text:
Developing a Mobile Application with Flash
flash air mobile game android file packager files runtime
For this article I am going to skip all that drama apart from how it affects the underlying technology and talk about the process of building a Mobile Flash app using Flash, the AIR SDK, and the mobile packager.
First off, what is AIR?
For example, let's say that I wanted to build a simple text editing application like Windows Notepad or Mac TextEdit, and I wanted to build it with Javascript and/or Flash. With a little work I could put together such a tool (as the Mozilla "Bespin" project shows). The only problem is that such an application would have two big deficiencies that would make it a poor cousin of a standalone text editor:
- It would have to run in a browser, so I am stuck with the browser's Windows and menus and toolbar buttons and URL bar and such.
- The Javascript and Flash sandbox would preclude me from accessing the underlying OS filesystem, so I could not open or save text files on the computer.
If you have downloaded an application like TweetDeck, you might have been presented with a file with the extension .AIR and not quite understood what that's about. Well, that is how the AIR runtime deals with cross-platform executable files. Rather than have the developer maintain multiple executable files for multiple platforms, you build a single AIR file that's actually a bundle of all your assets (HTML, JS, SWF, PDF), which the AIR runtime then converts into something resembling a first-class executable on your target platform (Windows, Mac, or Linux). Adobe's AIR packager handles all of the building for you, and your user just double-clicks the AIR file to install.
And, to quote Bill Cosby, "I told you that story so I can tell you this one".
AIR on Mobile
AIR on a mobile platform (specifically iOS, Android, and Playbook) is a bit different from its desktop counterpart. Not only is it different from desktop AIR, but each device deals with them differently. Thankfully, the differences between mobile platform AIR implementations are internal and, with a couple of exceptions, are not things you need to worry about.
For developers, the biggest difference between desktop AIR and mobile AIR is that mobile AIR is Flash-only. While you could build a desktop AIR application entirely out of HTML and/or Javascript and/or PDF, mobile AIR only deals with Flash. It's best thought of as a runtime that runs your Flash content full-screen and with access to the AIR native-OS class library so you can talk to the underlying phone OS and pretend you are a native mobile application.
In addition to standard OS stuff (files, process control, system event notifications), the AIR class library has been extended to include mobile OS features that most desktops lack, like geolocation, the accelerometer, and multi-touch gestures.
AIR on Android
Android AIR is much more like its desktop counterpart than iPhone AIR. Like desktop AIR, it is a free-to-download runtime (available in the Android Market for Android 2.2 "Froyo" and later) containing a Flash interpreter and native class library. While developers use the same command-line packager utility as the one that builds .AIR files, Android files are built into APK (native Android executable) files. These APK files look and behave like native Android executable files, although they require the AIR runtime to be installed (ala .NET). If you install an AIR-enabled executable to an Android device that doesn't currently have the AIR runtime installed, you will be gently ushered to the Android Market to install the runtime. While it is not a completely invisible process, it is just a one-time thing. Once the runtime is installed, you are good to go.
AIR on Playbook
Playbook AIR is even simpler, mainly because the AIR runtime is already baked into every shipping Playbook. You use a different command-line packager (supplied by RIM for free) to build a .BAR file that Playbooks run as first-class applications.
AIR on iPhone
You have undoubtedly heard of the drama surrounding the Adobe iPhone packager. In response to Apple's "no third-party libraries (by which we mean virtual machines)" decree, Adobe quietly put together a method to pre-compile iPhone native executable apps using Flash. In retaliation, Apple altered its license to specifically exclude Adobe-authored content (as well as several other non-Xcode development tools) from the App Store.
Apple did eventually soften its stance regarding non-Xcode tools, likely following some credible legal threats, and they did start to "bless" various non-Xcode-authored applications for the App Store. Ultimately Adobe-authored apps were quietly paroled. So it is once again "game on" for building iPhone apps with Flash.
Internally, iPhone AIR applications are quite a bit different from the the other mobile systems, and that is mainly due to Apple's license and its ban on shared runtime code or bundled VM's. Adobe's iPhone packager is built around an "ahead of time compiler" (what we old-schoolers used to just call a "compiler") for SWF files. If you request the AIR packager build an iPhone application, it will not build a bundle that will be executed by a runtime engine. Instead, your SWF will be precompiled into a runtime-free iPhone executable, ready to be signed and installed to a hardware phone.
And this developer workflow is not unique to the Adobe Packager. Novell's Mono for iPhone precompiles executable applications that would normally use a shared .NET VM on other systems.
There are a couple of things you lose with this ahead-of-time compile approach, necessitated by using a native code compiler rather than a VM. For one, you bypass Xcode so your application will not run on the iPhone simulator. Internally, the iPhone simulator is an API emulator and not an ARM processor emulator, so it cannot run executable files created with the packager or any other authoring tool that directly creates ARM executable files.
Secondly, you lose the ability to stream in and execute external SWF files. And this can be a pretty significant problem depending on the application you are building. If you are building a game that is entirely self-contained and does not stream in resources as SWF, then you should not have a problem. Some Flash-authored content, though, like the popular Club Penguin kids' MMORPG, is built as a "shell" that streams in all of its content (games, assets, locations) as SWF on an as-needed basis. Such a system is only do-able if you have a VM on the client.
But again, if your game doesn't plan to stream in external SWF content and you have an actual hardware iPhone or iPod Touch for testing, there's little reason you shouldn't be able to make a game in Flash.
Furthermore, you should be able to make a game that can be compiled for several mobile platforms with few or no changes.
How to Package
While it's done a bit differently between Android and iPhone, the packaging step is conceptually similar.
- Create a SWF file using Flash or Flex. If you want to talk to the phone's features, use the AIR native class library. Note that AIR only contains the second-generation AS3 VM, so it cannot work with old AS1 or AS2 code. Unless you have an old game you are porting to mobile, this should not be much of a problem.
- Create an XML file containing a description of the application. This file contains things like the application's name, version number, path to icons, security descriptor, orientation, etc.
- Run the packager. In all cases, the packager is a console application that can be run from a build script or from within the Flash IDE. The packager takes the XML description, SWF, and any other resources (like the icon PNG files) and builds the runtime file.
- Copy your executable to your phone and run it.
For iOS devices (iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch), you will need to be a member of the Apple Developer Program to generate Apple-blessed code-signing certificates. While the build and process for iOS is similar to Android, actually generating and downloading the certificate is a weird multi-step process that I only figured out via trial and error. Once packaged, you copy your game IPA file to your connected test device via iTunes.
Also note that the iPhone packager, since it contains an extra step of running an ahead-of-time compiler written in Java, is a lot slower than the Android packager. Packaging an Android or Playbook application basically entails zipping up your SWF with an executable stub, some icon resources, and a manifest file that the packager generates, so it is a quick process.
Building An Application
Beyond the build process, actually writing your game is exactly like writing a web-based game in Flash. You can build and test your game using the Flash IDE just as you would a web game. When you are ready to deploy to a mobile device, use the appropriate packager to build a mobile app.
But it isn't all easy. You do have to take into account device performance as well as screen limitations and limitations imposed by finger-based input.
In my experience, input imposes the most design limitations. While Flash will tell you "The user just tapped on point (175, 192)", you should assume that means "The user intended to tap on something somewhat near point (175, 192), so look for it". Mice and Styluses are accurate to within a pixel or two, but fingertips aren't. So make sure you design and code with that in mind.
And such design decisions are really dictated more by the game than any programming. A Tic Tac Toe game should work on any phone screen without any changes, as the squares would be quite large. A 20x20 Go board, on the other hand, could be quite frustrating. The individual board-squares would be quite a bit smaller than the smallest fingertip, and your users would likely find themselves accidentally tapping on the wrong square.
And games tackle this problem differently. Some games zoom in on the board when it is time to click on a cell. Some games scroll around. Some games pop up tips explaining what you're about to click (like most mobile keyboards). It is probably best that you play a few mobile games before you settle on your input scheme, as a natural feeling input scheme is often the difference between an excellent game and a frustrating one.
For my example, I designed my game "Hexapies", which is a simple "paint the board" game, to be mobile-friendly.
Note that the click-able pies are along the bottom of the board. This placement wasn't chosen randomly. Keeping the input items at the bottom keeps your hand from obscuring the board every time you make a move. If you want an example of how placement can hamper gameplay, try out any of a hundred Windows Solitaire knockoffs for mobile phones. Virtually all of them keep the same layout as Windows Solitaire even though such a layout is not mobile friendly. Every time you drag a card, you cover the entire board with your hand, and you find yourself having to drag the card off to the side to find your destination. A much better solution would be to have the cards along the bottom and have them "grow" upwards, but few games have that option, opting instead for familiarity with the original.
Real Production!
Okay, enough pontificating. Here is a real project. One game I have been developing and re-developing forever is "Brain Bones". It is a dice game that I thought it would be a good fit, as the screen is about the right size for mobile, and the controls are simple -- you have five dice to swap around and a big "play this combination" button. So I decided to make a mobile-friendly version as well as a version that I could move to various platforms. Here is the game in production in the Flash IDE.
Figure 2: Brain Bones in Flash. My biggest tip for using the Flash IDE is to put "one really bigass monitor" in your budget, as there are a lot of panels you will want to use.
(and yes, I know I should be more state-of-the-art and use ANT. I'll learn it soon. I promise)
And then I tested. Most testing involved building features that I could turn on and off for each platform. For example, you may notice that my desktop games shown below have a volume-slider on the screen and the mobile games do not. This is because most mobiles have hardware volume buttons, and it is not good form to duplicate that mobile feature.
Also, Androids have a hardware "back" button that I could override and use as a "return to main menu" function, so I wrote a little code for that and enabled it on those phones.
Brain Bones running on the Playbook Simulator.
Brain Bones running on a Motorola Droid
Brain Bones running on an iPod Touch 4
Brain Bones running on a Barnes & Noble Nook Color
Brain Bones running on Windows as an AIR application. Note the volume slider in the lower right. It's not there on devices with hardware volume buttons.
Brain Bones running on a Mac as an AIR application
And finally, just to be gratuitous, the Brain Bones SWF running in the Chrome web browser as a web app.
ImageMagick Is A Good Thing - One thing I learned early on is that every platform has its own icon requirements. While all icons were the same format (PNG), every platform had its own preferred sizes. If I didn't want to spend a half hour in a paint program resizing icons every time I made a change, I needed a way to automate this.
And ImageMagick fit the bill. ImageMagick is a free set of cross-platform command-line tools to do stuff with images. And one of those tools is "convert", which resizes images and saves them back out.
The largest icon size I would need is 512x512 pixels (No, really. The iPad uses an icon this big), so I drew all my icons this big and made a little batch file that shrunk that mega-icon to the other NINE sizes I needed.
Dropbox is great for Android, iOS not so much- The final step in my batch-build was to copy every runtime, AIR, APK, BAR, and IPA file to my Dropbox folder. From there I could open the Dropbox app on my Android test devices and directly download and install the APK file, thus removing the need to cable all my Android test devices to my computer every time I wanted to test the game.
And while the iOS Dropbox app could see my brainbones.IPA file just fine, iOS flat refused to install or run it. Apple's policy is that the only way to put an IPA file on a test device is via iTunes, and they're sticking with that.
Installing to the Playbook Simulator was a matter of putting the simulator into "developer mode" and telling the Playbook BAR packager to send the BAR file to the Simulator's IP address. This process worked very simply, although it RIM has made the process into a more complicated "development certificate" affair with actual hardware devices.
(and if you don't yet have a dropbox account, go get a free one here, as I get a little extra space as a referral bonus, thankyouverymuch)
Flash Professional CS5.5
Recently shipped is the new Adobe CS5.5 suite, featuring improvements and new features in several tools. The bulk of the new features and improvements are designed to improve development for mobile devices. I recently got a one-on-one with someone from the Flash team and got a sneak-peek at the new features.
Here are the ones I found that stood out as being helpful for my own development process.
My Flash CS5.5 Likes
(note that Flash CS5.5 is being released as this article is being published. I should have a more in-depth review in a bit)
Incremental Compilation- While it's a good idea to store your sound files in an uncompressed high-bitrate format, that's not good for deployment. 44 kHz stereo WAV files sound great and don't lose any sound information, but they're way too big for mobile or web-streaming.
Flash has long had the ability to store uncompressed sounds in its project file and then compress them at compile-time to a compact format. You can tell the compiler to compress all sounds to the same format and bitrate, or you can compress each sound individually. If you are setting compression levels for each sound, you can listen to sounds without recompiling, so you can find a good balance between quality and size for each individual sound. Then the sounds are compressed into the SWF at compile-time for production testing.
Problem is, compressing and resampling big WAV files into compact lossy formats is slow, and the tradeoff for this convenience is a long wait during compiles. About 95% of the compile-time for my Bulldozer game is compressing the game's theme music into a low-bitrate mono MP3.
Flash CS5.5 finally added incremental compilation for sound and font files. Rather than re-rendering sounds and fonts every compile, the compressed results are now cached in the project file. If you, like me, like the convenience of letting Flash compress your sounds at compile-time, this is most welcome.
Export As Bitmap - If you read the development blogs from fellow mobile Flash developers, you have learned to avoid doing a lot of vector stuff in mobile Flash. While Flash was originally designed as a vector renderer, Flash also handles bitmaps just fine.
Problem is, Flash does not have a bitmap editor. If you want a game with bitmap space invaders, you will need to draw them outside Flash and import them. You can leave your invaders as vectors and use the Flash engine's "cache as bitmap" feature, but that still leaves the work of rasterizing to the Flash runtime. The new "Export As Bitmap" feature converts vector objects to bitmaps at design-time rather than run-time.
Visible Property - This is one of those "why didn't they implement this six versions ago" features. While Flash DisplayObjects have had a "visible" attribute since forever, the attribute was only something that you could set at runtime. If you place an object on the stage at design-time, but you want it to be invisible (like a wall at the edge of the screen for collision detection), you had two options:
- Set the alpha property to zero. This works, but it's not good practice because, while you can't see the object, it is still in the rendering pipeline and is included in rendering and bounding-box calculations. And if you are developing for a CPU-constrained platform, you do not want to spend time drawing things you can't see.
- Set the visible property to false at runtime. This is much better practice than setting alpha to zero, but you have to remember to code for it.
Better Publish-For-Mobile dialogs- While I chose to build my XML descriptor files manually, Flash does have a couple of "wizard" style dialogs where you can set your descriptor properties in a friendlier fashion. The Android one has been improved to allow Flash to directly deploy and run an APK file on a USB-connected device without moving to the command line.
And if it seems odd that you can target Android, iOS, Windows, Mac, and Linux, but not Playbook, this will be addressed soon.
Shared Libraries- All of the graphics and sounds that make up your game exist in your Flash project in the "Library". While I ended up making all of my platforms out of a single project, I could have broken it up into more than one project. For example, if I wanted to "tune" my graphics for each platform or have higher bitrate sounds on higher quality devices, I could have done that with multiple projects. Problem is, each project has its own assets, so anything updated in one project would need to be updated in the rest. Flash CS5.5 addresses this by allowing you to share and synchronize symbols among multiple documents inside a project folder.
My Flash CS5.5 Wish List
Components - While Flex is going to see much-improved mobile components (no surprise there. 90% of Flex IS components), Flash's current set of "works good on the desktop, but not on your phone" components are still there.
I was told that the plan is to usher people to some quality third-party mobile components for Flash. I would like to see some more effort on this, as things are currently fragmented. For example, AS3Flobile has a nice Android skin (which I have tried), and MinimalComps has an iOS skin (which I have not yet tried), but the two libraries are incompatible and would require me to support two different codebases to use both.
These third-party component libraries are nice, but I haven't found one yet that's complete to my satisfaction. And by that, I mean skinned for desktop, iOS, Android, and Playbook so that I can make my big collection of Brain Bones's look and work even better on each device with nice native-looking controls on each.
Flash has definitely arrived on mobile. Pretty-much every mobile device out there supports Flash to one extent or another (except Windows Phone 7, what gives?)
It's not only possible to quickly build a high-quality multiplatform game with Flash, but it's not all that difficult.


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Re: Witness The Book of Divine Wisdom
You say the sweetest things.
>the problem
Nonsense. The only problem is that there are so few that come to these parts with enough man in them to saddle up for some challenge runs. Even vanilla VH seems to be a stretch for the majority of the fair weather casuals.
Carp: >not finishing with punctuation
More to add? How about the highest settings cleared in each entry? You did say you wanted to know where you were lacking, yes?
Re: Witness The Book of Divine Wisdom
Tank,,,,, thought this would be a good palce to give you my thoughts as from what I read in your posts your a developer. To me it seems like if you dident start on day one of the beta test your out of luck to level up. I started around day 4 or 5 and when I play I get greased real quick as at level 1 or 2 you do not stand a chance with a level 10 or 15. Tho it was fun for the first few go arounds, when I play now it's no fun being thrown into the meat grinder for other players to use to level up. So now I nolonger am playing and do not think I will try it again. I did pre-order the game so time will tell if I threw away 59 bucks. Thanks,, Vlad
Re: Witness The Book of Divine Wisdom
For whatever reason, Chrome doesn't mind and fixes them for you but IE 9 doesn't.
Re: Witness The Book of Divine Wisdom
pwinant wrote:
Is anyone aware that all the image links are broken on IE 9? The image URL's are missing the second forward slash after the "https:". For example:
For whatever reason, Chrome doesn't mind and fixes them for you but IE 9 doesn't.
Good catch! I was wondering why I couldn't view those pages . I've posted the images on a thread in the MP Beta forum since others were having problems viewing them too; the link is mentioned below. Also sent a msg to Tank about it since there are other broken links like this as well on the Ascension site, such as the new screenshots posted in the "Thank You" note.
"The Book of Divine Wisdom"
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subset: commoncrawl


text:
Chevrolet Bel Air for Sale
Selected Filters:Type of Ad: Vehicles for Sale Make: Chevrolet Model: Bel Air Remove All
1964 Chevrolet Bel Air 4 Door Wagon Wagon
Ham Lake, MN
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St. Louis, MO
1955 Chevrolet Bel-Air Two Door Sedan Black and red exterior with black interior Upgraded full interior and guages 350 CID V-8 with Assault intake manifold, electric radiator... More
1956 Chevrolet Bel Air 4dr sedan
Staunton, IL
1956 Chevy Belair 4dr sedan, nicley done, solid body, nice and straight, slick paint, rebuilt front end, power disc brakes, new mag wheels, nice... More
Advertiser since 1993
What Makes CARS Inc. Interiors for Classic Chevy's so Good? USA-made Craftsmanship!
1962 Chevrolet Bel Air 2 Door Sedan
St. Louis, MO
1962 Chevrolet Bel-Air Custom Two-door Sedan Full professional restoration with frame completely painted and polished Air bags installed at all four corners, with controls hidden in... More
1957 Chevrolet Bel Air Hardtop
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1957 Chevrolet Bel-Air Two-door Hardtop New 5-spoke American Racing Torq Thrust wheels New Nitto (front) P245/45ZR17 & (back) 255/50ZR17 tires One of 168,293 examples made in 1957 350... More
1954 Chevrolet Bel Air 2dr Coupe
Ham Lake, MN
1954 chevrolet belair video Take a look at this gorgeous 1954 Chevrolet Belair 2dr! Very solid car that you can ride and drive anywhere!... More
1954 Chevrolet Bel Air Hardtop Coupe
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Here we have a 1954 Chevrolet Belair 2dr Hardtop Street Rod. Nicely built with the following: Small block Chevrolet motor 200R4 Automatic Overdrive Transmission... More
1957 Chevrolet Bel Air Sedan
St. Louis, MO
1957 Chevrolet Bel-Air Sedan Super solid fully restored iconic bowtie India Ivory over Tropical Turquoise exterior and blue vinyl and cloth interior 283 CID V-8 engine Two-speed Powerglide... More
1957 Chevrolet Bel Air 4dr sedan
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1957 Chevy Belair 4dr sedan, good soli dbody, nice slick paint, nice redone period correct int, mag wheels, v8, auto, aluminum radiator, runs and... More
Advertiser since 1993
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1955 CHEVROLET BEL AIR, this is and all original car with a new paint job not show qualty but looks nice the engine is... More
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text:
Miscellany of fish stuff
I bought a bunch of stuff from an ex-hobbyist and have a lot left over after using what I needed from it. Here is a partial list; if you're looking for something in particular, give me a shout. I'm in the Santa Fe area, but can deliver to Albuquerque or meet you half-way.
Mr. Cleaner Gravel Vacuum -- battery operated. In great condition -- still in original packaging. Former owner apparently used it only once. $7.00
Shipping bags -- these are the 2 mil shipping bags. There are several different sizes available -- $2.50 per pack of 25.
Powerheads -- Miscellaneous powerheads -- as I recall there are two Penguin 550's, one Penguin 1140 and three AquaClear 103's. Asking $6 a piece or $28 for the lot.
Texas Holey Rock -- quite a few lbs of this stuff. Big and small pieces. $1.00/lb
Driftwood -- mostly Malaysian driftwood -- some burl-type pieces of some other variety. Several sizes and shapes available. PM for pics.
Lots and lots of Fluorite (Seachem Fluorite mixed color), used but incredibly clean (former owner cleaned it thoroughly in vinegar, baked it twice and stored it). $0.50/lb
Heaters -- 25W, 300W
Other stuff I can't even remember.
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text:
Flu Claims Lives Of Three More On Central Coast
All Under The Age Of 65
SALINAS, Calif.-- - Despite three more flu deaths in Monterey County, bringing the total to five, there is a shortage of flu vaccines at Doctors on Duty.
"We've had a good response to the point that we're out of vaccines," said Steve Standley, a 32-year veteran physician's associate at Doctors on Duty.
Doctors on Duty is out of vaccines in all eight offices on the Central Coast. Six of them are in Monterey County, two in Santa Cruz.
Standley said nearly half of the patients Doctors on Duty sees are for the flu. He said the deaths aren't the shocking part.
"We've had some deaths that they were young, healthy people with no additional medical issues and that was the surprising part," Standley said.
The Monterey County Health Department is still fully stocked with vaccines even after it ran out during a free flu clinic at Salinas Valley Memorial Healthcare System (SVMH) last month. Hospital workers were surprised when more than a thousand people lined up around the corner.
"We've seen people come back to the emergency room because they aren't getting any better and it's been two or three months," said Jovita Dominguez, a registered nurse at SVMH.
With eight flu deaths on the Central Coast, what do you do if you already have the flu?
"Rest, drink plenty of fluids, support your body to help fight it off," Standley said.
Otherwise, Standley said, doctor prescribed anti-viral agents like Tamiflu may be your best bet.
SVMH will have another free flu clinic a week from this Saturday, Feb. 22 from 11a.m. to 2p.m. CLICK HERE to learn more.


text:
Every season a number of Arsenal players go out on loan to gain valuable first-team experience. The 2011/12 campaign is no different and 16 Gunners are currently away from the Club.
Arsenal.com track their progress throughout the season. Our Arsenal's Loanees page offers an overview of all the players and below is the latest instalment of our Loan Watch feature with reports from their latest matches.
Sanchez Watt
Hull 0-1 Crawley Town
Saturday, January 28
Sanchez Watt made his Crawley Town debut on Saturday, playing 89 minutes as the League Two outfit secured their passage to the fifth round of the FA Cup against Hull.
Gavin Hoyte
AFC Wimbledon 1-2 Aldershot
Saturday, January 28
Gavin Hoyte made his AFC Wimbledon debut on Saturday, playing the whole match as his new side lost 2-1 against Aldershot at the Cherry Red Records Stadium.
Kyle Bartley
Rangers 4-0 Hibernian
Saturday, January 28
Kyle Bartley played the full 90 minutes of Rangers' comfortable 4-0 win over Hibernian at Ibrox on Saturday.
Carlos Vela
Real Sociedad 5-1 Sporting Gijon
Sunday, January 29
Carlos Vela played 80 minutes of Real Sociedad's 5-1 win over Sporting Gijon on Sunday and set up his team's second goal of the game.
Joel Campbell
Lorient 1-1 Sochaux
Saturday, January 28
Joel Campbell played 75 minutes of Lorient's 1-1 draw with Sochaux on Saturday before being replaced in the second half.
Alcoyano 0-1 Real Valladolid
Saturday, January 28
Wellington played half an hour as a second-half substitute in Alcoyano's 1-0 defeat to Real Valladolid on Saturday.
Vito Mannone
Hull 0-1 Crawley
Saturday, January 28
Vito Mannone played the full 90 minutes as Hull were knocked out of the FA Cup by League Two Crawley on Saturday.
Sead Hajrovic
Barnet 2-0 Crewe
Saturday, January 28
Sead Hajrovic made his Barnet debut on Saturday, coming on as a late substitute in their 2-0 win over nine-man Crewe at Underhill on Saturday.
Pedro Botelho
Levante 1-2 Getafe
Sunday, January 29
Pedro Botelho made his Levante debut on Sunday, playing 69 minutes of the team's 2-1 defeat at the hands of Getafe.
Daniel Boateng
Leicester 2-0 Swindon
Saturday, January 28
Daniel Boateng was an unused substitute in Swindon's 2-0 defeat at Leicester City on Saturday.
Nicklas Bendtner
Sunderland 1-1 Middlesbrough
Sunday, January 29
Nicklas Bendtner did not feature in Sunderland's 1-1 draw with Middlesbrough at the Stadium of Light on Sunday as he recovers from a facial injury.
Chuks Aneke
Stevenage 1-0 Notts County
Saturday, January 28
Chuks Aneke did not feature in Stevenage's 1-0 FA Cup win over Notts County on Saturday as the team secured their passage through to the fifth round for the first time ever.
Samuel Galindo
Gimnastic Tarragona 1-2 Almeria
Sunday, January 29
Samuel Galindo did not feature in Gimnastic Tarragona's 2-1 defeat to Almeria on Sunday.
Sao Paulo
Sao Paulo are currently in their off-season.


text:
IP Trace For 22.214.171.124
You searched for 184.108.40.206 and it is located in United States .
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text:
UN.GIFT Publications
CSO Where have all the flowers gone?
2011-02-22 10:45:00.0
Download right click "save as"
This research draws its learnings from the implementation of an anti-trafficking case management programme, which aimed to identify cases of children disconnected from their families and assist families to recover traces of their missing children. The programme showed that if the assistance begins from the source areas/victims's home, then victims are often recovered before being sold. Furthermore it has a significant impact on prevention, as the crime gets visible to the community at large. This publication should be useful for development practitioners at national and international levels, researchers, academics and policy makers.


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The DT 990 Edition headphones have been winning the hearts of countless HiFi and music enthusiasts since the 1980s. Boasting vibrant and natural sound, these headphones have been a popular choice for many years and are suitable for many music styles. The DT 990 Edition has been part of the beyerdynamic portfolio for more than 20 years and still enjoys exceptional popularity. All components are available as replacement parts, making the DT 990 Edition a reliable companion for many years to come.
The DT 990 Edition comes in an open back design. This means that background noise outside the headphones remains clearly discernible even at higher volumes. This design lends the music a feeling of a wide soundstage, an appreciation of space that gives almost the same sense of enjoyment as listening to music with loudspeakers. The sound is spectacular. Distinctive highs and intense bass combine to produce a perfect richness of sound that delights rock and pop enthusiasts in particular.
The flexible headband and silky-smooth ear pads ensure wearing comfort "par excellence". The ear pads are known for their breathable and skin-friendly velour, enabling the listener to enjoy music for hours without any excessive build-up of heat.The combination of comfortable headband and ear pads as well as yokes made from aluminium lend the headphones a stable exterior and a pleasant fit for long listening sessions.
The DT 990 Edition headset for use at home and the DT 990 PRO studio headset: both are identical when it comes to sound. Identically designed acoustic transducers are used. However, the Edition models have a somewhat softer headband for enjoying music at home while the Pro headset has a slightly tighter fit on the head so that it doesn't move even in case of faster movements in everyday studio use. Moreover, the PRO version is supplied with a coiled cable and the Edition version with a straight cable.
The 600-ohm version is suitable for HiFi systems with especially powerful headphone outputs or for use with special headphone amplifiers. The 250 ohm version of the DT 990 Edition was developed for use at home on a stereo system. The 32 ohm version is recommended for versatile use including on mobile devices such as tablets or smartphones.
The DT 990 Edition is available as a Manufaktur edition and can thus be custom designed to suit your requirements. Choose from a range of colours, preferred impedance, housing parts and different cables. All needs can thus be met.
DT 990 Edition Manufaktur
The quality pledge "Made in Germany" starts with the high-quality of the built-in parts. The next step includes hand crafting in Germany, where the product is produced with care and attention to detail. Finally, our products are characterised by durability, since many parts can be exchanged and replaced.
FAQs about DT 990 Edition and similar models
* Required Fields
beyerdynamic GmbH & Co. KGTheresienstr. 874072 Heilbronn - Germany
Questions regarding Orders, Payment & Delivery
Phone: +49 7131 617-444
Product Advice
Phone: +49 7131 617-430
Or contact us per e-mail!
pure value Ausg. 4, 11/2014Title: Plenty of individualityAuthor: Andreas GüntherTranslated from the original German article[...]
For large auditoriums there are customised microphone concepts, for individual ears unique headphone are manufactured. The lot size of one becomes a core message at the company's headquarters in Heilbronn. On their website beyerdynamic provide a headphone configurator, like the car industry, for the DT 880 and DT 990 over-ear headphones. Which colour, which leather, perhaps a plate with your name? This is a good sign: The individuality costs only a little more than the standard model; at best a modest waiting time of two weeks.
Stereo 01/2008
Translated from the original German article
It is comfortable when wearing and it sits right without creating any pressure. The sound is really spectacular with powerful highs and a crispy bass. It is never too intrusive, but it is also not very light. A wonderful reproduction of vocals. Price/performance: Very good


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Serves 8-10
125g (cup) butter, preferably unsalted
170g (cup) caster sugar
1 tsp vanilla essence
2 eggs
250g (2 cups) fine semolina (farina)
1 tsp baking powder
½ tsp bicarbonate of soda (baking soda)
185g (cup) plain yoghurt
Blanched split almonds
440g (2 cups) sugar
1 Tbsp lemon juice
1. Preheat the oven to 180°C. Grease a 20x30 cm slab cake tin.
2. Cream the butter, sugar and vanilla until light and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time and beat well after each addition. Sift the semolina, baking powder and bicarbonate of soda twice, then fold into the butter mixture alternately with the yoghurt.
3. Spread the batter into the tin. Arrange the almonds in rows on top of the cake, placing four rows across and seven down - so that when the cake is cut, an almond will be centred on each piece.
4. Bake for 30-35 minutes, or until a skewer inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean.
Meanwhile, make the syrup. In a saucepan, dissolve the sugar in 375ml (1 cup) water over medium heat. Add the lemon juice and bring to the boil, then allow to boil rapidly for 10 minutes. Cool the syrup by standing the pan in cold water.
5. Spoon the cooled syrup over the hot cake. Allow the cake to cool thoroughly.
6. To serve, cut into diamond shapes or squares. Serve with thick whipped cream if desired.


text:
After extracting one super full of honey, is it best to put that super full of wet frames back on the hive for the bees to clean up, or can it be placed outside for the bees to clean in the open? I just want them to clean it up so that I can store it until next season; I don't want them to put anything in it.
Thank you.


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Ohmy corndogs man. She is this greatest human ever to walk the planet. Cuter than MArtin Freeman, more intelligent than Sherlock Holmes, she deserves a BAFTA for her stunning sense of humor, award worthy good looks, the softest flesh ever known to man. She is the perfect person to fangirl with things about and has a great tumblr. She has a profound love for shoulder blades and collar bones and boys who are scrawny as fuck (i.e. Colin Morgan, Ben Whishaw). She has an amazing sense of style and is very creative and makes lots of neat stuff. She is loyal, caring and kind and a RAVENCLAW.
by The Ocelot Polisher January 05, 2013


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The first time I lifted a bar, the comb had attached to the side with the expected results.
The second time, I used a bread knife "just in case", then graduated to a homemade "L" shaped cutter, again, running it between comb and wall ""just in case"
Yesterday, I noticed something: I use my hive tool to seperate the bars from each other by about 1/4" (prior to lifting) first one side, then the other. If you watch each each side of the comb as you twist the tool you can see if it will stick or not. If no sticking, go right to "lift bar"( or move it away from the entrance, then lift). Speeds up the process - Mike


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Snow-packed hills prove to be headache for drivers
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. - Snowpacked hills proved to be a headache for drivers trying to make their way on roadways Wednesday night and Thursday morning.
At least 12 cars stalled on E Garden of the Gods while trying to make their way into the intersection of Austin Bluffs and Nevada Avenue.
Driver Matthew Blanski's black pickup truck skidded for nearly 10 minutes trying to gain traction on the snowpacked hill.
"I knew I needed a push or someone to pull me but I couldn't have made it if someone didn't come and push."
Two employees at ABBA Eyecare left their posts to give Blanski a hand.
"That guy was spinning his tires for like 10 minutes," said Cody Poston.
"Yeah, we saw his tires were spinning and we looked back over 10 minutes later and he was still sitting there," said Isaac Hackler.
Blanski was not the only driver having problems. Colorado Springs Police temporarily shut down E Garden of the Gods between Mark Dabling Boulevard and the intersection of Austin Bluffs and Nevada Avenue because of the amount of cars stuck on the hill. A semi-truck couldn't get traction and rolled down the hill toward oncoming traffic. There were no accidents from the incident.
Colorado Springs Streets Program supervisor Cory Farkas said for his plow team, snowpacked hills are one of their toughest challenges. He cited Woodmen Road and Austin Bluffs for being extremely difficult to tackle.
"Hills are always going to be a problem because you've got a steep incline that's going to have snow and the best we can do it try to de-ice them and if that doesn't work, bring the sanders out to get some traction on it," said Farkas.
But on Wednesday night, the Austin Bluff's hill proved to be even too much for plows. Colorado Springs Police shut down the road because cars were getting stuck.
UCCS student Kirstin Brenna Coco was stranded at the top of the Austin Bluffs hill because the road closure shut down the shuttle to her car.
"I actually called my mom and she was the one that said, 'I can't come get you,' and then I tried taking the bus to Four Diamonds, we have a shuttle here, and it wasn't going up the hill," said Coco.
She counted at least 10 people stranded at the shuttle stop with her. She said more students were on the bus and additional students were stuck at the bottom of the hill.
"What worried us all, that you know, 'what's the liability issue? What's the plan for the weather in the emergency?,'" said Coco.
She stayed with a cheerleading teammate in a dorm on campus. UCCS set up a temporary shelter for stranded students but it said no one stayed at the shelter.
Coco said she is glad the university canceled classes so her classmates and teachers could stay safe and off the roads.


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Post-Operative Delirium in Elderly Surgical Patients (STRIDE)
This study is ongoing, but not recruiting participants.
Johns Hopkins University
National Institute on Aging (NIA)
Information provided by (Responsible Party):
Frederick Sieber, M.D., Johns Hopkins University
ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier:
First received: December 28, 2007
Last updated: June 6, 2016
Last verified: June 2016
- Full Text View
- Tabular View
- No Study Results Posted
- Disclaimer
- How to Read a Study Record
Detailed Description:
This research is being done to see what effects sedative drugs during surgery have on peoples' thinking processes after they wake up.
Hip Fractures
Device: Deeper sedation
Device: Moderate sedation
|Study Type:
|Study Design:
|Allocation: Randomized
Intervention Model: Parallel Assignment
Masking: Double Blind (Participant, Care Provider, Outcomes Assessor)
Primary Purpose: Prevention
|Official Title:
|A Strategy to Reduce the Incidence of Post-Operative Delirium in Elderly Patients
Resource links provided by NLM:
MedlinePlus related topics: Delirium Hip Injuries and DisordersU.S. FDA Resources
Further study details as provided by Johns Hopkins University:
Primary Outcome Measures:
- Presence of delirium [ Time Frame: Postoperative days 1-5; 1 mon. after surgery; & 1 yr. after surgery ]Memory/thinking testing
Secondary Outcome Measures:
- Change in functional status [ Time Frame: 1 mon. & 1 yr. after surgery ]Ability to perform Activities of Daily Living; strength and walking testing
|Study Start Date:
|January 2005
|Estimated Study Completion Date:
|May 2017
|Estimated Primary Completion Date:
|May 2017 (Final data collection date for primary outcome measure)
|Assigned Interventions
Active Comparator: Deeper sedation
Patients randomly assigned to this arm will receive enough sedative drugs to keep their level of awareness during the hip fracture repair at a Bispectral index (BIS) score of 50-60. This is the "deeper sedation" arm.
Device: Deeper sedation
The depth of sedation, as measured by the Bispectral index (BIS) score and the use of the Observer's Assessment of Awareness/Sedation Scale (OAA/S), will be maintained at a BIS value of 50-60 and/or an OAA/S score of 0.
Other Names:
Active Comparator: Moderate sedation
Patients randomly assigned to this arm will receive enough sedative drugs to keep their level of awareness during the hip fracture repair at a Bispectral index (BIS) score of 70-80. This is the "moderate sedation" arm.
Device: Moderate sedation
The depth of sedation, as measured by the Bispectral index (BIS) score and the use of the Observer's Assessment of Awareness/Sedation Scale (OAA/S), will be maintained at a BIS value of 70-80 and/or an OAA/S score of 4-5.
Other Names:
Detailed Description:
We give sedative drugs to patients having spinal anesthesia so they are "asleep" (sedated) while we are fixing their broken hips. The spinal anesthesia provides pain relief at the site of surgery, while the sedative drugs keep people "asleep" during the procedure. We want to find out whether the amount of sedation we give might (1) make patients be confused when they wake up or (2) have anything to do with how well patients can do their ordinary daily routines a few months after their surgery.
|Ages Eligible for Study:
|65 Years and older (Adult, Senior)
|Sexes Eligible for Study:
|Accepts Healthy Volunteers:
Inclusion Criteria:
- is 65 years of age or older at admission;
- has surgical treatment of a traumatic hip fracture;
- has participating surgeon;
- has Mini-Mental Status Exam score of 15 or higher;
- able to read/write/speak/hear/understand English;
- gives informed consent;
- receives spinal anesthesia
Exclusion Criteria:
- receives general anesthesia;
- does not write/write/speak/hear/understand English;
- has severe chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD);
- has severe congestive heart failure (CHF);
- has Mini-Mental Status Exam score less than 15;
- declines to give informed consent;
- age less than 65 years at admission;
- attending surgeon does not participate in study
Contacts and Locations
Choosing to participate in a study is an important personal decision. Talk with your doctor and family members or friends about deciding to join a study. To learn more about this study, you or your doctor may contact the study research staff using the Contacts provided below. For general information, see Learn About Clinical Studies.
Please refer to this study by its ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT00590707
Please refer to this study by its ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT00590707
|United States, Maryland
|The Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center
|Baltimore, Maryland, United States, 21224
Sponsors and Collaborators
Johns Hopkins University
National Institute on Aging (NIA)
|Principal Investigator:
|Frederick E. Sieber, MD
|Dept. of Anesthesiology and Critical Care Medicine, School of Medicine, The Johns Hopkins University
More Information
Publications automatically indexed to this study by ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier (NCT Number):
Keywords provided by Johns Hopkins University:
Additional relevant MeSH terms:
ClinicalTrials.gov processed this record on May 25, 2017
Publications automatically indexed to this study by ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier (NCT Number):
Sieber FE, Zakriya KJ, Gottschalk A, Blute MR, Lee HB, Rosenberg PB, Mears SC. Sedation depth during spinal anesthesia and the development of postoperative delirium in elderly patients undergoing hip fracture repair. Mayo Clin Proc. 2010 Jan;85(1):18-26. doi: 10.4065/mcp.2009.0469. Erratum in: Mayo Clin Proc. 2010 Apr;85(4):400. Dosage error in article text.
|Responsible Party:
|Frederick Sieber, M.D., Professor, Johns Hopkins University
|ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier:
|NCT00590707 History of Changes
|Other Study ID Numbers:
ACCM Delirium 3
R01AG033615 ( US NIH Grant/Contract Award Number )
|Study First Received:
|December 28, 2007
|Last Updated:
|June 6, 2016
Keywords provided by Johns Hopkins University:
Hip fractures
Femoral neck fractures
Trochanteric fractures
Intertrochanteric fractures
Subtrochanteric fractures
Additional relevant MeSH terms:
Hip Fractures
Neurobehavioral Manifestations
Neurologic Manifestations
Nervous System Diseases
Signs and Symptoms
Neurocognitive Disorders
Mental Disorders
Femoral Fractures
Fractures, Bone
Wounds and Injuries
Hip Injuries
Leg Injuries
ClinicalTrials.gov processed this record on May 25, 2017


text:
Day 5: Rocky Mountain High Stratton to Avon, CO
Trip Start Jul 29, 2007
22Trip End Aug 18, 2007
Map your own trip!
Loading Map
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Where I stayed
Mileage covered: Approx 385 (we forget to read odometer before getting out of car today)
Weather: Rainy and mostly overcast with patches of sun
Abby Meltdowns: 0 - Abby appeared to be in some kind of mountain-induced sleep coma most of the day -- we could pay for this tonight!
Highlights: Aeeign the Rocky Mountains, Colorado Capitol Building, big horn sheep sighting, first snow capped mountain sighting, passing Georgetown, CO
National Park Stamps of the Day: Rocky Mountain National Park
Stay Over: The Pines Lodge at Beaver Creek resort in Avon, Colorado
Phrase of the Day: "Watch for Rocks and Wildlife on Road" Actual message on digital oad sign on Rte 70 before Vail
Shout Outs (new feature): Special birthday shout out to our nephew Ben on his 9th Birthday and our brother-in-law Chris who shares the 8/2 birthday! Hope you guys had a good one. A belated Birthday shout out to our friend Nancy whose birthday was 8/1!
Trivia Question of the Day: Where did World's First Rodeo take place? Hint: We passed it. (That is a special one for rodeo-loving Ben on his birthday)
Bonus trivia question: Which of the following was not considered as a possible name for Colorado: Cibola, Idaho, Franklin, Montana
Answer to yesterday's trivia question: Our good friend Kevin Hart pulled out the win with Sen. Arlen Specter. We were trying to trick some of you into a more obvious, but wrong answer -- Bob Dole, who is also from Russell, KS, but is obviously no longer a Senator. Way to go Kevin!
Thanks to our guest blogger who allowed me to turn in early yesterday -- the depth of his "Oz" themed blog was much more than I can provide -- I go for the descriptive accounts and cheap laughs
Today we traversed Colorado taking in the beautiful Rockies. Unfortunately, the weather didn't cooperate, but Abby sure did. We now know she certainly doesn't get car sick -- although the twists and turns of the Mountains seem to make her very sleepy. I think she was only away for about 25% of our time in the car.
After hitting Denver for a quick drive through and a tour of the Capitol, we made a spur of the moment decision to head up to Rocky Mountain National Park. We made good time getting there, but the weather kept getting worse. We had a couple of breaks in the clouds, but much of our ride in the Rockies was sopped in. There were whispers from the driver's seat indicating that we might need to come back some day -- add it to the list of National Park sites the O'Briens will visit again.
Tip for gamblers (yes, primarily Jer) - Try Black Hawk, CO.
We ended up at the beautiful Beaver Creek resort for the night. Now we need to catch some shut eye, which shouldn't be hard with the cool mountain air coming in the open windows.
A request has been made from a blog faithful to provide a highlight of tomorrow's destinations -- sorry, but no can do -- the beauty of this trip is that we go wherever the Odyssey, our imagination and the GPS take us for as long as one little girl can last...and we need to keep you coming back with anticipation...(ok, usually we just don't decide until breakfast!)


text:
Town Square
PAUSD needs an independent public investigation of bullying and student civil rights
Original post made by Ken Dauber, Barron Park, on Feb 22, 2013
We Can Do Better Palo Alto has for the last several years advocated for progress on the issues that are raised by this case: student social and emotional health, student civil rights, site-based control, and transparency in governance. At last Tuesday's school board meeting I and several other parent leaders and members of We Can Do Better Palo Alto called for an independent, impartial investigation into how this happened. We believe this step is critical to restoring public confidence in our school leadership.
So far, the school board has responded only by expressing regret, and by scheduling a closed meeting next Tuesday afternoon to discuss this case with the superintendent. The public will not be able to attend.
This week, another previously undisclosed resolution agreement between OCR and PAUSD has come to light, this one from October. Once again, the Superintendent communicated the agreement to Board members only after press inquiries last week, in a letter to the board dated February 14. The October case concerns failure to comply with requirements for 504 accommodations for disabled students.
A post to the We Can Do Better Facebook page puts this in national context: Web Link
As that post details, OCR very rarely finds against a district as it has with PAUSD. In only 1% of similar complaints over the past 4 years has such a finding been made. According to OCR data, PAUSD is one of only 15 public school districts in the country over the last 4 years found by OCR to have violated federal civil rights law for disability based harassment. OCR reports that of the 1513 complaints received over that period, only 240 required any OCR involvement. Of those, 119 were resolved through an Early Complaint Resolution process that was offered to PAUSD but not accepted by PAUSD, and another 87 were settled after an investigation began but before a finding of noncompliance, an opportunity also rejected by PAUSD. The remaining handful of cases, including PAUSD, settled only after the investigation concluded with a determination that federal civil rights law had been violated. Most of these are poor or rural districts.
Why did PAUSD choose not to resolve the case earlier? That decision has likely exposed the district to significant financial liability, as well as delaying help for the disabled victim of bullying who is at the center of the case. Unfortunately the board did not have chance to weigh in on this decision before a finding of noncompliance with the law.
At last week's board meeting, Dr. Skelly stated that he did not inform the board because he was "embarrassed" by the finding. He then stated in a February 14 letter to school board members that he "did not see the significance of the resolution agreement being signed" because such agreements were new to him. (See Web Link).
Dr. Skelly does have some prior experience with bullying cases and civil rights violations, however, as he was Associate Superintendent in Poway when that district lost a landmark civil rights bullying harassment case, Donovan v. Poway Unified (see Web Link). That case was the first case ever to hold a school liable under the California Education Code for failing to protect students from peer harassment (in that case based on sexual orientation), in part because of a failure by district officials to ensure that schools followed the district's complaint procedures. In that case, the plaintiffs received three quarters of a million dollars in damages and attorney's fees, due to the fact that the district failed to intervene despite repeated complaints -- a fact pattern similar to the OCR findings in its PAUSD investigation. Indeed, the Poway precedent will probably figure in any future litigation against PAUSD under state anti-discrimination law.
PAUSD currently has 6 board polices (1312.1, 1312.3, 5121, 5415.3, 5415.7 and 5415.9) and 3 sets of administrative regulations (1312.1, 1312.3, and 5415.7) that cover the bullying case investigated by OCR, yet according to OCR none of these were implemented by staff. The district has a designated Coordinator for Nondiscrimination under one of these policies (BP 5145.3) and a designated Compliance Officer under another (AR 1312.3) [both of whom are Associate Superintendent Charles Young] yet neither of these policies was enforced.
Accountability and progress depend on a full, fair, and transparent understanding of what happened so that we can take steps to make sure that it doesn't happen again. I have no doubt that all of the district staff involved care deeply about bullying and students' civil rights. That fact only underscores the need to understand how these mistakes could have been made. We will renew our request for a full, impartial and independent investigation of this situation at the next school board meeting, on Tuesday evening. Hopefully the school board will agree with us that transparency and accountability require an honest reporting of the facts.
a resident of Midtown
on Feb 22, 2013 at 7:22 am
What? whoever hire Skelly should had done a complete background check on him and the kind of work he did at the former districts he worked for. They just look at the Harvard graduation and were blinded by it and were not able to see beyond that. I am sorry but it is time for him to go, and all the others allow the bullying to continue. How can Skelly take that check and spend it when he let innocent people suffer. Does he have a conscience? Thanks Kent for doing your homework even when you do not get the big paycheck.
a resident of Palo Alto High School
on Feb 22, 2013 at 7:50 am
PAUSD has violated students'rights re bullying for years, decades even. It is time they paid some restitution. It is long past due for an independent third party to investigate the district, and especially Skelly. He is a failure at his job, and while he may be well-educated, he does not have the necessary set of skills to do the job. Anyone else so bad at a job would lose that job.
a resident of Barron Park
on Feb 22, 2013 at 8:08 am
I don't see anywhere in that weblink where Skelly states he was "embarrassed". What else have you misrepresented?
a resident of Barron Park
on Feb 22, 2013 at 8:20 am
Ken Dauber is a registered user.
See the Weekly's coverage from last week: Web Link.
a resident of Crescent Park
on Feb 22, 2013 at 8:30 am
Thanks Mr. Dauber. Great reporting and data. Kevin Skelly is a red hot mess. Charles Young seems like he has a gift for creating legal violations too -- cyclic fibrosis, 2 different OCR investigations, trying to tank the homework time limits, gee whiz. We really do not have the A team down there. I hope we get that investigation and I think that if the board did know they should be recalled.
a resident of Barron Park
on Feb 22, 2013 at 8:37 am
Ken Dauber is a registered user.
See also an article in today's Weekly: Web Link, which also covers the second OCR investigation.
a resident of Crescent Park
on Feb 22, 2013 at 8:50 am
Overzealous--embarrassed is the least he should be. How about unemployed? Mr. Dauber seems like the only one who wasn't in on the cover up so maybe you should give him some respect.
a resident of Palo Alto High School
on Feb 22, 2013 at 8:52 am
I recommend having district executives and Board of Ed members who act with concern for all students in the district. I'm not saying it is easy to do this, but this perspective must be maintained for fairness. I have had the thought at times that the Board was not focusing on the big picture of ALL students. This is a unified district, and I think that should mean something.
For this reason and others, I agree with the ideas of WCDBPA, even though we no longer have students in school, I am still concerned about the welfare and educational experience of local students.
The debacle of approving Mandarin Immersion is a prime example of catering to a select, self-focused group.I thought it appropriate and correct to take action on foreign language programs in a comprehensive way, that would be well worth doing, on behalf of ALL the students in the district, not by throwing everyone else into difficulty.
(School space issues, for example, related to MI or anything else should be a district issue, not something that one group is permitted to inflict on others while they enjoy small class size and select opportunities).
Ecucational equality is very important.
It is a high achieving district by most measures, however I will be blunt here in that I oppose hiring/voting in the Harvard Club, who then educate their kids in this district and gain their admission into Harvard, too, as legacies. It's too Harvard-centric.In reality it's a wide world out there, and I strongly oppose the Harvard-clubbiness as this is a public school district with a variety of persons in and associated with it.
a resident of Barron Park
on Feb 22, 2013 at 9:09 am
Exactly! In both cases listed in the Weekly he said he was embarrassed by the findings and why shouldn't he be? But being embarrassed by the findings is not the reason it wasn't brought to the board.
This is your mis-representation of the facts:
"Dr. Skelly stated that he did not inform the board because he was "embarrassed" by the finding."
This is simply not true and you should apologize.
a resident of Embarcadero Oaks/Leland
on Feb 22, 2013 at 9:17 am
One of the side effects of a very school district full of really smart parents and students is a lack of tolerance for anyone less intelligence or capable (like the parents that consider "B" students slackers and losers...) This logically translates into a lack of tolerance for special ed kids, particularly at the already less-than-kind stage of middle school.
Many of the changes that would perhaps better our District for the "regular" kids either won't happen or will be very slow to happen due to the academic success we have achieved. No one at the top wants to rock the boat and potentially bring achievement levels down.
I actually really like Dr. Skelly and think that in general he has done a good job and wants the best for PAUSD kids, BUT he and the BOE need to provide some clear vision in a few area (bullying being one) and a clear DISTRICT WIDE policy for some things. Site based management has its positive sides, but it is clear that it doesn't work in all areas.
Curriculum (which varies from school to school widely) and behavioral expectation should be clear and consistent at every school in the District.
a resident of Adobe-Meadow
on Feb 22, 2013 at 9:41 am
The Daily Post reported that Skelly said that he withheld the report because he was embarrassed. Your outrage seems misdirected.
a resident of Old Palo Alto
on Feb 22, 2013 at 10:03 am
overzealous, are you serious? Stop shooting the messenger. Go watch the video of the board meeting. Anyway, who cares whether he was embarrassed because he screwed up or embarrassed because he got caught screwing up or embarrassed because of the bullying problem. We shouldn't have to guess what our highly paid superintendent was embarrassed about screwing up. What about Poway? Was he embarrassed about that? How much is it going to take before we throw this joker overboard? He can't do the job and he's embarrassed about it. I'm sorry he's embarrassed but the Peter Principle is not a life sentence for PAUSD.
a resident of Gunn High School
on Feb 22, 2013 at 12:05 pm
Thanks Ken Dauber for this thoughtful analysis. You're right that sunshine will be the best disinfectant. Let's hope we all get that message.
a resident of Palo Alto High School
on Feb 22, 2013 at 3:01 pm
palo alto mom/Embarcadero Oaks/Leland
You posted about "B" students - I actually think some of those students are doing their own work instead of being prepped in advance by parent-paid tutors, and perhaps some of these "B" students are the genuine ones...
I actually think grades ought to be private matters, instead of subjects for bragging by some students and their parents. Constant one-upmanship is unpleasant and sometimes is even inaccurate (about some students' talents/abilities!) but some are determined to put others down.
a resident of Embarcadero Oaks/Leland
on Feb 22, 2013 at 3:59 pm
Paly Parent - you are probably correct that the "B" students do their own work, I would personally rather have my kids get "B" on their own... Recently I was at a meeting and some of the parents were discussing how the kids the "only get B's" need help and must be slackers. Made me sad.
a resident of Adobe-Meadow
on Feb 22, 2013 at 4:07 pm
Ken, it didn't. The Post's article actually explained why he didn't inform the board as does the email you linked. The article, unlike the Weekly's also explained what he apologized for.
It's not outrage, it's your typical spin. Stick to the facts.
a resident of Palo Alto High School
on Feb 22, 2013 at 4:10 pm
My son went through his entire primary and secondary education here. I was shocked when, even at the kindergarten level, parents were obviously doing the homework for the kids. By obvious, I mean elementary school kids just do not write that small and stylishly, nor do they dictate that eloquently, nor do they draw that small and accurately.
My son worked very hard on building a motor for a science fair project, and was completely overlooked because of children whose parents obviously did the project for them and wrote about it for them. Basically, these kids get rewarded for cheating, and learn nothing. What message are they getting? My son felt like a failure because he did not cheat!
a resident of Adobe-Meadow
on Feb 22, 2013 at 4:14 pm
Again, I'm reminded why I voted for the three board members who ended up winning and not for the one who didn't. Sour grapes, me thinks.
a resident of Leland Manor/Garland Drive
on Feb 22, 2013 at 5:09 pm
Spectator at Large is a registered user.
Ken: I reread the article about the board meeting next Tuesday and think it means that Skelly's performance review is closed but that addressing the OCR stuff will be open forum. Am I wrong here? Did the board change their mind about letting the people they serve be in on the discussion about the OCR issues?
Here's the quote from the article:
"Skelly told the Weekly Wednesday that a discussion of the matter would be on the board of education's public agenda next Tuesday night, Feb. 26. A closed session for Skelly's mid-year performance evaluation is also on the agenda."
a resident of East Palo Alto
on Feb 22, 2013 at 5:47 pm
Deos anyone know how much $ PAUSD spend law wise? That is for lawyers consulting and settlements (which may be kept confidential).
a resident of Duveneck/St. Francis
on Feb 22, 2013 at 6:01 pm
Thank you Ken Dauber for your excellent research. This is completely unacceptable from both Kevin Skelly and the board.
How can someone look at this information and not be enraged by Skelly's actions and our School Board's inaction?!
Exactly who is in charge and when will they step up and realize how serious this is?
Talk about things I wish I knew about PAUSD when I was buying my house. The premium real estate prices for the supposed "excellent schools" is a sham when you look at this data.
It is a miracle the schools do as well as they do DESPITE the board and the superintendent.
What an unfortunate mark of shame.
a resident of another community
on Feb 22, 2013 at 9:21 pm
@Too Scared to speak Out - why scared? most likely you are not the only one. Such fear to speak out may indicate serious systemic issue, here - the biggest democracy on earth.
a resident of Another Palo Alto neighborhood
on Feb 22, 2013 at 10:05 pm
Speaking out means your child will be assigned the worst teacher. At my kids' elementary school there are fabulous teachers, but also a few horrible teachers. Guess which kids get the worst teachers? The kids whose parents dare to do anything but smile. I smile until my teeth hurt and my kids have gotten fabulous teachers.
Two parents tried to talk to the District and the principal about food allergies....both kids got the nightmare teacher. Not by chance....and everyone knows it. The District is filled with bullies - and it starts from the top. That's why we need people like the Daubers - their kids are safely in private school so they can say what the rest of us can't. PAUSD needs to expel the toxic administration and start over. I'd sign a petition, but then my child will get the only bad teacher in that grade next year.
a resident of Duveneck/St. Francis
on Feb 24, 2013 at 4:21 pm
Thank you Ken for the article. I appreciate your willingness to continue to spend your time advocating for PAUSD students. I only wish that you were on the board.
a resident of Another Palo Alto neighborhood
on Feb 25, 2013 at 11:31 am
@Just Wondering,
Count me in, too. How much has our district spent on legal fees and legal services, and have those services gone to protecting the interests of our families and schools, or of Mr. Skelly at the expense of our families?
Is there any way for the Weekly or anyone on the board to determine what advice legal gave Skelly in regards to how to handle special needs students and procedures? That would shed light on why the district has chosen this tack of simply actively avoiding its responsibilities (and thus ultimately violating students civil rights, after putting families through the wringer). If Skelly sought advice to do something illegal, such as actively avoid documenting students' impairments or accommodations, or actively avoiding apprising parents of their rights, are his exchanges with district legal still privileged?
a resident of Another Palo Alto neighborhood
on Feb 25, 2013 at 11:37 am
More to the point, should the district be providing legal advice to Skelly at district expense right now, as it may be a conflict of interests for the district, should the district be sued because of such serious violations of the law because of Mr. Skelly's direction? Why should the district be paying for legal services to protect Mr. Skelly rather than the families of the district?
The board should seek new legal immediately, who haven't been involved in overseeing illegal behaviors/offering bad advice, and Drs. Skelly and Young should be put on leave and someone else who doesn't have a conflict of interest put temporarily (perhaps permanently) in their places until this is resolved, so that our leaderships' contacts with legal advice can be done in the interest of the district and without conflicts of interests that would hurt families and open the district to significant liability.
a resident of Crescent Park
on Feb 27, 2013 at 7:30 am
Disclosure: our kids have graduated.
Is there any data that provides an accurate scope on the size of the problem? In other words, how many cases are we looking at among the approximately 11,000 students?
Obviously there is a systematic/procedural problem that must be remedied. But I am curious as to how widespread (or not) has the issue been documented to-date.
a resident of Another Palo Alto neighborhood
on Apr 3, 2013 at 7:12 am
We need administrators with a higher ethical standard, whose professional values include wanting to work with parents and a belief that their job is to serve families in the district, i.e., it's time to find someone else.
Teachers and even a principal have been let go for far, far less. Shouldn't the superintendent be held at least to the same standard he holds those under him? This is shameful.
a resident of Another Palo Alto neighborhood
on Apr 5, 2013 at 12:32 am
I agree with the original poster that we need a full, fair and transparent investigation into how none of our policies were enforced. The new proposed set of policies is worse than the prior version. This situation is getting no closer to resolution. An investigation is required.


text:
Submit News
NYT Accuses Apple of Dodging Billions in Taxes, Apple Denies Claims
Tiffany Kaiser
April 30, 2012 9:14 AM
Recipient E-mail
Sender E-mail
(Source: todaysiphone.com)
Through a few different methods, The New York Times says Apple has avoided paying millions of dollars in taxes in the U.S. and billions of dollars in taxes worldwide
The New York Times
recently released a report on how
Apple is evading billions of dollars in taxes
annually through a few different methods, but Apple claims it has been playing by the rules all along and pays an "enormous" amount of taxes.
According to
The New York Times
article, Apple has managed to dodge billions of dollars in taxes around the world. Last year, the tech giant paid $3.3 billion in taxes around the globe on its
2011 profits
of $34.2 billion at a tax rate of 9.8 percent. Approximately 70 percent, or $24 billion, of the total $34.2 billion in pretax profits was earned outside of the country while 30 percent was earned in the United States.
This may seem odd, considering the fact that Apple's headquarters are in Cupertino, California. However, Apple products like the iPhone, iPad and MacBook are not manufactured in the state of California.
Through a few different methods,
The New York Times
says Apple has avoided paying millions of dollars in taxes in California and 20 other U.S. states. It has dodged billions of dollars in
taxes worldwide
How does Apple manage to do this? By putting an office in Reno, which allows Apple to escape California's 8.84 percent tax rate for Nevada's 0 percent; selling digital content, which can be sold from low-tax countries anywhere around the world, and the "Double Irish With a Dutch Sandwich," which allows Apple to cut taxes by directing profits through low-cost Irish subsidiaries, the Netherlands and the Caribbean.
According to former Treasury Department economist Martin A. Sullivan, Apple's federal taxes in the U.S. would have been $2.4 billion higher last year without such methods.
Apple opened a subsidiary called Braeburn Capital in Reno, Nevada in 2006. The reason for this subsidiary is to manage and invest Apple's cash. Braeburn Capital is responsible for depositing profits into accounts and then investing in bonds or stocks. When these investments lead to profit, a certain amount of it is protected from California tax authorities because Nevada has a 0 percent tax rate. If Braeburn was in Cupertino, Apple would be taxed 8.84 percent.
Braeburn's Nevada address also helps Apple reduce its taxes in other states like Florida and New Mexico because these different areas can decrease what is owed when Apple's financial management takes place somewhere else.
While Braeburn's location helps Apple dodge hefty California taxes, those in the state of California are not too happy with Apple's move. For instance, California Legislature upped the state's research and development tax credit to help companies like Apple escape billions in state taxes. The state legislature did this in 1996, 1999 and 2000, allowing Apple to save $412 million since 1996.
Selling digital content is another way Apple can escape pricey taxes. Apple doesn't only sell physical products like MacBooks and iPhones, but also digital items like songs on iTunes. Royalties and digital products can help Apple easily shift profits to low-tax countries because they can be sold anywhere as opposed to physical products.
Apple has another subsidiary in Luxembourg called iTunes S.à.r.l., which takes care of digital sales in Europe, Africa and the Middle East. When apps or songs are downloaded in any of these locations, the sales are recorded in Luxembourg because the country said it would tax the payments collected by Apple at low rates.
The "Double Irish With a Dutch Sandwich" is another way Apple avoids high-priced taxes. Apple established two Irish subsidiaries called Apple Operations International and Apple Sales International. Apple created the first Irish subsidiary because the Irish government offered Apple tax breaks in return for jobs, and also because Apple was able to send royalties on patents developed on California over to Ireland. This meant that profits were taxed at the Irish rate (12.5 percent) instead of the California rate (35 percent).
The second Irish subsidiary let other profits go to tax-free companies in the Caribbean. In addition, Ireland's treaties with Europe allowed some of Apple's profits to move through the Netherlands tax-free. This has helped Apple keep its international taxes at a low 3.2 percent last year.
Earlier this month, it was discovered that
Apple made $9.5 billion in Britain last year, but only paid $15.8 million in taxes
. This figure came out so low because British tax code rules exempt companies based in Ireland from paying British taxes.
"Apple, like many other multinationals, is using perfectly legal methods to keep a significant portion of their profits out of the hands of the I.R.S.," said Martin Sullivan, former Treasury Department economist. "And when America's most profitable companies pay less, the general public has to pay more."
Apple responded to the
article, saying that it pays an "enormous" amount of taxes and also creates jobs in California and other areas in the U.S. as well as other countries.
"Over the past several years, we have created an incredible number of jobs in the United States," said Apple in its response. "The vast majority of our global work force remains in the U.S., with more than 47,000 full-time employees in all 50 states. By focusing on innovation, we've created entirely new products and industries, and more than 500,000 jobs for U.S. workers — from the people who create components for our products to the people who deliver them to our customers. Apple's international growth is creating jobs domestically since we oversee most of our operations from California. We manufacture parts in the U.S. and export them around the world, and U.S. developers create apps that we sell in over 100 countries. As a result, Apple has been among the top creators of American jobs in the past few years.
"Apple also pays an enormous amount of taxes which help our local, state and federal governments. In the first half of fiscal year 2012 our U.S. operations have generated almost $5 billion in federal and state income taxes, including income taxes withheld on employee stock gains, making us among the top payers of U.S. income tax."
This isn't the first time
targeted Apple in its reports. Back in January,
attacked Apple for the treatment of workers in Apple's suppliers' factories overseas. The report cited issues like long hours, lengthy overtime, and poor working/living conditions as problems occurring in factories like Foxconn, and
claimed Apple was doing nothing to change these issues.
Apple ended up voluntarily joining the Fair Labor Association (FLA), which offers random, rigorous inspections of company factories. The FLA ended up
finding overtime/pay/safety violations at Apple's Foxconn plants in China
, and it's working with Apple and the suppliers to fix it.
The New York Times
The New York Times
"Death Is Very Likely The Single Best Invention Of Life" -- Steve Jobs
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April 10, 2012, 5:46 PM
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March 30, 2012, 9:38 AM
Update: Apple Announces Dividend for Q4, $10B Share Repurchase for 2013; Closes Above $600
March 19, 2012, 5:12 PM
Apple CEO Tim Cook: We Have More Money Than We Need
February 24, 2012, 8:13 AM
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text:
[quote user="JPizzack"][quote user="Morehead State"][quote user="byron"][quote user="Morehead State"][quote user="JPizzack"]
[quote user="Morehead State"]For the sake of an orderly transition, may I suggest that Matt start the new THEE thread on Monday, July 22nd. That way there is no confusion. Does this make sense?[/quote]

huh? apparently it doesnt make sense lol

[/quote] OK Pizz. Let me explain it to you. The boards are closing Wednesday and the new boards are opening Monday. We will obviously want to start our thread again. I was suggesting that Matt start it on Monday so we all know where to go.[/quote] I ain't buying it!!![/quote] What is it you guys aren't understanding?[/quote]

not that I dont believe YOU....but, I'll believe it when I see it happen I guess is what B meant lol, and im with him!! haha
[/quote]
Oh! Personally I hope it never happens but evidentally is on for Monday.


text:
Pappa al Pomodoro
Waste not, want not is a Tuscan credo. Many Florentine recipes make use of leftover ingredients. Pappa al Pomodoro, a thick, hearty soup made with dry bread, is one of the city's classic dishes.
4–8 cloves of garlic, according to taste
1 12-ounce can of plum tomatoes
1 pound of dry, stale (preferably unsalted Tuscan) bread, broken into smallish pieces
4–6 cups of water or warmed vegetable broth
1 bunch (20 leaves) of basil, coarsely chopped
2 tablespoons of olive oil
Salt and pepper
Half teaspoon of crushed and dried chili pepper (optional)
1 leek (white flesh only), finely chopped (optional)
Place the bread in a bowl and add water or broth. Cover and put aside for at least an hour. Sauté the garlic (and leek, if desired) with oil. Add dried chili pepper if desired, then the tomatoes, half the basil, and a dash of salt and pepper. Simmer for 20 minutes.
Squeeze excess broth from the soaked bread and add to the oil and tomatoes. Cook for at least 15 minutes, stirring occasionally. Serve hot with remaining basil and a swirl of olive oil.
Servings: Serves four
Bistecca alla Fiorentina
"Steak, Florentine style," is offered in most of the city's restaurants. Traditionally, a T-bone from local Chianina beef cattle is preferred, but an ordinary T-bone (or porterhouse) can also be used.
2-pound T-bone steak, three fingers thick
Sea salt (coarse)
Florentines grill the meat over a very hot wood or coal grill, but it can also be cooked on a hot skillet or griddle.
Grill the steak, without seasoning, for three to five minutes. Florentines often also grill the steak standing up on the bone for a few minutes at the end to cook around the T-bone.
The meat should be seared and crispy on the outside, cooked to a shallow depth inside, and red, almost raw at its heart. Allow to rest for ten minutes then cut the meat off the bone into large chunks, season with coarse sea salt, and serve.
Servings: Serves two to four
Ribollita means "reboiled," because to make this rich, thick vegetable soup correctly it must be cooked and recooked. The most widespread of any Tuscan soup, Ribollita appears with many variations, but the key ingredient is cavolo nero (Tuscan winter black cabbage), though kale, chard, or green and Savoy cabbage can also be used. Add zucchini, potatoes, Brussels sprouts, and other vegetables according to taste.
1 chopped onion
1–2 cloves of chopped garlic
1 leek (white flesh) finely chopped
1–3 chopped carrots
2–3 fresh or canned peeled plum tomatoes
1–2 cups of Tuscan white cannellini beans
1 quarter of cavolo nero or equivalent
1 bunch of Swiss chard and/or spinach
1 finely chopped celery stalk and leaves
4 chopped zucchini (courgettes)
2–4 peeled and cubed potatoes (optional)
1 pound stale Italian bread (optional)
4 tablespoons of tomato paste/purée
Salt and pepper
Olive oil
Oregano, rosemary, and hot chili pepper as desired (optional)
Sauté the onion, leek, and garlic in a large casserole dish. Add carrots, celery, chili, and cook for ten minutes. Add tomatoes, cabbage, beans, more oil, herbs, and salt and pepper to taste. Cook for 10 to 20 minutes. Add water to cover ingredients and cook gently for 90 minutes, adding water as necessary, plus tomato paste, zucchini, potatoes, or other vegetables. Alternatively, add these the next day before the soup is reheated. Leave to stand in a cool kitchen for a day and/or chill overnight.
To make the soup thicker, purée half the mixture. Reheat, ladling the soup over a slice of toasted dry bread to serve (optional). Add a swirl of olive oil to each serving.
A more traditional, but time-consuming version, involves layering the finished soup with the dried bread in a baking tray, baking the mixture, then reheating in a casserole dish, breaking up the bread if required.
Servings: Serves four
About Florence and Italy
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Bulletin Board Paper | Fadeless Bulletin Board Paper Cloud 48" x 12' 4 RollsFadeless Bulletin Board Paper
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text:
Top photo: Deputy City Manager A.J. Rodriguez
Bottom photo: Olympic athlete and teacher
Liza Hunter-Galvan
UTSA Alumni Association announces awards
By Marcia Mattingly
Communications Consultant, Office of Alumni Programs
(July 29, 2008)--Deputy City Manager A.J. Rodriguez will be named Alumnus of the Year and Olympic athlete and teacher Liza Hunter-Galvan will receive the Distinguished Service Award at the ninth annual UTSA Alumni Association Reflections Gala on Saturday, Aug. 16 at the Westin La Cantera Resort and Hotel.
Today's headlines
- La Prensa Foundation is newest member of UTSA Lone Star Society
- UTSA alumna Jordan Kaufmann wins $50K for new stent-graft start-up
- UTSA begins new way-finding sign installation this summer at Main Campus
- USA Today: UTSA long jumper Tyler Williamson rescues three-year-old boy
Article tools
"This is the night we celebrate the influential and successful alumni of UTSA -- the leaders in our community who, through their hard work and successes, reflect the best of UTSA," said 2008 Gala chair Cathy Starnes, Ph.D. '92, chief executive officer/employee benefits consulting division of Southwest Business Corp.
The new gala theme, "Reflections," was chosen to exemplify UTSA traditions, spirit and pride and to reflect the past, present and future of UTSA through its outstanding alumni. The theme also captures the spirit and promise of the university as it realizes its dreams for the future.
The Alumnus of the Year Award was established in 1980 to recognize UTSA alumni who have gained unique distinction through their achievements. Award winner A.J. Rodriguez, B.B.A. '98, M.B.A. '00, devoted enormous energy to the San Antonio Hispanic Chamber of Commerce as president and CEO from 1997 to 2008. Helping minority-owned businesses to advance in the marketplace, Rodriguez served as the chamber's adviser on local, state and national issues.
He helped create the Day of Advocacy, where local members meet with Austin legislators. Additionally, he supervised the directors of the Leadership San Antonio and Texas Scholars programs. Under his leadership, the Hispanic Chamber achieved a 49 percent increase in membership, and a 45 percent growth in total revenue. As the new San Antonio deputy city manager, Rodriguez oversees economic development, intergovernmental affairs, international affairs, the library system, and parks and recreation.
Rodriguez was listed in the San Antonio Business Journal's "40 Under 40" in 2003 and was named UTSA College of Business Young Alumnus of the Year in 2007. He serves on the Texas Association of Mexican American Chambers of Commerce executive board, the City of San Antonio River Commission and the advisory committee for JOVEN, a nonprofit agency for high-risk youth and their families. Rodriguez is a life member of the UTSA Alumni Association.
Established in 1997, the Distinguished Service Award recognizes alumni and others who have made significant contributions to the UTSA Alumni Association or UTSA. Award winner Liza Hunter-Galvan, B.S. '93, M.A. '05, is an Olympic athlete, marathon runner, science teacher and mother. A native of New Zealand, she was recruited to UTSA to compete in cross-country and track in 1989. As a senior, she won the Southland Conference individual cross country championship and was named SLC Cross Country Athlete of the Year.
Hunter-Galvan continued to run recreationally after her college years. In 2004, the mother of four represented New Zealand in the Olympic Games in Athens, finishing 51st in the marathon. She represented New Zealand at the 2005 World Championships in Helsinki, finishing 39th in the marathon. She has won many local, national and international races including the annual UTSA Alumni Diploma Dash. Always giving back to UTSA through participation in athletics and alumni events, Hunter-Galvan mentors athletes and serves as a role model to young women as an avid supporter of the UTSA Walk for Women's Athletics.
She and family members suffered a setback last year after a serious automobile accident while returning from a 10K race in the Rio Grande Valley. After awakening from a three-and-a-half-week coma, daughter Amber recovered to observe her 12th birthday. Overcoming hip and back injuries, Hunter-Galvan began training in August 2007 to qualify for the upcoming 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing. Her personal best of 2:30:40 was recorded at the Amsterdam Marathon last fall, and on June 29, she won a spot on the New Zealand Olympic team. Hunter-Galvan and her husband, Ariel Galvan, '03, are joint members of the UTSA Alumni Association.
UTSA Alumni Reflections Gala
The UTSA Alumni Reflections Gala begins with a cocktail reception and silent auction at 6:15 p.m. with music by the UTSA marimba ensemble. Dinner will be served at 7:30 p.m. and the program will begin at 8:20 p.m. The popular Austin band, Newsboyz, will provide music for the evening. Dress for the evening is black-tie optional for men and cocktail attire for women.
Table sponsorships are available at the Diamond level for $5,000, the Emerald level for $3,500 and the Ruby level for $2,500. These sponsors will have a student scholarship named for them for the 2009-2010 academic year. The Sapphire level is $1,500 and individual tickets are $125. Each table seats eight.
For reservations or more information, visit the UTSA Alumni Gala Web site or call (210) 458-4133.
UTSA Alumni Gala 2008 Power Drawing and Silent Auction
The Power Drawing is a great way to contribute to the UTSA Alumni Association Scholarship Fund. Purchase one ticket for $20 or 3 for $50 and have a chance to win one of these prizes: vacation for two to St. Maarten, $2,500 Valero pre-paid gas card, four-hour sailing tour of Lake Travis in Austin, trip for two to Breckenridge, Colo., with airfare to Denver, trip for two to Savannah, Ga., or a Samsung 40-inch flat panel HDTV. The prize drawings will be during the Reflections Alumni Gala Aug. 16; you need not be present to win.
For more information, visit the Power Drawing Web site or call (210) 458-4133.