national

6Oct

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

EDUCATION

Affirmative Action Bans Make Selective Colleges Less Diverse – A National Ban Will Do The Same

The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear arguments in two lawsuits on Oct. 31, 2022, brought by a group that opposes affirmative action in college admissions. Here, Natasha Warikoo, a sociology professor at Tufts University and author of the newly released “Is Affirmative Action Fair?: The Myth of Equity in College Admissions,” shares insights on how the racial and ethnic makeup of student bodies at selective colleges and universities will change if the Supreme Court decides to outlaw affirmative action. What’s at stake with the cases against affirmative action? Currently, many selective colleges consider race when they make decisions about which students to admit. In several cases since 1978, the U.S. Supreme Court has affirmed that it is constitutional to do so to ensure diversity on cam...

The National Broadband Rollout Has A Blind Spot: Lack Of Accurate, Transparent Data About Internet Access Speeds

3Apr

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

TECHNOLOGY, VIDEO REELS

The National Broadband Rollout Has A Blind Spot: Lack Of Accurate, Transparent Data About Internet Access Speeds

Imagine purchasing “up to” a gallon of milk for US$4.50, or paying for “up to” a full tank of gas. Most people would view such transactions as absurd. And yet, in the realm of broadband service, the use of “up to” speeds has become standard business practice. Unlike other advertisements for goods and services – for example, what a car manufacturer tells a customer about expected fuel efficiency – there are no federally set standards for measuring broadband service speeds. This means there is no clear way to tell whether customers are getting what they pay for. Consumers typically purchase an internet service package that promises a speed up to some level – for example, 10 megabits per second, 25Mbps, 100Mbps, 200Mbps or 1000Mbps/1Gbps. But the speed you actually receive can often be much...

How The FBI Knew What To Search For At Mar-A-Lago – The Presidential Records Act An Essential Tool For The National Archives And Future Historians

10Aug

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

IN OTHER NEWS, POLITICS

How The FBI Knew What To Search For At Mar-A-Lago – The Presidential Records Act An Essential Tool For The National Archives And Future Historians

The FBI search of former President Donald Trump’s Florida estate, Mar-a-Lago, on Aug. 8, 2022, has sparked a vigorous outcry from Trump and his allies. The details of the search are not clear, but reporting by The New York Times confirms that the search was “at least in part” for presidential records that Trump had taken from the White House and which were being sought by the National Archives and Records Administration. We asked Shannon Bow O'Brien, a scholar of the presidency at the University of Texas, Austin College of Liberal Arts, to discuss the history, law and customs associated with presidential archives. How do the archivists actually know what’s missing? Isn’t that hard to figure out? The archivists probably have a really keen idea of what is and what isn’t missing, based upon t...

Study Reveals Neighborhoods With MLK Streets Are Poorer Than National Average And Highly Segregated

2Apr

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

CULTURE

Study Reveals Neighborhoods With MLK Streets Are Poorer Than National Average And Highly Segregated

The big idea Poverty rates are almost double the national average in areas surrounding streets named after Martin Luther King Jr., according to our recent study, and educational attainment is much lower. Our geography research, published in the GeoJournal in September 2020, analyzed the racial makeup and economic well-being of 22,286 census blocks in the U.S. with roadways bearing the slain civil rights leader’s name. Streets named after Martin Luther King typically run through multiple census blocks; we identified a total of 955 such streets in the United States. The areas surrounding MLK streets are predominantly African American, with very few white residents, we found. This is particularly true in the South and Midwest. A notable exception includes California, where MLK neighborhoods...

Can A National Student Database Cheapen The College Experience

2Apr

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

EDUCATION, IN OTHER NEWS

Can A National Student Database Cheapen The College Experience

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has proposed that the federal government create a database that includes information on outcomes for individual college graduates, such as how much money they earn after they get a degree in a particular major. That’s according to a report that a commission sponsored by the foundation released in May 2021. I asked the U.S. Education Department if they plan to adopt the proposed database, but did not get a yes-or-no answer. “There are currently statutory prohibitions against the department developing a new national database on student information,” said Melanie Muenzer, chief of staff for the Under Secretary of Education James Kvaal. Muenzer said the department is reviewing the commission’s recommendations. “We anticipate more conversations with comm...

Study Reveals On National Average Neighborhoods With MLK Streets Are Poorer And Highly Segregated

18Jan

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

Journalism

Study Reveals On National Average Neighborhoods With MLK Streets Are Poorer And Highly Segregated

The Research Brief is a short take about interesting academic work. The big idea Poverty rates are almost double the national average in areas surrounding streets named after Martin Luther King Jr., according to our recent study, and educational attainment is much lower. The United States has 955 streets named after Martin Luther King Jr.. Katherine Welles/Shutterstock, CC BY-SA Our geography research, published in the GeoJournal in September 2020, analyzed the racial makeup and economic well-being of 22,286 census blocks in the U.S. with roadways bearing the slain civil rights leader’s name. Streets named after Martin Luther King typically run through multiple census blocks; we identified a total of 955 such streets in the United States. The areas surrounding MLK streets are predominantl...

32 Million Americans With Diverse Political Opinions And National Origins Make-Up ‘The Latino Vote’

9Nov

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

POLITICS

32 Million Americans With Diverse Political Opinions And National Origins Make-Up ‘The Latino Vote’

Pundits are expressing surprise that so many Latinos voted for Donald Trump. But pollsters who specialize in the Latino vote knew for months before the election that Latino support for Biden was soft, with many Latinos – especially in Florida – undecided. In Florida 57% of Latinos ultimately supported Biden, compared to roughly 70% nationwide. These numbers are reliable because they come from exit polls designed to capture Latino political preferences. National exit polls have been mostly wrong about Latino voting patterns since they first began including Latinos in the 1980s. The 60.6 million Americans lumped together under the umbrella term “Latino” are a racially, ethnically and geographically diverse group, as my research on Latino identity shows. And they have equally diverse polit...

Trump greenlights drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, but will oil companies show up?

3Apr

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

BUSINESS, VIDEO REELS

Trump greenlights drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, but will oil companies show up?

The Trump administration has announced that it is opening up the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil and gas development – the latest twist in a decades-long battle over the fate of this remote area. Its timing is truly terrible. Low oil prices, a pandemic-driven recession and looming elections add up to highly unfavorable conditions for launching expensive drilling operations. In the longer term, the climate crisis and an ongoing shift to a lower-carbon economy raise big questions about future oil demand. I’ve researched the U.S. energy industry for more than 20 years. As I see it, conservative Republicans have backed oil and gas production in ANWR since the 1980s for two overriding reasons. First, to increase domestic oil production and reduce dependence on “foreign oil,” a euphemis...

National Guard joins the coronavirus response – 3 questions answered

4Apr

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

COVID-19, HEALTH & WELLNESS, Journalism, VIDEO REELS

National Guard joins the coronavirus response – 3 questions answered

As a military organization divided into 50 distinct parts that can be commanded by either the president or state governors, the National Guard is perhaps the least understood branch of the U.S. armed forces. Despite its complexity – or perhaps because of it – the National Guard is taking the lead role in the military’s response to the coronavirus outbreak crisis. As many as 10,000 National Guard members have already been activated to help communities around the country, with many more expecting a call-up soon. People may know, from TV ads or other brief appearances in the media, that National Guard members are part-time citizen-soldiers, but not much else. As a longtime National Guard attorney and military law professor, I can explain a bit more about how the National Guard works. Ads l...

Reasons to celebrate: Where have all these ‘national days’ suddenly come from?

4Apr

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

Journalism

Reasons to celebrate: Where have all these ‘national days’ suddenly come from?

While many designations are quirky, others are beneficial — such as June 23 being National Hydration Day — or historic — Day of the Seafarer, June 25. June 20 was Ugliest Dog Day; the 22nd, National Kissing Day. June is considered the national month for candy, soul food, country cooking and dairy. Every day of every month, in fact, is a reason to focus on and “celebrate” something. While many designations are quirky, others are beneficial — such as June 23 being National Hydration Day — or historic — Day of the Seafarer, June 25. Just who decides these daily themes is a historic hodgepodge. From 1870 to 1983, U.S. Congress voted on 11 official “national” days, or federal days, some of which are recognized wholly by non-federal businesses while others less so: New Year’s Day, Martin ...