Warm gesture

A nice writeup about last week's Craft-In by Caroline Zilk, with two outstanding photos by Rusty Hubbard, appeared in today's paper!  I'm reproducing the text below since much of the paper is behind a subscription paywall, and I don't know how many of you will have access to it.  All content copyright held by its creators and the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.

Warm gesture

Honors College students hold Craft-In for CASA

BY CAROLINE ZILK
Staff Writer 

    Several members of the Honors College at the University of Central Arkansas in Conway carried around pointy sticks on Nov. 3.
    “So don’t mess with us,” Honors College Associate Dean Donna Bowman joked.
    The Honors College held a Craft-In service project for its seminar called “Craft Wisely: The Past, Present and Future of Handmade.”
    Bowman’s students were responsible for designing the project and choosing an organization to work with: Court Appointed Special Advocates.
    “Our syllabus specifies that there be at least one public event associated with the project, and the Craft-Ins fulfill that requirement,” Bowman said.
    “It’s an idea carried over from the same course last fall, where we did a Craft-In on campus to promote the work of Conway Cradle Care.”
    On the steps of Ferguson Chapel on the afternoon of Nov. 3, Honors College students, as well as other members of the UCA campus and Conway communities, knitted and crocheted scarves and other warm winter items for children in the court and foster systems throughout the state.
    UCA student Monica Runge said CASA provided the volunteers a list of names with the children’s favorite colors so the students could personalize their projects.
    Runge is a biology major who happens to love knitting, and she said she was one of many excited to help out CASA.
    “I believe everyone involved in this project is very strongly motivated to help other people,” she said. “We almost feel a personal connection making these items for these kids. It’s great to be able to help them just a little bit.”
    Bowman said CASA has partnerships with several groups on campus, especially students and faculty in the family and consumer sciences department, who often make things for CASA’s clients.
    The Honors College’s Craft-In is the first of two public events in conjunction with the project. The second will be a “buy one, give one” sale on Dec. 1.
    “We will have handmade winter accessories for sale in conjunction with items made specifically for CASA clients — kids who have been removed from abuse or neglect in their homes and are in the care of the court,” Bowman said. “Customers can buy the linked items, keep the one that’s for sale and donate the one made for the CASA child.”
    Bowman said this project is important because many of her students have benefited from a good support system and parents who took care of their children, while, on the other hand, the CASA kids have had a tough break.
    “It’s a long-term drag on their self-esteem and their future,” Bowman pointed out. “Some of them will have good outcomes, and some are going to have a lot of trouble.”
    However, if Bowman and the Honors College have anything to do with it, the children at least all will have warm hats, scarves and mittens this winter.
    “These kids are going to be our neighbors pretty soon. Maybe if they’re lucky, they’ll be on our campus, and they need any step back up that we can give them,” Bowman said.
    Staff writer Caroline Zilk can be reached at (501) 244-4326 or
czilk@arkansasonline.com.

RUSTY HUBBARD/RIVER VALLEY & OZARK EDITION 
Sarah Rawlinson, a junior at the University of Central Arkansas in Conway, knits while participating in the Craft-In service project held Nov. 3 by the UCA Honors College to benefit the youths in the Court Appointed Special Advocates program.

RUSTY HUBBARD/RIVER VALLEY & OZARK EDITION University of Central Arkansas students participate in the Honors College Craft-In, a service project for the CASA program held Nov. 3 on the steps of the university’s Ferguson Chapel.

Turning a profit

The paper raised an interesting question a few days ago about my university.  In 2003, under the previous administration, UCA built a retirement community about a block away from campus and a half-mile from my house.  At the time we were told that this was a growing trend among universities.  Now it has been revealed that the debt incurred to build the 100-bed facility was over $8 million, of which (after a 2006 refinancing), more than $7 million is still outstanding.

Since 2007 the facility has turned a profit -- sometimes small, sometimes large -- but the very idea of a public university operating a business that seeks to turn a profit and competes with private entities doesn't sit well with some in the legislature, who have made inquiries about the propriety of the arrangement.

The article provided details about businesses serving the public affiliated with other universities in the state, from the hotel and restaurant associated with the University of Arkansas's hospitality degree programs, to a retirement home on land leased by the University of Arkansas at Monticello.  The relationships between the businesses and the universities vary, with UCA's facility being owned by the school and exempt from taxes, while Fayetteville's restaurant and hotel get tax breaks for their involvement in training students, and the Monticello home is not owned by the university and gets no exemption.

Lawmakers are uneasy about a university using its privileged position as a public trust to gain a competitive advantage against area businesses.  UCA has responded that it's "common" for public universities to run golf courses, detail clinics, bookstores, hospitals, and other operations that cater to ordinary consumers.

What's your experience with auxiliary businesses being operated for a profit by public universities?  Do you see any problem with such arrangements?  Does it matter whether the business serves as a training ground or provides opportunities to students?  Does this constitute an unfair advantage over the competition?

Weepies

Noel and I are going out for a rare dinner-and-a-movie tonight, which will be followed when we get home by late Survivor finale and school lunch packing.  So I'll very quickly note that both of us spent part of the day wiping tears from our eyes -- me because of this story about an unlikely long-distance connection forged by a tornado disaster, from the Washington Post (reprinted in our local paper), and Noel because of the documentary Louder Than A Bomb, which caught him off guard with its portrait of a high school experience rarely caught on film these days, but whose kids in solidarity through a shared activity and talent was quite familiar to him.  What have you read or seen recently that has similarly moved you?

A charmed day

Here are some things that never happen.

1. The flight attendant says "We have a very full flight today," and warns people about overhead bin space three separate times, but the middle seat in my row remains unoccupied.
2. A flight leaves 10 minutes early and arrives 20 minutes early.

Both things happened to me on the same flight from Atlanta to Dallas today.  I felt a bit like I'd accidentally crossed over into the Neverland Airport.

It was a welcome reward for a couple of days that were among the longest of the semester.  Flying in for 24 hours of meeting and then flying back feels like the mental equivalent of a four-day trip, just with all the downtime excised.  I completely forgot about e-mail until an hour before I was set to leave the hotel today, and when I checked on my phone, I had 158 unread.

Now I'm home, where magical things have been happening, like Archer coming in 9th (out of 43) in his first-ever chess tournament, and Cady Gray doing square dances.  It's a strange disconnect given the world news of natural disasters (text "REDCROSS" to 90999 to donate $10 on your phone bill, by the way) and the steady stream of tweets from my students and friends with Japanese connections.  It feels like a secret bonus to have a full -- well, fullish, because of Daylight Savings Time -- weekend with my kids after what amounts to working two jobs over the last 12 days.  I hope you have similar blessings, and that you count every one.

America the beautiful

We live in a great country. A country where people can spout any nonsense they want, and where -- thank God -- other people can stand up and call it nonsense.

A country where it's not a crime to be a white supremacist -- where you can even run for public office on a platform of the eradication of races other than white. And where I can call that morally repugnant and Satanic.

A country where a man can give a speech claiming that a cabal of Democrats engineered the promotion of slavery in the nineteenth century, and that this means that black people are fools for not voting straight Republican tickets today. Where a newspaper columnist can swallow the speech whole and proffer its content as suspiciously suppressed truth in print. (Even though the judgment of those who give him column inches and order the type set is thereby rendered suspect.) And where a history professor can author a column in that same newspaper politely shining the light of day on the speech's distortions and falsehoods, and calling the columnist to account for endorsing it without question. (Links unfortunately lead behind a paywall; check the July 6 and July 10 opinion pages of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette if you want the full story.)

As a wise man once said, I will defend to the death the right of these people to believe whatever hateful, self-serving nonsense they prefer -- even to shout it from the rooftops through any mass media they can harness to their cause. And I'll exercise vigorously my right to broadcast why they're horribly, harmfully wrong, and encourage everyone I know to do likewise.

Sign that kid up

Cassandra Lives, 2006-2007. In this video, doomsayer Peter Schiff is openly mocked -- laughed out of the room -- by the other financial analysts on Neil Cavuto's Fox News show, all because he says tougher economic times are coming. Talk about being vindicated by history.

Cutest Google Alert ever

Like all vain people, I have a Google Alert for my name. That's how I know about my supporting role in this 2/3 disturbing, 1/3 heartwarming story out of Richmond, Virginia: Man who stole kitten guilty of misdemeanor.

The reporter tsk-tsks over the light sentence received by the perp, Carlos Marshall, who stole a kitten named Ernie from the local Humane Society. Marshall said that he fell in love with Ernie but couldn't afford the $100 adoption fee, so he sneaked out with the kitten. A volunteer saw him and informed SPCA officials, who left a message on Marshall's answering machine. Marshall called them back and arranged a meeting to hand Ernie back over.

Doesn't sound like the actions of a hardened criminal to me, but the story is full of righteous indignation about how the book couldn't be thrown at Marshall, as he clearly deserved, because cat theft is a misdemeanor in Virginia (although dog theft is a felony). Luckily the SPCA chief is making a push to increase the penalties for cat-snatching, reintroducing legislation now dubbed "Ernie's Law."

Where do I come in? I'm the "all's well that ends well" part at the end:

While yesterday's trial may not have ended with the desired outcome for Starr, all seems to have worked out well for Ernie.

He subsequently was adopted by Rachel Bowman, and he now spends his days waiting for the 14-year-old Chesterfield girl to return home from school.

"The second she walks in the door, he leaps up on her," Donna Bowman said of a cat that her daughter has renamed Louie.

"He jumps right into her arms just like a baby. This one wants to be in your arms -- not my arms but hers. It definitely knows who its caretaker is, and it's definitely Rachel."

Louie?! I hate to say it, but Rachel just dealt a fatal blow to the whole movement. Nobody's going to vote for a bill called "Ernie aka Louie's Law." It sounds like a push for stricter penalties on assaults against fifties mobsters.

My dear fellow, that was agreed, wasn't it?

I was flabbergasted by this Associated Press story in the paper today, headlined "Cyberdrill threw multiple disasters at U.S." The opening anecdote was the brilliant framing device in The Life And Death Of Colonel Blimp come to life:

In the middle of the biggest-ever “Cyber Storm” war game to test the nation’s hacker defenses, someone quietly targeted the very computers used to conduct the exercise.
The surprising culprit? The players themselves, the same government and corporate experts responsible for detecting and fending off attacks against vital computer systems, according to hundreds of pages of heavily censored files obtained by The Associated Press. Perplexed organizers sent everyone an urgent e-mail marked “IMPORTANT!” instructing them not to probe or attack the game’s control computers.
“Anytime you get a group of [information technology] experts together, there’s always a desire, ‘Let’s show them what we can do,”’ said George Foresman, a former senior Homeland Security Department official. “Whether its intent was embarrassment or a prank, we had to temper the enthusiasm of the players.”

But you damned young idiot, war starts at midnight! Haven't you been told?