Michelle Obama will visit Madison Monday to campaign for her husband, Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, and to kick off â??Womenâ??s Week of Action.â? The event will be held at 10 a.m. at the GAR Memorial Park at Camp Randall. Doors will open at 9 a.m.
As a Wisconsin taxpayer with a master’s degree in music education, I’m glad to see that UW-Madison’s School of Music will (probably) be getting better music performance halls. These improvements are much needed.
About 100 chronically drunken and disorderly individuals are the main cause of problems in Downtown Madison, and they cost the community hundreds of thousands of dollars in public safety resources annually, according to a new study by the Madison Police Department and United Way of Dane County.
Working with social service agencies, police and a UW-Madison Law School class, Balles compiled reports on people who repeatedly turned up in police reports about incidents Downtown — from disorderly conduct and public intoxication to assault and robbery — and cross-checked them with those who passed through homeless shelter services, the county jail, the detoxification center and other programs.
Michelle Obama will be in Madison on Monday at the Women’s Week of Action rally.
She will appear at Camp Randall where the rally is expected to start at 10 a.m.
Results from the first ever Big Ten Battleground Poll revealed Thursday just how close the presidential race is in the eight states with Big Ten schools.
D.C.A. Hillman isn’t on a mission to change the world. He just wants people to understand it a little bit better.
The Madison author of “The Chemical Muse: Drug Use and the Roots of Western Civilization” is trying to open a few eyes about ancient history. Drugs were an everyday part of life in ancient Greece and Rome, Hillman writes in the book, and an influence on the arts, philosophy and politics on which our own culture is based.
(Carol Newlands, chair of the Classics department, is quoted.)
More than 600 UW-Madison students are waiting for overdue financial aid and tuition refund checks from the university, a few worth as much as $10,000.
The checks, about $1.6 million in total, are more than two weeks late.
A man who was found naked lying on a couch in the basement of the home of one of Madison’s elite power couples has been ordered to appear in court to face charges of criminal trespass to property and criminal damage to property.
Andrew D. Martin, 28, of 1334 Jenifer St., was found Aug. 27 in the basement of the lakeside Morrison Street home of Alan Fish and Susan Goodwin. Fish is associate chancellor for facilities at the University of Wisconsin-Madison while Goodwin is the chief of staff for Gov. Jim Doyle. Neither was home at the time of incident, according to a criminal complaint filed Wednesday in Dane County Circuit Court.
Big Ten Network, most well-known for its extensive college-football and basketball coverage, is leaving the sports arenas and entering the political arena with a new election special.
Big Ten Battleground: Campaign 2008 is a 90-minute program that will air nationally on Big Ten Network Sept. 18 at 4 p.m. (EST). The special is based upon the results of the Big Ten Battleground Poll, a collaboration between a number of the Big Ten universities to measure voter sentiment in the eight Big Ten states, many of which will be key to the election outcome.
The Big Ten Network is offering something other than sports today.
U-W Madison political science professor Charles Franklin discusses the results of a Midwest political poll aimed at determining the attitudes of voters in the eight states where the Big Ten Conference is located. But, isn’t the Big Ten Network all about sports?
The Dog Jog, a two-mile run/walk sponsored by the UW-Madison School of Veterinary Medicine on Sunday, raised $29,000 to help care for homeless animals.
The money goes to area humane society and shelter organizations.
I usually am a big supporter of the SAFE (Safe Arrival For Everyone) Nighttime Services. However, this past Saturday night I had a pretty unpleasant experience with SAFEride. After a house party my roommates and I hosted, everybody was heading home. There were three freshman women remaining who called for a SAFEride to the same Southeast dorm from the Vilas neighborhood. When the cab got here, the third woman was turned away as per SAFErideâ??s policy of no more than two riders to a cab. The woman reminded the driver of the dangerous situation recently developing in the Vilas area, specifically the multiple armed robberies within a few blocks of our house, and asked him to forgive the rule. He bluntly responded with â??I donâ??t care,â? so she returned to our house to seek our help. As my roommate approached the cab to speak with the driver, the taxi pulled away, leaving her on our doorstep.
UW-Madison will continue to be a major center of European studies for at least the next three years thanks to a $450,000 grant from the European Commission.
The grant, to the UW-Madison European Union Center of Excellence, was announced Tuesday. It continues funding the center through 2011.
Five hundred dogs barked, howled, growled, whimpered, ran, sat, panted, sniffed and greeted each other with varying degrees of friendliness.
It was the 25th annual Dog Jog, put on by the UW-Madison School of Veterinary Medicine to raise money for humane societies in the area with registration fees and pledges.
The dogs brightened a cloudy, drizzly Sunday morning with their exuberant energy and varied sizes, shapes and personalities.
Cold weather and the threat of rain didn’t keep more than 1,000 people from experiencing Thai food and culture at Olbrich Botanical Gardens Sunday afternoon for Thai Fest.
The event is hosted by the Gardens as well as the University of Wisconsin, the University of Wisconsin Alumni Assocation, the Royal Thai Consulate General in Chicago and the Tourism Authority of Thailand. Throughout the afternoon, various groups of Thai performers showcased traditional dance, music and even a practice wedding ceremony.
After a rocky period, the UW-Madison political science department is experiencing a revival.
Nine political scientists left last year — more than one-fifth of the department — some to pursue other jobs and some to retire.
“There was a little bit of shell-shock after spring of 2007,” said department chairman John Coleman. “It was a bad coincidence of a lot of people leaving at the same time.”
Thai Fest, a celebration of Thai culture, was brought back to the Olbrich Botanical Gardens on Sunday, Sept. 14 from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Generously funded by the University of Wisconsin, the Wisconsin Alumni Association, the Royal Thai Consulate General in Chicago, the Tourism Authority of Thailand and Olbrich Botanical Gardens, the event was free and open to the enthusiastic people of Madison who bravely trudged through the mud and rain to attend the world-class event.
Audience members who came last Friday to the packed University of Wisconsin-Madison Cinematheque screening of “Singin’ in the Rain” found two new items in this Vilas Hall screening room.
One was a giant carrot cake, there to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the Cinematheque series, which brings classic, foreign and independent films to town that wouldn’t otherwise even screen at arthouses like Sundance or the Orpheum.
The other new thing was a donation box.
Amid a wave of complaints about Robert Felner, a former University of Louisville dean who is now under federal investigation, administrators supported the embattled dean and even bankrolled a lawyer to defend him from faculty critics. While the universityâ??s president and provost have recently apologized for backing Felner for so long, details emerging from the controversy show a broken grievance process at Louisville that many say favors administrators and leaves professors unprotected from retaliation.
The Krispy Kreme doughnut truck thief is in trouble again.
Warren G. Whitelightning, 36, was taken to detox early Wednesday morning and will face charges on several outstanding warrants from Dane and Marathon counties after being found in the same car driven by a woman arrested for a seventh drunk driving offense.
Whitelightning was arrested Nov. 24, 2007, after leading Madison and UW-Madison police on a variable-speed chase on University Avenue after he stole a Krispy Kreme delivery truck from an Open Pantry parking lot.
Dear Editor:
I am a Fresno State graduate and I will attend the Fresno State/Wisconsin game. Whatever the final score, I wish to thank the Badgers in advance for coming to Fresno and playing in a stadium that some teams (in-state and out-of-state) don’t want to play in. Some have even backed out on their word to play a return game. I’m looking forward to an exciting game and wish both teams the best.
Miguel Lopez, Reedey, Calif.
Construction on State Street, originally scheduled to finish Friday, will continue one more week, but buses will run and restaurants will be able to operate outdoor seating starting Saturday.
Representatives from City Engineering, Speedway construction company and the Business Improvement District made the decision during their weekly meeting Tuesday morning.
It’s a simple economic problem: Supply is not meeting demand. The UW-Madison economics department is struggling to deliver enough course space as the major grows at a heady pace.
In the 1998-1999 academic year, there were 183 economics majors at UW-Madison. Last school year, there were 442.
Some Universities are taking a new stance on campus violence.
They’re telling students to fight back.
NBC 15’s Barclay Pollak has more on this story.
The main reason Candice Beach chose to begin her collegiate career at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater is because she considers it to be a safe campus.
She says, ” Well just being here for the first week I haven’t seen any problems. I mean the people are all really nice here.”
A Doty Street resident who lives about a block from where Brittany Zimmermann was murdered earlier this year, was arrested Wednesday after he allegedly threatened to shoot into neighbors homes.
Paul C. Schultz, 39, of 416 W. Doty St., was charged with disorderly conduct after he made several statements to his next door neighbors at 418 W. Doty St. that he was going to “shoot you through the walls with hollow points,” referring to a bullet that expands upon impact.
Madison police officials said a Madison man died after being stabbed during a fight outside a well known downtown bar.
The victim has been identified as Juan Bernal, 22.  Bernal attended LaFollette High School in 2005 and his friends told 27 News he was the father a three year old boy.
Authorities said the stabbing took place outside The Plaza on North Henry Street just before midnight Wednesday.  “Bar patrons were able to trail some of the involved parties in this,” Captain Mary Schauf said.  “They were able to detain one individual who had critical information for us.”
Power has been restored to an area of Madison’s west side after being out for about an hour due to a failure of equipment at a substation.
Madison Gas and Electric spokesman Steve Kraus said power was restored at 11:10 a.m. in an area from the Hilldale Mall shopping center east to the UW-Madison campus. The problem was at the Walnut Street sub-station.
Police had been directing traffic at several intersections because of stoplights not functioning.
Craig Gilbert, the Journal Sentinel’s Washington bureau chief, and University of Wisconsin political scientist and convention expert Byron Shafer size up the GOP convention so far from the Twin Cities in this audio clip.
The Badger Herald was wrong to publish the guest column written by Rep. Steve Nass (â??University governance must permit conservative valuesâ?) in its Sept. 1 registration issue.
Printing this article was a mistake that the editors of this paper need not make. Nassâ?? article not only fails to conform to the basic standards of journalism this paper seeks to uphold, but provides no basis for any of its accusations beyond mere speculative leaps of logic and cheap shots at public figures.
“Strawbiddy Swirl” will be the flavor of the day Thursday afternoon during a UW-Madison ice cream social on Bascom Hill, where students, staff and faculty can meet and greet new Chancellor Carolyn “Biddy” Martin.
At this point four years ago, John Kerry had already been Swift Boated and MoveOn was branding President Bush a Vietnam War dodger, two of the bigger stories to emerge from the 2004 campaign cycle. But to this point in the 2008 campaign, the so-called 527s, tax-exempt groups that throw their weight behind certain candidates or issues during a campaign, have been relatively quiet. Instead, itâ??s been the campaigns themselves doing most of the advertising, according to Ken Goldstein, director of the Wisconsin Advertising Project, which has been tracking this electionâ??s ads closely.
A large hole and construction fencing will block a portion of Library Mall until October, as the University of Wisconsin works to complete a utility project for the new East Campus Mall.
UW physical plant director John Harrod said Library Mall will be back to normal in time for Halloween festivities on State Street, and pedestrians will be able to navigate their way through a detour on the north side of Library Mall.
Days before a University of Wisconsin System Board of Regents committee started meeting to decide on the next chancellor at UW-Madison in May, Gov. Jim Doyle interviewed the four finalists for the position over the phone. He then passed his thoughts about the candidates along to the committee.
The governorâ??s interviews have predictably caused some to speculate that Doyle played a role in the selection process, which ended with the committee choosing former Cornell Provost Biddy Martin to succeed John Wiley.
In one of the last moves of his chancellorship of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, John Wiley took aim at the state Legislature and business lobby group Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce in a recent column for Madison Magazine last week. Wiley accused the Legislature of producing a â??hyper-politicized environmentâ? and pointed to WMC as one of the main culprits responsible for the lack of funding for the UW System.
In Springfieldâ??s 15th annual community leadership visit to Madison, Wis., business and community leaders saw a city similar to their own, but on a larger scale. And the differences are things Springfield leaders would aspire to.
A group of 45 delegates from Springfield took the trip north Aug. 14â??16 to compare the two cities and touch on topics ranging from business-college partnerships to quality of life issues.
Madison is another Midwest city built around a large state university. However, Madison has nearly a third more residents in its metropolitan statistical area and the University of Wisconsin boasts 41,000 students, more than twice that of Missouri State University.
Hurricane Gustav has not been a significant challenge for New Orleans and its citizens, including Venkat-Ramani. A geophysicist involved in the search for oil and gas reservoirs beneath the seafloor in the Gulf, she is an alumnus of the University of Wisconsin- Madison, the president of the New Orleans chapter of the Wisconsin Alumni Association and member of the alumni board for the universityâ??s geology department. She is also an avid and well-read New Orleans blogger, having covered the impact and implications of Katrina and subsequent storms since first having to evacuate over 1100 days ago.
New student enrollment is booming at UW-Rock County and administrators expect those numbers to climb even higher.
Right now the school has more than 730 full time students. The previous record was set in 2001 with about 670. In the past, most students chose to attend part-time, but that’s starting to change.
After seven seasons as the outspoken and outrageous mom on the hit sitcom “Malcolm in the Middle,” UW-Madison graduate Jane Kaczmarek desperately needed a break from her TV family — and wanted time for her real one.
Brad Vogel departed his home in the Uptown neighborhood of New Orleans early Saturday morning, one among more than a million persons from the city and surrounding coastal regions of Louisiana that have evacuated their homes over the weekend in advance of Hurricane Gustav.
A native of Kiel, Wisconsin and 2006 graduate of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Vogel is a co-founder of Letters in Bottles, a blog covering politics and pop culture both in Madison and around the world, and an alumnus of the Badger Herald editorial board. He had just started his second year at Tulane University Law School last week before classes were suspended in anticipation of the storm, which is currently projected to hit Louisiana with considerable strength.
Writer opposes Governor Jim Doyle and hiring of Chancellor Biddy Martin.
Figuring out what to do with yourself in Madison isn’t a matter of finding stuff to do. It’s a matter of winnowing the many choices down to one. Here, we offer seven offbeat options for things to do in town that are unmistakably Madison:
(The Memorial Union and Cinematheque in Vilas Hall are included on the list)
It can be argued that those paid to protect and serve know more about how safe we are in Madison than anyone.
Tonight police chief Noble Wray is talking about some of our biggest problems and what’s being done about them.
The Chief spoke and answered questions with the common council for about 2 hours Wednesday night cutting through the rumors and perception and letting people know what’s really going on.
MADISON, Wis. — A third person has died after being injured in a single-car crash early Wednesday morning on Midvale Boulevard.
The Dane Counted coroner has identified the third victim as Daniel Myers, 22, of Madison. Myers was pronounced dead at UW Hospital late Wednesday morning.
The other victims were identified as Lindsey T. Plank, 23, of Madison, and Richard H. Putze, 22, of Madison, according to the Dane County coroner. Putze was pronounced dead at the scene while Plank was pronounced dead at UW Hospital.
The occupants of the car were all University of Wisconsin students.
Madison police would no longer be allowed to fine the homeless for public urination and sleeping in parks under ordinance changes to be introduced soon by Ald. Brenda Konkel.
With limited shelter space and no new city programs for the homeless population coming down the pipe in 2009, Konkel said the ordinance changes she will introduce at a City Council meeting in September are intended to spark a discussion about how the city treats the homeless.
Madison police Lt. Joe Balles has two Badgers’ home games circled in red on his calendar.
And it’s not because he’s a big college football fan. In fact, he could do with fewer fans in town on Oct. 4, when the Badgers play Ohio State and on Oct. 11, when their foe will be Penn State.
Balles supervises patrol officers in the city’s Central District, so it’s his job to keep the peace Downtown, which doesn’t get easier when 80,000 people descend on Camp Randall.
The UW Board of Regents is expected to approve a two-year budget today for the University of Wisconsin System that includes a request for $37.5 million in tax money and $13.4 million in student fees to support an agenda to recruit and retain more students.
MADISON, Wis. (AP) — Outgoing University of Wisconsin-Madison Chancellor John Wiley is receiving praise for starting a public debate about the future of higher education in Wisconsin.
Children can become rock stars without stepping on a stage.
They can hit a hole in one without holding a golf club.
They can fly missions in a helicopter without leaving the ground.
A growing number of video games let children simulate actions and tasks without any knowledge of their real-life counterparts. But how well or poorly do the games convey real-life skills to children?
It depends on who you ask.
Video games do not necessarily provide children with all the things they need to be an educated person or even master certain tasks, said David Williamson Shaffer, a professor of educational psychology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. However, they can provide specific skills, motivation and an opportunity to solve problems as people do in the real world.
Don’t look now, but biotech might not be Madison’s only technological identity, and its emerging information technology image is being shaped in the heart of town.
As the city attempts to lure the so-called â??creative class,â? downtown Madison slowly is becoming a coveted destination for information technology companies.
MADISON (WKOW) — A man found dead near Camp Randall stadium was jailed last month for violating probation rules against drinking any alcohol.
Authorities identified the man found at a Breese Terrace building as Jonathan Krenzelok, 29, of Madison.
Dear Editor:
We in Madison are blessed with wonderful things to do, places to go and a rich history of enjoying the environment. One place that we are blessed to have is the Arboretum. The Arboretum is a place to walk, run, bike and cross country ski. It is also a place for study and research.
We must preserve this wonder for our generation and generations to come. We as citizens must not take for granted what the Arboretum is all about. It is for the family and it is for individuals as well.
The public is invited to take part in a multicultural arts event honoring outgoing University of Wisconsin Chancellor John Wiley at the Overture Center in downtown Madison.
The Sept. 15 event, “An Evening of Celebration,” will feature music, drama and dance performances from some of UW-Madison’s most accomplished artists.
California-born Shannon Payette Seip moved to Madison to attend the journalism graduate program at UW-Madison and formerly worked as a producer, reporter and news anchor for WKOW-TV (Ch. 27).
MADISON, Wis. — Increasing sales of trademarked University of Wisconsin merchandise means the school will have more financial aid money for its neediest students this school year.
The university earned a record $2.8 million in royalties from the sales of sweat shirts, hats, jerseys and other items in the budget year that ended June 30. That was up $700,000, or 33 percent, from the previous year.
Underground utility construction on Library Mall on the UW-Madison campus has begun and won’t be completed until June 2009.
The work is expected to increase utility capacity and improve reliability in the east campus area.
Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty, often mentioned as a potential running mate for Sen. John McCain, promoted the presumptive Republican presidential nominee’s energy policy and critiqued his rival’s as he campaigned across Wisconsin — including at UW-Madison — on Monday.
Gov. Tim Pawlenty was on the road again Monday, campaigning for Republican John McCain in the critical swing state of Wisconsin. During a stop in Madison, Pawlenty touted Sen. John McCain’s energy plan, focusing on McCain’s call for more nuclear power.
Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty was in the state Monday to raise cash for state Republicans, but dropped no hints as to where he stands when it comes to joining the GOP ticket to be headed by John McCain. As part of his visit, Pawlenty visited UW-Madison’s teaching and research nuclear reactor.
Animal rights activists who want to build a museum highlighting what they say is cruelty at UW-Madison’s primate labs asked the state Supreme Court on Monday to review a lower court decision allowing a property owner to revoke his sale offer.
Possible Republican vice presidential pick Tim Pawlenty toured the UW-Madison nuclear reactor Monday and said the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, Sen. Barack Obama, of Illinois, would “slam the door shut” on expanding nuclear power and off-shore oil drilling.
