Category: UW Experts in the News

Quoted: A list of 30 creditors that NewPage owes the most money in unsecured debt includes four Wisconsin companies. Unsecured debt simply means there isn?t collateral, said Jonathan Lipson, a University of Wisconsin Law School professor and expert on corporate bankruptcy. An example of secured debt would be a car loan that would allow the company to take the car if the loan is not repaid. An example of unsecured debt would be a student loan, where there is nothing to take back.

Noted: “Another class member is now a prominent professor at the University of Wisconsin. I asked him what it was like in Madison during last summer?s demonstrations and he said, “Heck, I was in them. We?ve got an absolutely insane governor in this state, Governor Walker. The man is crazy. He wants to gut the entire system. We were out there to stop him.”

Noted: Diana E. Hess, an education professor at the University of Wisconsin in Madison, analyzed nine American high school textbooks that together are used by almost half of American students. She found that while they used dramatic labels (?horrendous plot? or ?crime against humanity?) to describe the attacks, they provided little information about what actually happened. Most of the textbooks did not even say how many people were killed or who was responsible for the attacks.

Noted: Compiling such a list can be a complex undertaking. “Issues of scale, era and location complicate the question, as do the criteria for a ?sneak attack? ? which is often viewed as a preemptive strike by those who launch it,” observes military historian John W. Hall at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. “Rarely are such affairs complete and total surprises. In hindsight, it often emerges that the indicators for an attack were present but overlooked, or not placed in the proper context.”

Quoted: Justices returned to passionate, yet civil, debate during oral arguments. The big question is whether they?ll remain civil in private, University of Wisconsin-Madison law professor Donald Downs said.

Quoted: Timothy Smeeding, a University of Wisconsin-Madison professor who specializes in income inequality, called the outlook for younger adults in the U.S. especially troubling. He pointed to youth discontent in other parts of the world, such as England, where he says high unemployment and widening inequality contributed to recent rioting.

Quoted: Will Jones, a noted labor historian and University of Wisconsin-Madison professor, pointed out that Labor Day began as an almost militant demonstration for workers? rights in the 1880s. Since then, it slowly morphed into parties like Monday?s as unions gained acceptance. Now, Jones said more than just union workers have found themselves backed into a corner again.

Labor Day in the United States dates to the 1880s. ?The first Labor Day march was a march of unions, planned by the central labor union of New York City,? said UW Madison history professor Will Powell Jones.

An area man who was in New York for work on 9/11 shares his memories of that day and his work as a first responder in the weeks following the terrorist attacks. Tony Rajer is a professor for UW-Madison and was visiting New York at the time of the attacks.

Quoted: “I think it is pretty remarkable,” says Barry Burden, a political science professor at UW-Madison. “It tells me something is at stake here. Conservatives in the party are really concerned about Tommy winning the election. They are trying to head off his really owning the nomination at this point, and I think that?s why they?re in so early.”

Quoted: Steven A. Ackerman and Jonathan Martin, professors in the UW-Madison department of atmospheric and oceanic sciences.

Quoted: Starting both diesel engine and gasoline engines from cold conditions causes a significant amount of friction and wear, says Rolf Reitz, an expert on combustion engines and professor of mechanical engineering at UW-Madison.

Quoted: Economist Andy Reschovsky of the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Material about 9/11 in textbooks has changed over time, too, from stories about heroes to examinations of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, researchers at the University of Wisconsin found.

Noted: Jandali and his girlfriend, Joanne Carole Schieble (later Simpson), met at the University of Wisconsin, where he was a professor and she was a student, according to previous press reports. They wanted to marry, but Simpson?s father wouldn?t let her marry a Syrian immigrant, Jandali said. Simpson left and when their son was born in 1955, she gave him up for adoption. A few months later her father died and she married Jandali.

Quoted: Diana Hess, professor of curriculum and instruction.

Noted: Sara Goldrick-Rab, associate professor of educational policy studies and sociology at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, emphatically agreed. ?I found it hard to believe we sociologists would come to a place that clearly thrives on the exploitation of people?s financial and emotional insecurities,? she wrote in an email.

Noted: Perhaps his own closest international collaborator is Harold Tobin from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He?s more optimistic that something good can emerge from the NSF?s review – perhaps a structure that can even lead to the ships spending more time on science than on commercial contracts. But he has concerns too.

Quoted: That?s Charles Franklin, a political scientist at UW-Madison. He says while in Congress, Nuemann built a reputation as one of the most fiscally conservative members of the House, and someone willing to dissent when he did not believe Republican leaders were being frugal enough. Franklin says Nuemann also has been staunchly conservative on social issues, such as abortion.

With healthy rates of volunteering and charitable giving, the people of Dane County have proven themselves a generous sort. We?d better keep it up; people appear to be depending on us. Madison ranked sixth nationally among mid-sized cities for volunteerism, according to a report this year by the Corporation for National and Community Service.

Quoted: Jane Piliavin, UW-Madison professor emerita of sociology

Quoted: “I?m cautious about the conclusions because the HLA system is so variable in living people,” commented John Hawks, assistant professor of anthropology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, US.

Quoted: “The idea that schooling is a local matter has been changing significantly for about the past half century and that shift has accelerated with increased state and federal involvement,” said Adam Nelson, a professor of educational policy studies and history at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Wisconsin senators are known for their longevity, according to UW-Madison Political Scientist David Canon. He says for example, Herb Kohl and his predecessor William Proxmire served a combined 56 years.

Professor Jonathan Martin chairs the department of atmospheric and oceanic sciences at UW Madison. He?s closely watching the development of Hurricane Irene. ?This storm seems destined to affect areas of the eastern United States that, though historically they?ve been subject to visitations by severe hurricanes, it?s been a long while since that?s happened,? said Martin.

Quoted: Donald Downs, a professor of political science, law and journalism at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said the ruling essentially means the media can report on games but cannot broadcast or stream them from beginning to end.

Quoted: In general, such restructuring is expensive, but it provides companies with the flexibility to deal with debt issues in an orderly way, said Jim Seward, an associate professor of finance and academic director of the Nicholas Center for Corporate Finance and Investment Banking at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Quoted: Michael Stier, associate professor of forensic pathology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, testified that Christine Staeven died of homicide by undetermined means.

Quoted: UW-Madison earthquake expert Cliff Thurber said that because of the ground and solid rocks between here and the East Coast, just about everyone east of the Mississippi River had the chance to feel Tuesday?s quake.

Quoted: The aggregate vote in the nine recall elections was 50.7 percent Democrat, 49.3 percent Republican, close enough that the outcome could have gone either way, said Charles Franklin, a political scientist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Quoted: “They put in a lot more time than people realize. They also spend their own money, often, on supplies and other things to help in the classroom,” said Deborah Mitchell, a retail expert at the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Business. “With what?s been going on with the budget in the state, they have less to spend.”

Quoted: When you play the angles, a Walker recall looks increasingly unlikely, says Charles Franklin, a University of Wisconsin?Madison political scientist. ?I think it could happen,? he told me, ?but between the letdown of not having succeeded fully this time and the competition in 2012, I think it?s going to wither away.?

Noted: One of UW?s top ALS researchers said its an important finding. “What they show is that in all three forms they share the same mechanism, that is the impaired function of Ubiquilin2,” said Dr. Su Chun Zhang, an ALS researcher at UW?s Waisman Center.

Quoted: ?It?s a whole new kind of preservation problem,? said Debra Shapiro, UW-Madison archivist. ?Digital images are not forever. Computers crash. Technology becomes outdated. Not many people are thinking down the road.?

Quoted: Steven A. Ackerman and Jonathan Martin, professors in the UW-Madison department of atmospheric and oceanic sciences.

Quoted: Timothy Smeeding, an economics professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and director of the Institute for Research on Poverty.

Quoted: “You really need to hear that voice; just reading a written message isn?t good enough,” says lead author Leslie Seltzer, postdoctoral fellow in biological anthropology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Quoted: ?There is no threat to China from the United States,? observes Edward Friedman, a China expert at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. ?If there are any threats to China?s rise, they lie inside China, i.e., local greed and conservative politics.?

Quoted: But Democrats lost a potential candidate to oppose Walker when Russ Feingold said Friday that he wouldn?t run. It could be awhile before a candidate emerges, University of Wisconsin-Madison political scientist Charles Franklin said.

Quoted: It?s a blockbuster of an announcement says UW-Madison Political Scientist David Canon. ?I?m a little bit surprised. I?m certainly not shocked but I was certain he would run for one of the other.?

Quoted: “Getting employment back up is going to have a lot to do with getting that housing market problem healed and getting us back on track,” said Steve Malpezzi, a business professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Quoted: The process of working with principals on problems at school can be fraught with inequity, said UW-Madison education professor Beth Graue, who is also a former Randall parent.

Noted: The large influx of Latinos to metro New Orleans after Katrina produced diverse reactions ranging from gratitude for their much-needed labor to resentment among workers who perceived the newcomers as opportunistic competition. University of Wisconsin-Madison sociologist Elizabeth Fusel, a former faculty member at Tulane University, has researched our region?s changing face and compiled her studies.

Quoted: Allan Odden, a professor of educational leadership and policy analysis at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and an expert on teacher compensation, has studied performance-pay models across the country for more than a decade and said the failure of some recent initiatives can be attributed to the fact many merit pay programs have been implemented as a ?pilot? program rather than being integrated with other programs and additional resources. He pointed to a study by the National Center on Performance Incentives at Vanderbilt University that found student test scores did not improve when middle-school math teachers in Nashville were offered bonuses tied to the results.

Quoted: “These aren?t necessarily views that the larger electorate is primarily motivated by,” said Charles Franklin, who studies public opinion and politics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.