Seventy-five sign-wielding members of the Local 171 branch of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees protested the Wisconsin Institute for Discovery privatization of food service employment outside the WID yesterday.
The City of Madison Plan Commission unanimously approved a conditional use request to construct a new UW-Madison Lakeshore residence hall and food service facility Monday.
A University of Wisconsin workers union held a protest and picket line outside the Wisconsin Institutes for Discovery building Monday morning to show their anger about the outsourcing of jobs to non-union workers.
About 70 unionized UW-Madison food service workers and their supporters picketed the Wisconsin Institutes for Discovery work site Monday to protest the university?s alleged complicity in a practice nearly as old as capitalism itself: union busting. The 1,500-member Local 171 of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees is irked because three dining venues planned for the privately owned parts of WID will not employ its members.
The University of Wisconsin will be teaming up with three of the state?s largest engineering research schools to become the fourth member of an energy research powerhouse that will combine university research and businesses.
University of Wisconsin Chancellor Biddy Martin may hire a consultant firm to look at the efficiency of the entire university, which may cost millions of dollars, but could potentially save tens of millions.
Most everyone has heard the term “green” jobs or listened to someone talk about the “green” economy, but do you really understand what those terms mean or know how you can parlay your skills into starting a new “green” career?
The public is invited to a free series of forums called “Green Jobs for Wisconsin?s Economy,” which are to examine this growing sector and highlight opportunities for those who would like to learn more about potential careers in this area. The events, which are organized by UW-Madison’s Nelson Institute for Environmental studies, are to be held on four Tuesdays in room 1106 of the Mechanical Engineering Building. These forums run from 5:30 to 7 p.m.
Customers of Charter Communications have a new $1 surcharge on their bills. The “broadcast TV surcharge” stems from the often fierce retransmission negotiations between broadcast networks (ABC, CBS, NBC, etc.) and subscription TV providers.
Quoted: UW-Madison telecommunications professor Barry Orton
UW Hospital is one of the nation?s top 10 companies for working parents, according to an annual list developed by Working Mother magazine.
STEVENS POINT ? Dave Obey was on hand here a few days ago as University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point officials, faculty, students and community leaders celebrated the launching of the Wisconsin Institute for Sustainable Technology in ceremonies on campus.
Obey?s presence was fitting. He directed about $1.4 million of federal funds to support the institute at the university, which will take an interdisciplinary approach as it creates and commercializes sustainable technologies and connects the campus to the business community.
UW-Madison ranked among the top 25 schools in the nation according to a Wall Street Journal survey of recruiters who work for the 479 largest public, private, nonprofit and government agencies. UW-Madison checked in at No. 16.
Mentions that the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation, which patents discoveries of University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers and licenses them to companies around the world, has offered exclusive licenses for a limited number of crops.
Noted: A report by Dennis Winters, Wisconsin?s chief labor economist, who wants the state to save $1,000 every year for every public school student to help pay for college. Winters describes the plan in a publication issued by the Wisconsin Center for the Advancement of Postsecondary Education, a UW-Madison think tank.
Stem cell researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison are relieved by a court ruling that will allow their federal funding to continue temporarily. Researchers had warned that studies on a range of diseases would come to a halt if a federal judge?s order blocking the funding stayed in place. An appeals court ruled Thursday the funding can proceed temporarily until the court rules on the Obama administration?s position in a lawsuit that calls the research illegal. UW-Madison?s federal lobbyist Rhonda Norsetter says the decision is terrific news.
A leading scientist at UW-Madison praised a ruling Thursday lifting a recent ban on federal funding for embryonic stem cell research but said an ongoing court case still calls the future of the funding into question. “It?s good news; we hope this will allow the research to go on unimpeded,” said Dr. Tim Kamp, director of the university?s Stem Cell and Regenerative Medicine Center. “The challenge is that it?s hard to plan for the future with this on-again, off-again situation.” A federal appeals court permitted federal funding of embryonic stem cell research to proceed while it considers a judge?s ruling last month that had temporarily shut off the funds.
The government may resume funding of embryonic stem cell research for now, an appeals court said Thursday, but the short-term approval may be of little help to research scientists caught in a legal battle that has just begun. It is far from certain that scientists actually will continue to get federal money as they struggle to decide what to do with research that is hard to start and stop.
Quoted: Dr. Norman Fost, director of the bioethics program at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, who was on the National Academy of Sciences committee that wrote the first national guidelines on embryonic human stem cells.
Gov. Jim Doyle came out in support of embryonic stem cell research at the University of Wisconsin Tuesday, vowing to fight a recent injunction halting federal funding for facilities across the country that perform stem cell research.
Wisconsin will “move forward on every legal front we can” to overturn a court ruling that has blocked federal funding for embryonic stem cell research, Gov. Jim Doyle said Tuesday.D oyle said the injunction entered by a federal judge in Washington last month could cripple Wisconsin?s growing bioscience industry and stop the search for cures for disease. Doyle spoke at the Waisman Center, where UW-Madison scientists using stem cells to study ways to treat eye disorders and Down syndrome expect to immediately lose grants totaling $400,000. UW-Madison Chancellor Biddy Martin said two dozen university researchers have been affected by U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth?s decision, and jobs and millions of dollars are at stake.
With research grants on hold and dozens of scientists uncertain about ongoing experiments, Gov. Jim Doyle and UW-Madison officials said Tuesday that a recent federal court ruling that halts federally funded work with human embryonic stem cells is a serious threat that both the state and the university intend to fight. “There is an incredible amount of uncertainty,” Doyle said at a press conference at UW-Madison?s Waisman Center, where researchers are relying on stem cells to study maladies such as vision problems and Down syndrome. As they await the outcome of legal challenges, as many as two dozen UW-Madison stem cell researchers face costly disruptions in their efforts to test the cells? power to cure human ailments such as juvenile diabetes and spinal injuries, Chancellor Biddy Martin said at the news conference.
Jeremy Crane, 22, started a business derived from all the old furniture you see on Mifflin and Langdon Streets and everywhere in between when the students are moving in and out. The business is called Furnish U, and it?s likely only one of what will be many entrepreneurial successes for Crane.
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.
It is not everyday University of Wisconsin Chancellor Biddy Martin pops up online for all of Madison to chat with, but on Sept. 1, she did just that.
Following the University of Wisconsin?s decision to cut ties with Nike over workers rights concerns early this year, the Board of Regents approved a five-year extension to a major apparel contract with Adidas.
Badger faithful going to Saturday?s football game against UNLV in Las Vegas will have to rely on their iPods to hear On Wisconsin, If You Want to Be a Badger and other classics, as the UW Marching Band will not be there to play them.
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.
Mentions G. Steven Burrill, founder of Burrill & Co., and a major donor to the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he teaches an entrepreneurs? boot camp, sponsors a business plan competition and is an adviser.
UW-Madison depends heavily on federal funds to advance its work on using embryos as a source of stem cells to cure disease. But others have done just as well using bone marrow cells and even skin cells to develop stem cell lines.
Here comes the embryonic stem cell debate again. It?s time to get past this recurring hurdle to ethical and enormously promising medical research. Millions of patients with debilitating diseases will have much better shots at improved treatments – maybe even cures – if embryonic stem cell research is allowed to continue in Madison and elsewhere using federal dollars.
Boldness is a word often used in discussions about Wisconsin?s economic future. Of course, boldness means different things to different people.
If I were doing research for the Wisconsin Department of Commerce, would it be bold to compare key statistics of neighboring states with those of Wisconsin? Or would it be bold to research former agrarian countries like Taiwan and South Korea to find out how they transformed into technical powerhouses and created the jobs and corporate brands we desperately seek here in Wisconsin. [A column by Walt Ferguson, former Silcon Valley executive, in response to a column by the business school deans at UW-Madison and Marquette.]
In a debate with his Republican primary opponent Scott Walker, Milwaukee County executive, former U.S. Rep. Mark Neumann said he could add 250,000 jobs by having the University of Wisconsin System work more closely with businesses to create research hubs similar to what is being done in North Carolina.
Stem cell researchers in Madison faced an uncertain future following this week?s federal ruling that undercuts certain types of work with the embryonic cells. Monday?s ruling temporarily blocks the use of taxpayer money for stem cell research. If it stands, the ruling means researchers will have to replace public funding with private money, or end their research outright. Either way, researchers are worried.
Democratic gubernatorial candidate Tom Barrett blasted his Republican challengers Wednesday for not supporting embryonic stem cell research, dusting off campaign rhetoric that resonated with voters four years ago. Barrett drew applause when he spoke out in support of the research at a biotech conference in Middleton, saying some of the best scientists in the world are doing such work at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
With a final summer vacation out of the way and the start of the 2010-11 academic year quickly approaching, it?s time to catch up on a couple higher education-related items.
** UW-Madison was given the green light last week by the Board of Regents to ink a bigger and better deal with Adidas to outfit the university?s 23 sports teams. This new five-year contract is worth about $11 million.
** Biddy Martin states her case for a “new partnership between (UW-Madison) and the state” in a piece that appears in the September issue of Madison Magazine.
** You can bet UW Athletic Director Barry Alvarez is paying attention to a creative fundraising tactic being promoted by the University of Nebraska.
Mark D. Bugher has been elected to the Board of Directors of Madison Gas and Electric and MGE Energy, Inc., effective Sept. 17, 2010.Mr. Bugher is Director of the University Research Park, University of Wisconsin-Madison.
One of the few benefits of the sluggish economy is that traffic death rates both nationwide and in Wisconsin have dropped to historic lows.
?People stay a little closer to home when times are tough,? says Maj. Dan Lonsdorf, director of the state Bureau of Transportation Safety. And that, he says, translates into fewer miles traveled, fewer crashes and fewer deaths.
Quoted: UW-Madison traffic specialist David Noyce, associate professor of civil and environmental engineering
The Church of College Football is about to open for services. It is perhaps the most passionate religion we have in this country, a seductive blend of our most popular sport and the romantic notion that the young athletes are playing for their schools, not for money.
Two BCS championship coaches recently launched attacks on sports agents for allegedly defiling this house of worship by giving college players what the NCAA calls ?impermissible benefits? — benefits that make those players pros and not amateurs.
?The agents that do this, and I hate to say this, but how are they any better than a pimp?? Alabama?s Nick Saban so memorably put it last month. And Florida?s Urban Meyer said that the problem is ?epidemic right now? and that agents and their associates should be ?severely punished.?
Volcanic ash from Iceland. Fires in Russia. Hurricanes over the Atlantic Ocean. Scientists at a 30-year-old Madison satellite institute have studied them all.Their work will continue under a new five-year, $60 million federal grant, the Cooperative Institute for Meteorological Satellite Studies said Friday.
….Ultrinsic, an Internet-based company, is offering students at 36 college campuses ? including those who attend UW-Madison ? the chance to bet on whether or not they?ll earn a certain grade in a given course. The company is promoting itself as a virtual kick in the butt that can help motivate students who might require a little added incentive to get off the couch and into the library.
….At this point, not many administrators, professors or students at UW-Madison appear to know about Ultrinsic. Aaron Brower, UW-Madison?s vice provost for teaching and learning, e-mailed to say he knew nothing about the company. But after glancing at a few newspaper articles about the website, he noted that the company ?trivializes what college should be about ? learning ? for the sake of grades.?
Noted: Maria Alvarez-Stroud, a UW-Extension official who is directing the initiative.
Following some small but steady gains on the jobs front earlier this year, Wisconsin went the other way in June, losing another 8,200 jobs, according to the Center on Wisconsin Strategy?s monthly report. Wisconsin has added 34,000 non-farm positions since December 2009, welcome news for a state that had been hemorrhaging jobs for the better part of two years.
But the number of jobs fell again in the April to June period, erasing some of the earlier momentum. Wisconsin is now down 162,000 jobs since the recession began in 2007, with the state?s job base sitting 5.6 percent below its pre-recession level.
“The severity of this recession stands out when compared to the three most recent downturns of 2001, 1990, and even that of 1981,” says COWS, a liberal UW-Madison think tank. “Despite the increase in jobs starting at the beginning of this year, jobs fell yet again in June and we have a long way to climb to reach pre-recession levels.”
…as the Great Recession drags on, that is indeed the question: What can Madison really do to grow its economy and generate enough jobs to keep the region thriving? For an area formerly insulated from economic realities thanks to the University of Wisconsin and state government, it?s a critical discussion.
Over the past five years, the Madison Metropolitan Statistical Area, which comprises Dane, Columbia and Iowa counties, has lost nearly 11,000 private-sector jobs, or more than 4 percent of the area?s total non-government positions. From high-tech medical equipment maker TomoTherapy to high-end appliance maker Sub-Zero Freezer, few local companies have been spared the pain, whether it?s layoffs, pay freezes or threats to send jobs to other states.
And while there were still 84,400 government jobs here as of June 2010, roughly one-fourth of the total employment in the area, that may change too. With politicians of all stripes vowing to cut spending ? Democratic candidate for governor Tom Barrett even boasts about “putting Madison on a diet” ? the number of public jobs here could well drop.
Quoted: Sandra Bradley, director of the University of Wisconsin E-Business Consortium?s Web and multichannel marketing area.
In another blow to the beleaguered owners of the Hilldale Shopping Center, the UW Foundation, which built and developed Hilldale, on Thursday sued a group that bought the Foundation?s stock in the shopping center for allegedly failing to make interest payments on two promissory notes.
The mile-long corridor of University Avenue between Farley Avenue and Breese Terrace, once the main artery between Downtown, UW-Madison and the West Side, lacks an identity, is uninviting to pedestrians and bicyclists, and has lost businesses since the Campus Drive bypass opened to the north in 1968. The city, residents and others want to transform the street into a green, sustainable place with a strong identity, a ?walkable educational classroom? of best practices that could be a model for older, mixed-use corridors in the city and elsewhere.
Noted: A 50-page report, “Be Bold Wisconsin,” calls for a new state Department of Commerce purely devoted to business development and promotion. The deans of the business schools at UW-Madison and Marquette University helped write the report.
Bill Nelson now has the space to crush a 20-foot-long section of a bridge and test the strength of a two-story wall, complete with windows and doors. Down the hall, engineer C.R. Boardman can create, with a few keystrokes, Seattle-like rain or the blistering heat found in Arizona. The Forest Products Laboratory in Madison is ready for the next 100 years of research with the recent opening of the $38 million Centennial Research Facility. The 87,000-square-foot center, nestled on the west side of the UW-Madison campus, is owned and operated by the USDA Forest Service and is a gleaming but functional tribute and improvement to the previous 100 years of research at the FPL.
When he worked at the UW athletic department, Vince Sweeney recalls some serious soul-searching about whether to permit StubHub to be an official sponsor. He says there was concern over how fans would feel about the athletic department doing business with the online ticket resale giant. But after approval, “we didn?t hear boo,” says Sweeney, former senior associate athletic director and now vice chancellor of university relations. As with most things, the Internet has changed the game.
Even as manufacturing emerges as one of the few sectors showing consistent life in the nation?s struggling economic recovery, experts at UW-Madison stand ready to help Wisconsin businesses get a bigger piece of the action.
At UW-Madison?s Center for Quick Response Manufacturing, one of director Ananth Krishnamurthy?s goals is increased outreach to help state manufacturers be more competitive, by applying center principles aimed at cutting costly lead time in all phases of a company?s manufacturing and office operations.
In June, the wiry 18-year-old walked across the Oregon High School stage at his graduation ceremony. Now Fred Machado is at a military base 2,000 miles away, training to become a Marine. He joins more than 2,700 Wisconsinites younger than 25 entering active military duty this year.
….Recruiters say the lengthy economic downturn, which has created double-digit unemployment rates in some parts of Wisconsin, and a strong sense of patriotism, especially in rural areas, have made recruiting easier.
Despite concerns that the city doesn?t need more liquor outlets, especially at pharmacies, the City Council on Tuesday approved liquor licenses to let Walgreen Drug Stores sell beer and wine at three stores in Madison. The approvals continue Walgreens? national push to reintroduce beer and wine sales to its stores in response to customer demand and competition.
The council, following recommendations of the Alcohol License Review Committee and after a near three-hour debate, approved licenses for stores at 7810 Mineral Point Road, 606 S. Whitney Way and 8302 Old Sauk Road.
After residents fought a much larger project, the Mullins Group is proposing a six-story, $15 million to $20 million housing redevelopment on a triangular block where University Avenue meets Campus Drive on the West Side.
Mullins wants to redevelop the 2500 block of University Avenue ? except for Lombardino?s restaurant ? with 110 apartments, eight town homes, commercial space and a 166-space parking garage. The project, which would replace older, one- and two-story buildings and surface parking, would target professionals working at UW-Madison and nearby hospitals, said Sue Springman of the Mullins Group.
A prominent UW-Madison cancer researcher has abruptly resigned after university officials began investigating a potential conflict of interest involving his outside business interests.
The case involving Dr. Minesh Mehta, an internationally recognized expert on human clinical cancer trials, comes amid heightened national scrutiny of doctors? ties to industry and the university?s own attempts to better monitor such relationships.
While addressing faculty senators this spring about pressing issues facing UW-Madison in the near term, Chancellor Biddy Martin noted the critical importance of finding a quality replacement for Sandy Wilcox, who announced last fall his plans to retire as president of the UW Foundation.
By all accounts, that item was successfully crossed off the to-do list Wednesday when Mike Knetter, the popular and highly regarded dean of UW-Madison?s School of Business, was named the next president and chief executive officer of the UW Foundation, the private, nonprofit corporation that raises funds for the university.
Last week Tuesday in Property Trax, I reported on the federal government?s latest program to stem the rising tide of foreclosures driven by unemployment. And I noted it looked similar in concept to a plan put forward in late 2009 by experts in UW-Madison?s real estate program. Since then, I?ve heard from one of those experts, UW-Madison professor Stephen Malpezzi, a housing economist.
An internationally renowned cancer researcher at UW-Madison abruptly resigned this spring after university officials began investigating a potential conflict of interest involving his outside business interests. The State Journal looks at the case of this prominent doctor and how a 22-year career at UW-Madison came to a surprising end.
Does Walgreens really need to sell liquor amidst all the products designed to care for the wounds that liquor helped create? No, for many reasons, including the hundreds of people in Wisconsin who are killed and injured every year by people who found it too easy to drink too much.
In an eight-way race to fill the seat of retiring state Rep. Spencer Black, a majority of the candidates are echoing the progressive, pro-environmental policies that defined Black?s 26 years in office. Politically speaking, it?s a smart move.
Quoted: Political science professor David Canon
In a move praised by labor activists, Nike Inc. agreed Monday to spend $1.5 million to help workers abruptly laid off last year by two subcontractors in Honduras. The announcement came amid mounting pressure from universities and student groups, who had urged Nike to pay the workers the severance they should have received when the factories closed. Nike had refused for months, saying the workers? compensation was the responsibility of subcontractors. In April, UW-Madison Chancellor Biddy Martin made the school the first to end a licensing agreement with Nike, which meant the firm could no longer produce Badgers apparel.
The University of Wisconsin took a tough stand when it decided to end its licensing agreement with Nike, after complaints arose regarding the company?s treatment of displaced workers who had been employed by Honduran factories that make the company?s athletic wear.
But the bold move has proven to have been exactly the right one.
In a move praised by labor activists, Nike Inc. agreed Monday to spend $1.5 million to help workers abruptly laid off last year by two subcontractors in Honduras.
