A Sea Change in Less Than 50 Years as Gay Rights Gained Momentum; New York Times, 3/25/13

John Harwood, New York Times; A Sea Change in Less Than 50 Years as Gay Rights Gained Momentum: "The struggle for African-Americans’ rights, symbolized by the bloody 1965 Selma march, is as old as the nation. The effort for American women’s rights began at Seneca Falls, N.Y., more than 150 years ago. The modern fight for gay rights is, by contrast, less than a half-century old, dating from the 1969 Stonewall uprising in New York. But this week, as the Supreme Court hears two landmark cases on same-sex marriage, the speed and scope of the movement are astonishing supporters."

Acceptance by Example, on the Field and at Home; New York Times, 3/23/13

Scott Fujita, New York Times; Acceptance by Example, on the Field and at Home: "Sometimes, people ask me what any of this has to do with football. Some think football players like me should just keep our mouths shut and focus on the game. But we’re people first, and football players a distant second. Football is a big part of what we do, but a very small part of who we are. And historically, sports figures like Jackie Robinson, Billie Jean King and Muhammad Ali have been powerful agents for social change. That’s why the messages athletes send — including the way they treat others and the words they use — can influence many people, especially children. Believe it or not, conversations about issues like gay marriage take place in locker rooms every day. In many respects, the football locker room is a microcosm of society. While there is certainly an element of bravado in our sport, football players are not the meatheads many think we are. For some of my friends who raise personal objections to marriage equality, they still recognize the importance of being accepting. And many of them also recognize that regardless of what they choose to believe or practice at home or at their church, that doesn’t give them the right to discriminate. I am encouraged by how I’ve seen such conversations evolve."

Boy Scouts Sends Questionnaire to Members About Ban on Gays; New York Times, 3/12/13

Kirk Johnson, New York Times; Boy Scouts Sends Questionnaire to Members About Ban on Gays: "The Boy Scouts of America is reaching out to parents and scouts as it decides whether to continue or rescind the group’s ban on gay members and leaders. Surveys went out in recent days to 1.1 million scouts and their families around the nation... A spokesman for the Scouts, Deron Smith, said the answers to the survey would be provided to national leaders before the May meeting. A second round of surveys, he wrote in an e-mail, will be sent soon to about 325,000 people in scouting alumni groups, including members of the National Eagle Scout Association. The survey was developed by a third-party research provider, North Star Opinion Research, with assistance from volunteers and professionals, Mr. Smith said, with “diverse viewpoints.”"

2 Awards Given to Promote Multicultural Children’s Books; New York Times, 3/10/13

Leslie Kaufman, New York Times; 2 Awards Given to Promote Multicultural Children’s Books: "A month ago a nonprofit called First Book, which promotes literacy among children in low-income communities, announced the Stories for All project, a program intended to prod publishers to print more multicultural books. Kyle Zimmer, First Book’s chief executive, says that part of the motivation was the “chasm” between the number of people who want such books and what is available. On Wednesday, First Book will announce that awards of $500,000 will go to two publishers for their proposals for the project: HarperCollins, the big publishing house owned by News Corporation, and Lee & Low, a minority-owned independent publisher."

NFL Combine Gay Questions: Teams Prying About Sexual Orientation, TE Nick Kasa Says; HuffingtonPost.com, 2/26/13

HuffingtonPost.com; NFL Combine Gay Questions: Teams Prying About Sexual Orientation, TE Nick Kasa Says: "NFL prospect Nick Kasa was asked by scouts about his sexual orientation at the NFL Combine, the tight end said in a radio interview on Tuesday. Kasa, a senior at the University of Colorado, is one of a few hundred players who participated this week in the NFL Scouting Combine, an annual showcase for NFL prospects in advance of April's draft. Over the course of the Combine, participants submit themselves for a variety of physical and mental tests, as well as interviews with NFL teams. According to Kasa, it was during these interviews that the topic of his sexual preferences came up. “[Teams] ask you like, ‘Do you have a girlfriend?’ Are you married?’ Do you like girls?’” Kasa told CJ and Kreckman of ESPN Radio Denver on Tuesday. “Those kinds of things, and you know it was just kind of weird. But they would ask you with a straight face, and it’s a pretty weird experience altogether.”"

Making Good on Our Commitment to Needy Students; Chronicle of Higher Education, 2/21/13

Kate Queeney, Chronicle of Higher Education; Making Good on Our Commitment to Needy Students: "Even as colleges and universities redouble their commitments to first-generation and low-income students, it's clear we still have a great deal to learn. Last December, The New York Times published an article on this topic, "For Poor, Leap to College Often Ends in a Hard Fall." In lengthy and provocative profiles, the story reflected on how students at even the most well-intentioned colleges and universities are held back—by family pressures, self-doubt, and deceptively "small" barriers—from reaching their educational potential. The profiles in The Times did not have happy endings. Fortunately, Anna's story does. She enrolled in a Ph.D. program closer to home and finished her degree while helping to care for her mother. She is a postdoc now at the same university and, with luck, will make a fine professor, if that's what she chooses. At Smith, a commitment to students of promise is a fundamental value. While not every story ends as positively as Anna's did, many do. And when disadvantaged students succeed in college and beyond, their experiences teach us what we do well and how we can do it better...As a faculty member, I have come to understand that asking questions, and being prepared to hear the sometimes difficult answers, can mean the difference for students between simply making it through college and truly reaping the benefits of higher education. When my colleagues found that first-generation students and students of color weren't persisting in STEM fields at the same rate as Smith students at large, we created a program focused on mentoring and supporting those students."

Online Courses Could Widen Achievement Gaps Among Students; Chronicle of Higher Education, 2/21/13

Jake New, Chronicle of Higher Education; Online Courses Could Widen Achievement Gaps Among Students: "Low-cost online courses could allow a more-diverse group of students to try college, but a new study suggests that such courses could also widen achievement gaps among students in different demographic groups. The study, which is described in a working paper titled “Adaptability to Online Learning: Differences Across Types of Students and Academic Subject Areas,” was conducted by Columbia University’s Community College Research Center. The researchers examined 500,000 courses taken by more than 40,000 community- and technical-college students in Washington State. They found that students in demographic groups whose members typically struggle in traditional classrooms are finding their troubles exacerbated in online courses. The study found that all students who take more online courses, no matter the demographic, are less likely to attain a degree. However, some groups—including black students, male students, younger students, and students with lower grade-point averages—are particularly susceptible to this pattern."

A Titan’s How-To on Breaking the Glass Ceiling; New York Times, 2/21/13

Jodi Kantor, New York Times; A Titan’s How-To on Breaking the Glass Ceiling: "Before Sheryl Sandberg, the chief operating officer of Facebook, started to write “Lean In,” her book-slash-manifesto on women in the workplace, she rereadBetty Friedan’s “The Feminine Mystique.” Like the homemaker turned activist who helped start a revolution 50 years ago, Ms. Sandberg wanted to do far more than sell books. Ms. Sandberg, whose ideas about working women have prompted both enthusiasm and criticism, is attempting nothing less than a Friedan-like feat: a national discussion of a gender-problem-that-has-no-name, this time in the workplace, and a movement to address it. When her book is published on March 11, accompanied by a carefully orchestrated media campaign, she hopes to create her own version of the consciousness-raising groups of yore: “Lean In Circles,” as she calls them, in which women can share experiences and follow a Sandberg-crafted curriculum for career success. (First assignment: a video on how to command more authority at work by changing how they speak and even sit.)"

Sewers, Curfews and a Ban on Gay Bias; New York Times, 1/28/13

Dan Barry, New York Times; Sewers, Curfews and a Ban on Gay Bias: "Admit it: The Commission’s anti-discrimination vote seems at odds with knee-jerk assumptions about a map dot in the Appalachian coal fields, tucked between Sassafras and Happy. For one thing, Vicco embraces its raucous country-boy reputation — home to countless brawls and a dozen or so unsolved murders, people here say. For another, it is in Perry County, where four of every five voters rejected President Obama in the November election. But the Vicco Commission’s 3-to-1 vote this month not only anticipated a central theme in the president’s second inaugural speech (“Our journey is not complete until our gay brothers and sisters are treated like anyone else under the law ...”), it also presented a legislative model to the nation’s partisan-paralyzed Capitol, 460 miles away. You discuss, you find consensus, you vote, and you move on, explained the mayor, Johnny Cummings. “You have to get along.”"

Revolution Hits the Universities; New York Times, 1/26/13

Thomas L. Friedman, New York Times; Revolution Hits the Universities: "LORD knows there’s a lot of bad news in the world today to get you down, but there is one big thing happening that leaves me incredibly hopeful about the future, and that is the budding revolution in global online higher education. Nothing has more potential to lift more people out of poverty — by providing them an affordable education to get a job or improve in the job they have. Nothing has more potential to unlock a billion more brains to solve the world’s biggest problems. And nothing has more potential to enable us to reimagine higher education than the massive open online course, or MOOC, platforms that are being developed by the likes of Stanford and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and companies like Coursera and Udacity...YOU just have to hear the stories told by the pioneers in this industry to appreciate its revolutionary potential. One of Koller’s favorites is about “Daniel,” a 17-year-old with autism who communicates mainly by computer. He took an online modern poetry class from Penn. He and his parents wrote that the combination of rigorous academic curriculum, which requires Daniel to stay on task, and the online learning system that does not strain his social skills, attention deficits or force him to look anyone in the eye, enable him to better manage his autism. Koller shared a letter from Daniel, in which he wrote: “Please tell Coursera and Penn my story. I am a 17-year-old boy emerging from autism. I can’t yet sit still in a classroom so [your course] was my first real course ever. During the course, I had to keep pace with the class, which is unheard-of in special ed. Now I know I can benefit from having to work hard and enjoy being in sync with the world.”"