The World Bank on Thursday approved a record $1.05 billion line of credit to help get more children into schools in India, the largest ever investment in education by the poverty-fighting institution.
“This is going to be a game-changer for a number of the poorest households in India, who until now have been out of the system,” Carlson told Reuters.
Since that program’s launch in 2002, school enrollments have increased significantly.
(READ the story in Reuters)
Cheetahs have returned to a national park in Angola, after a three-decade civil war devastated their former habitat, according to a conservation group based in Namibia.
The cheetah’s prey of deer and oryx have also returned to the 3.8 million acre reserve in the years since peace was declared in 2002.
(READ AP story in Huffington Post)
Federal workers Lisa Grimm and Brian Norton were honored Monday by the National Air Traffic Controllers Association for guiding Doug White and his family to safety on April 12, 2009, when the pilot of their plane died during a flight.
Talking on the radio was the one bit of knowledge that may have saved White’s life — and the lives of his wife and two daughters who were with him. The controllers could hear the panic in his voice.
(READ the story in the Washington Post)
For the first time in twenty-three years, a religious Sikh was allowed to complete officer training for the U.S. Army after he was issued an individual exemption.
Capt. Tejdeep Singh Rattan, 31, was allowed to serve without sacrificing the turban and full beard mandated by his faith. An immigrant from India who arrived in New York as a teenager, Rattan said it was important for him to serve a country that has given him so many opportunities.
(READ More in the Huffington Post)
By nickels, dimes, and dollars, Americans donated a record $139 million to the Salvation Army’s Red Kettle campaign during the holidays, despite a continued economic slump.
The tally represents a seven percent increase over the record set in 2008 of $130 million, and comes at a time when demand for social services has skyrocketed.
“America is an incredibly generous nation and philanthropy is alive and well, despite the current economic conditions impacting so many,” said Commissioner Israel L. Gaither, national commander of the Salvation Army, Religion News Service reports. “We are grateful for every donor, volunteer and corporate partner for supporting the Salvation Army’s mission during a time when some have so little to give.”
Researchers in Japan have designed a super-elastic iron alloy which they hope can be used in sophisticated heart and brain surgeries and even buildings in earthquake zones.
In a paper published on Friday in the journal Science, the researchers said the metal’s super-elasticity allows it to return to its original form and gives it additional properties, such as ductility and a change in magnetization.
(READ More in article from Reuters)
As soon as President Obama signs the historic health care legislation that passed in the U.S. Congress, the American people will see immediate benefits, including a guarantee that children can get health insurance — even if they have a pre-existing illness — and a measure that would let young adults stay on their parents’ policies until they turn 26.
The legislation will (either now, or in six months to one year):
Many of the plan’s most important benefits won’t kick in until 2014. Those include the guarantee that anyone can buy insurance; the exchanges where individuals and small businesses can shop for policies — and the subsidies to help pay for them.
As soon as President Obama signs the historic health care legislation passed by Congress tonight, the American people will see immediate benefits, including a guarantee that children can get health insurance — even if they have a pre-existing illness — and a measure that would let young adults stay on their parents’ policies until they turn 26.
The legislation will (either now, or in six months to one year):
Many of the plan’s most important benefits won’t kick in until 2014. Those include the guarantee that anyone can buy insurance; the exchanges where individuals and small businesses can shop for policies — and the subsidies to help pay for them.
Englewood’s Urban Prep Academy for Young Men in Chicago has fulfilled its lofty mission within four years: 100 percent of its first senior class has been accepted to four-year colleges or universities.
Mayor Richard Daley and Chicago schools chief Ron Huberman surprised students at a school assembly recently with congratulations, and school leaders announced that as a reward, their senior prom would be free.
107 seniors at the all-boy, all-African-American school gained acceptance from 72 different colleges, including Northwester, Morehouse College, Howard University, Rutgers and DePaul University.
READ the good news in the Chicago Tribune…
(This is one of the happiest stories I have ever read. – Lynn)
Gashaw Tahir, an American citizen, traveled back to his birth country of Ethiopia to find the green hills that surrounded his home eroded and stripped bare from deforestation. So he decided to do something extraordinary: Plant one million trees.
He hired 450 young people and changed the ecology of his country.
WATCH the video below…
Gashaw Tahir, an American citizen, traveled back to his birth country of Ethiopia to find the green hills that surrounded his home eroded and stripped bare from deforestation. So he decided to do something extraordinary: Plant one million trees.
He hired 450 young people and changed the ecology of his country.
WATCH the video below…
With her many good deeds, Angelina Jolie is quietly becoming a modern-day Mother Teresa, particularly in her role as Goodwill Ambassador for the UN Refugee Agency.
18 months ago, she visited a settlement for refugees returning to Afghanistan, mostly from Pakistan. The families shared with her their concerns about a lack of educational facilities in the area.
Now, people are celebrating the new primary school for girls, opened after Angelina donated the necessary $75,000 to construct the campus.
Inaugurated on Thursday in time for the start of the school year next Monday, the school in eastern Afghanistan features eight classrooms, four administration buildings, a well and eight latrines, the school can accommodate up to 800 students in two shifts.
For thousands of years, the people of China, Japan, India, and Thailand have consumed green tea and used it medicinally to treat everything from headaches to flatulence.
Over the past few decades, research in both Asia and the West has begun providing scientific evidence of green tea’s numerous health benefits — slowing or prevent conditions including high cholesterol, heart disease, rheumatoid arthritis, impaired immune disease and liver disease.
READ the recent article at Health News…
An innovative Dutch company, recently developed an organic-based glass coating called Smart Energy Glass. Windows made with this glass are transformed into solar energy collectors. The energy captured can either be used immediately or fed back into a power grid, adding to a building’s energy efficiency and sustainability. (Ode)
The windows can be adjusted as the sun changes to allow in more light or create more privacy, and thus effecting the amount of energy generated.
WATCH the marketing video below from PeerPlus.nl
Katie Spotz is a 22 year-old endurance athlete rowing across the Atlantic Ocean. Alone.
Endurance is her strong suit, she’s run 150 miles across the Mojave Desert and biked 3,300 miles across the US, averaging 85 miles per day — not to mention an impressive swim the full 325-mile length of the Allegheny River. Now, it’s a 2,500 mile row from Senegal to French Guiana
Along the way she’s raising awareness for her cause: clean, viable drinking water.
This should, at the very least, make us think twice about leaving the water running when brushing our teeth. Aside from raising awareness, another important goal was to raise $30,000.
READ the story in the New York Times .
Jill Starr works to save American mustangs and domestic horses from abuse. Her organization now includes Red Horse Nation, which helps Native American youths by enabling them to connect with the rescued horses through direct contact, teaching and more.
One sunny afternoon, when they had finished their tasks, the students and a few elders within their group brought a tribal drum to the site. The students sat around the instrument and began to chant and drum.
Suddenly, the horses followed the drums and, mesmerized, made a semi-circle around the students, gathering just 12 to 20 feet away.
READ MORE at Discovery.com …
Actress Demi Moore is among those credited with preventing yet another suicide late last night, thanks to Twitter.
When a young man from Casselberry, Fla., just north of Orlando, wrote of his plans to hang himself, she responded immediately, “R U rlly asking 4 help?” The man proceeded to send several more messages to the actress.
(READ More at E Online)
Actredd Demi Moore is among those credited with preventing yet another suicide late last night, thanks to Twitter.
When a young man from Casselberry, Fla., just north of Orlando, wrote of his plans to hang himself, she responded immediately, “R U rlly asking 4 help?” The man proceeded to send several more messages to the actress.
(READ More at E Online)
Would you be happier if you spent more time discussing the state of the world and the meaning of life — and less time talking about the weather?
A new study published in Psychological Science finds that people who have a greater number of substantive conversations are more likely to rate themselves as happy. In fact, the researchers found that the happiest participants spent about 70 percent more time talking and had twice as many substantive conversations as the unhappiest participants. And, the happiest students had roughly one-third less small talk.
(READ MORE of the story at the New York Times )
Few people understand what the past five years have been like for the family of West Virginia assistant coach Billy Hahn.
His wife, Kathi, is healthy enough to travel after overcoming ovarian cancer in June 2008 and recovering from a bone marrow transplant following a leukemia diagnosis two months later.
(Read this story of healing and family at the Washington Post)
