University of Saskatchewan launches website aimed at rooting out Indigenous identity fraud

Fri, March 3, 2023

The University of Saskatchewan has launched a website aimed at verifying membership or citizenship in Indigenous communities. (Indigenous.usask.ca - image credit)

The University of Saskatchewan has launched a website it hopes will help ensure that only genuine Indigenous people will benefit from jobs and funding set aside for them.

The site is a portal, enabling First Nations, Métis, Inuit and international Indigenous peoples applying for Indigenous-specific jobs, scholarships or funding to upload proof they belong to an Indigenous community.

It also provides a verification process for those without documentation.

The website is the latest step in a long process that began in late 2021, shortly after CBC published a story that showed high-profile Prof. Carrie Bourassa, who had claimed to be Métis, Anishnabe and Tlingit, was of entirely European ancestry. Following an internal investigation, Bourassa resigned from the U of S.

At that time, the university followed the honour system — self-identification — when it came to claims of Indigenous ancestry. If someone said they were Indigenous, the university accepted it without question.

Since that time, the university has publicly said the honour system is no longer acceptable. Angela Jaime, the university's interim VP of Indigenous engagement, says the new system represents a concrete change.

"We know that there are already individuals who may not be truthful about who they are and their connection to community who are employed across Canada in government, in private sector and in institutions of higher learning," she said. "So it makes no sense to allow them to continue to occupy Indigenous space if they are not themselves Indigenous."

Artsandscience.usask.ca

Jamie says while the site is run by the university, Indigenous communities are in the driver's seat when it comes to deciding what qualifies as proof of membership or citizenship.

She says the proof could be a status or citizenship card, though the community might be open to other forms of proof.

"It's the Indigenous governments and communities that determine what that documentation looks like, whether that be a physical piece of paper, a card or an oral history and who adjudicates that. It's those communities that decide that for us — not the university determining it," Jaime told CBC.

She says the new system will not only apply to future applications for jobs, scholarships and funding, but also to those already benefitting from such opportunities.

"Anyone who holds Indigenous space, Indigenous-specific roles or material advantage in any way will be required to go through the verification process," she said.

Between 100 and 150 university faculty and staff will be required to go through that process, she says, which will be done in stages over the next year. The process for existing students will take place at a later time.

Jaime says there will be an appeals process if the documentation is deemed insufficient. However, she says, the final decision will rest with the Indigenous community being claimed by the applicant.

"It's the sovereign inherent rights of Indigenous people to determine the way forward," she said, "not Western institutions like the University of Saskatchewan or any other university."

A single foreign worker blew the lid off a massive international trafficking ring north of Toronto, police say

Fri, March 3, 2023 

A farm north of Toronto where York Regional Police say foreign workers from Mexico worked in deplorable conditions. (York Regional Police - image credit)

It began with a tip from a single foreign worker.

Now, police north of Toronto say they have rescued 64 Mexican migrants exploited by an international labour trafficking ring and in living conditions so deplorable that officers themselves have been left shaken.

On Feb. 8, police acting on search warrants in East Gwillimbury, Vaughan, Toronto and Mississauga located dozens of workers who they say were lured to Canada with promises of a better future. Instead, they were given mattresses on the floor, housed with dozens in bug-infested rooms, faced threats and, in some cases, say police, sexual assault.

"These workers are coerced with promises of a better life, decent wages, quality housing and eventually documentation. These are almost always false promises," York Regional Police Deputy Chief Alvaro Almeida told reporters on Friday.

One foreign worker — not the one who blew the whistle — spoke to CBC News in the days following the raid, and described the squalid housing he and others were forced to pay for out of their wages.

The man, in his 20s, was a farm worker, but managed to leave before the police raid. CBC News has agreed to protect his identity because he fears deportation.

At 5 a.m. each morning, he said a bus would take the workers to a farm where they would pack vegetables. At the end of the week, he says he would be left just $50 in a cash envelope — after deductions for food and lodging.

At the Toronto duplex where he was housed, there were six to eight workers in a room, pairs of two sharing a mattress, he said in Spanish.

"We really came to suffer from deception by those who hired us, with extensive work hours and sleeping in dirty places with cockroaches and bedbugs… These were the daily conditions we faced."

5 charged, 2 more wanted

The investigation began in November 2022 after one Mexican national contacted police, police said at a news conference.

Over the next three months, investigators spoke with several others who provided similar accounts and found they'd been exploited by a trafficking ring operating not only in York Region but across the Greater Toronto Area, police said. Workers were living in squalor, forced to work long hours with little pay and bussed in to work at farms, factories and warehouses, all while their exploiters lived lives of luxury, police allege.

York Regional Police

The names of those businesses have not yet been released as the Ontario Ministry of Labour continues its investigation.

Five people have been arrested, including two Canadian citizens and three Mexican nationals, facing 44 charges between them including human trafficking, materially benefiting from trafficking people and participating in a criminal organization, among others.

Two others remain wanted.

As for the foreign workers, police say Spanish-speaking officers from York Regional Police as well as police in Peel, Toronto and the Ontario Provincial Police explained what was happening and offered workers support. Of the 64 workers found, 53 accepted the help and continue to be supported, police say.

Officers saw themselves in those seeking 'better life'

"To see the state of the workers' living conditions, considering the promises that were made to them, was heartbreaking," said York police Chief Jim MacSween.

"The Spanish-speaking officers who assisted in the investigation were also deeply affected, as they could see the reflections of their own families and friends in the faces of these hardworking people who were only trying to find a better life."

Evan Mitsui/CBC

Exactly how they were recruited in Mexico remains under investigation, police say.

Almeida said he knows labour trafficking victims may be afraid to come forward, afraid to seek help for fear they'll be arrested and deported.

To anyone in that position he said, "We're here to help."

But one advocate says Canada's own immigration system has serious gaps that can leave migrant workers fearful about coming forward about the exploitation they face.

'A systemic issue,' advocate says

"What we see often in situations like this is that police come in, do a big splash, call it human trafficking ... and within a few weeks, workers are being deported," said Syed Hussan, executive director of the Migrant Workers Alliance of Canada.

Rather than police, who lack the tools to secure rights for exploited workers, immigration, housing and labour authorities should work to ensure the workers aren't doubly punished, first by being exploited and then by being removed from Canada, he said.

"This is a systemic issue.... Many migrants are facing these issues because they don't have permanent residence rights," said Hussan.

The federal government has said it is working on a regularization program to grant status to undocumented migrants in Canada, but Hussan says despite making that promise over a year ago, there's been no update.

"We're calling on the federal government to not delay," he said.

But no matter their status, he says, if workers were brought to Canada under false pretences, the federal government should act to secure them proper work permits.

"Our concern is what will happen to the workers after the spotlight shifts and the police move on."

But Cynthia Moreno of the Consulate General of Mexico in Toronto says she expects the workers will likely have some status in Canada.

"If they are potential victims, that guarantee comes first, the guarantee of their rights as victims."

N.W.T. says lack of notice on oilsands tailings spill goes against deal with Alberta

Fri, March 3, 2023 

The government of the Northwest Territories says Alberta didn't tell it about two major oilsands tailings spills on waters that flow into the territory, despite a legal agreement obliging it to do so.

Shane Thompson, the territory's environment minister, says he didn't learn about the two spills of at least 5.3-million litres until Wednesday.

Alberta Environment and Protected Areas hasn't responded to questions about when it first learned of the spills.

The first began in May, when workers at Imperial Oil's Kearl oilsands mine noticed seepage from one of its tailings ponds.

A second release was spotted in February when tailings escaped from a storage pond.

Thompson says he has spoken with Alberta Environment Minister Sonya Savage several times since the first release and she didn't mention it — although the two departments have been in touch this week.

He says the poor communication is not encouraging as Alberta and Ottawa work out how tailings will be released into the waters of the Athabasca River, which flow into the N.W.T.

A 2015 agreement between the two jurisdictions obliges one party to immediately inform the other of any emergencies or environmental changes to the river.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published March 3, 2023.

The Canadian Press

ABOLISH THE SECOND AMENDMENT

3 ways to prevent school shootings, based on research

Beverly Kingston, Director and Senior Research Associate, Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence, University of Colorado Boulder 

Sarah Goodrum, Senior Research Associate, Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence, University of Colorado Boulder

THE CONVERSATION
Fri, March 3, 2023

School shootings are tragic, but parents, students and school staff can take steps to prevent them, researchers report. AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell

In the months leading up to his 2012 attack that killed 26 people in Newtown, Connecticut, a 20-year-old man exhibited a cascade of concerning behaviors. He experienced worsening anorexia, depression and obsessive-compulsive disorder. His relationships deteriorated, and he became fixated on mass murders.

In 2013, an 18-year-old had enraged outbursts at school and threatened to kill his debate coach. Concerned, the school’s threat assessment team interviewed him, rating him as a low-level risk for violence. But three months after the assessment, he shot and killed a classmate and himself on school grounds in Centennial, Colorado.

By 2018, a 19-year-old man had more than 40 documented encounters with law enforcement and a history of threatening others and weapons purchases. After his mother died in 2017, family friends contacted law enforcement and expressed concern about his behavior. In 2018, he perpetrated a shooting that killed 17 people in Parkland, Florida.

All three perpetrators displayed disturbing behavior before their attacks – and the people around them missed the opportunities to intervene.

We are sociologists at the Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence at the University of Colorado Boulder. We study the circumstances that lead to violence in which an attacker picks a target – like a person, group, or school – in advance.

We find that the same patterns of concerning behavior emerge among the perpetrators, but that’s not all. We also find that there are often many opportunities to intervene with the perpetrator before the tragedy that peers, family members, school staff, law enforcement officials, and others miss.

Much of the public discussion on preventing school shootings focuses on whether and how to limit people’s access to firearms. While these efforts remain important, over the past 30 years, our work has identified other strategies that can reduce the risk for violence. Here are three evidence-based steps that schools and communities can take to prevent violence.

1. Teach students and adults to report warning signs

Most school shooters exhibited concerning behavior and communicated their plan to cause harm before their deadly attack.

These troubling behaviors and communications provide opportunities for adults to step in, for students to speak up, and for people to help a student who may be in psychological or emotional distress.

But the warning signs for violence can be difficult to distinguish from other types of problem behavior, particularly among adolescents.

According to the U.S. Secret Service, the 10 most common concerning behaviors among school attackers are:

threats to the target or others, and an intent to attack, including on social media


intense or escalating anger


interest in weapons


sadness, depression or isolation


changes in behavior or appearance


suicide or self-harm


interest in weapons or violence


complaints of being bullied


worries over grades or attendance


harassing others

Attackers typically exhibit five or more of these concerning behaviors.

Educational programs and training that encourage people to share their concerns about, and seek help for, those engaging in worrisome behavior may improve safety in schools and communities.

2. Develop and publicize around-the-clock anonymous tip lines

People need a way to safely report their concerns. Tip line systems include websites, phone numbers to call or text, email addresses, and apps. They let students and others anonymously, or confidentially, share their concerns about another’s threatening behavior or communications.

These tip lines can make people less hesitant to report situations that worry them or that they think may not be their business, such as bullying, threats, drug use, or someone’s talk of suicide.

Several states have modeled their tip lines after Colorado’s Safe2Tell, which is a 24/7/365 live anonymous reporting system that was created in the wake of the 1999 Columbine High School mass shooting. Safe2Tell relays tips to local law enforcement officials and school leaders, who investigate and triage each tip. These law enforcement officials and school leaders determine the nature of the concern, along with the most appropriate response.

A 2011 study found the system had helped stop 28 potential school attacks, but that research has not been updated in the years since. Recent Safe2Tell reports indicate that the system also helps students get help for significant mental health needs.

During the 2021-22 school year, for instance, Safe2Tell received 19,364 reports. Of those, 14% were related to suicide threats, 7% to bullying, and 7% to welfare checks. Of the 84 self-reports related to mental health that year, 32% received counseling services, 32% had their parents notified, 22% had an official check on their well-being, 12% were hospitalized at least briefly, and 10% were given a suicide assessment; some received more than one of those responses.

These types of interventions are known to prevent school violence. The National Policing Institute is a nonprofit organization based in Arlington, Virginia, that maintains the Averted School Violence Database. As of 2021, the database contained case information on 171 averted attacks, 88 of which were first discovered by a peer of the potential attacker.

3. Conduct behavioral threat assessment and management

Once people report their concerns, law enforcement officers, school staff and mental health professionals must evaluate the reports and determine how to handle the information, and the people implicated.

One method, called behavioral threat assessment and management, seeks to identify the cause of the concerning behavior – such as a grievance, psychological trauma, or mental health concern. In schools, this process encourages the threat assessment team to evaluate the risk for violence and build a plan for supporting and monitoring the student, their behavior and their communications.

Schools that use this approach are less likely to simply suspend or expel the students they evaluate. That means students can still receive services and support through their school, rather than being excluded from it.

This process also helps distinguish cases in which a student made a threat but does not intend harm from those in which a student poses a real threat.

Once the team has assessed the threat, it can share the results – and the plan of action – with other school staff members to ensure everyone knows how to handle the student and their behavior. School staff members then also know how, and to whom, to report any subsequent observations of worrying actions or statements from the student.

It’s important for all school personnel to know that the federal student privacy law allows this type of information-sharing because it relates to school and personal safety. Some school leaders hesitate to share the plan because they are confused about this provision of the law.

For that reason, and because resources may be constrained at school or may not extend to a student’s home life, the action plans that follow behavioral threat assessments aren’t always carried out properly. So the team may have completed the assessment paperwork, but not the actual work of supporting, managing or monitoring the student’s needs.

Americans are not helpless in the face of school violence. Research has identified solutions. We believe it’s time to act to consistently and effectively implement these solutions.

This article is republished from The Conversation, an independent nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts.

It was written by: Beverly Kingston, University of Colorado Boulder and Sarah Goodrum, University of Colorado Boulder.

Read more:

Five years after Parkland shooting, a school psychologist offers insights on helping students and teachers deal with grief


Five years after Parkland, school shootings haven’t stopped, and kill more people

Beverly Kingston receives funding from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Bureau of Justice Assistance, U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Botnar Foundation, City of Denver

Sarah Goodrum receives funding from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Bureau of Justice Assistance, and U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

MICHIGAN

Hamtramck approves proclamation supporting Palestinians

Niraj Warikoo, Detroit Free Press
Thu, March 2, 2023 

Hamtramck city council this week approved a proclamation expressing support for Palestinians and opposing military aid to "all repressive governments."

The proclamation did not mention Israel, but appeared to criticize the country, drawing criticism from some residents and support from others during a council meeting Tuesday night when the proclamation was approved. It's the latest council move that has drawn intense debate in a city with changing demographics. It was signed by Mayor Amer Ghalib and five of six city council members; the one member who did not sign it, Amanda Jaczkowski, announced last week she is resigning and her resignation was accepted Tuesday night by the council.

The impetus for the resolution originally came from a pair of Ann Arbor activists who have tried unsuccessfully over the years to convince Ann Arbor and Dearborn to pass resolutions criticizing Israel.

Hamtramck has one of the highest poverty rates among cities in Michigan, which was noted in the proclamation.

"The City of Hamtramck believes that the Palestinian People should enjoy the right of self-determination that comes with having a free, peaceful and secure homeland of their own; and ... the City of Hamtramck stands against occupation of any country and supports the right of every occupied nation to gain freedom, sovereignty and independence," the proclamation read. "U.S. military aid to foreign governments has enriched defense contractors at the expense of struggling cities like Hamtramck while threatening the safety and security of the people in the region and elsewhere."

Hamtramck City Hall and Police Department in Hamtramck on August 25, 2021.

The proclamation concluded by stating "that the Mayor and Council of the City of Hamtramck oppose military aid to all repressive governments around the world."

Ghalib read the proclamation during the meeting and explained why he supports it, acknowledging that some were concerned.

"There was a lot of tension around this," Ghalib said. "I keep getting calls from members of the community to explain, thinking that we are doing stuff that are unnecessary."

He said that Hamtramck has issued previous proclamations in support of other groups. In 2020, Hamtramck passed a resolution slamming India for its treatment of Muslims.

"We have done proclamations before for Ukraine ... for Poland, for Yemen, for Bangladesh," Ghalib said. "And this is for Palestine. ... Three things we cannot bargain about ... faith, family, and freedom. ... We support the freedom of every nation to live free of occupation and free of repression and persecution."

There was no formal vote since proclamations don't require one, said City Clerk Rana Faraj. No council member objected to the resolution at the meeting.

Carrie Beth Lasley, a Hamtramck resident and former city councilwoman, blasted the resolution, saying it was part of a pattern of missteps by the council that feeds into stereotypes of Muslims wanting to establish sharia, or Islamic law. Faraj read Lasley's comments, which were submitted in writing.

Lasley suggested the proclamation was introduced by an anti-Semite and that the council is "acting exactly how Islamophobes have said the first majority-Muslim council would act," making it seem like Hamtramck residents are "petty, hateful people."

"You're all playing right into the stereotype," Lasley said.

The proclamation came during an intense round of Israeli-Palestinian violence. More than 60 Palestinians and 14 Israelis have been killed this year, according to the Associated Press.

More:Hamtramck council approves Islamic animal sacrifices at home

More:Hamtramck's all-Muslim City Council condemns antisemitism

The debate over the proclamation touched upon some tensions in Hamtramck over the past year on LGBTQ issues, religious animal sacrifices and bars as the city's demographics change to a population with more Muslim residents.

There is strong support for Palestinians among many in Hamtramck, which has one of the highest percentages of residents of Arab and Bangladeshi descent among cities in the U.S. The mayor and all of its city council members are Muslim, believed to be the only city in U.S. history with an all-Muslim council. The city has the highest percentage of immigrants among cities in Michigan. During the meeting, most of the residents and others who spoke about the proclamation expressed support for it and criticized Israel.

Metro Detroit communities have over the years weighed in on foreign policy topics, but in some cases, have resisted attempts to weigh in on matters over which some say they have no jurisdiction. In 2014, Dearborn City Council President Susan Dabaja, the first Arab American to lead the council, pushed back against attempts by activists from Ann Arbor to pass a Dearborn resolution criticizing Israel.

On Tuesday night, the activists from Ann Arbor who were at the Dearborn meeting in 2014, Blaine Coleman and Mozhgan Savabieasfahani, were at the Hamtramck council meeting urging passage of the proclamation.

Ghalib told the Free Press that idea for the resolution originally came from Coleman and his associates.

Coleman said he and Savabieasfahani "proposed a simple 7-word resolution to Hamtramck City Council which we have also proposed to Ann Arbor City Council for many years: 'We are against military aid to Israel.'"

Hamtramck mayoral candidate Amer Ghalib delivers a victory speech during a campaign party on Nov. 2, 2021, at the Yemani American Leadership Association in Hamtramck.

Ann Arbor Council has rejected Coleman's anti-Israel resolution in previous years.

Ghalib told the Free Press by email that "Blaine and his people have been advocating and requesting that for months. They finally came to the council meetings a few times. A councilman volunteered to bring a resolution with that idea. It mentioned Israel by name. Another council person opposed that. We tried to compromise with removing names and generalizing the idea to include all repressive governments and occupying forces around the world."

Ghalib added that Hamtramck "passed one for Ukraine last year and we are not afraid of voicing our support for freedom, peace, sovereignty and independence of every nation around the work."

Coleman said they will now try to convince Dearborn to pass a similar resolution.

A leader with a Jewish group in metro Detroit said it will continue to work with Hamtramck on other issues and believes the proclamation does not refer to Israel since Israel is not a repressive nation.

"While many may see this resolution as targeting Israel, I am glad Israel is not specifically mentioned," Rabbi Asher Lopatin, executive director of the Jewish Community Relations Council of metro Detroit/American Jewish Committee told the Free Press by email. "Israel is certainly not a repressive government. The situation in the West Bank is one of disputed territory that needs to be resolved by the Palestinians and the Israelis. Since 1967, Israel has struggled for a peaceful and equitable solution on this territory. And many Jews ... can agree that the Palestinians should have a right to nationhood."

Lopatin added that Israel should not be held to a double-standard.

"I am glad that the resolution mentions 'all repressive governments' rather than singling out ... any one nation," he said.

Speakers at the council meeting who support the proclamation expressed different views of Israel, calling it racist and an apartheid state. One speaker, Nasr Hussain, lamented that the proclamation did not mention Israel specifically. Hussain also noted Hamtramck's sizable Bangladeshi American population, comparing Israel to Pakistan, which used to occupy the area that is now Bangladesh.

Hamtramck City Council and Mayor Amer Ghalib, on Jan. 10, 2023, voting to allow animal sacrifices for religious reasons.

"Nobody hates occupation more than Bengalis with Pakistan occupying Bengal" before Bangladesh became a free country in 1971, Hussain said.

Bill Meyer, an activist in Hamtramck, also spoke in favor of the proclamation, saying that criticizing Israel is not antisemitic.

"Supporting Palestinians does not mean you're antisemitic," Meyer said.

The debate over the Hamtramck proclamation is the latest local controversy in Michigan over the Middle East dispute. In January, a group of protesters on the campus of the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor who demonstrated in support of Palestinians during a visit by Vice President Kamala Harris drew criticism from Jonathan Greenblatt, CEO of the Anti-Defamation League, the nation's largest Jewish civil rights group, because they chanted in support of "intifada," an Arabic word that means "shaking off." The word has also been used to refer to armed uprisings against Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza. UM spokesman Rick Fitzgerald told the Free Press the university is reviewing the matter.

In January 2022, Hamtramck's council passed a resolution condemning anti-Semitism shortly after the all-Muslim council took office. At the time, Lopatin and the American Jewish Committee hailed the move as a positive step for Jewish-Muslim relations in metro Detroit. Lopatin and other Jewish leaders then went to Hamtramck to meet with Ghalib and Jaczkowski.

Lopatin said this week that "while certainly we can disagree on the Middle East, that should not stop us from working together in areas that we agree upon locally."

The January 2022 resolution condemning anti-Semitism was introduced by Jaczkowski, a Polish-American convert to Islam and the only woman on the council. In a Facebook post, she said she resigned for health reasons. In a statement from her that was read at the meeting, she said: "I don’t want anyone to take my resignation as a reason to blame others, fight, or walk away from Hamtramck. In fact, I encourage the opposite. Attend more meetings. Join a commission. Educate yourself on the political process, public policy, and more."

In another proclamation approved Tuesday night by the council celebrating women's history month, her name was on the proclamation. Jaczkowski has at times disagreed with members of the council who are more conservative, but her colleagues and Ghalib praised her at the meeting.

"We always had some disagreements," but they were minor, Ghalib said. He said Jaczkowski leaving is "a big loss."

Contact Niraj Warikoo:nwarikoo@freepress.com or Twitter @nwarikoo

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Hamtramck city council approves proclamation supporting Palestinians

A manhole cover launched into space with a nuclear test is the fastest human-made object. A scientist on Operation Plumbbob told us the unbelievable story.

Rebecca Harrington
Thu, March 2, 2023 

The pockmarked Nevada Testing Site, strewn with craters from all the nuclear weapons tests that took place there.NNSA

Robert Brownlee was on the Operation Plumbbob team that launched an object in space before Sputnik.

They put a manhole cover above a nuke underground, and the explosion shot the iron cap into space.

The fastest human-made object was part of the US government's nuclear testing in the 1950s.

When I first saw this story on an old Quora thread, I didn't believe it.

Pedestrians walk past a manhole cover that wasn't shot into space in Berkeley, California, on July 18, 2019.AP/Jeff Chiu

How could an iron manhole cover be the fastest human-made object ever launched?

I honestly pictured something akin to the exploding manhole covers that terrify NYC residents:

It wasn't like that. This manhole cover was shot into space with a nuclear bomb.

Robert Brownlee, an astrophysicist who designed the nuclear test in question, told Insider the unbelievable story in 2016, before he died at the age of 94 in 2018.

Brownlee refuted the non-believers and asserted that yes, it likely was the fastest object that humankind ever launched.

Here's how Brownlee says history was made.

From 1945 until 1992, the US detonated 1,054 nuclear bombs in tests.

DOE

By the 1950s, the US government and the public were concerned with the radiation that nuclear bombs could release into the atmosphere.

The last US nuclear bomb to be tested, nicknamed "The Divider," being loaded underground for detonation on September 23, 1992.LANL

By 1962, the US was conducting every nuclear test underground.

But the very first underground nuclear tests were a bit of an experiment — nobody knew exactly what might happen.

The mushroom cloud from the Uncle test at the Nevada Test Site on November 29, 1951, reached 11,500 feet.Department of Energy

The first one, nicknamed "Uncle," exploded beneath the Nevada Test Site on November 29, 1951.

Uncle was a code for "underground."

It was only buried 17 feet, but the top of the bomb's mushroom cloud exploded 11,500 feet into the sky.

The underground nuclear tests we're interested in were nicknamed "Pascal," during Operation Plumbbob in 1957.

Sadly, no images are left from the Pascal experiments. All that's left are government documents like this one.NNSA

Brownlee said he designed the Pascal-A test as the first that aimed to contain nuclear fallout. The bomb was placed at the bottom of a hollow column — 3 feet wide and 485 feet deep — with a 4-inch-thick iron cap on top.

The test was conducted on the night of July 26, 1957, so the explosion coming out of the column looked like a Roman candle.

Brownlee said the iron cap in Pascal-A exploded off the top of the tube "like a bat much hotter than hell."

Brownlee wanted to measure how fast the iron cap flew off the column, so he designed a second experiment, Pascal-B, and got an incredible calculation.

Herbert Grier, director of timing and firing, seated at the firing console in control room during an Operation Plumbbob test.NNSA

Brownlee replicated the first experiment, but the column in Pascal-B was deeper at 500 feet. They also recorded the experiment with a camera that shot one frame per millisecond.

On August 27, 1957, the "manhole cover" cap flew off the column with the force of the nuclear explosion. The iron cover was only partially visible in one frame, Brownlee said.

When he used this information to find out how fast the cap was going, Brownlee calculated it was traveling at five times the escape velocity of the Earth — or about 125,000 miles per hour.

"The pressure at the top of that pipe was enormous," he told Insider in 2016. "The first thing that you get is a flash of light coming from the device at the bottom of the empty pipe, and that flash is tremendously hot. That flash that comes is more than 1 million times brighter than the sun. So for it to blow off was, if I may say so, inevitable."

Pascal-B's estimated iron cover speed dwarfs the 36,373 mph that the New Horizons spacecraft — which many have called the fastest object launched by humankind — eventually reached while traveling toward Pluto.

An artist's rendering of the New Horizons spacecraft approaching Pluto.NASA

Brownlee said he expected the manhole cover to fall back to Earth, but they never found it. He concluded it was going too fast to burn up before reaching outer space.

WT1190F, a hollow seven-foot piece of space junk, seen burning up as it re-entered the Earth's atmosphere on November 13, 2015.IAC/UAE/NASA/ESA

"After I was in the business and did my own missile launches," he told Insider in 2016, "I realized that that piece of iron didn't have time to burn all the way up [in the atmosphere]."

Mere months after the Pascal tests, October 4, 1957, the Soviet Union launched Sputnik, the world's first artificial satellite. While the USSR was the first to launch a satellite, Brownlee was probably the first to launch an object into space.

On Oct. 4, 1957, Sputnik 1 successfully launched and entered Earth's orbit.NASA/Asif A. Siddiqi

Since it was going so fast, Brownlee said he thinks the cap likely didn't get caught in the Earth's orbit as a satellite like Sputnik and instead shot off into outer space.

Some people have doubted the incredible manhole cover story over the years. But Brownlee, with first-hand knowledge of the test, said he knows the truth.

"From my point," he told Insider in 2016, "it sure happened."

So the next time you look up at the stars, remember Brownlee's story. Somewhere out there, a manhole cover launched by a nuclear bomb is probably speeding away from Earth at about 125,000 mph.

Bryan Allen/Getty Images

This story has been updated.

Black girls are 4.19 times more likely to get suspended than white girls – and hiring more teachers of color is only part of the solution

Andrea Joseph-McCatty, Assistant Professor of Social Work, University of Tennessee

THE CONVERSATION
Sat, March 4, 2023 

Race, class and gender can not only impact the education that students receive, but also the punishments they receive. 

Courtney Hale/iStock / Getty Images Plus via Getty Images

Andrea Joseph-McCatty is an assistant professor at the College of Social Work at the University of Tennessee. Her research examines disproportional school suspensions and, in particular, the ways in which inequity impacts the experiences of students of color. Below are highlights from an interview with The Conversation. Answers have been edited for brevity and clarity.

You recently gave a talk about the disproportionate suspension of Black girls in the U.S. Why is equity so hard in our schools?

Most recently my work has focused on understanding and addressing racially disproportional school suspensions and the ways in which those are also gender disproportionate. For example, we know nationally that in the 2017-2018 academic year, over 2.5 million children received one or more out-of-school suspensions. While these numbers are going down compared to years prior, students of color and students with disabilities are receiving a greater share of suspensions and expulsions.

It’s also important to disaggregate the data to understand trends at the intersection of race, gender, class and other student characteristics. For example, in 2017-2018, Black girls had 4.19 times the risk of receiving an out-of-school suspension compared to white girls. Nationally, they are the only group of girls disproportionately suspended in relation to their enrollment.

To address high and disproportional suspensions, schools have implemented multitiered interventions, such as restorative justice practices, and positive behavior interventions, which create positive, predictable, equitable and safe learning environments. While some studies show a reduction in high and disproportional suspensions from these efforts, discipline disparities often persist.

However, some schools are seeking to change these disproportional rates for Black girls and other girls of color by partnering with community organizations such as Gwen’s Girls Incorporated, The F.I.N.D. Design and Code Switch, among others, to provide gender and culturally responsive interventions.

Yet, a major barrier to intervention is the perception adults hold about Black girls. Instead of receiving developmentally appropriate and socioemotional support, many Black girls are adultified – a concept coined to describe how Black girls are disproportionately perceived as less innocent, needing less nurturing, less protection, less support, knowing more about sex and adult topics, and are more adultlike than their peers.

While some may generally assume that students only receive school discipline for breaking school rules, social scientists have used data to show how race, gender, disability and class bias at the intersection of punitive discipline policies and systematic inequities lead to disproportional suspensions.

For example, we know that Black girls in particular are getting disciplined in school for wearing their natural hair in afros or having braids, both of which are styles that allow Black girls to embrace their beauty and have cultural pride in the face of Eurocentric beauty ideals that suggest that straight hair is more professional and neat.

In other cases, Black girls are more likely to receive school discipline outcomes for subjective infractions such as tone of voice, clothing and disrespect compared to other girls. And that’s part of the way racial and gender discrimination intersect to create disproportional suspensions for Black girls. In my research, I build on these ideas and also explore how adverse childhood experiences, including neglect, abuse, neighborhood violence and parent incarceration and/or death, become another layer by which Black girls are misunderstood.

In my research and community partnerships, we explore how race, gender and adultification bias are shaping the way adults perceive the behaviors of Black girls and how this might impact how their trauma-response behaviors are perceived. Will it be met with punishment or support? Increasingly, schools are adopting trauma-informed practices and policies to decrease the punishment of childhood adversities in school.

But I wonder if they account for the way that race, gender and class bias and inequities both inform adverse childhood experiences and inform adult perceptions about children’s behaviors. While school-based trauma-informed practices are a step in the right direction, the next question I also ask is, how are school districts defining what an adverse childhood experience (ACE) is? Are they using the early measure normed on a predominantly white middle-class population, or are they using the [expanded measure] that surveyed a diverse population and identified additional ACEs such as racial discrimination, foster care involvement, neighborhood violence and bullying?

Without using the expanded definition, it is possible that schools are continuing to overlook students’ needs and instead punish their trauma. My colleagues and I suggest that practitioners need trauma-informed professional development at the intersection of race and gender at minimum to begin to provide robust support for students of color experiencing adversity.

Does the race of the teacher play a role in all this?

I would say yes, but I don’t think it’s a simple answer. I think there is a movement that says, hey, we still need more teachers of color to foster a more equitable environment. While there is research to suggest that Black teachers are less likely to suspended Black students, this is not always a consistent finding for boys and girls, and across school demographics, because having a diverse workforce does not totally eliminate bias.

Therefore, having more teachers of color is not the sole solution to addressing disproportional suspensions. It can help in terms of seeing students’ behaviors in context, particularly when an educator of color comes from a similar cultural context, gender context and class as that young person. However, despite these benefits and their training, it is an uphill battle for any educator to teach in a school system that has not addressed past and present funding, practice and policy inequities.

So when we think about change, it’s really systemic change that we need. We need whole school change to begin to address some of these inequities. Meanwhile, as I continue to co-advocate with my community partners for Black girls, we’ll continue to ask, “Is your intervention intersectional”? – meaning does it take into account the the interconnected nature of social categorizations and discrimination.

This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts. 

It was written by: Andrea Joseph-McCatty, University of Tennessee.

Read more:

Students are suspended less when their teacher has the same race or ethnicity


Students are often segregated within the same schools, not just by being sent to different ones


Schools are the ‘hubs and hearts’ of neighborhoods – here’s how they can strengthen the communities around them

Andrea Joseph-McCatty received funding from The University of Tennessee College of Social Work's Social Justice Innovation Initiative for her research on Black girls and disproportional suspension. Dr. Joseph-McCatty is a former employee of Gwen's Girls Inc. (PA) and is a current board member for the FIND Design (TN) whose focus is to "mitigate the effects of systemic and personal trauma on Black girls, and other girls of color ages 11-17".

'MAVERICK'
Texas GOP May Censure Congressman Over Support for Marriage Equality

Trudy Ring
Fri, March 3, 2023 

U.S. Rep. Tony Gonzales

The Republican Party of Texas is considering censuring a GOP congressman from the state for his votes in favor of marriage equality and gun control.

U.S. Rep. Tony Gonzales, who represents the 23rd Congressional District in south Texas, was the only Republican from the state to vote in favor of the Respect for Marriage Act last year. The act, which was signed into law by President Joe Biden, writes marriage equality into federal law, protecting it in case the Supreme Court overturns the Obergefell v. Hodges decision that established equal marriage rights nationwide.

He also voted in favor of a gun control package after the mass shooting at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas. The package, passed by both chambers of Congress and signed by Biden, expands background checks for gun purchases, tightens restrictions on purchases by those with a history of domestic violence, and provides funding for mental health programs.


Gonzales, who is in his second term, has already been censured by the Medina County Republicans for these and other actions, including his opposition to some anti-immigration legislation. The county group’s censure resolution, approved in February, calls Gonzales “a poor representative for his Republican constituents” and urges other Republican groups to take action against him.

That led to a statewide censure resolution that the State Republican Executive Committee will vote on at its quarterly meeting this weekend, according to the San Antonio Report. The vote is expected to take place Saturday morning.

If the censure is approved, the Texas Republican Party could punish Gonzales in several ways. “They could simply discourage Gonzales from running for reelection as a Republican, or they could lift the restriction on party officials campaigning against him, as is required for current GOP officeholders,” the Report notes. “Perhaps of greater consequence, they also could prohibit Gonzales from receiving financial help from the party.”

Gonzales was first elected to the U.S. in 2020, when he defeated gay Democrat Gina Ortiz Jones for the open seat after moderate Republican Will Hurd retired. He was reelected last year in a race against Democrat John Lira. So far, he hasn’t commented to local or national media on the possibility of censure.

The last time the Texas Republicans approved a censure was in 2018, when it took the action against Texas House Speaker Joe Straus, who had opposed an anti-transgender “bathroom bill.”

The Texas Republican Party is known for its anti-LGBTQ+ and generally far-right stances. It adopted a platform last year that called homosexuality “an abnormal lifestyle choice” and opposed “all efforts to validate transgender identity.”

A gay Republican state legislator in Missouri may be censured by the local party because of his support for marriage equality. The Jackson County Republican Committee decided this week that censuring Rep. Chris Sander was outside its responsibilities, but the group is forming a separate committee to consider censuring him at some point.

End ‘colonial’ approach to space exploration, scientists urge

Nicola Davis Science correspondent
Sat, 4 March 2023


Humans boldly going into space should echo the guiding principle of Captain Kirk’s Star Trek crew by resisting the urge to interfere, researchers have said, stressing a need to end a colonial approach to exploration.

Nasa has made no secret of its desire to mine the moon for metals, with China also keen to extract lunar resources – a situation that has been called a new space race.

But Dr Pamela Conrad of the Carnegie Institution of Science said the focus should shift away from seeking to exploit discoveries.

Speaking ahead of a panel event on Saturday on the ethics of space exploration at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) meeting in Washington DC, she said: “If we were willing to seize that as not just a possibility, but an imperative then oddly enough, the Star Trek series and culture becomes a prime directive for how we could explore space: seeking not to interfere.”

In the Star Trek series, the Prime Directive, or General Order 1, of Starfleet Command sets out that the Starfleet should not interfere with the social, cultural or technological development of any other planet.

Conrad said that rather than setting out to own or take resources from space, humans should endeavour to be “gentle explorers”.

“Regardless of who or what is out there, that attitude of exploration being almost synonymous with exploitation gives one a different perspective as you approach to the task,” she said.

“Because if something that’s not here [on Earth] is seen as a resource, just ripe to be exploited, then that [perpetuates] colonialism.”

Conrad said such attitudes matter because a colonial approach can impinge on the rights of others to explore – whether in space itself or by looking at it from Earth.

Researchers have previously argued that light pollution creates just such a problem, with low-orbit satellites threatening to hinder the ability for astronomers to make new discoveries, and lighting associated with urban expansion and the use of LEDs making it increasingly difficult to pick out the constellations when stargazing.

The latter, some have argued, amounts to cultural genocide as the stars, and the ability to observe them, play a key role in many indigenous traditions and knowledge systems.

Dr Hilding Neilson, a Mi’kmaq person and a scientist at the Memorial University of Newfoundland and Labrador, who will also take part in the AAAS panel, said that in Canada Indigenous peoples had rights and responsibilities to unceded and treaty land, with the absence of a height limit, meaning those concerns extend to the skies above.

What’s more, he said Indigenous people had deep connections with bodies such as the moon.

“Part of that connection is inherent to the culture and the way of living and way of knowing,” he said, adding any damage to such bodies was therefore a concern.

As a result, Neilson said those working on space missions, such as the Nasa Artemis programme – which seeks to establish a long-term presence on the moon and eventually send humans to Mars – should engage with Indigenous people in advance.

“Right now when we look at the moon in terms of the space missions and colonisation it is very much as a dead object to be conquered. And that’s not how many Indigenous peoples see it,” he said.

“So when we go [and] do things like mining on the moon, are we creating harm and are we essentially cheering on the history of colonialism in ways that are harmful to some peoples?”

He also stressed the need for a move away from rhetoric around “building colonies” on the moon or on other planets.

“I’ve actually sat and listened to a CEO of a very large company talking about how going to space is the same [as] when people settled what is now Quebec,” he said, adding that stance not only glorified colonisation and its history but ignored the negative impacts of space colonisation.

Sport is both a climate victim and villain. These champions show there’s another way

Marthe de Ferrer
Sat, 4 March 2023 


Sport occupies an unusual place in society. It’s simultaneously public and private - something we do for our own personal health, but also a multibillion-dollar industry; both political and apolitical, accessible and exclusive.

This is also why sport straddles such interesting territory when it comes to both the climate and nature crises.

Champions for Earth, an organisation of athletes promoting environmental action, was formed for exactly this reason.

“Climate change affects us all, and in pursuing solutions we must bring as many people together as possible,” their mission statement reads. “We see sport as a piece of that puzzle: unifying people across race, age, gender, sex, religion and disability.”

But, sport, as a sector, is also a major contributor to the damage being done to our planet: from the greenhouse gases emitted from transporting equipment, athletes and fans all over the world, to the harm done to ecosystems by venue construction, high-density events and poor waste management.

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Sport is both a ‘victim’ and contributor to climate change

The start of the women's World Cup slalom race in Zagreb. In November the Alpine Skiing World Cup in Croatia was cancelled because of warm conditions and a lack of snow. - AP Photo/Giovanni Auletta

Though it’s impossible to accurately calculate sport’s contribution to global warming and biodiversity loss, some have compared its carbon footprint to that of a country the size of Spain.

Unlike many other industries, however, sport is also often situated on the frontlines of the climate emergency.

We saw this at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021, as athletes passed out and faced serious health problems due to the excessive heat. This was clearer still at the Beijing Winter Olympics a few months later, as the Games became the first in history to rely almost entirely on artificial snow.

In the months since the Olympics, we’ve seen more races and competitions cancelled, relocated and postponed because of the direct effects of climate change.

A recent report from Badvertising argued that many of the major sponsors for winter sports were directly melting the snow necessary for events to take place. Britain’s most successful Winter Olympian Lizzy Yarnold said these deals were “like winter sport nailing the lid on its own coffin.”

“Sport is not just a victim of [climate] change, but an important contributor too,” writes author David Goldblatt in Rapid Transition Alliance’s report into the relationship between sport and climate change.

So how then can sport be used to tackle the environmental issues we’re collectively facing?

World’s biggest sports events may have to be held in cooler months due to global warming

Athletes have a ‘unique perspective’

Hannah Mills MBE is a British competitive sailor and two-time world champion in the Women's 470 class, having won in 2012 and 2019. - Thomas Lovelock for SailGP

Hannah Mills is the most successful female sailor in Olympic history. After decades spent competing and training on coastlines around the world, the 34-year-old is acutely aware of both the gravity of the climate crisis and the impact major sporting events can have on the planet.

“There's a big environmental footprint with sport,” Mills says, “so that on the one hand needs to be addressed, by reducing things like emissions and everything we possibly can.”

Her passion for environmentalism stems from a lifelong relationship with the outdoors.

“It’s one big playground that we’re lucky enough to get to use in so many different ways,” she says, “and through sailing you spend so much time outside on the ocean, which is a real privilege… you always have an appreciation for nature and just how vast the ocean is.”

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Sport as a tool for finding local solutions

It was what Mills saw at her second Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro that crystallised for her the severity of our plastic pollution problem.

“I’d never seen anywhere where it was quite so stark,” Mills explains, “everywhere we’d sailed before you’d see the odd piece of plastic floating around, and I wouldn’t necessarily think too much of it. But in Rio… it became too much to ignore.”

Rio’s plastic pollution problem is also a good example of how localised issues - that need localised solutions - sometimes get lost when common environmental issues are considered on a global scale.

Decades of inadequate infrastructure and a lack of funding for waste management have caused the carpets of plastic waste that cover the otherwise beautiful coastline around Rio. But when that messaging gets oversimplified into general conversations about avoiding single-use plastics, rather than tackling the root causes of the specific crisis playing out in Rio, it’s clear to see why this leads to a lack of meaningful action.

SailGP runs outreach initiatives in each racing location in order to leave a lasting positive legacy. - Thomas Lovelock for SailGP

This is where Mills feels sport has the opportunity to enact more meaningful change.

“We get this unique perspective and this unique impact as athletes or as sporting events to tell stories - and people, for whatever reason, listen and look up to athletes.”

Mills works with SailGP as the strategist for the Emirates Great Britain team, an international sailing competition that takes place across a season of grand prix events around the world. Similarly to the work being done by Extreme E, SailGP runs outreach initiatives in each racing location - not just to ensure the competition is sustainable, but in an effort to leave a lasting positive legacy.

“A huge part of the climate change narrative is that in every location there will be different solutions that are effective,” says Mills, “it’s about understanding that it’s not a one-size-fits-all.

“Yes, we all need to come together globally in terms of emissions. But actually, in terms of restoring and protecting nature, it’s very location-dependent as to what’s working,” she explains.

Some of SailGP’s local impact projects have included introducing “ecological anchoring” in an effort to preserve and restore seagrass beds off the coast of Saint-Tropez, developing large-scale solar farms in England, and planting native poplar trees in southern Italy.

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Bringing the political to the apolitical?

When athletes, coaches or commentators raise issues like the urgent need to address the climate crisis, a common criticism is that this is seen as making a political point within a space that is ostensibly neutral.

We saw this during the Qatar World Cup last year, where athletes wanting to make the vaguest of nods towards Qatar’s atrocious human rights record for LGBTQ+ people were threatened with sanctions.

There are separate conversations to be had about whether environmentalism should be considered political or whether sport has ever been remotely apolitical - but that’s perhaps best left for another time.

Sometimes climate action is seen as sufficiently apolitical to feature in sport, such as Reading FC’s fantastic collaboration with Reading University - incorporating the climate stripes into their kit.

“I can really see the argument both ways,” Mills says, explaining that “in the field of play” people’s focus should perhaps be entirely on the sport and the competition.

“But I think there’s such an opportunity around athletes in the build-up to big events and in interviews during big events where you can really use your platform.”

For ultramarathon runner Damian Hall, however, sport and climate action are directly entwined. His latest book is even titled ‘We Can’t Run Away From This.’ He also co-founded The Green Runners, a community of running enthusiasts putting the planet first.



Hall recently won the 268-mile (430km) Spine Race - affectionately dubbed ‘Britain’s most brutal race’ - in a gruelling 84 hours and 36 minutes, setting a new men’s course record in the process.

For spectators tracking the runners online, Hall’s profile showed him holding a Just Stop Oil banner - which he later unfurled upon crossing the finish line.

“This all just feels so urgent,” Hall explains, “my sport is very niche, but there are moments where it might get a little bit of publicity… I guess I’m just desperate and trying to use those moments.”

It was the 2019 Extinction Rebellion protests in London that spurred the father-of-two down this path, catching his attention with their colourful and vibrant nature before driving home the severity of the climate crisis.

“We’ve all seen headlines about polar bears and melting glaciers for years, but it was difficult sometimes to connect that to your life. So those protests made me start to realise how urgent things were and how governments really weren’t acting,” Hall says.

“I also started questioning myself as an athlete,” he continues, “as an elite ultramarathon runner I would fly to on average probably three big, international races a year - in fact in 2019 I flew five times return and hadn’t really given that significant thought.”

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Cutting down on flights and picking ethical sponsors

Hall also advocates for change with sportswear manufacturers and suppliers. - STUART MARCH PHOTOGRAPHY/Damian Hall

Now, Hall hasn’t flown for three years - opting for domestic races and international events accessible by greener modes of transport. He’s part of a small but growing field of athletes turning down opportunities to compete abroad. Despite having a list of events he’d always wanted to do - such as one on Reunion Island in the Indian Ocean - he says he now “can’t justify that to myself.”

One of Great Britain’s leading junior athletes, Innes FitzGerald, recently made headlines after declining to compete in Australia because of the environmental impact of travelling halfway around the world.

“The reality of the travel fills me with deep concern,” she said in a letter to British Athletics. “I was just nine when the COP21 Paris climate agreement was signed. Now, eight years on, global emissions have been steadily increasing, sending us on a path to climate catastrophe.”

However, Hall hasn’t written off flying entirely.

“I don’t think I should have to sacrifice my entire career,” he says, explaining that there are a handful of key races - largely in the US - that he still hopes to do.

It’s also through his sponsors where Hall feels he can help effect real change. He’s meticulous about the companies he partners with, turning down sponsorships and funding when organisations aren’t engaging meaningfully with environmental issues.

“I thought it would make me kind of unpopular, but it’s actually sort of had the opposite effect,” he explains, “I’ve found some companies have approached me because they want to work with me because of my ethics.”

Though Hall is extremely humble about his impact, the kind of companies he deals with are sometimes major sportswear manufacturers and suppliers.

“It’s nudging for systemic change that is going to have the most impact.”