During the decades-long debate over affirmative action, many schools like UW-Madison have determined that strict reliance on grades doesn?t always result in the best applicants. Despite all the overheated rhetoric from some, it?s not really that shocking to discover some people get a break in life while others don?t.
The most striking thing about Tuesday?s press conference on UW-Madison?s alleged affirmative-action-driven bias against white and Asian applicants was not the loud, mildly violent protest that overran it. It was the university professor who publicly touted the rising admission rate for white students and the declining rate for blacks. This from an institution that only 11 years ago was so worried about its less-than-diverse image that it Photoshopped a black student onto an admissions catalog.
The end of summer sends Wisconsin?s university, college and technical college students back to fall classes. So, it?s a timely question: How many of those institutions of higher learning does Wisconsin have? The answer: 62.
This summer, news blew up that a ?glass box? will likely be added to the Memorial Union Theater. The structure would jut out in a mushroom-like shape, encompassing much of the area that sits next to Park Street to the north of the Union.
We fashionably compress our commemorations of 9/11 events into a neat triangle to include the Afghanistan and Iraq wars. But in accepting this, we terribly distort our history, for any link between 9/11, the present Afghanistan war and the Iraq war is patently false.
(Stanley Kutler, a UW-Madison professor emeritus, is the author of “The Wars of Watergate” and other writings. This column first appeared on Truthdig.com.)
A bill introduced in the Wisconsin Legislature would make it a crime for Wisconsin researchers to continue using those cells, even though they have done so legally, ethically and effectively for 50 years or more.
Lawmakers who believe they are merely standing firm against abortion should think twice about the far-reaching effects of this bill on medical research and the state?s innovation economy.
STEVENS POINT ? Autumn is at the doorstep again, and across much of the state, corn crops are bursting with promise, soybeans are yellowing out in their patient manner, alfalfa and pasture lands are lush and emerald green. Grain prices are high, boosting land values and yielding profits for farmers. In a difficult economy, agriculture seems to be thriving. That?s good news for this bedrock Wisconsin industry, at least for the short term. Not to look for clouds on a sunny day, but the words ?short-term? are important markers for some analysts.
MADISON ? For 50 years or more, researchers in Wisconsin and around the world have used cells derived from human fetal tissue to pursue cures for chronic diseases, to develop and produce vaccines and to conduct basic research on a wide range of human health issues.
In 1962, the University of Wisconsin created the Eagle Heights Community Garden, and it remains one of the oldest community gardens in the country. According to UW, the purpose of EHCG is to give people opportunities to enjoy nature, build community, learn about gardening, and feed their families. The garden brings together a diverse group of students, faculty, and families in the community. At last count, gardeners at EHCG spoke 60 languages.
At a time when Congress is considering big cuts to social programs to deal with record budget deficits, it can?t be just my personal aversion to time-sucking high-tech distractions that makes me wonder if spending taxpayer dollars on the development of a shoe-based cell-phone charger is really all that great of an idea. Last week, UW-Madison engineers Tom Krupenkin and J. Ashley Taylor unveiled their “reverse electrowetting” technology and its potential for recharging cellphones and other electronic devices by transferring the energy created by walking into electricity.
Badger football returns this week with a glow from last season?s conference title and Rose Bowl appearance, the electricity of a night crowd, the promise of an accomplished quarterback ? and the first $100 game ticket in school history.
Dear people of Madison and beyond: Forty-one years is a long time to wait to say ?thank you,? to express my gratitude for the ways, known and unknown, that you have touched my life. It has taken me this long to come to a place where I recognize the gift my life has been, and how I have not gotten here alone. Forty-one years ago, early one morning, my father was killed in the bombing of Sterling Hall on the University of Wisconsin campus.
….I may never fully know who all of you are and the many ways you have touched my life. What I can offer you is my heartfelt gratitude, and the knowledge that within even the greatest tragedy is the opportunity of the gift, even if it takes a lifetime to see it.
One hundred years ago, Wisconsin made history by enacting the first constitutionally valid worker?s compensation law. Worker?s comp was one of many innovative laws pioneered for the country by Wisconsin?s Progressive movement.
Faculty at the University of Wisconsin along with state managers and legislators gushed forth with many progressive legislative ideas, including factory safety laws, child labor laws, utility regulation and unemployment insurance. Teddy Roosevelt, the country?s Progressive in Chief, was a big fan of “The Wisconsin Idea” for public policy-making.
Even as the Big Ten grew from 10 to 12 schools, it was palatable because the conference expanded incrementally. And when the Big Ten couldn?t come up with anything better than Leaders and Legends for its division names, at least the opponents were familiar. If, however, Texas A&M moves from the Big 12 to the SEC as many expect it to do, decorum in college athletics will be lost forever. The resulting land grab will dramatically alter the NCAA landscape, and not for the better.
“The brakes are off and that?s our system of government now,” observes Andrew Kersten, a University of Wisconsin-Green Bay labor historian. Kersten?s new book is titled, “The Battle for Wisconsin: Scott Walker and the Attack on the Progressive Tradition.” Kersten has been asking why wealthy donors in and out of Wisconsin seem so relentless.
Robert Golden, dean of the School of Medicine and Public Health at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, can hardly contain his excitement when he?s asked about research financed through money set aside after nonprofit Blue Cross Blue Shield United of Wisconsin converted to a for-profit corporation.
“Take the Survey of the Health of Wisconsin alone, and it?s already producing a statewide databank – complete with genetic, tissue and blood samples – that will help inform public health decisions for years to come,” said Golden, who came to Wisconsin five years ago after filling a similar role at the University of North Carolina. “It?s one of the more comprehensive projects of its kind anywhere.”
Gary Green, a UW-Madison sociology professor who studies economic development, said the success of economic development plans ?really varies by the plan,? but that research on economic development corporations such as Thrive is pretty conclusive.
We have reached that moment in the discussion ? begun last month in this space ? on whether it might be possible to move ?Nail?s Tales,? the Donald Lipski sculpture adjacent to Camp Randall Stadium that many people have regarded as an eyesore, to put it kindly, ever since it was unveiled in 2005.
When I talk to people about WiscNet they invariably ask, “What is WiscNet?” Perhaps I can shed some light on why WiscNet is important to public libraries and education and why it?s in the news.
The Treasury can cry foul all it wants, but the decision by Standard & Poor?s to downgrade America?s credit rating by one notch last Friday, and the subsequent plunge in the stock market, are serious symptoms of a loss of confidence ? an assessment that is fundamentally political, not economic.
Two years ago, I traveled to the University of Wisconsin at Madison to give a lecture on the obligations of flagship universities. I had recently returned from a vacation in Turkey and was thinking of the library in Topkapi Palace, where the best and brightest Christian students from throughout the Ottoman Empire were brought to study in comfort and splendor behind high walls that overlooked the Sea of Marmara and Constantinople below. As one historian said, “Theirs was pride of the most splendid and forgivable sort; for they were fitted to rule.”
It?s clear that a crucial path to healing historic racial injustices and overcoming current ones is to create more educational opportunities so people of color can compete in employment markets. At a time when radical forces are pushing for less funding for public schools, creative solutions are especially needed now.
So for me, last Friday was a red-letter day. Few events have so clearly showcased creative, responsive government at its best as the luncheon I attended for UW-Madison?s PEOPLE program, which stands for Pre-College Enrichment Opportunity Program for Learning Excellence. The program was launched in 1999 with 66 high school students from Milwaukee and has grown to engage over 1,300 students statewide, from second-graders to undergrads.
Even after the federal debt ceiling is raised, one thing is certain about federal spending over the next decade: There will be less of it than expected. To be precise, federal spending will drop by about $2.4 trillion from current estimates. That means a full range of programs, from social services to defense to academic research, are likely to feel the pinch.
One solid building block is GE Healthcare?s relationship with the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation, the nonprofit patenting and licensing arm for the university.
Ten years ago, the university, WARF and UW Hospitals launched intellectual property agreements that have allowed UW and company researchers to work side-by-side in Waukesha and Madison.
Kakadu National Park, Australia ? Eleven thousand miles from my home in Wisconsin, this national park is one of my favorite places on the planet ? a vast area of wetlands, woodlands and rock formations that is home to a fantastic array of wildlife.
CHICAGO ? When Jim Delany started the national discussion on cost-of-attendance scholarships in May, it was perceived as the Big Ten Conference commissioner trying to divert attention from the NCAA-related mess at his premier football school, Ohio State. If the proposal was a smokescreen, however, it hasn?t blown away yet. At separate media days events in the last week, Delany?s counterparts in the Southeastern and Atlantic Coast conferences trumped him by calling for far-reaching changes in the way intercollegiate sports are conducted.
Madison area local businesses and nonprofits have come through once again for the Dane County Boys and Girls Club. Some 24 high school boys and girls have summer job internships where they can explore career paths and gain some valuable on the job work experience to become productive citizens in adulthood.
This past April, the Colorado House Education Committee rejected a bill that would have granted the children of undocumented state residents in-state university tuition. The issue pitted those who support educational opportunity for all young Colorado residents against those more concerned about the implications of legal citizenship for the receipt of state benefits. Both parties have valid concerns, yet there were, and still are, larger issues at stake.
Norway?s tragedy has struck a chord in Wisconsin, where we have historical, cultural, economic and institutional connections with a nation known for promoting peace and understanding. Our kinship with Norway is rooted in our communities and remains vital today through educational, governmental and other official relationships, as well as individual ties.
For UW-Madison, these ties are institutional and personal, with our students and scholars involved in research and exchange there, and Norwegian scholars and students coming here to study and live.
For more than five years now, Good Doug, who always looks on the bright side, had been trying to embrace the sculpture outside Camp Randall Stadium known as “Nail?s Tales.”
“I kept thinking it would grow on me,” Good Doug said. Bad Doug, who believes it is always darkest just before it turns pitch black, hated the sculpture when it was unveiled in November 2005, and he hates it even more now.
“It grows on you,” Bad Doug said. “Like a goiter.”
As a born-and-bred Illinoisan with roots in the Chicago area, I have to ask: What is this Wisconsin Idea you speak of? So far as I can tell it has something to do with Robert La Follette, or the University of Wisconsin, or clean government ? or maybe all three. Whatever it is, it has increasingly been an occasion for mourning among the more left-leaning types I?ve interviewed, especially since Gov. Scott Walker took office.
Quoted: Kathy Cramer Walsh, UW-Madison associate professor of political science.
A fine legal education may indeed be costly, but I reject the idea that its worth should be determined by the number of jobs available in the lucrative realms of the legal profession.
The Republican-controlled Legislature has passed its redistricting maps and Republican Gov. Scott Walker is set to sign them into law. The response from Democrats can be appropriately summed up by that hackneyed, old threat delivered by Sen. Spencer Coggs, D-Milwaukee, to his GOP colleagues: “We?ll see you in court.”
Quoted: David Canon, UW-Madison professor of political science.
My own decision to attend law school was based in part upon my perception, still shared by those who rush our doors, that a legal education provides an unparalleled opportunity to understand the intersection of private and public power, to explore the rationale for the organization of human society and to participate more knowledgeably and effectively in every aspect of human endeavor. A fine legal education provides an opportunity both to grasp the current arrangement of our legal order and to understand laws? limitations and shortcomings.
[A column by UW Law School professor Linda Greene]
The additional regulations regarding ?house parties? in Madison proposed by Mayor Paul Soglin are not only an extreme infringement on personal privacy rights, but will also have a horribly adverse effect on young adults living in close proximity to campus.
In the world according to ALEC, competing firms in free markets are the only real source of social efficiency and wealth. Government contributes nothing but security. Outside of this function, it should be demonized, starved or privatized. Any force in civil society, especially labor, that contests the right of business to grab all social surplus for itself, and to treat people like roadkill and the earth like a sewer, should be crushed.
Gauging by decibel level, the best moment in a 21-point Badger basketball victory last Dec. 8 was a free-throw contest between Biddy Martin and her fellow chancellor from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, the Badgers? foe that night. Madison?s chancellor hardly missed, drilling 12 free throws with a rapid-fire, line-drive delivery to win easily. As with most things during her three years in Madison, Martin came prepared. Just before the shootout, she had sneaked off to warm up on the Nicholas-Johnson Pavilion practice courts next to the Kohl Center.
When a UW official first shared that anecdote last winter, it fit my evolving impression of Martin as a person who left nothing to chance. That, plus being smart, broadly experienced and charismatic, won her the chancellor?s job. Yet she also seemed oddly cautious and sensitive to what others said about her.
Now she?s history. Her last day here was Friday, and the one-word summary that comes to mind is ?enigmatic.?
A lot of political venom is still directed at the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010. But this landmark legislation has provisions that promote health care innovations that can cut Medicaid costs while preserving coverage and quality of care.
A recently proposed health care delivery system for Medicaid patients would combine five features of the law: the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation (the Innovation Center); community health centers; teaching health centers; the National Health Service Corps; and reform of graduate medical education and reallocation of its support. [A column by Richard E. Rieselbach, professor emeritus of medicine and Patrick L. Remington, professor of population health and associate dean for public health at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health.]
One out of about every 14 public employees in the Wisconsin Retirement System asked for “the numbers” – estimates of what their pensions would be if they retired – in the first half of this year.
A new report from the Department of Employee Trust Funds, which runs the pension system, says the 18,759 state and local government workers who asked what their pension would be was 75% more than those who made the same request in the same period last year.
Spinback is a much more recent story. Founded by three University of Wisconsin-Madison graduates, it was sold recently to Buddy Media, a New York company that markets a Facebook advertising program. Spinback, which helps e-commerce retail firms track social media traffic and sales, was a New York company with six employees when it was sold.
Quoted: Tim Smeeding, director of the Institute for Research on Poverty at the UW-Madison La Follette School of Public Affairs.
It can?t just be my party-pooping perspective that caused my eyebrows to elevate at news of the farewell soiree for Biddy Martin on Bascom Hill Wednesday. Brats were served, the marching band played, and well-wishers signed a copy of “The University of Wisconsin: A Pictorial History” for the outgoing UW-Madison chancellor Now, I know Martin was well-liked among students; they gave her props for appearing in the “Teach Me How to Bucky” video and for calling a snow day in February, among other things. But I was struck by how disproportionate the outpouring of love seemed in light of Martin?s timing and relatively short tenure.
The past two years of data suggest exploding mortgage payments are not the cause of the foreclosure crisis. Prime mortgages account for the majority of mortgage defaults. Instead, there are two ?triggers? that cause foreclosures. [A column by Morris A. Davis, business professor and academic director of the Graaskamp Center for Real Estate at UW-Madison.]
Doug Erickson?s story about Wisconsin?s new voter ID law, which ran in the State Journal over the Fourth of July weekend, ought to open a few eyes around the state. Truth is, of course, that election fraud in Wisconsin is virtually nonexistent, but it was a convenient excuse to get what the Republicans wanted ? to discourage classes of state citizens, mainly the 18- to 21-year-old college kids, the poor and senior citizens from voting because they tend to favor Democrats.
I didn?t know Dr. James C. Allen personally, but had heard a little about him over the years. He was seldom in the papers, yet was one of the most revered faculty members at the UW-Madison Medical School?s Department of Ophthalmology and as an extraordinary eye surgeon at the William S. Middleton Memorial Veterans? Hospital during a career that spanned 40 years.
According to colleagues and others who knew him personally, Dr. Allen was one of those rare individuals who never tired of helping others, but never sought recognition.
Written by Laura Dresser, Madison, labor economist and associate director, Center on Wisconsin Strategy at UW-Madison.
A longtime friend who now lives in Washington, D.C., called the other day.
?What the hell is going on in our state?? he demanded. ?People are making jokes about Wisconsin all over the place.? He?s right, of course. Our once proud state that long had the reputation for being on the cutting edge of everything from social justice to clean, honest government has become a laughingstock to many outsiders.
The most progressive legislative session in Wisconsin history took place precisely 100 years ago, when a coalition of rural Republicans and Milwaukee Socialists united to enact reforms that broke the grip of the robber barons and finally put state government on the side of working Wisconsinites, small-business owners and farmers.
….Wisconsin established the standard by which other states were measured. It was the most innovative, the most humane, the most responsible and, above all, the most politically progressive state in the nation. And the ideas that came from Wisconsin formed the underpinning for the labor, farm, civil rights and social justice movements that would eventually come to the fore two decades later, as Franklin Roosevelt imported University of Wisconsin professors and veterans of the state?s legislative and political battles to forge a ?New Deal? for America.
I ADMIT it was with some trepidation that I began to read Chris Stringer?s new book, The Origin of Our Species, on a long train journey. I mention the train because I wondered if I was fit to survive hours spent captive with the Darwinian prose suggested by the title. I needn?t have worried. Stringer has a crisp style that helps lighten what might have been heavy material.
Environmentalists face a fundamental challenge: How can we devise arresting stories, images, and symbols that capture the pervasive but elusive effects of what I call “slow violence”? Climate change, the thawing cryosphere, toxic drift, deforestation, the radioactive aftermaths of wars, oil spills, acidifying oceans, and a host of other slowly unfolding environmental crises confront us with formidable representational obstacles that hinder efforts to mobilize for change.
And so, after six contentious months, the state of Wisconsin has a budget, a $66 billion spending plan balanced on the backs of the state?s children….We are already paying a price for this. UW-Madison Chancellor Biddy Martin is gone. She may have been the university?s best hope for adapting to the future but she got caught up in Gov. Walker?s schemes and her position became untenable. I expect we?re going to see many of our best faculty members leave, too. It?s one thing to work here for less money than you can earn elsewhere; it?s another to work in an environment where the Legislature takes pride in cutting schools.
We are two extremely lucky people. We lived through the horrific experience of being the targets of a pair of students who, in separate crimes, carried guns into college classrooms at Virginia Tech on April 16, 2007, and at Northern Illinois University on Feb, 14, 2008. All around us, the lives of our classmates were senselessly ended. It was the most intense, stressful and frightening experience of our lives.
Wisconsin state politicians believe the way to deal with such campus violence is to allow college students to bring loaded, hidden guns onto campuses. This provision is part of the concealed carry legislation that passed the Wisconsin Senate and is set for a vote in the state Assembly on Tuesday.
It?s commencement time and, for newly minted grads facing a long and potentially futile job search this summer, there?s at least one bit of good news. According to its recent Spring Salary survey, the National Association of Colleges and Employers found that starting salaries are up 5.9 percent for 2011 college grads.
The news is not so good, however, for young women starting new jobs. In a separate study, the same organization found that the average Class of 2010 female with a new bachelor?s degree received a $36,451 starting salary ? 17 percent less than the $44,159 her average male peer received.
(This column appeared first in the Washington Post)
Jeremi Suri, the prominent history professor who is leaving the University of Wisconsin-Madison in frustration to join the faculty at the University of Texas, emailed me today about his analysis of university Chancellor Biddy Martin?s resignation posted today on his blog at Global Brief. It is passionate and blunt, a great read.
I watched the video of fighting mice posted on the Madison-based Alliance for Animals website as part of the complaint it and People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals filed against UW-Madison, which apparently has been pitting mice against one another in laboratory studies of aggression..It?s hard for me to see much blood lust in a pair of mice that are fighting, which in the short video looked more like a kind of bloodless wrestling. So it?s hard for me to see why it should be illegal.
On June 3, the state Legislature?s Joint Committee on Finance slipped several policy items into the state biennial budget that would change the way the Internet service provider WiscNet operates and require the University of Wisconsin to return more than $32 million in federal grant money awarded in August 2010 for a broadband expansion project.
The proposed changes to WiscNet could result in schools, libraries and institutions of higher education paying two to three times more for Internet access from for-profit providers. Actually, it?s more accurate to say that taxpayers would foot the increased bill, or library patrons and students would no longer have the access they need and want. The policy changes would also disrupt the ability of the UW to pursue its research and education mission.
….When I speak on college campuses, students will often say they don?t believe that a woman?s attire makes it justifiable for someone to rape her, but ? and there almost always is a ?but? ? shouldn?t women know better than to dress in a suggestive way? What I try to explain to those students is part of what the SlutWalk protests are aiming to relay on a grander scale. That yes, some women dress in short, tight, ?suggestive? clothing ? maybe because it?s hot outside, maybe because it?s the style du jour or maybe just because they think they look sexy. And there?s nothing wrong with that. Women deserve to be safe from violent assault, no matter what they wear. And the sad fact is, a miniskirt is no more likely to provoke a rapist than a potato sack is to deter one.
As one Toronto SlutWalk sign put it: ?Don?t tell us how to dress. Tell men not to rape.? It?s this ? the proactive, fed-upness of SlutWalks ? that makes me so hopeful for the future.
(This column appeared first in The Washington Post.)
?We will be hiring dozens of new faculty across disciplines. Would you have some Ph.Ds ready??
Column by David Mladenoff, a professor of forest biology at UW-Madison.
As the Wisconsin Idea has long been a model for public higher education in this country, it is a propitious time to at once reaffirm and replenish our public commitment. Just over a half-century ago, Helen C. White reaffirmed Wisconsin?s motto of public higher education, calling again for a “continual and fearless sifting and winnowing in the pursuit of truth.”
Now is the time to reaffirm that creed, seize the moment and re-imagine public higher education both in Wisconsin and across our nation. [A column by Geoffrey Mamerow, a doctoral student in higher education at the University of Wisconsin-Madison; and Clifton Conrad is professor of higher education at UW-Madison.]
