The deadline to submit a Spring (May 19, 2019) graduation application is Monday, November 26, 2018. The deadline to submit a Fall/Winter (January 15, 2019) graduation application has passed (July 9, 2018), but are still being accepted with a late fee. (Note: Graduation fee – $200.00; late fee – $25.00.)
Please indicate your “date of proposed graduation.” The site will notify me when the application is complete.
As I reflect on 2015, one of the things that keeps coming to mind are the people. If you know me, you know that I love people (most of the time) and that the people in my life play a major part. They are the ones who support me, make me laugh and help to create lasting memories, so I thought I’d shine a light on some of those beautiful people.
I love my family so much, in spite of their imperfections. My Uncle Keith and Aunty Cynthia made me feel completely at home when I stayed with them in Huntsville, and I loved having the opportunity to get to know my cousin Kaleem better.
Of course, there’s someone in my family who is a stand out time after time. My sister, Rhianna, was a star again this year and despite some bumps in the road, we’ve come through 2015 tighter than ever. She’s been my main supporter in all I do, provided a ton of jokes and supported me through my madness — I genuinely don’t know where I would be without her. I’m also prouder of my sister than I’ve ever been, as I’ve watched her display great strength, start a degree and finally get the job she deserves.
I also have to mention my adopted brother, Jemel. Now my parents didn’t actually adopt him, but I’ve adopted him as my brother. The support Jemel’s shown me this year has been amazing and touched me more than I think he’s realised. I was incredibly thankful to him for taking part in my short film and watching him want to do well for me provided me with so much joy, as well as laughter.
Then there are my crazy, dysfunctional, beautiful, church family, who never fail to play a big part in my life. I’ve enjoyed conversations with my girl Sh’kira, who I’m always excited to see and is always interested in what’s going on in my life. I’ve laughed with my darling Elliott, who came out with some classically weird lines this year which had me dying of laughter. But most of all, it meant a lot to see the love and support shown by my church family on my 23rd birthday.
I’ve been fortunate enough to stay friends with a number of girls from school and sixth form, who continue to show me love and support year after year — I was overcome with emotion when Ope unexpectedly gave me flowers and a card at my launch. However, I’ve got to shout out one of my special Textiles girls, Nahed, who’s been there for me big time in 2015. She was in my short film and came out to the launch, just like Jemel, but she’s done so much more than that. She’s constantly checked up on me, shown huge amounts of love, and we’ve been able to connect on similar situations that have been affecting us. Anyone would be lucky to have a friend like Ned.
I’ve also made a whole load of new friends this year, mainly because of my travels to Bosnia and the USA. In the USA, I met some lovely people, like Matthew, Glen, Kojo and Khyle, but most of all, I had the privilege of meeting Britney, one of the nicest people you will ever come across. Britney’s got a skill for writing and she’s a spoken word ninja — I was lucky enough to see her perform at Oakwood and she gave some of her wonderful words to my own spoken word script. And just like most of my friends, Britney is funny; just last week she brought me a lot of cheer with the best Christmas message ever.
Then in Bosnia I met an abundance of beautiful people — Lidija, Lara, Katarina, Nina, Marko, Biljana, Sandra, Ellie, Amy, Izzy, Jessie, Rory, Ljubiša, Nemanja, Tina, Alex, Mikica, Nevena. My house sister Naomi, who was also in my short film, and the hilarious Julia, who was kind enough to come and support me at my launch. The list is endless and there are so many others I would love to name, but I wanna spend a little time on my friend Filip.
Filip is a beautiful being, full of kindness, caring and sincerity. He’s intelligent, serious and wise beyond his years, but fun, entertaining and witty. He’s a writer, like me, and a musical romantic who shares my love of Florence + the Machine. I feel blessed to have found a friend in Filip, who’s bought me plenty of laughter and put many smiles on my face in a short space of time.
There are so many other beautiful individuals who have been big a part of my life in 2015, including my talent coach Teresa, my best friend Mells, my girl Jhanielle, the lovely Aisha, my hilarious grandparents and of course, my own parents. I’m so thankful for the people in people in my life, and looking back, I can see how blessed I am. I’m looking forward to developing these relationships and meeting more beautiful people in 2016.
Posted in Feelings, My Expression, My Thoughts... and tagged 2015, Beautiful People, Caring, Church Family, Develop, Family, Friends, Funny, Love, Reflect, Sister, Smile, Textiles on December 31, 2015 by Shaniqua Marie. 2 Comments	
Here are just some of the prestigious brands from the B2B space who have appeared on our show over the years.	
“What could be more important than doing our absolute best to give everyone we serve the best possible quality of life?”
A new vision for the council is being rolled out over the coming weeks. The new vision reflects the challenges and opportunities the council faces both now and in the future.
The council priorities show how we will achieve the vision of Your East Riding... where everyone matters. Although the current priorities were still appropriate, it was agreed they needed to reflect the importance of children and young people.
This new £3.9million development at Bridgehead Business Park, Hessle, is a partnership between the council and the University of Hull and offers flexible office space, conference facilities, an on-site café and parking. It is a key part of the council’s economic vision for the area of helping to grow businesses in emerging sectors like renewable energy and environmental technology – strengthening the Humber’s reputation as the UK’s Energy Estuary.
Residents in the East Riding are the number one recyclers in the country, with the council recycling more household waste than any other council in England. The council was able to recycle or compost 65.4% of all household rubbish in the 2016-2017 financial year - the average national recycling rate for England was 45.1%. This is great news for the environment, with as little waste as possible going to landfill.
The council’s leisure centres not only offer state-of-the-art facilities but a range of programmes such as Live Well and Exercise on Referral to help people’s physical and mental wellbeing. Our approach of investing-to-save is benefitting residents across the East Riding by providing fantastic, multi-million-pound facilities for them to enjoy sporting activities and socialise at the same time as improving their health and wellbeing.
Vulnerable people to be supported if they feel frightened, confused or lost while out and about. Buildings display Safe Place stickers and staff are trained to support vulnerable people, such as those with learning disabilities and dementia, and can alert trusted, named contacts of the people from information on cards they carry with them.
The council has teamed up with the Hull and East Yorkshire Children’s University to offer school pupils insights into different careers - with the aim of raising aspirations and inspiring them to achieve in education and their adult lives. Children from New Pasture Lane Primary School in Bridlington were given a VIP behind-the-scenes tour of Bridlington Spa and taught how to be journalists, photographers and videographers for the day, even getting the chance to interview cast and crew from the BBC charity panto being performed there.
Working with others to support sustainable economic growth and strong communities, ensuring the East Riding is a great place to invest in, live, work and visit.
“We have simplified the wording of our priorities and included the importance of helping children achieve their full potential.”
The words 'quality', 'pride' and 'respect' from the old vision still resonate with many so these are being used to uphold the new values. The new values and behaviours help to guide how we work with each other, with our partners and residents and communities to achieve the vision.
The pledge is a voluntary show of support to the Quality, Pride and Respect values and the behaviours expected of all of us across the council. Complete the pledge and you will receive a new Vision Lanyard.
Your views about the new vision and values are important so please share any suggestions, feedback and questions you may have using this simple form.
If you also have any questions or suggestions for Caroline about the work taking place to develop the council's approach to flexi-working, the recruitment and retention of staff, leadership training and employees' health and wellbeing, you can also use this form.
Feedback: I found the roadshow I attended extremely interesting as it gave me a much better understanding of the council and its priorities, problems and challenges. It allowed me to feel part of the council as a whole rather than only knowing what is going on in my own area. Thank you for taking the time to keep us all informed. I feel it would be helpful to have something similar on maybe an annual basis to keep us all up to date.
Caroline Lacey: Thank you for your feedback and suggestion. I found the roadshows really helpful in being able to communicate with a large number of staff and have been really pleased with the feedback, questions and enthusiasm they have generated. I will be looking to make these an annual event.
Feedback: I have been stopped by members of the public at lunchtimes who noticed my where everyone matters lanyard and gave constructive feedback on council services. Other than directing them to the website or general phone number, should I be doing anything further to log these?
Caroline Lacey: It is great to hear you have had constructive feedback from members of the public about council services and you are clearly acting as an ambassador for the council. I think you are doing the right thing directing people to the website, we don’t need to record these comments anywhere.
Feedback: I think the pledge is very relevant to the current priorities in the East Riding and feel proud to be working at the council.
Caroline Lacey: I am really pleased to hear you are proud to work for the council. I will continue to publicise the outcomes of the work we are doing around leadership, recruitment, retention and flexible working through The Grapevine and Insight over the next few months, so look out for these articles.
Feedback: My question is around flexible working and staff wellbeing. Is the maternity policy going to be reviewed? If I start a family I am worried I will be left behind from being able to access flexible working options, especially as the current policy states I would not be able to retain the same job role should I drop to lower than full-time hours after maternity leave. This suggests new mums are not deemed able to manage their roles on a part-time basis and have to drop to level one. I’m sure you understand this brings its own worries and frustrations and affects staff retention as they do not feel they are being given the opportunity to develop.
Caroline Lacey: I have looked into the question and there is no restriction within the policy on returning to work part-time in the same job following maternity leave.
The maternity policy states: “2.10.1 An employee has the right following OML to return to the position (subject to paragraph 2.10.2 below) to which they are employed under their existing contract of employment. If an employee returns to work following AML, their entitlement is to return either to the same job, or if that is not reasonably practicable from the council’s perspective, to another suitable job which is on terms and conditions not less favourable.”
This provision is built into the legislation and takes into consideration operational difficulties that could result from a longer absence from work as a result of maternity leave. It therefore gives the employer the ability to move an individual according to business need.
In relation to any request to reduce working hours following maternity leave, this is dealt with by the Right to Request Flexible Working policy.
This policy applies to all employees with more than 26 weeks service who wish to request any changes to hours, days, working patterns, etc. It does not refer specifically to maternity leave and does not treat individuals returning from maternity leave differently to any other.
This policy states: “An employee only has a right to request to work flexibly. There is not an absolute right for the request to be granted.”
However the council will always try to accommodate flexible working requests and has a duty to seriously consider any such requests but, in considering any request, has to balance the needs of the individual and that of the service.
A request should only be refused if certain grounds apply relating to considerations like additional cost or not being able to meet customer demand due to staffing.
I hope this makes the policy situation a bit clearer. It may be there are particular service issues that mean flexible working requests cannot be accommodated at level two but I encourage you to discuss this with your manager.
Feedback: Having returned to work after having a child, I appreciate the approach you are taking to flexible working. Knowing we are valued not only as staff members but also as people has really encouraged me to offer extra, doing work in my own time for instance. I also really appreciate the launch of the coaching and mentoring project as this is an area I feel has been a gap in our organisation previously. The attitude that a happy ‘workforce’ (although I dislike the term) is likely to be reflected in happier residents is great.
Caroline Lacey: Thank you for your support of the work we are undertaking around flexible working and coaching and mentoring.
We will be taking a report to Cabinet in November following the outcome of the pilot work on flexible working, with a view to rolling out the approach across the authority.
The workstreams on recruitment and retention will also be feeding back in November/December and we will be keeping everyone updated on the outcomes of these workstreams through The Grapevine and Insight.
Extramedullary acute myeloid leukemia (AML) is a leukemic infiltration outside the bone marrow and is common in monocytic and myelomonocytic leukemia. The incidence is rare (0.6%-7.4%) and the clinical diagnosis requires a high index of suspicion. Fluorodeoxyglucose-positron emission tomography (FDG-PET) is used to detect, stage, and restage solid tumors, including lymphomas and Richter transformation. However its role in the management of liquid tumors and specifically in extramedullary AML has not been assessed. We present a case of a 64-year-old man who was diagnosed with AML and subsequently had recurrent extramedullary AML relapses. This case demonstrates the usefulness of FDG-PET for staging and assessment of the treatment response.