Nov 2022 update. The World Health Organization (WHO) reduced exposure guidelines for PM 2.5 concentrations to 5 ppm in 2021. https://www.who.int/news-room/feature-stories/detail/what-are-the-who-air-quality-guidelines The World Health Organization maintains that clean air is a basic human right. Yet, air pollution continues to pose a significant threat to people worldwide – it is the greatest environmental threat to health and a leading cause of …
How Cities Are Using Digital Twins Like a SimCity for Policymakers
CityLab Design The new technology, which creates virtual models of cities and simulates policy scenarios, could be a potential game-changer for urban planning. By Linda Poon April 5, 2022 The entire 40-square-mile metro region of Orlando, Florida, may soon live virtually inside the offices of the Orlando Economic Partnership (OEP). The group has partnered with the gaming company Unity to develop …
Intentionally igniting racial anxiety to get or maintain political dominance
Excerpt from Charles M. Blow, NYTimes: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/03/opinion/youngkin-virginia-race.htmlf …the frenzy around critical race theory is just the latest in a long line of manufactured outrages meant to tap into this same fear, and the strategy has proved depressingly effective. There was the fear of “race-mixing” among children — including the notion that Black boys might begin dating white girls following the …
Rural students are far less likely to go to college than their urban and suburban counterparts, and they’re less likely to finish once they start
“Rural students are far less likely to go to college than their urban and suburban counterparts, and they’re less likely to finish once they start.” NYT Mag (gift article for ND readers): The Tragedy of America’s Rural Schools. (If rural Americans and inner city Americans ever realized they were victims of the exact same systemic unfairness and got together to …
A monopoly can be given to a private corporation if it actually fulfills two things: allow just and reasonable prices and serves the public interest. Also, only one reason to grant a corporate charter…
David Korten’s presentation to the Summit on the Future of Corporations, Faneuil Hall, Boston MA, November 13, 2007. Only One Reason to Grant a Corporate Charter (see end) ** Excerpts from Interview – John Farrell and Jean Su – May-June 2021 Jean Su: A monopoly can be given to a private corporation if it actually fulfills two things. And this …
What is a solidarity economy — and can it save us from capitalism?
By Luke Ottenhof May 20, 2021 SHARE David Cobb considers himself a prepper, though not in the mainstream sense. A prepper is someone preparing to survive disaster, but Cobb isn’t the Purge-style, guns-and-ammo-hoarding variety. He works with Cooperation Humboldt, a solidarity economy group in and around Eureka, California. “I’m preparing my community for the climate crisis, for the shift that’s coming, as opposed …
Rethinking Education: Latinx and Black Family Homeschool Educators Enjoy Greater Control Over Curricula
The pandemic created a new, more diverse, more connected crop of homeschoolers. They could help shape what learning looks like for everyone. IT’S EASY TO homeschool in Texas. A cursory search leads to a step-by-step guide for withdrawing your kid from the school system. Plug a few bits of information into a templated letter, send to a district administrator, and voila! …
America’s Broadband Problem
A county-by-county look at the broadband gap, by Russell Brandom and William Joel May 10, 2021 https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/Ol08y/15/ For example, Park County CO has just 10% at broadband speeds. Percentage of people using the internet at 25Mbps or above per county. Blue< 15% of population has broadband internet speed. Gray ≥ 15% If broadband access was a problem before 2020, the pandemic turned it into a crisis. As …
North Dakota is requiring all schools to teach Native American history, culture, and treaty rights
Native News Online, curriculum on Native American history.” By Darren Thompson, April 9, 2021 BISMARCK, N.D. — A bill that requires all North Dakota schools to teach Native American history, culture, and treaty rights passed the North Dakota state senate on Tuesday, April 6 in a 72-21 vote. The bill calls for “requiring all elementary and secondary public and nonpublic schools in …
Land-Grant Colleges and American Indian Dispossession
Entangled Pasts: Land-Grant Colleges and American Indian Dispossession, Cambridge University Press, 29 October 2019, Margaret A. Nash, Article Land-grant colleges were created in the mid-nineteenth century when the federal government took and then sold off public lands and allowed states to use that money to create colleges. The land that was sold to support colleges was available only because of …