When it came time to launch their clients fresh new brand and corporate structure, our partner agency in Newfoundland needed someone to design and develop a website to match. Also, to compound the challenge, timing and teamwork were essential for preparing the site to go live with the new brand!
We created more than a new, responsive design for the site, we also revisited the IA with the client to restructure the content, so that visitors could easily navigate it and find the info they needed quickly. This ease of use extended to the backend as well, where we provided an elegant and intuitive administrative interface for keeping the website's content updated.
The result is a dynamic site that showcases the new branding, is easy to navigate and update, and will grow with Cahill going forward.


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For the pilots of Solar Impulse, the lifesaving techniques can be found in the asanas and pramayamas of yoga. Working withSanjeev Bhanot, a professional yoga trainer with over 20 years professional experience, André Borschberg has been able to address the difficulties of warming the body with little available oxygen, and cooling the body in the heat of the sun.
"Among these technical innovations of Solar Impulse is the calm of yoga, including a modified sun salutation," said André Borschberg. "Sanjeev's training in collaboration with Hirslanden Clinics has given us the best preparation for the upcoming challenge, and his expertise has been invaluable in finding practical solutions within the constraints of the cockpit."
Si2's single seater cockpit acts as a yoga mat – no need at all for carry-on luggage for pilots André Borschberg and Bertrand Piccard. The seat has been specifically designed to be lowered into a horizontal position, providing enough space for the pilot to fully stretch out. Sanjeev has been able to train with André to identify other points in the cockpit that the pilots can use to push against and support themselves during the flights of up to 120 hours.


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Our RED Level Wash is a great, basic wash!
An amazing DELUXE Wash Package!
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Every Wednesday we like to say THANK YOU to our customers by giving everyone $2.00 off ANY CAR WASH! Thanks for choosing us to keep your car looking great.
Get directions to our Okemos Wash World Location!


The Hunterian holds one of the finest collections of work by the four painters who became known, in their lifetime, as the Scottish Colourists –Francis Campbell Boileau Cadell (1883–1937), John Duncan Fergusson (1874–1961), George Leslie Hunter (1879–1931) and Samuel John Peploe (1831–1935). The collection comprises over 130 paintings, works on paper, and sculpture. The majority of the works were presented by three collectors: Alec Macfie (1898–1980), former Professor of Political Economy at this University; Gilbert Innes (1888–1971), a Glasgow businessman who knew Cadell personally; and George Smith (1907–1997), a Glasgow-based accountant.
All aspects of the Colourists' art are represented, from Peploe and Cadell's sparkling representations of Iona to Fergusson's vibrant portrayals of women. Highlights include: work from Fergusson's productive years in Paris between 1907 and 1913, notably Fauve-related portraits, landscapes and large scale nudes; a unique group of early Hunter drawings for magazine illustrations and prints – the only known works by Hunter to have survived the 1906 San Francisco earthquake which hit during his sojourn in California; and a rare group of Fergusson etchings bequeathed by his widow, the dancer Margaret Morris. The holding of work by Fergusson is particularly strong and includes Les Eus, one of the most significant British paintings of the early twentieth century, as well as prints, drawings and watercolours, and key examples of his sculpture, notably the carved wooden Dryad and the brass Eastre, both of 1924.
Tulips in a Pottery Vase vividly illustrates how Peploe's association with leading figures of the Parisian avant-garde between 1907 and 1912 which led him to simplify forms and to convey light and space through the use of vibrant primary colours. Still Life and Rosechatel is a striking example of the series of carefully composed studio interiors Cadell painted in the 1920s. It was shown at the 1924 Paris exhibition Les Peintres de l'Ecosse Moderne, where the Colourists exhibited together for the first time and won enthusiastic press coverage.


text:
Q: How to set up wifi pods at home with an existing router? I have a bell home hub 2000, and I want to connect wifi pods to it. I wanted to know what is the best way to set it up.
The pods I'm looking at now is this one
https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B09VVV18D9/ref=emc_b_5_t
Some questions I have is?

*

*Is tri band better than dual band if only phones and maybe 1-2 laptops will ever be connected?

*Should I make it an AP mode for the pods, or disable the bell HH2000 wifi and set up a new wifi from the pods? I guess if I leave the bell wifi on, would it interfere with the pod wifi or somehow work together to make it better?

*Would these pods work with the bell hub 2000, or am I only limited to the bell pods itself?

*Can a switch be connected to a pod for additional LAN ports?

Ideally looking to set it up like this:

Thanks

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


Congratuations to the Winners of the 2010 Golden Foot Awards!
and to all the finalists and participants who have demonstrated fantastic programmes, facilities, projects and commitment that is making New Zealand a safer and exciting place for all walkers.
The awards were presented by Fran Wilde, chair of the Greater Wellington Regional Council, at the Award Ceremony in Wellingon on 1st August. More information and photos will be posted after the National Walking Conference which is running through 2nd and 3rd August. More photos from the ceremony can be viewed here.
A brief description of each finalist, with photos, is viewable by clicking on the Award Displays pdf at the bottom of this page.
These industry awards celebrate and recognise New Zealand achievements for walkers by acknowledging innovative new facilities, highlighting national best practise and rewarding ongoing commitment to walking. The awards are for private companies and public organisations, not-for-profit groups, and community organisations.
The awards showcase walking innovations and facilitate the sharing of new ideas across the country. They raise the profile of walking-friendly infrastructure and promotions, and encourage designers of future projects and promotions to give more consideration to the needs and benefits of more people moving about on foot.


Being Mom, Wife, Cook, Maid and a Career Women..
No one ever told me growing up that having a family and career would be like juggling glass bottles. I new from a little girl I wanted to be a mom. There was also that part that my family instilled in me, to have a career and be successful. What I thought my career choice would be was completely changed once my first son was born. I wanted to travel and be a writer. Well, once my baby was born and I had to learn how to breastfeed, change diapers survive days without much sleep and just be mommy all of those expectations where put on hold. I began to realize why I loved babies so much as a child and why I was always intrigued by pregnant women. Soon I started to realize my passion, my inspiration my future as a birthworker. Full speed ahead and 9 years later i'm the proud mommy of 2 funny incredibly smart boys. Besides being extremely busy with them I am also a career women. Sometimes trying to balance the 2 can be a roller coaster ride filled with tons of twist and turns and sometimes bumps in the road. There should be some kind of school or training to prepare you for such a task. If you focus on work too often you lose out on time with your family. If you focus on your family it can take away from your work. What is the right time for both? This is constantly the question I have and other mommies in this situation too. The moms who completely focus on there career and barely spend time with the family are considered bad moms. Why? Has it ever occurred to those people that maybe she is focusing so much because she is trying to provide for her family so that they can have an easier life in the future? Or maybe she herself is hurting from not seeing her family as often but knows in her heart she is doing the best she can. Then on the other side of it, moms who leave there career to be a stay at home mom. There are still those negative people who say, why would she study for so long or sacrifice her career to be home? This is what society is teaching little girls and eventually new mommies have to face this extremely hard decision. This is what many mothers struggle with and it shouldn't be. In my brain I am constantly trying to balance time with my husband, kids and career. I can be cooking and all of a sudden I will walk away from the food to check my emails to make sure I didn't get an update of something I was supposed to do. I cannot tell you how often I literally walk by a full basket of clean laundry that I know needs to be folded and put away. There are nights where I just don't have the energy to put the dishes away or even think about mopping. I have realized that it's OK. The clothes will be there in the morning, the dishes will get put away and the rest will just have to wait. I will make the time they need so that I don't miss anything as they grow. I will set priorities for work and home and make it work however I can. Mothers have enough pressure in this society than to judge themselves for doing the best they can and I for one support doing your best. Even if society doesn't think it's up to there standards. It's OK mommy keep doing your best and stop being so hard on yourself. It took me a while to realize this for myself but I remind myself every day and so should you.


14ymedio, Havana, 21 December 2018 — After days of intense controversy, the Ministry of Tourism Director of Development, José Reinaldo Daniel Alonso, has had to respond to the speculation about Payret cinema in Havana. "It will be studied, it will be seen and decided, at the appropriate time, if the cinema stays or not," the official said about the possibility of being its converted into a space for tourists.
After the publication of an article in the digital newspaper Cubanet warning about the remodeling of the whole block where the movie theater is located and the demolition of the Kid Chocolate sports center to build the Hotel Pasaje, an avalanche of criticism emerged in the social networks and it has only been increasing with the passing of days.
The adversaries of the idea claim the patrimonial value of the Payret, founded 142 years ago, and the need to preserve the property as a movie theater in view of the notable decrease in such places in recent years. Critics are also wondering if the Ministry of Tourism has the power to determine the use of the building.
"We are not going to violate anything that is established," press official Daniel Alonso responded on Thursday. The tourist investment project linked to the Payret cinema is still under study and must first pass "all the controls" necessary for its approval.
The old property is listed as available in the portfolio of foreign investments, which total 300 million dollars made available to foreign entrepreneurs. The project is a few yards from Central Park and in front of Havana's famous Capitol building, a tourist area where several new hotels have recently been inaugurated, including the luxurious Manzana Kempinski.
"They are turning our city into a theme park of socialism for tourists," one reader denounced in a comment.
Ernesto Estévez Rams, another reader, labeled Daniel Alonso "arrogant" for his statements and called for a "collection of signatures" so that those "who are affected can have a local or provincial or even national consultation to democratically decide on a path" for the fate of the Payret.
Currently the cinema has been closed for several years and both its interior and its façade have suffered an accelerated deterioration. The marquee shows rust stains, the walls are blackened by soot and the interior carpentry has been destroyed and systematically sacked, some of the signs of its fall from grace.
In its almost century and a half of existence, the Payret has undergone innumerable architectural adaptations and traversed periods of clear decline, but since the 1950s it has become one of the most iconic cinemas in Cuba.
With a cabaret located on the lower floor, rounded staircases that attract the eyes of everyone who enters and a projection room adorned on its sides by a sculptural complex of nine muses created by the artist Rita Longa, who also made the The Illusion piece located in the lobby, the building is also an architectural symbol.


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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


Half Round Rain Gutters are the Ultimate Upgrade.
Trust us, your neighbors will notice.
Often called European Style rain gutters, half round gutters have an extremely clean look to them, and are often upgraded to include a decorative exposed bracket, bell style end caps, and yoked drop outlets. This style of rain gutter is used to upgrade the look and feel of your home's exterior. Copper material is often used rather than aluminum, adding another layer of class that is unmatched.
You cannot find a nicer style of rain gutter, and we promise you that you won't be disappointed.
Half Round Copper Rain Gutters look stunning!
Browse our list of common questions, or call to speak to a specialist today.
Are you interested in half round gutters?
We'll put you in touch with one of our gutter installation experts so you can find out what kind of options are available to get your home updated with half round aluminum or copper rain gutters.
Hi- I just wanted to write a positive review for City Seamless Rain Gutters. I got their name just from a flier that was mailed so I went in blindly with no references! I found Travis to be helpful, professional and knowledgeable about his product. He helped us pick a product and color and was very upbeat about helping us choose rain gutters for our house. I felt that the price was very reasonable and I'm sorry I cannot remember the name of the installer, but he did a great job. I'm very thankful I went with these guys! We really needed gutters, so it has been a huge relief that they are finally installed and they look great.


text:
What makes NPTEL India's EdTech hero — without newsy fundings and valuations
Sriram Sharma	July 24, 2017 9 min
Initiated in 2003 by seven IITs, NPTEL's YouTube channel has over 245 million views.
To put that in perspective, MIT's OpenCourseware, another top Massive Online Open Course (MOOC) has fewer than half its views.
Online certifications are offered at Rs 1,000 per course, through an in-person proctored exam.
"Some people train for JEE from their 6th standard. There's a huge number of people in India, students particularly, who have a strong analytical and problem-solving background. Not all of them get into IITs or the top institutions. What happens to those guys? They go to other colleges, and they do engineering. When they have access to IIT courses, a huge number of people are able to appreciate that. I think it really starts somewhere there," says Professor Andrew Thangaraj, electrical engineering department, IIT Madras, in a phone call with FactorDaily.
Thangaraj has been serving as NPTEL coordinator at IIT Madras since 2001 and is currently national MOOCs coordinator for NPTEL in the SWAYAM project of the ministry of human resources development (MHRD) of the Indian government.
We're discussing the impact and reach of NPTEL (National Programme on Technology Enhanced Learning), which by some measures, is already a world beater. It's also quite likely that you haven't heard of it, unless you're from an engineering background.
NPTEL was initiated in 2003 by seven IITs (Bombay, Delhi, Kanpur, Kharagpur, Madras, Guwahati and Roorkee) along with the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru, in 2003. In its first phase (2003-2009), NPTEL developed 235 courses in web/video format, at http://nptel.iitm.ac.in (now defunct). In Phase II (2009-14), an additional 600 web and video courses were recorded, with new features, such as indexing and keyword search. A YouTube channel was created in this period. In Phase III, starting 2014, an optional NOC (NPTEL Online Certification) was offered for Rs 1,000 through a proctored exam, which has seen over one lakh registrations so far.
NPTEL is the most accessed library of peer-reviewed educational content in the world, an emailed fact sheet states. According to Alexa, it's ranked at 328 in India. Its YouTube channel, with close to 20,000 videos, has more than 800,000 subscribers and over 245 million views
"With over 250 web and video courses and more in development, NPTEL's extensive offerings are rivalled in scale by few other online courseware programs," wrote Taylor Walsh in his 2011 book entitled Unlocking the Gates: How and Why Leading Universities Are Opening Up Access To Their Courses. A lot has changed since then, most significantly, the rollout of a proctored certification program that costs Rs 1,000. Enrollments for July 2017 are open now for 159 courses, its course explorer states.
So, how big is NPTEL? It's the most accessed library of peer-reviewed educational content in the world, an emailed fact sheet states. According to Alexa, it's ranked at 328 in India. Its YouTube channel, with close to 20,000 videos, has more than 800,000 subscribers and over 245 million views. Head-to-head, MIT OpenCourseware has more subscribers, but fewer than half the views (112 million views). But Youtube stats alone don't give a full measure of this mammoth beast. Its content is also free to download, available on DVDs, and distributed under the CC BY-SA (Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike) license.
IIT Madras and IIT Kanpur have provided a bulk of the online courses on NPTEL
Also read: The CAT whisperer
In its product brochure, NPTEL calls itself "the largest online repository in the world of courses in engineering, basic sciences and selected humanities and social sciences subjects." That's quite a mouthful, and kind of explains why it doesn't get more recognition for its achievements. The former President of India felicitated the programme earlier this month, if that helps.
"The video repository provided by NPTEL and mirrored in YouTube is the largest technical education online video repository in the world, which is structured and developed according to a unified curriculum, with free and unlimited access without a formal registration for downloading them," wrote professor Mangala Sunder Krishnan, National Web Courses Coordinator, NPTEL Project (2003-2015), in a draft entitled The Story of NPTEL. The article is currently under review for publishing by the Commonwealth of Learning, an intergovernmental body with its head office in Vancouver, Canada. The programme has recorded more than 300 million visits, the article states.
In its product brochure, NPTEL calls itself "the largest online repository in the world of courses in engineering, basic sciences and selected humanities and social sciences subjects"
"Unfortunately, no agency bothered till now to verify our claims," wrote Professor Krishnan, clarifying in an email to FactorDaily that this figure does not include the millions of visits to Google Scholar, the MOOC platform used by NOC. NOC has hosted more than 350 courses and run proctored exams, and issued certificates to more than 100,000 registrants, he said.
How NPTEL is charting a new course
In the first 10 years of its operation from 2003 to 2014, NPTEL functioned as a repository for self-learning content. In March 2014, NPTEL gave its MOOC programme a unique value proposition — a certificate from the IIT or the IISc. The courses as such were free, anybody could enrol, go through the content, answer the assignment, and make use of the forum.
But for Rs 1,000 per course, an in-person proctored exam would provide proof of proficiency.
"We get them (the students) a hall ticket, photo and ID. Our representative is there at each centre, and we verify the credentials, and they take the exam in a proctored environment. That was the change we made in the Indian setting because it was important for us to know who is writing the exam," said Bharathi Balaji, senior project officer at NPTEL. The platform support was given by Google, and launched by the MHRD, with TCS iON (a business unit of Tata Consultancy Services) as an exam partner, she said.
Certificates are awarded on the basis of a 25% weighting for the assignment score, and a 75% weighting for the final exam score. Certifications come with three tiers of merit — Gold (90% and above), Elite (60-90%), and Successfully Completed (40-60%). Every course conducted on NPTEL records a wide range of statistics on enrollments, registrations, certificates issued, and top-ranking students.
NPTEL's courses are also differentiated on the basis of diversity of the courseware offered, regardless of their popularity. It is also indirectly influencing the quality of teaching and technical skills of college faculty in the country — 15% of the enrolments are from faculty members
NPTEL's courses are also differentiated on the basis of diversity of the courseware offered, regardless of their popularity. While courses on computer science, Indian philosophy, quantum physics, and design get thousands of enrolments, there are some that get just hundreds.
"We don't do just popular courses — IoT, big data, and digital marketing are in hot demand today, but that's not all we do. All the core engineering disciplines are covered in our courses. We cover all disciplines, including management and humanities, UG (undergraduate) and elective courses, PhD-level courses. Some courses have just a 100 students, but you won't find them being offered at any institute across the country," Balaji said.
Based on NOC Statistics, computer science is the most followed subject on the platform in terms of top enrolments — the top nine enrolments are all from just this stream.
NPTEL is also indirectly influencing the quality of teaching and technical skills of college faculty in the country. Fifteen percent of NPTEL's enrolments come from faculty members, an NPTEL infographic on learner profiles shows. "This is something that has naturally happened, and it's turning out to be a faculty development programme without us even thinking it to be so," said Balaji.
Also read: EdTech startups are focusing on the wrong thing; they need teachers, not tests
Upping the talent stack
Why would anyone visit NPTEL when there is a plethora of world-class options available, including MIT OpenCourseware, and dozens of courses from the world's top universities on edx.org? One clue might lie in the fact that not everyone in India is comfortable with a western accent.
"There are plenty of MOOCs available, but the accent of the teachers is not Indian, and they charge more money for certification courses. So I have not applied for them," said Alok Shakya, a final year engineering student at KNIT Sultanpur, UP, who has completed five certifications from NPTEL. He had applied to IIT-JEE earlier but didn't get through, he said.
"There are plenty of MOOCs available, but the accent of the teachers is not Indian, and they charge more money for certification courses. So I have not applied for them" — Alok Shakya, final year engineering student at KNIT Sultanpur, UP
Shakya took NPTEL's courses to get a better grasp of concepts in the IT industry, as he didn't find any good resources in his college. He stumbled upon NPTEL while searching for an explanation on a programming concept on YouTube. "I watched the videos and my doubts regarding that particular concept became clear. My college seniors also advised me to go for NPTEL courses," he said. His favourite professor on NPTEL is Tanmai Gopal, who co-created the course entitled Introduction to Modern Application Development (IMAD), he said.
While 80% of NPTEL's audience comes from India, it also has participants from across the world. "We have a lot of traffic from Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri-Lanka, Malaysia, Indonesia, Saudi, apart from US and Canada," said Balaji. "Even for our exam in March, there was a faculty member from Saudi (Arabia), who had enrolled for a course and wanted to get the certificate. So, she actually flew down on the day of the exam in the morning, and got her certificate," said Balaji.
NPTEL's most-watched video on Youtube, a lecture entitled Introduction to Basic Electronics has fairly positive comments from people around the world. "This Man is brilliant! Every American teacher could learn from this man!!!," writes one commenter.
NPTEL's greatest hit
According to NPTEL's statistics, Introduction to Modern Application Development (IMAD) is the most popular course on the platform. The free online course was launched a year ago and has cumulatively seen over 1,00,000 registrations so far.
"People haven't just taken this course, more than 10,000 applications have been built. I feel it's pretty amazing for something that was just a side project for us," said Tanmai Gopal, CTO and cofounder of Hasura, a Bangalore-based cloud infrastructure focused startup, speaking to FactorDaily on the success of the course.
"There's a huge gap between the kind of knowledge you need when you start doing development, building applications, and what you actually learnt in university and school," Gopal said. "On a side note, a big difference between India and the Silicon Valley is that everybody really understands tech there. There's so much awareness in the entire ecosystem about what applications are, and how they're built etc. But, their rate of innovation is much faster. Their applications are of a much higher quality from the word go. It kind of boils down to this fundamental knowledge of how applications are built, or how to get one built if you're a business owner," he said.
Some concept artwork featuring Hasura and Madi, the IMAD mascot
To encourage deep, quality discussions on the platform, Hasura set up a Stackoverflow-type forum for people inside the community. The game-changer for students was the ability to write and deploy code, and see the finished product on their own subdomain.
Also read: This Haryana teacher's free YouTube classes have helped 13,000 job aspirants crack competitive exams
"Everybody has the will and energy to do things, but you need money, a credit or debit card, and spare income to do a random thing like hosting a server," Gopal said. The IMAD.Tech portal was created using Hasura's back-end technology, which enabled tens of thousands of people to run their own subdomain on a small cluster of servers.
Hasura.io co-founder Tanmai Gopal, the co-creator of the IMAD Tech course
"I could learn basic things by executing them on the console that the course provided on IMAD," said Yogesh SP, a developer who works at Pathtracker.io, a Bengaluru-based tech startup. He appreciated how one could "learn by doing" in the course. "The course is more about creating a live website. It helped improve my HTML, CSS, JS, SQL skills. It enhanced my skills and provided me with a step-by-step approach to building a website," he said. His future plan is to crack the Associate Android Developer course, and become a full-time Android developer.
"That was one of the big things for students. It's not just listening to things; after listening to me, you're supposed to go try something out, and you're supposed to go build something. You can build this on your mobile phone, on a tablet, Windows, Mac, Linux — it doesn't matter," Gopal added.
Growing enrollments with Local Chapters
Local Chapters, an initiative launched by NPTEL to drive up student participation, was launched in April 2015 as a pilot in Tamil Nadu. Through this programme, NPTEL appoints an SPOC (single point of contact), either a faculty member or a college student, as its ambassador. Until now, NPTEL has on-boarded over 1,000 colleges across the country in the programme and adds 5-10 more each week. Tamil Nadu (192) and Maharashtra (190) have the highest number of local chapters, followed by Andhra Pradesh (91).
Local Chapters is an initiative launched by NPTEL to drive up student participation. Until now, NPTEL has on-boarded over 1,000 colleges across the country in the programme and adds 5-10 more each week
Enrolments are concentrated around industrialised states where there are a lot of engineering. colleges, said Thangaraj, adding that NPTEL's state-wise statistics are in sync with the gross enrolment ratio for a university education. "Traditionally, even IT recruitment is like that and fits the same patterns. We are trying to make inroads into other states. It's a bit of a long battle, and we'll probably get there," he said.
Since last year, NPTEL has started recognising these Local Chapters as well, and rating them according to performance, based on the number of toppers, gold medalists, and elite students they produce. "We do a rating of the top 100 Local Chapters, also on our site," said Balaji.
A group photo from NPTEL's SPOC (Single point-of-contact) workshop at IIT Madras on July 15,2017.
While NPTEL has successfully closed the college loop, the industry loop is something it is yet to nail. However, it has had some success in offering its courses to decrease the onboarding time at companies, Balaji said. "Companies hire freshers and want them to do some courses before they come in. Companies said it reduced their training time at the job. TCS openly announced in one of our data analytics forum that if anybody has completed this course at TCS, we have a vacancy here," she said.
Lead visual: Nikhil Raj
Disclosure: FactorDaily is owned by SourceCode Media, which counts Accel Partners, Blume Ventures and Vijay Shekhar Sharma among its investors. Accel Partners is an early investor in Flipkart. Vijay Shekhar Sharma is the founder of Paytm. None of FactorDaily's investors have any influence on its reporting about India's technology and startup ecosystem.
Nilesh Christopher
Telegram turns go-to platform for test-prep in India but has a piracy problem
'Mentor' Harshit has a wee bit of Byju Raveendran in him. As a teenager growing up in Kanpur, Harshit Shukla …
January 28, 2019	 Future
We asked the man who coined the term 'data scientist' what it takes to be successful in the world of data
We recently got an opportunity to talk to D J Patil, the rockstar of data science, about the growing field. Here is Part II of our interview with him.
July 31, 2017	 Future
Sat Singh
This Haryana teacher's 'jugaad' has made learning super fun for her students
Teacher Pooja Singh of Government Primary Girls' School in Dobh village of Haryana's Rohtak district has introduced an audiovisual teaching model and shows students educational YouTube videos on her smartphone.
June 8, 2017	 Culture
Suvarchala Narayanan
The future is no longer what it used to be. How do you prepare for it?
Anyone who knows me well will attest to my obsession with futurism, especially as it concerns the future of learning. …
April 21, 2017	 Future

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


New Hampshire Becomes First State Senate with Female Majority | Democracy Now!
President of the Planned Parenthood of Northern New England Action Fund.
AMY GOODMAN: Yes, history was made in New Hampshire Tuesday, as New Hampshire's state senate became the first state legislative body in US history with a female majority. Thirteen of the state's twenty-four senators are now women. Nationally, less than one in four legislators is female. New Hampshire also has a female US senator for the first time in history, after Democrat Jeanne Shaheen defeated incumbent Republican John Sununu.
I'm joined by Nancy Mosher. She is president of the Planned Parenthood of Northern New England Action Fund. How did you do it?
NANCY MOSHER: Well, I'd love to take all the credit, but we worked really hard layering our political action with local and federal races in collaboration with our national PAC, as well as the America Votes organization in New Hampshire. I can't tell you how helpful they were in helping us slice and dice the databases.
And what we did was we targeted women under fifty-five who were center or right-of-center, because we had research this year that showed that Planned Parenthood's name is highly trusted by women in our country, and they really, really took us seriously when we told them about the positions of the candidates. So we were able to go out and expose McCain's extraordinary, terribly terrible record on women's health, zero percent rating with Planned Parenthood, as well as highlight the Senate race, the House races, where there were two pro-choice incumbents that we were working to reinstate, and the local senate races. So three-out-of-four of the targeted senate races that we worked on were won, and they were all women.
AMY GOODMAN: And the state senate, was it clear? Did people in New Hampshire realize they could possibly make history with a woman majority?
NANCY MOSHER: You know, I'm not really sure they did. I think there were some pundits who certainly were aware of it, but what we found when we were knocking on doors was that people really were unaware of the senate candidates. So if we could sort of grab their attention talking about McCain's record, then we could say, "And by the way, you know, here's what we have to tell you about your local senate candidate and where they stand on women's health." So it was very, you know, grassroots from the ground up.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, talking about women taking power, Gretchen Peters is also with us. She is a singer-songwriter. She wrote the song "Independence Day," which became a hit for country singer Martina McBride. We played that, her version of it, in the first segment. Well, Gretchen made headlines recently when she protested the use of the song by Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin.
Explain what happened, Gretchen. The night of the vice-presidential debate?
GRETCHEN PETERS: The night — yeah, the night of the vice-presidential debate, I got a phone call after it was over, and it was actually my booking agent, and she said, "Did you hear?" And I hadn't heard whatever, you know. She said, "They used your song to bring Sarah Palin on stage." And it's not the first time, you know, the song has been sort of taken out of context and misused.
AMY GOODMAN: This was in the post-party of the debate?
GRETCHEN PETERS: The post-party, right. But I just — I think the thing that was different about it for me this time was that she really represented — this is a song about domestic abuse. I mean, this is — she represented the opposite of what this song really is all about. And I just — I knew that I didn't have any legal recourse, but I also felt like I could have — that there was some way for me to make some kind of a statement.
AMY GOODMAN: So how did you do it?
GRETCHEN PETERS: Well, ultimately, I decided to follow the lead of this viral email that was going around, and I donated the royalties during the election cycle, from the time, you know, Sarah Palin was named as the VP candidate, to Planned Parenthood, in her name.
AMY GOODMAN: All the royalties of the song.
GRETCHEN PETERS: From the song, yeah.
AMY GOODMAN: Can you play a few verses? Let's see what we've got time for, but we're not just interested in the chorus; we want to hear this song.
AMY GOODMAN: Ultimately about domestic violence.
GRETCHEN PETERS: OK, alright, you got it. [singing] Well, she seemed all right by dawn's early light / though she looked a little worried and weak. / She tried to pretend he wasn't drinking again / but daddy left the proof on her cheek. / I was only eight years old that summer / and I always seemed to be in the way / so I took myself down to the fair in town / on Independence Day. / Well, word gets around in a small, small town. / They said he was a dangerous man. / Mama was proud and she stood her ground / but she knew she was on the losing end. / Some folks whispered, some just talked / but everybody looked the other way. / And when time ran out, there was no one about / on Independence Day. / Let freedom ring. / Let the white dove sing. / Let the whole world know that today is a day of reckoning. / Let the weak be strong. / Let the right be wrong. / Roll a stone away, let the guilty pay. / It's Independence Day.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, Gretchen Peters, I want to thank you very much for being with us.
GRETCHEN PETERS: Thanks for having me.
AMY GOODMAN: And thank you for playing more than a chorus.
AMY GOODMAN: You're going home to Nashville now?
AMY GOODMAN: And congratulations on this being a CMA hit, country music star and hit.
GRETCHEN PETERS: Thank you very much.
AMY GOODMAN: And thanks so much to Nancy Mosher of Planned Parenthood Action Fund in Northern New England.


text:
Parkour in Schools
Construction & Design
What is parkour?
Name & Logo
Parkour Earth
Parkour is an area rife with research opportunities.
There are community members and academics around the country who have explored parkour as part of their degree or postgraduate studies. We have partnered with tertiary institutions and also conducted our own independent research.
Here we provide you with quick access to the varying parkour research projects (published and unpublished) that have been conducted in NZ.
We have no current research projects underway, however, there are several journal articles conference presentations from Dr. Puddle's PhD thesis that will be forthcoming.
Making the Jump: Examining the Glocalisation of Parkour in Aotearoa New Zealand (Damien Puddle, 2019) – download full PhD thesis
Brief: Once a niche physical pastime of a small group of men in the urban suburbs of France, parkour is now a global phenomenon. Parkour provides an ideal context to investigate contemporary youth, and adoptees of this primarily youthful culture, and their increasingly connected experiences.
Importance: There are concurrent examples of universality and particularity as New Zealand practitioners negotiate between their global and local parkour experiences. This research suggests that an appreciation of glocalised experiences is essential for understanding the ways in which adherents of contemporary youth cultures like parkour make sense of their lives in an increasingly connected and globalised world.
Results: In the first empirical chapter Puddle draws on Appadurai's (1990, 1996) model of global cultural flows which provides a framework to introduce and understand the various macro movements of people, media, technology, ideas, as well as the physical landscape that underpins the broad experiences of New Zealand practitioners. In the second he adopts a mobilities approach (Sheller & Urry, 2006; Urry, 2007) to ask questions about how parkour participation is experienced differently by core and marginalised members of its community, informing experiences of gender and ethnicity. In the third and final empirical chapter he draws upon Ritzer's (2003a, 2007) concept of 'globalisation of nothing' to facilitate an exploration of the development of Parkour NZ and how the New Zealand community involves itself in the politics of parkour's global institutionalisation.
Do parkour landing cues affect the kinematics and kinetics of landings in non-parkour practitioners? (Joel Impey, 2013) – (link forthcoming)
Brief: In 2016 we began a new study with the Wintec Centre for Sport Science and Human Performance where we explore the effects of parkour coaching cues on the landing techniques and forces of recreational athletes who have not trained parkour.
Importance: We now know that parkour practitioners land more safely than recreational athletes when both perform their preferred landing strategies, but can the cues used in parkour coaching and training have an immediate benefit on the landing data of these non-parkour participants? If it does, parkour landing practices may be of benefit to athletes in other landing sports (basketball, volleyball, netball, etc.), for recreational athletes and the public in everyday life.
Results: Forthcoming
Parkour/Freerunning as a Pathway to Prosocial Change: A Theoretical Analysis (Johanna Herrmann, 2016) – download full Masters thesis
Brief: What is parkour/freerunning, and how can the practice support prosocial change? In order to determine the impact of practicing parkour/freerunning on the individual, a historical analysis looked at values, goals, assumptions, and skills underlying the practice. A comparison of the two major frameworks currently used in offender rehabilitation was conducted to examine its value for prosocial development.
Importance: Practitioners have started using parkour/freerunning for programmes targeting youth at risk as well as positive youth development. Yet, this idea is insufficiently grounded in theory and research. Moreover, the common misrepresentation of parkour/freerunning in the media as a daredevil sport has fuelled controversy and confusion about the practice.
Results: Parkour/freerunning has emerged as a highly versatile tool for self-development and change. The major overlaps of parkour/freerunning with both rehabilitation frameworks suggest that the practice can increase an individual's capacity to live a healthy and prosocial life, reduce the risk of reoffending and offer a pathway to identity (trans-)formation.
A Comparison of the Habitual Landing Strategies from Differing Drop Heights of Parkour Practitioners (Traceurs) and Recreationally Trained Individuals (Regan Standing + Dr. Peter Maulder, 2015) – download full article
Brief: As our previous research highlighted, parkour practitioners should perform parkour landing techniques rather than traditional landing techniques, but what is the difference between the landing techniques of practitioners and non-practitioners? A sample of parkour practitioners performing their preferred landings were compared to a sample of recreational athletes involved in landing based sports performing their preferred landings. Sound was also measured to begin exploring its relationship with force.
Importance: If parkour practitioners do land more safely than non-practitioners, then parkour could be a very valuable training tool for athletes in landing sports and even for the general public. If higher sound is associated with higher force, it will support the coaching cues used in parkour and suggest that "quiet" = "safe".
Results: The preferred landing techniques of parkour practitioners are safer than the preferred techniques of recreational athletes. Sound as a measure of landing effectiveness and safety holds potential significance; however requires further research to confirm.
Ground reaction forces and loading rates associated with parkour and traditional drop-landing techniques (Damien Puddle + Dr. Peter Maulder, 2013) – view infographic / download full article
Brief: Are parkour landings more valuable (i.e. safer) than traditional landing techniques for parkour practitioners? A sample of parkour practitioners used traditional and parkour (precision and roll) landing techniques from a fixed height to measure the differences in impact force, loading rate and time to peak force.
Importance: No study had previously investigated these parkour landing techniques and compared them with traditional landing techniques. If the techniques used by parkour practitioners are "worse" than traditional techniques, then changes should be made to parkour coaching systems. Alternatively, if traditional techniques are "worse" then parkour coaching systems should be solidified and coaching systems for other sporting codes should perhaps take on board these new landing techniques where possible.
Results: Both parkour landing techniques result in less impact force than the traditional technique (when performed by parkour practitioners).
NZ Injury Rates in Parkour (Parkour NZ, unpublished, 2013) – view the infographic.
Brief: In late 2013 we collected data from a public questionnaire asking questions from practitioners around the country to share the details, stories and information in regards to any and all injuries they have sustained while participating in parkour.
Importance: Many people perceive parkour as dangerous, yet our experiences seem to tell a different story.
Results: 44% of practitioners surveyed have never had an injury, 66% of those who had believed their injuries were avoidable and 37% of injuries occur in the first year of training and rapidly decline as training experience increases. The most common injuries are sprains, the most common injured site is the ankle, most injuries seem to occur during or because of jumping and overtraining was the most common reason associated with why the injury occurred.
Ground reaction forces and loading rates associated with parkour drop-landing techniques from varying heights (Damien Puddle, unpublished, 2011) – download unpublished manuscript
Brief: A follow-up study (from the study above) investigating the same landing techniques but from varying heights that are more applicable to parkour training.
Importance: Parkour practitioners use precision and roll landings in different contexts, usually when height is a factor. Jumping and landing from heights that are higher than what the average person is likely jump and land is common in parkour, making it important to investigate what happens at these higher heights and whether one technique is more valuable than the other as height increases.
Results: The data showed that parkour landings are still valuable for reducing impact forces on the body compared with data from other landing studies, but the difference between the two techniques was inconclusive. Testing protocols may have limited the study in this regard.
Motivation in Parkour: A Self-Determination Theory Approach (Barnaby Matthews, unpublished, 2010) – download unpublished manuscript
Brief: How do parkour practitioners perceive their own motivation in an activity that is devoid of trophies, prizes and awards (external motivation factors)? In order to investigate why people train parkour, over 100 parkour practitioners (with more than 2 years experience each) were recruited to answer an adapted Sports Motivation Scale (an accepted standard for sports motivation questionnaires).
Importance: Traditional sport is built around competition and thus external motivation factors are highly present. However, long term commitment to physical activity has been linked to high levels of self-determination (e.g. intrinsic motivation – doing things for the sheer joy of it) while athlete burnout (common in elite sport) is associated with low levels of self-determination). The philosophies embedded in parkour practice may be valuable for long term participation.
Results: Parkour is trained primarily due to intrinsic motivational factors. The potential exists for parkour to be a viable physical activity for persons unmotivated by extrinsic reward systems.
For all enquires not answered by information available on the website, please use the contact form below.
Flips & Tumbles brings Luke Stones of the Motus Projects to NZ
Flips & Tumbles Wigram, Christchurch's n...
New Zealand's Parkour Coaching Pathway Launches
After a significant amount of development, New Zea...
Parkour NZ Community Awards
The Parkour NZ Community Awards are our annual awa...
Address: 225 Tramway Rd, Enderley, Hamilton 3214, New Zealand (mail only)
Email: contact@nzparkour.co.nz
Phone: +64 27 747 8426 (9am – 5pm, Mon – Fri)
Thank you to Kiwi traceur and photographer David Tressler for the use of his photos.


text:
CNY Solidarity Coalition
United in defense of our community and our neighbors
Guide: Letters to the Editor
Track your reps
Directory of Organizations
Anchor Organizations
CNY Solidarity Newsletter – Jan 31 – Jan 24, 2023
Community Events & Newsletter October 20 – October 27
CNY Solidarity
Blog, View Weekly Action Alerts
From CNY Solidarity Coalition:
Next Meeting: Sun. Oct. 25, 2020, 3-4 PM, via Zoom. Link to come.
Agenda: Election topics
Upcoming Meeting Schedule: 11/8, 11/22. 12/6, 12/20/20, 1/10/21
The latest on what we can all do for this election:
The best way to fend off a Trump challenge to the election is a Biden landslide. Reporting from the east coast states will be important in the news narrative, so your vote in New York does count!
One: Vote and Be Counted!
Here are four ways to vote, starting with the most secure and reliable:
1. Vote early in person, if you can. Your vote will be counted on election day. Early Voting: 10/24-11/1, including weekend days, at six locations in Onondaga County.
2. Absentee Ballots are still available. Drop off in Person if possible. You can now walk into the Board of Elections, complete an Absentee Ballot application, receive a ballot, complete it, and submit it, all in one visit. Like Early Voting, except your vote will be counted after Election Day. But you can do it now. http://www.ongov.net/elections/
3. Absentee Ballot, Mail it in. Do it now. Absentee ballots, delivered in person or by US Mail (2 0r #3), will all be counted after Election Day.
4. Election Day Voting. Last choice. Try to get it done earlier. (Trump has promised that there will be chaos on Election Day.)
If you would like to check to make sure BOE has received your absentee ballot, you can use this link. Make sure to type in your street abbreviation; for instance st for street, ave for avenue.
Two: Take the Senate, the House, and State Legislatures.
Any of these could be decisive in various close-election scenarios. It's not too late to help!
Donate to Indivisible's Payback Project. They have targeted eleven Republican Senators who have to go. You can also sign up for phone and text banking in key states.
Here's a fund dedicated to increasing the majority in the House. There are some scenarios in which this could be crucial.
There's an ActBlue to support 48 state legislative candidates who could collectively flip 10 State chambers. The GiveSmart Fund has a similar goal.
Three: Protect the Vote. UPDATE Oct. 20:
IMPORTANT: A group of us are putting together a coalition of representatives of local progressive organizations to respond if/when Trump tries to steal the election, and to engage in possible proactive efforts to prevent that. We know that Trump is prepared to declare victory and begin legal battles if the results reported on Nov. 3 are close. A group met last week, and there are plans to expand the group and meet again this week in order to create a plan that works for a broad community.
Of course, many of us are working hard to be sure there is an undisputable landslide against Trump, but we need to be ready for major demonstrations and other kinds of political action to prevent him from short circuiting the election. This may require weeks or months of work. Indivisible is calling for a nationwide action on November 4 at 5 PM. Please save the date. We have signed on to have an event here, but what that will look like and what specific actions will be part of it are to be determined by this broader group.
More information will be coming.
Here are some of the resources we are looking at. You can start to get ready now.
· Indivisible's https://protecttheresults.com is building a coalition of voters ready to mobilize. Share that link with friends in other places – they can look up local events.
· Choose Democracy is a new effort focused specifically on post-election action. Read this: 10 Things You Need to Know to Stop a Coup
· Hold the Line Organizing. M+R and re:power held a national roundtable featuring their Hold the Line Guide, and are supporting groups who want to create their own Hold the Line teams.
Voting Information:
New York Board of Elections: contacts for all counties
Onondaga County Board of Elections absentee ballots, early voting info, etc.
Dana Balter for Congress: We need a progressive voice representing us in Congress, instead of someone who endorses Donald Trump for President! https://electdanabalter.com/
Biden/Harris campaign: https://joebiden.com/
Rachel May for State Senate: http://www.rachelmay.org
John Mannion for State Senate; https://www.mannionforstatesenate.com
Anthony Brindisi for Congress NY 22 Donate
Articles of the Week:
Local Activist News: Have you seen the video entitled "A Future Without Nuclear Weapons" that was made by Rashid Mamun, Don Hughes, and Peter Swords for the international 75th commemoration of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki? It is about resistance to nuclear weapons including Back from the Brink. Here is the link: https://youtu.be/Gfvo4EiE0I023.
2020 CNY ELECTIONS: CANDIDATE VIEWS ON CLIMATE CHANGE ISSUES
from Climate Change Awareness and Action. Read it Here
John Katko has not responded at this time.
Repeated from last week. Important. These two, particularly Barton Gellman's, give the best, and scariest, overviews of what could happen. Barton Gellman's "The Election that Could Break America" and Jeffrey Toobin's "The Legal Fight Awaiting us after the Election."
Election Guide 2020: Who will be on the ballot in Central New York? In Syracuse.com. Read it here.
EVENTS/ACTIONS CALENDAR
Sign this petition: Support Peace in Artsakh and an End to Imperial Wars: DSA Syracuse Solidarity Statement
Indigenous Armenian civilians in Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) have been under constant bombardment for the past three weeks by Azerbaijan and Turkey. This petition, directed to Dana Balter, urges the United States to condemn this ongoing humanitarian crisis, and use its power to help end the war and prevent the renewed ethnic cleansing of Armenians in Artsakh.
Get a Rachel May lawn sign!
Thursday, Oct. 22 – 5 PM – 6 PM. Corner of Beech and Westcott
We're in the final push before Election Day. If you'd like to show support for Rachel, please swing by Busker's Park (the corner of Westcott and Beech) and pick up a lawn sign. Senator May and staff will be there, if you want to say hello!
There is no charge for signs, though donations are always welcome!
Judaism & Zionism – Wednesday, October 21, 7:30-9 pm
Rabbi Walt will synthesize his personal experience of the fusion between Zionism and Judaism and historical analysis of how they were fused with one another. Then he will articulate a vision of a universal non-Zionist Judaism. Discussion in small groups will follow his presentation. Register here.
Share on Facebook here.
This event will be livestreamed on the SPC Facebook page, as well as recorded for later viewing.
Rabbi Brian Walt is a rabbi and a human rights activist. He is Rabbi Emeritus of Tikkun V'Or in Ithaca, NY and Congregation Mishkan Shalom, an activist synagogue in Philadelphia that he founded in 1988. A native of South Africa, Brian was the founding executive director of Rabbis for Human Rights-North America. In 2012, he led a delegation of leaders of the Civil Rights movement on a visit to Israel and the West Bank. He has been involved in several progressive American Jewish organizations and is currently a member of the rabbinical council of Jewish Voice for Peace.
A Question of Safety; School Resource Officers Town Hall Series
Hosted by National Action Network Syracuse Chapter
October 20, at 6:00 p.m
More information and registration info Here
The 14 member organizing Collective who comprise the People's Agenda on Policing, in partnership with the Syracuse City School District, is hosting a series of town halls on School Resource Officers (SROs) in Syracuse City Public Schools. The conversation comes as public scrutiny of police officers in schools is growing nationwide as part of more extensive calls for police reform and accountability.
Hosted via Zoom, the town halls with guest panelists are offered on consecutive Tuesdays in October and November. The first meeting is Tuesday, October 20, at 6:00 p.m. EDT. The series will continue on Tuesday, October 27, Tuesday, November 10 with the last virtual meeting on November 17. Please see registration details below.
Upcoming NY-24 Congressional debates: Balter – Katko
Tuesday, October 20, 7pm, CNYCentral.com
Sunday, October 25, 7pm, NewsChannel 9 WSYR
A Community Conversation with Dr. Ibram X. Kendi, Author of How to Be n Antiracist
Join us for a FREE discussion on Zoom about antiracism and critical social issues that affect us all. The event will feature a presentation by Dr. Kendi, followed by a live-streamed, moderated conversation with questions from community members.
This event is open to all, however pre-registration is required. An email with a link will be sent out 1-2 days before the event.
Presented by The Friends of the Central Library, along with the Syracuse University Office of Diversity and Inclusion, Hendricks Chapel, and The Lender Center for Social Justice.
Sponsored by The Central New York Community Foundation, The Gifford Foundation, and WCNY. Register Here
Rally! No More Rate Hikes, Public Power Now! FB Event
Hosted by Syracuse DSA
Thursday, Oct. 22, 5 PM – 6 PM
Niagara Mohawk Building – Syracuse, NY 13202
National Grid is pushing to raise utility rates by July 2021. This means that our electric and gas bills will see an increase (4% and 6% respectively), just when working people are most affected by the economic consequences of the pandemic. This will generate a total revenue of 140 million dollars for the British multinational. National Grid says it needs to raise prices because they want to "modernize its gas and electric infrastructure", which experts read as an excuse for expanding its methane gas pipelines.
We think it is outrageous that National Grid wants to profit off of working people who are barely making it through in a crumbling economy while also destroying our climate! This is why DSA is engaged in a statewide campaign to take over utilities, switch to renewables and put the administration into public hand. That way we steer away from greedy capitalist corporations and attend to our utility needs rationally.
Please join us in this statewide week of action! Come to our rally in front of the Niagara Mohawk Building and let's make it clear that National Grid has to go! Public power now!
Sources: https://www.waer.org/post/advocacy-groups-worry-national-grids-proposed-rate-hike-could-hurt-consumers-environment
Early Voting in New York State.
October 24.
How to Vote Safely in Person: https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/633650/election-day-vote-in-person-safely?fbclid=IwAR2CkhbWOAqlSFlD0vAUdpdQxLDZUlBHkD6iG8C3ElfeP7_ln9CdIBsI3R0
Not Normal: Art in the Age of Trump (virtual event)
Saturday, October 24, 2020 – 7:00 PM to 8:30 PM
Each fall, since 2016, ArtRage Gallery and Building Company Theater have partnered to create NOT NORMAL: Art in the Age of Trump. This year, ArtRage is opening our virtual gallery doors for members of the community to share music, poetry, visual art, short film and performance art!
CLICK HERE to reserve your ticket TODAY! The Zoom link will emailed to you from Ticket Tailor after you reserve your ticket. The "Zoom Room" will open at 6:30pm and the event will begin at 7:00pm. This is a free event and donations are gladly accepted. All funds raised will go towards the work of ArtRage Gallery. Participating Artists will be announced soon!
Fight Your Boss! Teach-ins, Part 2: A History of Class Struggle
Thursday, October 29, 2020 at 7 PM – 8:45 PM
Following up the first Fight Your Boss! Teach-in, we are hosting Tod Rutherford of SU's Geography Dept. for some collective learning about the history of class struggle in the United States and workers' present situation. We must understand history to understand the present and future.
New and prospective members welcome regardless of prior knowledge or experience. Register in advance
This is the second teach-in focused on working class struggle in our series this fall. In November, we're hosting our final Fight Your Boss! Teach-in where we'll talk about how to organize in your workplace at the super practical level.
Election Day – November 3
Protect the Results/Count Every Vote
November 4, 5 PM
Nationwide day of action on November 4 at 5 PM. Please save the date. We have signed on to have an event here, but what that will look like and what specific actions will be part of it are yet to be determined.
ONGOING:
Street Heat – Weekly Protests are back with Physical Distancing!
HANCOCK: our decade-long protests against Hancock's piloting killer reaper drones over the Islamic oil lands continue. 6000 East Molloy Rd every Tuesday from 4:15 to 5 p.m.
DEWITT: Weekly protest against IDF terrorism, maiming and killing of Palestinians. Fridays 4:30 to 5:15 p.m. at Erie Blvd E and E Genesee, Dewitt. Park in the nearby mini-mall parking lot.
REGIONAL FARMERS MARKET: anti-weaponized drones/anti-militarism protest: 9 to 9:45 a.m Saturdays . directly across from the market's main entrance on Park Street.
For more information: anntiffany6235@gmail.com
FINDING HELP/RESOURCES
Also see COVID19 Info Below
SIRDN Covid19 Warm Line: (315) 552-1670
Syracuse Immigrant and Refugee Defense Network (SIRDN) Coronavirus-related information for farmworker, immigrant, undocumented, day laborer, and domestic worker communities. English and Spanish-speaking operators. Text and phone.
SIRDN has also created a resource document for COVID-19 information, for immigrants and undocumented folks. English and Spanish Or use these instructions to have Google translate .
COVID-19 INFORMATION:
If you do not have a doctor and have questions, symptoms, or may have been exposed to COVID-19, call Upstate University Hospital's Triage Line at 315.464.397
Onondaga County Coronaviris Disease 2019 (COVID-19) Information Page
COVID-19 Testing Hotline
Upstate University Hospital Regional Triage (COVID-19) Information Page
NYS Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19) Information Page
Peter McCarthy
pmccar1100@gmail.com
Tags: slider, Spotlight
Town Hall Series: School Resource Officers (SROs) in Syracuse City Public Schools
Action Alerts – Week of October 26
En Español »


Welcome to the second in our series of accounts of the activities taking place as part of the Heritage Lottery Fund supported Spa Ponds Heritage Project. The day-long training session was led by Matt Beresford of MBArchaeology, who treated participants to a presentation that introduced us to documentary and archival sources for local history research.
Moving on to more local sources, Matt recommended 'The History of Mansfield and It's Environs' (William Harrod, 1801) and John Beckett's 'Nottinghamshire Past'. Matt emphasised the importance of appreciating the site within its landscape. Books such as 'The Making of the English Landscape' by W G Hoskins and Francis Pryor's 'The Making of the British Landscape' could help us contextualise Spa Ponds within its Mediaeval landscape.
Another takeaway message from Matt's presentation was that digging around in old books can be just as valuable as digging in fields when it comes to understanding history.
Matt then led a discussion of the relationship between 'local history' and 'archaeology', explaining how these two disciplines often overlap. For example, we can find artefacts unearthed through archaeology stored in local history libraries.
Matt noted that historical records can also be found in unexpected places, like King's Mill Hospital. The group discussed some of the places where we have come across historical information. For example, John pointed out that public houses can be useful places to glean information, whether from photographs displayed on the walls as decorations, or from those who frequent such establishments.
We were introduced to some of the many different types of sources of information that might be useful when researching the history of Spa Ponds, including: maps, manorial documents, historical directories, legal records, personal diaries, census returns, drawings and photographs, and oral histories.
Matt warned us about some of the shortcomings of historical sources, including the way that maps are not always accurate and hand-written records are not always easy to decipher.
Matt signposted us to the British Association for Local History (BALH) and the Nottinghamshire Branch of the Victoria County Historians, alongside the County Archives for both Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire, and the National Archives at Kew in London. No doubt we will be visiting all of these via the Internet, as well as wandering around some of them 'in real life' over the coming months and years.
Who owned the area at the time of the Domesday Book (around 1086)?
When was the deer park first established in Clipston?
Where were the nearest manor houses, castles and other large buildings located?
Was the hill above Spa Ponds used prior to it being part of Clipston Park, e.g. as an Iron Age hill fort?
These and other questions may be addressed during our group research sessions and as part of the forthcoming Interpreting Maps Workshop (which will take place on Friday 21st April) when we will be mapping all recorded archaeological finds in the vicinity of Spa Ponds.
After lunch Matt guided us through some activities that were designed to help prepare us for the sort of challenges we can expect to encounter as we begin to undertake research into the history of Spa Ponds and environs.
Matt ensured that we are equipped with plenty of good ideas about where we might go to find information, including Internet resources and those available only by visiting libraries, museums and other places where archives are kept.
A day overflowing with information and thought-provoking activities was brought to a suitable close by Phil, who thanked Matt for his contributions, as well as thanking those who contributed in other ways, e.g. Ann, who made sure there was plenty of fruit and other healthy nibbles.
We are all looking forward to the next Spa ponds heritage project events, including the Heritage Management Plan and group research session on Friday 3rd March, and the LIDAR Workshop on Saturday 11th March.
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Where possible this project's digital outputs are released under the CC BY-NC license.