The Association for Gerontology in Higher Education (AGHE) has selected professor Leslie A. Morgan, Sociology & Anthropology, as recipient of the David A. Peterson Award for her Gerontology & Geriatrics Education article “Paradigms in the Gerontology Classroom: Connections and Challenges to Learning.”

The AGHE will present Morgan with this “best paper” award at its 2013 annual meeting. The group notes, “The purpose of this award is to recognize excellence in scholarship in academic gerontology.” Manuscripts are evaluated on “innovation, the soundness of their approach, and their significance to and implications for gerontology and geriatrics education.”

Morgan’s research focuses on social dimensions of aging. A recent book explored how people understand what “quality” means in their search for an assisted living facility (watch video). She is is author, co-author or editor of six books and dozens of peer-reviewed articles and chapters. UMBC named her 2011-2012 Lipitz Professor in the Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences, in recognition of her decades of exemplary scholarship, teaching and service to the university.

The AGHE also named UMBC Ph.D. student Colleen R. Bennett, gerontology, as honorable mention recipient for its Graduate Student Paper Award, recognizing her paper “What’s ‘Glee’ Got To Do With It? Lesbians’ Future Care Concerns and Popular Media.”

A remarkable new movement has hits the streets.

Yesterday,  millions danced in over 200 countries in support of One Billion Rising, a campaign to end sexual violence and abuse against women all over the world.  

One Billion Rising was founded by activist and playwright of the Vagina Monologues, Eve Ensler.

The number one billion comes from a United Nations assessment that 1 in 3 women in the world, or about 1 billion, will be victims of violence at the hands of men in their lifetime. 

After the horrendous gang-rape of 23 year old student in New Delhi in December, several hundred men, women and children rallied and danced Thursday night on the streets of Delhi. This event took a different attitude from the recent protests which have been occurring in New Delhi.

It portrayed a positive message instead of negative hostility toward the government. South Asia’s One Billion Rising coordinator, Kamla Bhasin was quoted regarding the movement,

“We don’t want violence; we want love… a love based on equality.”

This event was also highly attended by men who wished to change the culture of violence and to not be seen as predators. 

In San Francisco, inmates joined the movement by participating in a flash mob to “Break the Chains” by Tena Clark and choreographed by Debbie Allen. This dance was circulated on YouTube and thousands danced to it all over the world. 

Debbie Allen herself led 2,000 people  in Atlanta’s largest flash mob in history.  Other speakers at the Atlanta rally included SPANX founder Sara Blakely, Rev. Dr. Bernice King and Evelyn Lowery. 

D.C. rallied in favor of the re authorization of the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) which expands violence protection to Native American victims of violence and the LGBT community.

The act’s passed in the Senate 78-22.

However, the bill will have more difficulty in the Republican controlled House.

President Obama mentioned the bill in his State of the Union address on Tuesday, saying

“It’s now time for the House to follow suit and send this bill to my desk so that I can sign it into law.”

Eve Ensler, who danced in the Democratic Republic of Congo was overjoyed by the success of the One Billion Rising movement. Even the UN endorsed the event and apparently took a break from work and had a rising.  On the phone, Ensler told reporters, 

“I don’t think violence against women will get marginalized again.. I think it has moved to the center of the agenda as of today.”

Yesterday President Obama held a Google+ hangout with a group of bloggers. Limor Fried, the CEO of robotics firm Adafruit Industries asked the President

"When I attended high school, I had to take a foreign language requirement. Can we make it a national effort to also add a computer programming language requirement?

The President, responding very positively, said "I think it makes sense, I really do" and talked about a conversation he had with Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg to explain his thinking.

"Look at Mark Zuckerberg. I was sitting next to him at dinner a couple of years ago, and he said he taught himself programming primarily because he was interested in games. If we set programs in high schools that engage kids because they get it, they won’t be just sitting there slouching in back of rooms while someone is lecturing. Given how pervasive computers and the Internet is now, how integral it is in our economy, and how fascinated kids are with it, I want to make sure they actually know how to produce stuff and not simply consume stuff."

The NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Global Inventory Modeling and Mapping Studies Group in Greenbelt, MD is looking for a smart, eager and motivated undergraduate student to intern and support web-development for a number of our earth science applications projects. This will be an all year around paid internship: half time during the school year and full-time during the summer.

Posting:

NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) Global Inventory Modeling and Mapping Studies group provides scientific Earth systems research through the use of satellite remote sensing for environmental studies in ecological dynamics associated with climate variability. Our research has applications in global agricultural monitoring, food security, and disease surveillance.

The NASA/GSFC GIMMS group is offering a paid internship position to a Computer Science student to assist in developing a website and web mapping applications to support the surveillance and risk analysis of vector borne diseases using satellite imagery.

The successful candidate will also have opportunities to learn and assist in developing scientific computing applications and computational methods for remote sensing and geographic information systems.

Requirements

US citizen, permanent resident, or foreign national from non-designated countries

Experience and/or interested in:

• Web development using HTML, CSS, and Javascript
• Programming client-side web mapping applications
• Software development on Linux
• Programming in C

Apply

Submit cover letter and resume to Ed Pak at edwin.w.pak@nasa.gov