Assistive Technology: Enabling Dreams

Assistive Technology: Enabling Dreams

No more Excuses for Me! ...jim

"It took us three years," says Adrian's teacher, George Rehmet, of the amount of time they spent trying to locate a place on Adrian's body that would allow him to communicate using a computer. This particular computer has pictures tailored especially for Adrian: photographs or pictures of friends and family, including his baby sister, Alexis, and pictures or words depicting situations or events he would like to write about, such as the weather, trips with family, and meal preferences.

Money, Love and Responsibility

Your Money Counts
------------------------------------
Sunday, October 29, 2006 - 12 PM to 4 PM
St. Benedict the Moore - Social Hall
91 Crawford Street, Pittsburgh, Pa. 15219

Adult Financial Literacy Workshop

There is NO registration fee for the workshop and
lunch will be provided for FREE!


PRE-REGISTRATION FORM
+++ 3 ways to Pre-register

* By faxing a form to Your Sister's Project, Inc. (412) 227-0922
* By Calling Your Sister's Project, Inc. at (412) 288-2501
* By e-mailing: YurSisterProject@aol.com

Pre-Registration ends Oct. 26, 2006***
Free Gift Card to the first 27 participants who Pre-register by Oct. 26, 2006.

See recent photos from a Your Sister's Project seminar at: http://flickr.com/photos/jimuleda/
**Photos compliments of Your Sister's Project - 23 Oct 2006.

Allegheny County Community Seminar

Groveton Village Community Seminar

No-Cost Transitions Seminar
October 23rd thru 26th, 2006
11am to 1pm-Mon-Tues-Weds
8am-12noon-Thurs ONLY!

Groveton Community Center
511 Groveton Drive, Coraopolis, PA 15108
Phone:412.279.2888---Fax:412.429.2014

--Jobs, Work Readiness & Careers.
--CCAC Courses
--YOUR SISTER'S PROJECT--Financial Literacy
--Self-Assessments
--Challenges to Success
--Work Acquisition/Maintenance Strategies

26 OCT 2006-Thursday--
Bidwell Training Center--

--Academic Assessments & Campus Tour

Contact:
Barbara Baulding ACHA- 412-402-2523
bbaulding@achsng.com

Wives in Danger from Gun Toting Culture

AlterNet: Wives in Danger from Gun Toting Culture

At later gun shows, I started to pay more attention. Were ex- wives and their demands a threat to some guys at the gun shows? I frequently saw books for sale at the shows such as The Predatory Female by Rev. Lawrence Shannon, whose field guide to dating includes a set of tactics to undermine the supposed Gestapo power of women who rule the divorce and child-custody judicial system. In a radio interview, Shannon said that "victims of the predatory female are strewn all over the nation, writing alimony checks, recovering from gunshot wounds, treating cat scratches, trying to see their children, paying attorney's fees, picking through the detritus of their lives, and struggling to recover from ruined years." The Predatory Female is a collection of warnings about women who prey on the feelings and bank ac- counts of unsuspecting men. Female predators have their eyes on one thing alone -- money. They marry and divorce to get alimony. They use emotions of love, trust, and care to undermine the sacred contract of marriage. They are the new scourges of secular life, hunting down unsuspecting men to get bucks and tear out their hearts.

The Network on Transitions to Adulthood

The Network on Transitions to Adulthood

A new Network book, The Price of Independence: The Economics of Early Adulthood, is in the works. Network members Sheldon Danziger and
Cecilia Rouse have asked economists to examine the economic situation of today's young people. The book will include chapters on:

* Job Stability - Does job churn delay the transition to adulthood?
* Housing Costs - Do housing costs delay the transition to adulthood?
* Earnings and Wages - Do lower paying jobs force youth to move back home?
* International Perspective - Are U.S. young adults alone in staying home longer?
* And more...

Check out the Network website to catch a sneak peak at the chapters.

Chapters, policy briefs, and summaries

A+ Schools

A+ Schools


Community Forum on Charter Schools

Mark your calendars now! A+ Schools is sponsoring a Community Forum on Charter Schools to be held on Tuesday, November 14th (please note change of date) at Bidwell Training Center, 1815 Metropolitan Street from 6-8:30PM.

Please share this information with your friends, family co-workers and make plans to attend this event.

Join us for a discussion of the process by which charter schools are established; the state laws that govern that process; the process for funding charter schools, and how it might be improved;
and the relationship between charter schools and local school districts in Pennsylvania and how that relationship can be improved to benefit all students.

Sing with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra!

From: Lauro, Maria
Sent: Wednesday, October 11, 2006 10:46 AM

Subject: Sing with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra!
Importance: High

The Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra is returning to Wilkinsburg High School on Saturday, November 4 at 7PM. The theme of this year’s concert is “Anthem of Praise.” Ticket prices are $7 for adults, $3 for students in K-12, and can be ordered by calling Maria Lauro at (412) 871-2125.

Covenant Church of Pittsburgh, which is located in Wilkinsburg, will be singing with the Orchestra. Any member of the community who enjoys singing is welcome to join the choir. There are no auditions -- all you need is the desire to sing to the best of your ability with one of the greatest orchestras in the world! The choir will perform two numbers at the end of the concert.

Choir members *must* attend *all* of the following 3 rehearsals:

REHEARSAL 1: Thursday, October 19, 7:30-9:30 p.m. at Covenant Church of Pittsburgh at 2110 Andrew Drive, in the sanctuary. A mapquest map and directions to this location can be found here: http://tinyurl.com/pwev9

REHEARSAL 2: Thursday, October 26, 7:30-9:30 p.m. at Covenant Church of Pittsburgh at 111 Wood St.- in the sanctuary. This location is at the corner of Wood and Wallace, near 718.

REHEARSAL 3: Wednesday, November 1 6:30-9:30 PM (Location to be determined.) The final rehearsal is with Maestro Daniel Meyer and the entire PSO. They are rehearsing several choirs that evening, and cannot rehearse at Heinz Hall. As soon as their operations department has secured a location, we will let you know.

Dress for the choir will be all black. Women may wear pants, although dresses are preferred. The men will be wearing black shirts with red ties.

If you are interested, please contact either Maria Lauro at (412) 871-2125 or Lois Clark at (412) 371-9504 ext 2717, or just show up at the first rehearsal!

The Real Cost of Prisons Weblog: War on Drugs Victimizes Women

The Real Cost of Prisons Weblog: War on Drugs Victimizes Women


October 10, 2006
War on Drugs Victimizes Women

War on Drugs victimizes women
By LOIS AHRENS
Op-Ed- Daily Hampshire Gazette, Northampton, MA
We live in Orwellian times. We are asked to believe that the peacekeeper missile delivers peace and declaring war on a nation will bring democracy.

Now Sally Van Wright, soon to be assistant superintendent of the Hampden County House of Correction, a new jail for women, states ''We incarcerate to set free.''

Despite the beliefs of jailers, when the public is polled, as they were in a study by Peter Hart (''Changing Public Attitudes Toward the Criminal Justice System,'' February 2002), they say incarceration cannot solve the deep social and economic problems that drive crime, nor is criminalizing addiction more viable than treating it as an illness.

Jailing women does not set them free. It also drains money from programs that could treat drug addiction, prevent and treat childhood sexual abuse, and fund quality education.

Philanthropy News Digest Message Board: Fee Structure for Consultants

FROM: Philanthropy News Digest Message Board: Fee Structure for Consultants

Fee Structure for Consultants

Posted by cwoods on 9/27/2006, 8:29 am

An alum of the University in which I serve as Assistant Director for Innovation and Entrepreneurship has asked me to assist him in identifying resources/research for establishing fee structures for those programmatic advisors who offer their expertise to advance the goals of the nonprofit action agency in which he works. He made it clear that these advisors are not the Board, but rather collectively work on one of the organization's programs.

I suggested he look at the IRS regs and the fee structure they have established assigning a minimum dollar amount/hour for "volunteer" time. This figure, approaching $19/hour, is often used to calculate in-kind match requirements for grants, as well as being used in some financial reporting.

However, in terms of hourly rates applied to various expertise/skillsets, I am not certain how to advise and have come up with little. I do believe his organization should consider hiring an HR consultant with nonprofit backgrounds to tackle this project, as they would be more inclined to consider regulations that are tough in the employee/consultant differentiation as well as ethical implications, etc.

Do any of you have any experience in these areas or do you know of someone who has had similar experiences? I am hoping to identify people who have worked with professionals over and above fundraising.

Thank you for your time!

Pop City - Pittsburgh to host 2,500 for National Preservation Conference

FROM:Pop City - Pittsburgh to host 2,500 for National Preservation Conference

On October 31-November 5, Pittsburgh hosts the National Preservation Conference, the country’s premier educational mechanism for historic and community preservation.

Presented by The National Trust for Historic Preservation, with support from partner Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation (PHLF), the event presents strategies for protecting and restoring historic structures and communities.

“We’ll have planners, advocates, preservationists, municipal officials and leaders in community revitalization from across the county,” says Cathy McCollum, PHLF’s chief programs officer.

Over 2,500 participants are expected to attend fifty educational sessions to learn from best case studies and approaches. Author, historian and Pittsburgh native David McCullough will present the keynote address.

PodCamp Pittsburgh

PodCamp Pittsburgh


PodCamp Pittsburgh is coming - on Nov 10-12

This will be the second in what's become a growing number of PodCamp "un-conferences" around the country. This is a free grassroots event dedicated to sharing information and ideas regarding blogs, vlogs, audio and video podcasting and portable media in general.

The event is free to attend, and all sessions will be developed and carried out by the participants rather than the organizers.

Pop City - Development News

Pop City - Development News

with each edition of this weekly journal i wonder why some traditional media don't just fold their tent and quietly disappear into the night.

from the Desk of Nicola Jones

Certified or Degreed Medical Assistants, Medical Billers and Medical Front Office associates needed for temp; temp to perm: and direct hire positions.

You must have one year of experience in either a clinical or healthcare setting to be considered.

Salary $10.00 plus, depending on experience.

We have multiple positions available for professional, eager candidates.

Fax resume to 412-325-2748 or
email resume to: njones@countymedicalstaffing.com

After sending your resume please call Nicole Jones at 412-325-2746 to schedule an interview.

The Real Cost of Prisons Weblog: Hurricane Recovery & Women- a new report

Before Katrina, fifty-six percent of families in New Orleans were not two-parent but female-headed, single-parent households with median annual income of just $16,450-notching them below the federal poverty line. The Institute for Women's Policy Research recently found that women represent more than 90% of prime-age American workers (age 26-59) who average low earnings over 15 years. For many of Hurricane Katrina's female survivors, the loss of their home meant the loss of a home-based business as well.

Attempting to turn around their lives' upheaval, Hurricane Katrina's survivors are hoping for better prospects than they had before. The women's funding movement has set out to help make this a reality.

Throughout the South and in other parts of the country, women's funds are delivering resources to create sustainable economic opportunities and to reverse social injustices as the centerpiece of long-term relief for the direct impact of the disaster.
The role of the women's funding movement in Hurricane Katrina's aftermath is to identify the ways in which women and girls are impacted, and to make them integral to the disaster recovery and rebuilding of their communities.
Thirty years of partnership with grassroots women puts women's funds in a crucial position to funnel support to local activists dealing with economic and social justice issues as well as the long-term reconstruction effort...MORE

Home-Health Aides Struggle

Home-Health Aides Struggle
With Low Pay, Lack of Benefits
By Kristen Gerencher

From MarketWatch

Home health worker Merlin Willis looks on the bright side as he helps disabled and elderly people with dressing, bathing, food shopping, light housekeeping and feeding.

"In general, it's a decent job," said Willis, 55, who works for San Francisco's In-Home Supportive Services (IHSS) program, which helps low-income Californians remain in their homes. "You don't have a boss hanging over you every five seconds. You meet interesting people and you're making a difference."

The little things -- when a patient begins to walk on his own again or says a heartfelt thank you -- go a long way toward making the job satisfying, he said. But the flip side can be intense, such as when an unstable patient doesn't want the intrusion.

"I've been in the position where I've had knives pulled on me, bottles thrown at you," Willis said. "You do get clients that have drug problems, alcohol problems and they live in a single room of a sleazy hotel. You have to take care of them also. They're people."

Despite growing demand for their services, home-health workers often face tough working conditions, spotty low pay and lack of health insurance, experts said. Such issues are poised to become even more serious as Baby Boomers age and seek to remain out of nursing homes...MORE

Business - International Herald Tribune

Retraining laid-off workers, but for what?

Retraining laid-off workers, but for what?
By LOUIS UCHITELLE
The New York Times
SUNDAY, MARCH 26, 2006

Layoffs have disrupted the lives of millions of Americans over the last 25 years. The cure that these displaced workers are offered - retraining and more education - is heralded as a sure path to new and better-paying careers. But often that policy prescription does not work, as this book excerpt explains. It is adapted from "The Disposable American: Layoffs and Their Consequences" by Louis Uchitelle, an economics writer for The New York Times. Knopf will publish the book on Tuesday.

JO GOODRUM, a thin, energetic woman older than her audience of aircraft mechanics - old enough, perhaps, to be their mother - got their attention with a single, unexpected sentence, which she inserted early in her presentation. Her husband, she said, had been laid off six times since the late 1980's. And yet here she was, standing before them, in one piece, cheerful, apparently O.K., giving survival instructions to the mechanics, who would be laid off themselves in 10 days.

They were, in nearly every case, family men in their 30's and 40's who had worked for United Airlines since the mid-1990's. Summoned by their union, they had gathered in the carpeted conference room at the Days Inn next to Indianapolis International Airport, not far from United's giant maintenance center, a building so big that 12 airliners could be overhauled in it simultaneously. That no longer happened. Most of the repair bays were empty. The airline was cutting back operations, and the 60 mechanics at the meeting were in the fourth group to be let go.

Confrontation had brought on the layoffs. Influenced by militants in their union local, Hoosier Air Transport Lodge 2294 of the International Association of Machinists, the 2,000 mechanics at the center had engaged in a work slowdown for many months, and then a refusal to work overtime. But rather than give ground, United responded by outsourcing, sending planes to nonunion contractors elsewhere in the country.

That scared the mechanics. They quieted down and, in effect, authorized the leaders of Lodge 2294 to make peace. Their hope was that if they cooperated, United would ease up on the layoffs and revive operations at, arguably, one of the most efficient, high-tech maintenance centers in the world. In this state of mind, the union was helping to usher the 60 laid-off mechanics quietly away. It had rented the conference room on this cold January evening in 2003 to introduce the men to what amounted to a boot camp for recycling laid-off workers back into new, usually lower-paying lines of work. MORE

The Housing Crisis Goes Suburban

The Housing Crisis Goes Suburban

By Michael Grunwald
Sunday, August 27, 2006; Page B01

In the past five years, housing prices in Fairfax County have grown 12 times as fast as household incomes. Today, the county's median family would have to spend 54 percent of its income to afford the county's median home; in 2000, the figure was 26 percent. The situation is so dire that Fairfax recently began offering housing subsidies to families earning $90,000 a year; soon, that figure may go as high as $110,000 a year.

Seventy years after President Franklin D. Roosevelt declared that the Depression had left one-third of the American people "ill-housed, ill-clothed and ill-nourished," Americans are well-clothed and increasingly overnourished. But the scarcity of affordable housing is a deepening national crisis, and not just for inner-city families on welfare...

....(Still), Fairfax County illustrates how the creative solutions to the current crisis are emerging locally. It was one of 130 communities to adopt "inclusionary zoning," requiring developers to reserve a percentage of affordable units. It is one of more than 300 communities with affordable-housing trust funds; Fairfax voters approved a "Penny for Housing" initiative that will divert one cent of property taxes to subsidized projects. The Fairfax housing authority is also at the cutting edge of "workforce housing," offering 20 single-room apartments for day laborers in its own offices, while building and buying several dozen townhouses to rent to nurses, police officers, firefighters, teachers and bus drivers...MORE

Reason: The Amazing Colossal Poorhouse: Ten years after welfare reform, the welfare state is even larger than before

Ten years after welfare reform, the welfare state is even larger than before

The Amazing Colossal Poorhouse
by Jesse Walker

Ten years ago today, President Bill Clinton signed the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act, known more colloquially as welfare reform. The president had promised to end "welfare as we know it," and by signing the bill he did exactly that: In 2006 the welfare state is larger than ever before, but the way Americans think and talk about it has been radically changed. As a function of the government, welfare is thriving. As a culture war issue, it's practically dead...MORE

Job Corps Launches Innovative STARS Initiative

http://www.dol.gov/dol/topic/training/jobcorps.htm

Job Corps Launches Innovative STARS Initiative

Targets Raising Student Retention and Academic Achievement

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Department of Labor"s Office of Job Corps today announced the launch of an initiative designed to improve students" preparedness for high-demand industries of the 21st century.

The new program called STARS (Speakers, Tutors, Achievement, Retention and Success) will increase Job Corps students' academic achievement, career skills attainment and retention in the program by providing motivational speakers to inspire them, and highly-qualified tutors and mentors to assist them in academics and personal skills.

"The STARS initiative is a major component of Job Corps' Vision for the 21st Century," said Job Corps National Director Esther R. Johnson. "STARS resources will help students strengthen their literacy, numeracy, and personal and social development. STARS will increase student retention in Job Corps, ensure completion of their program of study, and ultimately prepare them for the 21st century workplace."

Motivational speakers will offer students the opportunity to hear and interact with real-life achievers who will provide motivating and inspiring messages about what it takes to succeed and the challenges they will face. Tutors will provide students with academic assistance based on their individual needs. Mentors will provide guidance in career technical areas and offer strategies to enhance personal development and life skills.

Thirteen Job Corps centers across the country have been selected for the STARS pilot phase. The STARS initiative began with a motivational speaker at the Woodland Job Corps Center in Laurel, Md. on Aug. 24, 2006.

Job Corps is the nation's largest and most comprehensive residential education and job training program for at-risk youth, ages 16 through 24. Job Corps combines classroom, practical, and work-based learning experiences to prepare youth for stable, long-term, high-paying jobs.

Job Corps is administered by the Department of Labor's Office of the Secretary. For information on Job Corps, including eligibility requirements and location of the center nearest you, call (800) 733-JOBS.

DOL Web Pages on This Topic
Job Corps Center Locations
There are 122 Job Corps centers located throughout the United States, each offering educational training and a variety of vocational training programs. Visit this page to learn more about centers located near you and what they have to offer.

Job Corps Contracts
Provides information about contracts that are available for providing Job Corps services and how to apply for them.

Laws on This Topic
Public Law 105-220
Workforce Investment Act of 1998

U.S. Department of Labor
Frances Perkins Building
200 Constitution Avenue, NW

Burning Man

Published: September 1, 2006
Burning Man
Former Baltimore cop and teacher Ed Burns isn't a masochist. The writer-producer for the HBO series The Wire is just feverishly trying to save public schools.
By Scott J. Cech

Stand at the intersection of Baltimore’s Guilford Avenue and East Lanvale Street and look up at the façade of the old brick school in front of you. Paint peels from every window frame, and even the boarded-up windows are broken. That in itself isn’t too surprising in an urban school system as troubled as this one. But check your watch. It’s a Tuesday morning in November, and there are no children in sight at an hour when students should be hustling up the littered sidewalks to beat the tardy bell. Instead, the street is jammed with shiny black semi-trailer trucks. The only humans in the vicinity of the building’s metal doors are a burly man and a young woman, each with a laminated ID and a walkie-talkie headset...MORE