Vice President Biden spoke to college administrators, chancellors, and student body presidents in a conference call Monday, the latest push in the White House’s ’It’s On Us’ campaign to try and end sexual assault on college campuses.
Sunday was Sue Riseling’s last day as chief of the UW Madison Police Department after 25 years of service to the UW community, and she leaves as one of the most respected campus police chiefs in the nation.
The University of Wisconsin-Stout is removing two 80-year-old paintings that depict American Indians and French fur traders from the halls of one of its buildings amid student complaints.
Noted: “It’s a fascinating feedback loop,” said Caitlin Pepperell, a professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison who studies the evolution of human diseases. “I hope these studies will spur us to think more about fire, and take it in all the different directions it can go.”
Noted: The new prototype, described in the journal Nature, is a step in that direction—“a very clear demonstration of flexible programmability and universality on a single hardware platform,” said Mark Saffman, a University of Wisconsin-Madison physicist who wasn’t involved in the work.
Quoted: “I think it’s become clear to policymakers that the courts are going to be pushing back,” said Barry Burden, director of the University of Wisconsin’s Election Research Center, who testified against his state’s voter ID law. “It’s not one rogue judge. It’s a series of district courts and appeals courts that are saying to the states, you’ve gone too far.”
Noted: If unscrupulous test-preparation centers were to obtain the items, the impact on the SAT would be “devastating,” said James Wollack, director of the Center for Placement Testing at the University of Wisconsin.
Quoted: Eleanor Neff Powell, assistant professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said some of that has to do with a lot of that donor money being less concerned about particular candidates, but instead particular issues.
Noted: Dr. Patrick Remington is a member of the Wisconsin Medical Society’s Board of Directors and is a professor and associate dean in the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health. Remington said while opioids have been, and will continue to be, a useful treatment option for some cases of chronic pain, the pain killers can easily be abused and lead to addiction.
When it comes to saving energy, three-toed sloths are on a league of their own—panda bears, koalas and opossums can’t beat them—according to a research paper by Jonathan Pauli and Zachariah Peery, of the University of Wisconsin–Madison. “We really expected them to have low metabolic rates, but we found them to have tremendously low energy needs—much lower than their cousins, the two-toed sloths, and the lowest documented for any mammal,” Pauli says.
Education is going through radical changes. Chalkboards have evolved into SMART Boards, and massive open online courses (MOOCs) have replaced some classes. Teachers and professors can lecture from across town or around the world.While ostensibly a boon for educators, technology is also causing confusion and uncertainty. “Technology can be disruptive, and a lot of these new innovative, instructional technologies have created a disruption within our traditional system,” says Les Howles, director of UW-Madison’s Division of Continuing Studies’ Distance Education Professional Development. “It’s forcing us to think about teaching, learning and learners in new ways.”
In recent years, conversations between the University of Wisconsin System and the state Legislature have been contentious, with the two groups butting heads over issues like funding cuts and challenges to tenure.
The last class of physicians has entered a longstanding Eau Claire family medicine residency program that UW-Madison will end in June 2019.
A team of researchers has come up with high-performance, micro-scale solar cells that outshine comparable devices by making sideways swipes. University of Wisconsin-Madison engineers’ miniature solar panels could power myriad personal devices – wearable medical sensors, smartwatches, even autofocusing contact lenses.
Noted: The work is scientifically sound, said Dr. William Busse, a professor of allergy, pulmonary and critical care medicine at the University of Wisconsin. “It is an extremely positive march forward,” he said. “This is an exciting paper.”
When people in Wisconsin think of the dangers that farmworkers face, they might envision extreme heat, malfunctioning machinery, or even unruly livestock. But they might be unaware of another serious threat: Hearing loss.
UW-Stout Chancellor Bob Meyer said after hearing that Gov. Scott Walker spoke highly of UW-Stout and UW-Eau Claire during a recent visit to the Chippewa Valley he was hopeful that a tuition freeze would be lifted.
Eau Claire (WQOW) – Governor Scott Walker told state agencies he plans to extend the University of Wisconsin tuition freeze in the next two-year state budget he will introduce in early 2017.
You never know what’s around the corner, but you also know never to say never — because in four years or so, you just might know exactly what’s hiding there.
Gov. Scott Walker wants to extend a tuition freeze at University of Wisconsin System schools through the next state budget but isn’t planning to hand them any additional funding.
Noted: Still, a sense of opportunity is in the air. In “Wealth and Welfare States,” published during the depths of the Great Recession, Irwin Garfinkel of Columbia University, Lee Rainwater of Harvard and Timothy Smeeding of the University of Wisconsin-Madison suggested the United States was ultimately likely to fall into line with the rest of the advanced industrial world — for the simple reason that they all face similar challenges.
A University of Wisconsin-Madison journalism professor says Donald Trump’s controversial responses to a Muslim-American military family might be an intentional attempt to exploit their ethnicity to win over voters.
This letter is in response to the July 9 news article (Page 2A) regarding Sen. Steven Nass, R-LaGrange, complaining about a lecture that took place at UW-Madison.
The University of Wisconsin-Madison is creating a diversity program for its incoming freshmen students after a series of race-related incidents on campus.
A University of Wisconsin-Madison swimmer with three school records under his belt last season will compete in the Rio Olympics. Matt Hutchins will swim the 400-meter freestyle and the 1500-meter freestyle.
Noted: Meanwhile, Yue Wang and John Williams from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, looked for spores from three fungi that grow in the dung of plant-eating animals. Large extinct beasts like mammoths produced a lot of dung, so scientists can track their disappearance by looking for sudden drops in the levels of these fungal spores.
When Jorgensen decided to become a triathlete at the age of 23, she had never even been on a road bike. Still, while in college at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, she made the swim, track, and cross-country teams as a walk-on and became an all-American runner.
Anxiety disorders are the most common mental illness in the United States, affecting about 40 million adults, according to the National Institute of Mental Illness. Although they’re highly treatable, only a small amount of those suffering seek help, said Dr. Ned H. Kalin of the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health.
Quoted: And Disque Denuncia data isn’t perfect, says Nick Barnes, a doctoral candidate in political science at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, who works with the service’s dataset regularly.
The modern era of mass shootings began here on a searing summer day in 1966. Just before noon, from high atop the University of Texas Tower, an ex-Marine sharpshooter named Charles Whitman leveled his rifle over the railing, peered through his scope and shot a pregnant student in the belly.
Quoted: “If you look at the futures market, it looks like we may have hit the bottom of this trough,” said Brian Gould, professor of agricultural economics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. “In 2014, we had all-time record highs, so that’s a tremendous percent drop in an 18-month period. And it’s a continuing problem, and we’re always trying as an industry to deal with it.”
Natural selection is tricky to catch in action. As Darwin put it, “A grain in the balance will determine which individual shall live and which shall die.” The grain in the balance—the slightly increased chance that organisms carrying one gene variant will fail in the struggle for existence—is the cost of selection. It is almost invisible, only becoming statistically evident when viewed across thousands of individuals, who may display only subtle differences in the affected character.
Noted: “The Salazar regime goes on until 1974, which is the end of the Estado Novo,” says Ellen Sapega, a professor of Portuguese language and culture at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. “In the 1980s, Portugal joined the European Union, and people wanted to get rid of things that were equated with the stuffiness of the Estado Novo and to embrace a new, more modern idea of Portugal,” she says. “That’s the time when the fast food restaurants enter into Portugal and global brands, and more supermarkets became chain supermarkets.”
Richard Keller tells students in his medical history and global health classes not to look for happy endings.
When it comes to putting one’s money where one’s mouth is, former U.S. Sen. Herb Kohl is better than most. He’s also good at putting his money where his heart is, as his generous gift to the UW’s athletic department shows.
Noted: If given the option, 90 percent of academics and researchers would favor a move away from the reliance on the official poverty rate data, according to Timothy Smeeding, the Lee Rainwater Distinguished Professor of Public Affairs and Economics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Smeeding said because the Supplemental Poverty Measure takes into account government contributions when determining whether a person is poor, it’s better for tracking the number of poverty-stricken people in the country than the official rate.
Quoted: It’s not unusual for a failed presidential candidate to campaign with his party’s nominee after the primary season is over, but it’s rare for congressional candidates to request that the losing candidate join them at their rallies, said Barry Burden, a political science professor and director of the Elections Research Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Noted: For decades, researchers have theorized that deceleration starts as energy stored in the muscles is used up. “All mammals engaged in intense exercise, be it a human marathoner, a cheetah trying to catch prey or the prey trying to avoid becoming a meal, rely on energy stored in the body, usually as glycogen,” said Karen Steudel, a professor of zoology at the University of Wisconsin. “Once this is depleted, the human or cheetah is basically out of gas.”
On July 26, 2016, Senior Producer Steve Walters conducted an exit interview with UW-Madison Police Chief Riseling regarding her years of service and her retirement.
Dr. Richie Davidson, a neuroscientist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, has been meditating for more than 40 years, but it was the Dalai Lama himself who convinced him to dedicate his life to researching the effects of meditation on the brain.
Noted: Barry Orton, a professor emeritus of telecommunications at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said that most households have more than one person using the internet at once, which makes faster speeds necessary.
With the Rio 2016 Olympic triathlon just a month away, TeamUSA.org caught up with Gwen Jorgensen’s mom, Nancy, to see if her daughter, a gold-medal favorite, showed signs of athletic dominance in her youth.
While I suspect we will never fully take for granted the miracle of organ transplants, the life-saving operation is certainly viewed today as commonplace and increasingly successful.
Quoted: “There’s a demand, so it fills a gap,” says Noel Radomski, director and researcher for the Madison-based Wisconsin Center for the Advancement of Postsecondary Education. “It’s addressing a need that public universities can learn from.”
Quoted: “She has to separate herself in a meaningful way,” said Ken Mayer, a political science professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison who studies the presidency. “You walk a very fine line.”
Noted: In life the men must have been fearsome figures. They were young and tall, at least one nearly six feet. Analysis of their teeth, combined with the design of the buried artifacts, suggests that they came from central Sweden, not Estonia, says study co-author T. Douglas Price, an emeritus professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. The skeletons on the larger of the two ships showed signs of violent death: stab wounds, decapitation marks, and an arm bone cleaved by a blade.
Quoted: “If your business involves these kind of social sales, be ready for a lot of polite ’no’ answers, and don’t push too hard lest it ruin your friendships,” said Christine Whelan, a clinical professor in the School of Human Ecology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, in the US.
Having a job that requires complex social interactions — like mentoring and negotiating — might protect the brain from developing symptoms of Alzheimer’s Disease by building up what researchers call cognitive reserves.
Brain-challenging jobs — especially ones focused on people — may help shield a person’s mind against the ravages of age-related dementia, a new study finds. People who work in jobs that task the intellect are better able to withstand the effects of brain lesions commonly associated with Alzheimer’s disease, report researchers from the University of Wisconsin’s Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center.
Quoted: Matthew Aliota, a scientist at the University of Wisconsin who was was part of the team that first detected Zika in Colombia, said the virus could be in an “inter-epidemic period” and that cases could surge again at some point.
London Business School has appointed François Ortalo-Magné as its dean. He joins from Wisconsin School of Business at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in the US, where he has been at the helm since 2011.
Noted: For now, this is just a hypothesis. But it’s “really interesting and thought-provoking”, says Caitlin Pepperell, from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, who studies the evolution of human disease. “It’s plausible because smoke inhalation is so damaging to the lung’s innate immune system—our first line of defense against tuberculosis. Perhaps the bacteria that breached this defense had an easier time of it from that point on. Smoke inhalation also increases coughing and could enhance TB transmission.”
Quoted: Steven Nadler, a University of Wisconsin—Madison professor who has published extensively on Rembrandt, says there’s no reason to assume Rembrandt modeled Jews for his Judas, or that he had contacts in the Dutch Jewish community in 1629, despite his likely apprenticeship to Pieter Lastman in Amsterdam in 1624.
Stereotypes and generalizations are powerful in that they constrict the poor and oppressed to limited and dismal narratives that people — both black and white — innately accept as universal truths. For Sagashus Levingston, a low-income black mother with six children from Chicago, you can go ahead and keep your stereotype to yourself. There’s no telling her what she can’t do. She’s simply not hearing it.
About this time last year, Kurt Squire and Constance Steinkuehler were at the forefront of a newly charged-up effort to cement a burgeoning game development scene in Madison. As of this January, they’ll be taking their efforts to California instead.
Noted: Nicholas Hillman, who researches higher education finance at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, is thinking a little bigger. He’d like to see a completely different process in place for targeting who gets access to help with their loans.
DeJa Cooper and Kingsley-Reigne Pissang are the embodiment of The Dream for attending college. The two incoming University of Wisconsin-Madison PEOPLE College Scholar freshmen were selected to go to the White House this year for the Beating the Odds Summit.
Quoted: “We continue to muddle along,” said Michael Knetter, Ph.D, an economist and the president of the University of Wisconsin Foundation. “It continues to be a little bit of a surreal situation, with these interest rates being so low.”
Madison — Dare Ogunbowale has been forced to modify his plan for life after the University of Wisconsin, a plan that was built meticulously over the course of several years.
Visitors are welcome to stop by and see one of the top research facilities in Wisconsin August 5.
