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During the 200 medley relay, that same quartet – Zapisek, Mullett, O'Donnell and Whiting – took third place in 1:39.62, not far behind Liverpool's winning time of 1:37.90, with Watertown (1:38.60) second. Again, the Wildcats were fast enough (1:40.67 was the standard) to earn a state meet berth to join the Warriors and Cyclones.
When the top swimmers gathered Saturday at Hamilton for the state qualifier, WG, led again by Zapisek, picked up 212 points, again third behind Liverpool (352 points) and Watertown (275 points0.
In the 200 freestyle, Zapisek was a bit slower, at 1:44.38, but still prevailed over Speidel (1:47.35) by nearly three seconds. And in the 500 freestyle, Zapisek nearly matched his time of two days before, winning in 4:46.76 as Matt Leverich (Skaneateles) was second in 4:53.90.
O'Donnell earned a berth in the state meet when he finished second in the 100 butterfly in 53.41 seconds behind Speidel (51.75) as Whiting was fifth in 55.01 seconds. O'Donnell also got sixth in the 100 backstroke (58.23 seconds) as Mullett took third place in the 200 IM (2:02.71) and also was third (1:01.20) in the 100 breaststroke.
Whiting, Mullett, O'Donnell and Zapisek again were quick in the 400 freestyle relay, improving by more than a second, to 3:16.12, but still finishing second to Liverpool (3:14.63). That same quartet did a bit better in the 200 medley relay than on Thursday, finishing in 1:39.37 for third place, just behind Watertown (1:39.23) as, again, Liverpool (1:37.95) was in front.
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"Poet Ezra Pound must have been very impressed by the electric lights in Manhattan in 1910: "Here is our poetry, for we have pulled down the stars to our will." In 1943, Antoine de Saint-Exupery made a similar comparison about a street lamp and a lamp lighter in "The Little Prince": "When he lights his lamp, it's as if he's bringing one more star to life, or one more flower."
In the clear night sky of Seoul, you can see about 20 stars. It became rather awkward to use the expression "as many as stars" to describe countless quantity. Light pollution does not just interfere with visibility. Some observatories have shut down as the glow of artificial light make it impossible to study the stars. The Mount Wilson Observatory in California, where Edwin Hubble studied the expansion of universe, shut down its observation operation as the glare from nearby Los Angeles made the night sky six times brighter.
Light pollution has adverse effects on the ecosystem as well. The natural sleep cycle is disturbed, and the risk of breast cancer and prostate cancer is increasing, studies show. Migrating birds mistake the artificial light as the moon and get disoriented. Cicadas are singing throughout the day as the night light confuses their sense of time. The artificial lights make creatures great and small go against the laws of nature.
The city of Seoul has recommended rules to prevent light pollution in order to reduce unnecessary lighting. Exterior lights on buildings would not be allowed until 11 p.m. and illumination from street lamps would not reach the windows of residential structures. However, the rules are not legally binding. Observing the stars in urban areas may be as difficult as reaching the stars in the sky."
If only Ezra Pound and Antoine de Saint-Exupery could see how much light blankets our skies today.
According to a 2007 census report, The Seoul National Capital Area, by all accounts, is a megacity and Seoul proper itself, contains over 10 million residents. As with any megacity, economic, social, and environmental challenges exist. Though many would not consider this a problem, but rather a consequence or virtue of living in a city, light pollution continues to grow everyday around the world. Light pollution contributes to all three challenges listed above.
Economically, communities waste an exorbitant amount on adding new and performing regular maintenance on inefficient light fixtures. If cities continue to waste more money on supplying energy to these light fixtures, then you, the resident or taxpayer, ultimately feel the burden. Hence why many communities around the globe have recently begun to reevaluate their lighting purposes, as well as their lighting ordinances. Some have chose 'shutting off redundant light fixtures' as the solution, which is a fine solution, but there's a better long-term solution. Shielded light fixtures direct the light downward, rather than upward. Directing the light downward concentrates the light, thus creating a more well illuminated area. Unshielded lights can accomplish this, though at the expense of a higher wattage bulb. Think of shielding as 'more, for less.' But it doesn't stop there. To fully maximize the potential of a shielded light fixture, one can couple it with an energy efficient light bulb and a motion sensor. Overall, this 'lighting trinity' would save communities the most money due to requiring less energy, fewer light fixtures and light when you need it.
Socially, megacities possess large populations. I think it's fair to say that some, if not most megacities have a problem regarding crime. The common belief, regarding light and crime, has been to use more light to deter crime. Here's the truth: more light, actually encourages more criminal activity. Here's why: excessive light can cause glare. Glare is light that can obscure our vision while driving or walking. Criminals can actually use glare to their advantage, to thwart the authorities. If communities wish to increase safety and reduce crime, I would suggest utilizing motion sensors. Consider the following: if you walked into a dark area where you shouldn't be and all of a sudden, a bright light illuminated your position, how would you react? The fear of being 'caught' in the dark, is enough for potential or real criminals to abandon their efforts. Certainly, crime will continue to occur, but utilizing motion sensors as a deterrent would yield better results than the 'accepted' light ordinance most communities utilize.
Environmentally, numerous studies have shown how our bodies, as well as pratically all life on Earth, are adversely affected by light pollution. Nearly all life on Earth functions on a day-night cycle aka circadian rhythm. When something upsets this natural balance, our brains have difficultly coping with the outcome. For example, insomnia, depression and cancer have been linked to light pollution. Certainly, other factors such as stress can affect insomnia, depression and cancer, but the fact remains: light pollution causes health problems. In fact, many animals migratory, feeding and reproducing patterns have been negatively affected. For example, sea turtles populations are on the brink of extinction.
Globally, light pollution is increasingly becoming more and more widespread. What needs to change is how we fundamentally perceive lighting. If all lights utilized proper shielding, then much, if not all of the world's light pollution would be eradicated. I can not stress the importance of proper shielding enough. Without it, all attempts to curb light pollution will be in vain.
Let there be night!

subset: commoncrawl


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Announcing The Startup Battlefield Of Disrupt SF 2015
TechCrunch is pleased to announce the 25 startups selected to participate in the Startup Battlefield of Disrupt SF 2015. Over the next three days, these companies will compete on tech's biggest stage for $50,000 and the coveted Disrupt Cup. The Battlefield represent the crème de la crème; the startups onstage represent just over 2.5 percent of those that applied. Startup Battlefield… Read More
Mobile Blog JKOnTheRun Is Reborn After The Fall Of Gigaom
Harken back with me to the heady days of 2004. The century was still young and we humans were yet unsullied by the great iPhoning of mobile technology. A young man, James Kendrick, hat in one hand and valise in the other, had just disembarked from the great ship HMS Mainstream Tech Media and begun writing on a website called JKOnTheRun. In those heady days tech blogs grew fat on the vine. Read More
Mashable Finalizes $14M First Outside Funding Round
Tech and social media blog Mashable has raised a total of $14 million in a Series A investment round led by Tribune Digital Ventures, the company announced today. The funding adds nearly $1 million to the $13.3 million the company revealed it had raised as of early January this year, and represents the first time the site has sought outside funding. Mashable has offices in New York City and… Read More
Blog Monetization Service Skyscraper Comes Out Of Closed Beta, Adds VigLink Integration & WordPress Plugin
Skyscraper launched last year as a pretty straightforward blog advertising service with a focus on helping bloggers make money through direct ad sales. That's still a main part of its business, and it is currently serving up more than 1.5 million ads every day, but as its co-founder Paul Burger told me last week, the company's focus is slowly shifting to becoming a full-service… Read More
Business Of Fashion Gets $2.1M Seed Funding From Index, LVMH And More For Its No-Nonsense B2B Fashion Blog
We've seen a lot of fashion tech and fashion e-commerce startups pick up steam in the form of users, revenues, and venture backing. But because content remains king, less tech-heavy sites, working in the area of amassing intelligent data, are also growing: Business of Fashion, a London-based B2B blog that chronicles the ins and outs of the fashion industry, is today announcing that it… Read More
61 Percent Of Disqus Comments Are Made With Pseudonyms
One of the unending debates in blogging circles is about the value of comments. How do you encourage the best comments and discourage the anonymous trolls? Do you even need comments? Or do you enforce civility by requiring real names, through the use of Facebook comments (which is what we currently use on TechCrunch) at the expense of discouraging conversation? But there is a middle… Read More
Gawker's Gulp Moment: Big Redesign Is Driving People Away
About ten days ago, gossip blog Gawker and its sister sites Gizmodo, Lifehacker and others switched over to a drastic redesign which was met with plenty of jeers. People always complain about design changes, but this time it looks like several of Gawker's sites actually took a major hit to traffic. According to Quantcast, which directly measures the sites, Gawker's U.S. daily… Read More
2010 State Of The Blogosphere: Facebook And Twitter Drive The Most Traffic (Slides)
Earlier today, Technorati CEO Richard Jalichandra gave his annual State of The Blogosphere presentation at the ad:tech conference. Technorati will be blogging about the findings over the next few days, which is based on a survey of 7,200 bloggers. But we have the full slide presentation after the jump. Some key takeaways: Read More
Six Apart Rolls Out Sponsored "TypePad Conversations," Your Comments Are Now Ads
Ever since this whole blog thing started to take off, marketers have been trying to horn their way into the conversation. It started out as crude pay-per-post schemes, and then evolved into more subtle "sponsored conversations". Once Twitter and Facebook took off, some of those conversations also were for sale. It got so bad, the FTC had to get involved. Now Six Apart is… Read More
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[France] Wikio has announced on its blog (in French) that Ebuzzing has joined the "Wikio communication group". You've probably heard of Wikio – you know, a kind've competitor to Digg and Technorati in France which expanded to Europe. But you've probably not heard of Ebuzzing, which is focused on France. Wikio and Ebuzzing are in fact two major players for… Read More
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Jeff Jarvis Tries To Save Local News (With Spreadsheets!)
Local news always seems to get the short end of the stick, both in terms of coverage and advertising dollars. And as the entire newspaper industry continues to struggle for survival, the prospects for local news looks particularly bleak. It just doesn't pay to have a reporter cover a neighborhood farmer's market when she could be covering the Mayor's office or something… Read More
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Village Voice Media Sites Now Get 40 Percent Of Traffic From Blogs; Planning Local Ad Network
The future of the weekly city paper is the daily blog. Hints of this future can already be seen at Village Voice Media, which owns and operates 15 of the top weeklies in the country, including the Village Voice, SF Weekly, and LA Weekly. Bill Jensen, the director of new media who oversees all the Village Voice Media sites tells me that 40 percent of pageviews comes from the blogs on the sites… Read More
Can the Statusphere Save Journalism?
Recently, I enjoyed a refreshing and invigorating dinner with Walt Mossberg. While we casually discussed our most current endeavors and experiences, the discussion shifted to deep conversation about the future of journalism in the era of socialized media with one simple question, "are newspapers worth saving?" Walt thought for no more than two seconds and assertively replied… Read More
ReadMyBlogToMe.com reads blog comments over the phone
ReadMyBlogToMe.com is a new service from Accross Media Limited that reads selected comments to you in MP3 format or over the phone. The service will cost $10 per month for blog posts and $50 per month for a complete feed of your Twitter conversations. Read on for a demo of the service and a free beta key. Read More
Microsoft now has a blog about Windows 7's development
Microsoft has a blog about Windows 7 now. It's called E7, and it's aimed at people like us, people who scrutinize the development (or lack thereof) of Windows to the nth degree. It's supposed to be a conversation, right, about how they're making Windows 7. The blog will primarily be written by two senior project managers, along with occasional input from the rest of… Read More
Mapping the blogosphere
We make a lot of noise about things like the "blogosphere", the ultra-intra-connected network of blogs around the globe that this blog is part of. And as blogging culture creates its own universe, somewhere between news, humor, and commentary, it becomes more and more intangible. That doesn't mean that some enterprising young dataminers can't make sense of it. Indeed… Read More
We're #7 on Kindle's list of blogs
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HERNDON, Va. (WUSA9) -- We at WUSA9 want you to stay safe and be prepared for hurricane season and severe weather.
Hurricane season begins June 1 and severe storms are a staple of summer.
Dominion Virginia Power wants to remind you of the dangers of downed power lines in storms.
They say:
-- treat all downed lines and anything touching them as energized and dangerous.
-- teach your kids the dangers.
-- report and check the status of power outages
--put together an emergency preparedness kit. Include supplies such as flashlights, 3 day supply of water and non-perishable food, batteries, weather radio, money and important documents for insurance.
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This week you can purchase emergency kit items TAX FREE in Virginia.
For an entire list of tax free items this week in VIRGINIA for Hurricane preparedness week go to: Http://loudoun.gov/CivicAlerts.aspx?AID=907


text:
7 March 2007
Three United Nations agencies urge donors to support an appeal for a full package of assistance to cut malnutrition rates at crisis levels among children under five in refugee camps in Kenya. They warn that a host of problems linked with persistently high malnutrition had to be tackled now to save lives.
17 January 2007
Over the last two years the efforts of humanitarian agencies in Darfur have saved the lives of hundreds of thousands of civilians caught up in the region's conflict.
2 January 2007
WFP has condemned a kidnapping and armed attack on a WFP-contracted convoy in Eastern Chad early on Sunday (28 January).
19 December 2006
The National Basketball Association\'s Chicago Bulls teams up with WFP to feed hungry schoolchildren in Darfur, Sudan with a $100,000 donation.
4 December 2006
WFP has welcomed a donation of US$8.7 million from the United Kingdom's Department for International Development earmarked for the United Nations food agency's giant road works project in southern Sudan.
9 November 2006
Hundreds of thousands of people in Darfur have gone hungry for three consecutive months because fighting and banditry have prevented the WFP from reaching them, announced Kenro Oshidari, WFP's Representative in Sudan.
19 October 2006
Despite the deteriorating security situation in Darfur, a new United Nations assessment has found that overall malnutrition levels have mostly stabilised in 2006 and food insecurity has improved slightly thanks to a stronger international response to the suffering in Sudan's war-torn west.
10 October 2006
WFP has announced that in September, food rations reached more than 158,000 people in Darfur, western Sudan, who have been cut off in recent months.
3 October 2006
WFP has said that a critically slow response to appeals for its emergency operation in Sudan have forced it to cut rations of pulses, sugar and salt for up to 3.5 million people immediately, to help limited stocks last longer.
16 August 2006
WFP has urged the international community to help end the misery in the western Sudanese region of Darfur, where almost half a million people are now cut off from emergency food aid because of fighting and attacks.
- How equal rights boost food security Source: IRIN News
- 20,000 believed displaced after unrest in Sudan's Darfur Source: AFP/ GlobalPost
- Conflict in Darfur threatens humanitarian assistance in Sudan: WFP Source: Xinhua News Agency
- 'Real peace' elusive in Sudan's Darfur 10 years on Source: The Daily Star (Lebanon) / AFP
- Sudan Launches Major Dam to Boost Agricultural Production, Investment Source: The New York Times
- 17 September 2015 Australia Helps WFP Feed South Sudanese In Sudan


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Fruit is normally a good way to get yourself to have an alternative to the sweets you might crave. I have been one that struggled with my weight ever since I was a child, and then almost every med I have been on for seizures always had a weight gain side effect with it. I lost weight to a healthy weight in the last two years. I did it with weight watchers, but the most important things I learned was eating meals and snacks throughout the day and portions. Keep variety in your diet and your exercise. Your body if you are trying to lose needs change. I lost my weight slowly. I had to build up exercise and keep changing my routine. I also had to find a way to get recipes that were things I liked to eat like mexican food that were healthier than what I got at restaurants. Don't stick with just chicken even though it is a healthy meat work in fish or lean meats that you like as well. If you do to much of the same your body basically retains the wait or can even gain because of your emotional times of feeling deprived. It takes a lot to get the right plan that works with your body because everyone is different. It took me a year and nine months for me to lose 120 pounds. Please let me know if you need any other weight loss tips. I like to be able to pay that forward because I struggled with it myself for so many years. Good luck and keep in touch.
JenView Thread
JenView Thread
I am sorry the juice didn't seem to work for you. I love puppies, but we live in an apartment so it isn't an option for us right now. I definitely know what you mean about kids that are ours. I have a mama bear that comes out when anything happens wrong with my kiddo. She is just going to be 8 years old in June. She was part of my motivation to lose weight. Before the med change I could outrun her. I am still having some dizziness so I haven't run for almost 5 weeks now.
I hope all goes well for your friend Ed for the license. I am currently unable to drive and I am very used to my independence and being able to go so I feel like a hermit and can sympathize a little for him. I don't know if it is all in my head or if from everything I have been told or read, but I agree that I don't think Dilantin would have worked for me long term. Maybe it would have but those side effects for me were nutso. I haven't ever been as uncomfortable as the first two weeks on that stuff. I think the anxiety is still there a little but at the same time I am a worrier anyway as it is.
I am now working on getting my communication more open about bills and side effects etc with my husband. It is hard sometimes with him because he is the type to say everything will be fine because he thinks it is what I want to hear, and he doesn't tell me much about what he worries about in general, not just about my health but I am saying our whole relationship it takes a lot to get the layers peeled back on him to get him to open up sometimes. we have talked more in the last few days and gone through medical plans/bills a little to be on the same page about things. so I guess slowly we will get there.
Day by day is how I look at it.
JenView Thread
Candi thank you for the information about the adrenal glands. That could help out a lot.
Angie I have only been on dilantin since April 29th but I have not noticed the difference in my gums. That sounds painful. But dilantin dose is down to 200mg one time a day.
I think I have a better chance of getting back to me soon, my step daughter is going to be with us for the next two weeks. She distracts me from thinking about medical stuff all the time. I love her from the bottom of my heart. I came in to her dad's life as his girlfriend right about the time she was born. His previous relationship with her mom was not healthy at all. The good thing is that I feel like she is my own because I have been in her life so long. She needs more supervision than my husband so hopefully you all have a good weekend.View Thread
The Lamictal is the med that I found the low energy side effect for listed as an infrequent side effect but it does list drowsiness as a common side effect.And as you probably already know the drowsiness is about one of the first listed with Keppra.
I hope that now that i am getting rid of my dilantin little by little that things will level out so I can get back to my usual life. I will keep my fingers crossed.
JenView Thread
I love your entries, they make me smile. You have a great sense of humor. about the journal piece, I honestly didn't start a daily one until this med change otherwise, like Angie I have a listing/calendar of the seizures I have had. Your idea about the database seems really ingenious but I am not sure how much people will actually put out there. I am pretty open with my history just to let people be informed around me especially so they know what is going on if I were to have a seizure. However there are sometimes that people find out this type of information and they treat you with a white glove or believe that it means you are not able to be accomplish the things the next person can. So I am not sure how it could work out but it sounds like something that doctors could even benefit from. HIPAA laws and everything combined with that is the only thing that comes to my mind that may shoot down your good intentions.
Good luck with your business you are starting as well. It sounds interesting and also sounds like it will benefit you health wise when it is up and going. but yes do be careful to not stress to much if things are just getting started.
Keep up the chatting!
JenView Thread
I know it is over overwhelming to start that journal. I do mine throughout the day so I don't forget anything. A good place to get ideas of what to take down is in the Tips area of this epilepsy community. You can search journal but the name of the thread is "journals posted by meetz." It has a lot of suggested things to journal. your post above about the breakfast foods made me smile. I get the same way but mostly in the afternoon with snacky foods. I have not experienced the smoke smell but I get dry mouth several times a day.
I have usually been on one or two meds. So it depends on the medicine and how it reacts with the person individually. I am going through a med change now but the goal is to be on one med or two in the end. I am sorry that may not be what you are wanting to hear. but I have learned the more the doctor knows about your symptoms, daily activities, how you feel, what you eat, and how much you sleep can help the doctor find the right path to making your seizures manageable and help you live more a more comfortable life. I realize your doctor didn't tell you about the journal but sometimes we as patients have to be proactive.
Even though our health is a definite priority keep laughing. that laughing can relax your body and when we are relaxing it is less likely for us to have those pesky seizures.
Keep coming back and chatting and let us know how you are doing. We all learn from each other. Have a good weekend!
JenView Thread
JenView Thread
I am fairly new to this community so I will introduce myself, My name is Jen. You and I have been going through a Keppra change at the same time basically. I am also on Gabapentin and Dilantin which I am starting to taper away the Dilantin this week. Anyways the appetite issue you are mentioning sounds familiar at this point for me, but my time of day is afternoon. In the morning I am not that hungry, but I am really trying to get back to my normal eating routine so I still eat a small breakfast. I have been on the keppra now for 3 weeks. I know I am on other meds now as well so our reactions may differ a little. I agree with Candi though as to break up your eating through the day but that also is how I have been doing it for a while because of a weight program I was on before, I had previously been on a medicine that made me gain weight and I didn't exercise regularly so I ended up having to lose 120 pounds to get myself back to a healthy weight. I have also read a lot about keppra and also others stories in this community about keppra and it seems it is not just you and I going through this because I have seen some stories about gaining weight. It took me almost 2 years to lose the weight I did so I know adjusting your normal eating habits can be hard but if it is going to keep you healthy and make your medicine work better potentially it is worth a try. We will both get adjusted to our new appetites or anything else that comes up. The trial and error period is bizarre sometimes. I hope all is going well otherwise and hope to hear back from you soon.
JenView Thread
I appreciate all the knowledge I have gained from both of you and will see with other people that submit questions if I am able to assist. I know it definitely can help to talk about things and hope that more people start to realize that and come here for assistance.
I will be around here somewhere just not sure where I will be able to add the most assistance/reassurance to people. but I am more than willing to help.
Have a good day!
JenView Thread
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Sometime ago we featured the creative work of Antonio DeRosa, the iCam, a
very good looking camera concept. Antonio has come up with another
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Hamburg and Froment Extend Streak
Nov. 8, 2013
Four members of the Minnesota men's tennis team completed their first day of play at the 2013 Dick Vitale Lakewood Ranch Intercollegiate Clay Court Classic in Sarasota, Fla. Friday. The Gophers went 2-1 in doubles and 2-5 in singles.
Jack Hamburg and Mathieu Froment continued an impressive fall run in doubles while Minnesota's other doubles tandem of Leandro Toledo and Franz Sydow lost in the first round, but saw each member earn one singles win.
Hamburg and Froment extended a four-match winning streak to begin the day with an 8-7 win over North Florida's Zachary Goldberg and Pablo Tellez and ran the streak to six with a convincing 8-1 triumph against Johnny Grimal and Jarryd Woog of Memphis. The duo, seeded second to begin the tournament is now in the semifinal round and is 10-1 on the fall.
No. 55 ranked and fourth-seeded Luca Corinteli and Harrison Richmond of defending national champion Virginia eliminated Toledo and Sydow, 8-4, in the first round.
Neither Hamburg nor Froment was able to advance past the Round of 32 in singles as Froment dropped a two-set match to North Florida's Yannick Zuern and Hamburg fell 7-5, 6-4 to 111th-ranked Jason Tahir of Duke, but Sydow and Toledo both moved on.
Sydow grinded out his second career victory in three sets, topping Christopher Ellis of Bates while No. 53-ranked and fourth-seeded Toledo downed Cedric De Zutter of Memphis in straight sets. Both players lost in the Round of 16, however.
Froment, who advanced via opponent withdrawal and a second-round bye, remains alive in the singles consolation draw. Hamburg was beaten by Florida Gulf Coast's Gabriel Echeverry in his second match of the day.
The Gophers will pick up play at the tournament Saturday and their fall season will come to a close on Sunday, the final day of play in Florida. Following the weekend, Minnesota will have two months off before kicking off its spring season at Oklahoma State in Stillwater, Okla. Jan. 19.
Singles Round of 32
Singles Round of 16
Singles Consolation
Doubles Round of 16
Doubles Quarterfinal
More Headlines
10/1/2015Spec, Corwin Headed To All-Americans
9/27/2015Gophers Compete At Wildcat Invite
9/21/2015First Serve With Justyn Levin
9/14/2015First Serve With Marino Alpeza
9/7/2015First Serve With Jesse Sprinkel
08/25/2015Gophers at the 2015 Minnesota State Fair
08/17/2015Summer Update: Ruben Weber
08/05/2015Gopher Tennis Serves Charity Tournament
07/27/2015Summer Update: Tucker Saxon
07/16/2015Gophers Recognized on All-Academic Teams
09/08/2015Men's Tennis Announces 2015-16 Schedule


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Gaucho Piccadilly is an Argentinean steak house in the heart of London's West End. Combining the flavours of Europe and South America, Gaucho presents a well composed menu that no meat lover can deny.
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Police Arrest 2 Suspects In Connection To Robbery, Assault At West Covina JC Penney
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WEST COVINA (CBSLA.com) — Police announced Thursday they have arrested two suspects wanted in connection to a robbery and assault at a West Covina JC Penney store.
Roman Daniel Landero, 36, and 24-year-old Monica Belen Ortiz were taken into custody early Wednesday morning after officers received a tip from a citizen who recognized their photos.
The photos, which were released to the public Tuesday, were taken from surveillance video of the crime on Sunday, Feb. 24 at the West Covina Westfield Shopping Center, according to police.
Following the citizen's tip, investigators served search and arrest warrants at a residence in the 1700 block of East "D" Street in Ontario around 12:30 a.m. Wednesday.
"Both suspects were arrested at the location without incident," the West Covina Police Dept. said in a statement. "The property stolen from JC Penney was recovered in the residence."
A 7-month-old infant was also found at the location and released to a family member, police said.
Landero and Ortiz were reportedly seen inside the JC Penney store placing items onto a baby stroller and trying on shoes, West Covina police said.
The couple then allegedly attempted to exit the store with the items, but was confronted by a Loss Prevention Agent.
"When the Loss Prevention Agent began to approach the female, the male ran up to him and punched him on his face," Officer Rudy Lopez said in a statement. "The male suspect chased the Loss Prevention Agent back into the store where he knocked him down and began striking him several times before running out of the store."
The Agent suffered a fractured nose, cuts, bruises and swelling to the face.
The bail for Landero and Ortiz has been set at $500,000.
Both suspects are expected to appear at the West Covina Superior Court Friday at 8:30 a.m.
RELATED STORY: 2 Suspects Sought In Robbery, Assault At West Covina JC Penney


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Global lawmakers delegation visits Bengal assembly
A 55-member parliamentary delegation from 23 different countries Monday visited the West Bengal Assembly and interacted with its members.
The delegation, comprising law makers from countries like Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, Kenya and Bangladesh, watched house proceedings and were felicitated by state Parliamentary Affairs Minister Partha Chatterjee.
The delegates are on a tour of the world's largest democracy to gain experience on the the functioning of the parliamentary system in India.
(Posted on 02-12-2013)


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On Wednesday, October 31, 2012, the Cedar Rapids Metro Economic Alliance, Kirkwood Community College and United Way of East Central Iowa hosted a community discussion about the best practices and idea generation to build a strong future workforce. Developing tomorrow's skilled worker has become more important than ever.
Click here to see photos from the event.
The program, held at The Hotel at Kirkwood, featured the following guest speakers:
Rick Dickinson, CEO and President, of the Greater Dubuque Development Corp., talked about how Dubuque positioned itself to draw IBM to the community.
Lily French, Director of Field Education and Clinical Assistant Professor at the University of Iowa School of Social Work, talked about what happens if we don't equip people with the skills needed by local industries. (Video not playing? Try the transcript at the end of this post.)
Kim Johnson, Vice President of Continuing Education and Training Services at Kirkwood Community College, talked about the types of strategies that are being implemented and developed.
(Video not playing? Try the transcript at the end of this post.)
Table discussion
Attendees engaged in roundtable conversation. Here's what we learned from participants:
What is needed to turn the curve and meet local skill demands?
- Develop a portal for employers to communicate their projected and real-time skill needs.
- Equip individuals with both technical and soft skills training.
- Engage and mentor youth early to explore careers in demand in the region.
Attendees indicated a need to have information about available career exploration and training programs.
- KPACE- Kirkwood Pathways for Academic Career Education and Employment Program
To learn more contact Judy Stoffel with United Way at 319-398-5372 or go here.
- Workplace Learning Connection
To learn more about this program contact Mary Lou Erlacher at 319-398-4825 or go to http://www.kirkwood.edu/site/index.php?p=19584.
Attendees expressed interest in participating on advisory committees and boards.
Kirkwood Community College initiated the development of the Advanced Manufacturing Industry Sector Board. To learn more about sector boards and other advisory committee opportunities contact Kim Johnson, Vice President of Continuing Education and Training Services, at 319-398-5525.
Kirkwood Community College, the Metro Economic Alliance and United Way will convene to determine next steps in a broader regional approach to addressing the skill and wage needs of residents. Click here to receive the United Way newsletter and get updates on how this work progresses.
Good morning. Thank you for the opportunity to be here this morning. I'm really glad that we started with something that was so uplifting and that showed the contrast of the dark and the light. I'll be honest in that I am not merry sunshine with my message today. But, I think it's really important that we have facts behind us and that we understand the base from which we're building upon to make the changes in our community that we all seek.
What I would share with you is that without significant collaboration between the social service sector and the private sector, Iowa communities will continue to face growing unemployment and particularly underemployment rates and increased poverty rates. That may sound startling. How can you say that? I'll show you where this comes from.
But what has happened over the last couple decades, and particularly the last decade in Iowa, is that despite having very modest standards of living, you know, compared to other communities and other states around the nation, individuals working are not able to keep up with the raise in cost of living expenses and that's really what we're finding. There is the fact that if we don't do something to really increase the education and training opportunities for individuals at the lower end of the wage spectrum, our communities will have increased poverty rates and we'll continue to see growing rates of un- and underemployment. And there's really a loss—there's a loss in our community of economic vitality, there's a loss of human capital, and there's a loss of opportunities for the residents of our communities. So I'm going to talk with you about where we're at so that we can make informed choices going forward.
So what we've done is that we've constructed cost of living budgets. We've been doing this for a while. I'm not going to give you the history, but I want to tell you what it is we're doing and why we're doing it.
We felt that it was very important to have a clear sense of what it costs for individuals, whether that's an individual person, a married person a single person, what it costs for households in Iowa to make ends meet. We wanted to develop a survival budget. What does it take to get by? So we've used a few budget assumptions. One we wanted to make sure that they had everything that they needed to be able to work full-time. So you'll see that reflected here.
- We included child care for individuals who didn't have a parent staying home with a child;
- We included very basic clothing and household expenses and telephone, clothing, very minimal level of expenditures;
- Food: we assumed that all food is cooked and eaten home using the USDA low-cost food plan (so there's no eating out, everything is prepared right at home);
- Healthcare: we wanted to make sure that people had healthcare so we split the cost down to the county level between what people pay out-of-pocket for their portion of employer-sponsored care, or if they are uninsured, to buy it on the private market;
- Housing: we wanted to make sure everyone had a home so we've included rent at the 40th percentile of HUD market rates. We didn't say we're going to top of the line, we don't want anything substandard. So just a bit below what would be the average so 40% of HUD market rate;
- And transportation: people need to be able to get to work. Because Iowa lacks an extensive public transportation system, we really worked under the assumption that people needed a vehicle to get to and from work.
- We also know that everyone pays taxes. We've got state taxes, income and payroll taxes included. So we did this and we calculated a very basic survival budget for 89% of Iowa households.
We have 21 family types represented. I'm not going to glaze your eyes with that and I only have 15 minutes, so we called up a couple to give you an example. So at that very basic threshold we determined that a single parent with one child working full-time would need to earn $18.08 an hour in order to meet that very basic threshold. If they were to have a second child, that would actually jump up to $24.88, so almost $25 an hour. This is in your community; this is in the Cedar Rapids and Metropolitan statistical area.
If we had a different family type—we looked at married couples—if one adult was working and one was able to stay home with the child, that's reducing the childcare expenses. Still, that individual parent would need to earn $19.56 an hour. If both parents are working with two children, they each would need to earn $14.49 an hour. So these are much higher wages than when we start thinking about the minimum wage or even the median wage. If you look at the median wage in this community, which is around $16 (it's $15 in the state, but it's $16 in Cedar Rapids) – – $16 an hour, this is reflecting that you're going to need at least two workers in the household in order to meet those basic living expenses.
And before we go on from these numbers, I'd just like to point out that there are some things that we know that would be in a thriving budget that we've completely omitted. You'll see there's nothing included for if you have an emergency—if your car breaks down, if you're sick, if you don't have paid leave and you're unable to work there's no cushion for you. There are no savings for training whether that's your professional development or your children's training down the road. There are no savings for retirement. There's nothing included here for birthday gifts or Christmas gifts. There's nothing including for recreation and there is absolutely nothing included for debt, which we know is a reality for many Iowa households.
At this very, very basic level, we're talking about these family types are needing to earn between $15-24 an hour to survive. That is not the history of Iowa and that is not the assumption that many people are working upon. So what this means is that we have to look very critically and very intentionally about the kinds of wages that are in our community and how we help people secure those kinds of wages.
I did want to let you know because I know that there are others in the room that work outside of Linn County, this information is available for a variety of family types, not the four that I just mentioned, and it's available for all 99 counties. So you can go to the Iowa Policy Project website, you can click on this map, click on your county, and up will pop information, so we have that for everyone.
The other thing that I think is important to share is that – – and we talked about it in an hourly wage, you know that $18.18 an hour. It's good to look at it in an annual sum as well. So we look at the annual salary, we determined that a family supporting wage, again is that survival budget, is really for a single adult around $20,000 a year; for a single parent with one child it's $32,000 a year and you can see as it goes down. What we noticed is that when you compared that with the federal poverty guideline because that's the discussion that a lot of people and we're talking about what are the needs of our community. It's all based around what are our poverty rates. This is how we determine who is in need in our community. What we've discovered is looking at specific Iowa spending down to the county level. The federal poverty guideline really underestimates what our families need to live and work in our communities. In each of these instances, families are needing to earn actually about 200% of the poverty guideline or twice what the federal poverty guideline is.
You can see for a single parent with two children the federal poverty guideline is $18,530 and we've determined that actually they need to earn over $42,000 at that very basic threshold, everything that I talked to you about, what they would be able to bring home. There is a significant disconnect between what gets described as the needs of our community using that standard and what families actually have to earn. And I'll just say briefly because sometimes folks have a real question about how could that be and how does that happen. I'll just throw out there that the federal poverty guideline was established almost 50 years ago. The methodology since that time has not been updated. It was based on taking the largest expenditure for families, which was food at that time (it was one-third of their expenses), multiplying that times three and that was the threshold. Today, families spend only a sixth to a seventh of their budget on food. So there is a growing disconnection.
The federal poverty guideline also assumed that women were not a formalized part of the workforce so they omitted childcare. They also have one housing cost whether you live in Iowa, Minnesota, Mississippi, California. There isn't that geographically variation when we know there's a difference between living in Hiawatha and Cedar Rapids and Lone Tree. There's variance that way.
And the third area which creates this growing disconnection is transportation. Our transportation costs have gone up dramatically since the mid 1960's. People live farther away from work; to get to and from work just costs much more.
As long as childcare, housing and transportation are a significant factor for families—and I would say that they are actually the largest portions of a families' budget (you can see that childcare, housing and transportation are)—there's going to be a growing disconnection between the federal poverty rate and what families actually need to live and work. So it's an important bit of information to hold in mind when you're looking at statistics, when you're trying to describe what you're communities' needs are and when you're trying to determine who needs the assistance.
To go a step further, and we've added this because we've been pressed, which is good, we've been pressed by legislators when we've shared this information, they would say, yeah, we have an idea that Iowa's wages aren't keeping up. We understand that the model a family says that they those higher wages. But when it really comes to Iowans, how many people are struggling? We need to know, we need you to look at Iowa household and say how many are falling below that line. And we can say that for the first time and this is where it is stark and needs some specific responses and creativity. There's also tremendous opportunity for these households.
We've learned that 23% of Iowa households who are working (this omits elderly households and it omits households that have someone who's working less than half-time), so a household who has at least someone working half time or more, 23% of those households in the State of Iowa are working and not earning enough to get at that very basic level of survival or financial assistance.
When you look at groups you'll see very quickly some groups are doing better than others even among the group that's performing the best (married couples without children) is 12%. That means more than one out of ten married couples without children are working and are not earning to meet their basic needs. When you look at single parents, it's a dramatically different story. Again, because I sort of communicated, our wages actually require that you're going to need to have two adults to meet our living expenses now. Living expenses have gone up, even in Iowa. Single parents: 3 out of 4 single parent households are working and not earning enough to get by. Linn County is doing a little bit better. The overall number of households who are struggling in Linn County is 18.7%, so just about 1 in 5 households in Linn County are working and not earning enough to get by. I'm sure most people in the room don't feel that that's an adequate number even though it's better than the state average. However, there is an opportunity to do something about that.
I have to move very quickly. And I just wanted to reflect, just a quick picture of another way to understand the financial realities that families are facing. This assumes a single parent is working with two children in Cedar Rapids at $9 an hour. What we've discovered is you line up those $9 an hour for year around employment against all the expenses that we outlined and the person is short over $17,000 a year working at $9 an hour.
There is something that can be done. We can work collectively to fill in the gap between low wages and what it costs to live in our communities. One of the ways we do that in the State of Iowa is through a variety of work support programs that would address some of those things—childcare assistance, food assistance, public health insurance, the state and federal earned income tax credit—but ways that we can help folks at that low level get by. And with all those programs together, they actually have over $4,000 in excess at the end of the year to be able to use for what their needs are. The only difficulty in that—and this is the big picture—that's relying only on public supports and there are other supports that can come into play, and that's something that we'll be talking about with our next speaker. Relying only on the public supports that exist for Iowans, you'll see that they do okay at that low wage level with the public work supports, up until around $12 an hour. And they hit a significant cliff when lose childcare assistance.
The most important thing for us to recognize is that they don't break even again until they reach $18 an hour. And they don't get back to where they were before they lost that childcare assistance and those public supports until $20 an hour. So the question for us is if that's the economic reality, if people are working, if they are doing their part, if they are not earning enough to meet their basic living expenses, if the public supports that we have in place don't fill in that gap, how do people get from $12 an hour to $18? How do they get from $12 to $20 an hour? And I believe and many of us in this room believe that education and skilled workforce development is the way that they make that leap. With every successful level of education attained, unemployment rates go down, wages go up. We know that individuals who earn more with each successful level of education until you reach a doctoral degree, which at point we're not going to be particularly concerned, you're doing okay, an individual with some college but no degree earns $268 more per week or that's $14,000 a year than someone who has less than a high school diploma.
Dee mentioned that high school education isn't enough for the needs of businesses today. It's also clearly not enough for Iowans to support themselves. That's very evident. Unemployment and underemployment rates of those without a high school diploma are more than double of those with an associate's degree.
So it doesn't matter whether we look at unemployment or we look at wages, we look at poverty, it's undeniable that education pays for Iowans; and this holds true even in hard times as better educated workers are less likely to fall into poverty when they hit economic difficulties, like the recession we've just have been recovering from, and because they spend less time without work after a job loss and they're more likely to be re-employed at comparable wages.
In addition to it having a benefit for individuals, earnings rise, unemployment goes down, underemployment goes down, people living in poverty goes down, it's also a tremendous benefit for our broader communities. With higher levels of educational attainment among your communities' workforce, your local businesses have better trained workers, there's more income in the community, and we expand and there are lower levels of poverty within the broader community.
We've also done some research that shows that investments in education benefit the state budget because obtaining a higher education actually allows workers to work more hours, to have higher wages, they're able to earn more overall and they pay more in state income tax and also sales tax as they're purchasing things in our communities. So the result is that it puts more money into the program than is actually even paid out. That's when you consider that some people might not be successful and it's also when we looked at migration. Maybe we trained some people and they moved out of our state. We still show that investments for low income adults generate more tax revenue to the state than the program costs. For an associate's degree with every dollar invested there's a return of $3.70; that's to the state budget that doesn't even talk about the broader benefits to the community, which actually is in the range of $5.37 for the community for every dollar invested. And for a bachelor's degree it's $2.40 for every dollar. We have a lot of data that shows the benefit of post-secondary education or higher learning opportunities for individuals.
I think I've hit my time.
So Rick and Dee talked about how workforce development, economic development and community development are so closely intertwined. And what Lily has helped us also understand is how workforce development, education and training is closely intertwined with individuals being able to compete and receive wages which help them for a sustainable family.
This is a complex issue and that's why I have titled this Building Opportunity Through Partnering. We are not going to be able address this issue without partnering, and within this community I feel that we are very lucky with the partners that have come together and are coming together to address our workforce challenges in the region.
Kirkwood Community College's mission is in the essence, I believe, of workforce development in terms of identifying needs, providing access and opportunity to education.
This is just a little bit about who we are and the reason I put this slide in here is I think it also talks to the impact education and training has within our region due to the number of graduates at Kirkwood that live and work in Iowa and in particular in our region, it's about 75% to 80% stay in our region that graduate.
We are working and have been working for many years and continue to work towards being a labor market responsive community college. Our learner success agenda is squarely placed within labor market responsiveness ensuring that we are helping our students complete to compete and that we are continuing to strengthen our regional leadership through partnering with regard to workforce and economic development.
At Kirkwood Community College we are very fortunate to partner with the Iowa Workforce Development system and the Iowa Works office located in Cedar Rapids and Iowa City. Through that effort, we are liaisons to the Regional Workforce Investment Board and that board is established to ensure that particularly the federal funds that flow through our community are aligned to the workforce needs of the community. So individuals that are receiving case management, tuition support, childcare and transportation, those investments are being made in occupations and careers which are in demand and pay sustainable wages within the community.
I just talked about Iowa Works in Iowa City and Cedar Rapids; they're engaged in working with job search, resume building, training and development, transferable skill assessment to again assist employers with their workforce needs.
The skills studies are one mechanism we use to ensure we're remaining in close contact and that we're listening to what employers are telling us about their workforce needs. We also engage in a variety of other tools, again to ensure we're data informed. I like the info action comment that Rick made. So we do use labor market data, our local inquire data, we also are really stepping up our work with industry clusters and industry sectors. I know I've seen several members here from our advance manufacturing industry cluster and what those organizations do, as employers they come together to talk about their common workforce needs and other needs that they have. The advanced manufacturing industry costs are for instance one of the areas of concern that they have is they have good occupations, high wages, sustainable living; however, sometimes the perception of that career or occupation is not the best, particularly because of how manufacturing was hit in the recession, even though our region fared very well as a manufacturing community during the recession. So that employer group, that's one of their agenda items: what can they do as employers to address that perception to help increase the pipeline of workers that will be coming to their organizations? We use focus groups. Most recently we are pulling together a group of employers in healthcare claims management—Revenue Cycle Management—because again the data was telling us this is a growing occupation area in the region and employers were saying our applicant pools are extremely tight so we've pulled a focus group together to see is there something we might be able to do to help address this and get individuals the skills to compete for positions within that cluster.
All of our academic programs have advisory committees comprised of employers in the region that provide counsel and advice. We're in the process of developing a workforce regional service plan under the direction of the regional workforce investment board which we're very excited about. And then we also enter into the public policy work that Steve has helped lead with partners such as United Way and the National Skills Coalition.
So at Kirkwood we have several different audiences that we support through workforce development opportunities. We have our academic programs which are largely one-year diploma and two-year degree programs. We have our continuing professional education programs which are short-term certificate and skills credential programs which now are aligned and in the future when any new program is developed, they are aligned to the credit one-year and two-year diploma. Our philosophy is there should be no loss point. A student is a student at Kirkwood Community College. If they come through the doors of a short-term credentialing program because of their current life circumstance, they can give 16 weeks but they don't know if they can give two years yet, they should be able to get that 16 weeks work but when they are ready or have a tuition reimbursement plan at an employer, they can come back and still have credit for that short-term program that they took.
Employer contracted training, Amy Lasack leads our division there. Just doing a ton of work right now with regards to employers with regard to training their existing workforce. And we are continuing to do more work with the populations that are underemployed and unemployed that need to get to the 18 and 20 dollar an hour jobs. Programs like KPACE—Pathways for Academic Career, Education & Employment—are one mechanism, and I'll talk about some other new programs we have and existing programs that work with that.
We have also available to us, because of the support of our legislature, tools that we can use to address the workforce issues. Tools that are available to businesses, new and existing, to train their employees, we have our GAP tuition assistance fund which had been piloted at several community colleges and just this past year received funding from the legislature. And this is a tool that allows us to help individuals who are 200 percent or below of the federal poverty level—so it's the individuals who are underemployed at that 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 dollar an hour range—to take short-term credentialing programs to either start them on a pathway to a diploma or degree or move them into the workforce at a higher wage. This fund pays for that tuition. Because our federal financial aid program does not recognize non-credit education, it is not eligible for PAL. This is a mechanism to use then to assist individuals whose life circumstance dictates a short-term intervention at this time.
We also have a workforce training fund, which is used really in a similar manner to gap but it really is helping us do more of the targeted industry cluster work in development of new programs. We refer to it often as our innovation fund at Kirkwood because it helps us provide the resources we need to flush out new programs like our new renewable energy distribution degree that we have on campus. And then we continue to work with grants and private foundations to braid as many funding streams as we can to get our resources out to individuals in need.
So I just wanted to talk a little bit about – – I was asked to talk about what strategies we have put in place to address the workforce development needs. These are a few of them which particularly tie to training and education. There are many other ways we are trying to engage in the workforce community through our workplace learning connection office in terms of increasing opportunities for internships through our career services office at Kirkwood who works with alumni community members and students to help prepare them out to the job market.
So in response to needs that have come forward through this data and through our work with employers, these are a variety of programs that have been developed recently:
- Our energy production and distribution degree began a year or two ago. We leveraged some state funding in order to be able to get that very expensive degree off the ground. You can imagine the type of equipment we have. If you haven't had a chance to tour our renewable energy center, I recommend that you do. It's pretty remarkable.
- We have a new Advanced Manufacturing Technology Degree that was put in place based on impact and based on what we heard from our advanced manufacturing employer group.
- We will be launching a logistics certificate next fall. Evone Vogenson and her team have been working on that. Again, one of our growing industry clusters it was clear in skills 2014.
- Our Pharmacy Tech Diploma is addressing a need.
- Our Customer Service Professional Certification was really our first foray into industry cluster work in 1998 and it's been a program that has stayed in existence through today. It's probably on its fourth or fifth iteration of curriculum to keep up with the industries needs, but it is a program that we pull off the shelf when it is in demand. It's not necessarily offered every semester and so we are in the process of pulling it off the shelf because we have heard a tightening with regard to the customer service representative positions in the region.
- Youth is another area of our workforce population that we need to keep our attention on so we've been doing some STEM-related camps to try to help that workforce arm for the region.
- Our most recent pilot project which because of the results we're now replicating in Linn County, is very similar to the program that Rick talked about in Dubuque being a short-term CNC, a one-semester training program. And then we also have the same program established for welding, and it is an opportunity for individuals to receive tuition, childcare and transportation assistance as they go through to complete this education with employers who have committed to interview and hire after they received their credentials.
I've talked about our work with industry consortiums and sector boards. Currently we are working with the information technology sector, Advanced Manufacturing, our call center industry sector and we just have started up a health services industry sector.
And so, again, partnering, these programs would not be possible if it wasn't for the employers and that's a big part of the solution. I've always said if employers endorse and recognize the certificate program because they've been involved in determining the learning competencies and skills so they understand when someone presents that resume and has that on it exactly the skills they have, which some will deem as experience, and we can place that into our orientation and information sessions and allow our students to tour those facilities, if we build it they will come! But without that connection, it is sometimes very difficult for an individual to understand this investment will get them to where they need to be to support themselves and their family.
I want to close by talking about our pathways program, which has just been a wonderful experience for us at Kirkwood and we are so complimentary of our partnership with United Way because we would not be able to do this work without that support.
The pathways program is a program which is solely focusing on the targeted population that is low-income, has socioeconomic barriers as well as some life barriers to being able to be successful in college. So it's a partnership between Kirkwood, United Way, community-based organizations and local employers. We are developing comprehensive career pathways that facilitate adults' learning through a series of chunks of modules, curriculums or programs.
We know an individual looking at a two year degree can seem "oh there's no way I can do that so I'm just not going to go to college," but when you can chunk that out and show them okay let's look at the first 16 weeks, here's what you need to accomplish. When you accomplish that, here's going to be the next step. But there's a pathway navigator—an individual who's working with this population—to navigate their educational journey. Pretty similar to the healthcare system and so we've taken some learnings from the healthcare systems and are applying it within our educational systems to help them navigate and move along that journey.
We are implementing some best practices. You may have heard of programs in Washington State and Kentucky and Arkansas, they're getting a lot of play in the nation with regard to their work on integrated programs which take basic skills training and couple it with occupational credentialing training. So I'm basic skills deficient. I'm not at college level math or reading and probably not writing. So I'm going to need to spend my first semester at least in pre-college courses before I can move into my occupational courses. We have a bit of a loss during that first semester, because again they're not seeing the connection to what awaits after that. So we're merging those two together so individuals can receive a credential within their first phase with us at the institution. And then that also provides them more options because life happens and so if after that first phase they have a credential and they just can't continue on to the next block, they wouldn't been successful continuing onto the next block, they have a credential that is recognized in the community that will at least help them gain a higher wage than where they were before they came into the program.
We believe a unique attribute to that program is the pathway navigator roll, which I've explained. We are and want to work more closely with community-based organizations in this communication process of individuals community-based organizations are working with that we think education and training can assist them to move forward with their lives.
I've always said for this type of a program, Kirkwood Community College should not be the only organization involved in assisting populations move to higher levels of education and attainment and so we are very interested in working with other organizations to scale this up because there is a certain number you can handle through these programs and we're finding even with our research on scaling, we're going to hit a maximum point in terms of what we're going to be able to handle through the Kirkwood pipeline.
This shows you graphically what that progression of certificates to credentials is. About 40 percent of our students in the pathway programs do not have a GED and 60 percent do. The math level is between eighth and ninth grade and a reading level is ninth to 11th grade. So in the first block it's getting their basic skills, a credential, and if they don't have their GED, a GED. From that sequence they then move into a college readiness boot-camp which occurs right before start of a semester to ensure they are engaged and aware of the resources within the community college system and getting some more math and reading prep. Then they are articulated into their first credit diploma, which right now we have programs that align in Allied Health, Advanced Manufacturing, which we're focusing on welding, and our administrative office assistant or really customer service representative is another good field for there. So it is a pathway to higher wages.
And we have had success. I think I want to say our retention rate is about 87 percent so to continue them moving on through their progression our credentialing rate is higher than that and our employment rate is right around 75 percent so we want to move that up. But again the goal really is to keep them moving. We'd prefer they not exit to employment before they get their one-year credit diploma or two-year degree Lily has shown. You get more wage benefit at that time so that's our overall goal. But as we say, life does happen and we want to be sure we can help them get a job if they decide they can't continue on.
Just briefly some public policy work. So we've been working on GAP and PACE legislation and we continue to evaluate additional programs or resources that we might add into that program. One thing we're looking at is some sort of middle skills internship program, our industry sector coalition work, and then access to public benefits. The number one reason students drop out is due to financial reasons. We have resources to fill a gap. Are we ensuring our students are connecting to the resources that are available to them while they are in our educational pathways? And that's another area that pathway navigators have really focused on. And while we have funds available for childcare and support, they've done such a good job at connecting with other programs, we haven't had to tap into those funds for that need as much.
Our regional education centers will be coming online, another way we are trying to move into kind of that junior/senior year of career preparation for workforce development. These are our new centers that will be coming online and I just love this picture and a student is a student because 70,000 futures have started at Kirkwood.


text:
How sweet it is! I guess the karma is bigger than the multitude of pit bull attacks by the Republican party..It isn't working for McCain/Palin..and I think that it is going to be as impossible as "winning the Iraq war" for them to pull out a victory on November 4th!
For months, the neoconservatives in this blog viciously criticized Hillary Clinton when they thought that she would win the Democratic nomination. They even laughed at how she laughed.
So, she lost the nomination even though she was the best candidate. Barack Obama won. Now, he will beat John McCain to win the presidency.
Now, I can laugh. The neoconservatives are the dumbest bozos. Obama becomes president.
Ha. Ha. Ha. He would laughs last laughs best. Ha. Ha. Ha.
The last sentence in the previous article should read, "Ha. Ha. Ha. He WHO laughs last laughs best. Ha. Ha. Ha."
Ha. Ha. Ha. Ha. Ha.
Laugh now, cry later if Obama becomes president. You losers don't even know who you're electing. Perhaps opening a book and finding out a little about your so called candidate might open your eyes. He has links to terrorists who wish they'd done more, among many others. You losers might be surprised by who wins next month.
You are attacking the wrong person. Neoconservatives, not blue-dog Democrats, destroyed the candidacy of Hillary Clinton. If you want to condemn someone for the victory of Obama over McCain, then condemn the neoconservatives like those in this forum.
If the neoconservatives had not destroyed her candidacy, then she -- not Obama -- would win the presidency.
I enjoy laughing at morons. Neoconservatives are really -- very dumb -- morons. Obama is exactly what you asinine neoconservatives deserve.
Yes. I am laughing -- hard.
Give it up man, it!s over. I can't balance the line no matter what odds I give McCain. The fat lady has sung!
Happy Halloween, I've got all the tricks and the candy, you have the burning sh-t bag on your porch!
In a recent interview, Jessy Jackson said "although the 'Zionists who have controlled American policy for decades' remain strong, they'll lose a great deal of their clout when Barack Obama enters the White House." Jessy Jackson is now starting to sound like Rev. Write. The problem is when we elect Obama we might resemble the two evil empires of the 20th century.
Come on Wall Streeters- you REALLY don't want McCain, or (God forbid) PALIN to be President, do you?
Come on, tell the truth, dog!
A vote for McCain is a vote for the Hannity/Martin ANTI-SEMITE party!
Unfortunately pro-Obama supporters know so little of the WORLD 20th century history. Let me see: PLATFORM OF CHANGE, INDOCTRINATION OF YOUTH, REDISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH, etc, etc, etc. IF IT DOES NOT SOUNDS FAMILIAR, THEN YOU DID SKIP THAT HISTORY LESSON IN SCHOOL. ALL THESE HAS BEEN DONE BEFORE BY COMMUNISTS IN RUSSIA AND HITLER IN GERMANY. Yes, I know I am just hateful, or a racist, or stupid. OR MAYBE I JUST PAID A LITTLE MORE ATTENTION IN CLASS.
give the n up
it is written
it is written
The liberals just don't get it. Obama lied about Rev Wright, Obama lied about Resko, Obama lied about Ayers, Obama lied about Acorn. It is not that he knew these people but that he lied about knowing them.
With all these lies the liberals believe what he says on the campaign trail he will do. He is campaigning that he is a middle of the road liberal like Bill Clinton when his voting record clearly shows him as the most liberal congressman in the Senate and the House for that matter.
But he is telling the truth now and will cut your taxes. Right
Who ever becomes president has to raise taxes. It doesn't matter if its McCain or Obama, both will have to make some unpopular choices.
What we need is a President that will stimulate the economy. To do that you have to cut government and cut taxes on business. I just don't see Obama doing that it goes against everything he believes in.
Trust McCain? McCain's dad & grand-dad Navy Admirals' influence got John into Annapolis, not his smarts. McCain ranked 894 out of 899 grads, near last. Didn't read flight manual, crashed 3 planes. Careless. At 42 traded 1st wife & 3 kids, for 24 year-old-millionaire Cindy, his beer distributor boss's daughter, whom John romanced while living at home with 1st family, grabbing at chance to get Congressional Campaign funded.
McCain's Senator influence got trophy-wife Cindy's felony charges reduced to pleading "no-contest," when she was a drug addict, stole drugs from her medical charity, used forged prescriptions, paid a fine. Had to join Narcotics Anonymous, dissolve charity, do community soup-kitchen work, & presto …buy another charity and h-e-r-e's Cindi, our new First Lady.
Without his Admiral family influence, academic underachiever Johnnie McCain would never been accepted at Annapolis, never graduated at the bottom, never been a pilot, never had Cindi's money to run for congress and never been a Presidential Candidate. A loose canon unfit to lead. No brainer.
Media polls indicate Barack Obama is supported by most college graduates and other intelligent people. Easily fooled people, with less education, like John McCain.
McCain's Gang searches out and feeds hate and lies to gullible, easily fooled race-baiters, self-anointed bumper-sticker super-patriots, self-righteous Bible-Thumpers and other cafeteria-style-pick-and-choose holier-than-thou Un-Christians. Their lack of ethics makes them thrive on hate-mongering about Obama and his family. McCain counts on fools to pass on his phony crap, because he knows they don't take time to understand the issues, problems or proposed solutions. Mccain fights dirty and does our country and Barack Obama and his family great harm. Fools deserve the incompetent government we have now, and one we may have to endure once again, if McCain/Palin is elected President.
McCain Gang of hate-mongers, liars, race-baiters, self-anointed bumper-sticker super-patriots, un-holy Bible-Thumpers all load up these comments quick, each day, as part of their lie and smear fraud campaign.
Where are their specific solutions to the problems Bush/McCain created? McCain was there 26 years.
Comment by McCain Gang fill-up these comment slots daily
with horse manure to feed the gullible.
McCain/Palin both favor returning our daughters, wives and sisters to back-alley abortions !!
They opposes all abortions, even in cases of rape, incest, severe physical or mental defect, or health of the mother.
Would you deny your mother, wife, daughter or sister an abortion, if she chose one due to rape, incest or deformed/retarded fetus? Then you and your Pastor are eager and willing to accept, love and care for the baby yourself through adulthood? Oh, Ya, right.
We may be strongly opposed to abortion being used as a contraceptive action of last resort. Intelligent mature people need to be held responsible for their lifestyle choices, decisions and actions. We may argue that in a consentual relationship, an unwanted pregnancy can be avoided. But, if it results in a pregnancy and childbirth, the male needs to share financial and childrearing responsibility with the mother and support his child until age 21.
Unfortunately, in an unplanned pregnancy, the complex decision, whether to abort, to raise or to give up her child, ultimately belongs solely to each woman who has to make it. The self-righteous may offer indignation or sympathy and little else, as she and her child will endure the long-term mental, physical and financial hardships resulting from her decision. Currently, our society does not hold our promiscuous sons accountable. The cowardly "Hit-and-Run-Romeos" are allowed to run away, turning their responsibility for life-long fatherhood to the Welfare Dept. and the taxpayers.
If McCain is such a great candidate for the Republican party, why didn't they support him 8 years ago? Eight years ago he would have been a fine president. Not this time around. I think he certainly has what it takes to be president, but not a great one. He seems to lack vision and tends to react to situations rather than think things through. I'm not sure his judgement has always served him well. I believe even the courts slapped his hand and said he suffered from "poor judgement" from his involvement with the Savings and Loan scandal.
During the second debate with Obama, he looked like a little old man shuffling around on stage. Even one of my kids walked in and commented on his elderly appearance.
I believe we need someone like Obama at this critical moment in history.
Liberals always call names becuase if you really stop hating and look at facts you'll see what the media does not want you to know. You have been brain washed by numerous media outlets such as Larry King, Cnn, The view, Hollywood ect...Obama has changed so much to get your vote. That is not leadership. Article by NY times clearly shows that Acorn and the Clinton Admin was pushing for lenders to loosen standards to give loans for home ownership.(2000) The Clintons, Gore, Kerry, 13 intelligence agencies, England, Germany, France, Israel, Iraqi generals, UN all that he had WMD. The media does not tell you that. Why dont they interview the Iraqi Generals who wrote a book about outfitting commercial flights to take Iraqi WMD work to Syria. NO ties to terrorists right?
It is hard to believe the venom being written here. The world is facing the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. Extremists in Iran and other theocracies what everyone who does not embrace their beliefs to DIE. 1 in 6 homeowners are under water.
When our country was founded, Washington was considered a traitor by the British. (From their perspective he was) He still earned the respect of the British by his actions as President. Menachim Begin, the former Prime Minister of Israel was part of a terrorist organization that blew up the King David Hotel. (In fairness, a warning was sent to the British which they ignored. He went on to sign a Peace Treaty with Sadat. People change. Reading what is written here is downright scary. That's just my opinion, I could be wrong
Woa, some of these comments are from serious paranoids, not just trolls. Relax, we are finally getting that gentler kinder American the Republicans promised. It's an evolution of the mind due to the availability of facts and all the fact checking. Only lies can delude and mislead. We wont go back into ignorance again. Once you've become free you'll never go back. White American was as enslaved as anyone and now we're free at last. Oh yeah, and the thank God almight part too.
There is no economic crisis in America and we're not even in a recession (as of yet anyway). What we have is a social crisis and a financial crisis. Auto maufacturers are churning out new cars when earlier models have not been fully utilized. What we need to do is slow down the economy to fix our social and financial problems.
[What we need is a President that will stimulate the economy.]
I love reading comments after stories. It always involves so called "liberals" pointing out actual facts, and "conservatives" pointing out innuendo and fantasies. He's a communist! He's a black national! He's a liar!
Never convicted of anything tied to Rezko. Never proved to have anything but a passing knowledge of Ayers, who won Chicago citizen of the year in 1997, never any proof that Obama was there during the 2 or 3 angry speeches put up by Rev Wright. If Wright was such a monger, why do only 3 speeches over 20 years exist?
It's all pretend fantasy land for so called "conservatives". Reality is not a friend of the Republican party and finally the neocon movement will be dead and buried after Nov 4th.
First, it is unsurprising that anti-McCain/pro-Oblahma Laura Meckler writes anything critical of McCain. Meckler is an absolute unprofessional hack, so this story is a bit unsurprising. Second, is this newsworthy, or reflective of a slow news day? I think the latter. It is a non-story in search of a story, spoken from the perspective of an Oblahma sycophant. Third, McCain is my choice, no matter what at this point. He should be yours, too. Even if lots of Oblahma sycophants like to pile on in their anger over the Bush years -- something we all share in common -- we should still vote for the better Presidential candidates: John McCain and Sarah Palin.
i heard that obama listens to rap music?! thats still a bad thing right? i even think he owns a Jay Z cd...
neo-cons are lame
To Obama supporters: It is not over yet. Bush got elected twice, more or less. The retard vote is still very strong and linked with corrupt election officials anything can happen. Vote early if you can. Get or make a receipt of your vote and have one of the poll workers sign it. This can be used for later evidence if any post election shennanigans are pulled.
Judging by these posts, conservatives can't spell or construct sentences. Now it all makes sense. Neither can Bush Sr., Quayle, Bush Jr., Palin or McCain. The GOP isn't anti government (the goverment under Reagan and Bush Jr. grew more than ever). They're anti-grammar. And on that count, mission accomplished.
Obama supporters are dreaming.
California Primary 2008 polls
had Obama +13 going in (other
poll had lesser leads); he lost to
Clinton by 10 points, 20 point
goof by the polls? Hardly -
Bradley Effect all the way. Same
thing happened in New Jersey.
Obama HAS to be +10 to even
tie this election. He won't be.
He is going to lose in a Landslide,
undetected now because of Bradley.
It's over and McCain is your next
President. Get used to it. Oh, I
know, Bradley doesn't apply here.
Sure. IT DID IN CALIFORNIA THIS
YEAR. And it will on Nov. 4, 2008.
Obama never stood a chance.
That will be the story of Election
PHD. In World History: this reminds me of 1920-30's Germany, a nation in search of a 'leader' to take them from misery. here comes Obama, an unknown except for his keynote speech in '04. What has he done to deserve this role he aspires to? His wife makes me sick. This is the first time she is proud to be an American? She forgets the hard work of so many people of different races to correct so many wrongs that enabled BO to be in the position he is in today. Excessive government intervention (different from necessary regulation to enable a level playing field)helped get us in this mess. I'm afraid it will only increase in a BO administration. Talk about losing your liberty! The more we rely on the government for our sustenance, the more beholden we will be to it. btw, I support NEITHER.
Hey, Dr. Doom and PHD in World History, just wanted to say that you guys broke Godwin's Law, which means you automatically lose this debate.
As someone from Obama's home state, I can say that he's done a good deal for Illinoisans in his time as a state and national Senator. The way I see it, the past eight years have been somebody driving a bus into a ditch. Obama's task will be to get said bus out of the ditch, and to do that he's going to have to do some things that might not be popular. But keep in mind, the reason he has to do these things is to repair the awful damage done by our last President.
The way our system works, not much will probably change. But Obama is definitely a step in the right direction after eight years of letting the wholly incapable lead the blind.
Godwin: once again, people like you equate anti-Obama with pro Bush. Did I say I support Bush? Even you might be surprised at how I've voted over the years. You certainly know about ASSUMING! Please inform us of all the things BO has done. convince me. :)
Mark from Brooklyn: Reality is not a friend of the Republican party and finally the neocon movement will be dead and buried after Nov 4th.
Mark, your entire post was spot on. Pretty much said everything that needed to be said on this thread.
To: PHD in History
You are conveniently overlooking the fact that the rhetoric employed by the Nazis was primarily a doctrine of hate. The DAP (the precursor to the NSDAP which became the Nazi Party) was founded on the principles of anti-semitism and combating left-wing political views. Does this sound like Obama?
Judging by this and many other message boards I have seen, a good portion of the hate-based rhetoric going back and forth comes not from Obama supporters but from the other side.
Obama leads in all the states with the highest IQs and most informed people.
Is there a photo of this somewhere?
Obama fans, don't get complacent. Remember that Gore and Kerry had big leads in the polls in the last few weeks before election.
For Women to have any political power, must have Media power first. Even Hillary Clinton got beaten badly by the media even she has more votes.
This Republican ideology of tax cuts for the rich, tax break for oil companies, golden parachutes, screw the middle class has wrecked the economy and brought the crisis upon us. If you want 4 more years of Republican rule, vote McCain
"Media polls indicate Barack Obama is supported by most college graduates and other intelligent people."
"Obama leads in all the states with the highest IQs and most informed people."
You elitist snobs. I have a couple of degrees, from top schools. I've studied under five Nobel laureates. I'll match my degrees, GPA, IQ, income, or total years spent serving my country against yours any day.
to be fair, don't forget the Fanny/Freddie mortgage giveaway sponsored by the dems in 1999. See NYT 9/30/99 article. sorry, I don't have the link at my current location. they all suck..
Obama will win - and should win - because he's not involved in the "psychodrama" playing out on pages like this one. Everyone needs to take some deep breaths, because it wasn't the "redistribution of wealth" that made Stalin and Hitler - it was paranoia and narcissism and the mob mentality.
Only Hillary Clinton knows who will win.
Remember 2012. Time for women for a change.
Interesting how the people with the highest IQs, the most intelligent and informed always screw up the worst.
Stalin starved and killed people because he wanted to take (redistribute) their lands.
Stalin wanted to redistribute the fertile lands of the Ukrainians to benefit poor Russians.
Stalin murdered millions of people Ph.D. in world history? give me a break. Communism killed all those people. It created a mob mentality bent on taking from others.
The disadvantaged tormented Ukrainian farmers with large tracks of land because they wanted what they had. Envy, and jealousy.
"Redistribution of wealth" led to the death of millions. What else is war or communism other than redistribution of wealth to the victor.
Did I mention Russia is an empty shell of itself, post commie.
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