Walmart Adjusts the Thermostat to Warm Worker Relations

Abstract: BENTONVILLE, Ark. — When the weather gets sultry here at company headquarters, Walmart workers everywhere brace for an icy blast. Because temperatures at Walmart stores across the United States are controlled remotely by the retailer’s centralized systems here, employees stock shelves and tend to customers under conditions that, by many accounts, tend to be on the chilly side from one city to another. So at an employees’ rally held here on Wednesday ahead of the retail giant’s annual shareholders meeting this week, company executives made one of several concessions by agreeing to raise average store temperatures by 1 degree for the majority of Walmart locations. From adjusting the air-conditioning to relaxing the dress code and even jazzing up a store’s music, the overtures — however small they seemed — are part of Walmart’s effort to project an image of a more caring employer. A day earlier, Walmart, the country’s largest private sector employer, said that it would raise the starting hourly wage for more than 100,000 managers in the United States. That was the second wave of wage increases at Walmart this year, after it announced in February that it would raise the pay for a half-million entry-level store workers. “I love to listen to you, I love hearing what’s working, what isn’t. I want to hear your ideas. I even like to hear your frustrations,” Greg Foran, the head of Walmart’s United States division, told about 3,000 store workers. “Our job, my job, is to make your life easier,” Mr. Foran said. Long a target of protests over low wages and rigid work schedules, Walmart is appearing to appease employees in the face of rising competition to hire and retain workers as the job market rebounds. Other retail chains, like Ikea and Gap, have also started to offer higher wages for store employees. Walmart is also trying to cast off an image as an exploitative employer with an army of minimum-wage workers, some of whom reportedly depend on food stamps or other government aid. Now, after the latest wage increases, all Walmart workers make above the minimum wage, the retailer says. Walmart also is trying to improve customer service as it struggles with sluggish sales at its supercenters and neighborhood markets. Sales at stores open for a year or more grew by just 1.1 percent from a year earlier in the first quarter, though its performance over the last few quarters has improved slightly after a period of sales declines. Not all workers were impressed with the changes. And not all of them were in Bentonville at the company’s invitation. Cindy Murray was in town with the labor union affiliate, Our Walmart, to speak in support of a resolution the group will be presenting on behalf of an activist investor at Friday’s meeting that calls for giving shareholders the right to nominate board candidates. Ms. Murray, who said she earned $13.20 as a fitting room clerk at a Walmart store in Laurel, Md., and struggled to pay her medical bills, said the retailer was skirting its workers’ most pressing concerns. “Anything Walmart does to makes life better for workers is awesome. But these changes are also basic things we need to do our jobs better and sell more,” she said. “Hire more workers and better pay — those are the biggest things. I think they should stop dancing round the boat.” Kristin Oliver, Walmart’s executive vice president in charge of human resources, acknowledged that workers harbored remaining concerns, and said Walmart was working on more flexible scheduling. She also said the company hoped that the combination of higher wages and friendlier policies would make its work force less transitory, and more likely to build careers with the retailer. “What we’ve seen in the last few years is people jumping for small wage increases. People will move from one retailer to another for 25 cents an hour,” Ms. Oliver said. “What we hope is going to happen with the investments we’ve made is to slow that down.” To entice workers to stay, Walmart on Wednesday announced a number of other changes to its employee policies. The retailer will ease a much-criticized dress code that had required store workers, even those in physically intensive jobs, to wear shirts, vests and khakis. Now, stockers and other back-of-store workers will be allowed to wear jeans and T-shirts. Service-oriented workers will also be able to expand their choice of pants to black or khaki-colored denim. On special occasions, like days with sporting events or seasonal holidays, workers will be invited to wear team jerseys, ugly Christmas sweaters or pink shirts to support breast cancer awareness, said Deisha Barnett, a Walmart spokeswoman. The retailer also said it was bringing back an in-store broadcasting service called Walmart Radio, with a D.J. who broadcasts music to stores, to address numerous complaints from workers about having to listen to the same Justin Bieber and Celine Dion albums all day. And temperatures at stores in the East and central regions will rise to 75 degrees from 74. (In stores in the West, average temperatures will fall from 76 to 75.) To acknowledge employees’ complaints, executives at the rally used an imaginary Walmart worker, a puppet they called Willy Sellmore, who offered a surprisingly frank take on the retailer’s policies. When an executive explained that the temperature changes had been discussed for a year, Willy appeared understandably baffled. “A year? A year? How long does it take to adjust a thermostat?” he said. “This shouldn’t be so hard.”

Walmart Stores
Retail
Jobs
Wages and salaries
Workplace


Wisconsin: Sentence in Shooting of Principal

Abstract: A 16-year-old was sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole in the shooting death of his high school principal. The boy, Eric Hainstock, was convicted of first-degree intentional homicide on Thursday in the death of the principal of Weston Schools, near Cazenovia, in September. The judge, Patrick Taggart of Sauk County Circuit Court, said Mr. Hainstock would be eligible for parole in 30 years.

Principals (School)
Education and Schools
Murders and Attempted Murders
Sentences (Criminal)


Coaching Carousel Spins Ever Faster

Abstract: Before the 1987 season, Virginia Tech hired a new football coach. The new boss was 2-9 in his first season. A half-dozen recruiting classes later, he finished his sixth season with a record that was, on paper, only microscopically improved: 2-8-1. Contemporary fans will be surprised to learn the coach was not fired. Instead, he proceeded to reel off 23 consecutive nonlosing regular seasons, ending each with a bowl trip. More than 200 wins later, his teams have finished in the top 10 six times, and played for a national championship. “Frank Beamer,” said Bill Carr, a former athletic director at Florida who consults on coaching hires, “would not have had his opportunity in this environment.” Such is the present-day reality of college football, with new coaches on incredibly short leashes and even old ones feeling insecure as rising revenues lead directly to rising turnover. Louisiana State nearly fired Les Miles last week, only four years after he led the Tigers to the national title game. Georgia did part ways with Mark Richt, who won almost 100 more games than he lost in 15 seasons in Athens. Miami dumped Al Golden at midseason — even though he had a winning record at the time. Over all, nearly two dozen jobs came open at some point this season. The process of filling them will surely open a few others. The carousel is spinning: On Sunday, Virginia Tech announced that Memphis Coach Justin Fuente had been hired to replace Beamer, who announced his retirement a month ago. And on Monday, Southern California said that Clay Helton, who took over for the fired Steve Sarkisian in October, would remain the head coach. But, like coaches, not all jobs are created equal. History, administration support and in-state talent all play a role in a program’s success, and those factors — and others — make some of the recent openings a lot more desirable than others. PLUM GIGS Southern California is one of college football’s great programs, and it was able to land highly rated recruiting classes even while under N.C.A.A. sanctions (since expired). Helton had the inside track and got the job, but job security is something else: He is, after all, the fourth Trojans coach, including interims, in the past three seasons. Image PAC-12: The U.S.C. job opened in October, with the dismissal of Steve Sarkisian, but never hit the market: Clay Helton, who had been coaching on an interim basis, was named the full-time coach on Monday. The bad news about Georgia is that expectations are so high that you can win nearly 75 percent of your games over 15 seasons and still be given your walking papers, as just happened to Richt. The good news is that with one of the country’s largest hubs of talent, tradition and prestige, and membership in the Southeastern Conference’s weaker division, those expectations are justified. This is the best job on the market. Virginia Tech ’s record of success is not as long as U.S.C.’s or Georgia’s, but the program has practically every factor in its favor: a relatively uncompetitive division, heavy investments in new facilities, a recruiting-rich state it dominates and even the retention of the experienced and respected defensive coordinator Bud Foster. Miami has made little noise over the past decade, but it has won five national championships — with four different head coaches — and finished second another three times in the 30 seasons from 1983 to 2002, primarily by feeding off South Florida’s plentiful talent. Image A.C.C.: Virginia Tech already has its replacement for Frank Beamer in Justin Fuente, and Miami's history could entice a big-name replacement for Al Golden. Winning at Syracuse and Virginia, however, will remain a massive challenge. While Gary Pinkel steps down as one of Missouri ’s most accomplished coaches, he leaves behind a program in far better shape than the one he inherited. Once a Big 12 also-ran, the Tigers now play in the SEC, and they have won their division twice in three seasons. REBUILDING PROJECTS Like several Atlantic Coast Conference members, Virginia is traditionally a basketball school that has been impelled by N.C.A.A. economics to beef up its football program. It will be difficult for it to gain much traction without first overcoming Virginia Tech, against which it has won only one of its last 17 meetings. Image BIG TEN: There are plenty of great jobs in the conference, but few would include Maryland, Rutgers or Minnesota among them. And no one would include Illinois anymore. Illinois and Minnesota had their head coaches leave either just before or during the season and then saw their interim athletic directors give their interim coaches short-term contracts. (The Illinois interim athletic director, Paul Kowalczyk, called his hiring of Bill Cubit “not ideal” Sunday, a comment that will probably not be a bonus on the recruiting trail.) Syracuse , Jim Brown’s alma mater, enjoyed a string of successes in the late 1980s and early 1990s and has a football-minded athletic director. But the Orange have struggled to adjust to the A.C.C., going 7-17 in their three seasons. Also, it is very snowy up there for players considering sunnier options. Despite playing in — and winning — the first college football game, in 1869, Rutgers has had only brief cameos as a nationally competitive program, and none since joining the Big Ten. Until Rutgers figures out how to dominate New Jersey’s prospect-rich but nationally-known high schools, the Scarlet Knights’ coaching job will continue to look like a poisoned chalice. Image BIG 12: Iowa State is starting over again after firing Paul Rhoads, but in moving quickly it landed one of the most sought-after names, Toledo's Matt Campbell. It is more than possible that Matt Campbell, the talented Toledo coach whom Iowa State plucked to head its program, sees something in Ames that others do not. But here’s what others see: a program that has four winning seasons since 1990 and last won its conference in 1912, and is the perpetual second choice even in its own small state. WILD CARDS Less than two years ago, South Carolina was the fourth ranked team in the country, pushing out a homegrown No. 1 over all N.F.L. draft pick. But there is little evidence the Gamecocks can replicate their recent success without the recently retired Steve Spurrier. Image SEC: Georgia, South Carolina and Missouri play in the SEC's weaker division, offering the next coach a simpler path to the College Football Playoff -- provided he can get around the often-stronger West champion in the league's title game. Maryland is coming off a 3-9 season and remains, to many, a basketball school playing in perhaps college football’s toughest division , the Big Ten East. Its administration mishandled Randy Edsall’s firing, but the support of the booster Kevin Plank, the founder of Under Armour, makes the Terps a high-risk, high-reward play for an ambitious coach. Memphis and Houston (which currently has a head coach, Tom Herman) are typically among the first candidates mentioned when prognosticators speculate about which members the Big 12 might add if (when?) the conference seeks to expand. They both have commitments to investing in football, and both sit on the recruiting equivalent of oil gushers. But until realignment happens, expect both of these programs to be sellers, not buyers, in the coaching market.

Coaches
Frank Beamer
College football
Mark Richt
Clay Helton


In Sled Hockey, Slower Pace but Hard Shots and Hits

Abstract: NEWINGTON, Conn. — Back on her wheelchair and in the dressing room with her teammates, Sara Tabor said it had not been such a bad day on the ice. Her team, the Rangers , had lost twice, but she scored a goal after nearly bowling over a goaltender with her sled. She laughed when she said opponents grumbled that she should have been called for a penalty, but she already knew that the referees rarely penalize the few women in the Northeast Sled Hockey League. Levels the playing field, you know. “I play really aggressive hockey,” said Tabor, who lives on Long Island and works in Manhattan. “They’ll say: ‘She’s a girl! Why does she get to hold?’ The refs never call anything. You get in guys’ heads.” Tabor, 31, is in her rookie season with a sled-hockey team sponsored, in part, by the N.H.L.’s Rangers, which explains why players wear red, white and blue sweaters. Tabor was partly paralyzed when she fell in a shower in Germany four years ago. She grew up in Minnesota and is a Wild fan (and a North Stars fan before that), but had never played organized hockey until she was injured. She is unable to walk without the aid of leg braces or crutches, and she needs to use a wheelchair to get from Penn Station to work, often slaloming through pedestrians. Hockey has rejuvenated her. “I count my blessings a lot,” she said. Of her injury, she said: “It’s not something I dwell on. I just have to get stuff done.” Though able-bodied people play sled hockey, the sport was designed for athletes with mobility limitations caused by injuries or conditions like cerebral palsy. It is a part of the Paralympic Games . The Rangers are one of six teams in the Northeast Sled Hockey League, the first of its kind, which holds five games one Sunday per month at the Newington Arena, near Hartford. Each team plays eight regular-season games and there are also playoff games. The annual entry fee is $3,000 per team. Many teams pad their schedules by playing in tournaments. Players strap themselves into seated $800 sleds with two skates mounted on the bottom, one at the front, one under the seat. They propel themselves with two half-hockey sticks in a fashion similar to cross-country skiers. Composite sticks cost $120 per pair and have small spikes bolted to the butt ends. (Tabor tapes hers pink.) The stick blades are less curved than those on standard ice-hockey sticks, and the elbows of the sticks are straighter than those on ice-hockey sticks, in part because the players are lower to the ice. A 45-minute game is played on a standard rink. “We’re not just some disabled people playing out there who are looking for a pat on the back,” said Victor Calise, a founder and team manager of the sled-hockey Rangers. Calise, also No. 9 (think Adam Graves) on the ice, began playing sled hockey not long after he was paralyzed in a bicycle accident in Queens in 1994 — “the year the Rangers won the Stanley Cup,” he said, smiling. Calise, 40, is a commissioner in New York City for the Mayor’s Office for People with Disabilities and lives on the Upper West Side with his wife and two daughters. Icing and offsides are called, and players on sleds often clash — and crash — while jousting for loose pucks in corners. Penalties are rare, but they are called by two able-bodied officials. There is only one concession at Newington: Players who are not in the game sit inside the boards, nudging live pucks back into play. The pace of sled hockey, of course, is much slower than, say, even the youth games played at Newington Arena, but the action can be ferocious. Wrist shots are hard, and players occasionally separate shoulders and snap collarbones when they slam into the boards. “It’s full contact,” said Taylor Chace, 26, a player for the United States Paralympic team who sustained a severe back injury while playing junior hockey in New Hampshire 10 years ago. “There’s just as much as able-bodied hockey.” As a volunteer for the Wheelchair Sports Federation, Calise serves as a liaison between the organization and the Rangers, who provide the sled-hockey team with jerseys, the use of their logo, ice time for practice twice a month at their training facility in Greenburgh, N.Y., and, occasionally, a grant. There is also an affiliated youth program. Calise, who grew up in Queens playing street hockey, said the Rangers’ affiliation with the sled-hockey team generates positive publicity for both teams. But he added that in a city with 800,000 disabled residents, it should be easier to find players than it has been. The Rangers have about 20 players on their roster, including three women. Asked to describe just how much of a workout a game is, Calise smiled and said: “Depends on how hard you push on your shift. You can’t just push yourself out there and play.” On a recent Sunday, the Rangers played back-to-back games against two of the best teams in the N.S.H.L.: the NEP Wildcats, a Durham, N.H.-based team for which Chace plays, and the Flyers, whose players are from the Philadelphia area. Each team can have up to three able-bodied players, but no more than two of them can be on the ice at one time, said Ken Messier, the president of the league and one of its founders in 2005. The team known as the Rangers joined in 2007. “If you have a good goalie, he can make up for a lot — just like regular hockey,” said Messier, who helps run the Connecticut Wolf Pack, another N.S.H.L. team. Then there are players like Tabor. She is a sled-hockey devotee who has gone from a newbie to a player who is considering trying out for the United States women’s sled-hockey team. She has made friends here quickly, and her boyfriend, Larry Minei, also plays for the Rangers. She said she is beyond the point of thinking that she merely caught a hockey bug. “We don’t really think of ourselves as inspirational stories,” said Tabor, who added: “We work out, we eat everything that regular hockey players do. It’s just that we play with our legs strapped down.”

Sleds
Northeast Sled Hockey League
Paralympic Games
Disabilities
Hockey Sled
Hockey Ice
New York Rangers
Tabor Sara


Con Ed Worker Killed in Brooklyn Manhole Explosion

Abstract: An explosion in a manhole where Consolidated Edison workers had been splicing cables left one worker dead and another injured in Brooklyn on Thursday afternoon. The man who was killed, George Dillman, 26, had been working in the manhole, filled with 120-volt power lines, at the intersection of Euclid and Sutter Avenues in East New York. His partner, Craig Penney, 28, had just returned to their truck when black smoke started pouring out of the manhole and a buzzing could be heard, according to Preston Fulmore, 54, who was standing near his parked truck talking on his cellphone when the accident occurred. Mr. Penney grabbed a ladder from the utility truck and lowered it into the manhole, which was about 6 feet deep, 5 feet wide and 10 feet long, a fire official said. “As soon as he put the ladder in there, that ladder ignited,” Mr. Fulmore said. “That ladder burned like paper.” Mr. Penney grabbed a fire extinguisher from his truck, but could not get close to the manhole because of the heat and smoke, Mr. Fulmore said. “He’s hollering, ‘George, George, oh my God,’ ” he said of Mr. Penney. “He fell to his knees crying.” Mr. Fulmore said he was trying to pull Mr. Penney away from the manhole when they heard an explosion. Mr. Penney was taken to Brookdale University Hospital and Medical Center with minor burns. Mr. Dillman was declared dead at the scene, but the specific cause of death was unclear. The cause of the explosion was under investigation. Con Edison officials said it was the first time in more than four years that one of its electrical workers had died on the job. Firefighters and other emergency workers went to the scene after the emergency call came in at 12:24 p.m., officials said. Deputy Chief David Jakubowski of the Fire Department said the flames coming out of the manhole were taller than the height of a Con Edison truck, or about 8 feet high. It took two hours before Con Edison could cut power to the manhole and the surrounding neighborhood, forcing rescuers to wait to retrieve Mr. Dillman. Power to neighboring homes and businesses was restored later in the day. “Our thoughts and prayers go out to the families of the deceased worker and his injured colleague,” Con Edison said in a statement. Sonny Jelovcic, 60, Mr. Dillman’s supervisor, said Mr. Dillman was “ liked by everyone, friendly, humble, always with a smile on his face.” He added: “He was looking to advance in his position. I don’t think anything would have stood in his way.” He said that Mr. Dillman lived in Nassau County, and had plans to get married. Joe Flaherty, a spokesman for the Utility Workers Union of America Local 1-2, said that Mr. Dillman celebrated his 26th birthday last week. “People don’t realize, but there are a lot of people who get burned on the job,” Mr. Flaherty said. “You throw a switch and the light comes on. But it takes a whole lot to make sure that happens and people take that for granted.” Jose Reyes, 28, who lives about a block from the site of the explosion, said he was walking down Sutter Avenue from a barber shop when he saw thick black smoke covering two blocks. When he was about a block away, Mr. Reyes said, he heard a loud explosion that shook his building. Flames were shooting out of the manhole, which is near a Valero gas station, he said, adding that Con Edison had been doing work there for about a week. Other neighbors said that when they heard the explosion, their buildings shook and the lights flickered; some reported problems with their electricity. Friends and relatives gathered at the home of Mr. Dillman’s parents in College Point, Queens, on Thursday. Matt Teepe, 40, a longtime neighbor and friend of the family, said he had known Mr. Dillman well. He remembered Mr. Dillman as a generous, “outgoing” and “bubbly” boy — and said he was the same as a man. “He would cut my grass. He wouldn’t even tell me he was doing it. I would hear the lawn mower going and it was him,” Mr. Teepe said. Many who knew him said that Mr. Dillman had long been interested in electrical work, a trade he learned from his father, who was also an electrician. Mr. Teepe said that Mr. Dillman loved his job with Con Ed. “That was it,” Mr. Teepe said. “He found his talent in life, and that was it.” Mr. Teepe recalled Mr. Dillman’s telling him the good news about getting the Con Ed position. “He said, ‘I finally made it!’ ” Jeffrey Ramos, 25, an attendant at a gas station in the neighborhood who said he had known Mr. Dillman since boyhood, said that about two weeks ago, Mr. Dillman was in the gas station lobby telling him and another friend about how precarious his job could be. “He was saying how his clothes were fireproof, but he’s not, how a manhole could be dangerous,” Mr. Ramos recalled. Mr. Dillman told him that “if he’s working underground, and something, God forbid, happens, you know, you can’t climb a ladder that fast.”

Manholes
Explosions
Consolidated Edison Inc
Accidents and Safety
Brooklyn (NYC)


China Invests in Germany Amid Uncertainty

Abstract: BRUSSELS — As Prime Minister Wen Jiabao of China tours Europe this week, it is no accident that Germany occupies a special place on his itinerary. After all, Germany is the one European Union country that has a trade surplus with China. And it has also been a focus of Chinese investment in Europe — so much so that analysts say some Germans are growing wary as Chinese businesses have been snapping up German engineering companies. Mr. Wen, making his sixth visit in eight years, and the German chancellor, Angela Merkel , on Sunday opened the annual trade fair in Hanover , billed as the world’s leading showcase for industrial technology. They plan to witness the signing of an economic agreement at the Volkswagen headquarters, in Wolfsburg, on Monday. According to German media reports, the deal will include the opening of a new car plant in the far western Chinese region of Xinjiang. Mr. Wen’s agenda, as with a follow-up trip planned by his likely successor, Vice Prime Minister Li Keqiang, seems aimed at presenting an aura of business as usual, even as trade tensions flare with the West and the Communist Party at home is embroiled in its biggest scandal in years, involving the deposed Politburo member Bo Xilai. “We shouldn’t be complacent about the stability of China’s leadership,” said Kerry Brown, head of the Asia program at the Royal Institute of International Affairs in London. To do business and expand access to markets, “you need more predictability in the system,” he said in an interview. “There’s too much uncertainty at the moment.” One thing that does seem certain is that neither Mr. Wen nor Mr. Li will be bringing open checkbooks to help shore up Europe’s shakiest economies. While China has offered moral support and promised to help in global efforts to back the euro zone, Mr. Wen has not made specific promises to invest in a European bailout fund or in bonds from the hardest-hit countries. Instead, the Chinese seem to be going for German bonds, or bunds, helping to drive Berlin’s borrowing costs to record lows, despite the mounting cost of rescuing its euro zone partners. “It can be summarized as helping Germany to help the euro zone,” Jonathan Holslag, a researcher at the Brussels Institute of Contemporary China Studies, said in a telephone interview from Washington, where he testified Thursday before the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission. China’s leaders, Mr. Brown said, “don’t understand the logic of putting hard-earned Chinese money into supporting the social welfare system of Europe.” But Chinese investment in European business is growing. And while much of the effort remains focused on setting up trading companies, Chinese companies have started to shop for industrial technology and brands that can help them become more competitive, at home and globally. In 2010, the most recent year for which data is available, Chinese direct investment in the 27 European Union countries totaled 900 million euros, or about $1.2 billion at the current exchange rate. That was only a fraction of the 28.5 billion euros ($38 billion) of American direct investment in Europe. But it was three times China’s level of only a year earlier — while the United States figure was shrinking. “China is catching up quickly, especially during the current financial crisis,” Zhang Haiyan, director of the Euro-China Center at the Antwerp Management School, wrote in the “Euro-China Investment Report 2011-2012.” The Chinese investment has been concentrated in a handful of countries: Luxembourg, mainly because of its reputation as an international financial hub, followed by Russia, Germany, Sweden and Britain. Sweden, where the Zhejiang Geely Holding Group bought Volvo from the Ford Motor Company in 2010 for $1.8 billion, is on Mr. Wen’s itinerary this week. Mr. Li will be stopping in Russia. There, as in other parts of Eastern Europe, “Chinese companies know how to fill the empty place in the market that used to be filled by the government,” especially in consumer goods, Mr. Zhang said in an interview. But China seems particularly intent on Germany. Chinese companies were the No. 1 investor in Germany last year, with 158 projects, or almost 20 percent of the total, according to Germany Trade and Invest, the government’s economic development agency. It was the first time China had surpassed the United States by that measure. Just last week, the Xuzhou Construction Machinery Group announced it would buy a majority stake in the German machinery maker Schwing, whose concrete pumps are being used to build the new European Central Bank tower in Frankfurt, as well as 1 World Trade Center in New York. The price was not disclosed. But a rival of Schwing’s, Putzmeister, was sold to the Chinese company Sany Heavy Industry in January for 360 million euros, now worth about $480 million. The same month, the Chinese energy company LDK Solar bought the German group Sunways for about 24 million euros ($32 million). In March, another German company, Kiekert, the world’s biggest supplier of car door latches, was bought by a Chinese competitor, Hebei Lingyun, for an undisclosed price. “It’s certainly true that German companies have most of the goodies and know-how that the Chinese are looking for,” Mr. Holslag said. Such companies are hardly household names. But they are part of the country’s Mittelstand, the roughly 3.7 million small- and medium-size companies, many family-owned, that are the backbone of the German economy and export engine. Some have had cash flow troubles made worse by the global financial crisis. And their privately held structure makes them attractive to Chinese buyers, who can deal directly with family owners rather than corporate boards and shareholders. Mr. Holslag said he expected to see German policy tilt more in favor of protecting the Mittelstand’s interests, rather than promoting industrial giants like Siemens and Volkswagen, out of concern that the rapid expansion in China by the big conglomerates might lead to overcapacity and job cuts at home. “This is certainly an evolution to watch,” Mr. Holslag said. The bulk of China’s outward investment is still aimed at securing natural resources, largely in the Southern Hemisphere. And Mr. Brown noted that the total level of investment was still relatively small, despite China’s having the world’s second-largest economy. “The idea that the Chinese are coming to ‘buy Europe,’ it’s really overblown,” he said. “That such a massive economy has so little prominence, it’s really a mystery.” Mr. Wen began his tour Friday in Iceland, which Chinese officials last week pointed out is the first Western European country to grant China market economy status. The European Union and the United States have yet to do so, largely because of concerns about subsidies that China gives its exporters. Such a designation would make it much harder for Western companies to win trade disputes in which they accuse China of dumping goods below cost. European Union officials say the market economy talks with China have been moving at a glacial pace, and the political transition in Beijing may slow it further. Mr. Li will meet in Brussels on May 3 with the presidents of the European Council and the European Commission, with talks mainly focusing on energy and urbanization instead. European Union officials said that also reflected a widening of the agenda from traditional foreign policy and trade issues. The issues being discussed may end up being overshadowed, however, by the scandal in China surrounding Mr. Bo and his wife, Gu Kailai, who is under investigation in the killing of a British businessman. A prolonged split in the party leadership would be problematic not only for China, Mr. Brown warned, but also for the global economy, and could stymie progress in efforts to gain greater access to China’s vast domestic market as well. “We cannot waste all that effort because of a bunch of squabbling politicians,” Mr. Brown said.

China
Germany
Wen Jiabao
European Union
Merkel Angela
International Trade and World Market
Politics and Government
Economic Conditions and Trends
European Sovereign Debt Crisis (2010- )


Messy Legal Fight Over Mandela Trust Goes Public

Abstract: JOHANNESBURG — Nelson Mandela was livid. He believed that two of his daughters, working with a lawyer he had recently fired, were trying to meddle in his financial affairs. So he summoned the daughters, Makaziwe Mandela and Zenani Dlamini, to his home here for a family meeting in April 2005. According to two people present, he gave them a withering talking-to. “Mr. Mandela made it clear,” Bally Chuene, Mr. Mandela’s current lawyer, said this month in a sworn statement, “that he did not want them involved in his affairs.” At the time, the daughters appeared to acquiesce to Mr. Mandela’s wish to appoint independent trustees to a trust he had created to provide for his descendants. According to the statement, they agreed to the appointment of Mr. Chuene and George Bizos, a veteran human rights lawyer and close associate of Mr. Mandela, as trustees to a trust financed by the sale of paintings of Mr. Mandela’s handprints . But the daughters secretly amended the trust document, with the help of Mr. Mandela’s estranged lawyer, Ismail Ayob, according to statements by Mr. Chuene and Mr. Bizos. And by 2011, they were seeking to distribute much of the trust’s money, about $1.3 million, among Mr. Mandela’s children and grandchildren, despite the insistence of the independent trustees that he wanted the money to last for generations. Now the matter is in court, with Mr. Mandela’s daughters seeking to remove Mr. Bizos and Mr. Chuene as trustees of the boards of two companies that support the Mandela Trust, arguing that they were improperly appointed. The case has brought into the open a long-simmering dispute over who will control Mr. Mandela’s financial legacy after he dies. The latest documents to emerge in the increasingly messy legal fight portray Mr. Mandela’s daughters and other relatives as being willing to trample on his expressed wishes to get their hands on money he set aside for his descendants’ welfare. Makaziwe Mandela, who sits on several corporate boards, runs a wine company called House of Mandela and speaks for her sister, declined to comment on the affidavits, as did Mr. Ayob. Mr. Mandela, 94 and in frail health, spent 27 years in prison in his battle against apartheid, emerging in 1990 to lead the African National Congress in a negotiated end to the brutal system of racial separation. He became South Africa’s first black president, stepping down in 1999 after one term to pursue charity work. He retired from public life in 2004, and has largely disappeared from view as his health has declined. The extent of the family’s wealth is not publicly known. Mr. Mandela received a presidential salary and pension, and his autobiography, “Long Walk to Freedom,” was a best-seller. But he never worked in the private sector, and his personal wealth is believed to be relatively modest. Mr. Mandela was the first to admit that his life as an anti-apartheid activist and his long imprisonment meant that his family was often neglected. He had six children with two wives, both of whom he divorced. He is now married to Graça Machel, a children’s rights activist and former first lady of Mozambique. “To be the father of a nation is a great honor, but to be the father of a family is a greater joy,” Mr. Mandela wrote in his autobiography. “But it is a joy I had far too little of.” Makaziwe Mandela said in an earlier interview that her father had been a distant figure her entire life. “My father knows us, but never really knows us,” she said. “We never really had that opportunity to develop that bond.” The fragile relationship between Mr. Mandela and his daughters was strained even further in a second family meeting on June 11, 2006. “The meeting was very heated and, in some respects, unpleasant,” Mr. Chuene said in his statement. “Mr. Mandela was furious.” His daughters, Mr. Chuene said, “had allowed themselves to be used by Mr. Ayob and had continued to associate themselves with him knowing full well that he had terminated his relationship with Mr. Ayob.” “He was moreover upset that they continued to be involved in his personal affairs despite his clear instructions,” Mr. Chuene said. Soon after, the trustees met in November 2006 to choose board members for the companies that fed the Mandela Trust, and Mr. Bizos, Mr. Chuene and two others were named to the boards. Then, in August 2011, Ms. Dlamini, who is South Africa’s ambassador to Argentina, called for another family meeting “to discuss the financial constraints that she and other members of Mr. Mandela’s family were experiencing,” Mr. Chuene said in his statement. At the meeting, family members asked that the money in the two companies that feed the trust be distributed directly to them. But Mr. Bizos balked. “As a confidant of Mr. Mandela, I know that his wishes in relation to the three general trusts established by him was that these ought to provide long-term assurance, to the extent possible, for the support and education of the beneficiaries, which would include generations to come,” Mr. Bizos said in a sworn statement. “I was, accordingly, concerned to learn in the last quarter of 2011 of a proposal for the distribution of almost the entire capital of the Mandela Trust in lump sums.” He added that whenever any member of the family had requested money from the trust it had been granted. Not long after, Ms. Mandela and Ms. Dlamini’s lawyer, Mr. Ayob, started writing letters to Mr. Bizos and the other board members demanding that they resign. When they refused, Mr. Mandela’s daughters took them to court, and what had been a quiet disagreement became a very public battle over the legacy of a man many here consider a secular saint.

Nelson Mandela
Makaziwe Mandela
Zenani Dlamini
George Bizos
Ismail Ayob
South Africa
Wills and Estates


Palestinians Corner Jewish Settlers During Clash in West Bank

Abstract: JERUSALEM — A confrontation between a group of Jewish settlers and Palestinian villagers in the West Bank on Tuesday ended when Palestinian officials handed the settlers, who had been surrounded by other Palestinians, over to Israeli forces. The episode shined an unusual spotlight on the potentially explosive tensions in the area even as Israeli-Palestinian peace talks were underway. Scenes captured on video showed a group of more than a dozen male settlers, including minors, who had apparently been corralled by angry Palestinians in an unfinished building on the edge of the village of Jalud, near Nablus in the northern West Bank. Some of the settlers had bloodied faces. The settlers said they had been hiking in the area. But Ghassan Daghlas, a Palestinian official who monitors settlement activities in the northern West Bank, said they had come to uproot olive trees and clashed with Palestinians who confronted them in the fields among the villages of Qaryut, Jalud and Qusra. Then, Mr. Daghlas said, villagers held a group of about 18 settlers in the half-built house for several hours, reported Wafa , the official Palestinian news agency. Hours later, the details of the confrontation remained sketchy. The Israeli military said the episode began when Israeli security forces removed an illegal structure in Esh Kodesh, an unauthorized Israeli settlement outpost in the northern West Bank. That suggested that some settlers might then have set their sights on Palestinian property for retaliation, in line with the so-called price tag campaigns often carried out by extremist settlers. A military spokeswoman said there was “mutual rock-throwing” between settlers and Palestinians in the fields, during which a number of the settlers were hurt. The settlers were later found in a building and rescued by soldiers, she said. Military officials could not confirm that the settlers had been held captive. Some Palestinians said the settlers had attacked farmers and hit a boy from Qusra. Ziad Odeh, a Qusra resident, told Israel’s Channel 2 news that hikers “do not come with iron bars, wooden clubs, or wearing masks.” After Palestinians began chasing the settlers through the fields, witnesses reported, some settlers sought shelter in the building under construction. Video footage showed that other settlers were being led there by Palestinians and that an angry crowd had gathered around the building. Abd al-Adhim Wasli, a village leader, told Channel 2 news that the Palestinians could have killed the settlers. “But because we are Muslims and responsible people, we protected their lives,” he said. He said the villagers called in Palestinian liaison officers, who then handed the settlers over to Israeli troops. Palestinian officials say they registered more than 1,100 attacks on Palestinian property and more than 983 episodes of violence by settlers in 2013. The Palestinians regard the Israeli-occupied West Bank as part of a future independent state. Suspected price tag operations, in which settlers avenge violence by Palestinians or Israeli actions against illegal building, have included the burning of mosques and an arson attack on a West Bank home in November. Graffiti at the scene suggested that the fire was intended to avenge the fatal stabbing of an Israeli soldier by a Palestinian teenager in northern Israel the day before. The family sleeping in the house, who had no connection to the stabbing, escaped without serious injury. The Israeli authorities have made few arrests in price tag cases. The police said Tuesday that they were questioning four Israelis in connection with what happened in the northern West Bank and that three others were taken to a hospital in Jerusalem for treatment of their injuries.

Palestinians
West Bank
Israel
Military
Israeli settlement


China: Confrontation Over Coal Plant Enters 3rd Day

Abstract: Police officers and protesters concerned about environmental pollution from a planned coal -fired power plant confronted each other for a third day in Haimen, Guangdong Province. The protests began Tuesday when thousands of people blocked an expressway to demand the local government cancel plans to build the plant. The police fired tear gas to try to disperse the crowd, according to a local resident reached by telephone. Chinese news organizations reported that officials said they would suspend the project. But on Thursday, police officers armed with tear gas guns sealed off the highway as a group of protesters faced them. Some news agencies reported that there were some arrests. Haimen is 90 miles from Wukan, a fishing village that evicted Communist Party officials and the police over a land dispute. Leaders there announced Wednesday they were halting their protest.

China
Coal
Police
Demonstrations Protests and Riots


Sister Mary Paul Janchill, Social Services Innovator, Dies at 88

Abstract: Sister Mary Paul Janchill, a founder of a youth support center in Brooklyn that embraced a holistic approach that became a model for many neighborhood-oriented family centers around the country, died Thursday in Brooklyn. She was 88. The cause was a heart attack, said Sister Paulette LoMonaco, the executive director of Good Shepherd Services, a social services agency that works with 21,000 children and their families in New York City. The Center for Family Life, which Sister Mary Paul opened in 1978, is a division of Good Shepherd Services. The center’s other founder, Sister Mary Geraldine Tobia, died in 2000 . Operating from a small brick building at 345 43rd Street in Sunset Park, the center serves a largely poor and Hispanic community that also has a high concentration of Chinese immigrants. With a mission of keeping families together, it offers a host of programs, including child care, after-school activities, job placement, family counseling, parent groups, a food bank, a sports league and a thrift shop. In recent years, the center has also gathered a cluster of local families to act as foster parents for neighborhood children, so that youngsters placed in foster care can usually keep attending the same school and see their friends and parents often. “It has generated visitors from around the country who have learned a holistic approach to serving young people and families in their local communities,” Sister Paulette, the executive director of Good Shepherd Services, said. Hilda Janchill was born in Brooklyn on June 15, 1920, one of four children of Haimy and Bertha Domwitz Janchill. Her father was a shoemaker. She is survived by her sister Ilene Klass-Kline, of Solvang, Calif. Miss Janchill joined her order, called the Sisters of the Good Shepherd , in 1945. As a young social worker, she worked at Good Shepherd centers in Brooklyn and Peekskill and Troy, N.Y. In 1953, she graduated from St John’s University. She went on to earn a master’s degree in social work from Catholic University, in 1955, and a doctorate in social work from Columbia, in 1968. In 2003, Sister Mary Paul received the Eleanor Roosevelt Award from the Citizens’ Committee for Children of New York. Of the center she helped start, the citation said, “This comprehensive support center for families continues to draw national attention for its blending of family development, youth work and community building, and serves as a model for many preventive and community service programs.”

Center for Family Life
Janchill Mary Paul
Deaths (Obituaries)
Brooklyn (NYC)


With Google as Partner, Verizon May Not Need iPhone

Abstract: It is a question that the nation’s early adopters keep hearing from friends: when is the iPhone coming to Verizon ? The combination of the biggest cellphone carrier in the United States and Apple ’s smash-hit phone would certainly be a powerful one. And it would be a major challenge to AT&T , which has been the exclusive carrier for the phone since its debut in 2007. But Verizon could decide that it does not actually need the iPhone, thanks to its deepening ties with Google . In big cities, AT&T’s network has buckled under the data-heavy demands of the iPhone, frustrating customers. Verizon has managed to avoid similar problems while working with Google, Apple’s latest nemesis, to offer several strong rivals to the iPhone that use the Android operating system from Google. On Thursday, Verizon will begin selling the Droid X, an Android phone that many say may be the fiercest challenge yet to the iPhone, Steven P. Jobs ’s crowning creation. “Verizon is back in the game, even without the iPhone,” said Craig Moffett, an analyst at Sanford C. Bernstein & Company. Despite the pull of the iPhone, Verizon has managed to steadily increase its share of the smartphone market, to 26 percent in May, from 20 percent in late 2008. In the same period, AT&T’s market share slipped to 40 percent, from around 45 percent, according to comScore . Those numbers do not take into account the impact of the popular iPhone 4, released last month. Before the original iPhone’s debut, AT&T and Apple signed a five-year exclusive deal that is due to expire in 2012, according to court documents that emerged in a class-action lawsuit against Apple. Only insiders know whether that agreement has been amended. When the phone proved to be a hit, Verizon appeared to be left out of the race for versatile phones running programs from third-party developers. Verizon was also not particularly friendly with Google, whose participation in an auction of precious wireless spectrum angered Verizon executives. Google wanted to force the federal government to require carriers to make their networks more open to a wide range of devices and software. Verizon executives were furious, vowing that they would not support the Android operating system. A year later, Verizon recognized the threat posed by the iPhone and began working with Google and Motorola to develop the first of its Android phones, which it sold under the name Droid, a trademark it licensed from Lucasfilm. Verizon has since collaborated closely with Google to develop six phones running Android, helping to give Google’s mobile operating system 13 percent of the smartphone market in the United States. In contrast, Apple has a 24 percent share, while Research In Motion , maker of the BlackBerry, commands nearly 42 percent. T-Mobile and Sprint have also jumped on the Android bandwagon. Matt Carter, president of Sprint’s 4G division, said the company was building a portfolio of smartphones that could run on its fourth-generation wireless network, including the Evo, an Android phone made by HTC. “Obviously, we would love to have the iPhone, but we feel the HTC Evo is a better phone,” he said. The success of its Android phones has emboldened Verizon to take shots at Mr. Jobs and the iPhone. A recent ad slyly referred to the controversy over the iPhone 4’s antenna design in boasting that the Droid X “allows you to hold the phone any way you like and use it just about anywhere to make crystal-clear calls.” “Verizon is behaving as if it’s not going to get the iPhone anytime soon,” said Charles Wolf, an analyst at Needham & Company. “The signal I’m getting from the intimacy of Google and Verizon is that it is certainly an engagement, if not a marriage.” Reports from analysts and the news media have predicted, with almost comic regularity, an iPhone debut on Verizon in the next week, next month or next year. Representatives for Verizon and Apple declined to comment on the matter. Neither company will rule out the possibility of an eventual union. For Apple, millions of untapped Verizon customers are at stake. Analysts say that a partnership between the two companies could double Apple’s smartphone share — a crucial jump if Mr. Jobs hopes to stay ahead of Google. At a technology conference last month, when Mr. Jobs was asked whether the iPhone could appear on rival networks, he replied that “the future is long.” John Stratton, chief marketing officer at Verizon, said in an interview that his company “had a lot of respect” for Apple. “They have served the industry very well,” he said. “The smartphone category is now growing faster than any other part of our business, and in no small part, that is something we can trace back to the creation of the iPhone.” A Verizon-Apple coupling faces some obstacles. In particular, Verizon maintains an ironclad grip over the phones on its network, steering marketing campaigns, stamping each device with a prominent logo and often installing its own applications, like its VZ Navigator mapping program. An Apple executive, speaking on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly, said Apple would never agree to put another company’s name on the iPhone. Then there are business factors. After Mr. Jobs visited rival carriers, AT&T secured the iPhone in part because it offered the most favorable terms. Analysts estimate that Apple brings in an average of more than $650 for each iPhone sold. Consumers pay upward of $200, and AT&T subsidizes the rest. Verizon, on the other hand, pays far less than $300 for Android, BlackBerry and Palm phones, said Shaw Wu, an analyst at Kaufman Brothers. Verizon has “done well with the network rollout, they have done well with the financial side of the equation, and they have maintained control by owning the Droid brand,” Mr. Wu said. “Verizon has proven that they don’t necessarily need Apple.” In addition, Verizon and Google may have agreed to share the revenue generated by sales of Android applications, something Apple does not do, said Philip Cusick, an analyst at Macquarie Research Equities. “Verizon would be uncomfortable ceding those things to Apple,” he said. Perhaps, he said, it won’t need to. “If Verizon didn’t get the iPhone, it wouldn’t be the end of the world,” he said. “They would continue to add subscribers and new phones.” But there are also signs that Verizon is willing to compromise to get what remains the world’s most coveted phone. Mr. Stratton of Verizon said the company was relaxing its control over the phones on its network and was even willing to sacrifice that logo. “We don’t have a hard and fast set of rules we think we need to operate under anymore,” Mr. Stratton said. One person who seems to believe a Verizon iPhone is a certainty — and is comfortable with that eventuality — is Eric E. Schmidt , chief executive of Google. In an interview last month, he said a Verizon iPhone would not bother him. “I think they should do what they need to do to make their data network and revenue stronger,” he said. “I am satisfied that the Droid would do well against an iPhone on the same data network.”

Google
Verizon
iPhone
Apple
Smartphone
Nexus One
AT T


Tigers’ Delmon Young, Accused of Slurs, Could Return to Field Soon

Abstract: Delmon Young, the Detroit Tigers outfielder who was arrested and charged with second-degree aggravated harassment Friday, could be back on the field playing for the Tigers early this week. After what the police called a drunken altercation that had a hate-crime component early Friday in Manhattan, Young was placed on the restricted list Friday night and will be evaluated Monday under guidelines provided for by Major League Baseball’s basic agreement. Under the guidelines, any player involved in an incident that also involves alcohol is referred for evaluation by a health care professional. A treatment program may then be mandated and a fine or a suspension may ensue, issued by M.L.B. or the team, or both. Tigers General Manager Dave Dombrowski, speaking publicly Saturday for the first time since Young was arrested, said that if Young was cleared in the evaluation, he would return to the field immediately. “I don’t know if I will find out Monday,” Dombrowski said. “But assuming I would find out Monday, if he is cleared to play, then he will play. Because that is the arrangement that is involved.” After ending a three-game series at Yankee Stadium on Sunday, the Tigers will return to Detroit to face the Kansas City Royals on Monday night to open a six -game homestand. According to the police, a heavily intoxicated Young yelled anti-Semitic slurs and attacked a group of tourists outside the New York Hilton, the Tigers’ team hotel, about 2:30 a.m. Friday. According to a police report, Young began yelling the epithets at a group of four tourists who were giving money to a panhandler who was wearing a skullcap and a Star of David pendant around his neck, and the encounter became physical. Young, who the police said threw one of the tourists to the ground, ran into the hotel and, after being stopped by security, went up to his room. A security guard called the police, who arrested Young in his room, according to Dombrowski. Dombrowski said he received a call between 3:30 and 4 a.m. and was summoned to Young’s room. The police were there at the time, and Dombrowski said Young was in bad condition. “He was apologetic at that time, although not in a very good state,” Dombrowski said. “Later on, he reached out to me and the organization, so I know that he’s very apologetic and knows there is no excuse for what he did.” When asked to specify what Young’s condition was, Dombrowski said, “He was not in a good state.” Young, 26, was taken to Roosevelt Hospital and was later charged with second-degree aggravated harassment, which includes assaulting or threatening to assault someone “on the basis of the victim’s race or religion.” Dombrowski said he did not know what happened regarding the bias accusations but did confirm the other aspects of the incident — that Young was inebriated and involved in a physical altercation. “All I know, and I was there, is that the person was not in a very good state as far as his sobriety,” Dombrowski said. “That is not a good situation. That’s all I know. I do know that he was in a skirmish. I do know that. Beyond that, I don’t know anything else. “Those situations themselves are concerning and not what you would like to see. If the allegations are true, that is also concerning and not what you’d like to see happen. I do not know what happened there. I do know the other things.” Dombrowski would not say whether the altercation alone deserved some kind of discipline from the team, even if Young was cleared Monday by health care professionals. “If he is cleared by the doctors, he would be in a position to play at that time,” he said. “Everything at that point is still allegations.” According to Dombrowski, if Young is entered into a program, it would include anger management and cultural-sensitivity training as well. Young was suspended for 50 games in the minor leagues in 2006 for throwing a bat at an umpire who had called him out on strikes.

Detroit Tigers
Baseball
Anti-Semitism
Young Delmon


Sayreville Football Coach Is Ousted After Scandal

Abstract: The embattled head football coach of Sayreville War Memorial High School has been ousted from his job in the wake of a hazing and sexual abuse scandal that drew national scrutiny, led to charges against seven players and upended a quiet New Jersey town that has long revered its top-flight program. The Sayreville public school district posted an online job announcement on Thursday morning seeking a replacement for George Najjar, 63, the once widely hailed coach who led the team for 20 years and won three sectional state championships. On Thursday, Superintendent Richard Labbe said in a brief statement: “Today we took the next important step toward the 2015 football season. We are excited to launch a new comprehensive search to find the next leader of our football program.” Mr. Najjar did not respond to a phone message left for comment on Thursday. He remains suspended indefinitely with pay from his tenured physical education teaching position at the high school, Michael J. Macagnone, the school board president, said in an email. Mr. Labbe, who suspended and then canceled the Sayreville Bombers’ 2014-15 season after learning of allegations of repeated player-on-player physical and sexual abuse, did not respond to requests for further comment. In a hazing scandal that stunned the North Jersey town of 44,000 last fall, a group of 15- to 17-year-old football players were accused of attacking four members of the school’s freshman football team in a locker-room ritual that involved flicking off lights, jumping the smaller players and, at times, allegedly groping their genitals or penetrating them from behind, using fingers poked through their pants. Image George Najjar in 2011. He had led the team for 20 years. Credit Russ DeSantis The charges followed a string of high-profile accusations of domestic and physical abuse in professional and college football. The alleged attackers were suspended from school, and their cases are pending, although the prosecutor in Middlesex County, N.J., has decided that the cases will be handled in juvenile court rather than in the adult system. Some victims, interviewed by The New York Times in October , played down the actions. One called it just horsing around. But the teenager also sheepishly admitted that he was upset and embarrassed by what had happened. The high school took on a dark atmosphere, as some students blamed the victims for ending the varsity football season and ridiculed or threatened them over social media. Kennedy MacFadyen, a 17-year-old senior at the high school who recently made a video highlighting community service that football players had performed in the past, said on Thursday that she was surprised to learn of Mr. Najjar’s ouster, and expressed sympathy. “I just hope everything works out for him,” she said. A longtime football watcher in town, Kathy Berardi, who, like many others has long revered Mr. Najjar, said in a passionate text message, “There is a general feeling of sadness and disappointment amongst the community over this decision.” She added, “Coach Najjar is a man of great character and integrity.” Ms. Berardi, whose brother worked as an assistant football coach under Mr. Najjar, also said that she felt Mr. Najjar, who Mr. Labbe has said most likely did not know of the hazing in his locker room, was being used as a scapegoat in the scandal. Several assistant coaches to Mr. Najjar had been suspended by the Board of Education, but later were reinstated to teaching duties.

Football
Coaches
Sayreville War Memorial High School
George Najjar
Sayreville NJ


NASA’s Juno Spacecraft Enters Into Orbit Around Jupiter

Abstract: Ducking through intense belts of violent radiation as it skimmed over the clouds of Jupiter at 130,000 miles per hour, NASA’s Juno spacecraft on Monday clinched its spot around the solar system’s largest planet. It took five years for Juno to travel this far on its $1.1 billion mission, and the moment was one that NASA scientists and space enthusiasts had eagerly — and anxiously — anticipated. At 11:53 p.m., Eastern time, a signal from the spacecraft announced the end of a 35-minute engine burn that left it in the grip of its desired orbit around Jupiter. Cheers and clapping erupted at the mission operations center at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory , in Pasadena, Calif., which is managing Juno. “This is the hardest thing NASA has ever done,” Scott Bolton, Juno’s principal investigator, told the mission team a few minutes later. “That’s my claim.” Status messages for each maneuver of the spacecraft came in as expected. The length of the engine firing turned out to be within one second of what had been predicted. Diane Brown, the program executive for Juno at NASA headquarters, described the performance as flawless. “To know we can all go to bed tonight, not worrying about what’s going to happen tomorrow, it’s pretty awesome,” she said at a news conference. Rick Nybakken, Juno’s project manager, held up a sheaf of papers as he celebrated the smooth execution of the maneuver. “We prepared a contingency communications procedure, and guess what?” he said, ripping the papers. “We don’t need that anymore.” Jupiter and Its Moons Spinnable maps of Jupiter and the Galilean moons. Juno is just the second spacecraft to enter orbit around Jupiter. NASA’s Galileo spacecraft spent eight years there surveying the planet and its many moons. But except for a probe that parachuted into Jupiter’s atmosphere, Galileo did not have the tools that Juno does to delve into what lies beneath Jupiter’s clouds. “We have a chance with Juno to go back and study the planet in its own right,” James L. Green, the director of planetary science at NASA, said during a news conference earlier on Monday. Jupiter, most likely the first planet formed after the sun, is believed to hold the keys to understanding the origins of our solar system. How much water it contains and the possible presence of a rocky core could reveal where in the solar system Jupiter was created and provide clues to the early days of other planets. Juno’s instruments are designed to precisely measure the magnetic and gravitational fields of Jupiter and the glow of microwaves emanating from within. That, for instance, will give hints about storm systems like the visible Great Red Spot , which has persisted for centuries, although it has been shrinking. “Juno is really searching for some hints about our beginnings, how everything started,” Dr. Bolton said. “But these secrets are pretty well guarded by Jupiter.” Dr. Bolton repeatedly described Jupiter as “a planet on steroids” in discussing the unprecedented dangers Juno faced Monday night. Ensnared by Jupiter’s gravity, Juno accelerated quickly to its rendezvous with the planet, passing within the orbit of Callisto and Ganymede, two of the main moons, on Sunday. It zoomed past the other two, Europa and Io, on Monday. Juno has been on its own since Thursday, performing a programmed sequence of actions. Around 10:30 p.m. on Monday, Juno passed over Jupiter’s north pole and through a region that Heidi Becker, the leader of Juno’s radiation monitoring team, described as “the scariest part of the scariest place.” In this belt of radiation, electrons bouncing back and forth at nearly the speed of light could have knocked out the computer and other electronics. “They will go right through a spacecraft and strip the atoms apart inside your electronics and fry your brain if you don’t do anything about it,” Dr. Becker said. But a titanium vault built for Juno proved up to the task of shielding its crucial systems. Video On July 4, 2016, NASA’s Juno spacecraft arrived to study Jupiter after a trip of nearly two billion miles. At 11:18 p.m., Juno’s main engine began firing to slow the spacecraft enough to be captured by the planet’s gravity. Juno also passed through the plane of Jupiter’s diaphanous rings. Although the mission planners had chosen a place that they thought would be clear, they could not be certain, and even a piece of dust colliding with a spacecraft moving at 130,000 m.p.h. could have caused considerable damage. Juno traveled within 2,900 miles of Jupiter’s cloud tops, passing through almost the exact spot that the navigators had aimed for after its 1.7-billion-mile voyage. “Isn’t that incredible?” Mr. Nybakken said. Then Juno headed outward again, away from Jupiter. After the end of the engine burn, the spacecraft pivoted so that its solar panels were again facing the sun. Sunlight at Jupiter is one twenty-fifth as bright as at Earth, and Juno’s three 30-foot-long panels with 18,698 solar cells generate a mere 500 watts to power the spacecraft and its instruments. “Now the fun begins, with science,” Dr. Bolton said. NASA’s Juno Spacecraft Arrives at Jupiter The Juno spacecraft successfully entered orbit around Jupiter on July 4. For now, Juno is on a 53-day orbit. Its scientific instruments, which had been turned off for the arrival at Jupiter, will be turned back on in two days. On Aug. 27, it will swing back for its first good close-up look at Jupiter. Juno will fire its engine again on Oct. 19 to move to a 14-day orbit, when the science measurements begin in earnest. The spacecraft will have to make multiple flybys, Dr. Bolton said, before the scientists will be able to start answering questions like whether there is a rocky core at the center of Jupiter. “We’ll be hesitant to guessing the wrong answer until we see more information,” Dr. Bolton said. With a different vantage point from Juno’s polar orbit, the spacecraft’s cameras are likely to add to the number of known moons of Jupiter, now 67. “I expect that we will see some, and the number will keep going up,” Dr. Bolton said. The assault of radiation each time Juno zooms past Jupiter will take its toll on the electronics. As the mission progresses, the orientation of the orbits will pivot, and Juno will pass through the more violent portions of the radiation belts. On the 37th orbit, scheduled for Feb. 20, 2018, Juno is to make a suicidal dive into Jupiter, ending the mission, the same way that the Galileo spacecraft was disposed of in 2003. That is to ensure that there would be no possibility of Juno’s crashing into Europa, regarded as one of the likelier places for life elsewhere in the solar system, and contaminating it with microbial hitchhikers from Earth. Even in the best outcome, the mission might be extended a few months.

NASA
Juno Spacecraft
Jupiter
Jet Propulsion Laboratory


Looking Back to Eddie Bauer to Rescue Eddie Bauer

Abstract: BEFORE McNeil S. Fiske Jr. — or Neil Fiske, as he prefers — was named to the top spot of the struggling retailer Eddie Bauer in June, he was better known as an author. His book “Trading Up” told the story of how America’s secretaries were rushing out to buy Godiva chocolates, seeking in other words, to own a piece of the luxury market at a (relatively) cheap price. While he was writing the book with Michael J. Silverstein in 2003, he was named chief executive at Bath & Body Works, a division of Limited Brands that needed a turnaround. He supplied it with catchy marketing and “the world’s best candle,” what he deemed an affordable luxury priced at $25. In his time there, sales rose to $2.5 billion from $1.8 billion. Four years later, Mr. Fiske, 46, is trying to work the same magic on Eddie Bauer, the sportswear company based in Bellevue, Wash., once owned by Spiegel. Bauer’s stock price plunged shortly after coming out of bankruptcy (and going public) in 2005 and has continued on a rocky road since. The company put itself up for sale in May 2006, but shareholders rejected an offer from two private equity firms, and the chief executive at the time walked out the next day. Mr. Fiske concedes that recent catalogs look dated and that expenses are significantly higher than those of his competitors. He vows to jazz up the catalog and cut costs, even if it means selling or leasing out the company’s huge, underused distribution center. Born into an outdoorsy family in Denver, Mr. Fiske skis, fly-fishes and does all those L. L. Bean/Lands’ End (to name just two competitors) things. In New York recently, he chatted about what he is doing — and what he wants to do — to make his brand a profitable (and perhaps luxurious) business. These are excerpts from that conversation: Q. As an expert on branding, what happened to the Eddie Bauer brand? A. There were 10 years of zigzag and drift, of veering off its natural path. Q. How do you see its “natural path?” A. As a premium active outdoor lifestyle brand that combines a sense of adventure with style. Q. How did you get to head up Bath & Body Works? A. I was at Boston Consulting Group for 14 years, and Les Wexler was my client. I spent all my time working with the Limited and Victoria’s Secret. Q. How does Eddie Bauer tie in with your thinking about luxury: do you really see Eddie Bauer as a “premium luxury” company, like, say, Gucci? A. Eddie Bauer when he started it — yes, he was a real guy — he went in for the idea of a new luxury brand with premium-quality goods with an emotional reach to the mass market. Q. That was in the 1920s? A. Yeah. And Eddie Bauer was a stickler for quality; he checked the quality of down, the quality of the manufacturer. He invented the down jacket. He was a tennis player, a pretty good-looking guy, and he realized a store had to have energy. He took his racket-stringing operation, and moved it to the window and did it himself. That brought in the customers. Q. So what are you doing to bring back that energy? How many of the things in the Christmas catalog are yours? A. None. The product lead times are about a year. In October, we had a theme in our stores, and to some extent in our catalogs, which was the 67th Anniversary Down Event. The 67 goes back to the year 1940 when Eddie patented the down jacket, and, in our stores, we brought back a lot of the iconography in marketing, so it was a little bit retro, a little bit modern. Q. Please don’t tell me you’re going “back to the DNA” — that’s what all the C.E.O.’s say these days. A. (Laughs.) No, I won’t say DNA. But part of what you do in a turnaround situation like this is you go back to what’s core, and you try to do a few things very well. Q. (Riffling through Bean, Lands’ End, Eddie Bauer catalogs.) Looking at these catalogs, I was struck by the fact that Eddie Bauer, in key areas, seems to be more expensive than the others. A. In some cases, that’s true. Part of what I wrote about in “Trading Up” was the idea that premium luxury brands could actually extend the price range considerably. We have to figure out where our opening price points are and be more competitive in those, and then build onto that a layer of better and best products. Q. Now everyone wants to know about Christmas. A. I make a point of not commenting on Black Friday because in all my years observing the retail industry, it has virtually no correlation to how the rest of the season plays out. Q. Is that true? A. Yeah. Black Friday’s a big day, but there are a lot of other big days in the holiday season. And I think it’s just become sort of a gigantic one-day national sale. Q. How do you think you’re doing, though? A. We’re doing pretty well so far. We’re tracking to where I want us to be tracking. Our outerwear’s very strong. Our down campaign we started in October continues to sustain momentum. There’s probably 75 to 80 percent of the season that has to play out, and it’s all back-loaded. Q. I read you’re going to focus more on men’s wear. A. If you just look at a snapshot from 1996 to 2006 in our retail stores, in 1996 the men’s business was significantly bigger than the women’s business; 2006, you look at it, and the women’s business was significantly bigger than the men’s. Q. How much bigger? A. It’s 25 to 30 percent bigger. Q. So are you returning it to more of a men’s business? A. I just want balance. Just as much as we’ve lost the identity of the Eddie Bauer brand, we’ve really lost the identity of the Eddie Bauer guy. The Eddie Bauer guy was an adventurer, he’s an outdoor guy, rugged, and over that period — particularly under Spiegel’s ownership — the brand just became more and more women-focused and walked away from the men’s business, the gear business. It became a less interesting brand for men. So our challenge is to bring it back.

Bath & Body Works
Retail Stores and Trade
Eddie Bauer Inc
Limited Inc
Stocks and Bonds


Hamas Shifts From Rockets to Culture War

Abstract: GAZA — Seven months after Israel started a fierce three-week military campaign here to stop rockets from being fired on its southern communities, Hamas has suspended its use of rockets and shifted focus to winning support at home and abroad through cultural initiatives and public relations. The aim is to build what leaders here call a “culture of resistance,” the topic of a recent two-day conference. In recent days, a play has been staged, a movie premiered, an art exhibit mounted, a book of poems published and a television series begun, most of it state-sponsored and all focused on the plight of Palestinians in Gaza. There are plans for a documentary competition. “Armed resistance is still important and legitimate, but we have a new emphasis on cultural resistance,” noted Ayman Taha, a Hamas leader and former fighter. “The current situation required a stoppage of rockets. After the war, the fighters needed a break and the people needed a break.” Mr. Taha and others say that the military has replaced field commanders and restructured itself as it learns lessons from the war. The decision to suspend the use of the short-range Qassam rockets that for years have flown into Israel, often dozens a day, has been partly the result of popular pressure. Increasingly, people here are questioning the value of the rockets, not because they hit civilians but because they are seen as relatively ineffective. “What did the rockets do for us? Nothing,” Mona Abdelaziz, a 36-year-old lawyer, said in a typical street interview here. How long Hamas will hold its fire and whether it will obtain longer-range missiles — which it says it is seeking — remain unclear. But the shift in policy is evident. In June, a total of two rockets were fired from Gaza, according to the Israeli military, one of the lowest monthly tallies since the firing began in 2002. In that tactical sense, the war was a victory for Israel and a loss for Hamas. But in the field of public opinion, Hamas took the upper hand. Its leaders have noted the international condemnation of Israel over allegations of disproportionate force, a perception they hope to continue to use to their advantage. Suspending the rocket fire could also serve that goal. “We are not terrorists but resistance fighters, and we want to explain our reality to the outside world,” Osama Alisawi, the minister of culture, said during a break from the two-day conference. “We want the writers and intellectuals of the world to come and see how people are suffering on a daily basis.” That suffering is quite real. An Israeli-led boycott limits economic activity here to farming and basic commerce, although Israel does allow about 100 trucks of food and medicine in each day, and more and more goods are coming in through desert smuggler tunnels from Egypt. Israel is experimenting with minor adjustments, allowing some equipment and glass in last week for the first time in a long time. Because Israeli officials also believe that they must improve public relations and message management, the new focus on culture here sets up an intriguing battle for world opinion. Both sides argue that journalists show too much sympathy for the other. But it may also bring unforeseen risks to the Islamist leaders of Hamas. The play currently seen nightly at Gaza City’s Shawa cultural center offers an example of how. Called “The Women of Gaza and the Patience of Job,” it consists of a series of contemporary and historical scenes about suffering. And while it might be helping to create a sense of solidarity among the people of Gaza, it pushes some local limits. In one satirical scene, for example, a Hamas fighter is standing over his rocket launcher about to fire at Israel when a woman asks about her brother, a fellow fighter. Oh yes, he replies excitedly, her brother is a hero. He made the Israelis quake in their boots. “He hit Tel Aviv!” From the audience emerges a dismissive laugh, for it knows how meaningless such boasting proved over the years. After the show one recent evening, its writer, director and star, Said al-Bettar, said he wrote the scene that way to make the point that, “We were the victims of a big lie.” He added, “The people paid a heavy price and society is looking for someone to express its views clearly.” Mr. Bettar, who is not a follower of Hamas and is popular here, said the government had not interfered with his work or criticized it. Besides mocking the rockets, he has done something else rather subversive — his entire cast (apart from himself) is female, and women sing on stage, something that is frowned upon by religious Muslims. He said he wanted to challenge the conservatives of Gaza and added, “We need to engage with the world, not isolate ourselves.” Abd Alkhalik Alaff, a poet and literature professor at the Islamic University, is the chief consultant on government efforts to use artists and writers to make Gaza’s case abroad. He said there were plans to award work that showed the plight of Gaza and added that a television series aimed at the holy month of Ramadan, which starts in late August this year, focused on Jerusalem. One of the first cultural products of the new campaign was given its premiere last week at the Islamic University. Written by Mahmoud Zahar, a physician who is among the most powerful Hamas leaders, it is a movie profile of Emad Akel, a commander of the Hamas military wing who was killed by Israel in 1993. The two-hour film shows Mr. Akel’s use of numerous disguises, including as a religious Israeli settler, and includes scenes of Israeli leaders feuding among themselves. It was shot at the new media center on the grounds of what used to be called Gush Katif, a group of Israeli settlements in southern Gaza from which Israel withdrew four years ago. A senior Hamas police commander who spoke on condition of anonymity said the focus on culture and away from rockets was appropriate for now. He said Hamas was working on increasing the range of its rockets. But he said: “We have made a decision not to fire. As long as Israel is committed to an unofficial truce, so are we.” He pointed out holes punched in his building by Israeli missiles in late December and said the world needed to know. As he bid goodbye, this menacing man with a fighting past had world opinion on his mind. With a bow and slight smile, he said, “Thank you for coming to Gaza.”


Bears’ Gaines Adams, Who Had Enlarged Heart, Dies at 26

Abstract: GREENWOOD, S.C. (AP) — Gaines Adams, a defensive lineman for the Chicago Bears who was an all-American at Clemson , died Sunday in South Carolina, the Bears said. He was 26. The team said Adams died Sunday morning at Self Regional Hospital. He had gone into cardiac arrest about an hour before at his family’s home in Greenwood, said Marcia Kelley-Clark, the chief deputy coroner for Greenwood County. An autopsy conducted Sunday showed Adams had an enlarged heart, Kelley-Clark said. She said the condition could often lead to a heart attack, though Adams’s relatives did not know of any problems. “Nobody was aware of any kind of medical condition,” Kelley-Clark said. Toxicology tests are being run by the State Law Enforcement Division, though drug use was not suspected as a factor in Adams’s death. But those results will probably not be available for at least two months, Kelley-Clark said. A 6-foot-5, 258-pound defensive end, Gaines was well known among Clemson fans for breaking up Wake Forest’s field-goal attempt and returning it for a touchdown in 2006 to defeat the Demon Deacons. Tommy Bowden, who was Adams’s coach at Clemson, said he could not believe he was dead. “I will always remember the smile he had on his face, and I will always remember his patience,” Bowden said. Adams was selected fourth over all in the 2007 N.F.L. draft by Tampa Bay, but was traded to the Chicago Bears in October 2009 for a second-round pick in the 2010 draft. He had not been able to live up to expectations that he would revive the Buccaneers’ once-feared pass rush, having just 17 tackles and a sack in 15 games this season. Adams fell short of the benchmark set by Buccaneers Coach Raheem Morris, who said at the start of training camp that Adams would be considered a bust if he did not reach double digits in sacks. Adams said during training camp that he welcomed the challenge posed by Morris, who also called out Adams after he began the season with lackluster performances in the first three games. “In football, you need that,” Adams said in early August. “Players tend to get in their own element and do things that they want to do. They need to be called out sometimes. He’s the coach. Whatever he says, goes.” With the Bears, Adams played brief stints on defense. He made five tackles. Bears linebacker Brian Urlacher told The Chicago Tribune that Adams’s death was “crazy.” Urlacher said: “I didn’t know him that well because he came in during the middle of the season. But I did know him. I still saw him every day when I went into work. It’s just weird. “I had a teammate die when I was in college. You just don’t know how to handle it. It’s just sad, man. It’s a bad deal.”

Chicago Bears
Football
Adams Gaines
Tampa Bay Buccaneers
Clemson University


Commerce Dept. Declares Northeast Fishery a Disaster

Abstract: BOSTON — The Commerce Department on Thursday issued a formal disaster declaration for the Northeastern commercial groundfish fishery, paving the way for financial relief for the battered industry and the communities that depend on it. To many here, the declaration underscored the urgency of a groundfish depletion that has become apparent to many scientists and some fishermen who work in New England’s waters. “Fishermen in the Northeast are facing financial hardships because of the unexpectedly slow rebuilding of fish stocks,” Rebecca Blank, the acting secretary of commerce, said in a statement. The declaration, which allows Congress to appropriate financial relief for the industry but does not guarantee any funds, comes after an assessment last year by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration that found that the population of Gulf of Maine cod — a critical commercial species here — was about 20 percent of its rebuilding target. Those findings increased the likelihood that federal catch-limits will be cut significantly in 2013 (regulators say cuts for some species could be higher than 70 percent), which some fishermen feel could further cripple an industry already suffering from withering stocks. “This year has been the worst I’ve ever seen it,” said John Our, who has caught only 500 of the 180,000 pounds of cod he was allotted this year and has shifted his focus to dogfish instead. “It is a disaster, I’ll give them that. I just don’t see any fish being landed.” Fishery disaster declarations are not novel for the agency — it often makes at least several per year — but are unusual for a fishery that has been actively managed for decades, according to Peter Shelley, senior counsel at the Conservation Law Foundation, which supported this declaration despite opposing previous calls for such an action. “The problem wasn’t that fishermen were overfishing,” Mr. Shelley said, “but that their limits were set too high — because of a failure to understand how the system has been changing.” The declaration comes as fishery management takes a prominent role in some of the region’s political campaigns. Senator Scott P. Brown , Republican of Massachusetts, recently released an advertisement featuring fishermen in Gloucester, Mass.; Representative John F. Tierney, a Democrat fighting a tough re-election battle in the state’s coastal Sixth Congressional District, and Representative William Keating, a Democrat who is running in the Ninth Congressional District, which includes Cape Cod, have both pushed federal regulators for the declaration. The Commerce Department also declared commercial fishery disaster relief for three regions in Alaska where Chinook salmon catches have plummeted — on the Yukon and Kuskokwim Rivers, both of which flow into the Bering Sea off Alaska’s west coast, and in the Cook Inlet southwest of Anchorage. In asking for federal help this summer, Gov. Sean Parnell , a Republican, described a ripple effect through an outdoor economy, and the simultaneous challenges for the deeply rural communities where subsistence fishing is an element of culture and survival. The numbers indicate a sudden, stunning decline in recent years, about which scientists have not settled on an explanation. On the Yukon, for example, 1,488 pounds of salmon were harvested in 2011, down from more than 859,000 pounds in 2006, a state study found.

Commerce Department
Fishing Commercial
Cod (Fish)
Blank Rebecca M
Brown Scott P
Northeastern States (US)
Tierney John F
Parnell Sean


Michigan Pounds Florida in Citrus Bowl; Tennessee Routs Northwestern in Outback

Abstract: Michigan and Florida’s Citrus Bowl matchup in Orlando, Fla., was supposed to play out as an evenly matched struggle between top defenses from the Big Ten and the Southeastern Conference. Someone forgot to tell the Wolverines. Jake Rudock threw for 278 yards and three touchdowns, and Michigan’s defense dominated throughout in the No. 17 Wolverines’ 41-7 victory over No. 19 Florida on Friday. “I would say this was the best game we’ve played all year,” Michigan Coach Jim Harbaugh said. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen our offense play better. Our defense was magnificent.” There were some questions surrounding how effective Rudock would be after being knocked out of Michigan’s regular-season finale against Ohio State with a left shoulder injury. He dismissed any notions about his health in the victory, the Wolverines’ first in a bowl game since 2012. Michigan (10-3) had three touchdown drives of at least 70 yards and finished with 503 yards of offense against a Florida defense that entered the game ranked sixth nationally. Rudock credited the coaching staff’s game plan and scouting efforts with putting him and his teammates in optimum situations. “We understood how they played — they play fast and they play physical,” Rudock said. “I had an easy job. I just had to get it out there to them.” Image Joshua Dobbs (11) rushing through Northwestern as Tennessee won the Outback Bowl, 45-6. Credit Mike Carlson/Getty Images He also had lots of support on the ground from tailback De’Veon Smith, who finished with 109 yards rushing and two scores. “We just came out there and competed today,” Smith said. “It just shows that hard work pays off.” Leading by 10 at the half, Michigan scored on its first two possessions of the third quarter to take a 31-7 lead. Michigan’s defense played without safety Jabrill Peppers, who sat out with an undisclosed injury. But the Wolverines did not miss him, holding the Gators (10-4) to 28 total yards in the second half. “It was a case of getting your rump kicked in,” Florida Coach Jim McElwain said. “That’s what it was. They really took it to us on both sides of the ball.” Florida quarterback Treon Harris had his moments early. But he also threw a costly interception in Michigan’s end zone late in the first half that stifled the Gators’ attempt to stay in the game. SUGAR BOWL Chad Kelly threw for 302 yards and four touchdowns — three to Laquon Treadwell — and No. 16 Mississippi crushed No. 13 Oklahoma State, 48-20, at the Sugar Bowl in New Orleans. Ole Miss (10-3) jumped out to a 34-6 lead by halftime, cruising up and down the field against an overwhelmed Oklahoma State defense. The onslaught was punctuated late in the second quarter when left tackle Laremy Tunsil had a 2-yard touchdown run on a trick play after a lateral from Kelly. Oklahoma State (10-3) lost its final three games after 10 straight wins. The Cowboys fell into a 41-6 hole midway through the third quarter and never mounted a legitimate challenge. Mason Rudolph was 18 of 31 for 179 yards for Oklahoma State. Ole Miss outgained Oklahoma State, 554 to 366, in total yards. OUTBACK BOWL The architect of Tennessee’s resurgence will not be happy until the Volunteers are perennial championship contenders again. Butch Jones, nevertheless, is proud of the progress Tennessee has made in his three seasons as coach and is confident that the program is on solid footing as it moves into 2016. A 45-6 victory over No. 12 Northwestern not only capped Tennessee’s best season in eight years, it showcased some of the young talent that gives the Volunteers a chance to keep improving. “The road to success is always under construction, and we need to continue to recruit and develop, and continue to grow and elevate our football program,” Jones said. “But where we’ve come in three short years is amazing.” Joshua Dobbs threw for 166 yards and ran for two touchdowns, while the bowl’s most valuable player, Jalen Hurd, rushed for 130 yards and a score for Tennessee (9-4), which finished with at least nine wins for the first time since 2007. “It’s huge,” Dobbs said. “We talked about finishing the season strong. It shows we’re on the rise. We realize our potential. We have to grind to reach it, but this was a good step.” Northwestern (10-3) sputtered offensively and was unable to keep up with the stronger, faster Volunteers defensively in falling short of a team-record 11 victories. “This is one game at the end of a spectacular season,” Wildcats Coach Pat Fitzgerald said. “You just move on. You learn, you grow.” Dobbs completed 14 of 25 passes. He also ran 12 times for 48 yards.

Bowl Games
College football
University of Michigan
University of Florida


Stark Pictures of Authority at Sundance and Other Science Events

Abstract: January events at the intersection of culture and science. FILM Sundance Film Festival. Park City, Utah. Jan. 22-Feb. 1. Tickets at sundance.org. Two films at the annual indie-movie festival examine the seductive power of authority as revealed in a notorious pair of experiments. Stanley Milgram’s famous 1961 study on obedience suggested that most people were willing to inflict severe pain on others if urged by an authority figure. The biopic “Experimenter,” starring Peter Sarsgaard as the scientist and Winona Ryder as his wife, tracks the wider span of Dr. Milgram’s career. “The Stanford Prison Experiment,” more than a decade in the making, gives a dark glimpse into the infamous 1971 mock-prison study by the psychologist Philip Zimbardo, in which college students took so fiercely to their roles as guards and inmates that research had to be halted early. In a slightly more hopeful view of human cooperation, a documentary titled “The Visit” takes viewers inside the United Nations’ Office for Outer Space Affairs, where scientists prepare to communicate with aliens, enter their ships and, if necessary, fight back. EXHIBIT Smithsonian Air and Space Museum. “Outside the Spacecraft: 50 Years of Extra-Vehicular Activity.” Washington. Opens Jan. 8. Free. Image Credit Image courtesy of NASA Fifty years ago, the astronaut Ed White opened the hatch of his capsule and became the first American to dangle in space. Since then, astronauts on spacewalks have fixed the Hubble telescope, built the International Space Station, walked on the moon and repaired their own craft. This exhibit gathers the apparel and implements needed for the job, including the headset that Neil Armstrong wore on the first moonwalk and the last boots to tread on the moon. Those who recall George Clooney zipping around on his booster seat in the film “Gravity” might be surprised to learn that most spacewalks involve tight tethers, long checklists and deliberate movements to ensure there are no surprises. Kathryn Sullivan, the first American woman to walk in space, once said spacewalking was more like slow-motion space-swimming. EXHIBIT American Museum of Natural History. “Countdown to Zero: Defeating Disease.” New York City. Opens Jan 13. Adults $22, students and seniors $17, children $12.50. Image No human disease has been eradicated since smallpox in 1979. This exhibit, conceived with the Carter Center, shows how some modern pathogens spread and predicts how health campaigns might curtail them. In the absence of vaccines, low-tech solutions are sometimes effective. Take Guinea worm , a parasite that once infected millions in Africa and Asia. No cure has been found, but with the use of cheap water filters, the current number of cases is expected to be announced as less than 150. Malaria evolves so quickly that most drugs against it eventually lose effectiveness, but the distribution of bed nets has narrowed its reach. “Normally we’re concerned about keeping things from going extinct,” said the exhibit’s curator, Mark Sidall, citing the museum’s mission to promote biodiversity. “The only consequence of driving these species to extinction is that people will be better off.” BROADCAST “Sinkholes — Buried Alive.” “Nova.” Jan. 28 on PBS. Perhaps you recall the case of Jeff Bush, whose bedroom floor in Sefner, Fla., collapsed in the middle of the night, baring a giant sinkhole that swallowed him whole, bed and all, never to be found. This episode of “Nova” takes a closer look at the geological mechanisms that underlie this tabloid-ready phenomenon. Sinkholes tend to occur when rain eats through limestone or other rocks, carving out empty spaces that can fill with soil and suddenly collapse. In some regions of Spain, sinkholes threaten to demolish historic buildings and derail high-speed trains. And humans can make the problem worse. An enormous sinkhole that opened up in Guatemala City was the result of an outdated sewage system, and a lake-size one in Louisiana was the result of salt mining.