An Open Letter to the California Legislature on SB520

An Open Letter to the California Legislature on SB520

May 7, 2013

An Open Letter to California State Legislators

Dear CA State Legislators,

As a parent and a UC professor, I feel compelled to urge you to reject the SB 520 bill being presented to you by Darryl Steinberg. Please fund the Community Colleges and the California State Universities and the University of California properly: that way you can help guarantee access to quality education. By mandating the use of on-line general education courses for public higher education, you put the entire system of public higher education at risk.

In education, there are no quick fixes: solutions such as SB 520 can cause long-lasting damage. Universities have been already been seriously weakened by years of budget cuts and administrative bloat. Real change, however, can only happen come through the implementation of ground-up reforms.

Our students need more interaction with real-life professors: they don’t need more screen time.  The Internet is an amazing resource for research and learning, but more screen time for young people is not a substitute for rich pedagogical experiences. Students need more contact with professors and their peers in an information saturated media ecology. They need quality experiences with on-line education as supplements not substitutes for real life classroom experience.

Although SB 520 has been amended to protect public funds from private exploitation, the provisions are weak at best. Case in point: California spends millions of dollars a year buying STAR tests from the ETS. A rampant assessment emphasis in public education has provided a windfall for secretive, privately run organizations like ETS. ,Next, week, my son - like millions of Californian schoolchildren - will be taking standardized tests that may or may not provide accurate assessments of his academic achievements and aptitudes.  Star testing was implemented as part of an accountability regime in K-12 education. It has produced mixed results in terms of actually improving the California public school system. Class sizes in public schools meanwhile have ballooned.

Technological solutions to social problems are dangerous panacea disguising the real cause of the problems we face – shrinking budgets for the University’s core mission of undergraduate education. Cynical administrative moves to disguise economic chicanery are not the solution.

As Diane Ravitch has written, “American education has a long history of infatuation with fads and ill-considered ideas. The current obsession with making our schools work like a business may be the worst of them.”  (222) 

SB 520 deplores the fact that so many of our students cannot get into courses to complete their degrees in a timely fashion. However, this is a problem that the three segments of public higher education in California do not have to the same extent. The UC faces that problem much less than the community colleges. Inversely, SB520 drives those in the UC, CSU, and the CCs who already developed their own hybrid technology-enhanced education into shot-gun marriages with for-profit providers, thus funneling public funds into private enterprise hands.. The present crisis is not some kind of natural disaster, like an earthquake. The crisis of access is entirely man-made!

Every undergraduate program on my campus has been cut to the bone: our core missions are compromised every day by budget cuts. Cal State, Community College and UC students represent a broad cross section of the population of  California. Our students don’t deserve access to on-line education approved or not by CA faculty. They don’t deserve a virtual University -- they deserve a real one. They need more access to professors, to content and to pedagogical situations that challenge and move them.

Please listen to the students. Time and again students across the state have insisted publicly that they neither need nor want more online education. Nor do they want state funds to go to for-profit and pseudo-not-for-profit vendors. Our students want a good education. Please leave it to those most engaged in public higher education to determine how technology-enhanced delivery can work to improve the classroom experience.

Please vote against SB 520. Please restore the UC, Cal State and Community College budgets so that we can continue to provide access to all of California’s college students.

Yours truly,

Catherine Liu

Professor, Film and Media Studies

Director, UC Irvine Humanities Collective

UC Irvine

For more News From Underground, visit http://markcrispinmiller.com
 
 

_________________________

EON

The Ecological Options Network

"Media working for Another World"

www.eon3.net        EON3emfBlog.net

EON's YouTube Channel  

PlanetarianPerspectives.net

The "Soft Fascination" of Nature

The "Soft Fascination" of Nature

by Richard J Dolesh

Richard Dolesh reports on a recently published study, the findings of which support what most of us know intuitively - that nature is good for us.

Immersion in nature is a restorative experience with multiple benefits

A walk in the park can calm and restore you. This is something we take for granted in parks and recreation, because we have known it to be true ever since we started spending time in nature.

But new research reported in the British Journal of Sports Medicine now provides scientific proof that walking in nature and spending time under leafy shade trees causes electrochemical changes in the brain that can lead people to enter a highly beneficial state of “effortless attention.”

The UK researchers state with some justifiable academic stuffiness that “…happiness, or the presence of positive emotional mindsets, broadens an individual’s thought-action repertoire with positive benefits to physical and intellectual activities, and to social and psychological resources.”

They assert that this mental benefit—happiness, if you will—occurs in individuals who are engaged in play, exploration, or other discovery-type activities. They note that until now, technology has not permitted scientists to study the cortical correlates of persons actively engaged within differing environments, but new developments in mobile electroencephalography (EEG), however, now allow exactly such measurements to be made.

In this recent study, a research team from Herriot-Watt University in Edinburgh, United Kingdom, outfitted a group of test subjects with mobile electrodes fastened to their heads. The subjects then took programmed walks in three different environments—an urban shopping district, a park with a lush green environment, and a busy commercial zone.

The results showed evidence of brain-wave activity indicating relaxed states—lower frustration, lower “engagement and arousal,” and higher meditative states—when moving into the green space, and just the reverse when moving out of it.

One of the most interesting aspects of this new research is how it conforms to a theory concerning the “soft fascination” of nature. In The Experience of Nature: A Psychological Perspective, researchers Rachel Kaplan and Steven Kaplan deconstruct what they call “the restorative experience.” This experience of being lifted out of a state of mental fatigue can be realized in a number of ways, but is most often accomplished by “getting away” or “escaping” from stressful environments and situations.

All of us can attest to times that we just want to get away, or spend time away from it all. However, research by the Kaplans and others shows that in the process of escaping from a state of mental fatigue, there are certain types of restorative experiences that seem to transcend others and produce multiple benefits, not just the benefit of escape from stress alone.

One of these states is the “fascination” that occurs when a person is immersed in nature. Entering this state of effortless attention can occur in a variety of ways—walking in the woods, hiking along a trail in a totally natural environment, or sitting by a stream watching water tumble over rocks. It seems that the experience of being in nature is transformative in and of itself—it can cause a person’s emotional state to be uplifted and mental balance to be restored. Being in nature is truly refreshing in a very deep, meaningful way.

Astute observers of the human condition have been cataloguing the things that fascinate us for hundreds, if not thousands, of years. However, the soft fascination of nature, according to the Kaplans, is a mental state produced by full engagement in the pleasurable context of nature.

When you enter a green space of natural light and shadows containing the colors of nature, you can also enter a particularly reflective mode at the same time in which you are able to comprehend more than one thing at a time, a state in which stresses and pressures are reduced. You are able to enjoy multiple stimuli and perceptions even while thinking about other things. All in all, being in nature produces a fully restorative experience.

The Kaplans’ research was largely based on observations of people and stimuli, similar to other research since then. Other studies, as mentioned in a recent New York Times article about the Herriot-Watt University study have shown the measurable and provable benefits of living near parks and green spaces.

They have also chronicled how kids do better on cognitive tests after spending time in nature, and how certain biochemical changes occur in a person’s saliva after they spend time outdoors. However, this new study is one of the first to make real-time measurements of brain activity that occurs while people are being bombarded by the stimuli of a busy commercial street or a shopping district, and the very different brain-activity patterns that result from the restorative effects of walking outdoors in nature.

It is extremely interesting to note that this new research from Herriot-Watt University, which used advanced technology to measure brain waves through mobile EEGs, shows what we have intuitively known for generations—that a walk in the park may be the most beneficial thing you can do for your mental and physical health.

Richard J. Dolesh is NRPA’s Vice President of Conservation (rdolesh@nrpa.org).

Published in Parks & Recreation, www.parksandrecreation.org. Copyright National Recreation and Park Association, used with permission.

http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/1920068/the_soft_fascination_of_nature.html

Cell Phone Use, Acoustic Neuroma and Cancer of the Pituitary Gland

Cell Phone Use, Acoustic Neuroma and Cancer of the Pituitary Gland

Cell phone use was associated with increased risk of two types of brain tumors in a new study of 790,000 women.

Joel M. Moskowitz, PRLog (Press Release) - May 10, 2013

Cell phone use was associated with increased risk of acoustic neuroma and cancer of the pituitary gland in a prospective study of more than 790,000 women in the United Kingdom.

Women who used cell phones for ten or more years were two-and- a-half times more likely to develop an acoustic neuroma. Their risk of acoustic neuroma increased with the number of years they used cell phones.

The results for acoustic neuroma re-affirm one of the two major conclusions by the World Health Organization (WHO) in its recent monograph about radiofrequency electromagnetic fields and form the basis for classification of cell phone radiation as "possibly carcinogenic" to humans:

“Positive associations have been observed between exposure to radiofrequency radiation from wireless phones and glioma, and acoustic neuroma.” (p. 421)

To see this news release: http://www.prlog.org/12135511

-- 

Joel M. Moskowitz, Ph.D.
Director, Center for Family and Community Health
School of Public Health, University of California, Berkeley
Center: http://cfch.berkeley.edu
Electromagnetic Radiation Safety

Website:             http://saferemr.blogspot.comFacebook:          http://www.facebook.com/SaferEMRNews Releases:  http://pressroom.prlog.org/jmm716Twitter:               @berkeleyprc

POTENZA PICENA RESOLUTION

POTENZA PICENA RESOLUTION

April 20th, 2013

On April 20th, 2013 the International congress of Potenza Picena entitled “Radar,

radiofrequency and health risk”, reached the following conclusions:


- radars use pulsed radiofrequency that causes characteristic biological effects which are more

invasive than non pulsed EMF;

- radiofrequency can cause structural changes in enzymes with time reactions of nanoseconds,

while the pulsed radiofrequencies emitted by radars occur every milliseconds, thus

suggesting that for every pulsing event several enzymatic changes occur;

- the pulsed signals can induce significant modifications on DNA regulations as an effect of

the methylation of the genome;

- scientific literature concludes that biological/health effects can occur at low intensity

exposure and chronic exposure can make a living organism more susceptible to the effect of

- ICEMS monograph (Eur. J. Oncol., 2010) concludes that there are non thermal mechanisms

of action of EMF (including RF) on the living matter;

- experiments on cell cultured in residential areas in Potenza Picena showed that the radar

signal activates apoptosis for short exposures and cell survival signal after 24 hours of

- preliminary results of animal experiments show that radiofrequency is a co-carcinogenic

- radiofrequency induces oxidative stress processes in tissues and living organisms;

- different epidemiological studies show that there is a significant increase of health risks on

the people exposed to pulsed radiofrequency and more studies need to be done to conclude

especially about pulsed radiofrequency;

- scientific literature suggests that for EMF the precautionary principle should be

internationally adopted;


Thus, stricter safety standards for EMF needs to be adopted by governments and public

health agencies because the existing ones are obsolete and they are not based on recent literature

According to the precautionary principle RF sources should be reduced as low as possible

because at now it is not possible to establish a safe limit under which no biological effects can be

RF sources should be kept far from residential areas. For pulsed RF sources, such radars and

Wi-Max antennas, the distance from the EMF source should be even greater because they cause

more biologically effects than non pulsed signals.


Wi-Fi should not be placed in schools and in public areas since they have characteristics of

The precautionary principle suggests to use special caution for the younger people and for

susceptible such as those with Electromagnetic Hyper Sensitivity a condition growing in modern

societies that makes people sick for exposure to EMF even at low level of intensity.

Prof. Massimo Scalia, physicist, CIRPS at University La Sapienza, Rome, Italy

Dr. Eleonora Miranda, Institute of Molecular Genetics, National Council of Research, biologist,
Bologna, Italy

Maurizio Brizzi, Associate Professor of Statistics, University of Bologna, Italy.

Prof. Mario Barteri, chemist, University La Sapienza, Rome, Italy

Ian Marc Bonapace, Assistant Professor. Department of Structural and Functional Biology,
University Insubria, Busto Arsizio (Varese), Italy

Prof. Henry Lai, Bioengineering, University of Washington, Seattle, USA

Dr. PhD Livio Giuliani, mathematician, University La Tuscia, Viterbo; ICEMS spokesman

Dr. Fiorenzo Marinelli, biologist, Institute of Molecular Genetics, National Research Council
Bologna, Italy; Scientific Secreteriat, Member, ICEMS;

Olle Johansson, Associate Professor, Karolinska Institute, histology; cell biology; basic and applied
neuroscience, Stockholm, Sweden

Dr. Michela Padovani, biologist, Cesare Maltoni Cancer Research Center of the Ramazzini
Institute, Bologna, Italy

Prof. Dr. Nesrin Seyhan, biophysicist, Founding Chair, Biophysics Dept. of Gazi University,
Ankara, Turkey; Founding Director, GNRK Center; Scientific Secreteriat Member, ICEMS;
Advisory Committee Member, WHO EMF

Dr. Maurizio Fontana, physician, Genova, Italy

Mr. Örjan Hallberg, MSc Electrical Engineering, Hallberg Independent Research, Farsta, Sweden

Thousands of Studies Showing Biological Effects: Ridiculous to Keep Asserting that Some People May Not Be Sensitive to These

There are literally thousands of studies showing adverse biological effects. It is ridiculous to keep asserting that some people may not be sensitive to these. What we really should be researching is why other people are so seemingly numb and oblivious to these health hazards. I was personally very sick for six months before I even realized that I was living in the vicinity of several cell phone towers or imagined that this might indeed be the cause of my health problem. Well, I have news for you. It was. I moved into a white zone and immediately I would say that 50% of a number of bizarre symptoms I was experiencing disappeared. It took me another four months of living in that area before I was back to being about 85% of where I was before I got sick. So they are trying to say that people see the cell tower and imagine that they are getting sick. What a crock of #$%&. I was sick way before I even saw the cell tower. We have a lot more "unexplained" illnesses than we did before all this wireless #$%& started invading and polluting our environments. Anyone using at least half a brain would consider the possibility.

http://www.reddit.com/r/skeptic/comments/1c7bo5/refugees_of_the_modern_world_the_electrosensitive/

EMF Sounds

EMF Sounds

Each electromagnetic source has it’s own characteristic sound, which is demodulated by broadband-meters to allow evaluating the source from the sound. Although GSM-900 and GSM-1800 can’t be differentiated by their sound as it is the same. Other sources are easily detectable, here are a couple of examples. If you’d like to listen to some other source, please contact us.

Use the embedded Player  to listen or download the file (right click the download button below the embedded Player, chose "Save Link/Target as…"

http://microondes.wordpress.com/emf-sounds/

Prof. Olle Johansson on Wi-Fi Exposure (Mice Sterility by the 5th Generation)