Self-Renewal & Motivation

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The self-renewing man is highly motivated and respects the sources of his own energy and motivation. He has the priceless quality of enthusiasm.  He knows how important it is to believe in what he is doing. 

He knows how important it is to pursue the things about which he has a deep conviction. Enthusiasm for the task to be accomplished lifts him out of the ruts of habit and customary procedure. Drive and conviction give him the courage to risk failure. (One of the reasons mature persons stop learning is that they become less and less willing to risk failure.) And not only does he respond to challenge, but he also sees the challenge where others fail to see it . . . 

John Gardner, Self-Renewal

Articles of interest about religion - April 11

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***COVID-19

Why It's Not a Bad Thing If You Don't Experience COVID-19 Vaccine Side Effects 

Why you should still wear a mask even if you've been vaccinated

***RELIGION & THE VIRUS

Why the key to ending the pandemic runs through the evangelical church

How White Evangelicals’ Vaccine Refusal Could Prolong the Pandemic ($)

***RELIGION 

'Allergic reaction to US religious right' fueling decline of religion, experts say

Church takes away fishing trip prize from woman-- because she is a woman

***RELIGION AND POLITICS 

Alabama removes religious oath requirement from voter registration

Survey: Most Americans know Biden is Catholic, far fewer know Harris’ religion

***RELIGION & THE LAW 

EEOC Issues New Guidance on Religious Discrimination and Accommodation of Religious Beliefs 

***RELIGION & RACIAL ISSUES

Proud Boys and other far-right groups raise millions via Christian funding site

Black Southern Baptists are "deeply disappointed" that seminary presidents continue to reject critical race theory in "all its forms"

***CATHOLIC 

Hans Kueng, dissident Catholic theologian, dies at 93

***MEGACHURCHES

Megachurch Pastor Greg Laurie still can’t smell after COVID-19

Former Hillsong Megachurch pastor who faked cancer to hide porn problem starts charity 

Hillsong shuts down Dallas operations after pastors used church donations to fund their lifestyle

***RELIGION & BUSINESS

Religion is a driving force behind the gender wage gap, study finds

Dave Ramsey’s company dropped from ‘Best Workplaces’ list by Inc. magazine

***ISLAM

Renouncing Islam in Malaysia

Civil rights group sues Facebook over anti-Muslim posts

***SATANISM

Why Satanic Panic never really ended

Nike reaches agreement with Satan Shoes manufacturer

***RELIGION & WOMEN’S ISSUES

Baylor professor argues 'biblical womanhood' more cultural than biblical

New data says that women are more religious than men but it’s more complicated than the numbers reveal

Beth Moore apologizes for her role in elevating ‘complementarian’ theology that limits women leaders

***CHRISTIAN CELEBRITIES

Former Moody Bible Institute professor Paul Maxwell leaves the Christian faith

Elizabeth Elliot & the Language of Mission   

Profit-preaching televangelist who stole millions is headed to prison

Articles of Interest about Higher Ed - April 9

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***COVID-19 

Got a strange text about your COVID vaccine? Here's what could be going on

1 in 3 Covid-19 patients are diagnosed with a neuropsychiatric condition

Wharton professor on the employer Covid vaccine requirement dilemma 

Your post-vaccination travel questions answered

What to Do If You Lose Your Vaccine Card

Here’s What Happens If You End Up Getting Two Different Vaccines

Tens of thousands of vaccine appointments remain unclaimed in Mississippi, a sign the state is already encountering hesitancy ($)

***HIGHER ED & COVID

Some Colleges Are Mandating COVID-19 Vaccines — But At What Cost?

5 US colleges to require students to be vaccinated before returning in the fall  

More colleges move to make vaccines mandatory for students

***COVID AT SPECIFIC SCHOOLS

Cornell University to require students to be vaccinated ahead of fall semester

More Than 50 UChicago Students Get Coronavirus, Forcing Return To Virtual Classes, Stay-At-Home Order 

Johnson County Community College is offering employees a one-time $250 payment to get the vaccine

 ***HIGHER ED  

Piedmont University's name change from Piedmont College now official

Coursera Is Now a Public Company. What Does That Mean For Higher Education?

***LAYOFFS & CUTS

Pacific Lutheran University will cut 36 positions, eliminate majors to fill budget hole

Western Oregon will be cutting multiple programs & the equivalent of more than a dozen full-time faculty 

Mills College Faculty Demand Answers About Closure 

***COLLEGE FINANCES 

Endicott College’s strength during the pandemic highlights the importance of diverse revenue streams

Tennessee owes Tennessee State University between $151 million and $544 million 

University of Iowa gives athletics $50 million ‘loan’

Biden Has Promised to Crack Down on Troubled For-Profit Colleges. Some Are Already in Peril.

Mormon Church helping put Utah State's language-focused programs under 1 roof

Donor Darla Moore writes off USC after it fails to acknowledge her mother's death

***ADMISSIONS 

Poll: Nearly half of parents don’t want their kids to go to a four-year college

COVID-19 pandemic making college choice especially difficult

University of Kentucky sends 500,000 acceptance emails in 'error'

Duke University Tried Test-Optional Admissions And Got 10,000 More Applicants

Harvard College Accepts Record-Low 3.43% of Applicants to Class of 2025

Colleges Get Creative To Reach Students After Enrollment Plummets Due To COVID-19

***HUMANITIES 

Survey of employers shows liberal arts skills are valued & sought out in the workplace

***HIGHER ED IN COURT 

LSU official sues for $50 million, alleging retaliation for Les Miles allegations

Michigan university can't punish Christian club for requiring leaders be Christian, Judge rules

Dartmouth College seeks dismissal of lawsuit alleging bias in sex assault ruling

University of Cincinnati Faces Lawsuit After Sharing Students’ Personal Data to Health Provider

***TEACHING  

What Impacts Active Learning in STEM?

A Harvard researcher says this is the smartest and 'least costly' way to help your kids reach 'accelerated learning'

Far Too Many Educators Aren’t Prepared to Teach Black and Brown Students (Opinion)

***ONLINE PROCTORING

Cheating on homework leads to extortion scam

UW-Madison disables proctoring software amid complaints

Proctoring Tool Failed to Recognize Dark Skin, Students Say

***ACADEMIC LIFE 

All Faculty Types Suffer Job Losses in 2020-2021 Academic Year

Florida GOP Wants To Take On 'Cancel Culture' By Secretly Recording Professors

Man who died in D.C. fire was an assistant professor at George Washington University

***CHRISTIAN SCHOOLS  

Notre Dame Law School Tells Non-Wealthy Students ‘Thanks, But No Thanks’ 

Baylor denies health care dependency status to same-sex spouses of university employees

LGBT students sue Education Department over Title IX religious exemption

Are LGBTQ students at Christian schools discriminated against?

Judson College trustees vote to keep the school open

***LIBERTY UNIVERSITY

Jonathan Falwell named Liberty University Campus Pastor following Nasser's resignation

‘They thank me’: Jerry Falwell Jr. says Liberty University community still embraces him

***RESEARCH

A simple guide to ethical co-authorship

Prey tell, what makes a publisher predatory?

Do you obey public-access mandates? Google Scholar is watching

Plagiarism scandals are devaluing higher degrees in central Europe ($)

***STUDENT LIFE 

I’m suing the University of Tennessee

Ole Miss Student Charged in Frat Hazing That Injured Pledge

Colleges see urgent mental health crisis ($)

Virginia Tech students decry Turning Point USA club for 'homophobic, racist' leaked chats

States Step In To Stop Colleges Holding Transcripts Ransom For Unpaid Bills

Another Graduating Class Faces A Workforce In Which Young People Are Struggling

A Michigan university is offering college students a scholarship to study cannabis

***SEXUAL HARASSMENT & ASSAULT

Eastern Connecticut State Univ hires firm to conduct independent review of its handling of Title IX claims  

Education Department Starts Review of Title IX

Former Northeastern University track coach accused of cyberstalking female athletes to get nude photos

***RACIAL ISSUES ON CAMPUS 

Albion College students continue to boycott class to fight racial injustices on campus

Police investigating after swastika found on furniture at MCLA

White supremacy graffiti was found on Northern Kentucky's campus for the second time this year

Honored by Southwestern Seminary, journal article explores Truett and Criswell's accommodation of racism

***HIGHER ED SECURITY

Moody's: Cyberattacks Could Dent Higher Ed Credit Rating

IRS warns of new phishing scheme targeting colleges

Brown Under Cyberattack: Some Systems Shut Down, University Calls Incident “Utmost Priority”

University of California victim of nationwide hack attack

How to safeguard online data collection against fraud

Essay mills ‘infiltrating university websites’ ($)

The Nazis hung him (on this date in 1945)

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Dietrich Bonhoeffer was arrested by the Nazi in 1943 for his work with the resistance. He had been warned not to speak publicly.  He did so anyway and was hanged April 9, 1945. Ethics is a gathering of his notes for an intended work on the subject, hidden in a garden before they could be seized by the police. Here is one paragraph contrasting the Ethics of Kant to Christ: 

Christ did not, like a moralist, love a theory of good, but He loved the real man. He was not, like a philosopher, interested in the 'universally valid,' but rather in that which is of help to the real and concrete human being. What worried him was not, like Kant, whether the 'maxim of an action can become a principle of general legislation', but whether my action is at this moment helping my neighbor become a man before God. -Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Ethics

Stephen Goforth

 

Change, Paradigm Shifts

Renewal and Friendship

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The self-renewing man has mutually fruitful relations with other human beings. They are capable of accepting love and capable of giving it – both more difficult achievements than is commonly thought. And what has that to do with self-renewal? The man or woman who is incapable of accepting love or of giving it is imprisoned, cut off from a great part of the world of experience. Love and friendship dissolve the rigidities of the isolated self, force new perspectives, alter judgments, and keep in working order the emotional substratum on which all profound comprehensive of human affairs must rest.

John Gardner, Self-Renewal

Articles of interest about journalism, writing, conspiracy theories & more - April 5

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***COVID-19

CDC: Fully vaccinated people can travel in U.S. without tests or quarantines 

Can Vaccinated People Spread the Virus? We Don’t Know, Scientists Say.

CDC Data Suggests Vaccinated Don’t Carry, Can’t Spread Virus

***JOURNALISM

Why Being ‘Anti-Media’ Is Now Part Of The GOP Identity

The journalism crisis across the world

Asian America women like me have been objectified & dehumanized. This was my TV news experience (opinion) 

Paul Brock, a founder of Black journalism group, dies at 89

Vaccine Hesitancy: What Journalists Need to Know

News deserts and weak ethics laws allow corruption to run rampant in SC

Kansas City newspaper sends a warning with a blank front page ($)

More than 25 places to find journalism jobs and internships

Bystander intervention training to stop anti-Asian/American and xenophobic harassment

***THE BUSINESS OF MEDIA

Billionaires push to derail hedge fund takeover of local newspapers

U.S. Supreme Court permits FCC to loosen media ownership rules

West Coast billionaires buy dying legacy media companies

How Stat survived, and thrived, during the craziest year in health reporting history 

***WRITING & READING

HarperCollins to Acquire HMH Trade 

Graphic novel from the “Captain Underpants” series pulled from library and bookstore shelves

‘Hemingway’ documentary Is a Big Two-Hearted Reconsideration ($)

***COVID-19 MISINFORMATION 

Vitamin D: The truth about an alleged Covid ‘cover-up’

As the flood of false & misleading health information continues unabated on social media, publishers find themselves in for a battle

The Antiscience Movement Is Escalating, Going Global and Killing Thousands

COVID-19 Misinformation Playbook

The Dark Web Is Teeming With Vaccine Listings Right Now

'You can't trust the government': Spanish-speaking social media spreads COVID-19 vaccine disinformation, adds to hesitancy

***FAKES

How Sounds Are Faked For Nature Documentaries

***SOCIAL MEDIA  

How to check if your account was part of Facebook’s 533M record leak

Google integrates Chat to Gmail for all accounts

How beauty filters took over social media | MIT Technology Review 

Facebook Disputes Claims It Fuels Political Polarization And Extremism

Group-Chatting Platform Discord Might Change Social Media With Its Business Model 

QAnon Facebook Group Linked to Capitol Riot Still Active

***PRIVACY & SECURITY 

Personal data from over 500M Facebook users leaked online - 9to5Mac

IRS Warns of Scam Targeting .Edu Email Addresses

Fake apps are circumventing Apple’s rules in order to rob users

New study reveals iPhones aren't as private as you think 

Spy pixels in emails have become endemic 

Companies use this email trick to spy on you all the time – and you had no idea 

***LANGUAGE

Words Like 'Racism' Have Lost Their Common Meaning (opinion)

***POETRY

San Diego's Poet Laureate Launches Digital Poetry Platform

Amanda Gorman’s Poetry United Critics. It’s Dividing Translators

Poetry Challenge: Create A List Poem That Grapples With Rise Of Anti-Asian Racism

Renewal Happens 

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Renewal comes neither by taking a rest nor changing the scenery, nor by adding something new to our lives, but by ending whatever is, and then entering a temporary state of chaos when everything is up for grabs and anything is possible. Then we can come out of what is really a death-and-rebirth process with a new identity, a new sense of purpose, and a new store of life energy.

William Bridges, The Way of Transition

 

Articles of interest about higher ed- April 1

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***COVID-19

Vaccine passports and digital vaccination records, explained 

Why vaccine passports may be inevitable in next phase of COVID-19

Should I laminate my COVID vaccine card? Here’s what experts say

How does COVID-19 affect the brain?

Florida man fired after fake vaccine card business exposed on TikTok

Stanford Scientists Reverse Engineer Moderna Vaccine, Post Code on Github 

***HIGHER ED & COVID

Some say COVID-19 may have changed college campuses for good

Rutgers University first in nation to require on-campus students get COVID vaccine for fall semester 

***ENROLLMENT

Enrollment declines at California’s community colleges far greater than earlier predictions  

***HIGHER ED 

Moody's Upgrades Financial Outlook for Higher Ed

The Absurdity of University Rankings

A new direction for Bennett College

Google Engineers Created a Cheap Certificate Program to Help You Get a New Job in Tech 

***LAYOFFS & CUTS

University of Montana professors, students protest proposed $2.6 million budget cuts 

Salem State University retrenchment plan accidentally released 

***COLLEGE FINANCES 

The biggest earners at private colleges and universities

Moody's Raises Higher Ed Outlook to Stable

***HIGHER ED IN COURT 

High court sympathetic to college athletes in NCAA dispute

Judge rules for Southern Methodist University over jurisdiction

Students file lawsuit over fake college sting operation by ICE and DHS

Appeals court says Iowa administrators are personally liable in lawsuit brought by Christian student group

***TEACHING 

A Pair of Business School Professors Made Their Students Read Fiction. Amazing Things Happened

Cal State LA was caught in a large-scale cheating scandal, but it’s not alone 

How Cheating in College Hurts Students

Zoom Escaper makes it easy to sabotage that unbearable Zoom meeting

***ACADEMIC LIFE  

University of Missouri faculty members upset about use of data in promotion and tenure 

The Well-Heeled Professoriate: Socioeconomic Backgrounds Of University Faculty

***ACADEMICS & CRIME  

Professor put camera in teen’s room ‘to bond with her,’ Oklahoma documents say

Ga. Tech professor indicted on federal fraud charges

***PROFESSORS IN COURT  

A professor was reprimanded for refusing to use a transgender student’s pronouns--A court says he can sue

Lecturer fired for ‘aggressive’ use of question marks gets $20K payout

***ADMINISTRATORS

SC State University faculty senate votes 'no confidence' in President and Provost

University of Michigan leaders condemn regent's comments 

***ADMINISTRATORS LEAVING 

Lily McNair No Longer President at Tuskegee University

University of Iowa President Bruce Harreld to leave earlier than expected

Oregon State University President F. King Alexander resigns amid fallout from LSU scandal

CUNY law school dean cancels herself after 'slaveholder' comment

***CHRISTIAN SCHOOLS  

Evangel University dropping the name "Crusaders"

Dozens of Christian students sue the U.S. Education Dept., hoping to pressure Equality Act negotiations

USA Today editor fired who wanted to ban Christian University from NCAA

After Lee University publicly corrects campus speaker, alumni organize to protect LGBTQ students who they say are in danger

Regent University hosts conspiracy-filled livestream event

Baylor University report recommends changing buildings and statues honoring slave owners but gives a pass to school’s founder

***RESEARCH

How to Find and Vet Journal Articles 

The fight against fake-paper factories that churn out sham science

Science relies on constructive criticism. Here’s how to keep it useful and respectful 

Self-correction in science: The diagnostic and integrative motives for replication

The internationality of published higher education scholarship: How do the ‘top’ journals compare?

The top editor at JAMA has been sidelined amid outcry comments on structural racism

***STUDENT LIFE 

Angela Davis event: Butler University students allege censorship

College student found driving 106 mph while watching Zoom class

Tax Refund Scam Targets College Students and Staff

Yale Disputes Social Media Report on Student's Suicide

28 Things They Don't Teach You In High School That You Learn Pretty Much Immediately In College

***STUDENTS IN COURT 

Supreme Court sides with student newspaper in dispute with UK over sexual misconduct records

Judge Says Students Can Sue Quinnipiac Over Shift to Remote Learning

FTC sends out nearly $50 million to former University of Phoenix students from 2019 settlement 

***STUDENT MEDIA 

Student journalist finds photo of the Harvard KKK — and documents school’s overlooked racist past ($)

***SEXUAL HARASSMENT & ASSAULT

Florida State scrambles to explain how a faculty member who was known to prey on Asian female students was allowed to do so for 30 years

Michigan University Students Claim Their Title IX Coordinator Told Them Sexual Assault Wasn't 'Worth Reporting'

New online reporting form allows Brown University students to report sexual harassment anonymously

Administrator files complaint against Oregon State--claims discrimination on the basis of disability, sex, gender

USC agrees to $852 million payout in sex abuse lawsuit

11 women file lawsuit alleging Eastern Michigan University mishandled sexual assault claims

***RACIAL ISSUES ON CAMPUS 

A white professor at Camden County College is alleging racial discrimination after discovering his Black colleagues make more money

More than 250 Univ of South Alabama faculty of color pen open letter to President, Board of Trustees after racially insensitive photos

Oxford University considers scrapping ‘colonial’ and ‘white’ music notation in syllabus makeover

Boise State resumes diversity classes after brief suspension and controversy

University of Cincinnati professor who called COVID-19 'the Chinese virus' not asked to return

Brown University undergraduates vote for reparations for descendants of enslaved people

***CRIME ON CAMPUS

Two plead guilty to stealing millions of dollars’ worth of computers from Stanford

***RANSOMWARE

Ransomware gang breaches University of Colorado and University of Miami

Ransomware group targets universities in Maryland, California in new data leaks

Mott Community College addresses data security breach

Data Science articles from March 2021

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DARPA seeks to improve computer vision in ‘Third Wave’ of AI research

Bayesian networks can provide answers when machine learning comes up short

MIT study finds ‘systematic’ labeling errors in popular AI benchmark datasets

An interpretable design of unsupervised deep convolutional neural network & lstm autoencoders based real-time anomaly detection from high-dimensional heterogeneous/homogeneous time series data

An overview of  machine learning operations maintenance

Small, cheap spy satellites mean there’s no hiding place

A new statistical model generates more nuanced predictions for complicated events

Spurred on by quantum experiments that scramble the ordering of causes and their effects, some physicists are figuring out how to abandon causality altogether

Researchers think they’ve solved the ‘barren plateaus' issue in quantum machine learning

Geospatial information is vital for linking unconnected datasets and driving digital transformation

Is coding more like a language, or more like math?

The not-so-secret value of sharing commercial geospatial and open-source information

Creating AI systems that can learn causal representations to solve machine learning’s causality problem

MIT built algorithm helps artificial intelligence systems dodge “adversarial” inputs

Bringing spiking neural networks & artificial neural networks together that might lead to allowing machine learning to run on edge devises

DARPA work on homomorphic encryption technology

Cataloging non-reproducible machine learning papers

Five reasons so many data science projects fail to deliver

Bayesian hierarchical modeling at scale

The same reinforcement learning techniques that help guide online ads can be used to solve many other problems

A TensorFlow cheat sheet

Articles of interest about religion - March 30

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***COVID-19

How to talk to those hesitant about the Covid-19 vaccine

Michigan must tell Johnson & Johnson vaccine recipients that it was developed using stem cells

Watch out for these vaccination scams looking to get your money, information

New York launches nation's first 'vaccine passports.'

People Fully Vaccinated Against COVID-19 Can Still Contract Virus, Study Shows

Why you should get a COVID-19 vaccine – even if you’ve already had the coronavirus

Office Depot will laminate COVID-19 vaccination cards for free

***COVID-19 & RELIGION

Hundreds attend Christian revival in North Carolina — most without masks, videos show

***RELIGION 

Why would Christians embrace conspiracy theories?  

National Association Of Evangelicals Leader Strives To Break Down Barriers, 'Build Bridges'

The Most Christian Continent: Africa

The waning of the black church A historic past is not enough for the black church to thrive today

***THE BIBLE

Dead Sea Scrolls Discovery Reveals New Details About the Bible’s Earliest Translations

Tennessee lawmakers advance bill to make Bible state's official book

***RELIGION & CRIME 

Atlanta Suspect’s Fixation on Sex Is Familiar Thorn for Evangelicals

Atlanta Shooting Suspect’s Church Bashed ‘Radical Feminism’ in Deleted Sermons

***RELIGION & RACIAL ISSUES

Study: Racial Diversity Within a Church Is Associated with Higher Average Attendance Over Time

A noose was found outside of a DC church, and police are now investigating incident as a possible hate crime 

***RELIGION & WOMEN

From the Empty Tomb to Today’s Abuse: Believe Women

The good White Christian women of Nazi Germany

Asian women lead charge against bigotry in Christian rallies across U.S,

After Beth Moore departure, more Southern Baptist women question roles in church

***MEGACHURCHES

Megachurch employee fired for “inappropriate behavior online” years ago, church leaders say

***RELIGION & BUSINESS  

Parent company of Christian radio's K-LOVE and Air1 relocating to Nashville area

Can you be fired over your sex life? Christian Financial Guru Dave Ramsey thinks so

***ISLAM 

Muslim groups are raising money for Colorado shooting victims

Colorado shooting suspect had worried about being targeted for his Muslim faith, acquaintances say

***RELIGION & SINGERS 

Skillet’s John Cooper Compares Grammys to Hitler, Condemns Cardi B’s Performance

Nike sues company behind Lil Nas X’s Satan Shoes which come with a pentagram pendant and a Bible verse

***RELIGION & CRIME

Accused Atlanta gunman was a patient at an evangelical treatment center 

***RELIGION & SEXUAL ABUSE

The inside story of how Kanakuk—one of America’s largest Christian camps—enabled horrific abuse

***SURVEYS ABOUT RELIGION

Gallup: Fewer Than Half of Americans Belong to a Church

74% of Black Americans believe in God of the Bible or other scripture

Nine-in-ten Black ‘nones’ believe in God, but fewer pray or attend services

***RELIGION & MONEY 

Preachers and their $5,000 sneakers: Why one man started an Instagram account showing churches’ wealth