Author: Serkadis

Wikipedia is such an integral part of the web that most people don’t even give it a second thought anymore. And much like everything else online, the site is completely free and available to anyone. Unlike most other sites, Wikipedia doesn’t have advertising, there isn’t a Wikipedia Pro, and has no other revenue than donations, not exactly the most reliabl… (read more)

Porvair Filtration Group, an engineering company specializing in filtration and separation technologies, has announced its presence at the 2010 Waste Management Conference** (March 7th – 11th) in Phoenix, AZ, USA.

Drawing upon many years of problem-solving experience – technical specialists from the Microfiltrex division of Porvair Filtration Group will be on-hand at WM 2010 Booth 633 to discuss and propose filtration / separation based engineering solutions to visitors from the nuclear power generation, fuel manufacture, waste treatment and storage sectors.

The nuclear industry demands special standards of performance and quality. Filtration is often the barrier between the environment and hazardous radiological or toxic processes. Originally chosen by the UK CEGB to replace existing filter systems in the UK nuclear reactor network, our filters now protect vital systems and the environment from harmful particulate around the world.

The Microfiltrex division of Porvair Filtration Group designs complete systems to meet the demands of virtually any application including powder transport in the fuel manufacturing sector ; final grinding coolant (liquid and air) ; sintering furnace and conversion oven off-gas ; disposable and cleanable filters for active liquors ; fluidized bed venting ; spent fuel dry storage pre-processing ; reactor safety relief valve and containment venting protection and crossflow liquid waste volume reduction.

A brochure detailing further information on optimized filtration / separation solutions for the nuclear industry is available from www.porvairfiltration.com.

Porvair Filtration Group is an international leader in the development and supply of materials and products for applications in filtration and separation. Their expertise in a wide range of media and the dedication of their design, manufacturing, sales, test and research teams ensure they are at the forefront of filtration technology, delivering world class performance to the Aerospace, Defence, Nuclear, Energy, Chemical Process, Industrial Process, Water Treatment, Printing and Life Science markets. With offices and manufacturing sites located in the UK, Europe and the USA combined with a world-wide network of market representatives and distributors, they pride ourselves on our continuous innovation and research to meet global demands.

For further information please contact Porvair Filtration Group on +44-1489-864330 / +1-804-550-1600 or email [email protected].

CAM software has grown beyond being a personal productivity tool—it impacts shop profitability on a number of levels.

It supports a broad range of CNC machine shops, their capabilities, and reduces part-run time and set-up time. It also reduces programming time and reduces scrap by keeping errors off the machine.

View the recorded webinar on our website below, to understand how GibbsCAM software can lower overall manufacturing costs and reduce programming time.

Registration Link: https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/845409704

Brookfield, the world standard for viscosity measurement and control, offers two courses that provide users of Brookfield instrumentation with the hands-on knowledge to get the most out of their viscosity test methods. These day-long training sessions are presented in easy-to-understand terms that give attendees the working know-how to verify and improve upon the data required for meaningful R&D and successful QC testing.

These courses are offered at Brookfield’s facility in Middleboro, MA., and at major metropolitan areas across the U.S.A. Arrangements can also be made to conduct the course at customers’ facilities where content can be adapted to their specific product applications.

PRACTICAL COURSE ON VISCOSITY MEASUREMENTS provides attendees with the tools and concepts they need to make the most precise viscosity measurements possible. The course is designed to benefit operators at all levels of experience. Participants are encouraged to bring product samples for testing where hands-on time is provided in a relaxed laboratory environment.

APPLIED COURSE ON VISCOSITY TEST METHODS is designed for the intermediate to advanced Brookfield Instrumentation user in R&D, Analytical, and Process Engineering functions. Focusing on test methods and techniques, it will review and discuss how Brookfield rotational viscometers and rheometers can be used to provide meaningful product analysis. The course takes you beyond pass/fail criteria, to an understanding of how to apply viscometric data as a problem solving and product performance/processing tool. Visit www.brookfieldengineering.com/services/educational-programs today or call 800.628.8139 or 508.946.6200 or via email [email protected] for course information and registration.

Published Feb. 16, 2010
By Kristi Pihl, Tri-City Herald staff writer

PASCO — A little girl bends over a coloring book, her crayon spreading red across the page.

Around various stations in Oralia Cruz’s Pasco home day care, the walls are covered with posters in Spanish detailing numbers, letters and colors and pictures of the children and their work. There are areas designated for reading, art, dramatic play, math and science.

Maria Diaz helps kids in her Pasco day care work on a shape and color project. Diaz has been involved in Pathways, a program at Washington State University’s Franklin County Extension, that’s designed to help Spanish-speaking child care providers improve their literacy and educate them on child development.

Cruz developed her enhanced day care with help from Pathways, a program of Washington State University’s Franklin County Extension that’s designed to strengthen Spanish-speaking child care providers’ literacy and to educate them on child development.

Cruz, who cares for eight children ages 2 to 12, said in Spanish that the program has increased her professionalism.

But Pathways, also known as Literacy and Education Pathways for Latino Child Care Providers, is running on borrowed time as it faces its funding running out.

Laurie Sherfey, WSU Extension director, and Alissa Schneider, Pathways project coordinator, say they are looking for grants and donations to keep Pathways alive.

A $1 million grant from the Gates Foundation for the first three years of the program will run out in March 2011, Sherfey said. The program began as a pilot project started in 2007 with donations from Women Helping Women Fund Tri-Cities and Bank of America.

With $100,000 a year, Pathways could continue its phase one program with a reduced staff, she said.

Schneider said they recognize it’s a “lofty goal,” but the community needs the program, which educates child care providers so they can better prepare kids for school.

The program is divided into two stages, with the first taught in Spanish and the more advanced second stage taught in Spanish and English, Schneider said.

Providers aren’t charged for the program, which allows Pathways to use curriculum from Mexico for free, she said.

Columbia Basin College provides vocational English as a second language classes and training for a child development associate certificate in the second phase, Schneider said. But the fate of this phase is up in the air, she said, because CBC agreed to provide it as part of the expiring grant and the college is facing state funding cuts.

Pathways has helped 75 providers so far, all but one of whom were women. Most have been in the U.S. for 10 to 15 years, Schneider said.

Schneider said she has seen the the program help the providers gain confidence and determination. They seek more resources and ask more questions.

Research has shown the program has improved children’s readiness for school, she said.

Maria Diaz of Pasco said she hadn’t had a chance to fulfill her education dreams until she began with Pathways.

She said it has helped improve her business. She reads with her six children in Spanish and English and has them practice writing, the alphabet and colors. Art projects that they do are more focused, and she has added science and math.

Diaz hopes to finish Pathways in the next year, attend community college and improve her English skills. She also wants to help other providers gain education.

Cruz said in Spanish that she joined Pathways because she wanted to learn. She is in the second stage, and wants to get her general equivalency diploma.

Pathways should continue, as it gives people who moved here from Mexico a chance to gain education they may have missed, Cruz said. It also helps them prepare children for school.

If interested in donating to Pathways or volunteering, call Laurie Sherfey or Alissa Schneider at 545-3511.

Additional news stories can be accessed online at the Tri-City Herald.

Published Feb. 15, 2010
By Pratik Joshi, Tri-City Herald staff writer

Demand for health care professionals, mechanics, pipefitters, electricians and other technical workers is rising in the Tri-Cities, even as the community readies for a post-Hanford economy.

Rob Walker, machine technology instructor at Columbia Basin College, answer questions about a student’s project recently at the Pasco campus. A new report highlights predicted job-skill gaps in the state as the economy recovers. The college is helping prepare students for the future jobs including machinists, health care professionals, mechanics, pipefitters, electricians and other technical workers. Photo by Bob Brawdy of the Tri-City Herald

And Columbia Basin College, in partnership with businesses and public agencies, is aiming to ensure a smooth transition.

CBC is helping WorkSource Columbia Basin train jobseekers for such jobs as medical secretaries, medical assistants, basic industrial mechanical maintenance workers and automotive technicians, said Candice Bluechel, business services outreach manager at WorkSource. Her agency is an arm of the state that helps people find job training and jobs.

Most of the training courses are short-term, designed to help students get jobs with employers who currently need workers.

Statewide, a shortage of bookkeepers, nurses, lab technicians, aircraft mechanics and manufacturing and production workers is likely as the economy recovers, says a recent report by the state Workforce Training and Education Coordinating Board.

Such middle-skill jobs require post-high-school education but not a four-year degree, and are critical to the economy because they fill the gap between high- and low-skill level jobs, said Dean Schau, regional labor economist.

Customized training and apprenticeship programs can develop a skilled work force rather quickly, he said.

Many middle-skill jobs have evolved as a result of mechanization and technological advancements that increased productivity, pruning the number of workers in some areas, Schau said. Other jobs were created by changing social and economic needs,.

CBC offers “focused education,” said CBC President Rich Cummins. It serves local and regional employment needs.

For example, many students come from other parts of the state to CBC for its dental hygiene program, he said.

The college develops new educational/training programs in consultation with experts from industry and the community and monitors emerging labor market trends, he said. “We create the capacity for the industry to create jobs.”

CBC also is looking at training students for jobs in the clean energy sector, he said. For example, the college plans to offer a short-term certificate course in how to install solar photovoltaic cell panels, Cummins said.

The Tri-Cities Research District, the HAMMER training center and the Mid-Columbia Energy Initiative, a group working toward establishing an energy park at Hanford, are helping determine long-term community needs, said Bluechel — “what kind of skills will we need as we transition from nuclear remediation to energy creation.”

CBC also can help develop a program for wind generation technicians, she said, adding it also can offer programs to help replace retiring Hanford workers.

Last year, the college began offering a nuclear technologies program, which is expected to cost about $2.1 million over the next five years. It’s being supported with contributions from Hanford-area companies — Energy Northwest, Washington River Protection Solutions, Battelle, CH2M Hill and the Mission Support Alliance.

Students are trained in nuclear power plant operations and radiation protection. Later the program is to be expanded to include training in maintenance and chemical and instrumentation control areas, college officials say.

This fall the college will change the name of its machine technology program to manufacturing, said Frank Murray, CBC spokesman. The program is broadening its focus beyond making tools, he said, to include design, manufacturing and marketing. “It’s a more descriptive title.”

The machine technology program on average had about 18 students but now has 32, he said. The college also plans to start a new program in diagnostic ultrasound, he said.

The challenge in training students for successful health care careers involves ensuring they can work with multi-disciplinary health teams and can communicate effectively, said Curt Freed, CBC dean of health sciences.

The aim is to develop workers who know enough theory to apply it practically, which is why the college empahsizes math and communication skills.

Hands-on courses are becoming more popular because those careers pay well and offer growth opportunities, he said.

More people are realizing community colleges are a good investment, especially in a tight economy, both Freed and Cummins said. They offer training in marketable skills at relatively lower cost than a four-year institution, Cummins said.

Additional news stories can be accessed online at the Tri-City Herald.

A 15- to 20-year plan for Peoria should address strategies to attract the middle class back into the inner city, establish measurable outcomes for its success and continue emphasizing future growth areas.

These were just a few of the many suggestions provided by council members during a lengthy policy session examining a proposed comprehensive plan, which analyzes future land uses and strategic development for the city of Peoria.

The session was highlighted by passionate remarks from 4th District City Councilman Bill Spears, who said any future document for Peoria should better address the flight of the middle class from the East and West bluffs, along with other inner city areas.

Spears questioned whether the plan adequately addressed how the city plans to attract people into subdivisions like Rolling Acres instead of promoting the expansion of northern and northwest growth cells, which are highlighted within it.

“We have to figure out a way to move people back,” Spears said, referring to statistics within the plan showing that Peoria is represented by low- and high-income households, but lacking in middle-income residents. “I think in a comprehensive plan, we should be saying these things.”

Spears also accused the council and the city’s staff of making decisions over the years that have helped drive away the middle class. He provided an example of a resident within his district who moved out because that person did not have a big enough driveway for a boat or an extra vehicle.

“We have to look a different ways of doing things than the same old way . . . that we’ll grow the city to the north and northwest and we’ll make (tax increment financing) districts in the Downtown area and wonder why the middle class left,” Spears said.

Mayor Jim Ardis later defended the growth cells, saying they allow Peorians a choice of schools. The comprehensive plan proposal introduces four planned growth cell areas, including three which geographically extend the residential areas of Far North Peoria closer to Dunlap and into rural Peoria County.

“It’s a positive for Peoria to have (Dunlap ) District 323,” Ardis said. “Seventy percent of the people who go to Dunlap schools live in Peoria. That’s great for us. That’s choice.”

Ardis said education continues to be a major problem for growing the inner city, a problem that might not change for years to come.

“It’s not going to change tomorrow or in five years,” Ardis said. “Hopefully in time, when we do the next comprehensive plan, (the council will be talking about) moving people back in.”

The plan will go back to the planning commission for a public hearing on March 17. The City Council could vote on it by April 13.

Ross Black, assistant director with the Planning & Growth Management Department, said his department will continue to get feedback on the plan and will “make sure we are clear” with how it addresses the redevelopment of the inner city.

“We need to be very clear the existing parts of the city will have as much of a focus if not more of a focus than the new development areas,” Black said.

 

John Sharp can be reached at 686-3282 or [email protected].

 

Read the original article from Journal Star.

Distributed via Chicago Press Release Services

A North Shore doctor who treated victims of the Haitian earthquake said the experience was both exhilarating and humbling.

Comparing his work in Haiti to battlefield surgery, orthopedic surgeon Dr. Michael Jacker has returned home with a sense of hope for those he helped, and a sense of sadness for those he couldn’t.

On staff at Advocate Condell Medical Center and Lake Forest and Northwest Community hospitals, Jacker recently returned from a seven-day volunteer stint in Port-au-Prince.

“When I heard the first radio reports, I knew immediately there would be a huge number of fracture and crush injuries,” said Jacker, 56. “I wanted to be there to help.”

He searched the Web for relief agencies, eventually finding California-based Airline Ambassadors International. Airline Ambassadors began in 1992 as a network of airline employees using their travel privileges to take trips for humanitarian projects.

Not knowing when he might return, Jacker packed plenty of clothes, a water filtration kit, mosquito net and protein bars. He flew out of O’Hare Airport at 2:30 a.m. on Jan. 29.

“It was a powerful moment for me,” Jacker said. “I knew I had to do this.”

Arriving in Port-au-Prince, he made his way to a private hospital that withstood the force of the quake. Hospital staff fled in the early days of the disaster and the place was being run by French and American medical teams.

Hundreds of injured were arriving daily.

“The most common injuries were open fractures with exposed bones. Many were infected and since the injuries were nearly three weeks old, the muscles were starting to atrophy,” Jacker explained. “I saw things I’ve only read about in textbooks.

Many of the arrivals had to be turned away. “If they had hip fractures, we couldn’t do anything for them. We just didn’t have the right hardware.”

In practice for 25 years, the Harvard University and Rush Medical Center of Chicago graduate has extensive experience in emergency trauma treatment. Fluent in French, Jacker said his language skills served him well in Haiti.

Jacker treated dozens of people, many of them children. Some of the treatment involved undoing the work done by other doctors.

“They did the best they could in the first days after the quake, but many of the casts and splints were applied in the wrong ways and needed to be changed,” Jacker said.

Lacking recovery rooms, patients were put in tents in the hospital’s courtyard.

The scene in Port-au-Prince was an assault on the senses, the Highland Park man said.

“The air was dusty, the odor from sewage, garbage and the tens of thousands of corpses still trapped in the rubble was overwhelming,” he said. “The crushed buildings and the tent camps were everywhere.”

Jacker didn’t witness any violence during his weeklong stay. The people still seemed to be in shock.

“They had a vacant look in their eyes. I saw no smiles. They looked as if they were living through a nightmare. Their tents were mostly worthless, bed sheets held up by sticks. I can’t imagine what it will be like when the rainy season comes soon.”

Jacker said being a doctor in that situation was unlike anything he’s experienced in the states.

“This was pure medicine,” he said. “No insurance forms, no malpractice worries, no paperwork. It was completely rewarding. I never felt tired, never felt exhausted.”

Read the original article on DailyHerald.com.

Distributed via Chicago Press Release Services

Conant High School art department students are currently producing their own stop-motion film projects.

Using digital cameras, students take photos of the action, and then download these image files onto Macintosh computers in the lab. Video editing software is used to edit and produce short films.

Conant High School students Joe Melone and Scott Durand collaborated on one such experimental film project, that utilizes both video and stop motion animation.

Their social commentary film, entitled “Happiness is Cool Plastic,” was edited using Final Cut Pro software on a Macintosh computer in Justin Bickus’ Studio Multimedia class, and was shown at the school’s annual Music Video Day in the auditorium.

Read the original article on DailyHerald.com.

Distributed via Chicago Press Release Services

Prospect High School in Mount Prospect hosted the Solid Waste Agency of Northern Cook County’s Eco-Friendly Fashion Show on Friday, Feb. 12.

Coordinated by science teacher and environmental club sponsor Mollie David, students from the environmental club and faculty modeled outfits with accessories made from environmentally-friendly renewable fibers or recycled materials.

All of the items are available at local retail stores or on the Internet, promoted on the SWANCC Eco-Friendly Marketplace, swancc.org/education/efmp/ecofriendlymarketplace.html. This educational program demonstrates the technological advancements in processing renewable fibers and recyclables.

“SWANCC’s eco-friendly fashion show is both entertaining and enlightening”, said Mary Allen, SWANCC’s recycling and education director.

“SWANCC’s goal is to show that these products are quality, nice looking, fun to wear and readily available, and to reinforce the importance of buying recycled and sustainable products whenever possible to conserve resources.”

Read the original article on DailyHerald.com.

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Article Tags: Tom Bethell

I planned to write something about nuclear power—about how the U.S., after a 30-year delay, had better hurry up and restart nuclear power. Then came Climategate. It involved the release—it has been called a theft but more likely it was a deliberate leak—of e-mails from a “university” in Britain that has been promoting climate change fears in the guise of collecting climate data.

With that, a new public understanding of the realities of science today may begin to dawn. The new reality is this. For about a generation, the Western world has been coping with a politicized attack on science by the very people who should have been guarding its integrity.

The obstruction of further developments in nuclear power was only the beginning. In 1979, an accident at Three Mile Island, in which no one was hurt, brought the nuclear power enterprise in the U.S. to a halt. Fears were deliberately inflated. China was not intimidated, however, and today it is adding nuclear power on a large scale; 25 new reactors are under construction. Plainly, if this continues much longer, China will develop an unstoppable economic lead over the U.S. And it will be our fault.

China’s former catastrophe (Communist rule) now works to its advantage. In 1949, the nation’s intelligentsia seized power—for that is what Communism entails. They became socialist planners for 40 years and impoverished the country with famine and ruin. Since the late 1960s, our homegrown intelligentsia have felt deprived because they never had the same opportunity. They never could seize the power they believe is rightfully theirs. The amazing result? China is now immunized against the socialist disease, whereas the U.S. has still not been fully exposed. We remain susceptible, and keep on experiencing its maladies.

Source: spectator.org

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Renowned stock photography service Shutterstock has passed the 10-million mark of hosted images, and by doing so, strengthening its position as the number one service in the business. While the stock imagery market has been turbulent in this recent period with numerous top companies acquisitions, Shutterstock still remains the … (read more)

Article Tags: Rebecca Terrell

Several organizations are petitioning Obama’s EPA to reconsider its December 2009 endangerment finding regarding greenhouse gases. The finding permits EPA to regulate carbon dioxide and other allegedly dangerous emissions under the Clean Air Act. But recent disclosures have revealed the UN data on which EPA based its decision was fraudulently manipulated and therefore completely unreliable. The source document, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) 2007 Fourth Assessment Report (AR4), has been under harsh scrutiny over the past weeks for a number of blunders, including the Climategate scandal, bogus claims about Himalayan glacier melt, false assertions The Netherlands are drowning, deceptive hysteria over conditions in the Amazon, exaggerations of vanishing polar ice caps, and fraudulent cover-up of Chinese temperature data.

On February 12, three organizations filed a Petition for Reconsideration in which they stated, “EPA’s Endangerment Finding is based on non-scientific reports by the IPCC and scientifically indefensible global temperature datasets.” The three petitioners are the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC), the Science and Environmental Policy Project (SEPP), and the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI).

Their petition goes on to explain EPA’s data was highly compromised, likely to contain political bias, and never independently verified. A CEI press release also warns the endangerment finding opens the door for EPA to impose crippling regulations on tens of thousands of previously unregulated small businesses.

Source: thenewamerican.com

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Article Tags: World Temperatures, YouTube

For those of you who enjoyed MUST SEE: What does Average Temperature Mean? this is the follow up.

To get regional and global view of temperature, dataset are combined and massaged to get the average graphs that depict a warming planet. But is this valid? I’ll show why it is not with specific examples. This practice must end because inventing data and combining data is creating data that does not exist

Source: youtube.com

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Article Tags: World Temperatures

Several errors have been recently uncovered in the 4th Assessment Report (AR4) of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). These include problems with Himalayan glaciers, African agriculture, Amazon rainforests, Dutch geography, and attribution of damages from extreme weather events. More seem to turn up daily. Most of these errors stem from the IPCC’s reliance on non-peer reviewed sources.

The defenders of the IPCC have contended that most of these errors are minor in significance and are confined to the Working Group II Report (the one on impacts, adaptation and vulnerability) of the IPCC which was put together by representatives from various regional interests and that there was not as much hard science available to call upon as there was in the Working Group I report (“The Physical Science Basis”). The IPCC defenders argue that there have been no (or practically no) problems identified in the Working Group I (WGI) report on the science.

We humbly disagree.

Click source to read more

Source: worldclimatereport.com

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Bradie Tennell isn’t sure how her figure skating career began: she was two years old when she first took to the ice.

But while details of the beginnings of Bradie’s career are murky, the direction of the Carpentersville girl’s future is clear. Bradie won the 2010 Upper Great Lakes Regional Figure Skating Championships last October in Hoffman Estates, securing a place in U.S. Junior Figure Skating Championships in Strongsville, Ohio.

At junior nationals, Bradie finished 10th in the juvenile girls division.

“My goal short term is to perfect my double-axel,” Bradie said. “I also want to go back to the junior nationals.”

There’s also the major competition that’s going on now in Vancouver, the Winter Olympic Games, but Bradie’s mother Jean Tennell, says the Winter Olympics are four – maybe even eight years away – because of the age restrictions. Bradie will turn 16 just weeks before the 2014 Games in Sochi, Russia.

“I am not sure when the cutoff date is for the Winter Olympics, but I am not sure that it is two weeks before they start,” Jean Tennell said with a chuckle.

Bradie, who just celebrated her 12th birthday, practices five hours a day, six days a week at the Twin Rinks Ice Pavilion in Buffalo Grove where she works with Denise Myers as part of the Wagon Wheels Figure Skating Club. Between practice sessions, Bradie and her two brothers, Austin, 10, and Shane 8, are home-schooled.

“I like presenting myself and having fun on the ice,” Bradie said. “I like jumping and bringing the judges into my creativity on the ice. I just skate and it feels like the best moment of my life.”

Her favorites move is the Biehlman Spin – where the skater touches their head to their rear end. Ballet improves Bradie’s posture and also strengthens the 12-year-old’s slight frame.

“It teaches you to keep your body still,” she said.

In addition to daily workouts, Bradie meets once a month to work with a choreographer, who helps develop routines.

Each routine in the two-and-a-half minute program must feature five to seven jumps and three spins, including combinations of jumps and spins.

“It’s all maintenance,” Bradie said. “I practice until it is good enough to take to competition.”

Bradie will work to perfect her routines and watch fellow figure skaters in Vancouver, aspiring to one day follow in their footsteps. Among Bradie’s favorite figure skaters are the retired Kristi Yamaguchi and current Olympian Rachael Flatt.

“In eight years when she is good and strong,” Jean Tennell said.

Read the original article on DailyHerald.com.

Distributed via Chicago Press Release Services

Steve Baskis makes his way to the bench press at Addison Park District’s Club Fitness, his hand on the shoulder of personal trainer Joe Sinople. He dons a special glove to improve the grip in his nerve-damaged left hand.

Baskis, a former U.S. Army infantryman, was wounded and blinded when a roadside bomb exploded near his armored vehicle on May 13, 2008, in Iraq. A Healthy Minds, Healthy Body program spearheaded by the Northeast DuPage Special Recreation Association in partnership with Club Fitness, the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago and the U.S. Paralympics is helping him rebuild his body and train for the 2012 Paralympics in London.

The pilot program offers qualifying vets with disabilities and their workout partners a year’s free membership at Club Fitness, along with 15 sessions with a personal trainer, exercise materials for home use and social opportunities to meet with other vets. The expectation is that after a year, the veterans will be able to continue with workouts on their own.

Baskis, a Glen Ellyn resident, was the first to sign up when the program started in September 2009.

“It’s near my hometown. I can come and get the kind of exercises and workouts that I really need,” he said.

Athletic by nature, Baskis said he would pursue fitness even if the program wasn’t free, but the equipment and guidance he receives from a personal trainer are a plus.

“Everything works really nice and it seems like it’s well laid-out,” he said. “It would be cool for the whole country if every state did this.”

Larry Reiner, executive director of NEDSRA, said he got the idea for the initiative after seeing the National Parks and Recreation Association partner with the U.S. Paralympics.

“We have the facilities. We have the resources. We just need to put them together,” he said. “The key thing is we need to welcome our veterans back home.”

The program has received partial funding from the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity and the Christopher and Dana Reeve Foundation, and has the full backing of the NEDSRA board, Reiner said.

During its pilot stage, “Healthy Minds, Healthy Bodies” is accepting veterans from any location who have a disability rating of 10 percent or more from the Department of Veterans Affairs. So far, 24 veterans have enrolled in the 50 program’s 50 open slots.

Given the unique opportunity, some of the participating veterans come from as far south as Joliet and as far north as Gurnee, said Monica Del Angel, director of public information for NEDSRA.

“If this works, we feel it can be replicated throughout the state,” Reiner said.

Program manager Donna Sebok said she is reaching far and wide to spread the word to veterans who might benefit. She has contacted veterans’ hospitals, family support groups and student veterans groups at colleges and universities; invited other organizations that work with veterans to the monthly socials; and even written letters to veterans she read about in newspaper articles.

Vietnam-era vets are welcome to the fitness program and often serve as mentors to the newly returned veterans, Sebok said.

“I’ve been very grateful for the connection,” she said. “It just feels good to offer something for the great service they’ve given us.”

Opportunity knocks

When Baskis heard about the program, it didn’t take him long to join. He’d spent about six months in Hines V.A. Hospital near Maywood, during which time his muscles had atrophied.

“As soon as I was discharged from the hospital, I was seeking ways to improve my health again,” he said.

Living in Forest Park after his discharge from the hospital, Baskis knew he soon would be moving to Glen Ellyn where he and his fiancee (now wife) had purchased at home. Baskis takes the Pace paratransit service to the fitness center two to three times a week for one-hour workouts. He also attends Paralympic training camps for tandem cycling and works out at home.

“My goal is to make it onto the national (Paralympic) team. I want to get on the team and go to London in 2012,” he said.

The 24-year-old ruefully admits he can’t resist other opportunities that come his way. He missed some workout sessions because he went on an expedition to climb a volcano in Mexico.

He competed in a half-Ironman in Georgia, biking 56 miles and running a half-marathon. About two weeks later, he entered last year’s Chicago Marathon – an event that garnered him media publicity that interfered with his training, he said. He made it halfway through the race.

“I have trouble saying no,” he admitted. “I should have waited longer and trained better.”

An advocate for veterans’ fitness and recreation, Baskis also is working to organize chapters of The Mission Continues and Team River Run in the Chicago area. The Mission Continues brings veterans together to volunteer in the community and Team River Run organizes river rafting trips for veterans.

“I love doing things outdoors,” Baskis said.

Baskis said he’s always had a positive attitude toward life and he sees no reason to change now. Some of his buddies were injured far worse than he was.

“The best thing I think for me is not dwell on what’s changed in your life, but to drive forward and do what you need to do to get by because you can’t change what’s happened,” he said.

Clients with spunk

It’s that kind of spunk and determination that makes working with veterans a pleasure, said fitness trainer Sinople. Sinople had no previous experience working with people with disabilities, but now is aiming at becoming a certified inclusive fitness trainer. NEDSRA is working with the University of Illinois-Chicago to prepare trainers to take the inclusive fitness exam.

“I like this. It’s so much fun. It’s kind of a learning experience for me, too,” Sinople said.

The center is about to obtain its first piece of fitness equipment that can be adapted to be used by people with and without disabilities. Meanwhile, Sinople has modified exercises so they can be done by vets in wheelchairs, learned to guide the visually impaired like Baskis around the fitness club floor, and made use of equipment such as padded cuffs so vets who lack hand strength can still give their arms a workout.

“You adjust everything to what they can and cannot do,” Sinople said. “Hopefully, I can help them get close to what they were before or just have a better life.”

So far, Sinople is the main trainer in the vets program. He doesn’t complain.

“They’re more determined than the able-bodied I work with,” he said.

To inquire about the Healthy Minds, Healthy Bodies program, contact Lisa Deets at (630) 620-4500, ext. 140.

Read the original article on DailyHerald.com.

Distributed via Chicago Press Release Services

Apparent tensions between China and the U.S. are nothing to fear according to New York Times op-ed contributor Minxin Pei.

Some degree of argument between the two nations is inevitable given the massive divide between the nations' political values.

But this values divide is dwarfed by the enormous economic relationship the two nations share.

NYT:

In many ways, the sudden worsening of ties between Beijing and Washington really means that U.S.-China relations are returning to “normalcy.” Because of the deep and unbridgeable differences between the two countries in terms of their political values... Chumminess and absence of tensions, as displayed during Mr. Obama’s first year in office, are actually the exception.

...

While it is true that the Chinese government has turned up its blustering several notches, we should learn to tell bark from bite. Other than canceling its military exchange program with the U.S., which is not viewed as productive in any case, China’s retaliations are mostly rhetorical and symbolic. The real test, of course, will be Iran. If Beijing single-handedly blocks sanctions against Tehran at the United Nations Security Council, that would be serious. But Chinese leaders must also know that they will surely face the united wrath of the United States and Europe, a prospect no smart mandarins in China relish.

So quit worrying about current tensions escalating past mere bluster and get used to it. The two nations will constantly argue, but in the end they are now economically inseparable and actually fit each other well due to their vastly different stages of development. After so much economic integration between the two nations, there's no turning back now. Thus it's in their best interests to always make up in the end, and they will.

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