… to take off the top of his convertible. UD was wowed by the crowds of immense palm trees on campus.
Like almost every other university, Miami’s starting to have serious money troubles.
… conflict of interest may ensue. When professors are really consultants or salespeople, or when they’re cooling their heels waiting for higher paying work, or … who knows what they’re doing on campus, but when professors aren’t really professors, conflict of interest may ensue.
Here’s an example from George Washington University.
A prominent professor in the GW School of Public Health and Health Sciences is under scrutiny this week because of allegations that he knowingly misled people about the safety of the District’s water while under contract with the city’s main water utility.
Tee Guidotti, a former professor and department chairman at SPHHS, published an article in the National Institute of Health journal in 2007 that said the extraordinarily high lead content in the D.C. water supply from 2001 to 2004 was not harmful, a statement cited locally and nationally as evidence that the city’s water supply was safe.
Last month, however, another study concluded that there is a correlation between elevated blood-lead levels in children and neighborhoods that had high lead levels in drinking water during the city’s water crisis, The Washington Post reported. The study found that hundreds of D.C. children had dangerous levels of lead in their blood.
After closer review, editors of the journal said Guidotti’s conclusions were questionable and that he may have been influenced to publish his conclusions by the D.C. Water and Sewer Authority, who contracted the study.
WASA paid Guidotti and GW $750,000 over a three-year period for his work on the study, according to The Washington Post.
On Friday the Post published a front-page story about the alleged conflict of interest, highlighting e-mails Guidotti sent to colleagues prior to the journal’s publication showing he knew a key portion of the article was inaccurate, though it was published anyway…
Here’s the Washington Post story.
[T]here is a way to appease both sides here. Some schools have classrooms where the Internet connection in the entire room can be turned on or off with the flip of a switch. This is a great way to compromise between professors and students. Students can bring their laptops so they can type up notes, but they are unable to get online unless the professor decides it would be beneficial to the class.
A student at UD‘s George Washington University makes a good case against classroom laptops. She offers the above as a solution, but UD could swear she read somewhere (she can’t find it now) that there are many ways for students to disable the off switch.
… writes Richard Wilbur, in one of his best-known poems.
He lives here, on Key West.
UD‘s eyes open to a cry of roosters, a swish of palms, and church bells. A breeze from her screened window, and a ceiling fan, cool her. Water trickles off the hot tub in the pool, and a small jet crosses a sky already bright blue.
What’ s the other animal? Querulous, jabbering.
And another bird, a parrot? Whistling.
The big red heart-shaped leaves from the whatever tree that shades the pool have fallen down. They make scratching sounds on the balcony. A man in a blue bandana stands by the side of the pool scooping out the leaves that fell overnight.
The church bells repeat the two notes that begin Goin’ Home. Go – in’. Go-in.’
After the frenzy of yesterday, the eyes open to a slow consideration of the world we’ve flown ourselves into. Questions of travel? That’s Elizabeth Bishop, another lover of Key West.
What childishness is it that while there’s a breath of life
in our bodies, we are determined to rush
to see the sun the other way around?
The tiniest green hummingbird in the world?
To stare at some inexplicable old stonework,
inexplicable and impenetrable,
at any view,
instantly seen and always, always delightful?
Oh, must we dream our dreams
and have them, too?
And have we room
for one more folded sunset, still quite warm?
It is childishness, the rush to this bright blue miniature world; blue and gold as the sun climbs over the island and lights up the palms. “All your life you’ve been bursting through doors,” said UD‘s sister to her at Mie n Yu two days ago. At this table, in fact.
The white one, in the foreground. “At Suburban, and at Washington Hospital Center, when Mom was sick, you just pushed your way in to see her. People were always shooing you out.”
Pushy. Yes. And here’s another door.
Scathing Online Schoolmarm hates quotation marks. But she knows there are times when you’ve simply got to use them.
Here’s a perfect example, from an article in Forbes giving advice about philanthropy.
Inquire about whether or not there is a conflict of interest policy in place. Is the investment manager on the board of the organization (i.e., Bernard Madoff was on the board of Yeshiva University and “managed” their investments)?
Long, long day. Two hours in the air to Fort Lauderdale; then a drive to Key West with UD‘s friend Kevan, who met her at the airport and took her down there in his blue Honda Del Sol convertible.
The views along the way, of endless green water and vanilla skies with vultures, set the surreal tone for all that UD‘s so far seen in this warm and brilliantly lit place. All the islands in the sea, and all the clouds that swirl around them, make the sort of beauty you have trouble grasping — it’s so out of line with anything else in the world.
UD‘s long day ended at a pier famous for its sunsets. Another species of surreality, the deep pink bands on the horizon, the elegant sailboats purring by, people dancing in the peaceful dusk.
UD leaves very soon for the next leg of her year-long sabbatical from George Washington University: Key West, Florida.
When we last saw her, UD was living in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, in an apartment overlooking the Atlantic. Cold winter weather meant the town was largely deserted. She had trouble finding convenience stores whose doors weren’t locked.
But there were quiet cafes, quiet walks along beaches, visits from friends, and long hours for writing and thinking. She loved the sunrises and sunsets and the placid change of skies from morning to noon to night. Cargo ships and contrails reminded her of a world in transit. She herself had gone gloriously aground.
Now she goes to a subtropical island in high season. Although her apartment’s near the quiet end of Duval Street (It’s 2:28 AM and the place is hopping.), she’s about to enter an all-night party. (A pink cab just drifted by the live cam.) Key West is warm and awake and UD‘s ready for that.
A couple of days ago, the New York Times featured a small Key West house and its owner. The article gave UD a sense of daily life there.
For Murphy Davis, getting away means leaving the front door to his Key West cottage open — not just unlocked, but flung wide open. Tropical breezes blow through the house, bearing leaves from sapodilla trees, hibiscus petals, even sand. The presence of these elemental bits of nature is a sign that he is truly at home.
… “One of my favorite things about being in Key West is the physical environment,” said Mr. Davis, seated barefoot in a blue canvas chair on his front porch, a glass of iced tea in hand. “I like the sand on my floor. I don’t understand people who close up their houses and crank up the A.C.”
In these cold winter months, Key West beckons to him. “I have always considered Key West my second home,” said Mr. Davis, 52, who first became enamored of the island as a child.
He vividly recalls a fishing trip with his grandparents when he was 8 years old. “We left freezing Long Island, and in one day it was hot,” Mr. Davis said. “That was magical to me.” Even today he can point out the booth where he sat with them at Pepe’s Cafe, the oldest restaurant on the island. Mr. Davis first bought property here in 1997, with his partner at the time, along with the playwright Terrence McNally; they had identical side-by-side cottages on an idyllic lane
… The cottage, on the corner of two quiet lanes, is enveloped by lush foliage. Its one-and-a-half-story design is typical of the island’s smaller residences, as are the original louvered windows.
… A typical morning begins on the back deck, where Mr. Davis drinks coffee and spends time reading scripts — usually on a futon that has been draped with an Indonesian sarong. “I’m partial to futons because as a young actor I was a futon salesman in New York City,” he said with a laugh.
He gardens, goes to the local movie theater, and mingles with friends who include actors, writers, massage therapists and the park ranger who works at the entrance to the local beach. Cooking for small dinner parties, where guests flow easily through the house, inside and out, is another ritual.
Mr. Davis relishes his time alone here. Long afternoons include trips to the beach, to swim and read. He has no car and says he would not consider owning one. Instead, he prefers to travel by bicycle, in thrall to the sea air, the tropical foliage and multicultural spirit of Key West, a city of 25,000 permanent residents.
His travels by bicycle have brought him closer to the distinctive architecture of the 4.5-mile-long island, particularly the historic district, which contains 3,000 wooden structures, many with two-story porches and Victorian and Queen Anne architecture.
Leaving soon for lunch at a Georgetown restaurant to mark UD‘s sister’s birthday and Valentine’s Day.
The restaurant has veiled tables.
Posting will be rather light today.
See Part I here.
More evidence of Ezra Merkin’s innocence led astray.
One of the top advisers to the money manager J. Ezra Merkin, who invested $2 billion of his clients’ money with Bernard L. Madoff, is a convicted felon who worked for Mr. Merkin while still in federal prison, according to recently filed court documents.
The adviser, Victor Teicher, who had been convicted of federal securities fraud and was barred from the securities industry, advised Mr. Merkin on the management of his Ariel Fund Ltd. through phone calls made to Mr. Merkin’s Park Avenue office from a New Jersey prison.
Information about Mr. Teicher’s relationship with Mr. Merkin was contained in court papers filed by New York University, one of several institutions now suing Mr. Merkin. The university lost $24 million from its investment in the Ariel Fund, which turned over $300 million of its assets to Mr. Madoff, without disclosing the arrangement to Ariel investors.
… In a memorandum filed in New York Supreme Court this week, the university said that none of the Ariel fund prospectuses disclosed that “Victor Teicher, a convicted felon, and his staff were the persons actively managing the majority of the Ariel assets, and that hundreds of millions of dollars of Ariel’s funds had also been delivered for management to Madoff — even though Teicher had warned Merkin than Madoff’s returns were not possible.”
Mr. Teicher began advising Mr. Merkin’s Ariel fund in 1993 after Mr. Teicher had been convicted of several counts of securities fraud, including using insider information in trading puts and calls. Mr. Teicher, according to the filing, advised Mr. Merkin until 2001, during which time New York University increased its Ariel investment.
1993. Began to lose his way sixteen years ago.
Although he earns over $700,000, a dean at the University of South Florida stole a bicycle.
He was captured on camera doing it.
He’s on leave.
UD thinks you can tell from his photo that he’s trouble.
That’s a USF clip he’s got on, which is already pretty weird. He’s anxious for you to see his way big gold watch. Bad sign. He looks smug. UD‘s theory is that he thinks he owns the clinic he works in, and all the objects in it. (He stole the bike from his building.) If he needs a bike, for instance, and he sees one, it’s his.
A poem about love?
I believe that’s already been done.
How about, instead of a poem about human romance, a prose passage of surpassing beauty about love of the world?
It’s by John Malcolm Brinnin, a writer who lived in Key West for many years, and died there a decade ago.
Brinnin described Key West as “a town at the end of the line that reveled in squalor, cultivated waywardness, and, calling itself Conch Republic, regarded Florida as an enemy country, somewhere toward the north.”
Here he recalls a high point from his life of travel on board ships. The passage starts with the September date. He’s on the Queen Elizabeth.
Sheepish, in the thrall of sentiment, the sentimentalist joins other sentimentalists on board to stand and stare with reverence at a sudden brilliant break in the seamless immensity of the ocean… You see I’m using his phrases, his beautiful words… How does he make his little narrative so beautiful?
First, concision. Each perfect-length paragraph contains only the moments and images and sentiments necessary to convey his exultation, his adoration of a world of stillness and a world of sublime interruptions of stillness.
[UPDATE: Here’s a little something I’m adding a day after I posted this.
Note one important reason Brinnin’s able to keep things tight and brief: His feelings don’t predominate. Nowhere will you find I felt; my heart went pitapat; I was reminded of my Aunt Tillie, my first sexual encounter, the Titanic, the souls who’d died in the construction of those ships; the majesty of God … Like all great writers, Brinnin knows that it’s mainly about the world outside yourself. You can certainly earn narcissism points. UD ain’t saying you can’t talk about yourself at all. But you’ve got to earn those points. And best of all is not having to do narcissism at all, but somehow letting the way you describe the world outside of yourself convey your history and consciousness. That‘s the ticket. Few people are naturals at this. That – aside from the intrinsic pleasure of the activity, of course – is why a serious writer will want to read someone like Brinnin.]
Next, close and sensitive observation of human emotions. I know so well that sheepishness, that sly glancing at other people gathered, like you, at a transcendent event. You know you and the others will stand there for hours if you need to, into the very late night if you need to, because you’re passionate about this experience. You want it very badly. Your passion somewhat embarrasses you, since it feels extreme, and intimate — private to you and your aesthetic and even spiritual obsessions. Yet here are these other strange folk who seem to share your strangeness… In few words, Brinnin captures the combination of determination to see, and awareness of how odd you are for the fierceness of the determination.
And then, you know — the prose.
They stand apart from one another and do not speak, their eyes fixed on the visible horizon to the west as the vibration of the ship gives a slightly stroboscopic blur to everything they see.
After the strobe goes off, and moving objects are suddenly stationary, they make a weird blur against a white screen… And this idea of pausing things, of the greatest experiences actually being those not of dynamism, but of the earth stopping for us, so we can really look, so we can for a privileged moment take in the truth of reality — this will be the central idea of the passage, and of Brinnin’s essay altogether about the wonder of travel.
The paradox of travel, as he would have it, is that by incessant motion we press toward immobility, toward Wordsworth’s spots of time in which things become clear.
But in terms of style: Notice the repeated use of the letter B: visible, vibration, stroboscopic, blur. Subtle, but it creates a soothing rhythm.
The mid-Atlantic sky is windless, a dome of hard stars; the ocean glows, an immense conjunction of inseparable water and air.
See the poetic glory of this prose: mid/is/wind… The internal sounds that gently repeat, creating a floaty trance-like effect in us, as we stand alongside the writer on the floaty trance-like ship. And then five one-syllable words: a dome of hard stars, their monolithic feel spectacularly right for the simple uncrackable hardness of that upper dome. The sound of the O‘s in the ocean glows… And then the idea of conjunction, natural conjunction between water and air, but also the conjunction the writer is about to witness, between the two enormous ships.
These ten or twelve of the faithful in their shadowy stances might be postulants on a Vermont hillside, waiting in their gowns for the end of the world.
Still the self-ribbing about the deep sentiment of the occasion. For clearly this is a religious moment, though the writer seems a secular person. He deals with his inner dissonance, if you will, by mild humor at his own expense.
Notice also, in terms of the greatness of the prose, the oddity of certain choices: Vermont, gowns.
Almost as if she were climbing the watery slopes of the world, the oncoming Queen shows one wink at her topmost mast, then two.
Well, so, this is brilliant, if you ask me. He’s already given us Vermont, so the slopes, even in the flatness of his surroundings, seem weirdly okay. And then we get this amazing fanciful image: climbing the watery slopes of the world. The watery slopes of the world! Climbing water. So strange, and so beautiful. I’ve never seen that image, that thought, before.
The huge funnels glow in their Cunard red, the basso-profundo horns belt out a sound that has the quality less of a salute than of one long mortal cry.
The ocean glows, the funnels glow — the world as an immense conjunction of inseparables aglow. Seeing the whole thing. The thing whole. Huge, Cunard, profundo, salute — playing out the long cry of the letter U as he then turns to the cry of the horns. A human cry as well as a non-human — a world in which all is conjoined.
As the darkness closes over and the long wakes are joined, the sentimentalists stand for a while watching the ocean recover its seamless immensity. Then one by one, like people dispersing downhill after a burial, they find their ways to their cabins and close their doors.
The Vermont hillside again, and people walking down the hill at the end of their vision. Yet still conjunction, as the long wakes are joined. And the word wake joined with the idea of burial makes us think of the two meanings of the word… This is an experience which has jolted sleepy people late at night on a soothing ship awake; but they have also just witnessed the end of something. They are standing at the wake of the final meeting of the two ships; they have just marked that burial. The flat ocean again covers all in its seamless immensity — a seamlessness that seems to shut us out. But the watchers have for a moment felt the earth and the ocean embracing them, taking them into a heart-stopping brilliance.
Dr. Lou Ann Cook, nursing professor who died Dec. 17, was memorialized by at least 45 current and retired faculty members, administrators and family at a ceremony Feb. 6 in the nursing and allied health complex.
Cook was a nursing professor at this college 25 years.
She was born Jan. 9, 1938, in Lakewood, Ohio.
Click on the link for more.
When you turn your university into a dumping ground for political hacks, not to mention a source of money for your kid, you can expect things to get ugly eventually.
Especially when your BFF, Rod Blagojevich, can no longer watch your back.
Southern Illinois University President Glenn Poshard said Thursday anyone with evidence of “pay-to-play politics” involved in appointments to the school’s Board of Trustees should contact the proper authorities.
Questions have arisen in public surrounding financial contributions to legally embattled former Gov. Rod Blagojevich by board members including Chairman Roger Tedrick, a Mount Vernon insurance agent; John Simmons, an attorney from Alton; and F. William Bonan II, regional president of Peoples National Bank in Mount Vernon.
… [One speaker] raised the claim of a $4 million state contribution for the construction of Rent One Park in Marion, the home stadium of the Southern Illinois Miners, a professional baseball team owned by Simmons.
Poshard, who worked with Simmons and his son, Dennis Poshard, to bring the team to the region, said the money was given to the city of Marion for infrastructure developments, not specifically the ball club.
Dennis Poshard was involved in other of Wright’s allegations, including that the Arthur Agency, of which Dennis Poshard is president, received contracts for work from the university.
Poshard acknowledged the work his son’s company has done for the university, but said it was all handled properly. For companies affiliated with university administrators and board members, policies and procedures for bidding are stricter than for general bid awards, Poshard said.
Documents from the March 2007 board meeting show a $100,000 payment to the Arthur Agency for marketing services for CONNECT SI….
Background on Poshard, who plagiarized his dissertation, here.
Undergraduates from Exeter College and Jesus College fought each other after the annual event, known as the Turl Street Dash, got out of control.
Some of the students had drunk between 12 and 15 pints according to those present.
The violence erupted when Jesus students, who outnumbered their Exeter counterparts, broke into their rivals’ college.
Exeter students launched a counter-attack and broke into Jesus as well.
In the fight that followed, students ended up being punched and with bloodied noses.
The Exeter College bar manager, who with the porter and junior dean tried to break up the fight, was kicked in the groin. …