yield cornfield…We endured the blazing sun to plant these trees for biomass because the buffer will reduce flood waters, provide cleaner lakes, fuel and feed to local farmers, habitat for people and wildlife, and give us cleaner energy than coal. The $275 million Charter Street investment will create projects like this all over southern Wisconsin and create new, needed jobs.
The only problem with Saturdayâ??s guest columnist by UW-Madison Chancellor Biddy Martin is that she seems to consider our species the only species that really counts.
Possible changes to UW-Madisonâ??s parking and transportation services â?? including a proposal to charge UW-Madisonâ??s 20,000 employees to ride the bus â?? could have far-reaching consequences for the campus and city. About one year into the job, UW-Madison transportation director Patrick Kass announced this spring that he needs to make drastic changes or else raise parking rates considerably in order to cover an annual budget deficit of roughly $1 million. One proposal is to begin charging UW-Madison employees between $50 and $150 per year for city bus passes, which have been free for the past seven years. Thatâ??s because the university, which spends about $1.5 million per year on employee bus fare, is facing an expected 21 percent cost increase from Metro Transit.
Advocates who are pushing for more changes say the law taking effect Thursday is a good first step but doesnâ??t go far enough. “People need to believe that they could get caught,” Nina Emerson, director of the University of Wisconsin-Madisonâ??s Resource Center on Impaired Driving, said Monday. “Right now the perception is there is a very low possibility of apprehension.”
A bitterly divided U.S. Supreme Court held Monday that a California public law school did not violate the First Amendment in denying official recognition to a Christian student group that effectively excluded homosexual students from membership based on their beliefs and behaviors. But the parties involved in the case, as well as experts on student organizations, disagree over whether many colleges have policies similar enough to the one at issue in the case to be affected by the decision.
The death of Robert Byrd wonâ??t immediately affect the balance of power in the U.S. Senate, but his home stateâ??s political landscape has changed in the more than fifty years Byrd represented West Virginia in Washington, D.C. University of Wisconsin political scientist Charles Franklin says the 92 year-old Byrd entered national politics from the conservative southern wing of the Democratic party â?? including an association and a vote he later came to regret.
A national body that accredits continuing medical education courses for doctors has backed down from its stance prohibiting employees of drug companies from making such presentations at medical meetings.
As I promised a couple weeks ago â?? my thoughts on my return after almost 2 years to Madison, those x square miles surrounded by Reality. In my case, the 2 days in Madison were bookended by the reality of Step 1 and now, starting tomorrow, the Major Clinical Year. All the more reason to hold onto those Happy Thoughts in preparation.
Quoted: “With (Dave) Obey in the race, he basically had no chance,” said Kenneth Mayer, a political scientist at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, of Wisconsin Republican congressional candidate Sean Duffy. Now, he added, Duffy “is running in a middle-of-the road Democratic district, but he has a shot.”
U.S. agriculture and justice officials heard a lot of different concerns about competition within the nationâ??s dairy industry in Madison last week, but one common theme echoed throughout Fridayâ??s workshop was that milk and cheese prices are being influenced by too few at the top. The forum, which is the third in a series of five joint public workshops being held around the nation, was indented to examine competition and regulatory issues in the dairy industry. About 500 people attended the program at the University of Wisconsinâ??s Union Theater.
A Wisconsin historian says comments made by General Stanley McChrystalâ??s staff made his firing by President Barack Obama inevitable. John Hall, Ambrose-Hesseltine Assistant Professor of U.S. Military History at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said weâ??ve been at this point before when President Harry Truman relieved General Douglas MacArthur of command in Korea in a similar situation.
Dairy farmers say they are being squeezed out of the business. They say the system that determines what they get paid for milk is badly broken. The farmers came to the University of Wisconsin-Madison Friday for the U.S. Department of Justice hearing on antitrust issues in the dairy industry. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack says heâ??s hearing a consistent message now — dairy producers, large and small, are hurting.
The federal governmentâ??s top antitrust investigator told hundreds of farmers, lobbyists and others at a hearing Friday that the Department of Justice is keeping close watch on the nationâ??s dairy industry. Assistant Attorney General Christine Varneyâ??s said at the hearing on antitrust issues that the department wants to promote fairness in the dairy industry, which has experienced massive consolidation in recent years. “We are keeping a watchful eye on this industry,” Varney told about 500 people gathered for the daylong hearing at the University of Wisconsin-Madison campus. “We know that dairy farmers are concerned about a lack of choices for buyers as well as how their milk is priced.”
Botox users have long been mocked for their inability to show emotion on their partially paralysed faces. But new research suggests the anti-wrinkle jabs could also affect womenâ??s ability to experience feelings in the first place. The findings are backed up by a similar study by scientists from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, published in the journal Psychological Science.
Since graduating from D.C. Everest Senior High School in 1957, John Wayne Kennedy has helped discover the Lost Pyramids of Rock Lake in Lake Mills, worked as an investigator for the U.S. Department of Agriculture, published a novel and consulted for companies dealing with pesticides. For the past three years, he has found another focus: sending plant and human stem cells into space to see how they reproduce, and in the process creating hardier versions of the plants and perhaps even human organs. The project stemmed from a question heâ??d asked as a biology student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1960: How would plant cells reproduce in zero gravity?
Robin Zimmermann has quietly been making inroads into Boiseâ??s music scene for years; so quietly — as is her nature — that her name is still unfamiliar to many of her peers. Zimmermann started her musical journey as a child, at the Wausau Conservatory of Music in Wisconsin, where she grew up. She focused on piano and by the time she reached the University of Wisconsin, Madison, she had burned out on the black and white keys, she says. So, she turned to voice and flute.
Quoted: Nina Emerson, director of the University of Wisconsin-Madisonâ??s Resource Center on Impaired Driving, said drunken driving carries a certain degree of social acceptance in the Badger State.
The intensity of tornadoes is assessed only after the storm has passed by examining the damage the tornado has done, say Steven Ackerman and Jonathan Martin.
For all the complex issues raised at Fridayâ??s workshop on competition in the dairy industry, the question at the heart of it was a simple one: What is happening? Thatâ??s how U.S. Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis., broke it down to a crowd of about 600 at Union Theater on the UW-Madison campus. The event drew farmers, producers, lobbyists, politicians and economists to discuss a dairy industry that has seen rising production costs and massive milk price fluctuations in recent years.
TomoTherapy is hoping the sun will shine on the company during the second half of 2010. With several new formats for its specialized cancer treatment radiation technology and the nationâ??s economy trying to emerge from a recession, things could align in TomoTherapyâ??s favor, company officials said. When TomoTherapyâ??s technology, discovered at UW-Madison, hit the market, it was unique.
With its overgrown lawn and deteriorating roof, the white, wood-sided house in the shadow of Madison Kipp Corp. on Madisonâ??s East Side looks like any other dilapidated property ripe for a visit from city building inspectors. But peek around the front porch to the backyard and you realize this is not your typical eyesore. The house itself, according to the few who have been inside, is full of drawings, paintings and sculpture of unknown value. Amateur artist Sid Boyumâ??s home at 237 Waubesa St. has been largely unlived in since Boyum died 1991 and his son Steve took ownership. Now Steve has died and the future of the property â?? which local art experts say is a valuable example of â??outsiderâ? art â?? is uncertain. â??It would be just the worst shame if we lost this in Madison,â? said Teri Marche, an associate professor of art education at UW-Madison who teaches a class that includes a visit to Boyumâ??s home. â??We lose this art and itâ??s part of our culture. Itâ??s part of our place. And itâ??s definitely part of a quirkiness that is Wisconsin.â?
The use of animals in scientific research is a contentious and emotional issue. It is also indispensable, because of its life-saving benefits to human health, writes UW-Madison Chancellor Biddy Martin.
The UW strength and conditioning program has evolved to add nutrition and position-specific exercises.
During the day, flowering plants proudly display their colorful blossoms to the world. At dusk, some of them demurely close their petals for the night, only to open them again the next morning. Why do they bother closing? According to Richard Vierstra, a professor of genetics at UW-Madison, it probably has to do with enhancing their chance of reproductive success.
A former UW-Madison genetics professor pled guilty in federal court today to falsifying data in a grant application. Elizabeth B. Goodwin of Upton, Mass., admitted her conduct constituted “misconduct in science,” according to a news release from the Department of Justice. She could face up to one year in prison and a $100,000 fine.Goodwin resigned from UW-Madison on February 23, 2006.
In a rare criminal prosecution for research misconduct, a former University of Wisconsin-Madison genetics researcher pleaded guilty Friday to submitting false data to the federal government. Elizabeth Goodwin of Upton, Mass., pleaded guilty to one count of making a false statement, admitting she included false data in a progress report to convince federal reviewers that her lab had made more progress than was actually the case.
Quoted: The Department of Agricultureâ??s proposed rule would mark a dramatic shift. Most importantly, argues Peter Carstensen of the University of Wisconsin, it would be much easier for small producers to sue under the 1921 Packer and Stockyards Act.
Aides to State Rep. Steve Nass (R-Whitewater) confirmed Wednesday they plan to reach out to the state Attorney General asking him to look into a controversial hiring at the UW System.
A UW researcher says what young women donâ??t know about Sexually Transmitted Diseases may hurt them. Doctor Heather Royer, a UW Madison School of Nursing researcher, said itâ??s clear many have significant misconceptions about Sexually Transmitted Diseases, and STD testing. For example, regarding condom use.
An Asian Carp has been found just six miles from Lake Michigan, the first above a barrier designed to keep the invasive fish out. DNA of the Carp had been found months ago in the lake, a reason Phil Moy, UW-Sea Grant Institute Fisheries Specialist, was not surprised at this weekâ??s discovery.
A Wisconsin historian says comments made by General Stanley McChrystalâ??s staff made his firing by President Barack Obama inevitable. John Hall, Ambrose-Hesseltine Assistant Professor of U.S. Military History at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said weâ??ve been at this point before.
Dairy farmers frustrated with ever-eroding profit margins and possible antitrust violations in the industry will get a chance Friday to voice their concerns to federal regulators in “Americaâ??s Dairyland.”
U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack and Assistant Attorney General Christine Varney, the departmentâ??s chief antitrust investigator, were scheduled to host the roundtable discussion in Madison, Wis., a state where dairy is a $26 billion a year industry.
Quoted: With concern coming from the federal government and the health community, media outlets had little choice but to address H1N1, said Sharon Dunwoody, a science journalism professor for the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Quoted: Well before gay characters began popping up in the mainstream on TV and at the movies, librarians embraced “Iâ??ll Get There,” said Kathleen T. Horning, director of the Cooperative Childrenâ??s Book Center of the School of Education at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Another important forerunner was Nancy Gardenâ??s 1982 “Annie on My Mind” and its unabashedly happy ending for two 17-year-old girls who fall in love.
Quoted: “I think itâ??s basically impossible to say with certainty whatâ??s going to happen to property taxes,” said Andrew Reschovsky, a University of Wisconsin-Madison economist who has studied school aid for years.
Almost 40 years ago, four men stole a van and turned it into a bomb that they set off outside the University of Wisconsin-Madisonâ??s Sterling Hall.
For many American cities, the decade after 2000 played out in two starkly different scenes: Years of euphoric growth and prosperity followed by a crushing reversal. For others, there was no heady boom â?? but no dramatic downturn either.
Big changes to how student loans will take place July 1, and while the students themselves arent likely to notice much, taxpayers stand to save $68 billion over the next 11 years.The changes — part of the health care reform legislation passed by Congress in March — moves all taxpayer-backed college loans for students to the Department of Education and away from private banks.
Susan Fischer, director of financial aid and the University of Wisconsin in Madison, said that the school has made the changes to its computer system to handle the direct loan switch. They also have a big push to tell their students that they need to sign a new loan document promising that they will repay the balance.
Richard Laverne Rakow, age 69, passed away at his home in Avoca following a heart attack on Monday, June 21, 2010. Richard worked in the maintenance department at University of Wisconsin-Madison for 38 years.
Owen Dixon “Dick” Coyle, age 82, died Saturday, June 19, 2010. Besides working as a reporter for The Capital Times, Dick taught classes at the University of Wisconsin in the journalism department.
The University of Wisconsin System offered a $245,000 per year position to Wisconsin Department of Administration secretary Michael Morgan without requesting his resume, records show. The hire was criticized as political patronage by Rep. Steve Nass, R-Whitewater. Morgan would have been out of a job when Gov. Jim Doyle left office next year. The university offered Morgan the job as vice president for administration and fiscal affairs without conducting a national search.
