May 2008 No. 18Table of Contents |
|
Earth Day (April 22), Arbor Day (April 25), and Rogation Day (April 25) are behind us. In spite of some holdouts and controversial textbook writers who don’t agree that human activity is fueling global warming, 65% of Americans say it’s so, up from 21% just a year ago, reports HarrisInteractive. Most still think a disaster is a lifetime or two away from being an imminent threat, but there's no better time to start than "now."
Know your household’s “carbon footprint”? Only 11% of Americans do—it’s an age thing, 18% of 18-31 year-olds do, three times the number of 63+ year-olds. So, classes are beginning that help people measure and reduce the impact that their household’s lifestyle and use of energy has on the environment—their “carbon footprint.” They're replacing cold-leaking windows, drippy faucets, energy-inefficient appliances, buying locally grown food (27% do), and giving up bottled water (21%). The Toyota Prius hybrid has been the fastest-selling car in America for the past 10 months.
Business. If you read Fortune magazine, check out “Eight Great Green Ideas” in the latest issue, just one of its increasing number of articles and “special sections” on the growing green economy.
The Greater Indianapolis Chamber unveiled a Green Business Initiative requiring their members to meet certain measures and pledge to continually strive toward business practices that will make the region more environmentally healthy and viable and to comply with all federal, state, and local regulations for a start. To get more information, e-mail
GreenBusiness@indylink.com.
Nonprofits. So, what are nonprofits doing to “go green”? Don’t bother bringing in celebrities. HarrisInteractive found they’re nice, but they don’t really change peoples’ minds much. Start with the basics. If you have a building, weatherize it, get solar panels, retrofit with water-saving toilets.
In Boston, the NonProfit Center bought a historic office building and did a “green” restoration, earning LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certification. In Chicago, an innovative nonprofit takes old bikes from garages and storerooms and “re-cycles” them to help local low-income kids have wheels and international projects get people to jobs.
What can your United Way and/or community do? Going green is not a fad. It’s here to stay!
It’s been a long time since the Hoosier presidential primary brought many candidate visits or media attention. But not this year. Though Senator McCain locked up the Republican nomination months ago, Senator Clinton and Senator Obama are duking it out to June. The failure of the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact to garner enough states to agree to cast all their Electoral College votes for the winner of the popular vote count means that the remaining primaries through June will likely decide things, presuming a mass of superdelegates follow their constituents’ lead. But, hey, who ever said politics was rational?
Here are some facts that the candidates can’t ignore:
There’s detailed analysis of what age group or political affiliation prefers which kind of news media at www.harrisinteractive.com/harris%5Fpoll/index.asp?PollYear=2008.
Some further words about the state of the news media:
An analysis of 70,000 stories from 48 news outlets in 5 media sectors came to these conclusions:
See www.stateofthenewsmedia.org/2008. This report’s worth a study by communications decision-makers.
Three percent of homeowners are projected to be in foreclosure over the next two years as a result of subprime loans made in 2005 and 2006. “The foreclosure wave is just beginning,” says a new Pew Charitable Trust report. Predatory lending, aggressive loan marketing, and proliferation of high-cost subprime loans created a “perfect storm” to push foreclosures to record levels. In December 2007, 2.9 million mortgage loans were past due in the USA, 49,000 for Hoosiers. In 2008, 79% of home loans are in “some stage of foreclosure,” and one million more foreclosures will occur by 2009. With 1,756,000 Indiana owner-occupied housing units in 2006, 2.7% of them will go through foreclosure proceedings by 2010. Check out “Defaulting on the Dream” at www.pewtrusts.org.
Whether you’re talking about poverty, housing, or health, there must be a successful completion of high school, a two-year certificate or four-year diploma, and a decent-paying job to get ahead. And this is usually done while a kid is breaking loose from parental control and getting out on one’s own. Tricky business!
AT&T and its foundation announced a 4-year, $100 million initiative to stem the tide of drop-outs in America. It will put 100,000 students in job-shadowing programs, underwrite research into what educators think can solve the dropout problem, and hold dropout prevention summits in every state led by America’s Promise Alliance. Today, one-third of highschoolers drop out, costing the US economy $3.7 Billion/year in lost earnings and remedial education costs. Stay tuned.
Indiana Governor Daniels has a plan to help high-school graduates from median-income homes get paid tuition at Ivy Tech Community College or its equivalent (about $3,000/year) at another state college. Funding for this is still a question mark. Details are promised.
Some one million community colleges do not participate in federal student loan programs. In several states, 20% of students don’t have access to them (Indiana was not listed in the report). There were also disparities in loan access between different racial and ethnic groups in the foundation coalition study. School financial aid officers are fearful that high default rates might jeopardize their institution’s ability to get other types of federal aid, but researchers found sanctions for defaults are rare and can be avoided by supportive financial counseling. “It makes no sense to force low-income students into a choice between expensive private loans and dropping out of college,” the report concludes. For details on this problem, see http://projectonstudentdebt.org.
Print
