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17:30 | 19 January
Facebook spying on teens, Twitter accounts hijacked by terrorists, and sexual abuse imagery found on Bing and Giphy were amongst the ugly truths revealed by TechCrunch's investigating reporting in 2019. The tech industry needs more watchdogs than ever as its size enlargens the impact of safety failures and the abuse of power. Whether through malice, naivety, or greed, there was plenty of wrongdoing to sniff out.
Led by our security expert Zack Whittaker, TechCrunch undertook more long-form investigations this year to tackle these growing issues. Our coverage of fundraises, product launches, and glamorous exits only tell half the story. As perhaps the biggest and longest running news outlet dedicated to startups (and the giants they become), we're responsible for keeping these companies honest and pushing for a more ethical and transparent approach to technology.
If you have a tip potentially worthy of an investigation, contact TechCrunch at tips@techcrunch.com or by using our anonymous tip line's form.
Image: Bryce Durbin/TechCrunch
Here are our top 10 investigations from 2019, and their impact:
Facebook pays teens to spy on their data
Josh Constine's landmark investigation discovered that Facebook was paying teens and adults $20 in gift cards per month to install a VPN that sent Facebook all their sensitive mobile data for market research purposes. The laundry list of problems with Facebook Research included not informing 187,000 users the data would go to Facebook until they signed up for "Project Atlas", not receiving proper parental consent for over 4300 minors, and threatening legal action if a user spoke publicly about the program. The program also abused Apple's enterprise certificate program designed only for distribution of employee-only apps within companies to avoid the App Store review process.
The fallout was enormous. Lawmakers wrote angry letters to Facebook. TechCrunch soon discovered a similar market research program from Google called Screenwise Meter that the company promptly shut down. Apple punished both Google and Facebook by shutting down all their employee-only apps for a day, causing office disruptions since Facebookers couldn't access their shuttle schedule or lunch menu. Facebook tried to claim the program was above board, but finally succumbed to the backlash and shut down Facebook Research and all paid data collection programs for users under 18. Most importantly, the investigation led Facebook to shut down its Onavo app, which offered a VPN but in reality sucked in tons of mobile usage data to figure out which competitors to copy. Onavo helped Facebook realize it should acquire messaging rival WhatsApp for $19 billion, and it's now at the center of anti-trust investigations into the company. TechCrunch's reporting weakened Facebook's exploitative market surveillance, pitted tech's giants against each other, and raised the bar for transparency and ethics in data collection.
Facebook pays teens to install VPN that spies on them
Protecting The WannaCry Kill Switch
Zack Whittaker's profile of the heroes who helped save the internet from the fast-spreading WannaCry ransomware reveals the precarious nature of cybersecurity. The gripping tale documenting Marcus Hutchins' benevolent work establishing the WannaCry kill switch may have contributed to a judge's decision to sentence him to just one year of supervised release instead of 10 years in prison for an unrelated charge of creating malware as a teenager.
The sinkhole that saved the internet
The dangers of Elon Musk's tunnel
TechCrunch contributor Mark Harris' investigation discovered inadequate emergency exits and more problems with Elon Musk's plan for his Boring Company to build a Washington D.C.-to-Baltimore tunnel. Consulting fire safety and tunnel engineering experts, Harris build a strong case for why state and local governments should be suspicious of technology disrupters cutting corners in public infrastructure.
Review of Elon Musk's DC-to-Baltimore 'Loop' system reveals safety concerns
Bing image search is full of child abuse
Josh Constine's investigation exposed how Bing's image search results both showed child sexual abuse imagery, but also suggested search terms to innocent users that would surface this illegal material. A tip led Constine to commission a report by anti-abuse startup AntiToxin (now L1ght), forcing Microsoft to commit to UK regulators that it would make significant changes to stop this from happening. However, a follow-up investigation by the New York Times citing TechCrunch's report revealed Bing had made little progress.
Microsoft Bing not only shows child sexual abuse, it suggests it
Expelled despite exculpatory data
Zack Whittaker's investigation surfaced contradictory evidence in a case of alleged grade tampering by Tufts student Tiffany Filler who was questionably expelled. The article casts significant doubt on the accusations, and that could help the student get a fair shot at future academic or professional endeavors.
Tufts expelled a student for grade hacking. She claims innocence
Burned by an educational laptop
Natasha Lomas' chronicle of troubles at educational computer hardware startup pi-top, including a device malfunction that injured a U.S. student. An internal email revealed the student had suffered a "a very nasty finger burn" from a pi-top 3 laptop designed to be disassembled. Reliability issues swelled and layoffs ensued. The report highlights how startups operating in the physical world, especially around sensitive populations like students, must make safety a top priority.
Reliability concerns raised over pi-top's STEM learning laptop
Giphy fails to block child abuse imagery
Sarah Perez and Zack Whittaker teamed up with child protection startup L1ght to expose Giphy's negligence in blocking sexual abuse imagery. The report revealed how criminals used the site to share illegal imagery, which was then accidentally indexed by search engines. TechCrunch's investigation demonstrated that it's not just public tech giants who need to be more vigilant about their content.
Despite bans, Giphy still hosts self-harm, hate speech and child sex abuse content
Airbnb's weakness on anti-discrimination
Megan Rose Dickey explored a botched case of discrimination policy enforcement by Airbnb when a blind and deaf traveler's reservation was cancelled because they have a guide dog. Airbnb tried to just "educate" the host who was accused of discrimination instead of levying any real punishment until Dickey's reporting pushed it to suspend them for a month. The investigation reveals the lengths Airbnb goes to in order to protect its money-generating hosts, and how policy problems could mar its IPO.
How Airbnb handles discrimination claims
Expired emails let terrorists tweet propaganda
Zack Whittaker discovered that Islamic State propaganda was being spread through hijacked Twitter accounts. His investigation revealed that if the email address associated with a Twitter account expired, attackers could re-register it to gain access and then receive password resets sent from Twitter. The article revealed the savvy but not necessarily sophisticated ways terrorist groups are exploiting big tech's security shortcomings, and identified a dangerous loophole for all sites to close.
Hackers are spreading Islamic State propaganda by hijacking dormant Twitter accounts
Porn & gambling apps slip past Apple
Josh Constine found dozens of pornography and real-money gambling apps had broken Apple's rules but avoided App Store review by abusing its enterprise certificate program — many based in China. The report revealed the weak and easily defrauded requirements to receive an enterprise certificate. Seven months later, Apple revealed a spike in porn and gambling app takedown requests from China. The investigation could push Apple to tighten its enterprise certificate policies, and proved the company has plenty of its own problems to handle despite CEO Tim Cook's frequent jabs at the policies of other tech giants.
Apple fails to block porn & gambling 'Enterprise' apps
Bonus: HQ Trivia employees fired for trying to remove CEO
This Game Of Thrones-worthy tale was too intriguing to leave out, even if the impact was more of a warning to all startup executives. Josh Constine's look inside gaming startup HQ Trivia revealed a saga of employee revolt in response to its CEO's ineptitude and inaction as the company nose-dived. Employees who organized a petition to the board to remove the CEO were fired, leading to further talent departures and stagnation. The investigation served to remind startup executives that they are responsible to their employees, who can exert power through collective action or their exodus.
Mutiny at HQ Trivia fails to oust CEO
If you have a tip for Josh Constine, you can reach him via encrypted Signal or text at (585)750-5674, joshc at TechCrunch dot com, or through Twitter DMs
Bolt raises €50M in venture debt from the EU to expand its ride-hailing business
Bolt, the billion-dollar startup out of Estonia that's building a ride-hailing, scooter and food delivery business across Europe and Africa, has picked up a tranche of funding in its bid to take on Uber and the rest in the world of on-demand transportation.
The company has picked up €50 million (about $56 million) from the European Investment Bank to continue developing its technology and safety features, as well as to expand newer areas of its business such as food delivery and personal transport like e-scooters.
With this latest money, Bolt has raised over €250 million in funding since opening for business in 2013 and as of its last equity round in July 2019 (when it raised $67 million), it was valued at over $1 billion, which Bolt has confirmed to me remains the valuation here.
Bolt further said that its service now has over 30 million users in 150 cities and 35 countries and is profitable in two-thirds of its markets.
"Bolt is a good example of European excellence in tech and innovation. As you say, to stand still is to go backwards, and Bolt is never standing still," said The EIB's Vice President Alexander Stubb in a statement. "The Bank is very happy to support the company in improving its services, as well as allowing it to branch out into new service fields. In other words, we're fully on board!"
The EIB is the non-profit, long-term lending arm of the European Union, and this financing in the form of a quasi-equity facility.
Also known as venture debt, the financing is structured as a loan, where repayment terms are based on a percentage of future revenue streams, and ownership is not diluted. The funding is backed in turn by the European Fund for Strategic Investments, as part of a bigger strategy to boost promising companies, and specifically riskier startups, in the tech industry. It expects to make and spur some €458.8 billion in investments across 1 million startups and SMEs.
Opting for "quasi-equity" loan instead of a straight equity or debt investment is attractive to Bolt for a couple of reasons. One is fact that the funding comes without ownership dilution is one attractive factor of the funding. Two is the endorsement and support of the EU itself, in a market category where tech disruptors have been known to run afoul of regulators and lawmakers, in part because of the ubiquity and nature of the transportation/mobility industry.
"Mobility is one of the areas where Europe will really benefit from a local champion who shares the values of European consumers and regulators," said Martin Villig, the co-founder and CEO of Bolt, in a statement. :Therefore, we are thrilled to have the European Investment Bank join the ranks of Bolt's backers as this enables us to move faster towards serving many more people in Europe."
(Butting heads with authorities is something that Bolt is no stranger to: it tried to enter the lucrative London taxi market through a backdoor to bypass the waiting time to get a license. It really didn't work, and the company had to wait another 21 months to come to London doing it by the book. In its first six months of operation in London, the company has picked up 1.5 million customers.)
While private VCs account for the majority of startup funding, backing from government groups is an interesting and strategic route for tech companies that are making waves in large industries that sit adjacent to technology. Before it was acquired by PayPal, IZettle also picked up a round from funding from the EIB specifically to invest in its AI R&D. Navya, the self-driving bus and shuttle startup, has also raised money from the EIB in the past.
One of the big issues with on-demand transportation companies has been its safety record — indeed, this is at the center of Uber's latest scuffle in Europe, where London's transport regulator has rejected a license renewal for the company over concerns about Uber's safety record. (Uber is appealing and while it does, it's business as usual. )
So it's no surprise that with this funding, Bolt says that it will be specifically using the money to develop technology to "improve the safety, reliability and sustainability of its services while maintaining the high efficiency of the company's operations."
Bolt is one of a group of companies that have been hatched out of Estonia, which has worked to position itself as a leader in Europe's tech industry as part of its own economic regeneration in the decades after existing as part of the Soviet Union (it formally left in 1990). The EIB has invested around €830 million in Estonian projects in the last five years.
"Estonia is as the forefront of digital transformation in Europe," said Paolo Gentiloni, European Commissioner for the Economy, in a statement. "I am proud that Europe, through the Investment Plan, supports Estonian platform Bolt's research and development strategy to create innovative and safe services that will enhance urban mobility."
Hyundai to build air taxis for Uber's future aerial ride share network
02:20 | 7 January
Hyundai Motor is partnering with Uber to develop and potentially mass produce air taxis for a future aerial ride share network.
The partnership is the latest addition to Uber Elevate's growing network that includes Aurora Flight Sciences, which is now a subsidiary of Boeing, Bell, Embraer, Joby Aviation, Pipistrel Aircraft, Karem Aircraft and Jaunt Air Mobility. Uber has also entered into a real estate partnerships with Hillwood Properties, Related, Macquire, Oaktree and Signature
Uber Elevate has previously said it plans to start flight demonstrations in 2020 and have commercially available to riders in 2023.
Hyundai made the announcement Monday at a press conference ahead of CES 2020, the annual tech trade show in Las Vegas. The automaker also unveiled a four-seater aircraft concept called SA-1, which was created in part through Uber's open design process.
Under the partnership, Hyundai will produce and deploy the air vehicles, and Uber will provide airspace support services, connections to ground transportation and customer interfaces through an aerial ride share network. Both parties are collaborating on infrastructure concepts to support take-off and landing for this new class of vehicles, the companies said in a joint release.
"Hyundai is our first vehicle partner with experience of manufacturing passenger cars on a global scale," said Eric Allison, head of Uber Elevate. "We believe Hyundai has the potential to build Uber Air vehicles at rates unseen in the current aerospace industry, producing high quality, reliable aircraft at high volumes to drive down passenger costs per trip."
Hyundai's model unveiled at CES is designed to cruise at speeds up to 180 miles per hour and at an altitude of 1,000 to 2,000 feet above ground, and a flying range of up to 60 miles. The concept vehicle will be all-electric, using distributed electric propulsion, powered by multiple rotors and propellers around the airframe.
Hyundai says the design, which uses smaller rotors, will be quieter than large rotor helicopters. The vehicle will require a human driver, or pilot, but the company claims it will become autonomous.
Startups Weekly: Oyo's toxicity + A farewell
Welcome back to Startups Weekly, a weekend newsletter that dives into the week's noteworthy startups and venture capital news. Before I jump into today's topic, let's catch up a bit. Last week I wrote about the startups we lost in 2019. Before that, I noted the defining moments of VC in 2019.
Unfortunately, this will be my last newsletter, as
for a new opportunity. Don't worry, Startups Weekly isn't going anywhere. We'll have a new writer taking over the weekly update soon enough; in the meantime, TechCrunch editor Henry Pickavet will be at the helm. You can still get in touch with me on Twitter @KateClarkTweets.
If you're new here, you can subscribe to Startups Weekly here. Lots of good content will be coming your way in 2020.
India's WeWork?
TechCrunch reporter Manish Singh penned an interesting piece on the state of Indian startups this week: As Indian startups raise record capital, losses are widening (Extra Crunch membership required). In it, he claims the financial performance of India's largest startups are cause for concern. Gems like Flipkart, BigBasket and Paytm have lost a collective $3 billion in the last year.
"What is especially troublesome for startups is that there is no clear path for how they would ever generate big profits," he writes. "Silicon Valley companies, for instance, have entered and expanded into India in recent years, investing billions of dollars in local operations, but yet, India has yet to make any substantial contribution to their bottom lines. If that wasn't challenging enough, many Indian startups compete directly with Silicon Valley giants, which while impressive, is an expensive endeavor."
Manish's story came one day after The New York Times published an in-depth report on Oyo, a tech-enabled budget hotel chain and rising star in the Indian tech community. The NYT wrote that Oyo offers unlicensed rooms and has bribed police officials to deter trouble, among other toxic practices.
Whether Oyo, backed by billions from the SoftBank Vision Fund, will become India's WeWork is the real cause for concern. India's startup ecosystem is likely to face a number of barriers as it grows to compete with the likes of Silicon Valley.
Follow Manish here or on Twitter for more of TechCrunch's growing India coverage.
Venture capital highlights (it's been a slow week)
Brazil's Loft nabs $175M from a16z, Vulcan
Shipfix raises $4.5M seed for its dry cargo shipping platform
InsightFinder gets $2M seed to automate outage prevention
The 5 biggest rounds in tech in 2019
A look at Utah's biggest venture rounds of 2019
In the shadow of Amazon and Microsoft, Seattle startups are having a moment
How to find the right reporter to pitch your startup
If you've still not subscribed to Extra Crunch, now is the time. Longtime TechCrunch reporter and editor Josh Constine is launching a new series to teach you how to pitch your startup. In it he will examine embargoes, exclusives, press kit visuals, interview questions and more. The first of many, How to find the right reporter to pitch your startup, is online now.
Subscribe to Extra Crunch here.
#EquityPod
Another week, another new episode of TechCrunch's venture capital-focused podcast, Equity. This week, we discussed a few of 2019's largest scandals, Peloton's strange holiday ad and the controversy over at the luggage startup Away. Listen here and be sure to subscribe, too.
For anyone wondering about changes at Equity following my departure from TechCrunch, the lovely Alex Wilhelm (founding Equity co-host) will keep the show alive and, soon enough, there will be a brand new co-host in my place. Please keep supporting the show and be sure to recommend it to all your podcast-adoring friends.
Alphabet-backed primary care startup One Medical files to go public
One Medical, a San Francisco-based primary care startup with tech-infused, concierge services filed for an IPO with the Securities and Exchange Commission today.
Internal medicine doctor Tom Lee founded the startup, now valued at well-over $1 billion dollars, in 2007. Lee exited his company in 2017, leaving it in the hands of former UnitedHealth group executive Amir Rubin.
The startup currently operates 72 health clinics in nine major cities throughout the U.S., with three more markets expected to open in 2020 and has raised just over $500 in venture capital from it's biggest investor, the Carlyle Group (which owns just over a quarter of shares), Alphabet's GV, J.P. Morgan and others. Google also incorporates One Medical into its campuses and accounts for about 10% of the company revenue, according to the SEC filing. The filing also mentions the company, which is officially incorporated as 1Life Healthcare Inc. ONEM, now plans to raise about $100 million.
Presumably, this money will help the company improve upon its technology and expand to more markets. We've reached out to One Medical for more and so far have only been referred to its wire statement.
According to that statement, One Medical has applied for a listing as ticker symbol, ONEM under its common stock on the Nasdaq Global Select Market.
2019 Africa Roundup: Jumia IPOs, China goes digital, Nigeria becomes fintech capital
12:53 | 30 December
2019 brought more global attention to Africa's tech scene than perhaps any previous year.
A high profile IPO, visits by both Jacks (Ma and Dorsey), and big Chinese startup investment energized that.
The last 12 months served as a grande finale to 10 years that saw triple digit increases in startup formation and VC on the continent.
Here's an overview of the 2019 market events that captured attention and capped off a decade of rapid growth in African tech.
The story of the year is the April IPO on the NYSE of Pan-African e-commerce company Jumia. This was the first listing of a VC backed tech company operating in Africa on a major global exchange — which brought its own unpredictability.
Founded in 2012, Jumia pioneered much of its infrastructure to sell goods to consumers online in Africa.
With Nigeria as its base market, the Rocket Internet backed company created accompanying delivery and payments services and went on to expand online verticals into 14 Africa countries (though it recently exited a few). Jumia now sells everything from mobile-phones to diapers and offers online services such as food-delivery and classifieds.
Seven years after its operational launch, Jumia's stock debut kicked off with fanfare in 2019, only to be followed by volatility.
The online retailer gained investor confidence out of the gate, more than doubling its $14.95 opening share price post IPO.
That lasted until May, when Jumia's stock came under attack from short-seller Andrew Left, whose firm Citron Research issued a report accusing the company of fraud. The American activist investor's case was bolstered, in part, by a debate that played out
on Jumia's legitimacy as an African startup, given its (primarily) European senior management.
The entire affair was further complicated during Jumia's second quarter earnings call when the company disclosed a fraud perpetrated by some of its employees and sales agents. Jumia's CEO Sacha Poignonnec emphasized the matter was closed, financially marginal and not the same as Andrew Left's short-sell claims.
Pan-African e-tailer Jumia grows 3Q revenue, e-payments and losses
Whatever the balance, Jumia's 2019 ups and downs cast a cloud over its stock with investors. Since the company's third-quarter earnings-call, Jumia's NYSE share-price has lingered at around $6 — less than half of its original $14.95 opening, and roughly 80% lower than its high.
Even with Jumia's post-IPO rocky road, the continent's leading e-commerce company still has heap of capital and is on pace to generate over $100 million in revenues in 2019 (albeit with big losses).
The company plans reduce costs by generating more revenue from higher-margin internet services, such as payments and classifieds.
There's a fairly simple equation for Jumia to rebuild shareholder confidence in 2020: avoid scandals, increase revenues over losses. And now that the company's publicly traded — with financial reporting requirements — there'll be four earnings calls a year to evaluate Jumia's progress.
Jumia may not be the continent's standout IPO for much longer. Events in 2019 point to Interswitch becoming the second African digital company to list on a global exchange in 2020. The Nigerian fintech firm confirmed to TechCrunch in November it had reached a billion-dollar unicorn valuation, after a (reported) $200 million investment by Visa.
Nigeria's Interswitch confirms $1B valuation after Visa investment
Founded in 2002 by Mitchell Elegbe, Interswitch created much of the initial infrastructure to digitize Nigeria's (then) predominantly cash-based economy. Interswitch has been teasing a public listing since 2016, but delayed it for various reasons. With the company's billion-dollar valuation in 2019, that pause is likely to end.
"An [Interswitch] IPO is still very much in the cards; likely sometime in the first half of 2020," a source with knowledge of the situation told TechCrunch.
China-Africa goes digital
2019 was the year when Chinese actors pivoted to African tech. China is known for its strategic relationship with Africa based (largely) on trade and infrastructure. Over the last 10 years, the country has been less engaged in the continent's digital-scene.
That was until a torrent of investment and partnerships this past year.
July saw Chinese-owned Opera raise $50 million in venture spending to support its growing West African digital commercial network, which includes browser, payments and ride-hail services.
In August, San Francisco and Lagos-based fintech startup Flutterwave partnered with Chinese e-commerce company Alibaba's Alipay to offer digital payments between Africa and China.
In September, China's Transsion — the largest smartphone seller in Africa — listed in an IPO on Shanghai's new STAR Market. The company raised ≈ $394 million, some of which it is directing toward venture funding and operational expansion in Africa.
The last quarter of 2019 brought a November surprise from China in African tech. Over 15 Chinese investors placed over $240 million in three rounds. Transsion backed consumer payments startup PalmPay raised a $40 million seed, stating its goal to become "Africa's largest financial services platform."
Chinese investors also backed Opera-owned OPay's $120 million raise and East-African trucking logistics company Lori Systems' (reported) $30 million Series B.
In the new year, TechCrunch will continue to cover the business arc of this surge in Chinese tech investment in Africa. There'll surely be a number of fresh macro news-points to develop, given the debate (and critique) of China's role in Africa.
Nigeria and fintech
On debate, the case could be made that 2019 was the year when Nigeria become Africa's unofficial capital for fintech investment and digital finance startups.
Kenya has held this title hereto, with the local success and global acclaim of its M-Pesa mobile-money product. But more founders and VCs are opting for Nigeria as the epicenter for digital finance growth on the continent.
A rough tally of 2019 TechCrunch coverage — including previously mentioned rounds — pegs fintech related investment in the West African country at around $400 million over the last 12 months. That's equivalent to roughly one-third of all startup VC raised for the entire continent in 2018, according to Partech stats.
From OPay to PalmPay to Visa — startups, big finance companies and investors are making Nigeria home-base for their digital finance operations and outward expansion in Africa.
The founder of early-stage payment startup ChipperCash, Ham Serunjogi, explained the imperative to operate in the West African country. "Nigeria is the largest economy and most populous country in Africa. Its fintech industry is one of the most advanced in Africa, up there with Kenya and South Africa," he told TechCrunch in May.
When all the 2019 VC numbers are counted, it will be worth matching up Nigeria to Kenya to see how the countries compared for fintech specific investment over the last year.
Tech acquisitions continue to be somewhat rare in Africa, but there were several to note in 2019. Two of the continent's powerhouse tech incubators joined forces in September, when Nigerian innovation center and seed-fund CcHub acquired Nairobi based iHub, for an undisclosed amount.
The acquisition brought together Africa's most powerful tech hubs by membership networks, volume of programs, startups incubated and global visibility. It also elevated CcHub's Bosun Tijani standing across Africa's tech ecosystem, as the CEO of the new joint-entity, which also has a VC arm.
CcHub/iHub CEO Bosun Tijani
In other acquisition activity, French television company Canal+ acquired the ROK film studio from Nigerian VOD company IROKOtv, for an undisclosed amount. The deal put ROK founder and producer Mary Njoku in charge of a new organization with larger scope and resources.
Many outside Africa aren't aware that Nigeria's Nollywood is the Hollywood of the continent and one of the largest film industries (by production volume) in the world. Canal+ told TechCrunch it looks to bring Mary and the Nollywood production ethos to produce content in French speaking African countries.
Other notable 2019 African tech takeovers included Kenyan internet company BRCK's acquisition of internet provider Surf, Nigerian digital-lending startup OneFi's Amplify buy and Merck KGaa's purchase of Kenya-based online healthtech company ConnectMed.
Moto ride-hail mania
In 2019, Africa's motorcycle ride-hail market — worth an estimated $4 billion — saw a flurry of investment and expansion by startups looking to scale on-demand taxi services. Uber and Bolt got into the motorcycle taxi business in Africa in 2018.
Ampersand in Rwanda
A number of local and foreign startups have continued to grow in key countries, such as Nigeria, Uganda and Kenya.
A battle for funding and market-share emerged in Nigeria in 2019, between key moto ride-hail startups Max.ng, Gokada, and Opera owned ORide.
The on-demand motorcycle market in Africa has attracted foreign investment and moved toward EV development. In May, MAX.ng raised a $7 million Series A round with participation from Yamaha and is using a portion to pilot renewable energy powered e-motorcycles in Africa.
In August, the government of Rwanda announced a national policy to phase out gas-motorcycle taxis altogether in favor of e-motos, in partnership with early-stage EV startup Ampersand.
New funds
The year 2019 saw several new funding initiatives for Africa's startups. Senegalese VC investor Marieme Diop helped spearhead Dakar Network Angels, a seed-fund for startups in French-speaking Africa — or 24 of the continent's 54 countries.
Africinvest teamed up with Cathay Innovation to announce the Cathay Africinvest Innovation Fund, a $100+ million capital pool aimed at Series A to C-stage startup investments in fintech, logistics, AI, agtech and edutech.
Accion Venture Lab launched a $24 million fintech fund open to African startups.
And Naspers offered more details on who can pitch to its 1.4 billion rand (≈$100 million) Naspers Foundry fund and made its first investment in online cleaning services company SweepSouth.
Closed up shop
Like any tech ecosystem, not every startup in Africa killed it or even continued to tread water in 2019. Two e-commerce companies — DealDey in Nigeria and Afrimarket in Ivory Coast — closed up digital shop.
Southern Africa's Econet Media shut down its Kwese TV digital entertainment business in August.
And South Africa based, Pan-African focused cryptocurrency payment startup Wala ceased operations in June. Founder Tricia Martinez named the continent's poor infrastructure as one of the culprits to shutting down. A possible signal to the startup's demise could have been its 2017 ICO, where Wala netted only 4% of its $30 million token-offering.
Africa's startups go global
2019 saw more startups expand products and business models developed in Africa to new markets abroad. In March, Flexclub — a South African venture that matches investors and drivers to cars for ride-hailing services — announced its expansion to Mexico in a partnership with Uber.
In May, ExtraCrunch profiled three African founded fintech startups — Flutterwave, Migo and ChipperCash — developing their business models strategically in Africa toward plans to offer their products in other regions.
These startups are locating in SF and Africa to win in global fintech
By December, Migo (formerly branded Mines) had announced its expansion to Brazil on a $20 million Series B raise.
As we look to what could come in the new year and decade for African tech, it's telling to look back. Ten years ago, there were a lot of "if" questions on whether the continent's ecosystem could produce certain events: billion dollar startup valuations, IPOs on major exchanges, global expansion, investment from the world's top VCs.
All those questionable events of the past have become reality in African tech, even if some of them are still in low abundance.
There's no crystal ball for any innovation ecosystem — not the least Africa's — but there are several things I'll be on the lookout for in 2020 and beyond.
Two In the near term, start with what Twitter/Square CEO Jack Dorsey may do around Bitcoin and cryptocurrency on his return to Africa (lookout for an upcoming TechCrunch feature on this).
I'll also follow the next-phase of e-commerce in Africa, which could pit Jumia more competitively against DHL's Africa eShop, Opera and China's Alibaba (which hasn't yet entered Africa in full).
On a longer-term basis, a development to follow is how the continent's first wave of millionaire and billionaire tech-founders could disrupt dynamics around politics, power, and philanthropy in Africa — hopefully for the better.
More notable 2019 Africa-related coverage @TechCrunch
Nigeria's #StopRobbingUs campaign could spur tech advocacy group, CEOs say
Africa can list more gazelles at home than unicorn IPOs abroad
Kenya's Twiga Foods eyes West Africa after $30M raise led by Goldman
Africa-focused Andela cuts 400 staff as it confirms $50M in revenue
Facebook's latest account purge exposes Africa's misinformation problem
Ethiopia's bid to become an African startup hub hinges on connectivity
Lessons from M-Pesa for Africa's new VC-rich fintech startups
#ANGELS founding partner raises $25M for debut fund Moxxie Ventures
Katie Jacobs Stanton, a former Twitter executive and co-founder of the #ANGELS investment collective, has raised $25 million for her debut venture capital fund Moxxie Ventures.
As the sole general partner, she plans to invest between $250,000 and $500,000 in underrepresented and underestimated founders, Stanton tells TechCrunch, with a focus on "products that make life and work better."
Stanton co-founded #ANGELS alongside Chloe Sladden, Jessica Verrilli, April Underwood, Vijaya Gadde and Jana Messerschmidt in 2014 with a goal of getting more women on startup cap tables. The #ANGELS, four of whom are Moxxie limited partners, share deal flow but invest in startups independently. Stanton said she will continue her work with the collective as she ramps up Moxxie Ventures.
"I wanted more agency over the types of companies I wanted to back," Stanton said of her decision to raise capital from LPs rather than stick to investing personal capital. As for her decision to invest primarily in minority entrepreneurs, Stanton cited recent statistics.
In 2019, just 2.8% of U.S. venture capital invested went to female-led startups, a small increase from last year's 2.2%. Despite efforts from new organizations like All Raise, venture capital firms tapping their first-ever female check-writers or new funds cropping up focused on the underfunded, the latest data paints a disappointing picture.
"We just aren't moving fast enough," Stanton said. "We need to take bigger swings to move the needle faster. The fastest way to make progress isn't to move inside those existing institutions but by creating new ones."
Stanton is not new to investing, having built a portfolio of some 40 companies over the last several years, including Cameo, Carta, Coinbase, Ethel's Club, Lambda School, Literati, Modern Fertility, Shape Security and Threads. As such, she was able to raise the $25 million effort in roughly six months. However, even with an extensive network of Silicon Valley heavyweights, Stanton said she pitched 279 individuals and organizations before closing the fund: "I told myself if I'm not getting rejected daily, I'm not trying hard enough."
The process made her a better investor, she said. A whopping 29% of the entities she initiated conversations with ghosted her after an initial reply indicating interest. "A fast no is a lot better than a long maybe," she said. "It's kind of like we went on these dates — it's not like we had a great date — and I never heard from him again."
Entrepreneurs, of course, are all too familiar with the concept of ghosting, as venture capital investors are prone to disappearing or elongating an eventual "sorry, we're not interested."
Moxxie enters the market at an interesting time for venture capital fundraising and investing. There are more funds than ever deploying more capital than ever. In fact, there are so many new sub-$100 million funds, there are new names to differentiate the sub $25 million funds, or nano funds, from the $25 million to $100 million funds, or micro funds. In total, U.S. VCs were expected to dole out more than $120 billion this year, surpassing last year's all-time high of $117 billion.
The frothy markets have allowed entrepreneurs to be pickier than in the past, leading to swelling valuations and frustrated investors. Stanton, like any optimistic VC, said she plans to be very disciplined and committed to the strategy she pitched LPs, meaning she will do her best to avoid the buzzy Y Combinator graduates that seek a $37 million valuation right out of the gate.
"People are raising a lot more money now just because they can," Stanton said. "I am trying to maintain some discipline and have some constraints around the valuation. When I hear things valued at $20 million at seed pre-revenue, I just back away. There's going to be a correction at some point and I worry for those founders."
Moxxie has invested in four startups to date, including women's professional network Elpha, hiring platform Purple Dot, a soon-to-launch tool for arranging meetings called Sesh and Honeycomb Labs, a parenting tech startup.
"My kids were encouraging me to do this and I realized it really just takes courage to do what founders do every day and to create something from nothing," Stanton said of the firm's name, Moxxie. "I added the extra X for the female chromosome because of my passion for the broader female founder and investor community."
I'm really proud of this," she added. "It's the scariest thing I've ever done but it's something that I think is important to do."
Professional network for women Elpha raises seed funding
Domio raises $100M in equity and debt to take on Airbnb and hotels with its curated apartments
Airbnb has well and truly disrupted the world of travel accommodation, changing the conversation not just around how people discover and book places to stay, but what they expect when they get there, and what they expect to pay. Today, one of the startups riding that wave is announcing a significant round of funding to fuel its own contribution to the marketplace.
Domio, a startup that designs and then rents out apart-hotels with kitchens and other full-home experiences, has raised $100 million, $50 million in equity and $50 million in debt, to expand its business in the US and globally to 25 markets by next year, up from 12 today. Its target customers are younger, millennials travelling in groups, or families swayed by the size and scope of the accommodation — typically five times bigger than the average hotel room — as well as the price, which is on average 25% cheaper than a hotel room.
The Series B, which actually closed in August of this year, was led by GGV Capital, with participation from Eldridge Industries, 3L Capital, Tribeca Venture Partners, Softbank NY, Tenaya Capital and Upper90. Upper90 also led the debt round, which will be used to lease and set up new properties.
Domio is not disclosing its valuation, but Jay Roberts, the founder and CEO, said in an interview that it's a "huge upround" and around 50x the valuation it had in its seed round and that the company has tripled its revenues in the last year. Prior to this, Domio had only raised around $17 million, according to data from PitchBook.
For some comparisons, Sonder — another company that rents out serviced apartments to the kind of travellers who have a taste for boutique hotels — earlier this year raised $225 million at a valuation north of $1 billion. Others like Guesty, which are building platforms for others to list and manage their apartments on platforms like Airbnb, recently raised $35 million with a valuation likely in the range of $180 million to $200 million. Airbnb is estimated to be valued around $31 billion.
Domio plays in an interesting corner of the market. For starters, it focuses its accommodations at many of the same demographics as an Airbnb. But where Airbnb offers a veritable hodgepodge of rooms and homes — some are people's homes, some are vacation places, some never had and never will have a private occupant, and across all those the range of quality varies wildly — Domio offers predictability and consistency with its (possibly more anodyne) inventory.
"We are competing with amateur hosts on Airbnb," said Roberts, who previously worked in real estate investment banking. "This is the next step, a modern brand, the next Marriott but with a more tech-powered brain and operating model." These are not to be confused with something like Hilton's Homewood Suites, Roberts stressed to me. He referred to Homewood as "a soulless hotel chain."
"Domio is the anti-hotel chain," he added.
Roberts is also quick to describe how Domio is not a real estate company as much as it is a tech-powered business. For starters, it uses quant-style algorithms that it's built in-house to identify regions where it wants to build out its business, basing it not just on what consumers are searching for, but also weather patterns, economic indicators and other factors. After identifying a city or other location, it works on securing properties.
It typically sets up its accommodations in newer or completely new buildings, where developers — at least up to now — are not usually constructing with short-term rentals in mind. Instead, they are considering an option like Domio as an alternative to selling as condominiums or apartments, something that might come up if they are sensing that there is a softening in the market. "We typically have 75%-78% occupancy," Roberts said. He added that hotels on average have occupancy rates in the high 60% nationally.
As Domio lengthens its track record — its 12 U.S. markets include Miami, Los Angeles, Philadelphia and Phoenix — Roberts says that they're getting a more select seat at the table in conversations.
"Investors are starting to go out buy properties on our behalf and lease them to us," he said. This gives the startup a much more favorable rate and terms on those deals. "The next step is that Domio will manage these directly." The most recent property it signed, he noted, includes a Whole Foods at the ground level and a gym.
Using technology to identify where to grow is not the only area where tech plays a role. Roberts said that the company is now working on an app — yet to be released — that will be the epicenter of how guests interact to book places and manage their experience once there.
"Everything you can do by speaking to a human in a traditional hotel you will be able to do with the Domio app," he said. That will include ordering room service, getting more towels, booking experiences and getting restaurant recommendations. "You can book your Uber through the Domio app, or sync your Spotify account to play music in the apartment.
There are plans to extend the retail experience too using the app. Roberts says it will be a "shoppable" experience where, if you like a sofa or piece of art in the place where you're staying, you can order it for your own home. You can even order the same wallpaper that's been designed to decorate Domio apartments.
Ripe for the booking
Although Airbnb has grown to be nearly as ubiquitous as hotels (and perhaps even more prominent, depending on who you are talking to), the wider travel and accommodation market is still ripe for the taking, estimated to reach $171 billion by 2023 and the highest growth sector in the travel industry.
"Airbnb has taught us that hotels are not the only to stay," said Hans Tung, GGV's managing partner. "Domio is capitalizing on the global shift in short-term travel and the consumer demand for branded experiences. From my travels around the world, there is a large, underserved audience – millennials, families, business teams – who prefer the combined benefits of an apartment and hotel in a single branded experience."
I mentioned to Roberts that the leasing model reminded me a little of WeWork, which itself does not own the property it curates and turns into office space for its tenants. (The Softbank investor connection is interesting in that regard.) Roberts was very quick to say that it's not the same kind of business, even if both are based around leased property re-rented out to tenants.
"One of the things we liked about Domio is that is very capital efficient," said Tung, "focusing on the model and payback period. The short-term nature of customer stays and the combination of experience/price required for to maintain loyal customers are natural enforcers of efficient unit economics."
"For GGV, Domio stands out in two ways," he continued. "First, CEO Jay Roberts and the Domio team's emphasis on execution is impressive, with expansion in to 12 cities in just three years. They have the right combination of vision, speed and agility. Domio's model can readily tap into the global opportunity as they have ambition to scale to new markets. The global travel and tourism spend is $2.8 trillion with 5 billion annual tourists. Global travellers like having the flexibility and convenience of both an apartment and hotel – with Domio they can have both."
Google details its approach to cloud-native security
Over the years, Google's various whitepapers, detailing how the company solves specific problems at scale, have regularly spawned new startup ecosystems and changed how other enterprises think about scaling their own tools. Today, the company is publishing a new security whitepaper that details how it keeps it cloud-native architecture safe.
The name, BeyondProd, already indicates that this is an extension of the BeyondCorp zero trust system the company first introduced a few years ago. While BeyondCorp is about shifting security away from VPNs and firewalls on the perimeter to the individual users and devices, BeyondProd focuses on Google's zero trust approach to how it connects machines, workloads and services.
Unsurprisingly, BeyondProd is based on pretty much the same principles as BeyondCorp, including network protection at the end, no mutual trust between services, trusted machines running known code, automated and standardized change rollout, and isolated workloads. All of this, of course, focuses on securing cloud-native application that generally communicate over APIs and run on modern infrastructure.
"Altogether, these controls mean that containers and the microservices running inside can be deployed, communicate with each other, and run next to each other, securely; without burdening individual microservice developers with the security and implementation details of the underlying infrastructure," Google explains.
Google, of course, notes that it is making all of these features available to developers through its own services like GKE and Anthos, its hybrid cloud platform. In addition, though, the company also stresses that a lot of its open-source tools also allow enterprises to build systems that adhere to the same platforms, including the likes of Envoy, Istio, gVisor and others.
"n the same way that BeyondCorp helped us to evolve beyond a perimeter-based security model, BeyondProd represents a similar leap forward in our approach to production security," Google says. "By applying the security principles in the BeyondProd model to your own cloud-native infrastructure, you can benefit from our experience, to strengthen the deployment of your workloads, how your their communications are secured, and how they affect other workloads."
You can read the full whitepaper here.
San Diego's Trust & Will raises $6 million for online estate planning
Estate planning in the U.S. is a $180 billion industry and unlike many of the other areas in the multi-trillion dollar financial services market, it's one that has yet to see a slew of technology companies come in to try and improve efficiencies.
One notable exception is Trust & Will, the San Diego-based startup that has announced a new $6 million investment to expand sales and marketing, product development and partnerships.
The company joins services like Quicken's WillMaker and startups like Everplans as relatively new entrants into the technology-enabled estate planning business.
Timing seems good for the company and its other competitors. The $180 billion estate planning business is expected to surge as millennials start having children and begin thinking about their wills. It joins other staid businesses like life insurance and home insurance as a category that's traditionally been overlooked by entrepreneurs who now see increasingly digital customers make demands of industry participants.
Right now, half of all adults in the U.S. have no will and millions more have out-of-date estate plans, according to Trust & Will. In addition, 45 million parents with minor children have no form of estate plan.
Since its launch in April, Trust & Will has had 60,000 members enroll in the company's platform and those enrollments represent $15.1 billion in total assets, $2.7 billion in reported life insurance policies, $137 million in charitable commitments and 88% holding real estate assets.
The company has a tiered subscription model offering a $399-$499 service plus an annual subscription fee for the creation of a trust-based estate plan that the company says can avoid probate for the protection and transfer of assets; a $69-$129 level, which includes plans for surviving beneficiaries and asset distribution; and a $39-$49 plan for parents with minor children who aren't ready to complete a will.
While customers may be able to draft a will themselves and just store it in a safe place, some people will likely gravitate to a digital will. At least, that's what Link Ventures, Revolution's Rise of the Rest Seed Fund, Western Technology Investment, Techstars Ventures, Luma Launch and Halogen Ventures are hoping for with their commitment to the company's Series A financing.
In January the company closed its first electronic will with help from its industry partner, Notarize. Co-founded by serial entrepreneur Cody Barbo, former product ad marketing strategist, Daniel Goldstein, and product designer Brian Lamb, the company now counts eleven people on staff.
"Trust & Will is another example of how digital services are disrupting traditional industries by offering a convenient and lower cost estate planning solution that helps consumers protect their valuable assets and loved ones," said Rob Chaplinsky, a managing director at Trust & Will's series A lead investor, Link Ventures. "We have been following this category for quite some and feel that Trust and Will's product and rapid market traction are second to none. We look forward to leveraging our big data assets to help them scale."
Walmart retreats from its UK Asda business to hone its focus on competing with Amazon
Peter Short
Evolve Foundation launches a $100 million fund to find startups working to relieve human suffering
Money will give hope
Boeing will build DARPA's XS-1 experimental spaceplane
Is a "robot tax" really an "innovation penalty"?
It need to be taxed also any organic substance ie food than is used as a calorie transfer needs tax…
Twitter Is Testing A Dedicated GIF Button On Mobile
Sounds great Facebook got a button a few years ago
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Apple's Next iPhone Rumored To Debut On September 9th
Looks like a nice cycle of a round year;)
AncestryDNA And Google's Calico Team Up To Study Genetic Longevity
I'm still fascinated by DNA though I favour pure chemistry what could be
Offered is for future gen…
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Whee! All The Way Home: Boo!
"Someone came and sat on my bed and talked to me last night," Youngest said a couple of nights ago as he got into bed for the night. "I'm scared."
Considering Pete and I always come and sit on his bed when he first gets in to go to sleep, I am puzzled by this. Here I thought it was a comfort for us to chat with him before he fades into sleep. And instead it's got him scared. Say what?
"No, it wasn't anyone I know. It was a stranger. It was a ghost," he said.
He spoke as if he was telling the absolute truth, as if he was wide awake and aware of it happening, and as if it could in no way be a dream. And the hair on my neck stood up, just like "they" say it does when you're frightened, and I got goose bumps down my arms. Inside, I'm freaking out because I'm a genuine scaredy cat.
But I'm totally cool on the outside as I assure him that it was a dream and that no one else could get in the house except the people who love him and that since it was a dream it won't happen again and that Dad and I are always right up there for him to come to or yell to if he has another bad dream.
Off to sleep he goes, of course, assured by his outwardly self-assured mother.
Last night, Daughter cries out and Pete goes to her. She had not yet fallen asleep. She could not fall asleep because, as she explains to Pete, Youngest's friend said he saw a ghost in the house last night. Pete relays the conversation to me when he returns upstairs, and I have the same physical reactions I had the other night.
I relate my conversation with Youngest from the other night to Pete, and I wonder aloud if it doesn't seem just a bit too weird, too coincidental. Of course, there's no such thing as ghosts. I know that.
So why, as I am writing this, do I feel my neck hairs rising and goose bumps shooting down my arms?
Because even though I know there's no such things as ghosts and certainly no such thing as ghosts in my house, I know that saying such a thing is just inviting a good haunting here. So let me just say for the record that, surely, there must be such a thing as ghosts.
I never believed there were ghosts either. Then I stayed at a B&B in Shreveport that left me uncertain. It freaked me out. On multiple occasions and while awake. Then I had trouble falling back to sleep and since sleep is important while working, I told myself that I switched places to stay because of that. Sleep. Not ghosts.
I've had weird stuff happen like that (usually when I'm alone) that raises the hair on my arms.
Wishing you a very happy and healthy new year!
I believe...I believe...it's scary, I know...but, I believe.
My daughter freaked me out one time just like Youngest did you. She spoke so matter of factly and it struck such stark fear in my heart. Especially when she said something like, "Will you miss me when Gabriel takes me away? I'll miss you." Gasp!
Well, I'm jealous. After my Mom died, I read all of these books about the afterlife, and how children are so responsive to spirits, and how many of them have conversations with their grandparents. Surely, I thought, with four young ones in my house, I would have a direct link to my Mom.
Nothing like this has even remotely happened around here. Almost makes me stop believing in spirits.
That was certainly a creepy story. Maybe the ghost is there protecting all of you and keeping you safe. If I were you, that would be my story and I would stick to it. Good luck!
I'm playing the other side here, just for argument's sake. Why can't there be ghosts? I think I'm a rational, well-educated person, and I believe I've seen one. At my dad's farmhouse, four separate individuals (all adults) have had a the same bed shake them awake. I'd suggest getting some holy water and sprinkling the house.
My friend swears the farmhouse she grew up in had ghosts. We live in an old house, likely it was a farmhouse at one point. It seems to be ghost-free, thankfully. 'Cause we would have to move.
Okay, now I'm creeped out. I have to go close the closet door.
Where is Peter? Is he the dapper gent in the middle with the big orange head, perhaps?
Oh, a lifetime of freaky-leaky happenings have left me utterly convinced that there are most certainly ghosts.
Having said that, I also think that little kids are not great at telling the difference between sleeping and being awake. So maybe. Maybe not.
I believe, too. When my daughter told me she was afraid of the angel on our roof, I had the same hair-prickling reaction you did. We just smudged our house before Christmas. I hope that did the trick.
OK, now I am totally freaked out too. Thanks!
Now I've got goosebumps too. My son has had a strange preoccupation with ghosts lately and he's been scared to death to be anywhere in the house alone. He won't even go to the bathroom by himself for the last two weeks. I'm not sure how much I believe in coincidences.
I believe that ghosts exist. New Orleans is full of them. That doesn't necessarily mean there is one in your house. Because in addition to the were they sleeping or not questions is the are they saying/believing it at this point from having gotten worked up over the notion of it? At any rate, a friend of mine told me the advice she'd been given by someone else: if you encounter a ghost, ask him what his name is. I like this advice to if you're ever attacked by a shark, punch it in the nose. Of course you'll remember to do it! You won't be, you know, terrified enough to forget such strong, helpful advice.
That should have said "I likeN this advice..."


text:
Festuca elwendiana är en gräsart som beskrevs av Markgr.-dann. Festuca elwendiana ingår i släktet svinglar, och familjen gräs. Inga underarter finns listade i Catalogue of Life.

Källor

Svinglar
elwendiana

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


Living with someone who gamblesLiving with someone who gambles can be just as difficult as living with someone with any other kind of addiction. It can be very stressful and it can lead to the breakdown of your relationship.
How to help someone who gamblesIt is important to remember you are not the only person in this situation and there are lots of people who can help.


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Exclusive: Education Pioneers Founder to Step Down as CEO After 15-Year Push to Train Diverse School Leaders
By Mark Keierleber | May 1, 2018
Education Pioneers Founder and CEO Scott Morgan, left, will step down after 15 years on the job. Melissa Wu, who has been chief program officer at the nonprofit organization since last year, will be promoted to CEO. (Photo courtesy Education Pioneers)
.@scottmorgan1, founder and CEO of @edpioneers, to step down after 15 years
.@melissawu99 to become new CEO of @edpioneers after founder @scottmorgan1 steps down in June
Scott Morgan, the founder and CEO of the school leadership training program Education Pioneers, announced Tuesday he will step down from his role at the nonprofit in June — one day shy of the organization's 15th anniversary. Melissa Wu, who has served as the organization's chief program officer since last year, will become CEO effective June 15.
Morgan founded Education Pioneers in 2003 after serving as legal counsel at Aspire Public Schools, a charter school network with campuses in California and Tennessee. A former teacher and attorney, Morgan said he recognized at Aspire a benefit to building leaders by bringing together diverse candidates with backgrounds in education and business. More than a decade later, the organization he founded has trained nearly 4,000 education leaders through its fellowship programs focused on education leadership. Although fellows typically have professional training outside education, most go on to work in the field, in areas including data analysis, operations, finance, and human resources.
As the Oakland, California–based nonprofit approaches its 15th anniversary, Morgan said he reflected on Education Pioneers' "core values," which say one person or idea alone cannot solve the complex challenges public education is up against. Stepping back to look at the organization's next chapter, he discovered it could benefit from a leader with different skills and a new perspective.
"Our fundamental belief at Education Pioneers is about the power of people, and I truly believe that in education the most important question we're answering is not the question about what, it's the question about who," said Morgan, who is still exploring opportunities for the next step in his career. "I always hoped, ever since the earliest years, that I would be the type of founder who could step down from the CEO role when the time was right for the organization, and the time is right."
Wu came to Education Pioneers in 2017 after more than six years at TNTP, a national education nonprofit that recruits and trains teachers. Wu began her career at the TEAK Fellowship, a New York City–based after-school program that helps students from low-income families get into and succeed at top high schools. She previously hosted Education Pioneers fellows on her team at TNTP, she said, which helped motivate her decision to join the organization.
"[Education Pioneers] has built this strong network and this large body of alums who are doing incredible work in the field, so it felt like an exciting moment to me to both think about how you sustain that momentum, sustain it with real quality, and to think about what the next phase would look like," Wu said.
Education Pioneers began with a class of nine fellows working at seven education organizations, but it now trains nearly 400 education leaders per year. The nonprofit has partnered with more than 750 organizations across the country.
Education Pioneers offers a 10-week summer fellowship program, composed predominantly of graduate school students, and a 10-month impact fellowship, in which emerging leaders are recruited and placed with education organizations to focus on data and analytics and strategic project management.
School districts and charter school networks make up more than half of partnerships, but the group also places fellows at state education departments and other education nonprofits. Among Education Pioneers alumni, 53 percent identify as leaders of color, though the group has put a greater emphasis on diversity in recent years, Wu said.
"We recognize that we need leadership in education that reflects the really diverse communities that we're serving," Wu said. "We have a very deep and strong commitment to equitable outcomes for kids and excellent outcomes for kids, but also diversity, equity, and inclusion in how the sector is being led."
As the network of Education Pioneers alumni continues to grow, Wu said she plans as CEO to further engage the network of leaders who got their start through the fellowship program. Beyond recruiting, selecting, and training education leaders, the next phase at Education Pioneers will focus on alumni outreach and "how we mobilize and catalyze those people over time throughout their careers."
As Morgan transitions out of the job, he offered optimism as Wu takes the helm. "This work is people-powered at the end of the day, and we need thousands of more exceptional, diverse leaders driving this important work advancing equity and excellence," he said. "This work is more important than ever for our nation, and I'm just incredibly excited for the next chapter under Melissa's leadership at Education Pioneers."
Disclosure: Education Pioneers and The 74 receive financial support from The Walton Family Foundation and the Carnegie Corporation of New York. 74 Senior Editor Andrew Rotherham serves on Education Pioneers' Washington, D.C.–area advisory board.
74 Interview: Sen. Lamar Alexander on Finally Fixing College Financial Aid Form, Being Ready to Advise Biden's Ed Secretary Pick and $900B Relief Bill
Education Through the Pandemic: From Florida's Remote Learners Falling Behind In-Person Peers to Houston Schools Scoring Record Failure Rates, 9 Ways States & Educators Are Coping With COVID-19

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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'Relative Stranger' premieres on the Hallmark Channel
In: Entertainment, TV
Relative Stranger is Hallmark's newest original movie and it focuses on the subject of fathers abandoning their families. A topic relevant in today's society, I think. I know that men have really stepped up parenting and do as much or more parenting as their female counterparts… but we still have too many fathers that walk away. To many men who neglect their parenting responsibilities.
From the Hallmark Channel's press release,
A former football star returns home to the family he left six years earlier to find some things have changed, while some have not – mostly within himself. Can a family hurt by a man who once was their hero forgive him? Can he forgive himself, or will he continue to run from his past? Difficult truths must be faced and forgiven in the engaging family drama "Relative Stranger," a Hallmark Channel Original Movie premiering Saturday, March 14 (9/8c). The all-star cast includes Emmy® and Golden Globe nominee Eriq La Salle ("ER"), Emmy and NAACP Image Award® winner Miss Cicely Tyson ("Diary of a Mad Black Woman"), SAG Award™ nominee Michael Michele ("ER") and NAACP Image Award winner Michael Beach ("Third Watch").
After learning of the death of his overbearing father, former football hero Walter Clemons (La Salle) comes home to Los Angeles to claim his share of the estate. Having abandoned his family six years earlier, Walter is in for a tough trip – a visit which involves dealing with the hurts he inflicted on his wife, Charlotte (Michele), their children, Denise (Davis) and Andy (McCullers) and his own brother, James (Beach), who has become a surrogate father to the kids. Can he count on his mother (Tyson) to help him through this emotional obstacle course, or is it best for all that he return to the empty life from which he came?
While Andy was too young to remember his father – or his leaving – the wounds are still far too fresh for teenager Denise, herself a young athlete, who has no interest in seeing her father return to cause more harm. His estranged wife and brother have each moved on in their own way, challenging Walter's relationships with both. His elderly mother, wise with age, tries to guide the family through their struggles with one another – but will Walter, a recovering alcoholic, be able to survive the emotional onslaught his family brings to the table, as well as his own?
Once again the Hallmark Channel will air a family movie that can inspire. Relative Stranger has a lesson to be learned and hopefully fathers who have abandoned or thinking about abandoning their children, will think twice.
You can go to hallmarkchannel.com to check out more about Relative Stranger; and tune in tonight, March 14, 2009 at 9:00 pm EST, and watch Relative Stranger. I would love to hear what you think about it.
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Dr Shane Lawrence - Blog - The EMA age 55-60 3000m in Ancona Italy was a personal best.
The EMA age 55-60 3000m in Ancona Italy was a personal best.
strength to finish 19th of 23 at 12:29.81 which was a personal best of 15s better than Magglingen Sweden in 2014.


Homemade outfeed and assembly table incorporating T-tracks embedded in dados at 90 degrees to each other.
T agree about the added usefulness with t-tracks...would more actually be better to allow clamping everywhere?
Those T-tracks make a world of difference in the usefulness of this table.


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How does this work? You simply have your calls forwarded from your landline to a dedicated local number assigned by AstraQom, and we'll take it from there. Your AstraQom Automated Call Service will handle the calls just the way you want them handled, and redirect them flawlessly to the numbers of the right employees on your traditional phone service. Your employees don't lose time answering misdirected calls, and you won't even need a receptionist.
At AstraQom, we have gathered all current Hosted PBX innovations in our virtual office phone system, and made it even more versatile, powerful and affordable. All your callers can hear professionally recorded interactive voice menus (IVR/auto-attendant) and be directly transferred wherever it is needed. You can have your incoming calls handled with premium ACD features such as call queues, hunt groups, and answering rules based on time schedules, Caller ID, etc.
Why choose AstraQom's Auto-Attendant Service?
Give your callers a professional image even if you cannot move all your services to AstraQom. Present a warm automated welcome greeting 24/7.
Guaranteed service level to give you peace of mind.
We can help you draft your greeting and even help you get it recorded.
As your telecom provider, we can program the Auto-Attendant to forward your calls to any telephone number and at an affordable cost.
Why do you need an Auto Attendant Service ?
In today's competitive market, corporate image makes the difference between a potential customer going for your services or for one of your competitors that appealed to him more.
Your business phone system is often the first impression people will have of your services; you really want your first contact to work for you and not against you.
Our automated answering service eliminates the need of a significant investment in a traditional PBX system that would make advanced features available for your landline. An Auto Attendant allows you to continue using your landline, while having Automatic Call Distribution capabilities, at a small fraction of the cost.
Your leads and customers will now be impressed before you even say a word to them thanks to your new quick and efficient call handling system. This way, your products and services will be perceived in a different and improved way right from the start.


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Q: Matching multiple values from matched file lines to one I have a question regarding Unix and shell. So my input file looks as follows:
path/filename ... username
path/filename2 ... username2
path/filename ... username2
...

and my desired goal, using ideally awk or sed, is to output something like:
filename username,username2
filename2 username2

so basically output one line for each unique file and print there all usernames, who opened them, all these values are stored in the input file so I'm just looking for an easiest way how parse them and do so.
Thanks in advance

A: Something like this. First prepare the basename, then append usernames, finally print the array.
% awk '{sub(/.*\//, "", $1)
       arr[$1] != "" ? arr[$1]=arr[$1]","$NF : arr[$1]=$NF}
       END{for(i in arr){print i,arr[i]}}' file
filename username,username2
filename2 username2

A: I have taken the small sample and saved it as dandys.
awk '{i=gensub(/^.*\/(.*)$/,"\\1","1",$1);a[i]=a[i]""$NF","}END{for(i in a){gsub(/,$/,"",a[i]);print i,a[i]}}' dandys
filename username,username2
filename2 username2

In i we store the last path element of the first field, i.e. filename*. We use i as an array index, and add the last field on each row, i.e. username* followed by a comma, to the respective a[filename]. After all input is processed we iterate over the array, trimming the last trailing comma, and printing the lot.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


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VIDEO: What A Canadian Comedian Thinks About Boston Fans
By Adam Vingan Jun 1, 2011, 1:44pm EDT
Share All sharing options for: VIDEO: What A Canadian Comedian Thinks About Boston Fans
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WARNING: This video features plenty of inappropriate language so you may want to put on headphones.
There has never been any reason for ill will between the cities of Boston and Vancouver. The two cities are literally on opposite sides of North America, but now they are bound by a common purpose: winning the Stanley Cup. The Bruins and Canucks will begin their respective quests for the Stanley Cup when they face off in Game 1 Wednesday and that is enough for Canadian comedian Andrew Barber.
Barber, a Vancouver native, has fired the opening salvo and presents his view of Boston sports fans.


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Tag: Microsoft
Microsoft announces Azure Hybrid Benefit for Linux in India
Microsoft has announced the general availability of its Azure Hybrid Benefit solution for Linux customers across India. It helps customers seamlessly migrate to on-premises Windows Server and SQL Server licenses, Red Hat Enterprise Linux […]
Microsoft announces Dynamics 365 Project Operations in India
Microsoft has announced the general availability of its Dynamics 365 Project Operations solution across India. It has been developed to help service-based businesses in unifying operational workflows to provide visibility, […]
November 18, 2020 Channel Infoline Brand
Microsoft Launches Surface Go 2 and Surface Book 3 in India
Your computers are going to be more fun and sophisticated after Microsoft announces its new surface features that will allow remote access allowing you to work, learn, connect, and play […]
November 18, 2020 November 18, 2020 Channel Infoline Gadgets
Microsoft adds Hindi to its Text Analytics service
Microsoft has announced the addition of Hindi as the latest language under its Text Analytics service to further support businesses and organizations with customer Sentiment Analysis. Text Analytics is part of the Microsoft Azure Cognitive Services. Using this service, organizations can find out what people think of their […]
November 5, 2020 Channel Infoline Brand
NSDC and Microsoft collaborate to empower 1 lakh underserved young women
With a vision to enhance skills for employability, Microsoft today announced a collaboration with the National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC) to skill more than 1 lakh underserved women in India […]
October 28, 2020 Channel Infoline Article
Tech Avant-Garde is Global Training Partner of Microsoft in Education
Tech Avant-Garde (TAG), technology powered Ed-Tech company, is now a Global Training Partner of Microsoft in Education. TAG is undertaking Digital Transformation & Holistic Learning program to make Indian school […]
Tech Mahindra Launches Dedicated 'Microsoft Business Unit'
Tech Mahindra Ltd. a leading provider of digital transformation, consulting and business reengineering services and solutions, today announced the launch of its dedicated 'Microsoft Business Unit' to accelerate their digital […]
September 3, 2020 Channel Infoline Article
Microsoft introduces the Power Platform Return to the Workplace solution in India
Microsoft has announced the general availability of its Power Platform Return to the Workplace solution across India. Introduced at its flagship partner summit Microsoft Inspire 2020, this pre-built solution will […]
NSDC and Microsoft collaborate to empower Indian youth with digital skills
With a vision to transform India into a skilled nation, the National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC) and Microsoft today announced a strategic partnership aimed at providing digital skills to over […]
July 8, 2020 Channel Infoline Partner
Microsoft to help 25 million people worldwide acquire new digital skills
Microsoft Corp. on Tuesday announced a new global skills initiative aimed at bringing more digital skills to 25 million people worldwide by the end of the year. The announcement comes […]
July 1, 2020 Channel Infoline Brand


States of emergency were still in force in various parts of southern and eastern Bulgaria on February 2 after heavy rains and strong winds that struck at the weekend.
A second wave of heavy rain hit Bourgas overnight, with the Dolno Ezerovo region again the worst hit, with a reported 70 houses flooded.
States of emergency were still in force in nine villages in the municipality of Dobrich, as well as in the districts of Smolyan, Vurshets, Devin, Topolovgrad and Kurdjali.
Lazar Lazarov of the Road Infrastructure told Nova Televizia that damage to roads from pouring rain and floods on February 1 alone was estaimted at 10 leva million leva (about five million euro).
Part of the damage was caused landslides and rivers bursting their banks.
A partial state of emergency was declared on February 2 in the town of Strazhitsa in the Veliko Turnovo region.


The DomeEx is a bench-scale laboratory Kneader-Extruder that allows researchers and new product developers to evaluate continuous wet granulation/pelleting of pharmaceutical powder blends for subsequent tableting. The unique features of the DomeEx allow it to continuously produce micro-granules of uniform diameter and hardness. This continuous processing concept eliminates the need for slow, batch granulation (e.g. high shear, and fluid bed Granulators), and yields a stream lined, high capacity, more consistent (minimal variability) process.
Pre-blended powders are continuously metered into the DomeEx using a powder feeder (sold separately). Liquid is added using a peristaltic pump. The DomeEx twin screws intimately knead/mix the material and transport it continuously into the inlet of the vertical extruder equipped with a dome die. The wet mass is gently wiped though the dome die producing fine, dense, cylindrical granules of a specific diameter. The prepared wet material is manually fed.


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Q: Display the map using Baidu API in Android I want to display a map using Baidu API.
Does anyone have an idea on this. If so, can you please provide some sample application code?

A: I have recently faced this question too. This answer is 2 years late but maybe someone can still use it later. The answer given by iDev is clearly focused on javascript, which does not answer the question that was about Android.
Baidu offers an official "Hello BaiduMap" tutorial. The explanations are in Chinese only but the code can still be useful if you don't read Chinese.
When adding the API_KEY  to your manifest you of course need to use your own key. I have described how to generate that in this answer. The difference is that for a mobile key you need to enter the SHA1 fingerprint of the keystore you use to sign your app, followed by your app's packagename specified in your manifest.
Baidu also provides a sample project demonstrating many functionalities of their maps. When  downloading the libraries select the second one (described as 包括类参考、示例代码、开发包[...]) which contains the sample project, ready for import into eclipse.
I have also asked and answered a question about some more advanced baidu maps features if anyone is interested.

A: We can do it using the method described here.
aCallbackMethod is optional. We use it to initialize markers and other stuff to display over the map.
You can also take a look at this page.


Cultivation and trading wines has been a family business since the early 18th century. The establishments C.Marey and Comte Liger-Belair, created in 1720 at Nuits Saint-Georges, later quoted on the Lyon Stock Exchange in 1923, counted amongst the most important wine merchant houses in Burgundy. Building on the quality of harvests and that wines, the family endeavoured to enlarge the domaine and to distribute the best wines of Burgundy, both in France and around the world.
1720: Claude Marey, secretary of the king and mayor of Nuits-Saint-Georges, owner of vineyards, founds the wine merchant C.Marey to sell its high-class wines.
1781: Claude Philibert Marey, his son, takes over the wine merchant house.
1852: Comte Louis Liger-Belair, owner of vinyeards in Vosne-Romanée and son in law of G.F. Marey becomes an associate in the business that now trades in the name of C.MAREY and Comte LIGER-BELAIR.
1906: With his three sons, Comte Edgard Liger-Belair creates the partnership 'LIGER-BELAIR et Fils Successeurs'.
1949: Felix Liger-Belair, son of the Comte Edgard, becomes sole chairman of the board. His Xavier son acts as is general manager.
1982: Death of Xavier Liger-Belair, sale of the wine merchant company. That same year his son Vincent son, supported by his mother, takes over the family buildings, restructures the Domaine, and reorganizes the vine cultivation through three vinegrowers of the Côte de Nuits.
2001 - 2003: Thibault Liger-Belair, son of Vincent, creates DOMAINE THIBAULT LIGER-BELAIR to exploit the family's historic vineyards. He creates simultaneously the wine merchant company: THIBAULT LIGER-BELAIR SUCCESSEURS.
After six years of study of vine growing and oenology, Thibault starts his career in a company specialized in the communication around the wine business, located in Paris. He works with and tastes the greatest wines of the world. After two years, he launches 'Wine and Co' an internet wine merchant. Since 2001 Thibault Liger Belair acts as chairman of Domaine Thibault Liger-Belair and is fully involved in the production of wines.


I never had a chance to go to school. So I hope I can go to school here soon! My family actually comes from Afghanistan but I was born in Iran, so I have never seen my family's home country. A couple of days ago people gave me a bicycle and I learned to ride it. I'm so proud of myself! Since I am here with my Mom and Dad in the camp in Stuttgart I have already made a lot of friends.There are so many children of my age here.
I'm from Lugar, Afghanistan. To learn more about my hometown click on the marker in the map to be transferred to Google Maps. There you find photos and information about my place.
I want to make my parents proud of me and become a doctor when I'm grown up. Listen, what I already learned in German in the camp since I arrived here three months ago with my entire family: "Eins zwei, drei, vier, fünf." I'm fortunate that I could go to school back in Afghanistan every day. English was my favorite subject there.
I'm from Farah, Afghanistan. To learn more about my hometown click on the marker in the map to be transferred to Google Maps. There you find photos and information about my place.


Harmonics International : Universal Harmonic Protocol & Cellular Enhancement Program Package 1/2 oz.
Universal Harmonic Protocol & Cellular Enhancement Program Package 1/2 oz.
Presenting, one of the most powerful programs we have ever introduced!
This Universal Harmonic Protocol is designed to provide an energetic homeostasis of harmony and balance, restoring the Breath of Life and Rainbow of Life. It uses the Harmonic Formulas of AWAKEN, Peace, Joy, Harmony and Manna, and Proclamations from "Proclamations of the Soul" by Rich Work.
We discovered, the Protocol will assist in holding the Rainbow of Life in the energy field for about 12 hours in the beginning, therefore most do it twice a day, once in the morning and again in the evening. Gradually this time extends. For some, it takes 21 days before it will hold 24 hours, for others it may take 42 days. The determining factor will be the stress level and specific traumas during the day. For example, on a very traumatic day, I used the Protocol 3 times. On a very calm harmonic, joyful day, I only used it once.
AWAKEN, Manna, Joy, and Harmony.
Drink 2 or 3 of these 16 oz. bottles of Harmonized Water per day.
- Put 4 drops Joy in beverages other than Harmonized Water.
- Place 5 drops of Manna on food.
- Put 2 drops AWAKEN on sheets every night before you go to bed.
- Put a drop of Harmony on the sole of each foot or in each shoe daily.
- Put 5 drops of Peace in wash water when laundering clothing and bedding.
Ebony, Intuition, Discernment Pre-mixed Triad 1/2 oz.


Day three is done… and boy am I thankful!!! Crap, this race is severely tough. Really, really tough. I went to bed last night staring up at the sky and wishing that I wasn't seeing such a beautiful display of stars…Clear skies are definitely NOT what we want here! The moon was out and shining brilliantly, which at least helped light the way to the portapotties. Zandy in my tent must have gotten in very late again because when I woke up in the middle of the night he was lying on the ground beside me, just outside the tent. I am so impressed by the tenacity of the other runners who spend ALL day out on the course and pretty much have to go right to sleep when they get into camp…with very little recovery time it is amazing they have the guts to start all over again the next morning!
We've lost two people from our tent so far. Bradley left yesterday and today unfortunately Natalia had to drop out, much to her disappointment. She went over on her ankle before checkpoint 1 and it ballooned up. I have no doubt that if she was able to continue on, she would have. It is hard seeing people forced out of the race who truly just want to participate…all those months of training… We will definitely miss Natalia in the tent – her positive energy was infectious!! But she will warm up the finish line for us and we'll toast her amazing strength with two cold beers at emma gorge…mmm, too early to start thinking about that now!
The day began again at 6am and as I feared, it was clear skies all around. Although the course was shorter today (34k), with the heat it felt just as brutal as the previous days. Up to checkpoint one the scenery was gorgeous, but it was hard to notice with all that huffing and puffing! The sweat poured down my face and over my sunglasses, obscuring my vision. The footing up until now has been pretty treacherous, but that first stage today was positively insane. Even the leaders were forced to walk, so we all walked in a file for the first hour and a half. An 8km death march into the checkpoint by the waterfall. So many hidden holes, streams, muddy patches, sinkholes, spinifex, hidden logs, twisted roots, barbed wire (yes! barbed wire!), bog, and rocks. Small rocks, large rocks, loose rocks….I can't tell you how many times I fell over. My ebola legs look ready for amputation. Between the mossie bites, the bruises, and the thousands of pricks from the spinifex I could easily be the "before" photo for some extra strength medical lotion. The biggest problem with falling was that each time I would end up stretching beyond was I was used to and I would pull a muscle. Adductors are screaming (James, get those IMS needles ready in London when I return!!).
At the waterfall at checkpoint one I wet my head buff and forged onwards. The field was still pretty tight at that point, which wore on me mentally. You couldn't ever really get a break – there was always someone behind you pushing the pace or someone ahead who seemed to have more energy. Running through the grass meant that we had to pick our feet up quite a bit to clear the clumps – like a 'knees up' soccer ball drill. But I hung in. The faster I finished, the faster I would be out of this heat!!
Barb, amazing firefighter/ironwoman aussie Barb, ran an amazing race today. She powered up the rock climbs and trucked along the flats. It was so inspiring to see – this woman is 51 people!!!! 51!!!! Wow. She never looked tired. We stuck together at almost every stage. Whenever I was in front and thought I was pulling ahead I would look behind and she was right on my tail. It was actually pretty motivating – I knew I couldn't ease off! At one point Barb and I ran with a group of about 4 other male runners, including Mehmet from Canada and Peter (aka dark horse), the 2:30 marathoner. I led the group for part of it, which was pretty cool – a couple said that I led a good pace and that I gave them a bit of a boost. AWESOME!!! Ha, of course as soon as we emerged from the grass and hit the road I stopped and waved them onwards. For the last 8.7 km from checkpoint 3 to the finish I asked Barb if she wanted to run with me so we could pace one another. We are so evenly matched, I thought that maybe we could help each other get through that last brutal 5km.I think it worked brilliantly. She thanked me for helping her through the last part but I think she was just being humble – it was definitely Barb that pulled me along! The last 4 or 5 k or so was all on dusty road… the sun was beating down on our backs and there was nothing but a long road ahead. At some point Gabriel (my tentmate and former olympian…in no order of importance, ha) caught up to us. He was out of water, thinking that we were almost at the finish. Because I was wearing my polar watch (RS800), I was able to track the distances and I knew we still had 2.7k to go. Gabriel ran with us and the three of us pushed one another along. "Let's run to that yellow sign up there…" Then we would take a little break and someone would call out the next running point. I was really suffering, but I just wanted to get to camp as quickly as possible.
As we came down the final stretch, a small plane landed on the road we were running on. I shouted out for them to take me away, but strangely enough they didn't stop! Gabriel, Barb and I rounded the final corner to the row of flags that marked the end of the stage. We ran across the line hand in hand, very relieved to put this stage behind us.
Now I will come to the chaffing. Again. I can deal with the back. I mean, it is itchy and uncomfortable, but I can deal. Today came the inner thigh and rear end chaffing. Now THAT is painful. I lay on my stomach for about an hour in the medical tent while the doctors tried to figure out how to tape it up, but alas, nothing can be done… It is so painful. When I took off my shorts there was dried blood all over the backside. EEP! I'm walking around camp with just a jacket tied around my waist, hoping and praying I will be able to push through this tomorrow!!
I have never felt like such a lady!!!
We have a view of beautiful hills and red rock cliffs from our camp, which I would enjoy more if I didn't know that we would have to scale them tomorrow! I reckon Barb will do brilliantly tomorrow and I will be very, very pleased if I can struggle to keep up third place. In these conditions, it really is just about surviving! sadly, one of the japanese competitors got a very serious head injury out on the course today and had to be rushed offto the hospital – another reminder of the brutality of this sport and of this race.
I should mention that my polar product has really saved me. Being able to measure the distances between checkpoints has allowed me to guage my water consumption — and mentally helps push me along! I've been calling out the distances for the other competitors as well. Many have brought Garmin GPS units, which I'm sure are great in training but absolutely useless in a race like this. The garmin battery only lasts 6-10 hours, so it really doesn't work on a multi-day race. My polar RS800 works through water, sand, road, and bush and the battery will last until at least next year!
Still gutted that I don't have my oso bite plate. I am going to try wearing half of it tomorrow. If anyone is interested in learning more about this, please contact David Cook at London Holistic Dentistry on Harley Street. I will post more about this on my normal blog in a couple weeks!!! (And yes mom, I can only update my RTP blog from here, not my normal blog… We don't actually have internet access here! RTP just downloads the messages once a day and then uploads them to these laptops).
Thank you THANK YOU THANK YOU for your messages. They have made me laugh, smile, and tear up a bit. The words of encouragement from family, strangers, new and old friends alike have been incredible. But Kim and Ben (my siblings!!!) where are you???
Thank you to my dream team back in London especially – David Cook (for the OSO bite plate), Steve Bessant (neuromuscular skeletal specialist at the Bowskill Clinic), JAmes Pinkney (IMS practitioner at the Bowskill Clinic), Petrus DeJager (massage therapist at the Third Space gym), Dr. Simon Costain (podiatrist at the Gait and Posture Clinic), Renata (cryotherapy at Champneys Spa), Phil Learney (strength and conditioning coach at the Third Space gym)…. who am I missing???
And thank you to my friend from Champneys for taking the time to send me a message – your support was a welcome and very lovely surprise!!
Paul and Chloe, send me some Australian strength!
Mark, Jenna, Alex and Belinda, your RTP wishes are much appreciated!!!
LOVE TO ALL – keep those messages coming!!!!


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Book > Professional Books > Physical Impairments
Identification of Students for Gifted and Talented Programs
Joseph S. Renzulli - University of Connecticut, Storrs, USA
The expert guide to the major challenges and promising developments in the identification of gifted and talented students!
Focusing on one of the most widely discussed and debated topics in the field, Identification of Students for Gifted and Talented Programs presents a cross-section of the most noteworthy theories and practices the leading experts in giftedness and talent identification have to offer.
An in depth review of the literature and commentary from Joseph S. Renzulli, Director of the National Research Center on the Gifted and Talented
Fourteen seminal articles from highly respected educators and researchers in the field of gifted education
Numerous research-based identification policy and procedure recommendations, including the use of both test and non-test criteria
Presented in a straightforward, no-nonsense fashion, the key research, ideas, and concepts in this ready-reference lend both wisdom and clarity to the pressing issues surrounding gifted and talented student identification; leading to enlightened policies and more effective practices.
Joseph S. Renzulli
Introduction to Identification of Students for Gifted and Talented Programs
Jack W. Birch
1. Is Any Identification Procedure Necessary?
Carolyn M. Callahan
2. Myth: There Must be "Winners" and "Losers" in Identification and Programming!
E. Paul Torrance
3. The Role of Creativity in the Identification of the Gifted and Talented
James H. Borland, Lisa Wright
4. Identifying Young, Potentially Gifted, Economically Disadvantaged Students
Robert J. Sternberg
5. Nonentrenchment in the Assessment of Intellectual Giftedness
6. Lies We Live By: Misapplication of Tests in Identifying the Gifted
7. Myth: The Gifted Constitutes 3-5% of the Population
Joseph S. Renzulli, Marcia A. B. Delcourt
8. The Legacy and Logic of Research on the Identification of Gifted Persons
John F. Feldhusen, J. William Asher, and Steven M. Hoover
9. Problems in the Identification of Giftedness, Talent, or Ability
Camilla Persson Benbow, Lola L. Minor
10. Cognitive Profiles of Verbally and Mathematically Precocious Students: Implications for Identification of the Gifted
Gilbert Clark
11. Screening and Identifying Students Talented in the Visual Arts: Clark's Drawing Abilities Test
Sylvia Rimm
12. The Characteristics Approach: Identification and Beyond
Jamieson A. McKenzie
13. The Influence of Identification Practices, Race and SES on the Identification of Gifted Students
Nicholas Colangelo, Penny Brower
14. Labeling Gifted Youngsters: Long-term Impact on Families
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