A Success Story : ABBAS JUMANNE Family

The Mandarin may be small but it is having a big impact on Tanzanian families. Yesterday I received this report from our friends at Floresta regarding a family who have had one of our lights for a year.

Introduction

Abbas Jumanne Abbas family joined Floresta VICOBA group since 2007 at Matala, Matala is a village in Kilimanjaro region, Moshi rural district and the family has 8 members. Four (4) kids are studying in Primary schools and one (1) kid is in secondary school. Before the introduction of solar lights in March 2010, we were using a lamp that uses kerosene and lanterns for lighting during studying during the evening or at night and cooking time. Our main activities are crops production and livestock rearing in small scale production.

The distribution of solar lights by Floresta Tanzania has changed our lives since March 2010 as described in several aspects below;

Education

Solar lights brought studying harmony to kids in accomplishing their home works as observed after introduction of this simple light, It is simple in handling and no harmful effect like injury, When kids woke up during the night, they simply switch on solar light as compared to kerosene lamps of which most of them fail to light it and ask their parents to help them which seems like a disturbance to them, Kids tend to study at night two days in a week due to unavailability of kerosene and the problem has been solved by Floresta and they are now studying everyday to accomplish their home work. Kids have raised their capacity by studying effectively during the evening and night. Example my child who is studying secondary has raised from top 20 up to the position of top 10 students in the class, this is due to the use of solar light that has little disturbances.

Health

By observation our children had a problem of eyes irritation when using kerosene lamps and lanterns for studying, probably this contributed to lower their capacity in studying, and also Kerosene lamp has a problem of producing pop sound/bursting which is danger to kids. Hence solar lights (Illumination) seem to be more effective in this manner for health of our families and no disturbances.

Economically

Kerosene is very expensive and its cost per liter tends to shoot from time to time. We have many things to accomplish with the available money rather than using in kerosene whereby in my family we were using 5 liter per month.

We are staying far from town and it involves costs for travelling while looking for kerosene but with the use of solar lights there is no costs associated, just the initial cost of buying it. The amount served from not purchasing kerosene help us in bus fare for our child who is studying in secondary at Himo which is a day school.

The use of solar lights serves time for other activities rather than looking for kerosene from a distance.

Kerosene lamps involve other costs of buying lamp glass as it is fragile of which approximately four to five times per year it may break and hence need replacement while in solar lights there is no such costs, no maintenance has been required so far (we have had the light for one year) unlike other products which were brought in the village which have had problems.

Reference Link
http://illuminationhq.com/blog/a-success-story-abbas-jumanne-family/

Courtesy
ILLUMI Nation HQ

ILLUMI Nation : illuminating nations one at a time with LED lamps: Tanzania

ILLUMi nation has a single goal: the elimination of kerosene as a domestic fuel source in the developing world.

Happy people with Illumination lights in Tanzania

About

Illumination has a single goal:

the elimination of kerosene as a domestic fuel source in the developing world.

Currently there are over 2 billion people throughout the world who do not have access to grid-connected electricity. For most of these people, kerosene is their principal fuel source for light.

Illumination aims to replace kerosene lamps with purpose designed solar LED lamps. Replacing kerosene based lighting with solar LED lighting provides very significant health and economic benefits to those in developing countries. Furthermore it substantially reduces the amount of Greenhouse Gas Emissions (GHG) emitted into the Earth’s atmosphere, thus also benefitting the more affluent members of the global community.

The illumination HQ Team

Here at Illumination HQ we have gathered a team of very professional people from a wide variety of backgrounds who all share a committment to improving the lives  of those in developing countries. We also believe that we have to enjoy what we are doing to really be successful, therefore we are not adverse to having a bit of fun along the way. The Illumination HQ team is:

• Shane Thatcher – Plenty Steward
• Jim Fraser – Mandatory Old Man
• Liz Aitken – Numbers Wizard
• Eli Mtango – Government Relations
• Edith Banzai – Distribution
• Sebastian Foot – Rainmaker
• Alex Lauber – Gentleman of the Robe
• Nick Barr – Threat Detector
• Kevin Lok – Carbon Ninja
• Harry Kikstra – Life Improver

Explicitly the benefits of the program in Tanzania

• A reduction in global carbon emissions of around 700,000 tonnes.
• Each light will save a family USD 100 annually from a mean monthly income of between USD 150 and USD 300 ($1800-3600 annually).
• Save Tanzanian families over $200 million per year in households costs
• Every light distributed will contribute to local charities, facilitating the advancement of other community based projects.
• Local staff will be employed for the project keeping cash benefits local.
• 25% of house fires in Tanzania are caused by kerosene lamps, this danger is eliminated through the use of solar lights.
• Health problems associated in breathing kerosene fumes in closed areas will be eliminated.
• Lights are priced so that after 2 weeks each family will be cash positive resulting from the elimination of kerosene costs.

Reference Link
http://illuminationhq.com/

Courtesy
ILLUMI Nation HQ

Saving Lives From Anal Cancer

By RONI CARYN RABIN

 

Paulette Crowther, second from left and wearing a wig because of her chemotherapy, with her children, (from left) Camille, Tristan and Justine Almada, on New Year’s Eve 2009.

Paulette Crowther’s three children were grown and she was plotting a midlife career change when a routine colonoscopy picked up cancer, but not of the colon — of the anus.

The diagnosis was a shock. Ms. Crowther, a 51-year-old mother of three from New York City, had had no symptoms and was feeling just fine. It felt like a bolt from the blue. The cancer had already spread.

But as Ms. Crowther and her children scoured the Internet for information, they couldn’t help but wonder whether the cancer could have been prevented, or caught earlier at least.

Some 80 to 90 percent of anal cancers are caused by the human papillomavirus, or HPV, the same kind of virus that causes cervical cancer. And decades earlier, when Ms. Crowther was in her 20s, she had been treated for cervical dysplasia, a condition that often precedes cervical cancer – and is also caused by an HPV infection.

If only she had known.

“We think Mom could have been saved if she’d been monitored and screened more often,” said Ms. Crowther’s oldest child, Justine Almada, 27. “Studies show that if you have cervical dysplasia, you’re at higher risk. At the very least, she should have been made aware of that.”

She added, “Anal cancer is quite treatable if it’s found early.”

The same types of human papillomavirus implicated in cervical cancer, HPV 16 and 18, are also linked to anal cancer. And in December, the Food and Drug Administration expanded the approved uses of the HPV vaccine Gardasil to include prevention of anal cancer and precancerous lesions.

Ms. Crowther — who was fiercely devoted to the brood she raised in Lower Manhattan, largely on her own after a divorce, and whom the children call their “best friend” — died last April. Within three months, Justine and her siblings, Tristan and Camille Almada, ages 25 and 23, had established the HPV and Anal Cancer Foundation.

The foundation’s aim is to raise awareness about the link between the human papillomavirus, an incredibly common sexually transmitted infection, and a whole list of cancers, each of which affects a relatively small number of people but which, taken together, affect tens of thousands. Besides anal cancer, HPV infections are linked to some gynecological cancers, like vulvar and vaginal cancers, certain penile cancers in men and certain head and neck cancers.

With a robust Web site — analcancerfoundation.org — and an expert scientific advisory board, the organization also aims to increase awareness about preventive screening, provide support to family members and caregivers and raise money for research on treatment, which remains limited for metastatic disease.

“What keeps us going is the thought that if someone had done this already, it could have prevented what happened to Mom,” said Camille, who recently stepped in to run the tax-exempt foundation.

The irony is that while Ms. Crowther was still alive, she never told anyone what kind of cancer she had. Experts say that’s not unusual for people with anal cancer, who often are ashamed of their disease. “The assumption most people make is that if you have anal cancer, you had anal sex,” Camille said. “That’s not true. Heterosexual men also have HPV in their anus, because HPV is so prevalent. But also: who cares if you had anal sex?”

Dr. Cathy Eng, an associate professor in gastrointestinal medical oncology at M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, said: “It’s really important to emphasize that the average person is in fact a female in her late 50s, early 60s — that’s the average patient.” The actress Farrah Fawcett, of “Charlie’s Angels” fame, who documented her battle with anal cancer on film, was fairly typical; she was 62 when she died of the disease in 2009. Dr. Eng added, “People associate anal cancer in general with men who have sex with men who are H.I.V.-positive; that’s not the case.”

While men who have sex with men are at elevated risk for developing anal cancer, the disease strikes more women than men: cases are diagnosed in some 2,000 men and 3,260 women each year in the United States. The disease is on the rise, with new diagnoses increasing by 2 percent a year in both men and women, according to national cancer statistics. Each year, 720 people die of anal cancer.

Other risk factors include having a history of cervical cancer or other gynecological malignancies, having a suppressed immune system, an atypical Pap smear and testing positive for HPV 16 or 18. Having had multiple sex partners, having a history of sexually transmitted disease and having had receptive anal intercourse, even without full penetration, likewise increase risk.

Early symptoms like blood in the stool or a feeling of pressure can easily be mistaken for hemorrhoids. “An important message is: if your hemorrhoids don’t get better, you need to talk to your doctor,” Dr. Eng said.

There is no clear medical consensus on screening for anal cancer. Choices include a digital rectal exam or digital anal exam, done as part of a physical or gynecological checkup, or an anal Pap smear. Dr. Joel Palefsky, an infectious disease specialist at the University of California, San Francisco, offers a screening procedure called high-resolution anoscopy, which may be an especially sensitive screening technique. But it is not widely available.

“If a woman has had cervical cancer, she is clearly at increased risk for anal cancer,” Dr. Palefsky said. “We’ve known about the connection for a while. People didn’t pay a lot of attention until recently.”

Another of the foundation’s goals is to destigmatize the disease and end the isolation many patients feel. “When you have cancer, you shouldn’t be ashamed of it; it’s terrible enough to have cancer,” Camille said

 

Reference Link
http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/02/09/saving-lives-from-anal-cancer/

Courtesy
The New York Times Company

Free public transport makes sense

By Ajai Sreevatsan

It will eliminate establishment cost and ensure better air quality

 

CHENNAI, INDIA : In light of Transport Minister K.N.Nehru’s announcement in the Assembly recently that the State Transport undertakings are set to incur a loss of Rs.1,000 crore this fiscal, the focus has shifted to defining this ‘loss.’

The Minister was essentially referring to the cash loss that is likely to be incurred, a little over one-third of which is due to the implementation of the Sixth Pay Commission recommendations, and the rest due to operational loss. Are there any grounds on which this cash loss can be translated into social profit?

Since the benefits of public transit are broader than are apparent with strict financial book-keeping, is there a rationale for universal free public transport?

Can Metropolitan Transport Corporation buses be made completely free for everyone to use? The idea might sound utopian, but experts point out that there is sound logic behind offering free public transit.

In fact, a number of mid-sized towns and cities across the world already have free public bus, train, or tram systems. The city of Hasselt in Belgium, for example, converted its entire bus networks to zero fare in 1997. Public transport ridership increased by as much as 13 times by 2006, according to a study done by the Belgian government.

Even while making the bus services free, the authorities through a combination of measures have made personalised transport expensive. This includes earmarking certain areas where entry of personal vehicles is by a fee and levy of a green tax.

The free bus service results in various benefits for the residents such as better air quality, lesser congestion and reduction in fuel consumption, a significant shift to public transit, fewer traffic accidents and increased access to work places for the poor.

According to an annual survey of air quality conducted by Simple Interactive Models for better air quality (SIM-air), an NGO based in New Delhi, the health cost of polluted air in Delhi in 2009 was Rs.2,450 crore.

A study by the Asian Development Bank in Bangalore shows that a 20 per cent increase in bus ridership reduces the city’s fuel consumption by 21 per cent. It frees-up road space equivalent to taking off nearly 4,18,210 cars.

Anumita Roychowdhury, Associate Director of the New Delhi-based Centre for Science & Environment, says: “If public transport is made free, more people would use it. Fewer automobile miles would be driven. Carbon dioxide emissions would drop. Everyone would benefit. It would be fair then that the cost is borne by everyone through a small tax.”

Subsidising public transport is fair, experts say, because personalised transport already receives hidden subsidies through investment on flyovers and broader roads, and free parking.

In the last four fiscal, the Corporation spent Rs.127.31 crore on six flyovers. According to the Chennai Comprehensive Transportation Study, the main beneficiaries of these facilities that were built using public money are car users, a segment which accounts for only 6 per cent of the city’s daily trips.

A senior MTC official said that free transit is a great idea as it would eliminate establishment cost, which amounts to a third of all expenses. There would be no need for conductors, ticket checkers, ticket printing or expenditure on revenue accounting. Excess manpower could be diverted to other activities that would increase overall efficiency.

“Every time the corporation incurs a loss, the government provides loans at 12.5 per cent to 15 per cent. It is almost impossible to pay back even the interest. When the transport corporation was incorporated in 1971, one of the object clauses was to ‘run it on sound commercial principles’ and hence zero operational subsidy. The primary reason for the MTC must be relooked,” he said.

Reference Link : http://www.hindu.com/2011/02/03/stories/2011020358140200.htm

Courtesy : The Hindu

Kalahari bushmen's legal victory

By John Simpson

The Appeal Court judgment is a remarkable victory for the bushmen. Not only has the court upheld their right to water in the Kalahari Desert, but it has criticised the government’s treatment of the bushmen as “degrading”.

Survival International, the London-based organisation which campaigns for the rights of indigenous peoples and has strongly backed the bushmen’s legal battle, described the appeal court’s decision as “momentous”.

Ever since 1997, when the Botswanan government decided to move the bushmen off their ancestral hunting-ground in the Kalahari, the bushmen’s battle to return has been a losing one.

In 2002, the Army moved the majority of the bushmen out of the Kalahari, often brutally, but some refused to leave. Others drifted back from the soulless shanty towns where they were forced to live.

For tens of thousands of years, the bushmen have managed to live and thrive in this deeply hostile environment. The British, who were the colonial power in Botswana before its independence, promised it to them in perpetuity.

The Botswana government’s decision to move the bushmen followed the discovery of diamonds in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve (CKGR), the heart of the bushmen’s territory. It has often been alleged that the two things were linked, though successive governments have denied this.

The legal battle focused on a single well, on which those bushmen who still lived in the CKGR depended for their water. The Army blocked up the pipe with concrete and filled the basin with sand: a melancholy sight in this inhospitable desert.

Nevertheless the bushmen managed to survive without the well. They found water in their traditional ways, and sometimes they managed to raise the money to buy bottled water from a store 48km away.

On at least one occasion, as a group was returning from the 108-km walk carrying hundreds of bottles, they were stopped by guards at the Central Kalahari Game Reserve, who poured all the water on to the ground.

The 2010 judgment, which the appeal court has now reversed, was criticised inside and outside Botswana for its tone.

Presiding judge then Judge Walia said the bushmen had “brought upon themselves any discomfort they may endure”.

Botswana is in many ways a model African country — wealthy, democratic and not obviously corrupt. But even its supporters have been embarrassed by the treatment of the bushmen.

— © BBC News/Distributed by the New York Times Syndicate

Reference Link : http://www.hindu.com/2011/01/31/stories/2011013163191900.htm

Courtesy : The Hindu, BBC News

Two Indian NGOs receive grant from Japan

By The Hindu Staff Reporter

Under the Grant Assistance for Grassroots Project

 

In recognition:Japanese Consul General Kazuo Minagawa hands over the grant contract to CREED Secretary Viswalingam Nadanasabapathy in Chennai on Tuesday. Kasthurba Gandhi Kanya Gurukulam managing trustee Appakutti Vedarathinam (left) is in the picture.

CHENNAI: Two non-governmental organisations on Tuesday received grant from the Japanese government for their projects under the Grant Assistance for Grassroots Project (GGP). Japanese Consul General in Chennai Kazuo Minagawa signed the grant contract here with the representatives of the NGOs.

Vocational training for women

The Centre for Rural Education and Economic Development (CREED) received Rs.45.36 lakh for its project to construct a training centre in Cuddalore to provide vocational training for rural women. A grant of Rs.37.79 lakh was given to Kasthurba Gandhi Kanya Gurukulam to construct a printing school for underprivileged girls and women in Nagapattinam. Mr.Minagawa, who gave away the cheques, said that the new building for CREED would help the NGO provide training in tailoring and computer science. About 2,500 women are expected to benefit from the grant.

Similarly, the grant to Kasthurba Gandhi Kanya Gurukulam would be used to train 100 women every year and provide them employment.

Funded projects

Nearly 100 projects have been funded under GGP in the southern States to improve the socio-economic situation in the rural areas since 1989.

This fiscal, four projects, including those provided in October 2010, have been funded, Mr.Minagawa said.

Target group

CREED’s secretary Viswalingam Nadanasabapathy said that the organisation has been working for the betterment of the underprivileged people for over two decades. CREED’s target group is mainly landless agricultural labourers who get seasonal income.

Appakutti Vedarathinam, managing trustee of Kasthurba Gandhi Kanya Gurukulam said that the grant would help reach out to more underprivileged women. The organisation has been striving for the welfare of rural women since 1950.

Reference Link : http://www.hindu.com/2011/01/27/stories/2011012752340300.htm

Courtesy : The Hindu

New LGBT-Friendly Hospital Visitation Regulations Go Into Effect

The Huffington Post Nick Wing First Posted: 01/19/11 10:05 AM Updated: 01/19/11 02:05 PM

New regulations regarding hospital visitation rights went into effect Tuesday, paving the way for members of the LGBT community to have further control over their own medical decisions.

Under the new protocol, initiated last April and developed over the following months, hospitals partaking in Medicare and Medicaid must now allow all patients to decide visitation rights, as well as who to entrust with making medical decisions on their behalf, regardless of sexual or gender identity.

“This policy impacts millions of LGBT Americans and their families. The President saw an injustice and felt very strongly about correcting this and has spoken about it often over the years,” White House deputy director of public engagement Brian Bond wrote on the White House blog.

Janice Langbehn, who, along with her children, was denied hospital access to her partner, Lisa Pond, in 2007 after she suffered an aneurysm told ABC News that she is happy with the development, but still grieving over the prior hospital practice.

“Other couples, no matter how they define themselves as families, won’t have to go through what we went through, and I am grateful,” she said. “But the fact that the hospital didn’t let our children say goodbye to their mom… That’s just something that will haunt me forever.”

Human Rights Campaign President Joe Solmonese has also expressed gratitude to President Obama and his administration for quick action on changing the policy.

“LGBT people experience discrimination in many aspects of their lives, but it is perhaps at its worst during times of crisis,” Solmonese said. “We thank President Obama and HHS Secretary Sebelius for recognizing the hardships LGBT people face and taking this important step toward ensuring that no one will be turned away from a partner’s hospital bedside again.”

Reference Link
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/01/19/new-hospital-visitation-regulations_n_810893.html

Courtesy
TheHuffingtonPost.com, Inc.

How Design Can Get Kids On the Path to Tech Careers

A conversation with Dr. Stephanie Pace Marshall, the founder of a new type of science and math academy.

“Education is the point at which we decide whether we love the world enough to assume responsibility for it… And education, too, is where we decide whether we love our children enough not to expel them from our world… nor to strike from their hands their chance of undertaking something unforeseen by us, but to prepare them in advance for the task of renewing a common world.” –Hannah Arendt

Her name comes up in almost any discussion about transforming education: Dr. Stephanie Pace Marshall. Dr. Marshall is the founding president (1986-2007) and president emeritus of the Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy (IMSA), an internationally renowned, publicly funded residential high school (10th to 12th grade) that emphasizes a curriculum in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM).

Dr. Marshall’s first mandate in developing the concept for this decidedly new learning experience was: “Let’s not call it a school but rather a ‘center for inquiry and imagination.'” When IMSA’s funding was in jeopardy, Dr. Marshall legendarily brought her students to the Illinois state capitol and set up classes in the rotunda. There they conducted physics and chemistry experiments, spoke Japanese and Russian, staged a scene from a Shakespearean play, and met with legislators. IMSA’s funding agreement was rectified. With STEM education a U.S. priority and increasingly seen as the means to competing with developing giants like China and India, I asked Dr. Marshall about the opportunities and challenges we face in advancing STEM learning.

How can the entanglement of design and education move the unmovable object — i.e. the established, staid institution of education?

I love this question, because it seeks to get at the core of design and its role in helping to co-create an educational system worthy of our children. I would amend it slightly however, to ask: ‘How can design both enter into and perturb a new conversation about education so the system becomes disturbed enough to begin living into their desired future now?’

“Design enables us to redefine who and how we now want to be.”

I am not a credentialed designer, but as a leader I have always been mindful of the power of design to evoke changes in perception, attitudes, experiences, and behaviors by helping to change the relationships, patterns, and shape of the system. For me, designers are storytellers. They speak a patterned and relational language, and they use it to create environments and experiences that change the system’s neural network and the traditional dynamics of who and how we move, think, and behave, within a particular place. Design invites us to navigate a new narrative, to alter the map and landscape we have traditionally traveled, and to be different and belong differently to a place. Design enables us to reclaim spaces and behaviors that may not have been accessible before and redefine who and how we now want to be.

Design enables us to encode our stories and create our maps. It makes our covenants visible, and it illuminates our beliefs and values. And when this happens, when design enables our children’s, teachers’, and system’s inventive genius to flourish, education will change.

Sometimes there are moments in human history that seem to beckon awakenings. They perturb us to reevaluate our beliefs, assumptions, and reigning cultural stories. They challenge us to synthesize and integrate seemingly disparate forms of knowledge into new relationships, new patterns, and new theories. They invite us to invent new language, new rules, and new structures. They call us to create and live into new stories of possibility. The ancient Greeks called this time kairos, the “right moment.” It is a time when reality embraces possibility.

What were the key ideas and goals behind creating a learning community like IMSA?

The idea of a residential secondary institution for students talented in mathematics and science was proposed by Nobel Laureate Leon Lederman. This was in the fall of 1983 and his vision was a response to the perceived national crisis in developing STEM talent. But as we know, the crisis persists. The achievement level of U.S. students on internationally benchmarked standardized tests in science and mathematics remain dismal and the needs of our nation’s most talented youth remain unfulfilled. Traditional models for educating academically talented students in STEM (Advance Placement courses) have not been able to nurture our next generation of STEM researchers, innovators, leaders, and inventors.

 

[Dr. Marshall talks to a student in a science class.]

From inception, IMSA sought not only to develop decidedly different scientific minds, but also to develop a decidedly different residential learning community — one that was nurturing and innovative, and one that instilled a sense of stewardship, and an obligation to give back. As a dynamic teaching and learning laboratory, IMSA continues to evolve, yet the roots of our founding ideas and goals remain. Here’s what they were and still are. The ‘IMSA idea’ means:

1. A collaborative partnership between diverse stakeholders — education, science, research, technology, innovation, business, and government.

2. Serving as a catalyst and laboratory to stimulate excellence in STEM teaching and learning.

3. Multi-dimensional admission criteria for identifying STEM talent and potential beyond a standardized test score.

4. An innovative, advanced and “uniquely challenging” curriculum designed by IMSA faculty that integrates the habits of mind of science and mathematics with those of the arts and humanities. Advanced placement (AP) would not be the content or driver of the curriculum.

5. Personalized learning opportunities both on and off campus for independent study, research and mentorships.

6. Formal interaction with some of the great minds of our time.

7. Developing deep disciplinary and interdisciplinary expertise and integrative ways of knowing and experiencing the interdisciplinary nature of science by solving complex multidisciplinary problems.

8. Learning experiences designed using current research on the learning sciences and how we learn.

9. Commitment to treat each student as if he or she is capable of significantly influencing life on the planet.

10. Embodies the following programmatic commitments: distributed expertise with students and teachers serving as co-learners and collaborators; fostering integrative habits of mind; designing competency-driven, inquiry-based, problem-centered, and integrative curriculum; experiential and technology embedded instruction; student-driven inquiry and research; flexible time structures to align with and support curricular and instructional goals and the commitment to share our learning, practices, processes, materials and models with educators and schools in Illinois and beyond.

Why did you feel so strongly about not calling IMSA a “school”?

It was very clear to me that whenever you say the word ‘school,’ it conjures up mental images and models of our experiences and behavior in a place — and accompanying that ‘place model’ is a kaleidoscope of memories and emotions about how that place looked and worked — how we felt in it, what was rewarded, celebrated and expected, and who we were supposed to be as learners in that place. Unfortunately, many of these mental models of how we should learn in school are completely at odds with how real learning happens and how it’s demonstrated in the real world. False proxies for learning often erode our children’s vibrant intellectual and creative potentials because they diminish the excitement of real learning and discovery. Everyone knows that finishing a course and a textbook does not mean achievement. Listening to a lecture does not mean understanding. Getting a high score on a high-stakes standardized test does not mean proficiency. Credentialing does not mean competency. Our children know it, too, yet it persists.

From IMSA’s inception, I knew that if we called IMSA a school, I would spend most of my time explaining what we were not instead of what we were. I would be telling people what we didn’t do rather than what we did do.

Years ago, a wise colleague told me to be careful because what you call it becomes what it is. This was a powerful caveat — calling ourselves an academy and a ‘teaching and learning laboratory for imagination and inquiry’ stimulates questions that enable us to have the conversations we want to have. All transformation begins in language. I did not want IMSA to be confined within a school story because that narrative would have been far too small for our imagination. You simply cannot create new maps from old stories.

Reference Link
http://www.fastcodesign.com/1662937/how-design-can-get-kids-on-the-path-to-tech-careers

Courtesy
Mansueto Ventures

[Images courtesy Illinois Math and Science Academy]

Phone Chargers To Be Standardized In 2011

Many people have a box or drawer full of old chargers for our old cell phones. Although the charger may function just fine, due to special connection types, we often can’t reuse a charger when we switch phones.

After all these years of dealing with different chargers and various connections between phones and other devices, some good news is in store. Soon, all mobile phones could use the same type of charger. In June 2009, 14 of the most prominent mobile phone manufacturers agreed to use a single standard. Although the agreement was made, there’s still a lot of background work to be done before consumers enjoy the full benefits of this agreement. Recently, the European Commission sent out details for the standard in preparation for the switch.

The technical specifications for the connection are based on the microUSB connector that many mobile phone manufacturers are already using.  You’ll find many of your favorite phone brands among the list of manufacturers that have agreed to adopt the standard, including Samsung, Apple, Nokia, and Research in Motion.

Although many of these manufacturers have already begun using the microUSB jack in preparation for the shift, you’ll notice one manufacturer on the list that has stuck with its own connection—Apple. Apple’s iPod connector is commonly found on a number of accessories. The Commission expects the first devices that have chargers with the precise details of the new standard to appear early next year.

“Now it is time for industry to show its commitment to sell mobile phones for the new charger. The common charger will make life easier for consumers, reduce waste and benefit businesses. It is a true win-win situation,” said European Commission Vice-President Antonio Tajani, Commissioner for Industry and Entrepreneurship.

Reference Link : http://hothardware.com/News/Phones-Chargers-To-Be-Standardized-In-2011/

Courtesy : David Altavilla and HotHardware.com

The Healers of 9/11

This weekend, a Jewish woman who lost her husband in the 9/11 attacks is planning to speak at a mosque in Boston. She will be trying to recruit members of the mosque to join her battle against poverty and illiteracy in Afghanistan.

Susan Retik

The woman, Susan Retik, has pursued perhaps the most unexpected and inspiring American response to the 9/11 attacks. This anniversary of Sept. 11 feels a little ugly to me, with some planning to remember the day with hatred and a Koran-burning — and that makes her work all the more exhilarating.

In the shattering aftermath of Sept. 11, 2001, Ms. Retik bonded with another woman, Patti Quigley, whose husband had also died in the attack. They lived near each other, and both were pregnant with babies who would never see their fathers.

Devastated themselves, they realized that there were more than half a million widows in Afghanistan — and then, with war, there would be even more. Ms. Retik and Ms. Quigley also saw that Afghan widows could be a stabilizing force in that country.

So at a time when the American government reacted to the horror of 9/11 mostly with missiles and bombs, detentions and waterboardings, Ms. Retik and Ms. Quigley turned to education and poverty-alleviation projects — in the very country that had incubated a plot that had pulverized their lives.

The organization they started, Beyond the 11th, has now assisted more than 1,000 Afghan widows in starting tiny businesses. It’s an effort both to help some of the world’s neediest people and to fight back at the distrust, hatred and unemployment that sustain the Taliban.

“More jobs mean less violence,” Ms. Retik noted. “It would be naïve to think that we can change the country, but change has to start somewhere. If we can provide a skill for a woman so that she can provide for her family going forward, then that’s one person or five people who will have a roof over their head, food in their bellies and a chance for education.”

In times of fear and darkness, we tend to suppress the better angels of our nature. Instead, these women unleashed theirs.

Paul Barker, who for many years ran CARE’s operations in Afghanistan, believes America would have accomplished more there if our government had shared the two women’s passion for education and development. “I can only wonder at what a different world it could be today if in those fateful months after 9/11 our nation’s leadership had been guided more by a people-to-people vision of building both metaphorical and physical bridges,” Mr. Barker said.

A terrific documentary, “Beyond Belief,” follows Ms. Retik and Ms. Quigley as they raise funds for Afghan widows and finally travel to Afghanistan to visit the women they had been helping. Ms. Quigley has since stepped down from Beyond the 11th because she felt in danger of becoming a perpetual 9/11 poster widow, but she still is working on a series of Afghan initiatives. Ms. Retik, who has since remarried, remains focused on the charity.

Beyond the 11th began by buying small chicken flocks for widows so that they could sell eggs. Another major project was to build a women’s center in the city of Bamian, where the women weave carpets for export. The center, overseen by an aid group called Arzu, also offers literacy classes and operates a bakery as a business.

Another initiative has been to train Afghan women, through a group called Business Council for Peace, to run a soccer ball manufacturing company. The bosses have been coached in quality control, inventory management and other skills, and they have recruited unemployed widows to stitch the balls — which are beginning to be exported under the brand Dosti.

Ms. Retik’s next step will be to sponsor a microfinance program through CARE. There are also plans to train attendants to help reduce deaths in childbirth.

Will all of this turn Afghanistan into a peaceful country? Of course not. Education and employment are not panaceas. But the record suggests that schools and economic initiatives do tend over time to chip away at fundamentalism — and they’re also cheap.

All the work that Beyond the 11th has done in Afghanistan over nine years has cost less than keeping a single American soldier in Afghanistan for eight months.

I admire Ms. Retik’s work partly because she offers an antidote to the pusillanimous anti-Islamic hysteria that clouds this anniversary of 9/11. Ms. Retik offers an alternative vision by reaching out to a mosque and working with Muslims so that in the future there will be fewer widows either here or there.

Her work is an invigorating struggle to unite all faiths against those common enemies of humanity, ignorance and poverty — reflecting the moral and mental toughness that truly can chip away at terrorism.

Patti Quigley, Beth Murphy, Susan Retik

Reference Link
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/09/opinion/09kristof.html?_r=1&th&emc=th

Courtesy
The New York Times Company