Category Archives: Transforming

Projects that are making a difference, improving lives, and building communities.

Authors A-H, Politics

The Jamaican Connection – by Terry Howard

This column is about Jamaica, a nation slightly smaller than the state of Connecticut. And at a contextual level, it’s about the prominent role native or U.S. born Jamaicans have played in history past and present. 

Now to bring it into today’s news cycles, it’s about the powerful roles being played by Vice President Kamala Harris and Tanya Chutkan, the presiding judge over the criminal trial of former U.S. president Trump over his alleged attempts to overturn the result of the 2020 presidential election, including the events leading up to the attack on the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021.

Continue reading The Jamaican Connection – by Terry Howard →

Advisors, Healthcare

Renewing Diversity #2: Teaching Health Equity – by Carlos Cortés, Adwoa Osei

In July, 2020, the two of us became the inaugural co-directors of the University of California, Riverside, School of Medicine’s new Health Equity, Social Justice, and Anti-Racism (HESJAR) curricular initiative.   Since then the teaching of health equity to medical students has been a journey of continuous renewal.   

Publications about health equity emerge nearly every day.  Each year’s student cohort provides new pedagogical challenges.  Every module we teach raises new issues regarding learning and assessment.  We can’t stand still. 

Continue reading Renewing Diversity #2: Teaching Health Equity – by Carlos Cortés, Adwoa Osei →

International Podcasts, Ukraine

Ukrainian Podcast: Mayor Yuriy Bova

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Mayor Yuriy Bova Yuriy Bova is Mayor of Trostyanets, a Ukrainian city just 20 miles from the Russian border that endured occupation for a month. Badly damaged in fighting with Russian forces almost two years ago, Trostyanets is one of six settlements being rebuilt in a pilot program to develop the skills and experience needed for a far broader reconstruction drive.

Trostyanets is now in partnership with the City of Chattanooga whose Mayor Tim Kelly formalized a cooperative agreement with the war-torn Ukrainian city. I met Mayor Bova at  a  recent reception celebrating the collaboration with many city leaders and organizations like Sister Cities. 

Hear Mayor Bova discuss through his translator:

  • The history and significance of Trostyanets and the remaining historical monuments
  • Trostyanets’ response to Russia’s large-scale invasion in 2022 and what the Russians did in the city 
  • The process of rebuilding: how it began and its current status
  • The city’s development strategy including sports and tourism industries and attracting new investors to the community

Takeaways:

  • What are current threats from Russia?
  • What are the most important problems requiring solutions now?
  • What will be the benefits of this partnership with Chattanooga and how does your visit benefit your people?

CLICK for podcast interview

Politics

National Daughters Day and the Election – by Terry Howard

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In sort of a nonchalant yawner – at least for me – September 25th, National Daughter’s Day came and went with nary a thought; understandable I guess if one isn’t blessed with having a daughter. 

But suddenly, like swift kick in the groin, this coming November 5th, Election Day, a relevant September 25th piece by John Pavlovitz, and a piece I wrote a dozen years ago led to a dot-connecting, “oh wow,” pause by me.  

Continue reading National Daughters Day and the Election – by Terry Howard →

Advisors, Politics, Social Issues

Debunking 4 Major Myths of Assault Weapons Ban – by David Grinberg

During the first week of September, the latest mass shooting tragedy occurred at a high school in Winder, Georgia. This has thrust the issue of gun safety reform squarely into the 2024 presidential campaign.

Thus far, there have been more mass shootings than days in the year (385 according to the Gun Violence Archive). Here are a few other shocking statistics to consider:

Advisors, Social Issues

One 9/11 Victim’s Positive Impact Posthumously  – by David B. Grinberg

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As another annual 9/11 observance has come and gone, I want to pay tribute to those lost, including a close childhood friend who was working in the Twin Towers as a financial trader on that tragic day.

President Roosevelt (FDR) called the bombing of Pearl Harbor during World War II: “A date that will live in infamy.” The same can be said of 9/11. 

Even though it’s been 23 years, we must be mindful year-round of all the families, friends and relatives who lost loved ones. The memories and pain of loved ones lost never goes away.

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Academic Articles, Authors A-H, Politics

Campus Jews on Trial – by R. A. Crevoshay

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Opinion: American Jewish Education
Fails Israel

What I offer is an unapologetic defense of the Jewish People. Oh yes, we are indeed a People. Not an ethnicity, though we have many ethnicities within our general culture. Not a religion, though we do have numerous and competing variations of theology among our ranks. It ain’t about religion.

Jews are the indigenous nation of the Land of Israel.

We’ve been separated from our land for a couple thousand years.

Jews are indigenous under the definition provided by the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs. Where we differ from virtually every other dispossessed indigenous culture is that we have honored the memory of our roots. Through a couple of millennia of suffering the brutality visited upon us by most of our foreign hosts, we not only remembered our homeland, but we’ve had the unwelcome chutzpah to recover and resettle it. 

Continue reading Campus Jews on Trial – by R. A. Crevoshay →

Authors R-Z, Social Issues

A Closer Look Inside India’s Cleanest City – by Yana Roy

If you can discern the presence of disproportionately more temples than public toilets; wide streets; tri-segregated waste bins lining the intersections of lanes and roads; the selling of meat concealed by humongous black cloths; mannequins, automobiles, absolutely any entity at all being adorned with orange flags depicting the Hindu God, Ram, you have successfully reached Indore. Welcome. Officially known as the cleanest city of India, this city boasts being free of open defecation, of possessing a minimal Air Quality Index (AQI) ranging from 50-80, source segregation of waste, and the list is interminable.

But, what does it mean to be the cleanest city of India? What are we cleaning? And for whom? Who gets to reap the benefits and who is burdened with the colossal task of cleaning? Let us find out.

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