Senior Women Web

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  • Undiscovered Species and Bioblitzes by Citizen Scientists

    Even if being a scientist isn’t your day job, there are lots of ways to contribute to scientific research about the natural world. From counting monarch butterflies to studying plant growth and tweeting earthquake locations, citizen science empowers the public to help scientists conduct and inform research. And it’s making a huge difference.

    Here are five ways you’re helping the Department of the Interior tackle real-world scientific issues on America’s public lands:

    Backyard Butterflies

    A monarch butterfly atop a pink flower dries its wings after hatching from chrysalis. Photo by U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

    A monarch butterfly atop a pink flower dries its wings after hatching from chrysalis. Photo by US Fish and Wildlife Service  

    Monarchs are an iconic backyard species, and they need our help. Populations of these gorgeous orange and black butterflies have been declining for several reasons like climate change, pesticides and habitat loss. At  Wolf Trap National Park for the Performing Arts in Virginia, they’ve replaced some grass lawns with native meadows — large areas of wildflowers and native grasses that are not only beautiful, but serve as important habitat for resident and migrating wildlife, including monarch butterflies.

    Thanks to the new meadows, park staff, partners and citizen science volunteers can study butterflies and other pollinators that are critical to successful plant reproduction. During monarch migrations, volunteers tag these incredible butterflies with special stickers to learn more about their movements and habits. By tracking their movements, scientists can better understand and address the issues affecting them. You can help by planting milkweed — monarchs’ favorite plant — and joining in a tagging event near you. 

    Lizards, Porcupines & Plants — Oh My!

    Park staff holds a porcupine to collect data during a bioblitz.

    Devils Tower National Monument staff holds a porcupine to collect data during the park’s bioblitz. Photo by National Park Service   

    It’s estimated that 80-90 percent of species in parks are undiscovered, and the more information park managers have, the better they can protect parks. National parks nationwide are hosting a “bioblitz,”  where citizen scientists spend a few hours or days documenting park biodiversity — from bugs to botany to birds. It’s like a treasure hunt. For instance, a 10-year-old observed a Brahminy Blind Snake at Hawai’i Volcanoes National Park last year as part of a bioblitz — the first confirmed record of the species in the park. How cool is that?Climbing Devils Tower

    More recently, Devils Tower National Monument in Wyoming held a bioblitz for a cute critter — the North American porcupine. Visitors worked alongside park biologists and scientists from the University of Wyoming, using radio signals to find two porcupines in trees. Groups then looked for tree scars — or chew marks — to see when and how often porcupines used the tree. They also recorded the tree species, size and GPS location. This bioblitz was the capstone to a two-year partnership with the University of Wyoming to collect habitat data on the park’s porcupine population, which hadn’t been studied before. Along with helping park management better understand how porcupines use the park, visitors gained a new appreciation for this unique animal and an enthusiasm to join future volunteer projects at Devils Tower. 

    Right, climbing Devils Tower

    Hundreds of parallel cracks divide Devils Tower into large hexagonal columns, making it one of the finest traditional crack climbing areas in North America. The longest of these continuous cracks are almost 400 feet long and vary significantly in width. Technical difficulties range from 5.7 to 5.13, although many climbers consider the older traditional “trade” routes such as the Durrance and Wiessner harder than the original ratings imply. Most of the routes at Devils Tower are not bolt protected and therefore require an appropriate selection of stoppers and camming devices in order to safely protect them. The few bolted face climbs that exist were established during the 1980’s and early 1990’s and the condition of some of the bolts reflect that era.

  • Chair Janet L. Yellen: “My Message Will Be Largely Favorable, Although Recent Developments Have Been Mixed”

    At The World Affairs Council of Philadelphia, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; June 6, 2016Fed Res Building Philadelphia

    I am delighted to be with you today. I will discuss recent economic developments, the outlook, and their implications for monetary policy. My message will be largely favorable, although recent developments have been mixed. Most importantly, the economy has registered considerable progress over the past several years toward the Federal Reserve’s goals of maximum employment and price stability, and, as I will explain, there are good reasons to expect that we will advance further toward those goals. The news from the labor market over the past year has been generally good, with significant job gains, the unemployment rate declining below 5 percent, rising household incomes, and tentative signs of faster wage growth. At the same time, recent signs of a slowdown in job creation bear close watching. Inflation has been lower than our objective of 2 percent, but I expect it to move up over time for reasons that I will describe. If incoming data are consistent with labor market conditions strengthening and inflation making progress toward our 2 percent objective, as I expect, further gradual increases in the federal funds rate are likely to be appropriate and most conducive to meeting and maintaining those objectives. However, I will emphasize that monetary policy is not on a preset course and significant shifts in the outlook for the economy would necessitate corresponding shifts in the appropriate path of policy.
     
    Alfred Bottiau’s sculpture on the west side of the main entrance to the Old Federal Reserve Bank, Philadelphia; Wikipedia

    In particular, an important theme of my remarks today will be the inevitable uncertainty surrounding the outlook for the economy. Unfortunately, all economic projections are certain to turn out to be inaccurate in some respects, and possibly significantly so. Will the economic situation in Europe or China take a turn for the worse or exceed expectations? Will US productivity growth pick up and allow stronger growth of gross domestic product (GDP) and incomes or instead continue to stagnate? What will happen with the price of oil? The uncertainties are sizable, and progress toward our goals and, by implication, the appropriate stance of monetary policy will depend on how these uncertainties evolve. Indeed, the policy path that my colleagues and I judge most likely to achieve and maintain maximum employment and price stability has evolved and will continue to evolve in response to developments that alter our economic outlook and the associated risks to that outlook.

    The Current Economic Situation
    The economic expansion following the Great Recession has now been under way for seven years. The recovery has not always been smooth, but overall, the gains have been impressive. In particular, the job market has strengthened substantially, and I believe we are now close to eliminating the slack that has weighed on the labor market since the recession.

    I will turn to this past Friday’s labor market report in a moment, but let me begin with some background: The economy added 2.7 million jobs last year, an average of about 230,000 a month. In the first three months of this year, payrolls were growing only modestly slower, at a little less than a 200,000 monthly pace. The unemployment rate had fallen to 5 percent, down from a peak of 10 percent in 2009. In addition, the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ measure of the job openings rate was at a record high in March, and the quits rate — the share of employees voluntarily leaving their jobs — has moved up and in March stood close to its pre-recession levels. The increase in the quits rate is a sign that workers are feeling more confident about the job market and are likely receiving more job offers.

    So the overall labor market situation has been quite positive. In that context, this past Friday’s labor market report was disappointing. Payroll gains were reported to have been much smaller in April and May than earlier in the year, averaging only about 80,000 per month. And while the unemployment rate was reported to have fallen further in May, that decline occurred not because more people had jobs but because fewer people reported that they were actively seeking work. A broader measure of labor market slack that includes workers marginally attached to the workforce and those working part-time who would prefer full-time work was unchanged. An encouraging aspect of the report, however, was that average hourly earnings for all employees in the nonfarm private sector increased 2-1/2 percent over the past 12 months — a bit faster than in recent years and a welcome indication that wage growth may finally be picking up.

  • Turner’s Whalers: “That is not a smear of purple … but a beautiful whale … whose tail has just slapped a half-dozen whale-boats into perdition”

    Whalers

    Image: Joseph Mallord William Turner (British, 1775–1851). Whalers, ca. 1845. Oil on canvas. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Catharine Lorillard Wolfe Collection, Wolfe Fund, 1896

    “The animals which inhabit the sea are much less known to us than those found upon land, and the economy of those with which we are best acquainted is much less understood; we are therefore too often obliged to reason from analogy where information fails, which must probably ever continue to be the case, from our unfitness to pursue our researches in the unfathomable waters.” — John Hunter

    Turner was seventy years old when Whalers debuted to mixed reviews at the Royal Academy exhibition of 1845. Its subject proved elusive, as the English novelist William Thackeray observed: “That is not a smear of purple you see yonder, but a beautiful whale, whose tail has just slapped a half-dozen whale-boats into perdition; and as for what you fancied to be a few zig-zag lines spattered on the canvas at hap-hazard, look! they turn out to be a ship with all her sails.” Apparently Turner undertook the painting — which was returned to him — for the collector Elhanan Bicknell, who had made his fortune in the whale-oil business.

    This picture is one of four whaling subjects by Turner; the other three form part of the artist’s bequest at Tate Britain, London. The Metropolitan Museum of Art painting and another of the same title were shown at the Royal Academy in 1845, receiving a mixed reception. The third and fourth in the series—“Hurrah! for the Whaler Erebus! Another Fish!“ and  Whalers (Boiling Blubber) Entangled in Flaw Ice, Endeavouring to Extricate Themselves — were exhibited the following year.

    Turner’s principal literary source was Thomas Beale’s Natural History of the Sperm Whale, published in London in 1835 and in an expanded edition in 1839. Elhanan Bicknell, the first owner of the MMA painting, had made his fortune as a director of Langton and Bicknell, oil merchants of Newington Butts, whose financial interest was in ships of the Pacific sperm-whale fishery. He subscribed for four copies of Beale’s book, and may have given or lent one to Turner, whose patron he already was. The artist subtitled his 1845 exhibits Vide Beale’s Voyage, referring to page 163 for the Tate’s picture and page 175 for the MMA work. For his depiction of the whale, which is clearly visible only in this canvas, Turner consulted wood engravings by William James Linton and after William Huggins that illustrate Beale’s book. Bicknell’s firm also owned a canvas by Huggins (private collection, United Kingdom), painted about 1835, that Turner must have used as a source for details in this picture and its companion.

    There are related watercolors on nine pages of Turner’s undated Whalers Sketchbook in the Tate  and a separate sheet with a whaling subject is at the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge. While the watercolors are as evocative as the painting, none is closely related in thematic material, and all may in any event be later. In the 1840s, few people in England knew what a sperm whale looked like. Turner may never have seen one and, using the descriptions and illustrations that were available to him, he created these works in part from his imagination, bringing to bear many years’ observation of the seas in the Channel and elsewhere along the English coast.

    In April 1850, a few months after returning to New York from his first visit to London, Herman Melville ordered a copy of Beale’s Natural History of the Sperm Whale. On the title page, Melville wrote, “Turner’s pictures of whalers were suggested by this book”, thus documenting that he knew of Turner’s paintings, even though he may never have seen them, and that he drew on Beale, as well as his own experience as a sailor and harpooner, when writing Moby-Dick, published in 1851. As Wallace (1985) has suggested, Melville may have had Whalers in mind while describing a picture hanging in the Spouter-Inn in chapter three of Moby-Dick.

    The painting, acquired by the Museum in 1896, was relined and cleaned in 1933, and treated again in 1968. The surface is flattened. The ship is considerably abraded, but some of the rigging can still be read. The best-preserved passages are the small boats and figures, the head of the whale, and the dark, choppy surrounding sea. Turner changed the contours of the whale’s nose, gradually widening and enlarging the shape. Examination under the microscope reveals the remnants of scumbles associated with the darkest gray pigment that may originally have subdued the contrast between this pigment and the surrounding areas.

     
    Editor’s Note: For more about whalers in nonfiction read Nathan Philbrick’s Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex which has just been made into a movie by Ron Howard.

  • On The Trail: Bernie Calls for Free Tuition Despite Opposition

    By Christopher Merchant, June 3, 2016

    Sanders shot back at critics of his economic proposals at a press conference at the Institute for Research on Labor and Unemployment at University of California Berkeley this past Friday evening.   

    (UC Berkeley video by Stephen McNally)

     The senator, who was introduced by Professor Robert Reich, kept his prepared comments to economic issues. Reich, formerly the US Secretary of Labor, has endorsed Sanders for president but clarified that the press conference was not an endorsement from the Institute or Berkeley.

    Sanders echoed his comments from the campaign trail about making tuition free at public universities.

    “Right here at the University of California at Berkeley, I believe that in the year 2016, public colleges and universities should be tuition-free and we should lower student debt,” Sanders said. “Are these radical ideas? These are not radical ideas.”

    During the question and answer portion of the conference, Sanders returned to his tuition plan. His frustration with Wall Street and some of his colleagues in Washington surfaced as he detailed his plan to cover those tuition expenses.

    “We pay for it through a tax on Wall Street speculation,” Sanders said, raising his voice. “What the conventional wisdom is about Wall Street’s greed and illegal behavior that destroyed the economy — of course we’re going to bail them out. Why would we not bail them out?”

    Bernie Sanders answers questions

    Sanders answers questions during the press conference. (UC Berkeley photo by Brittany Murphy)

    “But young people who desperately need a good education — of course they should leave school $50-or-$70,000 in debt. Why would we help them?”

    Tuition at public institutions across the country, including UC Berkeley, continues to rise as job growth begins to falter. The US Department of Labor Bureau of Labor Statistics recently reported that the economy added approximately 38,000 jobs in May. Though that drove national unemployment down to 4.7 percent, it represents a downward trend in growth over the past three months, Reich said during his introductory comments.

     

     (UC Berkeley video by Stephen McNally)

  • Underwater Archaeology: Sunken cities, Egypt’s lost worlds at the British Museum

    Arsinoe II

    Statue of Arsinoe; 3rd century BC, Canopus. Bibliotheca Alexandrina Antiquities Museum. Photo: Christoph Gerigk. © Franck Goddio/Hilti Foundation

    The British Museum is staging a major exhibition on two lost Egyptian cities and their recent rediscovery by archaeologists beneath the Mediterranean seabed. Opening for an extended run of six months, The BP exhibition Sunken cities: Egypt’s lost worlds is the Museum’s first large-scale exhibition of underwater discoveries. It will show how the exploration of Thonis-Heracleion and Canopus — submerged at the mouth of the River Nile for over a thousand years — is transforming our understanding of the relationship between ancient Egypt and the Greek world and the great importance of these ancient cities.

    300 outstanding objects are brought together for the exhibition including more than 200 spectacular finds excavated off the coast of Egypt near Alexandria between 1996 and 2012. Important loans from Egyptian museums rarely seen before outside Egypt (and the first such loans since the Egyptian revolution) are supplemented with objects from various sites across the Delta drawn from the British Museum’s collection; most notably from Naukratis — a sister harbor town to Thonis- Heracleion and the first Greek settlement in Egypt.

    Likely founded during the 7th century BC, Thonis- Heracleion and Canopus were busy, cosmopolitan cities that once sat on adjacent islands at the edge of the fertile lands of the Egyptian Delta, intersected by canals. After Alexander the Great’s conquest of Egypt in 332 BC, centuries of Greek (Ptolemaic) rule followed. The exhibition reveals how cross-cultural exchange and religion flourished, particularly the worship of the Egyptian god of the afterlife, Osiris.

    By the 8th century AD, the sea had reclaimed the cities and they lay hidden several metres beneath the seabed, their location and condition unclear. Although well-known from Egyptian decrees and Greek mythology and historians, past attempts to locate them were either fruitless or very partial. The exhibition shows how a pioneering European team led by Franck Goddio in collaboration with the Egyptian Ministry launched the first major exhibition of underwater archaeology.Gold earring

    Thanks to the underwater setting, a vast number of objects of great archaeological significance have been astonishingly well preserved. Pristine monumental statues, fine metalware and gold jewelery will reveal how Greece and Egypt interacted in the late first millennium BC. These artefacts offer a new insight into the quality and unique character of the art of this period and show how the Greek kings and queens who ruled Egypt for 300 years adopted and adapted Egyptian beliefs and rituals to legitimise their reign.

    Gold earring with the head of a mythical animal. Thonis-Heracleion, 4th–2nd century BC. National Museum Alexandria

  • “To the Rescue of the Crops”, The Women’s Land Army During World War II, “Food is a Weapon — Don’t Waste It”

    By Judy Barrett Litoff and David C. Smith

    women land farmers

    A woman and her daughter model the WLA uniforms adopted during World War I and War World II

    We’re working for Victory, too; growing food for ourselves and our countrymen. While other women work at machines and in factories—we’re soldiers in overalls. . . . We’re running the place while Dad’s away.

    — Toni Taylor, “Women on the Home Front,”
    McCall’s, May 1942.

    I noticed on the farms, mostly the little ones with just a shack for a house, there seems to be no one but the women left to do the work. You see them taking care of cattle, etc. It makes me proud to see how the women have picked up where the men left off and are keeping the home fires burning.

    — Mabel Opal Miller to Pvt. Ivan Johnson
    Letter of September 6, 1944

    One of the least known aspects of World War II in the United States is the crucial role played by the many women who plowed the ground, planted the seeds, cultivated the plants, and harvested much of the nation’s crops from 1942 through 1945. Without their contributions, food would have been even scarcer, both at home and on the fighting fronts. The physical well-being of the combat forces would have been less. America’s allies would have suffered greater privations than they did. Rationing, price controls, and dietary changes designed to meet food shortages would have been harder to bear. That this did not happen is a remarkable tribute to the women of the United States who, in response to great need, created a grassroots movement that came “to the rescue of the crops.” Whether the forces consisted of farm wives driving tractors, college women milking cows, housewives picking apples, or secretaries spending summer vacations harvesting vegetables, these workers responded with energy and ingenuity to the wartime need for farm labor.

    On Farm Mobilization Day, January 12, 1943, President Franklin D. Roosevelt delivered a nationwide address in which he underscored the important role to be played by American agriculture in the winning of the war. He told his audience that “food is the life line of the forces that fight for freedom. Free people everywhere can be grateful to the farm families that are making victory possible.” Using the motto, “Food Fights for Freedom,” the Office of War Information (OWI) in conjunction with the War Food Administration produced posters, pamphlets, and short films emphasizing that “raising food is a real war job” and “bread is ammunition as vital as bullets.” One widely distributed government poster proclaimed, “food is a weapon — don’t waste it,” while a 1945 OWI film, Wartime Nutrition, declared that the United States was both “the bread basket and the arsenal of democracy.”

    Throughout the wartime years, the need for workers in agriculture, as well as in manufacturing and the military, was unprecedented. Balancing rival claims for labor presented an almost impossible challenge to a nation that had been plagued by the problem of high unemployment for over a decade. During the depression years of the 1930s, farm labor had posed a difficulty only in its surplus of workers. At the end of the decade, few observers of the agricultural scene envisioned that labor shortages would be a significant problem — even if war were to come.

    When the Second World War broke out in Europe in 1939, Henry A. Wallace, the secretary of agriculture, had served in that post since 1933. After he received the Democratic nomination for Vice President in the summer of 1940, he was replaced by Claude R. Wickard, an Indiana farmer who had come to the Department of Agriculture early in the New Deal.

     During his tenure as secretary of agriculture, Wallace had developed a tightly run organization that allowed him to spend his time on more philosophical matters. As a result, Wickard was unable to obtain a strong hold on his position in the Department and in Roosevelt’s cabinet until late in 1942. Departmental infighting and political disagreements over wartime agricultural policies also limited his authority. These problems were not specific to the US Department of Agriculture (USDA), however, as battles for power within the federal government occurred throughout wartime Washington.

    Wickard had spent much of his public life dealing with crop surpluses and low farm prices while also working to establish the “ever-normal granary.” As secretary of agriculture, he was initially dependent on support and advice from persons affiliated with the American Farm Bureau Federation and the Washington-based leadership of the Extension Service of the USDA. These organizations focused their attention on issues such as high rates of parity, crop limitations, and possible export markets, which concerned large farmers. By contrast, the Farm Security Administration (FSA) and, to a considerable degree, its ally, the National Farmer’s Union, were concerned with small farmers, alleviating the poor conditions of sharecroppers and migrant laborers, and the introduction of newer crops, such as soybeans and peanuts. The differing approaches to solving the nation’s agricultural problems precipitated considerable political divisiveness within the Department of Agriculture. These clashes resulted in a major departmental reorganization and the dismantling of the Farm Security Administration in 1943.

  • Scout Report: Civil War & Reconstruction, Climate Change, Defense & Security; Buddhism, Fiction; James Madison; Accounting Principles

    NASA Climate Change

    NASA Climate Change site photos

    OPEN YALE COURSES: THE CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION ERA, 1845-1877

    This course, taught by Professor of American History and Director of the Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Resistance, and Abolition at Yale University, traces the American Civil War from its antecedents in the 1840s to its effects in the late 1870s. Taking into account national, sectional, racial, constitutional, individual, social, intellectual, and moral meanings that the war has held for American politics and civic life, the course is a must for readers serious about understanding America’s bloodiest war. Interested readers may like to begin by exploring the syllabus before delving into the 27 lectures of the course (under the Sessions tab). Each lecture features an introduction and an embedded video (complete with transcript), as well as Lecture Chapters that help divide the content into easily digestible pieces. 

    CLIMATE CHANGE: VITAL SIGNS OF THE PLANET

    NASA’s Global Climate Change: Vital Signs of the Planet website features a diverse set of resources related to the measurement, analysis, and dangers of global climate change. Here readers will find a collection of Interactive Features all designed to bring to life the sometimes abstract conclusions of scientific articles on climate and its effects on human and other life on Earth. For example, the Climate Time Machine allows readers to go backward and forward through four different key climate indicators, including Sea Ice, Sea Level, Carbon Dioxide, and Global Temperature. Perfect for educators who are looking for impactful visual representations of the rising temperatures on the planet, the interactive makes these measurements visceral in a way that charts and graphs are seldom able to do. Other interactives on the page include the Global Ice Viewer, Quizzes, The Sun: A Virtual Tour, The Water Cycle, and others.

    ANNENBERG LEARNER: PHYSICAL SCIENCE

    Annenberg Learner is known for providing well designed resources for teachers, and these eight sessions dedicated to getting educators ready to teach physical science to elementary school students are no exception. Educators may like to peruse the Course Overview and Course Structure sections before delving into the Workshop Sessions themselves. In sum, these sessions are designed to help elementary school teachers brush up on their basic science so that they can better guide their students in outcome motivated learning. Sessions cover such topics as What is Matter?, The Particle Nature of Matter: Solids, Liquids, and Gases, Physical Changes and Conservation of Matter, Chemical Changes and Conservation of Matter, and others. By participating in this free, online course, educators will gain much needed background knowledge in the physical sciences, allowing them to better introduce their students to these fascinating subjects.

    BROOKINGS INSTITUTION: DEFENSE AND SECURITY

    With its $100 million annual budget, the Brookings Institution, which celebrates its centennial this year, is one of America’s most powerful shapers of policy on a range of issues. This section offers readers a peak into the Institution’s latest analyses on defense and security issues. Topics include a somewhat pessimistic view of America’s attempts to retake the city of Mosul from ISIS fighters, a call for modest expectations in the Obama administration’s diplomatic efforts to institute further arms control measures with the Kremlin, and a report about Saudi Arabia’s new diplomatic overtures toward India (and away from Pakistan). For readers looking for educated opinions on the state of America’s security situation, and developments of defense around the world, these blog posts, opinion pieces, and other informative bits will provide an erudite overview of the latest news.

    HARVARD UNIVERSITY: BUDDHISM THROUGH ITS SCRIPTURES

    This self-paced online course from Harvard University begins on May 3, 2016 and covers the diverse range of beliefs and practices Buddhists have engaged with over time and across a multitude of geographies. Led by Yehan Numata Senior Lecturer in Buddhist Literatures, Charles Hallisey and doctoral student Alexis Bader, the course uses scriptural and informational readings to take readers into the complex matrix of art, devotional acts, and literary works that make up the ancient religion. No prior experience is required. To sign up, simply select Enroll Now and provide the required information (email, username, password, and a few other questions). From there, readers will begin receiving information as the course begins before proceeding at their own pace. There is option to either audit the course (free) or receive a verified Certificate of Achievement ($50).

    DISCOVERY EDUCATION: THE POWER OF FICTION

    Discovery Education has assembled this lesson plan to unpack the Power of Fiction. Intended for the high school English classroom, this activity examines Upton Sinclair’s muckraking novel, The Jungle, as well as student-selected works with strong social-action themes. The lesson plan begins by reviewing the main literary elements of Sinclair’s novel (setting, plot, characters, and central conflict), before explaining the historical context of the early 20th century, in which workers were placed in unsanitary and often dangerous conditions. Students then discuss whether they believe The Jungle is successful in its message before having them look closely at their own novels. Suggestions are provided for possible titles within the categories of Civil Rights, Women’s Rights, International Issues, and the Immigrant Experience.

    JAMES MADISON FOUNDATION: LESSON PLANS AND REPORTS

    The United States Congress established the James Madison Memorial Foundation in 1986 in order to better teach the constitution in high schools across the country. Fellows are drawn from students who plan to become teachers. In exchange for graduate school funding, selected students agree to teach history and civics for at least one year after graduation. This page gathers together various “powerful” lesson plans composed by past fellows on topics related to constitutional history and government. The lessons are divided into sections that cover Articles I-VII of the constitution, Lessons About Constitutional Connections, Lessons on the Federalist Papers, and Freedom and Slavery in the Early Republic. 

     THE IMPORTANCE OF GENERALLY ACCEPTED ACCOUNTING PRINCIPLES (GAAP)

    Financial reporting, in the form of balance sheets, profit and loss statements, financial notes, and disclosures, is an essential means of communicating information about the financial condition of a company or other organization. Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP), in turn, are the guidelines that help accountants with that communication. This site, from the Financial Accounting Foundation (FAF), helps readers understand the ins and outs of GAAP. Readers not familiar with the field may like to begin with About GAAP, before moving on to tabs dedicated to GAAP & Private Companies and GAAP & Not-For-Profits. Other interesting sections include GAAP & Public Companies, GAAP & State and Local Governments, and Simplifying and Improving GAAP. There is also a section dedicated to videos that explain basic GAAP principles. 

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    The Internet Scout Research Group, located in the Computer Sciences Department at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, provides Internet publications and software to the research and education communities under grants from the National Science Foundation, the Andrew W. Mellon foundation, and other philanthropic organizations. Users may make and distribute verbatim copies of any of Internet Scout’s publications or web content, provided this paragraph, including the above copyright notice, is preserved on all copies.

  • It’s Time to Hang Up My Traveling Shoes

    By Rose Madeline MulaPre-check line

    I love to travel.  At least I used to.  Not any more.   Not since my trip last winter to Florida where I fled to escape the icy Northeast blasts.

    It did not start well.  When I arrived at Logan Airport, I was offered a wheel chair.  Twice.  Why? Did I really look that ancient?  I refused the chair — twice — and started walking.  Where was my damn gate?   Was I going to have to walk to Florida?  I was regretting the pride that made me disdain the wheels.

    I finally arrived at my gate and joined the long line at security.   The agent looked at me.  “You don’t have to wait here; you can go over there,”  she said pointing to a much shorter line.  Great!  Wait.  Not so great.  All the people there were old!  I didn’t belong with them.

    “Let me help you,” said another agent, taking my arm and leading me to the body scanner.  “You don’t have to take off your shoes,” she said.  I had heard that a lot of the rules had been relaxed.  Good.  Then I noticed that everyone else was scampering around barefooted.  How come I was getting special treatment?  Did I really look too old to be a threat?  I knew my rights!  I wanted to be considered a potential terrorist too!  But even the dinging of the alarm in the body scanner reacting to my artificial hips and knee cap hardware didn’t scare anyone.  All it got me was sympathetic smiles and an invitation to just walk through.  Instead of being handcuffed and whisked away by security, I was ushered to the pre-boarding line, along with infants and old folks.  Oh, well, it would be a lot easier to get settled before the aisle was crowded with stampeding youngsters — you know, those rambunctious 70-year-olds.

    Problem: I couldn’t put my carry-on in the overhead bin. My shoulders screamed.  A flight attendant must have heard them.  She materialized at my side immediately and stashed the bag in the bin effortlessly with one hand. Show-off!

    I sat down, fastened my seat belt and relaxed.  For about thirty seconds.  I couldn’t believe it.  I had to use the lavatory even though I had gone to a rest room in the airport just prior to boarding.  My bladder hadn’t always been this demanding, but it was now making up for lost time.  All during the flight I had to make frequent trips to the lavatory, each one coinciding with turbulence and announcements for all passengers to return to their seats.  Mine, of course, was by the window, which meant disrupting my two seatmates every time I had to get up.  I was not winning any popularity contests.

    After finally landing at my destination, I headed for Baggage Retrieval (stopping at a rest room en route, of course).   My suitcase went around three times before I found the strength to yank it off the conveyor belt.  Had it always been this difficult?  

    Reminders of my age plagued me all during my stay.  At the beach, I found I could no longer sit in a low-slung sand chair.  Well, I could sit in it (or, rather, fall into it), but no way could I get up out of it.  I had to depend on the kindness of strangers to hoist me up before the tide came in and dragged me out to sea.

    If I pulled out my cell phone to check my email, invariably it would attract the attention of  someone nearby who would gush patronizingly, “Look at you!” as if I had just transformed water into wine.  Apparently it’s equally miraculous that someone of my advanced years has enough live brain cells to have mastered a basic electronic device.

    Mealtimes presented another reality check.  My limited social security income could not stretch to accommodate expensive dinners, so I would take advantage of the early bird specials, but I would tell myself they were late lunches with swingers — not early dinners with oldsters.  I tried to give the impression that I would be dining lavishly around 9:00 P.M. at the latest “in” hot spot, instead of dozing off in front of the TV watching Dancing with the Stars.  

    Next winter, instead of heading for the tropics, I think I’ll just stay home and fire up the thermostat.  Then I’ll relax with a cup of hot chocolate in my electric recliner that lifts me to my feet with the touch of a button, relieved to know that two bathrooms are just steps away, and I won’t have to disturb anyone to get to them.  And, hopefully, there won’t be any turbulence.

     

    Editor’s Note:  Rose Mula’s most recent book is Confessions of a Domestically-Challenged Homemaker &  Other Tall Tales, available at Amazon.com and other online book sellers.  Grandmother Goose: Rhymes for a Second Childhood is available as an e-book on Amazon.com for the Kindle and at BarnesandNoble.com for the Nook at $2.99; the paperback edition is  available for $9.95. Her books of humorous essays, The Beautiful People and Other Aggravations, and  If These Are Laugh Lines, I’m Having Way Too Much Fun can also be ordered at Amazon.com or through Pelican Publishing (800-843-1724).  Her website is rosemadelinemula.com.  

  • Culture and a Nation’s Ideal Effect Shapes How Leaders Smile

    By Clifton B. Parker

     Photos: Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe/AKIRA/ITOH; President Barack Obama/Pete Souza

    How much a political leader smiles reflects their particular country’s cultural values related to how people express themselves, a Stanford scholar has found. In the United States, the smiles of politicians and other leaders tend to be big and wide. In East Asian countries like China and Taiwan, they are much more modest, the research showed. The reason is that how one’s culture views smiling influences how people in that culture may smile, said Jeanne Tsai, a Stanford associate professor of psychology and the lead author on a published paper in the journal Emotion.

    “Often people think that when they are viewing a candidate’s official photo, they are learning about the candidate’s unique traits,” Tsai said. “But our findings suggest that they are also learning about the candidate’s culture and the emotions it values.” This smiling effect may have ramifications in the world of politics, Tsai continued. Culturally different emotions and expressions may create misunderstandings between leaders from different nations involved in negotiations or crises.

    Tsai directs the Culture and Emotion Lab at Stanford and has previously published research on how Americans tend to embrace positive feelings while Chinese people do not as much; how people from different cultures express sympathy; and how culture factors into why we like or don’t like people.

    Tsai’s most recent research compares the emotional expressions of leaders across different nations. The major finding is that the more a particular nation values excitement (as in the United States), the more their leaders show excited smiles. On the other hand, the more a particular nation values calm (as in East Asian countries), the more those leaders show calm smiles.  The reason relates to a nation’s “ideal affect,” which is defined as culturally valued emotions and how people want to feel, she noted. Different countries, such as China and the United States, diverge in their ideal affects — or how people want to feel.

    “It is significant that although democratic and developed nations were more likely to have leaders who smiled in their photos, it was the nation’s ideal affect that uniquely determined whether leaders’ smiles were more excited or calm,” said Tsai.

    As part of their research, Tsai and her colleagues conducted three studies. In one they compared the smiles of top-ranked American and Chinese government leaders, chief executive officers and university presidents in their official photos. They found that top-ranked American leaders showed more excited smiles than top-ranked Chinese leaders across all fields.

    In the second study, they compared the smiles of winning vs. losing political candidates and higher vs. lower ranking chief executive officers and university presidents in the United States, Taiwan and China. “American leaders showed more excited smiles than Taiwanese/Chinese leaders, regardless of election outcome or ranking,” Tsai and her co-authors wrote.

    The third study involved self-reported measures of ideal affect among college students from 10 different nations. Eight years later, Tsai and her research team coded the smiles that legislators from those nations showed in their official photos. Tsai and her colleagues found that the more nations valued excitement and other high-arousal positive emotional states, the more their leaders showed excited smiles. “Similarly, the more nations valued calm and other low-arousal positive states, the more their leaders showed calm smiles,” they wrote.

    Tsai explained that high-arousal positive states are emotions that feel good and energizing. On the other hand, low arousal positive states are emotions that feel good and soothing. She was surprised that the results held across all occupations — beyond politics — and regardless of whether leaders were of higher or lower rank. “I thought they might be more pronounced in occupations that are more visible to the public, like government,” she said.

    She also expected the findings might be more pronounced for higher ranked than lower ranked leaders, because higher ranked ones might have more knowledge about how their culture views smiling. But they were not — everyone shared the same inclination on smiles, per their culture. “I think the fact that the cultural differences emerged regardless of occupation or rank speaks to how pervasive cultural values regarding emotion are,” she said.

    The researchers noted that the study controlled for national differences in democratic levels, GDP per capita and human development.

    Tsai’s co-authors include researchers Jen Ying Zhen Ang, Elizabeth Blevins and Julia Goernandt from Stanford University; Helene H. Fung and Da Jiang from the Chinese University of Hong Kong; Julian Elliott from Durham University; Anna Kölzer from the University of Hamburg; Yukiko Uchida from Kyoto University; Yi-Chen Lee and Yicheng Lin from National Taiwan University; Xiulan Zhang from Beijing Normal University; and Yolande Govindama and Lise Haddouk from Université Paris V.

  • Keep On Stepping: The Peculiar State of Widowhood’s Challenge

     

    The Battle of Klontarf

    Battle of Clontarf, oil on canvas painting by Hugh Frazer, 1826, Isaacs Art Center

    By Jane Shortall

    The peculiar state of widowhood throws up many challenges, like what to do next. Two things, courage and movement, can help us decide. 

    Consider the old proverb: To get through the hardest journey, we need take only one step at a time, but we must keep on stepping.

    So I stepped. And it worked.

    Following the death of my husband, I decided to stay on in Ireland for about a year and think of what I might do with my future. I was there because, when he was diagnosed and knew there was no cure, my husband returned from France, to the imagined bosom of his Irish family.

    I knew I would eventually sell the house in the hills of southern France and move to another area of that beautiful country, or maybe go and live in Spain or Italy.

    The first thing I did was to try and sell the big Citroen car we had brought over from France. I wanted it out of my life, even though there were so many wonderful memories attached to it. We had, during our years living in France, flung our bags into it so many times and toured vast areas of that huge (in European terms) country.

    But nobody in Dublin, or indeed in Ireland, wanted it. Large, ultra-comfortable it may have been, but the left hand drive plus cost of importing it were major drawbacks. So the car sat in the underground car park, dust covering the bodywork, leaves blowing in, settling around the wheels.

    Eventually, with no interested buyers, I offered it to someone. As a gift. But even they weren’t interested. It was simply too big, too difficult to judge the road from the driving position.

    Then, out of the blue, a friend of my brother’s, living in Eastern Europe, was interested. A deal was done. The engine was perfect. I washed and polished the body until it gleamed.

    On a stormy wintry morning, in a great silver flash, it was driven from the apartment complex onto the coast road towards the ferry at Dublin port, then a short sea crossing to England, later a ferry to France, and then, the long journey through perhaps five European countries, and a new home.

    Back in the apartment, with a heaviness in my chest, a lump in my throat and a feeling of utter desolation, I wanted to crawl under the duvet.

    But I did not.

    Pulling on a woolly hat, scarf, gloves, heavy jeans, rubber boots and a waxed jacket, on that wild morning, I went out and walked the legendary Bull Wall in Clontarf, a long, long seafront walk, loved by the citizens of Dublin for hundreds of years. This is the area where the High King of Ireland, Brian Boru, was slain in a battle against the Danes in 1014. On that particular morning, I felt I was battling too.  

    Turmoil. High tide. Harsh winds. The sea crashed over the wall of the promenade. Flotsam, jetsam, pieces of driftwood tossed about on the waves. Seagulls screeched and called, blown about by the force of the wind. Impossible that day to cross the old wooden bridge and go down to the golden sandy beach.

    Walkers saluted and grinned as we passed each other, perhaps in recognition of some shared spirit of adventure, or possibly our eccentricity.